#bigjournalism — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #bigjournalism, aggregated by home.social.
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Destroying Autocracy – December 25, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ´em.
So folks, this is the final edition of Destroying Autocracy. Recently, I ran across a quote that fits with why I ran this project:
“I am absolutely convinced that only a small minority, a very small minority, among us, are seriously reached and profoundly moved by our propaganda of criticism, of doubt, of rebellion, of free investigation, of independent research. On the other hand, it is clear that our first interest lies always in seeking to increase this minority; to keep it, under all circumstances alive, active, refreshed. Our own happiness depends on it.
— Emile Armand”Thanks for following us. Now, on to what’s next.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is now the home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Destroying Autocracy, and Developing the OMN.
You can sign up now.
We are posting on the Fediverse now at @thefulcrum
Please copy and paste our handle into you favorite client to follow us. Original website content will start next week.
Featured Item(s)
I ran across these last week.
The Resonant Computing Manifesto
These are principles that should be implementing when developing for the Open Media Network.
Jan Wideboer writes:
Over the past few months, I thought a lot about Digital Sovereignty. I talked to experts, from analysts over legal experts to people running companies and public authorities. I tried to distill what is really at the core of the principle.
OCT – My Framework for Digital Sovereignty, Part 1
This is a good way to look at it.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
TechCrunch reports:
Stanford’s star reporter takes on Silicon Valley’s ‘money-soaked’ startup culture
TechPolicy shares:
Making the Digital Markets Act Developer-Friendly
The Guardian reports:
This is Europe’s secret weapon against Trump: it could burst his AI bubble
The Guardian view on Australia’s social media ban: dragging tech companies into action
MPs question UK Palantir contracts after investigation reveals security concerns
BleepingComputer reports:
Italy fines Apple $116 million over App Store privacy policy issues
Waterfox announces:
No AI* Here – A Response to Mozilla’s Next Chapter
The Register notes:
Waterfox browser goes AI-free, targets the Firefox faithful
You don’t need Linux to run free and open source software
This is one you should read and take action on. 🙂
Airbus to migrate critical apps to a sovereign Euro cloud
Europe gets serious about cutting digital umbilical cord with Uncle Sam’s big tech
It’s FOSS reports:
Denmark Begins its Exit from Microsoft — and This is Just the Beginning
At least the enemies of privacy are slowly telling Microsoft to fuck off.
NextCloud shares:
The Republic of Serbia deploys Nextcloud for compliant, on-premises collaboration
Robert Riemann asks:
EU OS: Which Linux Distribution fits Europe best?
Hamish Campbell asks:
What Did We Learn from Web3, Crypto?
Signal has:
This was 2025 for Signal: strong growth and many new features
CoMaps shares:
CoMaps and its community at the end of 2025
Neutral
The Center for Democracy and Technology has:
TechPolicy Press reports:
The Path to a Sovereign Tech Stack is Via a Commodified Tech Stack
Platforms Report to EU Regulators Under DSA With an Eye on US Politics
Europe Tried to Take Control of Its Digital Stack in 2025. Where Does It Stand Now?
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
Krebs on Security reports:
Dismantling Defenses: Trump 2.0 Cyber Year in Review
Cory Doctorow says:
America’s collapsing consumption is the world’s disenshittification opportunity
Tech Dadu reports:
EU Prepares Wider Data Retention Rules, VPN Providers Could Be Affected
The Register reports:
Denmark takes a Viking swing at VPN-enabled piracy
Pariah States
And:
Amazon security boss blames Russia’s GRU for years-long energy-sector hacks
China, Iran are having a field day with React2Shell, Google warns
BleepingComputer reports:
France arrests Latvian for installing malware on Italian ferry
Denmark blames Russia for destructive cyberattack on water utility
DarkReading reports:
Russia Hits Critical Orgs Via Misconfigured Edge Devices
Dormant Iran APT is Still Alive, Spying on Dissidents
EuronNews reports:
Pro-Russian hackers claim French postal service cyberattack
Big Media
Ben Werdmuller asks:
Just for brain-dead people.
Nieman Lab’s Predictions for Journalism 2026
Journalists talk about the elephant in the room: our relationship with Big Tech
CyberCultural shares:
My 2025 Indie Web Report and Thoughts on the Open Web
404 Media reports:
Archivists Posted the 60 Minutes CECOT Segment Bari Weiss Killed
Big Tech
The Nerd Reich reports:
Tech Billionaires Flirt With the Guillotine
JD Vance’s Theo Bro Network: Silicon Valley Meets ‘God’
Futurism reports:
Professor Warns That the Wealthy Are Trying to Use AI to Seize Control of Everything
The Rebel Tech Alliance reports on:
404 Media reports:
Hack Reveals the a16z-Backed Phone Farm Flooding TikTok With AI Influencers
SuperBloom examines:
From Content to Interface: Rethinking Platform Transparency Through Design
Wanna-be Big Tech
Mozilla spouts techbro delusions:
Mozilla’s Next Chapter: Building the World’s Most Trusted Software Company
Fuck Firefox.
Pivot to AI has the reality:
Firefox browser falls to AI. What do we do now?
Zen, Waterfox, or LibreWolf, peeps.
Cybersecurity/Privacy
The Register reports:
New React vulns leak secrets, invite DoS attacks
Poisoned WhatsApp API package steals messages and accounts
Krebs on Security reports:
Most Parked Domains Now Serving Malicious Content
DarkReading reports:
Attackers Use Stolen AWS Credentials in Cryptomining Campaign
BleepingComputer reports:
Microsoft 365 accounts targeted in wave of OAuth phishing attacks
Mullvad is:
Announcing GotaTun, the future of WireGuard at Mullvad VPN
Framasoft asks:
Qui suis-je et quelle est mon identité ?
404 Media reports:
Flock Exposed Its AI-Powered Cameras to the Internet. We Tracked Ourselves
Fediverse
Tim Chambres shares:
My 2026 Open Social Web Predictions
Ploum shares:
How We Lost Communication to Entertainment
The Social Web Foundation explores:
Implementing Encrypted Messaging over ActivityPub
Literally, awesome.
Connected Places has:
PeerTube announces:
Publish your videos with PeerTube for mobile!
It’s FOSS reports:
Decentralized YouTube Alternative PeerTube Adds Creator Mode
Holos shares:
ActivityPub for WordPress has:
Jose Murilo shares:
Museums in the Fediverse: Experiments with Tainacan, ActivityPub, and WebSocial
DeadSuperHerson says:
Ghost’s ActivityPub Integration Feels Half-Baked
I feel the same way. And it’s why I am running a backup of The Programmer’s Fulcrum on WordPress to keep Ghost honest. We’ll see where TPF ends up in 2027.
Mastodon shares its:
Piefed announces:
PieFed 1.4 is released – emoji, federated stackoverflow and AI content filters
Empathy Forward announces:
Fedify shares:
Fedify 1.10.0: Observability foundations for the future debug dashboard
Slightly Decentralized Social Media
Connected Places has:
ATmosphere Report 147 – Year’s end reflections
ATProto Community has:
Ændra Rininsland: Supporting and growing ATProto development in 2025 and beyond
I am going to check Leaflet out.
TechCrunch reports:
Bluesky launches a privacy-focused ‘Find Friends’ feature without invite spam
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a head start.
Never stop fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
#ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Holos #Mastodon #Peertube #RSS #StopChina #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism https://battalion.mobileatom.net/?p=4242
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse -
Destroying Autocracy – December 11, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
This is the penultimate edition of Destroying Autocracy with the final one coming December 25th. We have friends in town so there will not be one next week.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Developing the OMN and it’s coming soon.
You can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links to each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post along with their featured articles. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing next month.
We are posting on the Fediverse now at @thefulcrum https://ghostverse.link/@thefulcrum
Please copy and paste our handle into you favorite client to follow us. Original website content will start in 2026.
Featured Item(s)
Deutche Welle writes:
DW Access is a lightweight app designed to ensure access to independent information in regions where digital freedom is under threat. It provides users with a secure way to reach DW content even under severe censorship.
DW Access: New app counters global censorship
And Ben Werdmuller writes:
When people think about RSS, they most often associate it with the long-departed Google Reader — but it’s far from dead. From direct subscriptions to syndication into apps that aggregate and re-present content, RSS remains the standard for feeds. It’s the glue that holds the timely web together.
Most people know RSS powers blogs and podcasts. But it powers popular news apps too, from aggregated headlines on MSN or in SmartNews to up-to-date headlines in business services like Lexis Nexis or Bloomberg.
It’s also widely used to keep track of status updates of all kinds: weather, software updates, infrastructure uptime, and so on. Most of this activity happens behind the scenes. Publishers often think of feeds as an afterthought, but entire industries rely on them. It’s a workhorse that’s become essential infrastructure for the web.
There are more RSS items below.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
The Kyiv Independent reports:
404 Media reports:
DHS’s Immigrant-Hunting App Removed from Google Play Store
ICEBlock Creator Sues U.S. Government Over App’s Removal
Tech Policy Press reports:
The EU’s Fine Against X is Not About Speech or ‘Censorship’
Cory Doctorow has:
Pluralistic: The Reverse-Centaur’s Guide to Criticizing AI
Speaking of, Josh Collins says:
AI optimism is a class privilege
Speaking as an old affluent white man, I agree.
Fairphone shares:
We’re big fans of open-source buildable code at Fairphone. Here’s why.
Open WebSearch has:
Partner in Focus: Open Search Foundation
The Register reports:
Publishers say no to AI scrapers, block bots at server level
Google’s AI training tactics land it in another EU antitrust fight
Really Simple Licensing spec lets web publishers demand their due from AI scrapers
The Tyee reports:
The Man Who Tracks Silicon Valley’s ‘Nerd Reich’
TechCrunch reports:
The Guardian reports:
Nextcloud reports:
Île-de-France offers 550,000 students and staff a sovereign cloud collaboration platform
6-figure deployments show momentum of sovereignty in France
It’s FOSS opines:
This Could Be The Linux Phone We All Have Been Waiting For
APC shares:
What I shared about digital commons and the NGI0 grant programme during this year’s Global Gathering
NPQ reports:
This Giving Season, Nonprofits Should Address the Chill in the Air
Elena Rossini starts a series:
A newbie’s guide to self-hosting with YunoHost. Part 1: reasons + requirements
Neutral
Tech Policy Press reports:
Europe Fined X, But It’s Still Avoiding the Real Threat to Democracy
Policymakers Overlook How Open Source AI Is Reshaping Global Power
NiemanLab reports:
Public media sees infrastructure as its next act of service
Ars Technica reports:
Big Tech joins forces with Linux Foundation to standardize AI agents
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
Border Patrol Agent Recorded Raid with Meta’s Ray-Ban Smart Glasses
Man Charged for Wiping Phone Before CBP Could Search It
NOYB shares:
Digital Omnibus: First Analysis of Select GDPR and ePrivacy Proposals by the Commission
The Nerd Reich reports:
Financial Times Discovers the Network State Cult
The Gist shares:
Pariah States
The Kyiv Post reports:
Cyberattack on Reporters Without Borders Linked to Russian Security Services
The Register reports:
UK to Europe: The time to counter Russia’s information war machine is now
DarkReading reports:
Feds: Pro-Russia Hactivists Target US Critical Infrastructure
BleepingComputer reports:
North Korean hackers exploit React2Shell flaw in EtherRAT malware attacks
Big Media
NiemanLab reports:
The political journalism that matters most will be built from the ground up
The year journalism stops outsourcing its independence
Big Tech
Platformer reports:
Where Meta’s biggest experiment in governance went wrong
404 Media reports:
Instagram Is Generating Inaccurate SEO Bait for Your Posts
NetzPolitik reports:
All you need to know about how adtech data exposes the EU to espionage
TechDirt reports:
Elon’s Crying Censorship Over An EU Fine That Has Nothing To Do With Censorship
Politico reports:
X axes European Commission’s ad account after €120M EU fine
Fascists are such snowflakes.
The Register reports:
Block all AI browsers for the foreseeable future: Gartner
Forever.
Thomas Rigby shares:
They See Your Photos: 12 months on
Amusing, but unfortunately a real product from the c^nts at Google.
Wanna-be Big Tech
Youssuff Quips looks at:
Terror
The Register reports:
193 cybercrims arrested, accused of plotting ‘violence-as-a-service’
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Freedom of the Press Foundation shares:
Lessons from Defense Department ‘Signalgate’ report
BleepingComputer reports:
Portugal updates cybercrime law to exempt security researchers
DarkReading reports:
Gemini Enterprise No-Click Flaw Exposes Sensitive Data
Fediverse
Connected Places has:
The Digital Services Act and Theories of Power
Linuxiac reports:
PeerTube 8.0 Brings a Modern Video Player and Team Channel Management
José Murilo shares:
Museums in the Fediverse: Experiments with Tainacan, ActivityPub, and WebSocial
Steffen Voß has:
Wie spielen WordPress und Mastodon zusammen?
Events, WordPress und das Fediverse
Mastodon has:
Trunk & Tidbits, November 2025
The world needs social sovereignty
RSS
John Onolan says:
Robert Alexander is:
Discovering the IndieWeb with calm tech
Fantastic.
Peter Ries pursues:
Reading news from non-RSS websites
Slightly Decentralized Social Media
TBD
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a head start.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Mastodon #Peertube #RSS #StopChina #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #WordPress
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Destroying Autocracy – December 04, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Developing the OMN.
You can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links to each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post along with their featured articles. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing in January.
We are posting on the Fediverse now at @thefulcrum @thefulcrum.dev and original website content will start next month.
Featured Item(s)
Hamish Campbell writes:
ActivityPub is a shared vocabulary, a public language for moving meaning and connection across the open web. It gives you nouns and verbs, and the community defines the grammar through lived use.
This is why the OMN works with ActivityPub, a metadata and meaning layer, not a platform, flows, not silos. ActivityPub is the widely deployed 4 Opens protocol that treats publishing as a flow, a conversation.
Unlike the more vertical stacks (ATProto is a good example), ActivityPub doesn’t force a worldview. It doesn’t tell you, “this is how your network must be structured.” It doesn’t enforce hierarchy or lock you into one interpretation of identity, authority, or workflow. It’s a KISS path – here’s a shared language, verbs for publishing and receiving, express objects, updates, relationships. The rest is up to the commons.
This flexibility is exactly why the OMN can become a part of this flow.
Why the OMN works with ActivityPub – And why we need a bridge to p2p
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
DDEV has:
Power Through Blackouts: How DDEV Community Helped Me in Ukraine
TechPolicy Press shares:
How to Test New York’s Algorithmic Pricing Law
The EU’s Digital Omnibus Must Be Rejected by Lawmakers. Here is Why.
Singapore announced an:
Issuance of Implementation Directives to Apple and Google Under the Online Criminal Harms Act
The MIT Press Reader has:
The Secret History of Tor: How a Military Project Became a Lifeline for Privacy
The Guardian reports:
Irish authorities asked to investigate Microsoft over alleged unlawful data processing by IDF
Neutral
TechPolicy Press reports:
What the European Commission and Civil Society Both Get Wrong on the Digital Omnibus
Why Platforms Don’t Catch Climate Misinformation — and How to Change That
EuroNews asks:
Which European countries are building their own sovereign AI to compete in the tech race?
Numerama reports:
TechCrunch reports:
Mistral closes in on Big AI rivals with new open-weight frontier and small models
Wired reports:
The Age-Gated Internet Is Sweeping the states. Activists Are Fighting Back.
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Lawmakers Want to Ban VPNs—And They Have No Idea What They’re Doing
EDRi has:
Promises unkept: The EU-US Data Privacy Framework under fire
404 Media reports:
Flock Uses Overseas Gig Workers to Build its Surveillance AI
Pariah States
DarkReading reports:
Tomiris Unleashes ‘Havoc’ With New Tools, Tactics
DPRK’s ‘Contagious Interview’ Spawns Malicious Npm Package Factory
Student Sells Gov’t, University Sites to Chinese Actors
TechPolicy Press reports:
The Gulf’s AI Rise and the Risk of Entrenching Authoritarianism
The Register reports:
China using AI as ‘precision instrument’ of censorship and repression, at home and abroad
Big Media
Axios reports:
Fox News hires Palantir to build AI newsroom tools
Big surprise.
Big Tech
The Guardian reports:
How big tech is creating its own friendly media bubble to ‘win the narrative battle online’
More than 1,000 Amazon workers warn rapid AI rollout threatens jobs and climate
Anti-immigrant material among AI-generated content getting billions of views on TikTok
BleepingComputer reports:
Leak confirms OpenAI is preparing ads on ChatGPT for public roll out
Big surprise here. But, if you’re amoral enough to use it, you deserve all the privacy invading ads you get.
Google deletes X post after getting caught using a ‘stolen’ AI recipe infographic
Nature reports:
Major AI conference flooded with peer reviews written fully by AI
Wow.
The Guardian reports:
The question isn’t whether the AI bubble will burst – but what the fallout will be
National Review reports:
Meta Researchers Privately Compared Instagram to Addictive Drug, Bombshell Court Filing Shows
Wanna-be Big Tech
OMG Unbuntu has:
Mozilla’s ‘Rewiring’ to AI – Saving the Web or Saving Itself?
Cybersecurity/Privacy
TechCrunch reports:
European cops shut down crypto mixing website that helped launder 1.3B euros
DarkReading reports:
New Raptor Framework Uses Agentic Workflows to Create Patches
Bleeping Computer reports:
Fake Calendly invites spoof top brands to hijack ad manager accounts
The Register reports:
Microsoft quietly shuts down Windows shortcut flaw after years of espionage abuse
Fediverse
Coywolf has:
Mastodon creator shares what went wrong with Threads and ponders the future of the fediverse
Ben Werdmuller shares:
Sean Coates explores:
The Fediverse and Content Creation: Monetization
Great and important stuff.
Ploum asks:
Is Pixelfed sawing off the branch that the Fediverse is sitting on?
Wouldn’t the fix to this would be to show a larger version of a user’s profile image with text posts?
RSS
Planet Codigo has:
Mi solución RSS con software libre y autogestionado
Slightly Decentralized Social Media
TBD
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a head start.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Mastodon #Pixelfed #Roundabout #RSS #StopChina #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Threads
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Destroying Autocracy – November 27, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Developing the OMN.
You can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links to each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post along with their featured articles. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing in January.
We are posting on the Fediverse now at @thefulcrum @thefulcrum.dev and original website content will start in 2026.
Featured Item(s)
The Atlantic writes:
Over the weekend, Elon Musk’s X rolled out a feature that had the immediate result of sowing maximum chaos. The update, called “About This Account,” allows people to click on the profile of an X user and see such information as: which country the account was created in, where its user is currently based, and how many times the username has been changed.
Nikita Bier, X’s head of product, said the feature was “an important first step to securing the integrity of the global town square.” Roughly four hours later, with the update in the wild, Bier sent another post: “I need a drink.”
Almost immediately, “About This Account” stated that many prominent and prolific pro-MAGA accounts, which signaled that they were run by “patriotic” Americans, were based in countries such as Nigeria, Russia, India, and Thailand.
@MAGANationX, an account with almost 400,000 followers and whose bio says it is a “Patriot Voice for We The People,” is based in “Eastern Europe (Non-EU),” according to the feature, and has changed its username five times since the account was made, last year.
On X and Bluesky, users dredged up countless examples of fake or misleading rage-baiting accounts posting aggressive culture-war takes to large audiences. An account called “Maga Nadine” claims to be living in and posting from the United States but is, according to X, based in Morocco. An “America First” account with 67,000 followers is apparently based in Bangladesh. Poetically, the X handle @American is based in Pakistan, according to the feature.
Elon Musk’s Worthless, Poisoned Hall of Mirrors
Just FYI, December 25th will be the day I stop exploring the stupidity of our current timeline and the last Destroying Autocracy post. Again, see the notes above about The Fulcrum.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
EuroNews reports:
Life after chatbots: Meet the ‘AI vegans’ refusing to accept a virtual reality
Kagi is:
Introducing SlopStop: Community-driven AI slop detection in Kagi Search
Fucking awesome if you use Macs.
TechPolicy Press reports:
Why Civil Society Is Sounding the Alarm on the EU’s Omnibus Rollback
The Guardian reports:
European parliament calls for social media ban on under-16s
The Free Software Foundation Europe shares:
Germany Stack: Only Free Software Enables Digital Sovereignty
Wikimedia announces:
Unifying our mobile and desktop domains
Decidim reviews:
Decidim Fest 2025: Collective energy, digital sovereignty and a common roadmap
The Conversation reports:
Mullvad reports:
An important victory – but we still need to stop Chat Control.
Ploum says:
Fiona Fokus says:
I don’t care how well your “AI” works
Abso-fucking-lutely.
Neutral
The Guardian asks:
Has Britain become an economic colony?
England always makes sure to ape the shitty parts of America.
W3C shares:
Preventing Abuse of Digital Credentials
Ben Werdmuller covers:
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
Heise reports:
Analysis of the Digital Sovereignty Summit: Open Source Gets Scolded
We Are Solomon reports:
Hungry for data: Inside Europol’s secretive AI program
The Intercept reports:
The FBI wants to use Surveillance Drones with Facial Recognition Technology
How Corporate Partnerships Powered University Surveillance of Palestine Protests
The Counter Offensive reports:
Witkoff was secretly giving Russians advice
Pariah States
The Register reports:
CISA warns spyware crews are breaking into Signal and WhatsApp accounts
DarkReading reports:
DPRK’s FlexibleFerret Tightens macOS Grip
Big Media
The Columbia Journalism Review reports:
Could Public Skepticism of the Press Actually Be Good for Democracy?
It could since most Big Media is owned by right-wing c^nts.
ProPublica shares:
ProPublica’s May-August 2025 Impact Report: Independent Investigations That Spur Change
Big Tech
Sage Journals
Renée DiResta reports:
On the internet, nobody knows you’re a MAGA influencer… in Lagos
The Daily Beast reports:
Top MAGA Influencers Accidentally Unmasked as Foreign Trolls
404 Media reports:
America’s Polarization Has Become the World’s Side Hustle
The Register reports:
Meta knows how bad its sites are for kids, say lawyers
MM+M reports:
What healthcare marketers need to know about Meta’s censoring of abortion ads
The Markup reports:
How American Big Tech guards the profits it extracts around the world
Cybersecurity/Privacy
BleepingComputer reports:
Cox Enterprises discloses Oracle E-Business Suite data breach
Hmm, cable companies are literally shit at everything.
Code beautifiers expose credentials from banks, govt, tech orgs
DarkReading reports:
Infamous Shai-hulud Worm Resurfaces From the Depths
The Register reports:
FCC guts post-Salt Typhoon telco rules despite ongoing espionage risk
Fediverse
Terence Eden has:
Now witness the power of this fully operational Fediverse!
Ghost has:
RadWeb Hosting shares:
How to Host Your Own Mastodon Server on a VPS (5 Minute Quick-Start Guide)
How to Install Pleroma on Ubuntu VPS (5 Minute Quick-Start Guide)
NodeBB announces:
NodeBB v4.7.0 — category boost fixes, remote media/emoji in chats, and more!
Slightly Decentralized Social Media
Connected Places has:
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a head start.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#activitypub #ai #atproto #autocracy #bigJournalism #bigTech #democracy #fascism #fediverse #mastodon #nodebb #pleroma #stopChina #stopIsrael #stopRedAmerica #stopRussia #supportUkraine #technoanarchism #technofeudalism
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Destroying Autocracy – November 20, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Developing the OMN.
You can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links to each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post along with their featured articles. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing in January.
We are posting on the Fediverse now at @thefulcrum @thefulcrum.dev and original website content will start in 2026.
Featured Item(s)
Muni Town writes:
I’ve been trying to write this piece for years, really ever since I finished the first version of Open Source Explained (a v2 will drop early next year). Every time I get started I’m just overwhelmed with paralyzing visions of the commentariat accusing me of WrongThink.
So I drop it, because I’m tired to the bone of debating the minutae of open source definitions when the conversation we ought to be having is about power: who has it? (oligarchs), how did they get it? (monopolies & corruption), why is that a problem? (platform autocracy), and how do we the people take that power back? (protocols and open software).
Understanding ownership is power
It’s important to understand the codes in your life, because your life is made up of them. Once you understand which codes you already have access to and even the right to inspect, you can see more clearly which other codes you ought to have insight into.
Nothing makes me more anxious than writing about open source licensing because nothing brings out more opinion-havers, the vast majority of whom are speaking from a point of privilege-blindess in the western world. The widespread ignorance of the deeper power struggle at play (which we’re losing) has brought the free world to the very brink, so I’m pushing past the discomfort to honor the urgency of our moment.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
404 Media reports:
Ukraine Is Jamming Russia’s ‘Superweapon’ With a Song
Radio Free Europe reports:
How Britain’s Disposable Vape Ban Has Boosted Ukraine’s War Effort
TechCrunch reports:
Five people plead guilty to helping North Koreans infiltrate US companies as ‘remote IT workers’
Surveillance Tech Provide Proteir Was Hacked
Software Maxims has:
How FOSS Won and Why It Matters
Open Future announces:
Open Future Joins the European Network for Technological Resilience and Sovereignty
404 Media reports:
Airlines Will Shut Down Program That Sold Your Flights Records to Government
Framasoft has:
Renforcez l’internet du partage en contribuant à la robustesse de Framasoft
The Register reports:
Latest Servo release hints at a real Rust alternative to Chromium
Brussels eyes AWS, Azure for gatekeeper tag in cloud clampdown
Game over: Europol storms gaming platforms in extremist content sweep
The Guardian reports:
French authorities investigate alleged Holocaust denial posts on Elon Musk’s Grok AI
TechPolicy Press reports:
Brazil Supreme Court Ruling Redefines Framework for Platform Liability
Neutral
TechCrunch reports:
Databricks co-founder argues US must go open source to beat China in AI
The Guardian reports:
AI firms must be clear on risks or repeat tobacco’s mistakes, says Anthropic chief
The Center for Democracy and Technology reports:
Architects of Online Influence: How Creators, Platforms, and Policymakers Shape Political Speech
TechPolicy Press says:
If Europe Wants Digital Sovereignty, It Must Reinvent Who Owns Tech
MIT Technology Review reports:
Quantum physicists have shrunk and “de-censored” DeepSeek R1
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
Corporate Europe reports:
Preparing a roll-back of digital rights: Commission’s secretive meetings with industry
The Brussels Times reports:
Secret EU plans to allow Big Tech to train AI with our personal data
The Guardian reports:
Dark forces are preventing us fighting the climate crisis – by taking knowledge hostage
404 Media reports:
This App Lets ICE Track Vehicles and Owners Across the Country
IRS Accessed Massive Database of Americans Flights Without a Warrant
The Register reports:
Palantir plots NHS skills drive for its controversial data platform
Pariah States
TechCrunch reports:
US, UK, and Australia sanction Russian ‘bulletproof’ web host used in ransomware attacks
Forbes reports:
Has Samsung Installed ‘Unremovable Israeli Spyware’ On Your Phone?
The Register reports:
Tens of thousands more ASUS routers pwned by suspected, evolving China operation
Big Media
TBD
Big Tech
The Guardian reports:
White nationalist talking points and racial pseudoscience: welcome to Elon Musk’s Grokipedia
The Register reports:
Researchers find hole in AI guardrails by using strings like =coffee
404 Media reports:
A Researcher Made an AI That Completely Breaks the Online Surveys Scientists Rely On
The ACLU reports:
Your Smartphone, Their Rules: How App Stores Enable Corporate-Government Censorship
Yep.
TechPolicy Press reports:
How Tech Oligarchs Profit from the Logic of ‘Finitude Capitalism’ and What to Do About It
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Privacy Guides has:
Email Security: Where We Are and What the Future Holds
DarkReading asks:
Can a Global, Decentralized System Save CVE Data?
Heise reports:
3.5 Billion Accounts: Complete WhatsApp Directory Retrieved and Evaluated
Signal or Delta Chat peeps.
Fediverse
Ben Werdmuller reports on:
The State of the Open Social Web
Great Stuff as usual from Ben.
ForBetter explores:
The future of hope on the Social Web
Connected Places has:
Laura Hargreaves has:
Ghost v6 Upgrade + Docker Migration: What I Learned (So You Don’t Have To)
Big news with Mastodon this week:
The Future is Ours to Build – Together
Hopefully the new regime (foundation vs. benevolent dictator) will focus on trust & safety and not trying to be Twitter 2.
Chris Sturmsucht shares:
Fediverse: a new open and social web
Slightly Decentralized Social Media
TBD
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a head start.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#activitypub #ai #autocracy #bigJournalism #bigTech #democracy #fascism #fediverse #ghost #mastodon #stopChina #stopIsrael #stopRedAmerica #stopRussia #supportUkraine #technoanarchism #technofeudalism
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Destroying Autocracy – November 13, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Developing the OMN.
You can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links to and featured articles for each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post along with their featured articles. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing.
We are posting on the Fediverse now at @thefulcrum @thefulcrum.dev and original website content will start in 2026.
Featured Item(s)
Wrekage/Salvage writes:
Once you’ve seized the tools of political life to build communal power, it’s hard to forget what a hammer feels like in your hand.
Bonfire Networks is a tiny software org that has spent the past couple of years building a framework for communities on the open social web. At the end of last week, they released Bonfire Social, a microblogging app.
Like Mastodon, Bonfire Social runs on ActivityPub, but it takes differently opinionated approach to sociability.
(It has) features I (and many others) have been advocating for in Fediverse software for years, often while people explained at length that such things simply could not be implemented.
Most exhilarating to me, though, is that they aren’t just building another microblogging app. They’re making a toolkit for internet community software that is healthy and good and designed around real human needs from the start.
As they put it in their crowdfunding campaign, they’re making building blocks for communities on the open social web.
Total awesomeness that needs to blow up. We will cover (and support) Bonfire extensively on The Programmer’s Fulcrum.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
The Kyiv Independent reports:
Ukraine slaps new sanctions on Putin’s team and propagandist publishers
Radio Free Europe reports:
EU ‘Democracy Shield’ Aims To Counter Russian Disinformation
Open Web Advocacy has:
Tim Berners-Lee On Apple’s Browser Engine Ban and Web Apps
Heise reports:
Office alternative from Germany by Ionos and Nextcloud is now available
Great.
Speaking of Germany, The Guardian reports:
ChatGPT violated copyright law by ‘learning’ from song lyrics, German court rules
Meta could face millions in fines for not signing content deals in Australia
Digital Rights Bytes asks:
Can the government read my text messages?
404 Media reports:
Judge Rules Flock Surveillance Images Are Public Records That Can Be Requested By Anyone
TechCrunch reports:
Wikipedia urges AI companies to use its paid API, and stop scraping
Brookings says:
Preach brother.
Poynter reports:
As independent newspapers disappear, a secretive alliance fights to save them
Neutral
Open Knowledge shares:
Open letter: Harnessing open source AI to advance digital sovereignty
The Ringer has:
How Catastrophic Is It If the AI Bubble Bursts? An FAQ.
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
DHS Gives Local Cops a Facial Recognition App To Find Immigrants
TechCrunch reports:
Why a lot of people are getting hacked with government spyware
Lawmakers warn Democratic governors that states are sharing drivers’ data with ICE
Euractiv reports:
EU’s red tape bonfire puts AI ahead of privacy protection
NOYB reports:
EU Commission internal draft would wreck core principles of the GDPR
The Guardian reports:
The EU has let US tech giants run riot. Diluting our data law will only entrench their power.
Tech giants vow to defend users in US as spyware companies make inroads with Trump administration
Freedom of the Press Foundation reports:
Kansas county pays $3M for forgetting the First Amendment
Pariah States
BleepingComputer reports:
APT37 hackers abuse Google Find Hub in Android data-wiping attacks
BitDefender reports:
Russian hacker admits helping Yanluowang ransomware infect companies
The Register reports:
UK asks cyberspies to probe whether Chinese buses can be switched off remotely
Krebs on Security reports:
Google Sues to Disrupt Chinese SMS Phishing Triad
Big Media
The Columbia Journalism Review has:
Editorial Independence Means Technological Independence
The Open Media Network peeps.
The Guardian reports:
EU investigates Google over ‘demotion’ of commercial content from news media
Big Tech
And:
Big Tech’s control freak era is breaking itself apart
The Techno Anarchist Manifesto lists tools to help you avoid most of this AI horseshit.
Lies, damned lies and AI: the newest way to influence elections may be here to stay
Jesus.
Digital colonialism: the new frontier of Latin American dependency.
A side effect of techno feudalism.
PC Mag reports:
Asking ChatGPT About Affairs or Abortion? Be Careful, Marketers Are Peeking at Your Prompts
Cybersecurity/Privacy
The Register reports:
OWASP Top 10: Broken access control still tops app security list
IEEE Spectrum reports:
Your AI Agent Is Now a Target for Email Phishing. New tools can help thwart the attacks.
Like bitcoin, if you use this shit you deserve what you get.
DarkReading reports:
Orgs Move to SSO, Passkeys to Solve Bad Password Habits
GlassWorm Returns, Slices Back into VS Code Extensions
Check out VS Codium friends.
BleepingComputer reports:
Police disrupts Rhadamanthys, VenomRAT, and Elysium malware operations
Fediverse
Elena Rossini shares:
The rebellion will be federated – 2025 edition
A New Social has:
Bonfire explains:
Matters of care – why Bonfire maintenance comes first.
Comciencia has:
A comunicação da ciência no Fediverso
Laura Hargreves shares:
Growing My Own Little Fediverse: The Joy of Going Further Down the Rabbit Hole
Inside My Matrix: How I Reclaimed Messaging from the Cloud
TechCrunch reports:
Threads targets podcasters with new features, aiming to become the home for show discussions
BTW, fuck Threads.
Slightly Decentralized Social Media
The Dabbler has:
Chicken Caesars: they’re messing with your Bluesky feed
TechCrunch reports:
Jack Dorsey funds diVine, a Vine reboot that includes Vine’s video archive
Hmm, this is built with Nostr.
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a head start.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#activitypub #ai #autocracy #bigJournalism #bigTech #bluesky #bonfire #bridgyfed #democracy #fascism #fediverse #matrix #stopChina #stopIsrael #stopRedAmerica #stopRussia #supportUkraine #technoanarchism #technofeudalism #threads #xmpp
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Destroying Autocracy – September 25, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Developing the OMN.
You can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links to and featured articles for each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post along with their featured articles. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing.
Featured Item
Tuta shares:
Finally some good news: French MPs want to make it illegal to break encryption and limit surveillance.
Is France finally standing up for encryption and privacy?
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
The Guardian reports:
Too tricky to cancel: Amazon faces US trial over alleged Prime subscription deceptions
Ars Technica reports:
How to fight censorship, one Disney+ cancellation at a time
I canceled Hulu, ESPN+, and Disney+. And they’re gonna stay canceled. My drinking budget just went up $90 a month. Cheers!
The Verge reports:
Microsoft forced to make Windows 10 extended security updates truly free in Europe
404 Media reports:
We’re Suing ICE for its $2 Million Spyware Contract
The Kyiv Independent reports:
Ukraine hacks Crimea proxy head, uncovers child abduction files, intelligence source says
FSFE reports:
The Digital Markets Act turns 1: one year of pushing for Device Neutrality
Neutral
The Next Web reports:
The EU’s €2T budget overlooks a key tech pillar: Open source
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
Tech Policy reports:
The Internet Coup Is Here. And the World Is Still Asleep
The Guardian reports:
Documents offer rare insight on Ice’s close relationship with Palantir
Reuters reports:
Exclusive: US could hit entire International Criminal Court with sanctions soon
The EFF reports:
That Drone in the Sky Could Be Tracking Your Car
404 Media reports:
How Surveillance Firms Use ‘Democracy’ As a Cover for Serving ICE and Trump
Pariah States
DarkReading reports:
Chinese APT Leans on Researcher PoCs to Spy on Other Countries
Iran-Linked Hackers Target Europe With New Malware
EuroNews reports:
Inside Russia’s AI-driven disinformation machine shaping Moldova’s election
The Register reports:
SIM city: Feds say 100,000-card farms could have killed cell towers in NYC
Google warns China-linked spies lurking in ‘numerous’ enterprises since March
Big Media
Fuck Disney, fuck ABC, fuck Sinclair, fuck the FCC.
Big Tech
TechCrunch reports:
Meta launches super PAC to fight AI regulation as state policies mount
The Guardian reports:
Parents outraged as Meta uses photos of schoolgirls in ads targeting man
Meta exposé author faces bankruptcy after ban on criticising company
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Going Viral vs. Going Dark: Why Extremism Trends and Abortion Content Gets Censored
If we stop using products from the c^nts at Meta, we can solve all these problems.
Computer World reports:
OpenAI admits AI hallucinations are mathematically inevitable, not just engineering flaws
Hidde shares:
The politics of AI: we’ll need more sustainability, community and democracy
404 Media reports:
AI ‘Workslop’ Is Killing Productivity and Making Workers Miserable
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Camille Bouvat announces:
Saracroche, le bloqueur d’appels indésirables pour iPhone et Android
I was happy to find this spam blocker and put it to use on my Fairphone.
Between Two Firewalls reports:
Identity Is Still the Perimeter
Wired reports:
How Signal’s Meredith Whittaker Remembers SignalGate: ‘No Fucking Way’
BleepingComputer reports:
Police seizes $439 million stolen by cybercrime rings worldwide
Fediverse
Connected Places has:
Elena Rossini shares:
The Future Is Federated: My Fediverse Starter Guide
Open Journals has some new research:
Kalvin has:
Mastodon and Algorithms: Transparent, Simple, and User-Controlled
PeerTube announces:
PeerTube mobile app v1.1.0 is out!
PieFed announces:
Hackers Pub shows us:
How to Build a Simple ActivityPub Reminder Bot in Python.
Other Slightly Federated Social Media
TechCrunch reports:
Bluesky says it’s getting more aggressive about moderation and enforcement
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a head start.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #ATProto #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Mastodon #StopChina #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism
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Destroying Autocracy – September 11, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
The Programmer’s Fulcrum is the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy, Developing the OMN.
You can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links to and featured articles for each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post along with their featured articles. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing.
Featured Item
Dave Rupert writes and asks:
I think my answer to “Why would anybody start a website (in 2025)?” is the same answer for the content creator in the age of AI problem: I don’t know, but you gotta want to.
Money sweetens the deal when making content or websites, but we’ve shaken the money tree pretty hard over the last couple decades and it’s looking bare.
Increasingly, you’ve got to find other sources of inspiration to make a website – which by the way are still the coolest fucking things ever.
Why would anybody start a website?
To join the Open Media Network for one.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
Speaking of websites, the Columbia Journalism Review has:
Tom Ley Thinks More People Should Experience Worker-Owned Journalism
The Next Web reports:
Reclaiming the stack: Europe’s bid for digital sovereignty
The Register reports:
Big clouds scramble as EU Data Act brings new data transfer rules
Heisse reports:
400 scientists speak out against chat control
Europe is better than anywhere else, but it isn’t perfect.
The Guardian reports:
‘It is a war of drones now’: the ever-evolving tech dominating the frontline in Ukraine
Lawmaker calls for French criminal investigation into TikTok
EU fines Google nearly €3bn for ‘abusing’ dominant position in ad tech
Speaking of, Tech Policy reports:
Empowered Workers Are a Bulwark Against Illegal Monopoly
Ars Technica reports:
Judge: Anthropic’s $1.5B settlement is being shoved “down the throat of authors”
Pay-per-output? AI firms blindsided by beefed up robots.txt instructions.
Ben Werdmuller examines:
This is the type of content we will feature in The Programmer’s Fulcrum in 2026.
Make Use of shares:
I stopped using Gmail for this built-in client and now Gmail feels stuck
Here is a TAM lite tool for you.
Mojeek announces:
Mojeek is Not an Answer Engine
Tuta shares:
Chat Control is back & we’ve got one month to stop the EU CSAM scanning plans.
The Counterforce has a guide:
Signal For Punks (it has Stories now!)
I describe myself as 25% intellectual, 25% bohemian, 25% hillbilly, and 25% punk so this appeals to me. 😉
Neutral
The Observer reports:
Nick Clegg and Tim Berners-Lee: the battle for the soul of the internet
Tech Policy reports:
Washington and Brussels Vie for Control Over Big Tech
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
404 Media reports:
ICE Spends Millions on Clearview AI Facial Recognition to Find People ‘Assaulting’ Officers
The Kyiv Independent reports:
US steps back from joint efforts to combat misinformation, FT reports
TechDirt reports:
UK Age Verification Data Confirms What Critics Always Predicted: Mass Migration To Sketchier Sites
Pariah States
BleepingComputer reports:
Czech cyber agency warns against Chinese tech in critical infrastructure
The Christian Science Monitor reports:
Why some Israeli journalists only now are turning a lens on Gaza devastation
DarkReading reports:
Chinese Hackers Allegedly Pose as US Lawmaker
Big Media
The Guardian reports:
‘Existential crisis’: how Google’s shift to AI has upended the online news model
TechDirt reports:
Big Tech
Tech Policy reports:
How Big Tech’s ‘Invisible Hand’ Reaches Latin American Regulators
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Age Verification Is A Windfall for Big Tech—And A Death Sentence For Smaller Platforms
The Register reports:
It’s AI all the way down as Google’s AI cites web pages written by AI
The Guardian reports:
How thousands of ‘overworked, underpaid’ humans train Google’s AI to seem smart
Impact of chatbots on mental health is warning over future of AI, expert says
Meta hid harms to children from VR products, whistleblowers allege
The BBC reports:
Meta to stop its AI chatbots from talking to teens about suicide
404 Media reports:
Instagram Account Promotes Holocaust Denial T-Shirts to 400,000 Followers
Ars Technica has:
Former WhatsApp security boss in lawsuit likens Meta’s culture to a “cult”
EchoStar to sell spectrum to SpaceX after FCC threatened to revoke licenses
AI vs. MAGA: Populists alarmed by Trump’s embrace of AI, Big Tech
Even blind fascist squirrels find a nut sometimes.
SAN reports:
Not so secret: X’s new encrypted chat feature puts users at risk, experts say
Cybersecurity/Privacy
Signal announces:
Introducing Signal Secure Backups
La Quadrature reports:
In France, the eternal return of facial recognition
The Register reports:
Drift massive attack traced back to loose Salesloft GitHub account
In crypto bro FAFO news, BleepingComputer reports:
Hackers hijack npm packages with 2 billion weekly downloads in supply chain attack
DDoS defender targeted in 1.5 Bpps denial-of-service attack
Fediverse
Connected Places has:
Fedihost looks at:
PeerTube announces:
Mastodon has an update:
NodeBB shares a:
Progress update for Conversational Contexts
A New Social announces:
Launch: Notifications from Unbridged Users
RSS
Buttondown remembers:
The story of how RSS beat Microsoft
Other Slightly Federated Social Media
Connected Spaces opines:
On discourse and decentralisation
Personally I view Bluesky as only slightly better than Shitter (drastically fewer c^nts) with a 97.4% chance of becoming enshittified. However, Blacksky has given me a little hope for ATProto at least.
I would also like to point out 96.525% of people on the Fediverse don’t give a fuck about Bluesky and 99.912% of people on Bluesky don’t give a fuck about the Fediverse.
TechCrunch reports:
Bluesky adds private bookmarks
Bluesky will comply with age-verification laws in South Dakota and Wyoming after exiting Mississippi
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
- That’s it for this week. Please share this edition of Destroying Autocracy.
- Follow me on the Fediverse. Or this site via the button in the footer. Or via RSS. Or even our future home in 2026, if you want a headstart.
Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #ATProto #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Mastodon #NodeBB #Peertube #RSS #Signal #StopChina #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism
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Destroying Autocracy – August 15, 2025
Welcome to this week’s “Destroying Autocracy”.
It’s your source for curated news affecting democracy in the cyber arena with a focus on protecting it. That necessitates an opinionated Butlerian jihad against big tech as well as evangelizing for open-source and the Fediverse. Since big media’s journalism wing is flailing and failing in its core duty to democracy, this is also a collection of alternative reporting on the eternal battle between autocracy and democracy. We also cover the cybersecurity world. You can’t be free without safety and privacy.
DA comes out on Thursday and is updated through the end of day on Friday. Then we start over. So take your time in perusing it and check back in over the weekend.
FYI, my opinions will be in bold. And will often involve cursing. Because humans. Especially tech bros. And fascists. Fuck ’em.
There is some news about us this week. We are definitely retiring next year and sooner than expected. Once we move to Europe, I don’t want to spend 30 hours a week working on Symfony Station and Battalion. Producing short documentaries will be my main hobby.
But, I am willing to spend 10 hours weekly on The Programmer’s Fulcrum. It’s the future (and smaller) home for a fusion of Symfony Station and Battalion. Its tagline is Devs Defending Democracy.
For now its built with Ghost though WordPress is still in the running as a long-term site/newsletter/fediverse account solution. Sorry Drupal CMS you are dead in the water.
In any event, you can sign up now and for 2025 get an email with links and featured articles for each week’s Symfony Station Communiqué and Battalion “Destroying Autocracy” post. And you’ll be set with TPF after the fusing. I appreciate all of you.
Featured Item
The Sunday Times has an interview with my hero:
Meredith Whittaker, boss of WhatsApp rival Signal, says the UK’s Investigatory Powers Act could create a weakness that threatens users’ private data.
Signal boss: ‘disturbing’ laws show the UK doesn’t understand tech
Fuck Meta, and fuck What’s App.
We start and end with good news to make the middle bearable.
The response to Russia’s War Crimes, Techno Feudalism, and other douchebaggery
TechCrunch reports:
US government seized $1M from Russian ransomware gang
BleepingComputer reports:
North Korean Kimsuky hackers exposed in alleged data breach
TechCrunch reports:
Australian court finds Apple, Google abused app store market power
The Association for Progressive Communications reports:
Every Door on going from a map user to an open source map creator
Grenoble, France announces:
Access kit Open source software
Commons DB has:
Connecting the Commons: Shared Benefits for Wikimedia Commons and CommonsDB
The Center for Democracy and Technology shares:
Neutral
The Next Web reports:
Opinion: Europe can regulate its way to a better fintech future
Infrequently reports:
How Do Committees Fail To Invent?
Renée DiResta reports:
No Clapping Allowed: A Social Media Free Speech Debate Without the Usual Theater
Stateline reports:
More than half the states have issued AI guidance for schools
Dries Buytaert has:
Funding Open Source like public infrastructure
I disagree with 88.2% of Dries’ AI stance, but he’s 100% correct about this. 😉
The Evil Empire (AKA Autocracy) Strikes Back
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Americans, Be Warned: Lessons From Reddit’s Chaotic UK Age Verification Rollout
Unfortunately, our fools will follow in their fools’ footsteps. And btw fuck Reddit.
The Register reports:
Wikimedia Foundation loses first court battle to swerve Online Safety Act regulation
404 Media reports:
Trump Is Launching an AI Search Engine Powered by Perplexity
If there was any doubt that c^nts attract c^nts, now you know. Especially Clownish ones who want to buy Chrome.
Feds Used Local Cop’s Password to Do Immigration Surveillance With Flock Cameras
LAPD Eyes ‘GeoSpy’, an AI Tool That Can Geolocate Photos in Seconds
Euractiv has:
Palantir is well on its way to conquering Europe
Pariah States
The Register reports:
Russia’s RomCom among those exploiting a WinRAR 0-day in highly-targeted attacks
TechCrunch reports:
Russian government hackers said to be behind US federal court filing system hack: Report
BleepingComputer reports:
Pro-Russian hackers blamed for water dam sabotage in Norway
Curly COMrades cyberspies hit govt orgs with custom malware
Dark Reading reports:
REvil Actor Accuses Russia of Planning 2021 Kaseya Attack
EuroNews reports:
Russia blocks calls via WhatsApp and Telegram as it tightens control over the internet
Signals, peeps.
Israel faces widespread condemnation after Al Jazeera correspondent killed in Gaza
TechPolicy reports:
Artificial Intelligence and the Orchestration of Palestinian Life and Death
Big Media
Poynter says:
And have.
The Racket reports:
Substack’s extremist ecosystem is flourishing
They are on Beehiiv, which like Ghost is a moral alternative to SubStack.
NiemanLab reports:
Can nonprofit news mix with local TV? A Pennsylvania partnership aims to find out
Local TV news is shit. But, this is interesting.
Seeking Alpha reports:
Companies find new avenues to drive up sessions as Google’s AI Search tools reduce web traffic
404 Media reports:
Trump Administration Outlines Plan to Throw Out an Agency’s FOIA Requests En Masse
Big Tech
The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:
Data Brokers Are Ignoring Privacy Law. We Deserve Better.
Ben Werdmuller reports on:
TechPolicy reports:
In an Age of Information Gatekeeping, Don’t Just Google It
Fuck Google.
TechPolicy reports:
‘Big Cloud’ is Building Power via Pervasive Investments
TechCrunch reports:
Leaked Meta AI rules show chatbots were allowed to have romantic chats with kids
How to Save the World asks:
Has the Internet Succumbed to the Tragedy of the Commons?
Platformer has:
Three big lessons from the GPT-5 backlash
Ars Technica reports:
LLMs’ “simulated reasoning” abilities are a “brittle mirage,” researchers find
AP reports:
Students have been called to the office — and even arrested — for AI surveillance false alarms
Cybersecurity/Privacy
The Register reports:
The inside story of the Telemessage saga, and how you can view the data
DEF CON hackers plug security holes in US water systems amid tsunami of threats
Deepfake detectors are slowly coming of age, at a time of dire need
Fediverse
Connected Places has:
Hopefully the link is fixed now.
IFTAS says:
The 2025 Fediverse Needs Assessment is Open: Have Your Say
Salvatore Noschese shares:
We Distribute reports:
Big Updates Are Coming to Loops
tchncs has:
We Distribute asks?
Is Meta Scraping the Fediverse for AI?
Did I say fuck Meta?
TechCrunch reports:
Threads now has more than 400 million monthly active users
Fuck Threads too.
Arxiv is:
Exploring Left-Wing Extremism on the Decentralized Web: An Analysis of Lemmygrad.ml
The proper term is Tankies not left-wing. And it’s why you should use Mbin or Piefed.
Paths & Patches has:
Third Spaces in the Fediverse: FediCon thoughts Part II
Newsmast unplugged: FediCon Part III
The Register reports:
Secure chat darling Matrix admits pair of ‘high severity’ protocol flaws need painful fixes
Slightly Federated Social Media
TBD
CTAs (aka show us some free love)
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Keep fighting!
Ringleader, Battalion
Reuben Walker
Follow me on the Fediverse#ActivityPub #AI #ATProto #Autocracy #BigJournalism #BigTech #Bluesky #Bonfire #Democracy #Fascism #Fediverse #Lemmy #Loops #Mastodon #Reddit #Signal #StopChina #StopIsrael #StopRedAmerica #StopRussia #SubStack #SupportUkraine #TechnoAnarchism #TechnoFeudalism #Telemessage #WhatsApp #Wikimedia