Category Archives: Quick Commentary

Dispatches From The Rotting Carcass

Cover Image: “White-backed vultures eating a dead wildebeest” by Magnus Kjaergaard is licensed under CC BY 3.0 .

The FCC Will Be Gutted And You WILL REJOICE

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/03/fcc-democrat-to-resign-cementing-republican-majority-for-chairman-carr (https://archive.is/3bAAG)

Straight from the Project 2025 playbook is the gutting of the FCC, which will take a back seat to corporate interests. I guarantee you that there are telecom companies waiting to carve up that precious radio spectrum like an expensive Christmas turkey.

The people will be asked to comment but it isn’t like we’ll be listened to:

We already know what to expect from this:

It’s a massive “deregulation initiative,” a codeword for “party over here!”

Look for the public use rights around 900 MHz to go away. Let’s also take away more of the amateur spectrum while we’re at it guys!

Elon Musk denies selling Starlink to Russia after Ukraine claims use in war

Moscow says SpaceX’s internet service ‘cannot be officially used here in any way’.

Source: Elon Musk denies selling Starlink to Russia after Ukraine claims use in war

I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised Starlink made its way over to Russia. I’m hoping to be surprised if Elon does something about it. I’m not holding my breath. Effective altruists don’t really care about the present day and it doesn’t take the chosen one any closer to mars, so….

“How To Build A Fully Offline Smart Home, Or Why You Should Not” fully agree with major blogs that seem to just give a nod to “hacking”

Unfortunately this Hackaday article, while starting out strong just drops a cynical load of “everything is bad so just let the internet control your home.”

So-called ‘smart home’ appliances and gadgets have become an ever-more present thing the past years, with nary a coffeemaker, AC unit or light bulb for sale today that doesn’t have an associated smartphone app, cloud service and/or subscription to enable you to control it from the beach during your vacation, or just set up automation routines to take tedium out of your busy schedule. Yet as much

Source: How To Build A Fully Offline Smart Home, Or Why You Should Not

Microsoft introduces flighting for Windows Server insiders

Microsoft has launched flighting for Windows Server systems enrolled in its Windows Insider open software testing program. […]

Source: Microsoft introduces flighting for Windows Server insiders

I have yet to meet anyone using insider builds, let alone an expensive Windows Server license for an insider build. Free licensing for insiders would be a boon for Microsoft, provided the licensee can pass some basic requirements (testing, not in prod, etc). But it’s been some years since Microsoft ditched the whole Technet license thing and I don’t think we’ll ever see holistic QA from Microsoft, not when their testers all probably write malware after discovering flaws in early releases. 🤣

Image in article.