@Seagoon_ I just stopped by the shops quickly, and while I was there, picked up a freshly-made cinnamon donut.

Nom Nom Nom.

@Thornburywitch @bacon To all whom this may concern,

I am writing to express my strong and sincere recommendation for Mr. Simon Fluffybutt as a candidate for this position.

In his previous role, Simon unlocked substantial value, leading both directly and indirectly to a strengthening of the sales pipeline, while leveraging and fully capitalising on synergistic new opportunities for revenue growth.

In a dynamic, fast-paced, lean, and agile environment, Simon demonstrates a natural flair for delivering outcomes while expertly liaising across multiple internal and external stakeholder groups with divergent expectations, while diligently managing competing priorities.

He is both a dynamic self-starter who thrives when taking ownership of projects to drive strategic results, as well as a collaborative team player who works efficiently towards shared goals and KPIs.

I have full confidence in Simon's extensive expertise, knowledge, and skillset, which will contribute meaningfully and substantively to the long-term growth of your organisation going forward.

If you have any questions in regards to this letter, please don't hesitate to reach out.

Kindest regards,

AJ

@Seagoon_ Morning everyone.

So I still have a nose that alternates between being blocked and runny.

Yet I'm feeling less hungover than last week?

Sleeping in has worked wonders ☺️

It appears that drunk me not only did a load of washing last night, but also put it into the dryer too!

@LostXOR @yogthos @NoIWontPickAName @technology There's a few other steps they could potentially take.

The first would be to block any financial institution in the US, or that deals with the US, from sending any payments to or from ByteDance's accounts.

They could also freeze any assets currently held by US financial institutions.

Second, if they can get Apple, Microsoft, and Google on board to help do their bidding, they could pull the ByteDance app from the Apple and Google Play app stores.

That includes removing it from any apps where it's already installed. Globally.

They could also request that TikTok is removed from Google and Bing search results.

On top of this, they could do what you suggested, and ask ISPs and mobile carriers to block domains and IP addresses used by ByteDance.

And the US could apply diplomatic pressure on other countries to implement similar financial and ISP-level blocks and bans.

So, potentially, it's also blocked in the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and elsewhere.

@crispyflagstones @yogthos Someone is named @dansup who also created @pixelfed, the app is called Loops, you can follow his progress here: @loops

@quicken @tardigrada Really great point.

If Albo really wanted to send a message to Musk, here's how he could do it:

1. Ask all federal Labor MPs to stop posting on X, and start posting on Mastodon.

2. Order all federal government departments and agencies to stop posting on X, and start posting on Mastodon.

3. Bribe the states to do the same.

"Hi Queensland, guess what? We just found a billion dollars under the couch for a shiny new Olympic stadium. Hi Tasmania, likewise for your new AFL stadium. And look Victoria, here's a few billion for the airport rail link — we'll cover the cost difference to put the airport station underground.

"But only if you direct all your MPs, departments, and agencies to switch to Mastodon."

@ramble81 @BrikoX In Australia, if you work full time, your employer is required to deposit 11% of your income into a retirement savings account, known as a superannuation (or "super") account.

Most people use a member-owned industry super fund, but you can also opt for a super account from a for-profit private financial institution (but the fees can tend to be higher).

In most cases, you can access the money in your super account once you turn 65 (but there are some conditions where you can get early access).

The Australian government also offers a (government provided) aged pension, but it's quite low.

@politics There's more...

"Rebekah Mercer, the 47-year-old daughter of major Republican donor Robert Mercer, is a founding investor of Parler. She increasingly pulls the strings at the company, according to people familiar with the company who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private business matters. She holds the majority stake in Parler and controlled two of three board seats as of early February — a board to which she recently appointed allies."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/02/24/parler-relaunch-rebekah-mercer/

"Prominent conservative venture capitalists including Peter Thiel and J.D. Vance are investing in free speech-oriented video streaming site Rumble Video, the company said Wednesday.

"The deal, first reported by the Wall Street Journal, marks PayPal and Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel’s first investment in a social media company since he bought a large stake of Facebook as an early investor in 2004. It also means that Thiel is supporting a competitor to Facebook while he sits on Facebook’s board.

"That represents a major boost for Rumble, which aims to challenge the dominance of platforms that conservatives claim unfairly restrict free speech, including YouTube and Facebook.

"Rumble’s users include popular right-wing internet personalities like Donald Trump Jr., former Trump strategist Steve Bannon, commentator Dan Bongino and writer Dinesh D’Souza."

https://nypost.com/2021/05/19/facebook-director-peter-thiel-invests-in-conservative-rival-rumble/

"Last year, Rumble received a major investment from a venture capital firm co-founded by J.D. Vance, the Republican Senate candidate in Ohio. The firm, Narya Capital, got a seat on Rumble’s board, and its more than seven million shares place it among the company’s top 10 shareholders, according to securities filings. Mr. Vance also took a personal Rumble stake worth between $100,000 and $250,000, his financial disclosures show.

"Narya is backed by the prime patron of Mr. Vance’s Senate campaign, the billionaire venture capitalist Peter Thiel. And it was Mr. Thiel who played a leading role in Narya’s Rumble investment last year, becoming what the platform’s chief executive described as its first outside investor.

"The investment fits into an enduring narrative of Mr. Thiel, who has expressed skepticism of democracy and advocated keeping the airwaves open for hard-right voices since his student days at Stanford."

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/31/us/politics/jd-vance-peter-thiel-rumble.html

"Peter Thiel didn't just wake up one day with a net worth of roughly $4.9 billion.

"His claims to fame largely start as the don of the PayPal Mafia — a nickname embraced by PayPal's slate of co-founders, which also included Elon Musk. Though the digital banking service raised just $3 million in venture capital on its launch in 1999, PayPal was ultimately sold in 2002 for $1.5 billion. Thiel's 3.5% stake brought him an estimated $55 million which he used to start his empire.

"Then there was the $500,000 "angel investment" he gave Mark Zuckerberg in 2005. That 10.2% stake in Facebook turned into more than $1 billion in 2012."

https://www.salon.com/2023/03/27/what-does-peter-thiel-want-hes-building-the-right-wing-future-piece-by-piece/

@moitoi @unionagainstdhmo It's a bit more complicated than that.

So Nokia sold its mobile phone business to Microsoft for around US$7.5 billion in 2013.

Microsoft licensed the rights to use the Nokia brand for 10 years (but eventually rebranded the phones to Microsoft Lumia).

The old Nokia continues to make commercial communications equipment: https://www.nokia.com/about-us/news/releases/2014/04/25/nokia-completes-sale-of-substantially-all-of-its-devices-services-business-to-microsoft/

By 2015, Microsoft realised it screwed up and wrote down the entire value of the former Nokia/Lumia mobile phone business: https://www.computerworld.com/article/2945371/microsoft-writes-off-76b-admits-failure-of-nokia-acquisition.html

Meanwhile, a group of former Nokia employees, with financial backing from Nokia, set up a new company called HMD Global.

Then HMD Global bought most of the former Nokia/Lumia mobile phone business off Microsoft for $350 million (including the licence to use the Nokia brand).

Foxconn bought the manufacturing, distribution and sales divisions. Foxconn then signed an agreement with HMD to build phones for HMD using those assets: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/may/18/nokia-returns-phone-market-microsoft-sells-brand-hmd-foxconn

So when you buy a HMD phone, you're buying from a company that's partly owned by Nokia, managed by ex-Nokia people, designed by the former Nokia/Lumia mobile phone division, and built by the former Nokia/Lumia mobile phone division (through Foxconn).

It's pretty much a Nokia phone.

@Jawaka @fuck_cars That's true, but then there were people racing on country highways 20 or 30 years ago too.

The difference now is they're more likely to be doing it in massive American SUV, rather than a (often Australian made) ute or a sedan.

@zenkat @technology Totally agree.

But.

It's a surefire way to get yourself in that mess in rapid time, when you otherwise wouldn't.

@BarneyDellar @technology You're right, it should, in truly autonomous cross-functional teams that have a high degree of delegated decision-making.

But that's not what tends to happen in many larger, hierarchical organisations.

In those organisations, what can tend to happen is the daily scrum becomes where managers get to micromanage details and staff are expected to report back their progress.

(I'm thinking about one past job in particular, where it was explained to me that: "The scrum is important because it allows our manager to keep track of our progress and set priorities.")