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@empiricism

The admin is a (hopefully benign) dictator. Someone has to be God of the instance. The only way around this would be to have an elaborate system of checks and balances between at least three people where no-one can unilaterally cause permanent destruction. Very hard to set up and maintain.

Moral of the story, pick your admin with great care. Avoid billionaires.

@Michele @kathygriffin @jeffjarvis

I disagree. An algorithm is not intrinsically bad. As long as we understand that it represents the interests of whoever paid to have it constructed. I think an algorithm with human values that simply wanted to enrich experience is perfectly possible.

I haven't seen one, probably because nobody has ever had a financial incentive to construct it.

Mastodon would be a good place to try to make one.

I wrote an article diving into the statistics on far-right extremist violence compared to far-left extremist violence, and to say the least, it’s not a “both sides” problem. An estimated 75% of extremist killings in the US over the past decade are attributed to far-right extremists, compared to 4% attributed to far-left extremists — and that’s on the high end of the estimates for far-left extremist violence.
weaponizedspaces.substack.com/

The New America Foundation, which breaks down the categories of extremist violence a bit more than ADL, found that only one extremist killing since 9/11 is attributable to left-wing extremism, compared to 122 deaths attributed to far-right extremism. Here’s what that looks like visualized:

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Completely unconfirmed rumors suggest the Belarusian dictator is changing his chefs and bodyguards after the strange, abrupt death of his (previously healthy) foreign minister.
Here's an article I wrote about the Belarusians who want Lukashenko out:
theatlantic.com/magazine/archi

As #activitypub and the #fediverse is more than just Mastodon, please tell me what other things you're doing? I'd really like to get more involved with the wider #federated universe but have no idea what's out there.

Please Boost so I can hear from everyone!

quality twitter cross-post 

I would be very interested in the smallest circle containing half the World's population. It would probably be approximately the Yuxi Circle.

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RT @undertheraedar
I have written something about The Yuxi Circle - there are lots of maps, plus an attempt to find the world centre of population

statsmapsnpix.com/2022/02/the-
twitter.com/undertheraedar/sta

quality twitter cross-post 

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RT @BandyXLee1
In our selfishness, we use all our treasures to destroy the world rather than to build it, hence destroying the support system for the self. It is like the cancer cell that surpasses all others in surviving, only to kill the organism it needs to survive.
twitter.com/BandyXLee1/status/

@JonKramer @jlindley

But conservatives like that are about 30% of America. That would be an unbelievable number of pedophiles, so obviously not true. Most are sincere in their .

It's amazing to me that 's are simply 100% convinced that people are child sex groomers. It's axiomatic. No whatsoever. Some even think this characterization applies to anyone or .

I don't think we can call it anymore.

There are domestic reasons for the protests in Iran and China right now. But I can't help but wonder if the spirit of the Ukrainian resistance helps explain them too. Some people in both countries do have access to the real story of the war, through VPNs if nothing else, and have watched what can be achieved by solidarity and bravery

quality twitter cross-post 

Possible unraveling of Xi

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RT @ruthbenghiat
In October, giving talks in Germany, I observed that "When authoritarian states puff up personality cults, you know there is trouble brewing: growing disaffection in society, crackdown, or foreign aggression. In China, the inflation of Xi Jinping's cult..." 1/
twitter.com/ruthbenghiat/statu

Seasonal reminder: Alcohol is a completely legal drug that destroys lives, relationships and families. Don't make it hard for people who are trying to stay sober to enjoy festivities and functions.

Mastodon Tip for Posting Defaults 

#MastodonTip If you are more of a reply human than you are a post human, you may be unused to the "shoutyness" of Mastodon.

I like to reply to things, but I don't like to broadcast my replies out of context into the Federated feed, so I recommend setting the default to "Unlisted," if you're one of those reply people.

At times (like this) where you intend to notify everyone, you can just change it to Public.

The interesting thing about 𓃰 is that it can go some places an emoji can't, like hashtags.

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@heath

I don't use a screenreader, but I know they are all over the internet, clients and phones.

Some of my followers use them.

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