Jonathan Corbet
Posts
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34Followers
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
This ... is not something I approve of ... to put it politely ...
https://cpb.org/pressroom/Corporation-Public-Broadcasting-Addresses-Operations-Following-Loss-Federal-Funding
https://cpb.org/pressroom/Corporation-Public-Broadcasting-Addresses-Operations-Following-Loss-Federal-Funding
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
"I credit a good portion of my success to knowledge and insight I've gained from lwn articles."
("sophacles" on HN)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44747514
That is what we want @lwn to be, so it is nice to read a comment like that.
("sophacles" on HN)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44747514
That is what we want @lwn to be, so it is nice to read a comment like that.
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
And ... somehow ... nobody seems to stop to ask: does this actually make any sense?
https://apnews.com/article/ai-artificial-intelligence-data-center-electricity-wyoming-cheyenne-44da7974e2d942acd8bf003ebe2e855a
https://apnews.com/article/ai-artificial-intelligence-data-center-electricity-wyoming-cheyenne-44da7974e2d942acd8bf003ebe2e855a
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
list_add(figure_out_postgresql_replication, &task_list);
list_add(Linode, &shit_list);
list_add(Linode, &shit_list);
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
You really can't make this stuff up.
Maybe they should impose tariffs on the import of wildfire smoke? Of course, those of us in the western US know that our domestic production of smoke needs no extra support.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/15/republicans-canada-wildfire-complaint-letter
Maybe they should impose tariffs on the import of wildfire smoke? Of course, those of us in the western US know that our domestic production of smoke needs no extra support.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/15/republicans-canada-wildfire-complaint-letter
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
"It is true that AI is changing the internet and is threatening journalists and media outlets. But the only AI-related business strategy that makes any sense whatsoever is one where media companies and journalists go to great pains to show their audiences that they are human beings, and that the work they are doing is worth supporting because it is human work that is vital to their audiences."
404 Media seemingly reading directly from the @lwn playbook. We'll see if it works...
https://www.404media.co/the-medias-pivot-to-ai-is-not-real-and-not-going-to-work/
404 Media seemingly reading directly from the @lwn playbook. We'll see if it works...
https://www.404media.co/the-medias-pivot-to-ai-is-not-real-and-not-going-to-work/
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
Just last month we finally managed to get to the north rim of the Grand Canyon after years of wanting to.
Now the one lodge there has burned down.
Glad to have made it while it was still there but still ... this really sucks.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/13/wildfires-destroy-grand-canyon-lodge-north-rim
Now the one lodge there has burned down.
Glad to have made it while it was still there but still ... this really sucks.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/13/wildfires-destroy-grand-canyon-lodge-north-rim
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
I had the great privilege of seeing Bruce Cockburn play last night here in Boulder. Over the years, few musicians have earned as much of my respect as he has. Something like 40 years after I first saw him play, he is as good as ever.
If you get the chance to catch one of his performances, I would recommend taking it — I fear there may not be many more of those.
If you get the chance to catch one of his performances, I would recommend taking it — I fear there may not be many more of those.
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
It's awfully easy to get depressed about the state of the world, so an article like this one, on the speed and scope of the solar-power transition, is more than welcome.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-a-warming-planet/46-billion-years-on-the-sun-is-having-a-moment
https://www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-a-warming-planet/46-billion-years-on-the-sun-is-having-a-moment
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
I guess we just can't have good — or even nominally rational — things here. No easy unsubscription for us!
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/07/us-court-cancels-ftc-rule-that-would-have-made-canceling-subscriptions-easier/
The weird thing in my mind is that the cancellation gauntlet can only be hurting the industry as a whole. Once somebody has spent hours trying to turn a subscription off, they will be quite hesitant to sign up for the next one.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/07/us-court-cancels-ftc-rule-that-would-have-made-canceling-subscriptions-easier/
The weird thing in my mind is that the cancellation gauntlet can only be hurting the industry as a whole. Once somebody has spent hours trying to turn a subscription off, they will be quite hesitant to sign up for the next one.
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
Perhaps it's just me, but I do find it amusing that the GNU Readline 8.3 announcement, in July 2025, gives two FTP URLs as the primary way to obtain the software. I don't remember when I last fired up an FTP client, and my web browser has long since forgotten how to do it too.
https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-readline/2025-07/msg00004.html
https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-readline/2025-07/msg00004.html
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
So of course they have to make an electric vehicle with a 128dB noise generator... And of course they screw it up. Sometimes I think there is no hope for the human race.
https://electrek.co/2025/06/30/ev-with-fake-engine-noises-recalled-for-not-having-the-correct-fake-engine-noises/
https://electrek.co/2025/06/30/ev-with-fake-engine-noises-recalled-for-not-having-the-correct-fake-engine-noises/
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
If you run an operation that pays freelance authors for articles, you get a *lot* of people trying to sell you the output from their slop factory of choice. These pitches far exceed the legitimate ones at this point.
Today we got a pitch for an article about the load-balancing scheduler regression caused by the sched_ext framework in the 6.11 release. Somebody has clearly put a bit more than the usual amount of attention into the sort of topic that might appeal to @lwn. There is only one little problem... that regression had nothing to do with sched_ext, which was merged in 6.12. The pitch was a bunch of authoritative-sounding bullshit; the article would surely have been more of the same.
Sometimes I truly lose hope about humanity's ability to keep its head above the flood of this stuff.
Today we got a pitch for an article about the load-balancing scheduler regression caused by the sched_ext framework in the 6.11 release. Somebody has clearly put a bit more than the usual amount of attention into the sort of topic that might appeal to @lwn. There is only one little problem... that regression had nothing to do with sched_ext, which was merged in 6.12. The pitch was a bunch of authoritative-sounding bullshit; the article would surely have been more of the same.
Sometimes I truly lose hope about humanity's ability to keep its head above the flood of this stuff.
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
It took a long time and over 60 articles but, at @lwn, we have finally managed to complete our reporting from the 2025 Linux Storage, Filesystem, Memory Management, and BPF Summit. If you want to know what is going on in those core parts of the kernel, this is the place to look.
We've put together an EPUB version of the whole set as well — good bedtime reading!
https://lwn.net/Articles/1026338/
We've put together an EPUB version of the whole set as well — good bedtime reading!
https://lwn.net/Articles/1026338/
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
The net is full of articles and pictures about Linus Torvalds meeting Bill Gates. They all gloss over the fact that Dave Cutler was also there — to the point of cropping him out of the picture. Somehow, it seems, the guy who did RSX-11, VMS, and Windows NT is relevant too...?
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
US Politics
Show content
So, should you be a US person, and should you have an opinion on the wisdom of the US jumping into another foreign war, killing thousands of people, and incidentally wasting vast amounts of money, RIGHT NOW might be a really good time to convey that opinion to your congresscritters.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5359577-trump-iran-two-weeks/
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5359577-trump-iran-two-weeks/
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
The Wayback Machine managed to capture a Linux Journal article about the Arch Linux distribution's plan to switch to "rye-init" before whatever human intelligence remains there figured out that "rye-init" does not actually exist.
The Linux Journal predates LWN by some years and was, for a long time, the definitive read for Linux users. The Don Marti ( @dmarti ) years were especially noteworthy. It is sad to see where it has ended up now.
https://web.archive.org/web/20250618001301/https://www.linuxjournal.com/content/arch-linux-breaks-new-ground-official-rust-init-system-support-arrives
The Linux Journal predates LWN by some years and was, for a long time, the definitive read for Linux users. The Don Marti ( @dmarti ) years were especially noteworthy. It is sad to see where it has ended up now.
https://web.archive.org/web/20250618001301/https://www.linuxjournal.com/content/arch-linux-breaks-new-ground-official-rust-init-system-support-arrives
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
After years of wanting to, I finally managed to pay a visit to the north rim of the Grand Canyon. Unlike the heavily visited south rim, the north rim has little in the way of accommodations and is rather harder to get to, so it's much less busy with people. It is also at a far higher elevation with the sort of tall-pine-and-aspen forest that one does not expect so far south. Definitely worth it.
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Jonathan Corbet
corbet
One of these days I'll do a routine update on a BigBlueButton server and not have to spend the rest of the day figuring out why BBB doesn't work anymore.
This is not that day.
This is not that day.
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Jonathan Corbet
repeated
repeated
these aren't the numbers you're looking for
algernon@come-from.mad-scientist.clubRepeating this again, from a different perspective: when your precious AI buddy requires hitting niche forges multiple million times a day, that is a cost your precious buddy generates.
Whenever a legit human visitor's browser has to solve an Anubis challenge, that is a cost your precious AI buddy generated.
Whenever you use these tools, these are the costs you push down onto others. Your precious AI buddies cost us countless hours of CPU time, bandwidth, and incredible headache trying to fend them off.
If you are using genAI for any purpose whatsoever, you are party to this carnage.
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