mastodon - Link to source
A woman will head to court in March after the City of Burlington fined her for letting her garden grow wild. Similar cases have cropped up in other cities, raising the question of where our priorities lie thenarwhal.ca/opinion-burlingt…

Ontario cities police gardens and ignore biodiversity | The Narwhal

The City of Burlington is taking a woman to court for unpaid fines after letting her garden grow wild. Similar cases have cropped up elsewhere, to the detriment of the environment
Elaine Anselmi (The Narwhal)

mastodon - Link to source
A random question for blind people mainly, but really for anyone comfortable. What is your mental landscape like? What I mean by that is how do you picture things? Visual imagery? More sensory based? Nothing at all? Something else? I'm curious because even though I'm blind my mental landscape is very visual, I think in pictures, maps, recreations of places/objects/ETC in my head in a very visual way, which from what I've heard doesn't seem that common in the blind community. But maybe I'm wrong, I'd be really curious on thoughts here if you all are comfortable.

reshared this

mastodon - Link to source

I've noticed there seems to be two main types of Linux distributions:

1) Aside from security updates this is going to take a LONG time to get new packages. Updated version of Wine or MESA drivers? See you in six months!

2) EVERY package the second it releases! Hope you don't mind KDE breaking something every couple of months!

I'm wondering if there's any distributions that are similar to the second one but on like a one-month delay, to filter out problematic updates?

#Linux

#linux

mastodon - Link to source

Bill C-15 would allow corporations to be exempt from most Canadian laws

policyalternatives.ca/news-res…

All you need is to bribe one minister.

#cdnpoli


Bill C-15 would allow corporations to be exempt from most Canadian laws | CCPA

Buried on page 300 of the government’s omnibus budget implementation bill is an extremely troubling clause regarding corporate power in Canada—one that allows all cabinet ministers to exempt any individual or corporation from any federal Canadian law…
Silas Xuereb (CCPA)
#cdnpoli
This entry was edited (4 hours ago)

mastodon - Link to source
Something I'd really like to see from @fosdem - a graph of which social media addresses speakers have on their profile / presentations over the years. Last year it was still quite disappointing that the number of people with Mastodon on their slides was quite low. Maybe something for the stats session at the end?
#FOSDEM #fosdem2026
#fosdem #fosdem2026 @FOSDEM

mastodon - Link to source
I'm currently exploring options for local LLMs to be integrated into Home Assistant. Does anyone here got experiences with this already? Like, did you try running a Raspi5 with one of the AI hats? What were your results? Do you have any other affordable local AI systems running with Home Assistant, which models work best for you?
#homeassistant #ai #raspberrypi #ollama #smarthome
#homeassistant #AI #raspberrypi #smarthome #ollama

Jonathan reshared this.

in reply to Jage

mastodon - Link to source

Toni Barth

@Jage Thinking about the same, but renting a VGPU server would be way more expensive than buying even 1 graphics card now, at least in the long run. That is why i'm asking if people got experiences already. I don't need to interpret live video, I don't think images either. Mostly just text to control entities and such, at least for now. But having a bit of GPU power in reserve won't be bad either.
@Jage

mastodon - Link to source

"Code is a liability (not an asset). Tech bosses don't understand this. They think AI is great because it produces 10,000 times more code than a programmer, but that just means it's producing 10,000 times more liabilities.

#Code is a #liability. Code’s capabilities are #assets. The goal of a tech shop is to have code whose capabilities generate more revenue than the costs associated with keeping that code running.

…that's the thing: any nontrivial code has to interact with the outside world, and the outside world isn't static, it's dynamic. The outside world busts through the assumptions made by software authors all the time and every time it does, the software needs to be fixed." @pluralistic

pca.st/episode/ff6c7462-2117-4…


Code is a liability (not an asset)

Listen to your favorite podcasts online, in your browser. Discover the world's most powerful podcast player.
Pocket Casts
#code #liability #Assets @Cory Doctorow

mastodon - Link to source
Ok nice, just found the tool that's going to replace my quickly copy/paste link from PC to phone thing. NTFY. If I needed I could even make a script or something for it, though the web interface will be completely fine. I can then just open the notification on my phone, click on it and have it in the clipboard right away. Even more straightforward than roaming around on WhatsApp first, completely own infrastructure with a tool I use anyway.

mastodon - Link to source
I'm feeling sad, maybe I should make a version of NVSpeechPlayer that self-destructs and switches back to the person's last synthesizer after 5 minutes, then deletes its dll so it can't be run no more. Sigh. The new phoneme table sucks, the old one was better, that's the end of that, the story of Speechplayer ends here. At least, that's how I'm feeling this morning and why no updates for awhile.
in reply to aaron

mastodon - Link to source

Tamas G

@fireborn part of what I'm fighting a bit I feel like is ESpeak being the phonemizer, I mean it's a great engine for supporting a lot of languages, but then you have to work around some of its rules for speech and things like hyphen marks or if ESpeak itself already had issues with a particular sound. And things like Canadian English, even though it's there in support, enever a chance of it working well because ESpeak is just horrible at the IPA. But a larger rewrite with a different phonemizer and Lexicon set could drop already supported languages and complicate things, so sticking with ESpeak made the most sense architecturally until all the sounds in the phoneme table are correct, then perhaps a rebuild with another Open-source phonemizer isn't the worst.
@aaron
in reply to Alex Chapman

mastodon - Link to source

Tamas G

@alexchapman @fireborn The most promising is github.com/rhasspy/gruut - it supports many languages, although still not quite the set supported by Espeak, although I'd have to see how hard adding language support is for those not in their set that we have. It would support speech tags for words like wind outside vs wind up. Eloquence has this so NVSpeechPlayer needs to as well, but without a better phonemizer like that one it ain't happening, so I've been looking at it.

GitHub - rhasspy/gruut: A tokenizer, text cleaner, and phonemizer for many human languages.

A tokenizer, text cleaner, and phonemizer for many human languages. - rhasspy/gruut
GitHub
@aaron @Alex Chapman

mastodon - Link to source
Whether you hate him with a leftest passion, or you were a fan of him, Charly Kurk spoke the truth when he said this. Men always desire what they can't have. This was ment especially in the context of relations with females. And guess what? I feel it again in the hardest possible way right now. But nobody asked. Nobody cares. Nobody would understand my other struggles already starting with school. But yeah life is great, I got a fu ing roof above my head! Emotions? Nah let's hide them, we only wanna hear the positives!
Wow I'm sick of it.
Guess what, my father noticed it sadly. But I'm not gonna tell him anything in the slightest unless it's nesesary, school things might be something there. Dude has seriously been messing with my trust, using it as a weapon against me in the past, several times. Now he'll need to regain it. And if the rest of the world doesn't give a shit, guess let's put on the shield after hiding some more tears of exhaustion.

mastodon - Link to source
It's a bit wild to me how much AI and tools I use for work and home are converging. For example, I use ChatGPT and Codex in both places equally, of course at work more of the tools have AI built into them, but just to casually open the same thing on both feels jarring to me every time for some reason. Not like it should, technically Office was something you'd have on your home and work computers too, but it's the context: Even when you used an Office product at home, you used it to be productive and get something done, whereas AI can absolutely be that with the right use but also be an incredible time-waster you have endless chats with because by design it's made to hook you in. Not sure. There you go, a Tuesday morning. That feels like a Monday :D because we had it off here in the states. So now, no more NV Speech Player work for a bit. It's work work time.
This entry was edited (5 hours ago)

mastodon - Link to source

RE: mastodon.social/@Tutanota/1159…

Super grateful to @Tutanota for sharing our experience of trying to bring digital rights advocacy to a local level!

Tuta Mail has been the secure, reliable foundation from which we could build this group! Important that we started on the right foot.

#Tuta #Florida #Privacy #Cybersecurity #DigitalRights #Tech #Miami

Tuta

2026-01-20 14:01:24

mastodon - Link to source

Age verification laws are being introduced everywhere - including, Florida. 🔞🇺🇸

For Joseph, not knowing his own state had introduced age verification, was the final push he needed to take action and do something. So he started the Miami Tech Enthusiast Club @mtec

Don't miss this interview with him to find out why he started the club, its aims & goals, & why he chose Tuta Mail. 💪🔐

👉 tuta.com/blog/why-mtec-uses-tu…

"When age verification went into effect in Florida and I didn't know. That was my point. I could no longer afford to be uninformed about what was happening in my state. Sure it's not going to affect New York or California, but it's already affecting me, and that was what provided the impetus to know that we had to step up our game.” Joseph, Founder of Miami Tech Enthusiast club

Your voice, our drive: Presenting Tuta users from around the world. | Tuta

2025 was the year many people realized how at risk their digital privacy had become. For Joseph, it was the year to take action against this, and so he started the Miami Tech Enthusiast Club.
Tuta

#privacy #tech #cybersecurity #digitalrights #Florida #tuta #miami @Tuta

mastodon - Link to source

USA anektují ještě letos Grónsko. To bude mít za následek rozpad NATO a nejspíš nový obranný pakt bez USA. Současně celá Evropa vypoví smlouvy USA o umístění amerických vojenských základen, přestane se obchodovat mezi USA a Evropou. Díky některým evropským firmám, jako třeba ASML, bude mít USA velký problém. Budou si chtít technologii vymoct silou a začne válka USA proti Evropě.

Současně anexí Grónska potvrdí USA platnost ruské anexe Krymu a Rusko vtrhne po rozpadu NATO do Pobaltí a Polska, znovu zabere Kazachstán (ropa).

Současně anexí Grónska potvrdí USA čínský nárok na Tchaiwan a Čína tam vtrhne.

A máme to tady. Třetí světová jako na dlani.

mastodon - Link to source

Today's Web Design Update: groups.google.com/a/d.umn.edu/…

Featuring @mgifford, @SteveFaulkner, @MerylEvans, @eric, @TetraLogical, @deconspray, @matuzo, @aardrian, and more.

Subscribe info: d.umn.edu/itss/training/online…

#Accessibility #A11y #WebDesign

Web Design References: Webdev Newsletter

Web Design References: News and info about web design and development. The site advocates accessibility, usability, web standards and many related topics.
www.d.umn.edu
#a11y #Accessibility #webdesign @Adrian Roselli, pH0 @Mike Gifford, CPWA @Steve Faulkner @Meryl Evans, CPACC 🦻 @Manuel Matuzović @deconspray @Eric @TetraLogical

mastodon - Link to source
Just imagine, the Nobel Peace Prize, whether directly or indirectly, is the kindling for starting a conflict historians will come to call World War III. You know there's only one person in the world with all of the self-centered, idiotic, stupidity and unadulterated narcisim, qualities, and power to do it. And its not like he's some maniacle tyrant who grabbed power, his citizenry gave it to him, legally, twice! Just all kinds of LOLZ, irony, and insanity one would come to expect in 2026.

mastodon - Link to source

Age verification laws are being introduced everywhere - including, Florida. 🔞🇺🇸

For Joseph, not knowing his own state had introduced age verification, was the final push he needed to take action and do something. So he started the Miami Tech Enthusiast Club @mtec

Don't miss this interview with him to find out why he started the club, its aims & goals, & why he chose Tuta Mail. 💪🔐

👉 tuta.com/blog/why-mtec-uses-tu…

"When age verification went into effect in Florida and I didn't know. That was my point. I could no longer afford to be uninformed about what was happening in my state. Sure it's not going to affect New York or California, but it's already affecting me, and that was what provided the impetus to know that we had to step up our game.” Joseph, Founder of Miami Tech Enthusiast club

Your voice, our drive: Presenting Tuta users from around the world. | Tuta

2025 was the year many people realized how at risk their digital privacy had become. For Joseph, it was the year to take action against this, and so he started the Miami Tech Enthusiast Club.
Tuta
@Miami Tech Enthusiast Club 📎

mastodon - Link to source
Accessible recruitment is everyone’s business
hrreview.co.uk/analysis/analys…
by @iheni
#a11y #accessibility #hr #recruitment

Henny Swan: Accessible recruitment is everyone’s business - HRreview | HR News, Opinion & Advice

Recruitment is supposed to be a gateway. Too often, though, that gateway is built with walls rather than open doors.
Henny Swan (HRreview | Black and White Trading Ltd)
#a11y #Accessibility #hr #recruitment @Henny Swan

glitchsoc - Link to source

"Vibe coding" really is indistinguishable from playing a slot machine.

There's (for some) a degree of fun based on the hope of getting something valuable for a relatively small investment. When it won't work you just keep pulling the lever. At some point you surely will win, right?

Also with slot machines the bank always wins while slowly draining your resources.

mastodon - Link to source

#XMPP Community

The Chat of the Future Initiative has its first focus session today from 18:00 UTC!
As chosen by the participants, the topics are User interface & User experience and new Community Events.

xmpp.org/2026/01/chat-of-the-f…

#jabber #chat #interoperability #rtc #messaging #ux #ui

The Chat of the Future Banner with four icons referencing to experimentation, exploration, collarboration and innovation.

Chat of the Future Initiative | XMPP - The universal messaging standard

The XSF Communication Team is launching the ‘Chat of the Future Initiative’ to support the XMPP ecosystem through collaborative discussions, development, and improved public communication. This new initiative invites participants from all …
xmpp.org
#xmpp #Jabber #chat #UX #interoperability #ui #messaging #rtc
in reply to Justin Macleod

mastodon - Link to source

Jonathan

@JustinMac84 Because I don't need inflection. I want the text, that's the point of the message. Not to insert a sun or a colision or whatever you can spam on your frequently used emoji keyboard. Sighted can skip it, or ignore it, or yeah are bored of dry text but that's not my problem. What does a colision or a sun communicate to me? What is coliding? It's winter, no sun...
@Justin Macleod
in reply to Jonathan

mastodon - Link to source

Justin Macleod

If I send you a weary face imoji for example, it is a lot more concise and elegant than expressing that feeling in the required number of words. It adds emphasis to text. Sometimes lack of inflection can be problematic and lead to misunderstanding so, with an imoji, things can be clarrified. Given that, if I send multiple consecutive imojis, speech should concatinate them, I'm not seeing that it takes up significantly more time.
in reply to Justin Macleod

mastodon - Link to source

Jonathan

@JustinMac84 Lol and here kicks the language barrier, I don't even know from the top of my head what a weary face is. Right so I searched, do you mean this? 😩
I mean why is it better though. In germany we literally have a word for that. Erschöpft, tired, overwealmed, you decide. See I'd rather take your description of the actual feelings rather than a dumb emoji. But well I guess that's where our opinions differ and that's also good, you don't always have to disagree. Just to clarify I'm not trying to go against you in anyway, it's just I really struggle to find a proper need/usecase for me and am annoyed by the constant usage of them by some people.
@Justin Macleod
in reply to Jonathan

mastodon - Link to source

Jonathan

@JustinMac84 Also, and it'll be difficult to describe this in english, but it's a similar situation to alttext, just a bit less significant. How would I know what a person is trying to say with an emoji that I can't perceive the same way sighted/the sender does?
For example, recently in a Teams call we we're supposed to do the impression of a certain emoji someone would send into the chat, in this case, it was "Ermahnendes Gesicht", which, acording to AI, translates to shushing face. So in english I find this description to be more understandable than in german, but still, what is a shushing face? I didn't know, well shit. Turns out a face that has a finger over their lips to, idk, imply silence, make someone shut up? It's just useless. I can't, get them on the same level, same for gifs and stickers and all that crap.
@Justin Macleod
in reply to Jonathan

mastodon - Link to source

Jonathan

@JustinMac84 I had this several times now, sighted sent me emojis they interpreted completely different than whoever decided what my screenreader should say when it finds this random bunch of unicode clutter.
When I read out what the emoji was read out as to me, they were like, what, that is totaly not what this is etc. Well then, I rather just drop them completely.
@Justin Macleod

mastodon - Link to source

Oh look: #discord outsourced their age verification to some vendor. You know, the #ageverification that countries like the UK want to make mandatory for basically every online service. And the vendor had a data breach exposing photos of government IDs for 70,000 people.

Do you feel safer? How many children did we protect by exposing the IDs of these 70,000 (presumably) adults? Thanks for taking one for the team, you 70,000 canaries in the #privacy coal mine.

discord.com/press-releases/upd…


Update on a Security Incident Involving Third-Party Customer Service | Discord

At Discord, protecting the privacy and security of our users is a top priority. That’s why it’s important to us that we’re transparent with them about events that impact their personal information.
discord.com
#privacy #discord #ageverification
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