Serge Egelman

Yosemite as seen from the top of Lembert Dome.

Yours truly at the top of Lembert Dome in Yosemite.

Yosemite as seen from the top of Lembert Dome.

Deer in the woods.

Just got back from touching some grass!

This is precisely the argument Meta made in the Flo case: they only release tools for developers, how the developers use those tools are totally beyond Meta's control! ("Guns don't kill people...")

Luckily, the jury saw through that.

Yes, but this isn’t that: ample evidence was presented at trial here showing that Meta was fully aware of the data it was receiving.

The only choice the developer really makes is to embed the FB tracker. Everything that happens after that is within Meta’s control.

The point is that (1) Meta was aware it was receiving this data and (2) Meta chose to do nothing about it (because that data is profitable to them).

Meta has the ability to terminate API access to any app violating their ToS. They don’t, because they want the data.

That’s not really true. The whole issue here is that Meta designed the tracker to intentionally collect sensitive data, and despite Meta’s admonishment to developers to not send them sensitive data, Meta knows that many developers are sending them that data, which Meta also happens to profit from.

Brisket sitting on my smoker about to be turned into pastrami.

…and now with that behind me, it’s time to smoke some pastrami!

Meta violated privacy law, jury says in menstrual data fight The jury got to decide how seriously Big Tech takes privacy, the attorney for a class of Flo users said in closing arguments.

www.courthousenews.com/meta-violate...

So, umm, in other news, @jengolbeck.bsky.social and I are partially responsible for Meta now being liable for several billion dollars.

...and Flo has now settled, leaving the jury to deliberate only on Meta's culpability under CIPA. Closing arguments are first thing tomorrow!

39.

Imagine a fast food chain, while being sued for causing a salmonella outbreak, claiming as their defense that they don’t subscribe to the germ theory of disease.

Have they considered whether their customers will find that explanation satisfying after the trial concludes?

Seriously. Their primary argument is that device identifiers—sent to Meta specifically for the purpose of identifying people—are “deidentified data” simply because they don’t contain people’s names.

Later this morning I’m heading across the bridge for week 2 of the Flo Health trial.

It is absolutely wild to me that a company that relies on millions of people to trust it with their health information has settled on a defense of “we don’t understand what personally-identifiable means.”

The notice of proposed rulemaking is going to be lit.

Apropos, jury trial in SF kicks off tomorrow against Flo Health (and Meta) for sharing this type of data with advertisers.

it isn’t hyperbole, donald trump has pardoned more child sex offenders than any president in american history

Privacy Act says what?

Someone needs to goad these guys into writing a paper, submitting it for review, and then publicly posting the reviews.

AI is a tool (sorry!) that people who are bad at their jobs will use badly and that people who are good at their jobs will maybe, possibly find some uses for. People who are terrible at their jobs (many executives), will tell their employees that they “need” to use AI, that their jobs depend on it, that they must become more productive, and that becoming an AI-first company is the strategy that will save them from the old failed strategy, which itself was the new strategy after other failed business models. The only journalism business strategy that works, and that will ever work in a sustainable way, is if you create something of value that people (human beings, not bots) want to read or watch or listen to, and that they cannot find anywhere else.

This is very good.

www.404media.co/the-medias-p...

…up until the point that the scientists realize that they’re doing marketing and not science, and then flee.

But that happens long after next quarter’s earnings report!

Napoleon Dynamite.

I was reminded of this article, which explains why no one ever dies on planes:

archive.ph/lqVkd

Also, why is he still hanging around the department? He was denied tenure years ago:
www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/bac...

(The sad truth is that he's probably been turned into an adjunct.)

a man with a beard is driving a car with his arm out the window . Alt: The Dude from The Big Lebowski

Also obligatory...

Movie you’ve watched more than 6 times (hard mode, no SW, ST, or LOTR)

Uhh, which sites? Sites available to California consumers have needed them under CalOPPA since 2004.

It’s not really just Musk’s unreality, though: the myth of massive government waste has been used by conservatives for my entire lifetime as a manufactured excuse to cut basic services (usually for the poor).

Reason #537 why I no longer subscribe!

Ok, fine, you forced me into it: I just bought the hardcover version :)