The fact that in the past 30 days, *.doubleclick.net was tried to be accessed 109,496 times, *.LGSmartAd.com 71,081 times, *.GStatic.com 65,466 times, and app-measurement.com 17,539 times, speaks volumes about the amount of ads our devices gobble up each day. When I look at DNS stats and zoom into these I'm a bit shocked to see it, because these all happen during the background too, like the TV trying to push the Smart AD domain. Then there's device-metrics-us.amazon.com, somethinng my echos tried to reach 13,620 times, a relatively low number, but they appear to ping home every half hour without your knowledge, just silently. I've become hyper-aware of the traffic flowing in and out of my network now, and this is why using a 3rd-party DNS (or rolling your own, if you're into that sort of thing) is super crucial.
Tamas G
@Tamasg@mindly.social
- 380 Followers
- 299 Following
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Originally from Hungary, but living and working in the US now. Accessibility Web engineer at Spotify full-time, , avid philosopher. Fun, random, optimistic. Friend to many, with an open mind. Passionate about accessibility and usability. Tinkering with Raspberry Pi, meditation, ham radio (K7HUN,) more. eng posts do not reflect my employer's opinions or views
Hoping my Tiflotecnia Vocalizer issues will get solved today, I have 3 machines with my desktop, HP laptop, Asus laptop. So that's it, no work machine getting Vocalizer now. Ah well. They were not the ones to pay for it anyway, I'll just get them to invoice a license for me if I really needed to use it for work. Bye bye Vocalizer on Virtual Mac OS either, since that would count as a 4th machine. Argh. Guess I'll need to buy a second 3-pack license if I want it on more machines like that, what can I say, I just love computers. I sleep with 2 of them under the bed, 4 or 5 in storage bins like my old Macbook Air, so it's quite easy to hit that 3-machine ceiling for me.
What bullshitery, Tiflotecnia's Vocalizer licenses have a limit, was just told that I've hit my max registered licenses, very sad, right away, just removed the add-on. Looks like back to the cracked Vocalizer we go, since they don't even have a portal where you can reset your license, wow. Here I had thought Tiflo got better, but nope. (Still sent them an e-mail to the address my license came from and I sent proof of purchase for the CF one, we'll ssee if it's one of those no-response ones, just listed as tiflotecnia@tiflotecnia.com.)
Can someone scan through their documentation and tell me if they reference anywhere a line about a license limit, needing to deauthorize a license to get the counter lowered, ETC? Because I sure ain't seeing it. https://www.tiflotecnia.com/documentation.html
Update: OK, that e-mail does work! FYI, they track your machine name, internal IP, and external IP of each machine. Very interesting, not entirely surprised this is kept to prevent sharing of licenses though.
Can someone scan through their documentation and tell me if they reference anywhere a line about a license limit, needing to deauthorize a license to get the counter lowered, ETC? Because I sure ain't seeing it. https://www.tiflotecnia.com/documentation.html
Update: OK, that e-mail does work! FYI, they track your machine name, internal IP, and external IP of each machine. Very interesting, not entirely surprised this is kept to prevent sharing of licenses though.
Custom ROM Support Just Got a Lot Worse on Google Pixel Phones
"...the device trees and driver binaries for Pixel devices are nowhere to be seen. Google's VP and GM of Android, Seang Chau, confirmed that this change is, indeed, intentional. ..."
https://www.howtogeek.com/custom-rom-support-got-a-lot-worse-google-pixel/
"...the device trees and driver binaries for Pixel devices are nowhere to be seen. Google's VP and GM of Android, Seang Chau, confirmed that this change is, indeed, intentional. ..."
https://www.howtogeek.com/custom-rom-support-got-a-lot-worse-google-pixel/
Northern lights may be visible in these 18 US states tonight and over the weekend
"The northern lights could put on a show tonight and through the weekend as ongoing geomagnetic storm conditions driven by turbulent space weather may push aurora farther south than usual."
https://www.space.com/stargazing/auroras/northern-lights-may-be-visible-in-these-18-us-states-tonight-and-over-the-weekend
"The northern lights could put on a show tonight and through the weekend as ongoing geomagnetic storm conditions driven by turbulent space weather may push aurora farther south than usual."
https://www.space.com/stargazing/auroras/northern-lights-may-be-visible-in-these-18-us-states-tonight-and-over-the-weekend
I Convinced HP's Board to Buy Palm for $1.2B. Then I Watched Them Kill It in 49 Days
https://philmckinney.substack.com/p/i-convinced-hps-board-to-buy-palm
https://philmckinney.substack.com/p/i-convinced-hps-board-to-buy-palm
Amanda MarcotteSabrina Carpenter's new album cover is causing a lot of outraged, prudish reactions. Worse, people are using feminism as their excuse.
But her campy sexpot act is good for women — and feminism is not helped by rejecting humor or lust.
https://www.salon.com/2025/06/13/sabrina-carpenters-sexpot-pop-star-act-is-good-for-women/
Niki TonskyObligatory video
Simon JaegerIOS 26 is going to make it possible to add ringtones using the share sheet. Tech sites are not hyping this up enough because you still have to create the ringtone, but I know lots of us know how to do that already and just need the easy way to add it to our phone without going through iTunes. And now, approximately 14 years after Apple supposedly untethered the iPhone from the computer, we have it. So now if you go to one of those ringtone sites, or someone texts you an audio file, or you’re handy with Hokusai or some other audio editor for the iPhone, you can make your own ringtones without a billion steps. Like everything else Apple has done in recently years, it’s taken so long for such a basic feature to arrive that it’s hard for me to even be excited about it, but I sure won’t miss blundering my way through iMazing.
TechCrunchThe Meta AI app is a privacy disaster https://techcrunch.com/2025/06/12/the-meta-ai-app-is-a-privacy-disaster/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon
