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As election looms, a network of mysterious ‘pink slime’ local news outlets nearly triples in size

Editor’s Note: This is the second of our four pieces on this network. In December 2019, we first established the scope of the “pink slime” network distributing algorithmic stories and conservative talking points. In October 2021, we found that the network had received funding from multiple dark money groups as well as collaborated with advocacy […]

Brennan Kenneth Brown (@brennan@social.lol)

Because $18 million dollars isn't enough for some people, I have *more* people and organisations of note to list as paying Omarchy patrons (there are over hundreds in total): - Axel Fontaine is the creator of Flyway, the widely used database migration tool he sold to Redgate in 2019. He's also submitted code to the Omarchy repo, both a funder and a hands-on contributor. - Marc Köhlbrugge is the founder of WIP and BetaList, fixtures of the indie-hacker/bootstrapper scene that Omarchy's ricing bullshit aesthetic is clearly courting. - ServiceStack is an established .NET web-services framework vendor, one of the patrons backing the project as a company rather than an individual. - Bertrand Janin is a longtime open-source developer (ex-Ramp, ex-Truveris) running his own small shop, Atelier Janin. - Pagecord, the blogging platform created by Olly. - Vincent Ritter, founder of Tinylytics and Scribbles, known for complaining about being offended by pronouns, being disappointed by more inclusive Apple emoji, disparaging "foreigners" who drive for Uber and play "foul rap music," and praising Elon Musk the day after he performed two Nazi salutes on camera. Manton Reece, of micro.blog, publicly defends him. - 9538-7874 Quebec inc. is one of at least a couple of numbered, unnamed Canadian corporations on the list. Bizarre shell companies with no public identity attached to them at all. Unsure about these. https://omarchy.org/patrons/

Social Networking Utopia — Matt

In discussing the network topology of social networks — whether centralized like Facebook or federated like ActivityPub — I think the ult...

Radical Servers - riseup.net

Here is a list of either anti-capitalist, anti-hierarchy, autonomous, feminist, or radical server projects. Some of them are revolutionary collectives which provide free or mutual aid services to radical and grassroots activists. Others are more focused on privacy or on decentralisation. None of them are focused on money. Riseup is not endorsing these projects, but is keeping a list for people to be able to choose! Please read carefully the terms of service of the projects, as some may be subject to law-enforcement or surveillance laws.

W Social (@wsocial.eu)

As we have communicated. We did the update on Septemebr 17th. Now a question back to you @wdonthavetime.selfhosted.social Who have funded you and what is your connection to other PDS operators? What is your motive to create a site framing public information as a "data-leak" what's your motive?

Decentralized Deliberation Stack (DDS)

A W3C Community Group working draft for an open stack for sovereign, verifiable, interoperable, and resilient deliberation.

AT Moderation Architecture | bryan newbold

The AT network is becoming more heterogeneous in practice, with independent PDS hosts, apps, and alternative bsky AppViews establishing themselves. This means that more complex inter-service moderation scenarios are starting to get attention. While the labeling system was released all the way back i...

Hundreds of ‘pink slime’ local news outlets are distributing algorithmic stories and conservative talking points

<p>Editor’s Note: This is the first of our four pieces on this network. In August 2020, we found that the size of the network had nearly tripled to over 1200 sites. In October 2021, we found that the network had received funding from multiple dark money groups as well as collaborated with advocacy groups on topics to […]</p>

Motivating The Case for Decentralized Social Identity: Part One

RadicalxChange Foundation is an international nonprofit advancing participatory governance for the age of AI, championing Plurality to keep human agency and democratic participation at the wheel.