It’s January 9, and I just read the best article I will read all month.

“Social Quitting” by @pluralistic

“Once a platform has its users and business customers locked in, it can enshittify its service to the point of near uselessness without losing either, allocating all the useful surplus in the business to its shareholders.”

“The important thing about the Fediverse isn’t that it’s noncommercial or decentralized—it’s that its design impedes surplus harvesting.”

https://doctorow.medium.com/social-quitting-f049b33ad3f6

As he should, this was shameful: “Former ABC Media Watch host Jonathan Holmes has taken aim at Australia’s #media regulator and its capacity to oversee #JournalisticStandards, slamming its adverse ruling against the public broadcaster for an investigation into cable TV network #FoxNews and its coverage of the US 2020 election.” Via The Age

https://www.theage.com.au/business/companies/journalistic-cluelessness-ex-media-watch-host-roasts-regulator-20230103-p5ca37.html?btis

#introduction

Happy #EarthDay everyone!

I am a #paleoclimate #scientist who also is an expert on #biomarkers as #ClimateProxies. In other words, I study past #climate using #molecular #fossils.

I am currently a @CNRS_INSU researcher at the Centre de Recherche et d'Enseignement en Géosciences de l'Environnement (CEREGE, France).

In addition to boosting toots of interest, I will essentially toot my new #scientific #publications and other #scientific content.

#ECR #WomenInSTEM 👩‍🔬

“Hydrogen is a climate-heating gas, with a 100-year global warming potential that is about 11 times greater than carbon dioxide.

“Unlike carbon dioxide, hydrogen does not have a direct effect on climate. Instead, it affects other pollutants.

“Increased hydrogen in our air means that methane, the second-most important global warming gas, would stay in our air for longer and have more impact.”

#hydrogen #climate

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jun/17/pollutionwatch-hydrogen-power-climate-leaks

#Bacteria and #Fungi Can Walk across the Surface of Our Teeth https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/bacteria-and-fungi-can-walk-across-the-surface-of-our-teeth/

Interkingdom assemblages in human saliva display group-level surface mobility https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2209699119

Conglomerations of #Streptococcus bacteria and #Candida fungi work together to walk, leap across the surface of #teeth. Small bacteria cluster around the core of each clump, forming a sticky binding. Larger, rod-shaped fungi join on the outside to propelled the structure forward.

PSA to all admins: I highly recommend a #FediBlock of #mastinator (ie. the entire mastinator.com domain).

Mastinator is a service that allows a person to anonymously follow people on the fediverse. No big deal you think? Your public posts are probably already anonymously viewable from your public profile anyways and all it is doing is aggregating public info? That is what its creator claims---it is just a convenience service!

Well no, it is mode concerning than that. It does this aggregation by following any account a mastinator user types into its service then replicating *all* your non-DM posts into a sort of "proxy inbox" in the mastinator.com domain that is completely out of your control and viewable by everyone!

In other words, if you are followed by mastinator.com it effectively turns your follower-only posts into public posts and lets people you have blocked keep following you by following the mastinator replica of your posts!

Innocent intentions or not this violates user consent.