Steve Owens

Anti-Surveillance Mapmaker Refuses Flock Safety's Cease and Desist Flock Safety loves to crow about the thousands of local law enforcement agencies around the United States that have adopted its avian-themed automated license plate readers (ALPRs). But when a

We are thankful to DeFlock.me for mapping automated license plate readers nationwide and standing up to bullying by surveillance vendor Flock Safety. www.eff.org/deeplinks/2...

A drawing of a pumpkin with the text Happy Thanksgiving below it.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Border Patrol is monitoring US drivers and detaining those with ‘suspicious’ travel patterns - The Boston Globe The predictive intelligence program has resulted in people being stopped, searched, and in some cases arrested.

Another reason to restrict the use of automated licence plate readers www.bostonglobe.com/2025/11/20/n...

How Cops Can Get Your Private Online Data Can the cops get your online data? In short, yes. There are a variety of US federal and state laws which give law enforcement powers to obtain information that you provided to online services. But,

Law enforcement have a lot of tools when it comes to accessing your personal information, which is why the sites and apps you use need to know the law– and when to push back.https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/06/how-cops-can-get-your-private-online-data

The Republican president is a pedophile who has doubled my healthcare costs and let scores of violent criminals out of jail. But a Democratic mayor-elect wants to make busses free in a city I don't live in. I have never felt more politically homeless.

I think, of all the slides in this report, this is the most important -- it's really worth examining closely. This illustrates why the triumph of electrotechnical is inevitable.

🚨 Scam Alert 🚨
Scammers are sending fake emails posing as City of Cambridge employees and asking for permit payments.

If you get a suspicious email, don’t click links — call the department directly.

🔗 Learn more: https://camb.ma/4oQHXLo

“They were careless people, Tom and Daisy- they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”
- F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

Watertown Shuttle to Open New Route to Public, Watertown TMA Looking for Transportation Improvements For several years, the City of Watertown has been looking for ways to supplement the MBTA’s bus service in town and provide more options for people to get around town and commute. The most visible one...

www.watertownmanews.com/2025/10/22/w...

Logo for the musical Les Miserables. Okay, maybe Louis Philippe I wasn't a "real" king, but he was still king.

But if there were a real king, there wouldn't be a protest.

King John signs the Magna Carta after his barons rebelled.

But if there were a real king, there wouldn't be a protest.

The Destruction of Tea at Boston Harbor

But if there were a real king, there wouldn't be a protest.

This doesn’t even show the overflow folks closer to the Parkman Bandstand.

A graphic with a image of a sky with clouds, at the bottom of the page are three rows of solar panels in various shades of blue. In the center of the graphic is a mock energy bill with a title that says "We're Suing Trump's EPA for attacking affordable clean energy programs for low-income households"

A blue graphic with an image of two solar panels in the bottom right corner. Title text reads "What is Solar for All?" body copy says "Solar for All is a federal EPA program that provides residential solar to low-income and disadvantaged communities across the country to lower energy bills and create jobs. The elimination of this program would take $7 billion in grant funding from various solar projects intended to make solar power accessible to more than 900,000 lower-income Americans."

The Solar for All program ensures no community is left behind in the transition to solar and that every resident feels the benefits – from breathing cleaner air to more affordable utility bills.

The Trump Administration is attempting to illegally gut this program – we’re fighting back and suing.

The 2026 gubernatorial race is going to be so insufferable.

We’re not dealing with brilliant strategists cleverly laying traps, we’re dealing with impulsive whiners whose advantage is contempt for laws, norms, and morality.

They’re not pulling some elaborate trick, they’re just willing—even eager—to do things regular, principled people consider off limits.

New dashboard shows exactly how much federal funding Mass. is losing out on under Trump Many Massachusetts residents are at risk of losing their Medicaid coverage, SNAP benefits, and more under the funding cuts.

New dashboard shows exactly how much federal funding Mass. is losing out on under Trump trib.al/2stsXRv

ICE to Buy Tool that Tracks Locations of Hundreds of Millions of Phones Every Day Documents show that ICE has gone back on its decision to not use location data remotely harvested from peoples' phones. The database is updated every day with billions of pieces of location data.

ICE is buying a location tracking tool that harvests data from hundreds of millions of phones a day. Protect your location data by updating a few settings on your phone 🧵 (1/4): www.404media.co/ice-to-buy-...

A Fox News report in September that intermingled images of the small nightly protests at an ICE facility in Portland over the summer with video from the much larger 2020 protests prompted the president to say he “didn’t know that was still going on,” and to threaten to send in troops.

Trump is literally a confused fox news grandpa

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/28/u...

Trump Is Setting the National Parks Up to Fail Workers say the real crisis is happening behind the scenes.

The National Park System truly is America's best idea. The fact that Trump is out to destroy it is not the worst thing he's doing, but it's part & parcel of his administration's goal of plundering our shared national resources.
www.theatlantic.com/science/2025...

Some of us are old enough to remember the huge brouhaha over the memorial for Paul Wellstone.

How times have changed...

LA County moves to limit license plate data sharing amid ICE raids State law prohibits local police from assisting federal immigration enforcement in California

ALPRs can still be abused given the sheer volume of data collected and the lack of transparency in who can request it. “What we actually need, if we want these laws to mean something, are robust oversight measures,” EFF’s @maassive.bsky.social told Spectrum News 1.
spectrumnews1.com/ca/southern...

📣 Attention Cambridge families! 🎠 One of the biggest family events of the year is TOMORROW, September 20! Enjoy a fun-filled day of amusement rides, activities, arts and crafts, giveaways, music, food & more at Danehy Park Family Day. 🥳 More info: https://camb.ma/3yWQybr

Internet of Things that want to show you ads….

What happened to Jimmy Kimmel is not about one comedian who said something he should not have said. The Trump administration and its enforcers want to control your speech, your behavior, even your public expressions of mourning. You are not allowed to criticize the president’s associates. You do not even retain the right to remain silent; you must make public expressions of emotions demanded by the administration and its allies or incur its disfavor, which can threaten your livelihood. This is the road to totalitarianism, and it does not end with one man losing his television show.

The Republican reaction to Kirk’s murder has been a campaign of state repression that ends with Trumpist toadies deciding what Americans are allowed to think, do and say. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

'No rhyme or reason': AI grading issue affects hundreds of MCAS essays The use of AI to score Massachusetts’ standardized MCAS tests resulted in errors that affected hundreds of exams, the NBC10 Investigators learned.

Nothing could possibliy go wrong when AI intersects with high stakes testing. www.nbcboston.com/investigatio...

Flag at half mast in front of Watertown, MA fire station

Sky the same cloudless blue it was 24 years ago.

Bostonians from neighborhoods of color nearly 4 times more likely to be struck by cars across city, data show - The Boston Globe Residents of predominantly non-white neighborhoods are more likely to commute longer distances without a car, putting them at greater risk, researchers said.

Really tired of listening to right-wing politicians claim bike lanes are bougie infrastructure sought by rich white people when street calming will disproportionately benefit poor people of color who don't have cars! www.bostonglobe.com/2025/09/09/m...

Route 70 detour:
Route 70 detoured Sunday, September 7, from 11 AM to 4 PM, due to the Cambridge Carnival. Service will terminate at Mass Ave @ Pearl St. The nearest outbound connection is Western Ave @ Green St.
Updated: 2025-09-05 14:40:05 (Eastern).