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Latest 30 Comments

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By Cloversheen, 22 Apr 2026 at 4:59 pm UTC

It's starting to get REALLY expensive to compete with the already established tech giants....

And this is still just populism. No-one wants to be seen as "weak on extremists" or be accused of not "wanting to protect the children" (both terms are drenched in deep double speak and dog whistling).

Everyone is trying to kick the can to someone else, it's a lot easier. Facebook wants the kick age validation to governments, politicians want to be seen kicking the can to companies.

Companies should take responsibility, and so should governments. This is neither taking responsibility, and is just a bunch of theater.

Sorry, old man ranting again.
(At least the coffee price is down somewhat!)

News - Live out your witchy dreams in the open world adventure Witchspire in June
By Cloversheen, 22 Apr 2026 at 4:42 pm UTC

Cartoony witches and cute familiars?

Colour me intrigued. 🐱

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By vic-bay, 22 Apr 2026 at 4:27 pm UTC

how about targeting actual extremists in actual places where extremists dwell

News - 11 bit studios are totally remaking This War of Mine
By GoEsr, 22 Apr 2026 at 4:12 pm UTC

Doesn't really need to be brought up to "current standards" whatever that means, but there are a few QoL things that could be fixed up with a remake, especially with the excursions or whatever they're called. I've had buildings softlock more times than I care for.

News - Colorado Age Attestation bill gets amendments to have open source excluded
By Purple Library Guy, 22 Apr 2026 at 3:43 pm UTC

Quoting: Arehandoro
Quoting: Purple Library Guy
Quoting: GerarderloperI do wonder how long until this extends to ALL software. Imagine having to have your face and id scanned to play a game or use an adobe app.
Could be worse. What if instead of your id, they wanted to scan your superego?
One would hope that only happens in Nietzsche applications.
You know, the Jung people aren't going to understand these jokes.

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By dimko, 22 Apr 2026 at 3:32 pm UTC

Quoting: hardpenguinGood. It's time for gaming companies to take responsibility for spaces they own but opened to public.

You would ban an actively harmful and violent person out of your bar, football pitch, or book club, wouldn't you? This is the same.
Define actively harmful. I send my Turkish lady friend a joke about hitler and khm... sex toys, and it contained swastika. Or swastika MADE of sex toys. Which she loved and was laughing about. Am I actively harmful? Its just power grab by crazy people in head of state of AU. Nothing else. Anyone who is not opposing it is brain washed.

News - Mozilla using Claude Mythos AI Preview to help fix major security issues in Firefox
By elmapul, 22 Apr 2026 at 3:17 pm UTC

Quoting: Mountain ManUsing AI to fix security holes in software is like using window screen to repair a hole in a bucket.
its not to fix, but to find, then an human being can confirm the issue is real (not an halucination) and fix it.

News - Framework Laptop 13 Pro revealed with major changes and great Linux support
By uzay, 22 Apr 2026 at 3:13 pm UTC

I wish they weren't promoting and supporting fascists so I could appreciate them for their products.
https://gardinerbryant.com/the-omarchy-framework-thing/

News - US operating system age verification bill "Parents Decide Act" gets published
By Linuxwarper, 22 Apr 2026 at 2:43 pm UTC

US, the country where they sell insulin for free and excessively accept all valid insurances claims, land where justice prevails and CEOs and elites are given living wages for bare necessities like fuel, food and housing, are now passing bills to protect child so fast one has to ask what other wonderful things their parlamentary excellence will bring fourth tomorrow. We should do our part too and encourage our representatives to pass a bill to make all smartphone cameras controllable by federal government and local, so that law enforcement can track down the baddies without back doors. Noone likes backdoors, certainly not us penguins, so lets remove those also. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By SirMCJeager, 22 Apr 2026 at 2:25 pm UTC

Just more government control that ultimately will not yield any results. So glad I don't live in Australia.

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By Vardy, 22 Apr 2026 at 2:21 pm UTC

Comparing MS Paint to online platforms makes no sense. This isn't about how you use software, it's about how you regulate online platforms. Roblox, Minecraft and Steam are not "games" per se (unless you stick to single player Minecraft). Just thought you should be made aware of a very simple difference. Grooming, for example, has been widely reported on Roblox.
Also, you can use your printer to print whatever you like. You shouldn't be able to parade around promoting your hate speech and using your printed hate symbol in public. It's a serious debate, and sadly it seems a bunch of people commenting here don't even seem to understand the nature of the subject itself. I personally believe in banning n*z1s and groomers everywhere possible (by the same argument hardpenguin stated), but I don't know, that's my non-n*z1 non groomer perspective.

News - Streaming or recording on Linux? Check out the audio management tool Pipeweaver
By walther von stolzing, 22 Apr 2026 at 2:05 pm UTC

Quoting: Cley_Faye
Quoting: WORMI can’t help but think a similar tool targeting Windows would be super janky and cost $20.
VoiceMeeter is actually free, although they do ask for money if you want. And it provides a lot of features that makes it a breeze to manage a fair amount of real and virtual input/output with multiple routing, in addition to a pretty good networked audio solution on top of it and various built-in effects.

It's actually the piece of software I miss the most from windows, although I just coded a pair of scripts that tweak all my audio devices as needed, now, so all of this is kinda moot to me now. And it also auto-toggle when my wireless corsair headset connects, which was impossible to do on windows, as far as I know.

Still, it's nice to have more good UI for audio management moving forward. Pulsemeeter is another project, but seems to move very slowly, and not everyone is comfortable with just piping scripts in `pw-cli`.
I've used VoiceMeeter 'Banana' on Windows earlier this year to route the output of a midi synth instrument & microphone to OBS, & then to video conferencing -- and yeah it was a breeze to set up, there was no added noticeable latency on the midi instrument, etc.

qpwgraph is very powerful on Linux, but doesn't cover all of the use cases that 'Banana' helps with, especially the easy routing of virtual io -- so I'm really excited to see this new program.

News - Mozilla using Claude Mythos AI Preview to help fix major security issues in Firefox
By Mountain Man, 22 Apr 2026 at 1:18 pm UTC

Using AI to fix security holes in software is like using window screen to repair a hole in a bucket.

News - Mozilla using Claude Mythos AI Preview to help fix major security issues in Firefox
By scaine, 22 Apr 2026 at 12:41 pm UTC

Quoting: stormtuxNot exactly a revolutionary technology, ever heard about "static program analysis"?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Static_program_analysis

Are they surprised that a new approach to the problem has uncovered new vulnerabilities? Who would have thought! 🤔

How many vulnerabilities have been systematically fixed by traditional code analyzers throughout the entire history of Firefox without all this marketing hype?
Yeah, these tools have been around for years (by which I mean "before the genAI hype cycle began late-2022"), but typically only affordable to large Enterprises. With their desperate need to overhype genAI, the AI companies are loss-leading the access to these models to drive adoption, so we're seeing lots of weird hype for things that have existed for years, but have been priced... well, if not fairly, then at least "normally", within the industry. So now smaller outfits like Mozilla have access to these capabilities, and we're seeing headlines like this.

News - Framework Laptop 13 Pro revealed with major changes and great Linux support
By Stella, 22 Apr 2026 at 12:17 pm UTC

Quoting: neolith
Quoting: ScottCarammellon one hand, I love Framework and I REALLY want to get one of their laptops when I can afford to.

on the other hand. $1200. base price without RAM or storage. they're not exactly making it easy
My thoughts exactly... They produce nice hardware, but that laptop with the RAM and SSD I need easily puts it higher than what I payed for my computer. That's just not gonna happen, I cannot mindlessly throw away that kind of money.
yea.. struggling to see the point if you can get better desktop hardware, even with dGPU, for much lower price

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By benstor214, 22 Apr 2026 at 12:03 pm UTC

This afternoon I will paint a swastika in MS Paint. That’s right, Microsoft (MSFT) is far-right because it is enabling me to create far-right propaganda material.
Then I will print the swastika with my Hewlett-Packard InkJet. The 'P' in 'HP' stands for 'Phacist', a bonafide nazi-company.
I will conclude my already very productive afternoon by going to a mailbox in order to send the printed swastika to a friend. Australia Post serves as a formidable communication platform for extremist like my friend and me. Their post offices are veritable hubs for alt-right, extreme right and all other kind of facist minded people.
How is it possible that none of this 3 companies is investigated for enabling me from spreading my hateful speech?
Won’t someone think of the children?!

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By neolith, 22 Apr 2026 at 11:38 am UTC

Quoting: hardpenguinYou would ban an actively harmful and violent person out of your bar, football pitch, or book club, wouldn't you? This is the same.
I don't think it is the same. This is akin to trying to get Olympia to make sure their typewriters are not used to write an extremist manifesto - which is arguably also a lot harder to do than kicking an unwanted person out of a bar.
Any means of communication can be used to communicate bad things.

News - Streaming or recording on Linux? Check out the audio management tool Pipeweaver
By FeRDNYC, 22 Apr 2026 at 11:31 am UTC

Hm, this might finally provide a feature-equivalent (or more) replacement for pavucontrol. (The PulseAudio "Volume Control" that was actually more like a full-featured device/stream manager and configurator.)

pavucontrol worked, and still works, just fine with PipeWire, as long as its PulseAudio emulation is enabled (which it always is). Still, pavucontrol is getting a bit long in the tooth, and isn't the easiest thing to rely on on today. But since neither the DEs' system settings tools nor wireplumber provide sufficiently robust control over the audio subsystem, a dedicated tool remains necessary. Here's hoping pipeweaver shapes up to fill that void.

News - Mozilla using Claude Mythos AI Preview to help fix major security issues in Firefox
By stormtux, 22 Apr 2026 at 11:15 am UTC

Not exactly a revolutionary technology, ever heard about "static program analysis"?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Static_program_analysis

Are they surprised that a new approach to the problem has uncovered new vulnerabilities? Who would have thought! 🤔

How many vulnerabilities have been systematically fixed by traditional code analyzers throughout the entire history of Firefox without all this marketing hype?

News - Colorado Age Attestation bill gets amendments to have open source excluded
By Arehandoro, 22 Apr 2026 at 10:47 am UTC

Quoting: Purple Library Guy
Quoting: GerarderloperI do wonder how long until this extends to ALL software. Imagine having to have your face and id scanned to play a game or use an adobe app.
Could be worse. What if instead of your id, they wanted to scan your superego?
One would hope that only happens in Nietzsche applications.

News - I'm going to spend far too much time playing Orc Incremental
By grigi, 22 Apr 2026 at 10:46 am UTC

It's got a very Warcraft 2 look to it.

News - I'm going to spend far too much time playing Orc Incremental
By hardpenguin, 22 Apr 2026 at 10:37 am UTC

Loving the top-down perspective, I feel it doesn't get much love lately!

News - Mozilla using Claude Mythos AI Preview to help fix major security issues in Firefox
By hardpenguin, 22 Apr 2026 at 10:36 am UTC

Using AI for any kind of recognition is good, actually (and often helps with accessibility).

Using AI for creation is not good.

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By hardpenguin, 22 Apr 2026 at 10:34 am UTC

Good. It's time for gaming companies to take responsibility for spaces they own but opened to public.

You would ban an actively harmful and violent person out of your bar, football pitch, or book club, wouldn't you? This is the same.

News - Framework Laptop 13 Pro revealed with major changes and great Linux support
By CatKiller, 22 Apr 2026 at 9:45 am UTC

Ars has [an interview](https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/04/frameworks-ceo-on-the-ram-crisis-and-creating-a-macbook-pro-for-linux-users/) with the Framework CEO for those that are interested.

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By TheSHEEEP, 22 Apr 2026 at 9:36 am UTC

Quoting: neolithbut I have no idea how Australia's eSafety agency imagines this is going to work in detail. Or perhaps they just don't.
My guess would be, they don't.
They probably just want the devs/companies they are contacting to tell them how they tackle those issues so they themselves won't have to do anything.

Some of the wording is a bit nonsensical, though, I agree.
How exactly do you want to stop someone from, idk, building some swastika-looking things? You can't.

And anything that allows peer 2 peer communication can in theory be abused by one group or another to do their communication in.
At least for Valve/Steam, though, as far as I know message get auto-checked / auto-modded before publishing?

I assume these "reports" they are talking about Steam being a "hub" for one group or another is probably some milquetoast stuff like those "isitwoke" etc curator groups?
I mean, I'd gladly remove any political culture war nonsense from gaming, so getting rid of those would not exactly make me shed tears. However, I do not believe there is really a basis for this.

Yes, all of this feels A LOT like amateur hour - which is unfortunately kind of normal whenever politicians get involved in anything even remotely out of their interest/age group.

News - Mozilla using Claude Mythos AI Preview to help fix major security issues in Firefox
By PlayingOnLinuxphone, 22 Apr 2026 at 9:24 am UTC

LLM is just saying "large language model" and programming languages are very well structured languages. And it seems that Claude is specialized (or better "optimized") for programming languages, but it can also handle human languages and even has to (see commit messages and issue reports).

Of course it is in first place a PR campaign, but at least it becomes somehow helpful to find vulnerabilities. We still should not replace researchers and use such LLMs just as additional layer in the way of "four eyes see more than two".

There are still a lot of problems with these LLMs, even on this fully legit use case. It is still "endless" amount of energy on times of climate change, LLM trained on stolen data (so it is not GPL2.0 compatible - hello Linux kernel team) and these companies become new gate keepers to these super expensive technologies, at least for the next decades: how can I access Claude Mythos to find vulnerabilities in my own software that is not developed by such big players (maybe I am the solo developer that maintain one keystone of the internet software infrastructure)? And once Mythos become public, companies will push serious [codemaxxing](https://github.com/jshchnz/codemaxxing) even further.

By all the good use cases, we should not forget the whole picture around LLMs.

News - Australia targets Steam, Roblox and others in new legal push against extremists and predators
By neolith, 22 Apr 2026 at 9:15 am UTC

This smells like people not understanding how things work.

We've seen numerous media reports about grooming taking place on all four of these platforms...
Well, yeah... different kinds of media outlets publicize all kind of reports. That doesn't mean they are good reports and it doesn't mean what they report has to be true. I've seen reports that claim that all gamers are just waiting to run amok or that aliens have visited.
Why are people in the government relying on random media reports? Didn't they think to check for themselves?

... as well as terrorist and violent extremist-themed gameplay.
By that definition that does include Counterstrike. Are we at that point again? I feel like we've been there ~25 years ago.

... as well as far right groups recreating fascist imagery in Minecraft.
This might come as a surprise, but you can also do that stuff in Photoshop. I don't like it but that doesn't mean that Adobe should be forced to take action. I am not a Minecraft player, but aren't the worlds selfhosted?
Also, how do you expect MS to limit this kind of creativity in a game that allows for creativity in the first place? It's already impossible to make people not say unwanted things in simple text-chat, how the heck is that supposed to work in Minecraft?

Media reports have also pointed to games in Fortnite gamifying the horrific events...
I am also not a Fortnite player. Does that game have a sandbox mode?

... while Steam is reportedly a hub for a number of extreme-right communities
Reportedly? Didn't they care to check for themselves? I feel whenever you are trying to pass a law, you should not rely on hearsay.

Now don't get me wrong, I am all for not having kids run into extremists and predators online – but I have no idea how Australia's eSafety agency imagines this is going to work in detail. Or perhaps they just don't.

edit: fixed some typos

News - Mozilla using Claude Mythos AI Preview to help fix major security issues in Firefox
By doragasu, 22 Apr 2026 at 8:44 am UTC

Quoting: AlveKattI have a feeling this isn't an LLM but an actual specialized AI system. The companies keep conflating different machine learning cases to drive their AGI narrative.
It's LLM, and might be nothing special, just marketing as usual: https://www.flyingpenguin.com/the-boy-that-cried-mythos-verification-is-collapsing-trust-in-anthropic/