Notices by Adrian Cochrane (alcinnz@floss.social), page 2

Reading this https://wicki.io/posts/2020-11-goodbye-google-fonts/ , my thought seems to go in an unusual direction: Browsers are partitioning their caches?

They're probably doing it to prevent timing attacks. Similar to Spectre, but not a CPU-level vulnerability.

But it immediately struck me as a probable performance regression. I reckon network timings shouldn't be exposed to webpages, but doing so would once again break most JS. JS was a mistake!

My greatest thanks to:

Kennedy Phillips
Gregg Taylor
Gabriel Urbina
Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor
Lauren Shippen
Daniel Manning

And everyone who helped bring their excellent stories to life!

Thank you Dispiration & Kevin Chi for your music!
Thank you to the Blender Foundation for their amusing shorts, and to concept David Revoy for also drawing the Pepper & Carrot comics!

Any other artists you wish to thank today?

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Happy International Day Against DRM!
https://www.defectivebydesign.org/blog/international_day_against_drm_idad_almost_here_stand_us_dec_4
(It might be tomorrow for you, I tend to be a day ahead of the rest of the world)

You can celebrate by e.g. avoiding DRM for the entire day, here's my recommendations: https://adrian.geek.nz/movies

That'd be far from unusual for me though, so I'll probably listen to more entertainment! And maybe join the chats...

What are you doing?

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Hey, does anyone want help deploying a static website?

I've got *plenty* of diskspace (and if I weren't concerned about security, CPU time) left on my home server left to offer you!

The (Extremely) Loud Minority: https://hankchizljaw.com/wrote/the-(extremely)-loud-minority/

"Always remember that although a subset of the JavaScript community can be very loud, they represent a paltry portion of the web as a whole. This means that when they say something like “CSS sucks”—what they mean is “CSS sucks for a small subset of less than 1 percent of the web” *."

I make no secret I disagree with *that* minority, they're smothering The Web to death!

The status quo online is that we require the assistance of centralized intermediaries (like Stripe, PayPal, Patreon, BandCamp, etc) even beyond the banks to receive any money online. At which point most publishers just go for the menace which is online advertising!

Hopefully payto: can help change this! GNU Taler is excited!

https://taler.net/en/news/2020-11.html
https://michael-lewis.com/posts/what-went-wrong-with-the-internet-and-how-to-fix-it/

I just proposed a LibrePlanet2021 talk! Let's see if it gets accepted? If I need to expand on what I gave for Pheonix Linux User Group?

5 Most Annoying Website Features I Face As a Blind Person Every Single Day: https://bighack.org/5-most-annoying-website-features-i-face-as-a-blind-screen-reader-user-accessibility/

These same points apply for Rhapsode. Except autoplaying video, I don't and won't support that!

Still for everyone's sake, don't autoplay video!

I like to advise people against watching mainstream entertainment. Don't give them your time, money, or attention!

This started in response to the major publishers not wanting us to own our computers for fear of "piracy". Their insistance on me running "DRM" I don't trust!

But as I began finding alternatives, it became clear how limited American media really is! I'm seeing more gender divirsity, anti-capitalism, & better scientific understanding outside the mainstream!

@spacekookie @cblgh Personally my attitude tends to be:

Don't worry about the hate getting hosted. Worry about it getting shared!

Search & discovery must be curated, I have no patience for anyone who's excited for peer-to-peer unmanaged search like Yacy.

O.K., now I think the FSF is getting somewhere with their propaganda videos: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/watch-and-share-rewind-to-help-explain-free-software

The previous ones I don't think have arguments that'll reach out beyond preaching to the choir. But this one argues that we're being prevented from improving and collaborating upon our software for the sake of profit, and it does so emotionally.

Is Your Favorite Podcast Tracking You? - The Markup: https://themarkup.org/ask-the-markup/2020/10/08/podcast-privacy-tracking-listener-data

Related: Will Spotify Ruin Podcasting? - BIG: https://mattstoller.substack.com/p/will-spotify-ruin-podcasting

I must say, I love podcasting as-is! With or without advertising they have far and away some of the best interviews & fictional stories!

Why DO we need surveillance advertising? Or move away from RSS?

Reading https://modelviewculture.com/pieces/the-culture-war-in-open-source-is-on

My position is I'm skeptical of tackling these issues through new copyright licenses, but they are issues that absolutely needs addressing! I think being more particular about which projects & software architectures we tackle *can* help, but mostly we need to spread new norms.

e.g. Make it clear we value libre OVER gratis!

P.S. Major software companies do tend to shun if not explicitly avoid the (A)GPL...

The best way to beat ad blockers? Let them win: https://medium.com/theagency/the-best-way-to-beat-ad-blockers-let-them-win-beac3658f7ff

Alerts! -- A11ycasts: https://invidious.snopyta.org/watch?v=5lzAj1ahRSI

Hmmm, doesn't mention the <dialog> element...

In Rhapsode I have absolutely no plans to support alerts, they're a terrible auditory experience! Instead of you interrupting the listener, how about they ask for an update?

In Haphaestus I think I'll add link attributes allowing for modal dialogs, automatic updates whilst selected, etc...

As I reflect on designing a web browser specifically for smart TVs it really strikes me that type of thinking is really vital there, and that I'm curious others' takes! People are especially likely to rely on corporate hueristics to decide what to watch on TV! They need something better...

So my question to anyone interested: What homepage can you design for "Haphaestus" to automatically generate interesting links?

You can test in existing browsers with JS turned off...

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I'm really curious what web browsers can do to help people (re)discover interesting/useful/entertaining/etc webpages without relying on centralized, profit-seeking services. That's what really got me into web browser development.

I've found some good techniques for this. I love good old-fashioned webfeeds! Echoing back unvisited links you've encountered works quite well as personalized recommendations! I like the topsites concept!

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"In short, federation distributes governance and cost, and can allow us to tackle challenges that we couldn’t overcome without it. The free software community needs to rally behind federation, because no one else will. For all of the reasons which make it worth doing, it is not rewarding for corporations. They would much rather build walled gardens and centralize, centralize, centralize — it’s more profitable!"

https://drewdevault.com/2020/09/20/The-potential-of-federation.html

Web Design & Carbon Impact: https://cmhb.de/web-design-and-carbon-impact

Seems to meet the consensus I've been roughly seeing elsewhere... And that I understand from the theory!

1. Reduce Images
2. Optimize Images
3. Reduce Video (Also: please add a download link...)
4. Font Selection & Optimization (I'd say, sure use webfonts if it gets you away from excess images!)
5. Write clean code
6. Use Less JavaScript
7. Use Server Caching
8. SEO

Building a Framework for a Free Online Classroom: https://www.fsf.org/bulletin/2020/spring/free-online-classroom

Another mention of Zoom, and I'm left wondering: How and when did we all start using that software? It all seems quite sudden and out of nowhere to me!