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macroblogging social media site, mastodon.eskimo.com a federated microblogging site, and yacy.eskimo.com an uncensored federated search engine. All Free!
A data broker owned by the country’s major airlines, including Delta, American Airlines, and United, collected U.S. travellers’ domestic flight records, sold access to them to Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and then as part of the contract told CBP to not reveal where the data came from, according to internal CBP documents obtained by 404 Media. The data includes passenger names, their full flight itineraries, and financial details.
CBP, a part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), says it needs this data to support state and local police to track people of interest’s air travel across the country, in a purchase that has alarmed civil liberties experts.
The documents reveal for the first time in detail why at least one part of DHS purchased such information, and comes after Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detailed its own purchase of the data. The documents also show for the first time that the data broker, called the Airlines Reporting Corporation (ARC), tells government agencies not to mention where it sourced the flight data from.
“The big airlines—through a shady data broker that they own called ARC—are selling the government bulk access to Americans' sensitive information, revealing where they fly and the credit card they used,” Senator Ron Wyden said in a statement.
ARC is owned and operated by at least eight major U.S. airlines, other publicly released documents show. The company’s board of directors include representatives from Delta, Southwest, United, American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, JetBlue, and European airlines Lufthansa and Air France, and Canada’s Air Canada. More than 240 airlines depend on ARC for ticket settlement services.
****Do you work at ARC or an agency that uses ARC data? I would love to hear from you. Using a non-work device, you can message me securely on Signal at joseph.404 or send me an email at joseph@404media.co.****
ARC’s other lines of business include being the conduit between airlines and travel agencies, finding travel trends in data with other firms like Expedia, and fraud prevention, according to material on ARC’s YouTube channel and website. The sale of U.S. flyers’ travel information to the government is part of ARC’s Travel Intelligence Program (TIP).
A Statement of Work included in the newly obtained documents, which describes why an agency is buying a particular tool or capability, says CBP needs access to ARC’s TIP product “to support federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies to identify persons of interest’s U.S. domestic air travel ticketing information.” 404 Media obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.
A screenshot of the Statement of Work. Image: 404 Media.
The new documents obtained by 404 Media also show ARC asking CBP to “not publicly identify vendor, or its employees, individually or collectively, as the source of the Reports unless the Customer is compelled to do so by a valid court order or subpoena and gives ARC immediate notice of same.”
The Statement of Work says that TIP can show a person’s paid intent to travel and tickets purchased through travel agencies in the U.S. and its territories. The data from the Travel Intelligence Program (TIP) will provide “visibility on a subject’s or person of interest’s domestic air travel ticketing information as well as tickets acquired through travel agencies in the U.S. and its territories,” the documents say. They add this data will be “crucial” in both administrative and criminal cases.
A DHS Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) available online says that TIP data is updated daily with the previous day’s ticket sales, and contains more than one billion records spanning 39 months of past and future travel. The document says TIP can be searched by name, credit card, or airline, but ARC contains data from ARC-accredited travel agencies, such as Expedia, and not flights booked directly with an airline. “[I]f the passenger buys a ticket directly from the airline, then the search done by ICE will not show up in an ARC report,” that PIA says. The PIA notes the data impacts both U.S. and non-U.S. persons, meaning it does include information on U.S. citizens.
“While obtaining domestic airline data—like many other transaction and purchase records—generally doesn't require a warrant, there's still supposed to go through a legal process that ensures independent oversight and limits data collection to records that will support an investigation,” Jake Laperruque, deputy director of the Center for Democracy & Technology's Security and Surveillance Project, told 404 Media in an email. “As with many other types of sensitive and revealing data, the government seems intent on using data brokers to buy their way around important guardrails and limits.”
CBP’s contract with ARC started in June 2024 and may extend to 2029, according to the documents. The CBP contract 404 Media obtained documents for was an $11,025 transaction. Last Tuesday, a public procurement database added a $6,847.50 update to that contract, which said it was exercising “Option Year 1,” meaning it was extending the contract. The documents are redacted but briefly mention CBP’s OPR, or Office of Professional Responsibility, which in part investigates corruption by CBP employees.
“CBP is committed to protecting individuals’ privacy during the execution of its mission to protect the American people, safeguard our borders, and enhance the nation’s economic prosperity. CBP follows a robust privacy policy as we protect the homeland through the air, land and maritime environments against illegal entry, illicit activity or other threats to national sovereignty and economic security,” a CBP spokesperson said in a statement. CBP added that the data is only used when an OPR investigation is open and the agency needs to locate someone related to that investigation. The agency said the data can act as a good starting point to identify a relevant flight record before then getting more information through legal processes.
On May 1, ICE published details about its own ARC data purchase. In response, on May 2, 404 Media filed FOIA requests with ICE and a range of other agencies that 404 Media found had bought ARC’s services, including CBP, the Secret Service, SEC, DEA, the Air Force, U.S. Marshals Service, TSA, and ATF. 404 Media found these by searching U.S. procurement databases. Around a week later, The Lever covered the ICE contract.
A screenshot of the Statement of Work. Image: 404 Media.
Airlines contacted by 404 Media declined to comment, didn’t respond, or deferred to either ARC or DHS instead. ARC declined to comment. The company previously told The Lever that TIP “was established after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to provide certain data to law enforcement… for the purpose of national security matters” and criminal investigations.
“ARC has refused to answer oversight questions from Congress, so I have already contacted the major airlines that own ARC—like Delta, American Airlines and United—to find out why they gave the green light to sell their customers' data to the government,” Wyden’s statement added.
“Overall it strikes me as yet another alarming example of how the ‘Big Data Surveillance Complex’ is becoming the digital age version of the Military-Industrial Complex,” Laperruque says, referring to the purchase of airline data.
“It's clear the Data Broker Loophole is pushing the government back towards a pernicious ‘collect it all’ mentality, gobbling up as much sensitive data as it can about all Americans by default. A decade ago the public rejected that approach, and Congress passed surveillance reform legislation that banned domestic bulk collection. Clearly it's time for Congress to step in again, and stop the Data Broker Loophole from being used to circumvent that ban,” he added.
An aviation industry clearinghouse is collecting passenger information from billions of past and future flights and selling it to Trump’s immigration enforcers.
I love the fediverse. I really do. To the point where I run a couple of fedi servers and actively select platforms that integrate with it when I don't want to run things myself. That's why it truly bothers me that all these FutureOfFediForumsOfTheFuture are all just some contrived way of doing exactly the same thing that already exists, just fediverse'd. The biggest voices of the fediverse are never willing to let the thing just be what it IS.
Day after Christmas, known as Boxing Day to folks in the British Commonwealth, I called my cardiologist’s office to report some issues I’d had during the previous week.
After riding a stationary bike for 20-30 minutes last Saturday the 21st, I started feeling like I was going to have a heart attack.
That I am perpetually fatigued. Simple things like doing the dishes, cooking, and carrying in a couple bags of groceries are leaving me exhausted.
So the receptionist dutifully notes down my issues. “We’ll have our triage person get back to you.” An hour or so later, I get a call from someone in scheduling. “Your doctor says you need to go to the hospital.” Of course, I’m thinking this is complete and utter bullshit, because that day I was feeling just fine. Same for the day before. But we (GF and I) talked ourselves into going to the ER anyway.
They ran a bunch of tests on me. “Your heartrate is normal. Blood pressure is worryingly low.” I didn’t think to mention that I’d popped some xanax before heading to the ER; that might have explained the low BP. I did a bunch of sleeping. At some point, my girlfriend wakes me up. “They want to hold you for observation and do a bunch of tests on you, including a CT scan on your brain.” And I’m like what the actual fuck? Brain? Whut?
The reasoning is that maybe my low blood pressure was due to a brain tumor. Maybe it is, but realize, I have a heart condition that is basically terminal. The last thing I care about is whether I have a brain tumor to go along with it. Metaphorically, suppose I was eating a slice of birthday cake made from rat faeces laden with hanta virus. Am I actually going to give a shit that the chef used some plutonium in the icing? Nope.
I’m a huge believer in science, though I think the obsession with medical testing is harmful to science. Hell, this is pretty much true of all data. We’ve got data. We have so much data that it’s coming out of our ears and assholes. What we don’t have enough of is logic, intuition, and critical thinking.
Worth mentioning that while I was in the ER, I got myself a referral to hospice, so I’m on hospice now. Hopefully I can live out the next months, years, weeks, days, or whatever I have left in some degree of comfort without playing this revolving door hospital game.
I’ll start at the end, because that’s the most important part. Later this month, I’m obtaining medical aid in dying AKA death with dignity. Barring unforeseen circumstances or unexpected changes, my last day on earth will be June 13th, 2025. Realize that I’m just over 46 years old. So how the hell did we get here? I’ve written part of the story in dribs and drabs over the years, so I may as well write up the whole thing.
Late on the night of November 14th, 2021, I went to the local emergency room. I had a blood pressure of 55/37 and a pulse of 220. I had a heart attack at some point. I’m not quite sure when that happened. They admitted me for a hospital stay.
One of the first things they did was an arteriogram, and they found blockage in one artery. They thought they would be able to treat it with stent placement during the procedure, but it was too severe for that. They had a surgeon consult with me about doing an open heart procedure. It would be a single bypass. If I refused the procedure, my life expectancy would be about 4 and a half years. So it seemed reasonable to go ahead with it.
On Thursday, I went in for surgery. It was miserable, but I survived it. By Monday afternoon, I had recovered sufficiently to be released from the hospital, so I went home and finished the recovery process there.
During my hospital stay, I was also diagnosed with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction. My ejection fraction was between 25 and 30 percent. They told me that they would probably want to place an ICD (implantable cardioverter defibrillator) if my ejection fraction didn’t improve. It never really did. The best it got was 30 to 35 percent. So in February of 2023 I went in for an out patient stay to have a subcutaneous implantable cardioverter defibrillator (SICD) placed.
Fastforward a few months. I’m sitting in my recliner, eating some plantain chips, when all of a sudden, I got shocked. I jumped and screamed. Still, it only happened once, and I’m thinking: this is no big deal. A few weeks later, in August, I received another shock. It only happened once, so again, I’m like “no big deal.”
On September 11th, the situation changed. I felt “off” all evening. I was shocked once, and I kept feeling like another one was coming. So I went to the ER. My ICD device fired while I was on the ambulance and when I was being wheeled into the ER. They kept me for a couple days, ran some tests, told me to follow up with cardiology, and sent me home.
A week later, I was back in the ER with the same complaint. I don’t remember whether there were multiple shocks. The same thing happened: they kept me for a couple days to make sure I was stable, ran some tests, sent me home, and told me to follow up with cardiology.
On the first Friday of October, I kept feeling “off”, as though I was going to have a heart episode. The device didn’t fire, but I went to the ER anyway. When I was in the ambulance, they told me that I was in VTac (ventricular tachycardia), and they shocked me. I was shocked several times by hospital staff while they tried to get me stable. This time was a little different. The cardiac electrophysiologist decided that it was time to do a cardiac ablation. They performed that procedure on the following Monday or Tuesday, and I went home in the middle of the week.
Things seemed ok for the next couple of months. Then, on the night of February 1, 2024, I started receiving more shocks from the ICD. I went back to the ER. That night, my ICD shocked me at least seventeen times, and I was also shocked several additional times by paramedics and ER staff. If you’ve ever taken a physical beating that has left you sore for days, you know exactly what I went through that night. I took a beating or two of that sort when I was younger, and that’s exactly how being shocked more than twenty times felt. Every movement of my upper body hurt for the next several days, including just shifting around in bed. The day after I landed in the emergency room, they sent me to a much larger university hospital in Portland. That hospital stabilized me, switched out my ICD for another device, and sent me home a couple days later.
I spent the next few months in a state of total mental paralysis that I suspect was some kind of PTSD. I kept feeling like I was going to have heart episodes and waiting for the next shock. The new device they placed when I was in Portland had some pacing functionality, so I’m pretty sure I avoided some shocks. When I saw my cardiologist in the summer of 2024, she told me that the pacing functionality barely succeeded keeping me out of a round of shocks. She and her boss wanted to do another cardiac ablation.
At this point, I started wondering just how much life I had left. I bluntly asked for an estimation of my life expectancy and was told maybe ten years with the ablation and the defibrillator. The point of the ablation was to act as a “band-aid”, to calm the heart and hopefully keep me out of the emergency room and from being shocked repeatedly. I agreed to yet another procedure, and it was done in late August.
Less than a month later, I received multiple shocks from the ICD. I went back to the ER. I was shocked at least nine times that night. They stabilized me, kept me for a couple days, and told me to follow up with cardiology.
So I followed up with cardiology. And I bluntly asked the life expectancy question again. “Obviously, the cardiac ablation did not work. How much life would you estimate that I have left?” “Maybe two years, but I honestly don’t know.” At that point, I asked them to disable the defibrillator. I was tired of getting multiple shocks and not knowing when they would come, tired of landing in the ER. Realize that in one year, I had ended up in the ER and hospital 5 times for the exact same problem. My prognosis without the defibrillator was a few months.
But at first, I wasn’t going to let it stop me. In December, I started a cardiac exercise program. Basically, they monitored my heart while I exercised. That went well for a few days. Then one day, my blood pressure bottomed out and my heart rate spiked during a session. During the next session, I felt “off” afterward. A couple days before Christmas, I was riding my stationary bike at home for a while. At some point, I started feeling like I was about to have a VTac episode, so I stopped. I spent the next few hours in agony, until I was finally able to sleep.
It gets worse. At this point, even doing trivial tasks became a burden. I’d start having heart palpitations and become winded while bringing in a couple bags of groceries or doing the dishes. This part of the story is told more completely in an older post: Reason 666 Why US Health Care Is So Fucked: The Testing Obsession!.
I’m basically terminally ill. I got a referral to hospice, and I’ve been on that program for several months. I still have heart episodes. I can back them off with morphein, which I use very judiciously. But I expect that at any time, I could have an episode strong enough to land me back in the ER. At that point, I’d most likely just die naturally.
I am afraid to so much as go for a walk, because the last thing I want is to die in the middle of the sidewalk, or worse, be discovered by paramedics and accidentally receive medical intervention.
A while ago, I started investigating Oregon’s Death with Dignity program. Not because I want to die. I don’t. But I’d rather die in a controlled manner than die in pain and be found unresponsive in the middle of my floor by my girlfriend. I want to live, but I’m strongly opposed to my few remaining possibilities for medical treatment (I’ll get to that in a moment). No, I am not a burden to my family. They’re glad to care for me. In fact, it is going to be bad for them when I’m gone. Especially in this hellworld that the US has become under a second Trump Presidency with a stacked Congress and Supreme Court, as well as a crazed billionaire and his wrecking crew actively destroying the government. I’m sad to leave them, and I worry about how they’ll make it without me. I’m angry that I have severe heart failure that started when I was in my early forties. I’m too young for this, but here we are, and here is what I’ve chosen.
So let’s talk about my scant options for treatment. I could have my defibrillator reactivated, and maybe have a couple more years. If I do that, I expect many more ER visits and more painful and unpredictable shocks. I already said no to that. Another slim possibility is a heart transplant. I am not interested. I’ve explained my reasons more fully to people who are close to me, but they basically boil down to the fact that an organ transplant requires a full commitment to the process, and I’m not willing to make that commitment.
A few months ago, a friend sent me a link to a university doing clinical trials using stem cells to repair the heart. It seemed really promising. Unfortunately, they are in Germany, and they only accept German residents. So that wasn’t an option.
So anyway here I am, planning for my upcoming death. And I don’t have enough nice things to say about this process. At every point, the choice is entirely mine. From the beginning of the process all the way until I consume the cocktail of meds that will end my life, I can decide not to proceed, or I can decide to wait to fill the prescription, or whatever. This is my choice all the way.
As it was put to me: “Chris, you’re dying of heart disease. You can choose to just let it naturally run its course. Or you can choose a controlled exit. Either way, if you choose medical aid or you choose to let it run its course, you’re dying.”
Reason 666 Why US Health Care Is So Fucked: The Testing Obsession!
Day after Christmas, known as Boxing Day to folks in the British Commonwealth, I called my cardiologist’s office to report some issues I’d had during the previous week.
After riding a stationary bike for 20-30 minutes last Saturday the 21st, I started feeling like I was going to have a heart attack.
That I am perpetually fatigued. Simple things like doing the dishes, cooking, and carrying in a couple bags of groceries are leaving me exhausted.
So the receptionist dutifully notes down my issues. “We’ll have our triage person get back to you.” An hour or so later, I get a call from someone in scheduling. “Your doctor says you need to go to the hospital.” Of course, I’m thinking this is complete and utter bullshit, because that day I was feeling just fine. Same for the day before. But we (GF and I) talked ourselves into going to the ER anyway.
They ran a bunch of tests on me. “Your heartrate is normal. Blood pressure is worryingly low.” I didn’t think to mention that I’d popped some xanax before heading to the ER; that might have explained the low BP. I did a bunch of sleeping. At some point, my girlfriend wakes me up. “They want to hold you for observation and do a bunch of tests on you, including a CT scan on your brain.” And I’m like what the actual fuck? Brain? Whut?
The reasoning is that maybe my low blood pressure was due to a brain tumor. Maybe it is, but realize, I have a heart condition that is basically terminal. The last thing I care about is whether I have a brain tumor to go along with it. Metaphorically, suppose I was eating a slice of birthday cake made from rat faeces laden with hanta virus. Am I actually going to give a shit that the chef used some plutonium in the icing? Nope.
I’m a huge believer in science, though I think the obsession with medical testing is harmful to science. Hell, this is pretty much true of all data. We’ve got data. We have so much data that it’s coming out of our ears and assholes. What we don’t have enough of is logic, intuition, and critical thinking.
Worth mentioning that while I was in the ER, I got myself a referral to hospice, so I’m on hospice now. Hopefully I can live out the next months, years, weeks, days, or whatever I have left in some degree of comfort without playing this revolving door hospital game.
I’ll start at the end, because that’s the most important part. Later this month, I’m obtaining medical aid in dying AKA death with dignity. Barring unforeseen circumstances or unexpected changes, my last day on earth will be June 13th, 2025. Realize that I’m just over 46 years old. So how the hell did we get here? I’ve written part of the story in dribs and drabs over the years, so I may as well write up the whole thing.
Late on the night of November 14th, 2021, I went to the local emergency room. I had a blood pressure of 55/37 and a pulse of 220. I had a heart attack at some point. I’m not quite sure when that happened. They admitted me for a hospital stay.
One of the first things they did was an arteriogram, and they found blockage in one artery. They thought they would be able to treat it with stent placement during the procedure, but it was too severe for that. They had a surgeon consult with me about doing an open heart procedure. It would be a single bypass. If I refused the procedure, my life expectancy would be about 4 and a half years. So it seemed reasonable to go ahead with it.
On Thursday, I went in for surgery. It was miserable, but I survived it. By Monday afternoon, I had recovered sufficiently to be released from the hospital, so I went home and finished the recovery process there.
During my hospital stay, I was also diagnosed with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction. My ejection fraction was between 25 and 30 percent. They told me that they would probably want to place an ICD (implantable cardioverter defibrillator) if my ejection fraction didn’t improve. It never really did. The best it got was 30 to 35 percent. So in February of 2023 I went in for an out patient stay to have a subcutaneous implantable cardioverter defibrillator (SICD) placed.
Fastforward a few months. I’m sitting in my recliner, eating some plantain chips, when all of a sudden, I got shocked. I jumped and screamed. Still, it only happened once, and I’m thinking: this is no big deal. A few weeks later, in August, I received another shock. It only happened once, so again, I’m like “no big deal.”
On September 11th, the situation changed. I felt “off” all evening. I was shocked once, and I kept feeling like another one was coming. So I went to the ER. My ICD device fired while I was on the ambulance and when I was being wheeled into the ER. They kept me for a couple days, ran some tests, told me to follow up with cardiology, and sent me home.
A week later, I was back in the ER with the same complaint. I don’t remember whether there were multiple shocks. The same thing happened: they kept me for a couple days to make sure I was stable, ran some tests, sent me home, and told me to follow up with cardiology.
On the first Friday of October, I kept feeling “off”, as though I was going to have a heart episode. The device didn’t fire, but I went to the ER anyway. When I was in the ambulance, they told me that I was in VTac (ventricular tachycardia), and they shocked me. I was shocked several times by hospital staff while they tried to get me stable. This time was a little different. The cardiac electrophysiologist decided that it was time to do a cardiac ablation. They performed that procedure on the following Monday or Tuesday, and I went home in the middle of the week.
Things seemed ok for the next couple of months. Then, on the night of February 1, 2024, I started receiving more shocks from the ICD. I went back to the ER. That night, my ICD shocked me at least seventeen times, and I was also shocked several additional times by paramedics and ER staff. If you’ve ever taken a physical beating that has left you sore for days, you know exactly what I went through that night. I took a beating or two of that sort when I was younger, and that’s exactly how being shocked more than twenty times felt. Every movement of my upper body hurt for the next several days, including just shifting around in bed. The day after I landed in the emergency room, they sent me to a much larger university hospital in Portland. That hospital stabilized me, switched out my ICD for another device, and sent me home a couple days later.
I spent the next few months in a state of total mental paralysis that I suspect was some kind of PTSD. I kept feeling like I was going to have heart episodes and waiting for the next shock. The new device they placed when I was in Portland had some pacing functionality, so I’m pretty sure I avoided some shocks. When I saw my cardiologist in the summer of 2024, she told me that the pacing functionality barely succeeded keeping me out of a round of shocks. She and her boss wanted to do another cardiac ablation.
At this point, I started wondering just how much life I had left. I bluntly asked for an estimation of my life expectancy and was told maybe ten years with the ablation and the defibrillator. The point of the ablation was to act as a “band-aid”, to calm the heart and hopefully keep me out of the emergency room and from being shocked repeatedly. I agreed to yet another procedure, and it was done in late August.
Less than a month later, I received multiple shocks from the ICD. I went back to the ER. I was shocked at least nine times that night. They stabilized me, kept me for a couple days, and told me to follow up with cardiology.
So I followed up with cardiology. And I bluntly asked the life expectancy question again. “Obviously, the cardiac ablation did not work. How much life would you estimate that I have left?” “Maybe two years, but I honestly don’t know.” At that point, I asked them to disable the defibrillator. I was tired of getting multiple shocks and not knowing when they would come, tired of landing in the ER. Realize that in one year, I had ended up in the ER and hospital 5 times for the exact same problem. My prognosis without the defibrillator was a few months.
But at first, I wasn’t going to let it stop me. In December, I started a cardiac exercise program. Basically, they monitored my heart while I exercised. That went well for a few days. Then one day, my blood pressure bottomed out and my heart rate spiked during a session. During the next session, I felt “off” afterward. A couple days before Christmas, I was riding my stationary bike at home for a while. At some point, I started feeling like I was about to have a VTac episode, so I stopped. I spent the next few hours in agony, until I was finally able to sleep.
It gets worse. At this point, even doing trivial tasks became a burden. I’d start having heart palpitations and become winded while bringing in a couple bags of groceries or doing the dishes. This part of the story is told more completely in an older post: Reason 666 Why US Health Care Is So Fucked: The Testing Obsession!.
I’m basically terminally ill. I got a referral to hospice, and I’ve been on that program for several months. I still have heart episodes. I can back them off with morphein, which I use very judiciously. But I expect that at any time, I could have an episode strong enough to land me back in the ER. At that point, I’d most likely just die naturally.
I am afraid to so much as go for a walk, because the last thing I want is to die in the middle of the sidewalk, or worse, be discovered by paramedics and accidentally receive medical intervention.
A while ago, I started investigating Oregon’s Death with Dignity program. Not because I want to die. I don’t. But I’d rather die in a controlled manner than die in pain and be found unresponsive in the middle of my floor by my girlfriend. I want to live, but I’m strongly opposed to my few remaining possibilities for medical treatment (I’ll get to that in a moment). No, I am not a burden to my family. They’re glad to care for me. In fact, it is going to be bad for them when I’m gone. Especially in this hellworld that the US has become under a second Trump Presidency with a stacked Congress and Supreme Court, as well as a crazed billionaire and his wrecking crew actively destroying the government. I’m sad to leave them, and I worry about how they’ll make it without me. I’m angry that I have severe heart failure that started when I was in my early forties. I’m too young for this, but here we are, and here is what I’ve chosen.
So let’s talk about my scant options for treatment. I could have my defibrillator reactivated, and maybe have a couple more years. If I do that, I expect many more ER visits and more painful and unpredictable shocks. I already said no to that. Another slim possibility is a heart transplant. I am not interested. I’ve explained my reasons more fully to people who are close to me, but they basically boil down to the fact that an organ transplant requires a full commitment to the process, and I’m not willing to make that commitment.
A few months ago, a friend sent me a link to a university doing clinical trials using stem cells to repair the heart. It seemed really promising. Unfortunately, they are in Germany, and they only accept German residents. So that wasn’t an option.
So anyway here I am, planning for my upcoming death. And I don’t have enough nice things to say about this process. At every point, the choice is entirely mine. From the beginning of the process all the way until I consume the cocktail of meds that will end my life, I can decide not to proceed, or I can decide to wait to fill the prescription, or whatever. This is my choice all the way.
As it was put to me: “Chris, you’re dying of heart disease. You can choose to just let it naturally run its course. Or you can choose a controlled exit. Either way, if you choose medical aid or you choose to let it run its course, you’re dying.”
@VigilantFox: This is no longer America. But President Trump just declared war on the chaos. At Fort Bragg, he called the LA riots a foreign invasion—and made one thing crystal clear: “Generations of army heroes did...…
"Des écoles promettent des conventions de stage en un temps record et pour quelques centaines d’euros à des jeunes qui recherchent un stage, parfois déscolarisés et en quête d’expérience. Enquête sur le business de ces formations en ligne.Enquête"
Pars Today – Iranian state television, quoting informed regional sources on Sunday, reported the most significant intelligence blow in history against the...
Wouldn't it be amazing if just *once* the news was about all of our lives not getting materially worse whilst also reading about a handful of individuals breaking all previous personal wealth records. Interestingly the richest person who ever lived was Mansa Musa, the 14th-century ruler of the Mali Empire, whose wealth surpassed that of today's billionaires. Primarily from gold resources.
He threw his gold wealth around so much when on a pilgrimage, he totally wrecked a number of economies. Due to the subsequent depreciation of gold, it's estimated his pilgrimage led to over a billion dollars of economic losses across the Middle East.....
"The king reportedly left Mali with a caravan of 60,000 men.
He took his entire royal court and officials, soldiers, griots (entertainers), merchants, camel drivers and 12,000 slaves, as well as a long train of goats and sheep for food.
To a person, all the way down to the slaves, they were clad in gold brocade and finest Persian silk. A hundred camels were in tow, each camel carrying hundreds of pounds of pure gold."
Mali is now one of the poorest nations on the planet, heavily reliant on foreign aid, with food insecurity and high numbers below the poverty line including nearly 20% living in 'extreme poverty'.
Men that steal the natural resources of the planet on an obscene scale for personal wealth are not your friends. And they are not doing it for your benefit.
I feel super dumb asking this. But what actually is and how does github (or similar sites) work? Are they all just source files one needs to manually compile? I am always confused when I look at a github page. I know some have directions but they still go way over my head sometimes. Im not a total noob but some of this stuff seems like you need to be in programming and have an IDE just to run a program.
On the Hebrew University’s invitation to Javier Milei and why it shouldn’t surprise anyone
#Argentine President Javier #Milei is expected to arrive in Jerusalem tomorrow to speak at the Hebrew University. Miley is admired by the Israeli right for his unwavering support of Israel and his promise to relocate the Argentinian embassy to #Jerusalem.
Since taking office, Milei has slashed over 70% of public university budgets, vetoing a law to ensure adequate funding and accusing faculty members at the University of Buenos Aires of corruption. The university’s budget has seen a 26% cut while the Argentinian secret service budget increased by 68%. Over 60% of university employees are now below the poverty line. While austerity measures might be argued for, Milei's actions appear to be a deliberate attack on education, #liberalism, and potential political opposition.
There have been growing calls to boycott the Hebrew University. Two Dutch universities have recommended suspending academic partnerships, citing the institution’s complicity in Israel’s genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.
The Hebrew University was found to be directly training Israeli military intelligence officers through the Havatzalot program. The university develops military technologies used in #Gaza through Talpiot program. The campus was built on illegally occupied Palestinian land in East Jerusalem and armed soldiers attend classes on campus, creating militarized environment.
See also Maya Wind's book, Towers of Ivory and Steel, investigates the material realities of this involvement, arguing that Israeli universities are deeply embedded in the state and implicated in decades of Palestinian dispossession.
The Google-owned site has provided moderators with new guidelines and training on how to deal with inflammatory content that breaks YouTube's code of conduct, writes The New...
Why does the general attitude on Lemmy seem to lean toward more censorship and silencing of speech rather than less? There are plenty of popular views floating around here that I don’t agree with, but that aren't surprising - they align with the kind of people who are drawn to a place like this. This one, however, is surprising.
EDIT: I think ChatGPT did a pretty decent job at explaining this. And didn't even accuse me of being a fascist for asking.
::: spoiler spoiler You're not imagining it—liberal-leaning platforms like Lemmy, Mastodon, Tumblr, and especially certain corners of Reddit often do show a strong tendency toward content moderation that can slide into ideological gatekeeping or outright censorship. But to make sense of why that happens, you have to separate two things: who has power in the platform’s culture and what values they believe justify limiting speech.
Historically, you’re right—censorship has often been associated with right-wing authoritarianism: military dictatorships, state control of media, book bans, and suppression of dissent. But the core mechanism of censorship is not inherently right-wing. It’s just a tool. Who uses it, and why, changes depending on who holds power.
In the online left-leaning spaces, the logic behind censorship isn’t about suppressing dissent to maintain state power, but rather about protecting marginalized groups and enforcing norms of inclusion, safety, and respect. That sounds noble on the surface, and often it is. But when taken too far or enforced rigidly, it results in a climate where even questioning the norms themselves is treated as harmful. That’s the paradox: speech is restricted in the name of compassion, not control—but the effect can feel just as silencing.
There’s also the factor of social capital. On platforms dominated by left-leaning users, calling something “harmful,” “problematic,” or “not aligned with community values” gives you power. Moderators and users gain status by enforcing those norms. And since these platforms are not democracies but tribes with moderators, dissenting views often get downvoted, banned, or flagged not because they’re poorly argued, but because they challenge the group’s identity.
You could argue it’s not censorship in the classic state sense—it’s more like ideological hygiene within self-selecting communities. But if you’re the one getting silenced, it doesn’t really matter why. You just feel the muzzle.
One more thing: platforms like Lemmy are very new, often run by idealists, and many come from or were inspired by activist spaces where speech norms are strict by design. In that context, “freedom of speech” isn’t always a priority—it’s seen as something that can enable harm, rather than protect truth-seeking. And that mindset has filtered into moderation culture.
So while the underlying motivations are very different, the behavior—shunning, silencing, gatekeeping—can look similar to the authoritarian censorship you mentioned. It just wears a different uniform. :::
I feel like the issue people her take with this is rather "great, even more Nazi content" than "I want censorship". YouTube already has an issue with demonetizing content it deems risky for its ad business, like curse words or the mention of violence while allowing inflammatory content that drives engagement
I’d imagine that the inflammatory content in question mostly gets demonetized just the same, so I don’t really see what the issue is. It’s not like a specific kind of content is being treated differently, or is it?
It does not, because demonetized content is also no longer pushed by the algorithm. Since the right wing stuff still gets pushed to the front page and recommendations, it probably did not get demonetized
Since the right wing stuff still gets pushed to the front page
I find this hard to believe since it goes against my decades long personal experience using YouTube. The moment I click on a “Ben Shapiro destroys” video, sure - I get plenty more in my feed. But they also go away when I stop engaging. In my experience, YouTube does a great job of recommending me the kind of content I actually like to watch.
Because very rich and powerful people have made it their business to ensure it happens, using their broad and deep control over the organs of narrative deployment and opinion control.
A few months ago, a new terminal emulator was released. It's called ghostty, and it has been a highly anticipated terminal emulator for a while, especially due to the coverage that it received from ThePrimeagen, who had been using for a while, while it was in private beta.
I give it a spin every month or so to see how it’s getting on. I’m on macOS.
Every time I walk away unimpressed, despite its maker’s very deserved esteemed reputation.
I’m probably not seeing something. What I do see, however, is that I can’t search my scrollback history, nor can I select text without a mouse.
Also, pressing cmd+, on macOS opens the config inside TextEditor (yes, a separate GUI app) rather than in $EDITOR. It’s a small thing but I couldn’t figure out how to change it. Coming from Kitty, this drove me mad.
I’m not sure who Ghostty is for. My feeling is it’s aiming to be an excellent, polished experience for casual terminal users. But I didn’t see anything that Kitty or just tmux anywhere can’t do.
I guess I've been cutting Mitchell some slack since this is a passion project for him - his goal was to build the modern terminal he always wanted, so an opinionated feature set was always expected. And, new terminals with actual new features need their own terminfo entries, it just comes with the territory. It'll sort itself out as the databases catch up.
For now, though, you don't need to address this on an individual host level. I'm in the same boat at work with thousands of servers. If you want to give Ghostty another shot, this wrapper handles the issue automatically, even for servers where AcceptEnv doesn't include TERM or where SetEnv is disabled:
ssh() {
if [[ "$TERM" == "xterm-ghostty" ]]; then
TERM=xterm-256color command ssh "$@"
else
command ssh "$@"
fi
}
Just drop it in your .bashrc (or functions.sh if you rock a modular setup) and SSH connections will auto-switch to compatible terminfo while keeping your local session full-featured. Best of both worlds. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Addresses #4156 and #5892, specifically by implementing @mitchellh's
[request](https://github.com/ghostty-org/ghostty/discussions/5892#discussioncomment-12283628)
for "opt-in shell integra...
Those bases are Fort A.P. Hill, Fort Pickett and Fort Robert E. Lee in Virginia, Fort Gordon in Georgia, Fort Hood in Texas, Fort Polk in Louisiana and Fort Rucker in Alabama.
Pretty sure they blocked me after I commented, so no screenshot.
The US essentially has no restrictions on what parents can do to their children, or pay to have done to them. These companies will show up at night, and take a child out of their bed at night. They explicitly tell parents not to warn the kid what will happen.
When I was sexually abused at a similar facility and tried to report it - I was placed on heavy doses of antipsychotics in retaliation. They drugged me unconscious, and then punished me for sleeping during “class.” As an adult, I have involuntary shakes and movements associated with the medical malpractice enacted on me.
These places don’t get investigated, they don’t get shut down. I think Utah is one of the only states with any form of agency that watches over these places. Child protective services won’t go in, health care agencies won’t go in.
Children have no rights in the US. They are the property of their parents, to be disposed of as they wish. And fuckers like this agency are delighted to kidnap children that their parents can’t be assed to parent.
The "troubled teen industry" in Utah— congregant care centers where kids can be sent for months or years for treatment—may be in line for more state oversight
I’ve only been able to make it to page 10. People often mock the idea of being “triggered” but fuck, it makes me need my trazadone. I want to print this in full color and leave it everywhere I can.
It’s great - I actually shared it as one of the links in my post. People do need to know what these places look like, and that visceral reaction I have to it hopefully means that it inspires others.
Thank you for taking the time to write that. I can understand those circumstances, what I can't wrap my head around is the methods described. Children need acceptance and love, on top of discipline; not punishement.
I can’t even describe how angry I feel about that. Expletives don’t fit. I’m not big on death penalty, but I think these people deserve it - more than some who are sentenced to death.
I also am feeling incredibly grateful that my parents didn’t get caught up in the scam.
NATO is retooling its armed forces, boosting military budgets, and revamping its command structure – all with one target in mind: Russia, stated Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko.
Die Jüdische Stimme hat vorhin den Ablaufplan einer #MdB-Lobbyreise von #ELNET nach #Israel geleakt. Abflug am Sonntag 10:55 von SXF. Briefing durch IDF-Buddy Arye Shalicar, dann Weinverköstigung, Besuch von Nova-Festivalgelände, Kampfdrohnenfabrik und deutscher Luftwaffe.
This often means staying quiet or serving truth in small portions when we sense others aren’t yet ready and would injure themselves with larger truth portions.
On June 14—Flag Day—Donald Trump wants tanks in the street and a made-for-TV display of dominance for his birthday. A spectacle meant to look like strength. But real power isn’t staged in Washington. It rises up everywhere else.
The Document Foundation and LibreOffice support the international campaign @endof10 https://endof10.org/ The countdown has begun. On 14 October 2025, Microsoft will end support for Windows 10.
As Mexicans joining the Global March to Gaza, they hope to influence their government. Oriana Gonzalez reports from Mexico City.Subscribe:http://trt.world/su...
I am furious — incandescently furious — over the attacks on science by Trump and his regime, especially the actions of RFK Jr., which, *as history has plainly show us*, result in deaths upon deaths.
Meet the new Murena Teracube 2s Privacy-first, deGoogled with /e/OS from @e_mydata:
- Replaceable 4000mAh battery - Dual SIM + microSD + headphone jack - Face & fingerprint unlock – your data stays yours - Built to last – no planned obsolescence
In today’s fast-evolving quarrying and aggregate production landscape, the 150 tph stone crusher price is no longer determined by tonnage output alone. Technological advancement is a primary price accelerator—and rightly so. Embedded within modern crushing plants are intelligent systems that directly dictate productivity, energy usage, and lifecycle costs. While entry-level units appeal to price-sensitive buyers, savvy operations recognize that performance-driven enhancements can make or break profitability.
Technological Sophistication and Its Influence on Pricing
Modern 150 tph stone crusher plants integrate a constellation of advanced technologies. These include automated lubrication systems, variable frequency drives, PLC-based control architectures, and real-time condition monitoring sensors. Each of these additions is engineered to reduce human intervention, improve safety protocols, and stabilize performance over time. Naturally, these augmentations elevate the upfront capital cost. But the value lies in embedded operational resilience.
For example, an integrated dust suppression unit, although considered ancillary, contributes to regulatory compliance and prolongs component life. Similarly, crushers equipped with hydraulic relief systems prevent catastrophic damage during overload conditions. These technologies reshape the pricing structure—not as mere accessories, but as value carriers. The cost delta between a basic crusher and an advanced stone crusher plant can reach 20–30%, but that gap represents a layered investment in durability and control.
Operational Efficiency Gains Through Advanced Features
Where the real impact is felt is in downtime reduction and process continuity. Wear-resistant liners optimized through digital simulations extend runtime before maintenance is needed. Automated feed controls prevent overloading and ensure a consistent gradation of output materials. These capabilities convert raw throughput into meaningful yield.
Real-time diagnostics—often transmitted via remote cloud-based platforms—enable operators to visualize performance metrics like motor load, bearing temperature, and power draw. Early fault detection becomes not just possible but routine. This shifts maintenance from reactive to proactive, drastically curtailing production interruptions.
Enhanced crushing chamber geometries and dual-layer screening technologies also play a role. By optimizing material stratification and crushing angles, advanced designs reduce recirculation loads and improve product shape, particularly in secondary and tertiary applications. Such nuanced engineering produces superior aggregates with fewer processing stages.
Strategic Investment: Balancing Initial Cost with Lifecycle ROI
Initial purchase decisions often fail to reflect the total cost of ownership. Plants equipped with telematics and remote analytics capabilities may carry a premium, but they reduce the frequency and severity of failures. Predictive maintenance—driven by machine learning algorithms—forecasts component fatigue and schedules part replacements well before mechanical limits are reached.
Furthermore, modularity in design enables scalable upgrades. A mobile crushing plant that supports bolt-on automation, secondary screening modules, or hybrid power integration provides a future-proof asset. It allows enterprises to adapt to market demands without replacing core infrastructure. Over a five-year operating window, the additional CAPEX is often amortized through savings in fuel, manpower, and downtime mitigation.
Lifecycle ROI modeling consistently shows that technologically advanced crushers yield superior net margins. High-efficiency motors alone can reduce electricity consumption by up to 15%, while precision feeding can slash waste by 10–12%. For operations running continuously, these metrics aren’t optional—they’re decisive.
In conclusion, the 150 tph stone crusher plant has evolved from a brute-force machine to a data-driven production asset. Investing in advanced features is not an indulgence—it’s an operational imperative. The interplay between upfront cost and downstream efficiency defines the modern crushing economy.
Every time I order at the Wendy's by me with the app, they end up handing me somebody else's order. I don't even question it anymore. It's like a little adventure.
Thursday, June 12, 2025, Voku for Joe’s Repairs. Food served from 7 pm, no reservations! Voku for Joe’s Repairs. Come and support Joe’s garage maintenance costs by getting a tasty vegan Tuscan meal. To keep this great space up & running, we sometimes need to make repairs, and that isn’t always free. The food will be delicious, and you will leave with a full belly and a smile.
One of the most powerful leaders in Mexico is floating a plan for his country to seize a large chunk of the United States’ land as the riots in Los Angeles continue to rage.
We're thrilled to announce our new project: docs.coop/
Building on the great work of Suite Numerique (docs.numerique.gouv.fr/home/), we are offering an opportunity to be part of a new collaborative Docs platform as a service, that provides an ethical alternative to Google Docs, Office 365, Notion etc.
Docs is the result of a joint effort lead by the French 🥖 (DINUM) and German 🥨 (ZenDiS) governments which represents a paradigm shift in the way open source software is funded.
"French Digital Minister Clara #Chappaz’s office told POLITICO it is considering designating websites such as @bsky.app @Mastodon and #Reddit as #porn platforms, obliging them to implement stringent #ageverification requirements under new French rules that came into effect Saturday."
Question is: who is running this platform called #Mastodon ??? 🤔
What if we could look at the Sun from a whole new angle, one we've never seen before?
From Earth, we always look towards the Sun's equator. This year, the ESA-led Solar Orbiter mission broke free of this ‘standard’ viewpoint by tilting its orbit to 17° – out of the ecliptic plane where the planets and all other Sun-watching spacecraft reside. Now for the first time ever, we can clearly see the Sun’s unexplored poles.
Using different instruments, Solar Orbiter can see what happens throughout the Sun's outer layers. The material in these layers never stays still, being pushed outward and (usually) falling back to the Sun.
Interestingly, it saw that the Sun's magnetic field has its north and south all tangled up, with patches of both magnetic polarities present right up to the Sun's south pole. This only happens once every 11 years, at the point in the solar cycle when the Sun's magnetic field flips.
Solar Orbiter will keep a close eye on the Sun – including its poles – for the years to come. Its unique viewing angle will change our understanding of the Sun’s magnetic field, the solar cycle and the workings of space weather.
Profitant du sommet sur les océans à Nice, plusieurs pêcheurs ont fait le déplacement depuis l’Afrique pour dénoncer la surpêche des Européens. Un « crime », selon eux.
Sobreviviendo, (Victor Heredia) Álbum "Con Sentido y Razón" Teatro Caupolican - Chile Descarga Con Sentido y Razon (Buy link): Portaldisc: http://www.portald...
Au printemps 1992, la ville de Los Angeles fait face à six jours d’émeutes. Des policiers blancs, accusés d'avoir tabassé Rodney King, un automobiliste noir, ont été acquittés. ↓
« Que l’Amérique sacrifie le social au rêve impérial ou au dogme libéral et les oubliés finiront par se faire entendre. Surtout si, comme à Los Angeles, une décision de “justice” absout la violence de la police : “No justice, no peace” ».
I know everyone is overwhelmed with multiple crises around the world right now, but please take 3 minutes to remind yourself of what may be the worst of them all - but probably gets the least international attention: #Sudan.
For more than two years now, a horrific conflict has been raging in #Sudan. In Human Rights Watch’s Daily Brief today, Andrew Stroehlein reminds readers what’s been happening:
Support Palestine Deep Dive: https://www.palestinedeepdive.com/supportPalestinian journalist Abubaker Abed exposes Israel’s targeting and killing of Palestin...
Pour celles et ceux qui sont encore sur une autre planète du médiavers...
Voici l'ancien chef du #Mossad qui ADMET qu' #Israël AIDE #ISIS. Edward #Snowden et Julian #Assange ont déjà révélé qu’Israël, l’Amérique et le #Royaume-Unidirigent l’ #EI.
Immigration for political reasons is a human right. Immigration for social reasons is a human right. Immigration for safety reasons is a human right. Immigration for economic reasons is a human right. Immigration is a human right.
Lefties posting this shit today. Here’s an idea. Stop burning shit, attacking police, and looting. That would ensure no martial law. Why isn’t that an option?
Sam Altman claims an average ChatGPT query uses 'roughly one fifteenth of a teaspoon' of water theverge.com/news/685045/sam-a…
Altman is a scamming liar.
Here's what Shaolei Ren, an actual expert, just wrote to me:
"Let's just use their numbers as is. It's not clear how they got the water number from energy; the ratio doesn't match with the water efficiency reported by Microsoft.. This type of inconsistency raises concerns with the validity of their statement."
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, in a blog post published Tuesday, says an average ChatGPT query uses about 0.000085 gallons of water, or “roughly one fifteenth of a teaspoon.”
Los Jornaleros del Norte is the name of the band that @ddayen was talking about at the peaceful protests on Monday. THAT is what we need to see. But of course the burning cars are what TV news shows.
Depuis le 9 juin 2025, une caravane humanitaire baptisée Al Soumoud (« la ténacité » en arabe) a quitté Tunis avec un objectif aussi clair que symbolique : rejoindre la bande de Gaza par voie terrestre en traversant la Libye et l’Égypte. Cette initiative, inédite par son ampleur dans la région, entend manifester un soutien populaire fort au peuple palestinien, alors que le siège de Gaza dure depuis novembre 2023.
On June 14—Flag Day—Donald Trump wants tanks in the street and a made-for-TV display of dominance for his birthday. A spectacle meant to look like strength. But real power isn’t staged in Washington. It rises up everywhere else.
Stoller: “Private Equity, UnitedHealth Take a Huge Loss as Oregon Bans Corporate Control of Doctors”.
Here in Canada, the home of single-payer free-for-residents healthcare, we’ve also had financiers rolling up a variety of healthcare operations and we should do like Oregon.
Oregon passes SB 951, a bill that prohibits private equity and corporate decision-making in health care. UnitedHealth Group, Amazon, and private equity lobbied fiercely, but lost. Is it a trend?
"Most of you aren’t from LA, and since I grew up here, went to college here, and have worked here for the past 20 years, I thought I could provide some information and context about what’s going on right now." Thank you @hormiga
Nicholas Conrad
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in reply to Nicholas Conrad • • •