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Joined 7 months ago
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Cake day: May 10th, 2025

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  • Lots to cover so let’s start one by one: Firstly, even trying to put my GNU biase aside, canoeboot is just libreboot with the non free stuff removed. The problem with that is it has been shown to allow some non-free firmware in a recent version, and so, I feel like using a more independent free bios would be better atleast for me. I understand the fact about the chip itself being non-free, but as for a laptop, that’s just the most free you can get right now (do correct me if I’m wrong), so it’s better to use the most free option rather than using a less free option because the most free option isn’t fully free. I completely agree and can’t emphasise that enough: The FSF and GNU are not made for security. A lot of people especially the ones complaining how not allowing microcode updates allows for security risks don’t understand that the FSF’s and GNU’s goals are to protect user freedom. I don’t believe in a society without phones, it’s just if those phones exist, they should be free, transparent, and respect user privacy. Finally, I did know about riscv, but as you mention, I also knew that there were no 100% free boards. By designs, they still need the proper tools and need to be done by a proper computer engineer right? The framework board isn’t 100% free right?



  • I’m simply providing an alternative. We all know ultra-processed food is bad, but that alone doesn’t help anyone be healthy. They need to know what to eat (in this case) use instead. Yeah I carry it by putting it in the same light and small backpack I put my other stuff in when going out. I do not use WhatsApp and do not have a phone number. Counterintuitive to go through all the troubles of being as free and as private as possible and then use WhatsApp spyware and a phone number





  • They might know about free software’s corporate term “open source”, but surprisingly, most lemmy users are actually unaware of free software as they often confuse it with the corporate whitewash of open source. As for your claim, yes, I also do believe most lemmy users already use GNU+Linux, but it’s also important to go further than that by actually understanding the importance of software freedom to not only use free software, but also contribute to it in addition to teaching. Most people just stop at using another os and some free software, but it’s important to go down the more radical path by replacing all non-free software, using a fully free distribution like parabola, using a fully free bios like GNU Boot, and using ryf hardware.






  • FreeWilliam@lemmy.mltoPrivacy@lemmy.ml*Permanently Deleted*
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    6 months ago

    I personally don’t own a phone. My solution to messaging, recording, and navigation is my Thinkpad X200T running parabola GNU+Linux-libre as the os and GNU boot as the bios. It’s as anti-surveillance pro-piracy pro-freedom you can get. For protests, just turning off bluetooth and wifi on it pretty much gets you off the radar. The only problem is that it’s camera really sucks. Photos are doable, but videos might not. Also, for protests, physical privacy is important too, so I hope you are wearing bandana to protect you from being identified in addition to protection (helmet, knee pads, and maybe a gas mask depending on how big the protest is)


  • I see the confusion. In this case, evaporating doesn’t happen the natural way of boiling at 100 degrees celcius. Instead, these data centers mostly use things called cooling towers, where the warm water is sprayed into the air and some of it evaporates. It’s not technically “consumed”, because again, I emphasise that water doesn’t dissapear. It instead goes through the water cycle, but this evaporating removes water from the local supply, which can be a problem in water-scarce areas.


  • No, they don’t consume. Instead, they use it for cooling their servers. You might have heard of a way to cool a computer that is more effective than a fan called water cooling. It basically uses water to absorb the hot air from the GPU/CPU to be sent to the radiator where the water is cooled and sent back to be pumped and continue the cycle. This is called a closed-loop water cooling system. These big “AI” databases are also using water to cool the components like how they’re being used in the computer, but unlike the example, it’s not a closed-loop water cooling system, meaning that instead of the water being reused, it instead gets evaporated and participates in the water cycle. The problem with this is that water used in these open-loop systems is evaporated, meaning it is remove from the local water cycles, making fresh water less accessible in areas that already face shortages, so while the amount of fresh water on Earth stays the same, it becomes inaccessible to the people, which leads to the current situation where more than a billion people don’t have enough access to fresh water while big “AI” databases are using over 100 million liters daily. This is only one of the alarming consequences of “AI”. This however could be easily fixed by using a closed-loop water cooling systems that use renuable energy sources for the energy required to pump and cool the system. However, sadly, in our current capitalist society, the rich are too greedy and corrupt to save lives and actually help the people.