Ben Royce 🇺🇦 @benroyce@mastodon.social A rather poignant commentary on #war and the #environment Because of radio frequency jamming, fiber optic #drones are being used by #Russia and #Ukraine on the frontlines They just spool the fiber out as they fly Apparently some areas look like giant spider webs everywhere from the endless #drone flights And #birds are now using the waste of war to make their nests

John Gruber over at Daring Fireball reporting on the discovery of Facebook tracking Android users: These native Android apps receive browsers’ metadata, cookies and commands from the Meta Pixel and Yandex Metrica scripts embedded on thousands of web sites. These JavaScripts load on users’ mobile browsers and silently connect with native apps running on the same device through localhost sockets. As native apps access programmatically device identifiers like the Android Advertising ID (AAID) or handle user identities as in the case of Meta apps, this method effectively allows these organizations to link mobile browsing sessions and web cookies to user identities, hence de-anonymizing users’ visiting sites embedding their scripts.

1. Florida banned cities from lighting up bridges rainbow colors for Pride. So the people of Jacksonville did it themselves using flashlights and gels. They opened the drawbridge to block them. So they marched to a different bridge. The latest from S. Baum. Subscribe to support our journalism. — Erin Reed (@erininthemorning.com) 2025-06-03T01:00:53.542Z

I hate this button!

sjvn @sjvn@mastodon.social In the 1968 movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey, we see people talking to their family via videoconferencing on their tablets. What a marvel of prediction! Later, their AI will try to kill them. Hmmm... 9:36 PM • May 28, 2025 (UTC)

Federico Viticci writing for MacStories: What sets Sky apart from anything I’ve tried or seen on macOS to date is that it uses LLMs to understand which windows are open on your Mac, what’s inside them, and what actions you can perform based on those apps’ contents. This looks to be really powerful. I like that they did something other than just taking screenshots of everything.

Church of Jeff @jeffowski@mastodon.world #ShitIFind #GenX #VideoGames #Arcade 6:04 PM • May 24, 2025 (UTC)

Jason Koebler writing for 404 Media: The article, called “Summer Reading list for 2025,” suggests reading Tidewater by Isabel Allende, a “multigenerational saga set in a coastal town where magical realism meets environmental activism. Allende’s first climate fiction novel explores how one family confronts rising sea levels while uncovering long-buried secrets.” It also suggests reading The Last Algorithm by Andy Weir, “another science-driven thriller” by the author of The Martian. “This time, the story follows a programmer who discovers that an AI system has developed consciousness—and has been secretly influencing global events for years.” Neither of these books exist, and many of the books on the list either do not exist or were written by other authors than the ones they are attributed to.

Fossil fuels are cooked. In a decade, the backwards United States will be the only market in the world that Trump's Saudi friends can still sell oil too — mtsw (@mtsw.bsky.social) 2025-05-18T15:34:11.257Z

Aamir Siddiqui writing for Android Authority: While all of this sounds great for businesses, it eventually does mean more ads for users, now delivered to their messaging app, irrespective of their OS. In the screenshot above, you can’t even spot an easy way to unsubscribe or opt out of the messages, which is a horrible user experience. What do you mean the messaging protocol developed by an advertising company is good for advertising? I’m shocked!

Emma Roth writing for The Verge: Cue added that searches in Safari fell for the first time last month, something that has “never happened in 22 years.” Under Google’s deal with Apple, the search giant pays Apple a chunk of ad revenue from searches on Safari. Fewer searches mean less revenue for Apple, something he has said he’s “lost a lot of sleep thinking about.” I’ve pretty much shifted all of my internet searching to Perplexity, I’d love to see it as a search engine option in Safari.

A commenter on the MeidasTouch YouTube channel has a suggestion — MeidasTouch (@meidastouch.com) 2025-05-06T15:09:09.387Z

This iconic Fabian Todorovic cartoon is still one of the best I’ve seen at illustrating the remarkable amount of space we surrender to cars, leaving little space left for everyone and everything else. The text added later makes the bonus point that many drivers still manage to complain about it. — Brent Toderian (@brenttoderian.bsky.social) 2025-05-02T04:40:24.772Z

Reece Rogers writing for WIRED: The new user experience of buying stuff inside of ChatGPT shares many similarities to Google Shopping. In the interfaces of both, when you click on the image of a budget office chair that tickles your fancy, multiple retailers, like Amazon and Walmart, are listed on the right side of the screen, with buttons for completing the purchase. There is one major difference between shopping through ChatGPT versus Google, for now: The results you see in OpenAI searches are not paid placements, but organic results. “They are not ads,” says Fry. “They are not sponsored.”

sjvn @sjvn@mastodon.social Whenever I hear someone saying they're a vibe programmer. 4:52 PM • April 24, 2025 (UTC)

Zac Hall writing for 9to5Mac: The newest version of the app can interact with Reminders, search and play Apple Music and Podcasts, and even compose and send emails and calendar events. There’s also ride hailing, making reservations, and searching Apple Maps. This is pretty cool, I’ve only played with it a little bit so far, but very impressive!

From Kotaku: The company has confirmed in a statement that the delay was done to “align with the timing” of pre-orders in the United States, which were delayed last week due to President Trump’s tariffs. Such bullshit. Don’t punish Canadians because of America’s stupidity.

Jason Evangelho writing for Forbes: At its core, Thundermail will primarily be a mail service provider, eventually expanding to offer a familiar browser-based experience similar to Gmail. Users can send and receive email using new Thundermail accounts they sign up for. The service will also allow using your own custom domain (e.g. your.name@yourdomain.com). 👍🏼 More competition is always good.