Beehaw

13,700 readers
51 users here now

We're a collective of individuals upset with the way social media has been traditionally governed. A severe lack of moderation has led to major platforms like Facebook to turn into political machinery focused on disinformation campaigns as a way to make profit off of users. Websites with ineffective moderation allow hate speech to proliferate and contribute to the erosion of minority rights and safe spaces. Our goal with Beehaw is to demonstrate and promote a healthier environment.

Our philosophy:

Downvotes are disabled on this instance.

Be(e) nice.


As a news aggregator and a social media outlet, with a focus on being a safe and accepting space, we strive to create a positive social impact. We will, also, help to connect underprivileged and minority individuals with education and civic participation by promoting a healthier online experience.


We currently have a Mastodon account you can follow for major updates: @beehaw at hachyderm.io. You can also join our community Discord or Matrix servers. You can also view our status page.


Our instance is 100% user-funded - help us keep it running by donating.

If you donate, you should know that 100% of the costs will go towards server time, licensing costs, and artwork.

In the future if we need to hire developers or other labor, it would be sourced through the Open Collective Europe Foundation, and it would be transparent to the community before any changes were made.

Donate on Opencollective


Our community icons were made by Aaron Schneider under the CC-BY-NC-SA-4.0 license.

Blobbee emojis made by olivvybee on Github.

Our most up to date FAQ can be found here.


if you can see this, it's up  

founded 3 years ago
ADMINS
1
 
 

I'm currently sick with strep! 4th time in a year, doc said maybe it's time to get the tonsils out. I'm not sure I'm sold on the idea - outside of the last 2ish years I feel like I don't get strep all that often. Anyone else have their tonsils out as an adult? What was your experience?

2
3
 
 

I found this really lovely (imo) queer punk cover of Jolene today, that I thought would be nice to share.

4
16
submitted 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) by tymon@lemm.ee to c/gaming
 
 

It's tough to express how much of a bummer this whole mess has been. Veilguard is such an embarrassingly lazy, shallow experience.

Placing all of the blame on Busche isn't fair, as she was brought in at the end of the development process, but it was her leadership that prevented the game from getting the extra time it needed.

The creative and design aspects of the game's failure falls primarily on John Epler's lap.

BioWare was so special for such a long time. Watching them fumble the ball directly into the deepest part of the toilet three times in a row feels completely insane.

Fuck EA forever, man.

5
 
 

An indie dev's response to NYT's "Games Can’t Afford To Look This Good" and the meme of "I want smaller games with less graphics and I'm not kidding".

6
6
Canids as pollinators? (esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com)
submitted 2 hours ago by luciole to c/animals
 
 

Doggos exploring their inner bee yay! bee happy emoji

Shamelessly stolen and dememefied from !science_memes@mander.xyz

7
 
 

Washington — The Supreme Court on Friday upheld a new law that would lead to a ban of the social media platform TikTok, clearing the way for the widely popular app to shutter in the U.S. as soon as Sunday.

"We conclude that the challenged provisions do not violate the petitioners' First Amendment rights," the court said in a unanimous unsigned opinion, which upholds the lower court decision against TikTok. Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Neil Gorsuch wrote separately, with Gorsuch agreeing with the outcome of the case but splitting with the court's reasoning.

8
9
 
 

Archived link

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Wednesday accused Russia of planning acts of "air terror" against airlines worldwide, including sabotage and diversion operations on Polish soil.

Tusk made those remarks during talks in Warsaw with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, as well as almost a month after an Azerbaijani Airlines passenger plane crashed in western Kazakhstan after unsuccessfully trying to land in southern Russia.

"All I can say, and I will not go into details, but I can confirm the validity of these fears, is that Russia had planned acts of air terror, and not only against Poland, but against airlines all over the world," Tusk told reporters.

While it was not immediately clear what incidents the Polish prime minister was referencing, authorities in Azerbaijan have accused the Russian military of shooting at Azerbaijani Airlines Flight 8432 as it tried to land in the city of Grozny last month. Moscow has provided various explanations for the crash, which happened near Aktau, Kazakhstan, and killed 38 people.

Meanwhile, Tusk also pledged to accelerate Ukraine’s EU accession process as Poland holds the bloc's rotating presidency.

"The Polish presidency will break the impasse that has been evident in recent months," Tusk said. "And we will work together with Ukraine and our European partners... to speed up the accession process as much as possible," he added.

[...]

"The sooner Ukraine is in the EU, the sooner Ukraine becomes a member of NATO, the more we interact, the sooner the whole of Europe will get the geopolitical certainty it needs," the Ukrainian president Zelensky.

"Russia will not pass where there is our integration, our common strength, our respect," Zelensky added.

10
 
 

Archived link

Of course, ordinary, non-LGBTQ+ victims of Putin’s regime are treated harshly too, but LGBTQ+ people are likely to face more brutality. What is truly horrifying is the deep-seated hatred and disgust toward LGBTQ+ people in Russian prisons, where individuals accused of “LGBTQ+ extremism” will eventually end up.

It is common knowledge that in Russian prisons, those even suspected of being gay are subjected to dehumanization, humiliation and sexual violence, both from fellow inmates and prison authorities. Vladimir Osechkin, a Russian-born human rights activist, claims that, according to his sources, Kotov, while in detention, was raped and had already been relegated to the ranks of prisoners with “low social status.”

Sexualized violence undoubtedly exists and has existed in penitentiary systems worldwide throughout history. Even before the Soviet Union, in tsarist prisons, sexualized violence among males was quite common: older inmates inflicted sexual violence on younger inmates.

Age, physical strength, prison status and one’s perceived masculine or feminine behavior, as well as resources, dictated who would be sexual prey and who would be sexual predator. If a youthful newcomer was raped by fellow prisoners, he would be rapidly incorporated into the prison’s social system as a “pederast,” at its lowest caste. After this status was set, he would become a prostitute, not to mention an object of attacks and abuse from other prisoners.

These practices continued in the Stalinist Gulag. Sexual violence among males was so widespread, and its role in establishing unofficial prison hierarchies so evident, that Gulag officials, after Stalin’s death, took measures to crack down on prison homosexual activity and homosexual violence.

[...]

In contrast to the late-Soviet and post-Soviet periods, in today’s Russia, sexual violence in prisons does not seem to bother officials much. In fact, not only are they not concerned about it, but they are willing to weaponize and harness it as a means of controlling prisoners and instilling fear in them.

The issue of widespread torture of prisoners, as well as prison authorities’ encouraging and condoning of sexual violence among male prisoners, gained prominence in Russia after Osechkin started to attract public attention to the issue. In 2012, the businessman-turned-human-rights-activist set up Gulagu.net, which has become a unique social networking site, where the relatives of abused prisoners can register their complaints, share information and seek assistance.

[...]

11
 
 

bye bye

12
 
 
13
 
 

Imaging Exocomet Belts: A Breakthrough Study

Website: https://joshuniverse.com/imaging-exocomet-belts-a-breakthrough-study/

Astrophysicists led by a team from Trinity College Dublin have made a groundbreaking discovery in the realm of astrophysics by imaging a large number of exocomet belts surrounding nearby stars. This research, deemed pivotal, marks the first time that such a substantial number of these mysterious structures have been captured in high-resolution images, revealing not only the belts themselves but also the tiny millimeter-sized pebbles embedded within them. This article provides a comprehensive analysis of this significant advancement in space science.

@science@lemmy.world @science@beehaw.org space@beehaw.org @space@lemmy.world @science@lemmy.ml @space@newsmast.community #space #science #nasa #astronomy

14
 
 

Archived link

[...]

While the Supreme Court continues to consider the constitutionality of the TikTok ban, it is clear that TikTok presents serious and unique national security and human rights concerns. The platform’s parent company, ByteDance, is beholden to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which has a record of coercing the private sector into conducting censorship and surveillance at home and abroad. The risks of TikTok being exploited by the CCP for malign purposes—for instance, to access personal data to track journalists or shape the information environment in the United States in the event of a national crisis—are very real and need to be taken seriously.

[...]

A better approach to protecting rights and security would be to adopt legislation that strengthens data privacy, platform transparency, and cybersecurity. This would force TikTok to operate more responsibly and better protect Americans’ data, while shedding light on the influence that ByteDance and the CCP have over the platform. This approach would also help address challenges raised by other social media platforms, including those with similar ties to authoritarian states.

[...]

15
16
 
 

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/18057223

Archived link

The Central Tibetan Administration [CTA], also known as the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, has announced plans to publish a comprehensive book and map documenting the original Tibetan names of places and boundaries. This initiative, aimed at countering China’s escalating cartographic aggression, was disclosed by CTA President Penpa Tsering during an interview with Hindustan Times.

President Tsering [...] explained the challenges and scope of the project, noting that the complexity would vary depending on the depth of research undertaken. “The work on the map is under process, and much will depend on to what level we need to go to find out the original names in Tibetan. If we restrict it only to townships, the task becomes much easier. Maybe we will begin by focusing on townships and later expand it to include villages, and that involves a lot of work.”

[...]

Prominent international media organisations, including The Guardian, AFP, ANI, and NDTV, have been criticised for using the term “Xizang” in their reports. A recent example involved coverage of the devastating earthquake in Dingri County, Shigatse Prefecture, which claimed 134 lives, injured 337, and destroyed thousands of homes. These reports prominently featured the Chinese term, drawing criticisms from the Tibetan community.

In another instance, the Musée du quai Branly in France faced backlash for using “Xizang” in its catalogue of Tibetan artefacts. Following strong opposition from the Tibetan community, supporters, and activist groups like Students for a Free Tibet (SFT) in France, the museum eventually removed the term. Scholars argued that the use of “Xizang” aligns with China’s official narrative and diminishes Tibet’s cultural and historical autonomy.

[...]

17
18
 
 

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/18057351

Archived link

  • China increases its aggressive tactics in the South China Sea, with the Philippines becoming a major target
  • Philippine ships face increasing harassment, including blockades, ramming, and non-lethal weapons such as lasers and water cannons
  • This large-scale maritime occupation infringes Philippines’ exclusive economic zone, displaying China’s growing confidence and belligerence

In recent years, we’ve seen China become more confident and confrontational, especially in the South China Sea region. Their aggressive tactics have intensified, with the Philippines now standing out as a primary target.

China is making full use of its considerable maritime power, pushing boundaries and displaying no signs of backing down – quite literally. There has been a marked increase in instances where Chinese ships have obstructed, rammed or swarmed the vessels of the island nation. Sounds like something from a pirate movie, doesn’t it? But this isn’t fiction.

[...]

Infringement of Philippine Waters

The South China Sea also plays host to the Philippines’ internationally recognized exclusive economic zone (or EEZ). This basically means that the Philippines has special rights over the exploration and use of marine resources in this area. It’s akin to having your own backyard, where you should be free to do what you need without interference.

However, what Manila now faces is a large-scale maritime invasion by what can only be described as a hostile imperial power. This is similar to having a territorial bully walk into your backyard and claim it as its own.

[...]

To sum it up, the situation in the South China Sea reflects China’s rising audacity. [China's] belligerent maneuvers, particularly towards the Philippines, reveal a scenario of maritime machismo in full swing. In a world that so often extols the virtues of peace, diplomacy and respect for international boundaries, what China is doing is downright audacious.

With each swarming event, each blockade, and every powerful laser beam, the tension mounts further. However, the world watches and waits, hoping for a resolution that respects international law and the sanctity of sovereign waters.

[...]

19
 
 

A complex sense of touch for individuals living with spinal cord injuries is a step closer to reality. A study published in Science, paves the way for complex touch sensations through brain stimulation while using an extracorporeal bionic limb, that is attached to a chair or wheelchair. The paper is titled "Tactile edges and motion via patterned microstimulation of the human somatosensory cortex."

20
 
 

Archived link

Beijing's Salt Typhoon cyberspies had been seen in US government networks before telcos discovered the same foreign intruders in their own systems, according to CISA boss Jen Easterly.

Speaking at a Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) event on Wednesday, the agency director said her threat hunters detected the Chinese government goons in federal networks before the far-reaching espionage campaign against people's telecommunications providers had been found and attributed to Salt Typhoon.

"We saw it as a separate campaign, called it another goofy cyber name, and we were able to, based on the visibility that we had within the federal networks, connect some dots," and tie the first set of snoops to the same crew that burrowed into AT&T, Verizon, and other telecoms firms' infrastructure, Easterly noted.

By compromising those telcos – specifically, the systems that allow the Feds to lawfully monitor criminal suspects [the U.S. Wiretap system} – Salt Typhoon had the capability to geolocate millions of subscribers, access people's internet traffic, and record phone calls at will.

This visibility into federal government networks, combined with private-industry tips coming into CISA, led to the FBI and other law enforcement agencies obtaining court-approved access to Salt-Typhoon-leased virtual private servers.

"That then led to cracking open the larger Salt Typhoon piece," Easterly said.

Still, she cautioned, "what we have found is likely just the tip of the iceberg" when it comes to Chinese intrusions into American critical infrastructure.

"China is the most persistent and serious cyber threat to the nation and to our national critical infrastructure," Easterly warned, adding that Salt Typhoon isn't her biggest worry when it comes to Middle Kingdom cyberthreats.

[...]

The public later learned that the same PRC-backed crew had compromised at least one large US city's emergency services network, been conducting reconnaissance on "multiple" American electric companies, and was still lurking inside power, water, and comms systems, preparing to "wreak havoc" on American infrastructure and "cause societal chaos" in the US.

21
 
 

Considering the Switch 2 (with those pretty joystick well covers to protect from drift, omg) and the Ryzen Z2 Go announcements, the low cost and availability of Steam Deck & parity level APU machines for purchase now, and the giant 1080p gaming install base represented by current gen consoles, it sure seems like low spec & 1080p gaming is going to have a pretty sunny future. I am hoping this gives small and medium sized development teams a chance to show up what is left of AAA gaming.

What are your favorite low spec gaming setups right now? I'm enjoying a 5700g APU system the most these days. Mainstream wise, I've been playing Elden Ring and Injustice 2 and Vampire Survivors. The last Indie I played is this beat-em-up / horde survival game An American Werewolf in LA which was pretty cool.

22
 
 

cross-posted from: https://feditown.com/post/981497

Note this post evaluates Linux systems. Microsoft presumably has a different, hopefully better, implementation.

23
 
 

Non-paywalled: https://archive.is/bA3RB

24
 
 

Archived link

Russia’s runaway consumer price inflation (CPI) made more gains in December, rising to 9.5% y/y, as the Central Bank continues to lose the fight to reign in rising prices.

“The rise in Russian inflation to 9.5% y/y in December is likely to be followed by an increase to more than 10% early this year. The Central Bank has set a high bar for further tightening but we think the balance remains tilted towards another interest rate hike this quarter,” Liam Peach, the senior emerging market economist with Capital Economics, said in a note.

Inflation started to climb in the second quarter of 2023 and Central Bank Governor Elvia Nabiullina reversed a previous easing policy and has been increasing rates ever since in a futile attempt to halt the price rises. In a surprise decision in December, the Central Bank left rates on hold at 21% — their highest level in years — as the Central Bank comes under increasing pressure to cut rates that have driven borrowing costs up to a very painful level.

[...]

The problem is that traditional monetary policy tools to bring down inflation don’t work as the cause of the inflation is not problems with money supply, but the fact that the Kremlin has pumped some 10 trillion rubles ($100 billion) in military spending in 2024 — a source of money that the Central Bank is powerless to limit. The upshot is that Russia’s economy, which grew by an estimated 4% last year, is overheated and running well ahead of its potential growth of around 1.5%.

The problem has been exacerbated by additional off-budget spending. According to a recent report from the Davis Center at Harvard University, the Kremlin has also forced banks to make state-direct soft loans to defense companies to the tune of 25 trillion rubles ($250 billion), which has added to the torrent of cash pouring into the system. The Davis Center warned of a looming credit crisis unless this lending is curtailed. However, other economists say the Russian economy is more robust than first appears and the chance of a crisis remains low.

[...]

“The unexpected decision by Russia’s Central Bank to leave its policy rate on hold at 21.00% in December, rather than hike as most expected, suggests that there is a high bar for further tightening,” says Peach. “The Central Bank commented on the recent softening in credit growth as one reason why it paused. For now, we don’t expect another rate hike. But inflation is out of control and we think the bias will remain towards further monetary tightening in the coming months as inflation continues to rise and inflation expectations remain elevated.”

[...]

25
 
 

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/18055357

Archived link

***This is an opinionated piece by Nick Trickett, commodities analyst with Fitch Solutions. All views expressed are his own and do not represent those of his employer. ***

[...]

The Ukrainian Association of Geologists estimates that the country has as much as 5% of the world’s critical minerals resources, including titanium, uranium, lithium, gallium, manganese, beryllium, rare earth elements, bulk ores like iron and scores of other minerals. It is hardly a stretch to imagine that Kyiv and Moscow are aware of their strategic value.

Resource wars typically bring oil to mind. However, cleantech is changing how nations conceive of energy security. Where fossil fuel crises are immediate – these fuels are produced or imported, used only once and sometimes have storage constraints – the clean energy crises of the future come from disruptions to the supplies of metals required to build essential technology. In turn, these metals are processed from ores that, in their raw form, can be stacked in warehouses indefinitely.

Proponents of the financial windfall from these minerals might rethink the scale of the markets involved. In tonnage equivalent, the world consumes over 5 billion tons of crude oil and its derived products every year. Financial markets trade oil product futures equivalent to 2.5 trillion tons, the combined markets of which generate trillions of dollars of trading activity.

Among critical minerals, copper is king with a physical trade of about 30 million tons a year, worth closer to $270 billion with a comparatively small futures market footprint. Lithium – a hot topic for Ukraine’s mineral riches – is closer to 1.5 million tons and lacks a liquid futures market for now, generating more like $30 billion a year. Critical minerals are indeed critical but do not generate the same financial muscle as oil to finance recovery or provide tax revenues.

If Russia’s war aims concern Ukraine’s mineral wealth, the obvious question is what comes next? Sanctions are unlikely to go anywhere and Europe will not turn to buying resources from Russia. China controls half or more of the processing and refining of virtually every critical mineral, often through vertically integrated companies that are profitable at lower prices than their Western peers. Either Russia intends to build a green economy – terrible for its existing growth and fiscal model – or it will sell to Chinese buyers who can drive a hard bargain on price.

[...]

For Ukraine, on the other hand, these reserves are strategically valuable because they could grant Kyiv a competitive advantage for cleantech and nuclear tech manufacturing. A post-war Ukraine could benefit from reshoring supply chains out of Germany, as Poland and other eastern European members of the EU. If Kyiv were to ensure rapid investment and development, it would likely look at primarily taxing miners’ profits rather than extraction, significantly reducing the tax base from the sector in exchange for export earnings to bolster the hryvnia.

[...]

Ukraine also has gallium, a rare metal used in semiconductors, solar PVs, LED lights, circuitry, and power converters. China recently imposed export controls on gallium in response to U.S. policy, exploiting its near-total control of refined gallium production. This could provide an opportunity for Ukraine to become indispensable to global supply chains, but the market is quite small in financial terms.

[...]

Europe has the most to gain from unlocking a new supply of minerals. Squeezed between the mercurial bellicosity of Trump and the mounting pressure of China’s cleantech prowess and economic slowdown makes Beijing even more reliant on exports, the continent’s reliance on trade for a large share of its GDP makes it an ideal partner for Kyiv. Building mines in the EU is even harder than in the U.S. Onshoring mineral value chains provides opportunities for cost-savings and vertical integration. For all its tough talk and acknowledging the growing gap between Europe’s financial support for Ukraine and that of the United States, there is not yet reason to believe European governments are willing to make even larger sacrifices to ensure Ukraine wins a fair peace.

[...]

Ukraine may seek to use its mineral wealth as a diplomatic object of negotiations for a just peace. That would be completely understandable in a war for national survival. Whoever controls these deposits faces the whims and disorder of rapidly changing markets that confound expectations and pose challenges.

view more: next ›