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John Gruber on Annoying Sharing Bars

Over on Daring Fireball, John Gruber has some true words to say about those pesky floating sharing bars (or “dickbars” like he calls them) used by Medium and others.

A website should not fight the browser. Let the browser provide the chrome, and simply provide the content. Web developers know this is right — these dickbars are being rammed down their throats by SEO experts. The SEO folks are the same dopes who came up with the genius strategy of requiring 5-10 megabytes of privacy-intrusive CPU-intensive JavaScript on every page load that slows down websites. Now they come to their teams and say, “Our pages are too slow — we gotta move to AMP so our pages load fast.”

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New Scientist goes independent

My main source of scientific news since childhood has gone independent. The future for the magazine looks bright I hope.

We are pleased to announce that New Scientist has been acquired by a company set up specifically to publish the magazine. This marks a return to independent ownership and operation for the first time in several decades.

I might even go back on my words in this tweet:

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Microsoft’s Role in WannaCry

Sam Biddle wrote for the Intercept on the recent WannaCry malware disaster. According to Sam, it’s not possible to name a single culprit for what happened, but militarism and greed are the two main forces at play here.  This bit stood out to me:

Microsoft also did not create WannaCry. But it did create something something nearly as bad: Windows Vista, an operating system so horrendously bloated, broken, and altogether unpleasant to use that many PC users back in 2007 skipped upgrading altogether, opting instead to stick with the outdated Windows XP, a decision that has left many people on that decade-and-a-half-old operating system even today, years after Microsoft stopped updating it.

I recommend reading the full original article here: https://theintercept.com/2017/05/16/the-real-roots-of-the-worldwide-ransomware-outbreak-militarism-and-greed/

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Podcast: Chatting about WordCamp Helsinki

I was a guest on the 7th episode of the only Finnish-language WordPress podcast around, Se Alkuperäinen WordPress Podcast . We chatted about attending WordCamps, organizing WordCamps and the upcoming WordCamp Helsinki in particular. This year I’m not on the organising team but I’ll be giving a lightning talk on the WordPress Customizer.

Jakso 7: WordCamp Finland

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Good For The EU, But

Some very sad conclusions regarding Brexit by analysts working for Algebris Investments on the World Economic Forum website.

Brexit is a symptom of Britain’s deeply rooted economic imbalances: a growth model too concentrated on finance and services and dependent on foreign goods, human and financial capital; record-high social and wealth inequality; a lack of investment in infrastructure and education; and monetary and fiscal policies that have helped create a property bubble and excess household debt.

In their attempt to create a fairer and more equal country, Britons sought to sever ties from what they saw as a weakened partner. The reality is that Brexit will likely make Britain weaker and, ironically, is making the EU stronger.

I recommend reading the full article here: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/04/brexit-european-union-negotiations/

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R.I.P. Leonard Cohen

And even though
It all went wrong
I’ll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah

Leonard Cohen, 1934–2016