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Trump refuses to say if he wants Ukraine to win the war
  • That would be after the low hanging fruit of Moldova. Neighbors Ukraine, Constitutionally neutral, does not admit stationing foreign military troops on its territory, can only be altered by referendum, and not at all during a state of national emergency, martial law or war.

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    Kamala Picking Governor Walz for VP Is a Win for the Right-to-Repair Movement
  • I'm less surprised by that than the exclusion of video game consoles.
    Didn't know the Nintendo lobby was a formidable adversary up there.

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    Black Lives Matter demands DNC host virtual primary
  • It’s not like there was a Warren-level progressive in the running.

    And if there were, we know from 2020 there'd still be cosplay communists insisting she wasn't progressive enough.

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  • gizmodo.com Kamala Picking Governor Walz for VP Is a Win for the Right-to-Repair Movement

    The Minnesota governor signed one of the country’s most consequential and expansive laws aimed at helping people fix their own stuff.

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    pirg.org "Smart" Washing Machines are Dumb

    For a machine designed to pour water on clothes and spin them around, “smart” washing machines are over-engineered and inconvenient.

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    California Passes Right-to-Repair Act Guaranteeing Seven Years of Parts for Your Phone.
  • iFixit noted yesterday, "Though the bill is strong and should make repairs more available for everyone, it allows manufacturers to continue to engage in parts pairing, a practice by which they limit repairs with software blocks. They can also combine parts into expensive assemblies, which makes repairs more expensive."

    Similarly doubt there's any way to legislate against the dismal engineering that tempts a failure avalanche like the Ford F150 taillight horrorshow I posted a few days ago.

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  • hackaday.com When Tail Lights Lose Touch With Reality

    To study the history of the automobile is to also be a student of technological progress — as with each decade’s models come new innovations to make them better handling, more corrosion…

    Water gets into 2018 Ford truck tail light assembly, corrodes connectors, disables vehicle, $5600 repair.

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    www.iowapublicradio.org Midwest farmers aren't allowed to fix their own tractors. And many right-to-repair bills are stalled

    Farmers and ranchers across the Midwest say regulation is the only path forward to fixing their own equipment. But there’s been strong opposition to right to repair legislation, as manufacturers argue they’ve provided pathways for quick repairs.

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    github.com GitHub - Clemapfel/Mousetrap.jl: Finally, a GUI Engine made for Julia

    Finally, a GUI Engine made for Julia. Contribute to Clemapfel/Mousetrap.jl development by creating an account on GitHub.

    Initial commit was June 11. Documentation is here.

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    > Holly Borgmann, vice president of government affairs for ADT, Boca Raton, Fla., said that while these types of laws may make sense for some industries, tools and manuals that could enable someone to disarm an alarm or reroute an emergency signal should remain proprietary. Borgmann is an SIA board member and vice chair of the SIA government affairs committee.

    A security system that can be repaired without notifying the monitoring service, nor sending any suspicious signals, is a security system that can be defeated independent of right to repair legislation. Likewise, if the monitoring service can't verify repairs to be authorized by the customer, they can't handle response to an ordinary alarm.

    The site specific data of an alarm panel is generally uploaded remotely by the monitoring service using the communication system through which the panel is monitored. That data is retained by the monitoring service in the event it needs restored, or for use as a template should it need modified. This is a trivial operation if there are any doubts regarding the integrity of the programming.

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    grist.org Why e-bike companies are embracing recycling while fighting repair

    E-bikes are a climate-friendly way to get around, but the industry opposes laws that would make them easier to fix.

    "In a letter sent to New York Governor Kathy Hochul in December, People for Bikes asked that e-bikes be excluded from the state’s forthcoming digital right-to-repair law... The letter cited 'an unfortunate increase in fires, injuries and deaths attributable to personal e-mobility devices' including e-bikes. Many of these fires, People for Bikes claimed in the letter, 'appear to be caused by consumers and others attempting to service these devices themselves,' including tinkering with the batteries at home. Before Hochul signed the right-to-repair bill, it was revised to exempt e-bikes.

    "Asked for data to back up the claim that e-bike fires were being caused by unauthorized repairs, Lovell said that it was 'anecdotal, from folks that are on the ground in New York.'"

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    the hacker's dictionary
  • Recommend also the seminal TMRC dictionary for several terms absent here, plus some memorably elegant definitions:

    Kludge: A crock that works.
    Crock: A kludge that doesn't work.

    Same again true of Peter Samson's original 1959 and 1960 editions.

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  • www.nytimes.com Fixing Your Laptop at Home Should Be Easy. Here’s Why It’s Not.

    Framework’s laptop proves that it can be easy to repair your devices at home. But most companies won’t let you.

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    www.repairerdrivennews.com Mass. Right to Repair Committee: NHTSA’s take on Data Access Law ‘incorrect’

    In the ongoing “right to repair” lawsuit in Massachusetts, in which the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently agreed with the plaintiff Alliance for Automotive…

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    https:// toolboom.com /en/articles-and-video/led-light-bulb-diy-repair-at-home

    I don't propose any and every repair guide on the Internet relevant to post; we could easily drown in them.

    What sets this one apart? Not sure why, but it never occurred to me that LED lightbulbs could be repaired.

    Almost want to set up a drop box for burned out LED bulbs to give it a try. I don't imagine them equally repairable. Provided it caught on as a niche hobby, I expect something on the order of Open Repair Data could be collected on this topic alone.

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    pirg.org How printers keep us hooked on expensive ink

    Manufacturers lock us into buying ink cartridges at exorbitant prices. There are simple steps to end the ink trap.

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