Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

Word salad with all caps

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense.

Almost as fun as hiking the Appalachian Trail.

This blog is Obama’s Katrina.

Wetsuit optional.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

This is how realignments happen…

Hot Air and Ill Informed Banter

I thought we were promised Infrastructure Week

Saul Alinsky is my co-pilot

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

This is a big f—–g deal.

Good luck with your asparagus.

Also, too.

Too inconsequential to be sued

Where tasty lettuce and good mustard aren’t elitist.

Shock troops for the Unitarian Jihad.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Reality always wins in the end.

No one could have predicted…

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Tech News and Issues

Trump Crime Cartel Open Thread: Sarah Cooper Fans Rejoice – TikTok Is *SAVED!*

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Repubs have been putting the ‘less’ in ‘shameless’ any time these past fifty years, but you’d think this kind of blatant ‘Anything you want, as long as I get a little taste in return’ would at least prompt some *token* pretense at embarrassment…

Every single GOP legislator is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Trump Crime Cartel, Inc.

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BJ Hive Mind: Android Phone and Windows Laptop Request

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One of our jackals has an ancient Android phone that needs to be replaced, and needs our help.

Wyatt would love to draw upon the collective wisdom of the Balloon Juice community and cast the widest possible net in order to thoroughly research options before making a decision.

One thing is absolute:  He wants to stay with an Android phone and a laptop running Windows 10.

In his own words:

I’m not working and don’t have a gazillion $$$ for a high end model, but still want to do as much research as possible to find the best available model for my budget.  I also need to buy a laptop, though the smartphone is my first priority.

Fellow jackals, when you want to find a thorough/authoritative review of a new smartphone, laptop, tablet, or software program are there any sources that you would consult in addition to the ones listed below?

CNET, ComputerWorld, Consumer Reports, PC Magazine, PCWorld, Techradar, Tom’s Guide, Wirecutter, and ZDNet

Suggestions for specific hardware are also most welcome and appreciated!

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Monday Morning Open Thread: Tick… Tock…

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I don’t know how seriously anyone took the Squatter-in-Chief’s weekend threat to ‘ban TikTok’, but the most likely route to doing so would be getting some Big Swinging Dork like Mike Pompeo to declare it a national security threat. (Yes, it may even *be* a security threat, but so is Donald Trump and just about every member of the Trump crime family and the Republican Party, and you don’t see Pompeo bitching about them.)

Well, threat ‘temporarily’ averted, and who knows where we’ll all be by mid-September?

President Donald Trump only agreed to allow Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) to negotiate the acquisition of popular short-video app TikTok if it could secure a deal in 45 days, three people familiar with the matter said on Sunday.

The move represents an about-face for Trump and prompted the U.S. tech giant to declare its interest in the blockbuster social media deal that could further inflame U.S.-China relations. Trump said on Friday he was planning to ban TikTok amid concerns that its Chinese ownership represents a national security risk because of the personal data it handles.

The proposed acquisition of TikTok, which boasts 100 millions U.S. users, would offer Microsoft a rare opportunity to become a major competitor to social media giants such as Facebook Inc (FB.O) and Snap Inc (SNAP.N). Microsoft also owns professional social media network LinkedIn.

Trump had dismissed the idea of a sale to Microsoft on Friday. But following a discussion between Trump and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, the Redwood, Washington-based company said in a statement on Sunday that it would continue negotiations to acquire TikTok from ByteDance, and that it aimed to reach a deal by Sept. 15.

This is a deadline that was put to ByteDance and Microsoft by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which scrutinizes deals for potential national security risks, according to the sources.

Trump changed his mind following pressure from some of his advisers and many in his Republican party, one of the sources said. Banning TikTok would alienate many of its young users ahead of the U.S. presidential election in November, and would likely trigger a wave of legal challenges. Several prominent Republican lawmakers put out statements in the last two days urging Trump to back a sale of TikTok to Microsoft…

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I’m Beginning to Think Facebook is in a Spot of Bother

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When I read that REI, Patagonia and North Face pulled their Facebook and Instagram ads over Facebook being Facebook and letting Trump and Trumpists spew hate, I thought it was probably a limited campaign. Those high end outdoor brands are quick to boycott, but none of them are behemoths. Ben and Jerry’s is another brand that boycotted shortly thereafter, and they’re in the same boat as the first three.

Then, Verizon, which spent about $2 million on Facebook and Instagram in the last 30 days, said they’re out. They’re the 78th biggest advertiser on Facebook, so that’s kind of a big deal. They were one of the specific targets of the Anti-Defamation League’s campaign against Facebook.

Now there’s this:

The messaging service Viber, the fifth biggest with more than a billion users around the world, is severing all ties to Facebook as part of a growing boycott of the company by commercial partners. […]

On Wednesday, Viber pulled all advertising from Facebook and its sister app Instagram. Now, the company has begun the more labour-intensive process of removing all Facebook technology from Viber’s own apps.

The company uses a number of Facebook tools, [CEO] Agaoua said. Facebook Connect enables a “login with Facebook” button, common in apps and on websites across the world, while Viber also integrates with Giphy, an animated gif search engine that Facebook bought in May.

It’s one thing to kill ads, but quite another to disable single-signon with Facebook. I’ll wager that feature isn’t coming back, and it’s a big deal when a billion-person platform decides to reject signons from your multi-billion-person platform. And disabling Giphy might seem like a joke, but it’s still another instance of Facebook losing market penetration. (Since Viber competes with Facebook Messenger, this is probably a good competitive move, too, but Facebook gave them a good excuse.)

I don’t get Zuckerberg’s angle here. He could have done what Twitter did –walk away from political ads and give Trump a couple of tiny slaps on the wrist — and probably skated by. Instead, he decided to throw his lot in with the haters and the dummies, showing the world that Facebook is where stupid old people go to read an Internet of hot garbage.

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Saturday Morning Open Thread: A New ‘Normal’

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The announcement is the point

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As you’ve undoubtedly heard, Trump is rummaging through the executive order toy box again, this time to punish tech companies that are mean to him. This morning, he tweet-screamed the following: “This will be a Big Day for Social Media and FAIRNESS!” Reuters reporters saw a draft of the EO and provided an overview in the wee hours:

The executive order would call for the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to propose and clarify regulations under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a federal law largely exempting online platforms from legal liability for the material their users post. Such changes could expose tech companies to more lawsuits.

The order asks the FCC to examine whether actions related to the editing of content by social media companies should potentially lead to the firms forfeiting their protections under section 230.

It requires the agency to look at whether a social media platform uses deceptive policies to moderate content and if its policies are inconsistent with its terms of service.

The draft order also states that the White House Office of Digital Strategy will re-establish a tool to help citizens report cases of online censorship. The tool will collect complaints of online censorship and submit them to the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

It requires the FTC to look into whether complaints violate the law, develop a report describing such complaints and make the report publicly available.

It’s so confusing when creeping authoritarianism arrives not in jackboots but in a soiled diaper. Maybe I’ll regret not being more alarmed by this, but my initial take is that Trump is putting on a show, much as House Republicans did when they held hearings on alleged Big Tech bias against conservatives.

That event featured clowns like Diamond and Silk whining about their alleged “shadow-banning” on Facebook, which turned out to be a misunderstanding of how settings affect content delivery. The FTC complaints report will likely provide a similar outlet for idiotic grievance-mongering.

Maybe Trump’s real object was this, also from the linked Reuters piece:

Twitter’s shares were down over 4 percent in pre-market trade on Thursday. Facebook fell nearly 2 percent and Google was down 1 percent.

Stock market manipulation is included in Trump’s extremely limited skill set. But the real point is the splashy announcement. It always is with Trump, from licensing deals for sketchy real estate development schemes to the commission investigating non-existent voter fraud to the Ukraine shakedown and the recent “Obamagate” meeping.

I’m more worried about Big Tech’s subversion of democracy and society for its own moneymaking purposes than anything the crybaby in the White House might do.

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The Panopticon Intensifies

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…as we all said it would. Majority Leader McConnell wants to amend the USA PATRIOT Act (possibly the most ridiculous legislative acronym ever) to make it worse.

There is a portion of the Act, Section 215, which authorizes the FBI to seize “any tangible thing” relating to the subject of an investigation, without a warrant. Mitch’s legislation would expand the definition of tangible things to include web browsing history. I don’t think I need to drone on about how this is very bad.

Senator Wyden (D-OR), consistently one of the best on this issue, filed an amendment that would have excluded browser history. It failed 59-37. Notably absent from the vote were Senators Sanders and Murray. Feinstein, Manchin, the rest of the usual suspects, and also Kaine for some reason voted no.

Sanders and Murray better have damn good excuses, because this is not a power that any Attorney General–to say nothing of Barr–should have. Section 215 is a travesty; expanding it is unconscionable. Shame on everybody in the Democratic caucus who opposed this amendment, or didn’t bother to show up and vote.

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