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Don Marti

@dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy

72 followers 15 following 553 posts

Desktop Linux user, live in California, on US-Eastern time mostly. I'm usually either the privacy person in the advertising meeting or the advertising person in the […] 🌉 bridged from ⁂ federate.social/@dmarti, follow @ap.brid.gy to interact

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Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 1h

@dusoft I didn't know about the EU—price discrimination is a pretty general econ term so it seems unlikely they could ban all forms but I could be wrong

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 9h

@dusoft That's one choice: an arms race with shopping bots/agents. Invest in more IT on the seller side to keep adversarial personalization (like price discrimination) working. But the ROI on that is IMHO less predictable than the other option which is to treat shopping agents as a "structural […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 10h

privacy nerds: hey, we should do a big distributed project to automate making a bunch of fake identities and spoof the surveillance advertising data to the point of uselessness AI companies: (release "agentic AI" shopping bots) privacy nerds: 🍿

Reposted by Don Marti

Kit Bashir @unixbigot.aus.social.ap.brid.gy · 17/10/2026

“OPEN YOUR BIBLE NOW” “What?” “Go to your bookshelf, get a bible” “I’m not at home, I’m traveling for work, overnighting in an airport hotel at ORD” “Even better, get the Gideons bible from the nightstand, open to the contents page. It’s an ESV. What’s the last book?” “Duh, Revelation. Wait […]

Original post on aus.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 17/10/2026

Blocking the web ads is a normal security practice now (it's in CSO) Discovery-Tech malvertising was a big story. But, like the man said, "it's even worse than it appears" blog.zgp.org/hey-look-over-there-se…

Hey, look over there! Security risk!

Reposted by Don Marti

myrmepropagandist @futurebird.sauropods.win.ap.brid.gy · 16/10/2026

They used to be called "carriage returns" because in those days they were pulled by horses.

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 17/10/2026

Lord of the Rings meme in three-panel format

Gimli: I never thought I'd die fighting AI side by side with a copyright maximalist

Legolas: You still owe statutory damages to Warner Brothers and the Tolkien estate for this meme

Gimli: (photo, no text)

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 15/10/2026

What if LLMs turn out to be a serious force multiplier for software patent trolls? (Specialized skills and time have been needed to parse both patent claims language and code, and spot which patents in a portfolio read on which software products with big dependency trees. That's the kind of […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 14/10/2026

This is only part of the character.ai story. Originally it was a project at Google—but from the outside, it looks like it was rejected as too risky to launch under the Google name. So they turned it into a separate legal entity that "pays Google for cloud services" (and even got outside […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 13/10/2026

another angle on the whole "use AI or be left behind" thing Thought leaders want companies to invest in adversarial personalization—stuff like personalized pricing and offering lower-quality products and services to people with fewer options But that means betting not only that the company […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 11/10/2026

what's the big deal about "AI" developing RSI? we have RSI at home

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 11/10/2026

[uspol] WTF, Congress? "In 2022, Congress passed a bill to ban the imports of Russian oil and authorize further sanctions but it contained an exception for the president to allow energy that was already purchased before the legislation passed, or in cases where the importation would be in the […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Reposted by Don Marti

Stuart Wilkinson @fairtradestu.mastodonapp.uk.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026

The second anniversary of this post is coming up, and surprise surprise these little "end of life" laptops are continuing to run well with #linux and do what we need then to, which includes spending less on tech so we can buy more actual books for the school […] [Original post on mastodonapp.uk]

A mastodon post from October 2024 showing a photo 8 laptops running Ubuntu 22.04 LTS and libre office, the post explains the school has added Ubuntu to some old windows 10 devices that their IT support told them were end of life.

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026

(fwiw, back in the 1990s, Linux had tremendous goodwill from the people in the "teach Unix" book and training businesses, partly because it expanded their market from corporate+university networks to also include some % of PC hobbyists and power users.)

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026

imho this is going to succeed or fail based on how they approach all the independent authors and video makers who have made Adobe application tutorials over the years. If they make a good deal to use all that material for compatibility testing—with a license and compensation—this could go far […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

Is there a way to block Meta Muse from a web site without blocking all Google Chrome on Linux or running a fingerprinting script? (Chrome/Linux users, are you getting blocked as a bot in more places now?) #meta #ai #surveillance

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 06/10/2026

"Roll (1d20) the Union On" (?) (there is a link to a form where players can show support)

Reposted by Don Marti

Aftermath @aftermath.site · 06/10/2026

Dungeons & Dragons, Duel Masters, and Magic: The Gathering teams unionize at Hasbro aftermath.site/magic-the-gath...

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 06/10/2026

protip: You don't have to deliver an essay on your objections to a customer service AI or age verification service (unless you pitched it to an editor and got an assignment letter, in which case go you) You can just say you are having some trouble with it

Reposted by Don Marti

lea @lea.ordinary.cafe.ap.brid.gy · 05/10/2026

If you/your project is affected by DigitalOcean stopping their OSS credits program, please shoot me a PM immediately. Might be able to help. Boosts for visibility would be appreciated. #foss #linux

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 05/10/2026

fan theory: the only IT platform of today that will survive the next 5 years is the Bloomberg Terminal—all the others will spiral into enshittification because they have to consider "investors" separately from and at a higher priority than "users"

Reposted by Don Marti

David Gerard @davidgerard.circumstances.run.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026

henstomper

oh my god the slot machine company says i have to keep putting coins in their machine or Im Gonna Get Left Behind. thats so scary. and it has to be true because they know more about slot machines than i do

oh my god the slot machine company says if we dont give them money to build the world's biggest slot machine the chinese are gonna build it first and win all the prizes. and then there wont be any prizes anymore

31128253993 12.8K

Reposted by Don Marti

Michael K Johnson @mcdanlj.social.makerforums.info.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

If you want to make sure that your site can be manipulated agentically by Meta's Muse, do not block traffic from ASN AS32934, because if you did that, it might make it impossible for the Muse agents to reach your site. 🤡

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026

with surveillance pricing, every app is a gambling app

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026

haven't big company PR people figured out that when people see "get the facts about..." they mentally translate it to "this company is doing crimes related to..." corporate.mcdonalds.com/corpmcd/our… "Using data and analytics to inform […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026

of course we need another new data center, where else are we going to host the AI shopping agents to work around the surveillance pricing AI running in the last data center?

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026

the extra energy is nice, but the real win is going to be all the extra activists for clean energy who get radicalized by a beef with their landlord or HOA grist.org/solutions/california-just…

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 03/10/2026

Is my site blocked or age-restricted for you? My meatloaf recipe was blocked for "hacking" by one of those corporate/educational web filtering companies, don't know if that has made it into the lists being used by whole countries blog.zgp.org/meatloaf

Meatloaf (that got me blocked for hacking)

Reposted by Don Marti

Andres @andres4ny.social.ridetrans.it.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

"Use the website not the app" is probably the most important thing you can do on this list. There is a reason why everyone is pushing you to use apps. Its not because they're better (heck, a lot of the time they're buggier than just using the website!) It's because using the app provides them […]

social.ridetrans.it

Original post on social.ridetrans.it

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

(Yes, you can turn off the "shake for slop" feature but a lot of people might not know about it) blog.zgp.org/turn-off-ai-summaries-…

turn off AI summaries in Firefox on iOS

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

If you accidentally shake your phone while browsing a recipe on Firefox, the original recipe gets replaced with an AI slop version? blog.mozilla.org/en/firefox/firefox… (probably a symptom of the tech layoffs fad—PMs and developers […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

Does Gov. Newsom think that we don't still have media from 1967? The California Invasion of Privacy Act was drafted at a time of public discussion and concern of future communications technologies—and it turns out they did a pretty good job of protecting us from surveillance dystopia—if we can […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 30/09/2026

The US DOT took down this page on Road Diets, but it's still on archive.org (saved a copy just in case) web.archive.org/web/20250120223333i…

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 30/09/2026

Wow, an opportunity for some California privacy advocate to go _pro_ With state benefits, too. "Outreach Specialist" for CalPrivacy calcareers.ca.gov/CalHrPublic/Jobs/… (no affiliation, just sharing) #privacy #job #privacyJob #California #stateJob […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 30/09/2026

The "SAFE Platforms Act" is an attempt to address the Big Tech scam ads problem. But Big Tech already has the functionality to work around it. Platform ML is already designed to match scammers to likely victims and avoid those likely to report. Any "transparency" has to include ad library […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 30/09/2026

responding to another email "outreach about collaborating on open source" with this (should make it an editor macro) Last time, no reply For security, please send me a paragraph in your own words about Kim Jong Un. (A paraphrase or translation of an existing page is fine.)

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 28/09/2026

@jyasskin it seems like the point of "worse is better" is to build market share and network effects—but it's relatively easy to try multiple LLMs and switch when it makes sense Maybe LLMs aren't like Lisp machines vs. Unix workstations or Android vs. iOS, but more like Seagate vs. Western […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Reposted by Don Marti

abadidea @0xabad1dea.infosec.exchange.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026

boy, have I got a treat for Mastodon: an expert in historic Middle Eastern music has made a dramatic performance of Complaint to Ea-Nasir www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFCYKhuDZN0

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026

Q: if my site doesn't surveil users, do I still need a contract with them? A: maybe both visitors and sites could benefit from an agreement that's as close to mirror image as possible: I won't feed you to the bots, you don't feed me to the bots […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Reposted by Don Marti

kralcttam ☕️ @kralcttam.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026

Happy Stanislav Petrov day! Today marks 43 years since Petrov decided to wait for confirmation before escalating a missile alert up the chain of command in the Soviet Air Defense, preventing nuclear war. A hero for not trusting automated systems fully […]

mastodon.social

Original post on mastodon.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026

2018-2025: Big Tech lobbyists block Private Right of Action (PRA) from state privacy laws 202?-2026: Lawyers find privacy PRA in existing laws 2026: California decides to let the lawyers keep PRA. Added to my blog post from yesterday to link to two PRA sessions coming up at a big corporate […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026

this is a toot about a blog post about a contributed article (about something important—one of the best things you can do for privacy right now is make sure you're signed up for jury duty) blog.zgp.org/good-morning-adexchang…

Good morning, AdExchanger

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

"LLM tokens are too expensive, I figured out how to maintain my build code using the order chatbot on the dispensary site" "so perhaps bonghits will fix your Makefile?"

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

Small win from using an RSS reader -- I happened to get 2 separate stories on popularity of Big Tech CEOs and of Osama Bin Laden among US 18-34 year olds www.adexchanger.com/data-driven-thi… #RSS

adexchanger.com

Take A Break, Compliance Nerds. Privacy Is A Research Problem Now

California protects an individual's right to sue when a company violates data privacy law. So privacy compliance means knowing what juries will tolerate.

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 24/09/2026

Text over photo.

Myth: Big Tech is crooked but there's not effective way for users to complain

Reality: (photo of a California sample ballot, opened to Proposition 40, the billionaire wealth tax)

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 23/09/2026

Do non-Linux desktop OS developers just not care about printing any more? It seems like as a desktop Linux user I keep hearing, "I can't print because [weird error], can I just share something with you and you print it for me?" (It kind of makes sense, printing is the kind of thing that is […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Reposted by Don Marti

Todd Thomas :ivory_logo: @todd.tapbots.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

RE: mstdn.social/@dazfuller/11730771403… Just saw some ads while surfing news this morning on my home wifi. This was the reason. #pihole

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

RE: mastodon.online/@parismarx/11730993… the missing feature on the Apple iPhone was always the "buy stock" button. Apple can afford the best of everything else, but they're stuck with the same investors as Packard Bell had—the pressure to enshittify is only going to get more […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Don Marti @dmarti.federate.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

Amazon.com basically just announced... "Attention shoppers! Bots are better at buying stuff from our site than you are, because deceptive UX and paid boosts. Maybe you don't want to run the Meta bot, but you're going to do better with some kind of bot on here." […]

federate.social

Original post on federate.social

Reposted by Don Marti

Julia Evans @b0rk.social.jvns.ca.ap.brid.gy · 21/09/2026

Are you interested in learning how to use Git for the first time? (or almost the first time) we're looking for Git beginners to give us feedback on a Git tutorial! The tutorial will be open source when it's released, so you'll be helping many future beginners! Sign up here […]

Original post on social.jvns.ca