love birds.

Birds are lovely, adorable animals. They’re enjoyable to feed or even just to look at. Birdwatching isn’t just some reactional activity of old generations (elderly people); anyone out there should be able to enjoy that and it doesn’t cost anything. Today we watched a wren hiding in the trees and singing. Later another bird walked towards our door, so we treated it while it was carefully watching no other bird noticed (or competed for the seeds).

But we don’t really want the birds inside the home, not just for sanitary reasons or damages. We seldom let them indoors, sometimes for shelter from horrible weather, sometimes by accident, and sometimes not (neither). The Sick Bird walked into our home once and it was – for a change – with full consent because she was vulnerable.

Birds are in general not domesticated and it would be cruel to put any kind of bird inside a cage. It’s not in their nature and massive cages in zoos are still cages. We need more wildlife, not zoos. As for pets, it depends on the animal.

t’s a “deja vu” day. It happened this past summer. It happened in 2020/21. Now again.

“Hello Roy Schestowitz,” told me Pest Control today regarding an item I discussed with them yesterday [2, 1]. “Please reply to the MCC Neighbourhood Compliance North Team who sent you this letter if you wish to make comments. You have blanked out the sender details.”

I replied: “They told me to contact you.”

At the moment they seem to be playing ping-pong regarding an important matter in our area. Several of us in the street are looking after wildlife and clarity is needed.

This ping-pong routine is beginning to remind me of what they did half a decade ago [1, 2, 3]. Both sides tell you to talk to “the other side” as if the goal is to waste your time.

he other day I received “Greetings from Georgia Tech!”

Why? Because Dr. Stallman (RMS) will be giving a talk there soon.

“Hi Dr. Schestowitz,” it said. “Thank you again for your support – it truly means a lot! We officially purchased RMS’s flights to Atlanta last night, and we’re all incredibly excited about the upcoming event.”

It’s about more than just the talk, it’s a statement of sorts. See what’s at stake.

“You’ve absolutely got a new ally here at Georgia Tech through us at LibreTech Collective, and you’ve also gained a new regular reader in me. I already follow Phoronix and a few other tech blogs, so when your Techrights post popped up in my newsreader a few days ago, it genuinely made my night!”

Techrights is a bit ‘different’ a site, http://tuxmachines.org has more ‘conformist’ material.

Techrights deals with whistleblowers. “Whistleblowing isn’t impulsive but premeditated,” as noted yesterday. “Impulse can lead to errors.”

Our reporting is certainly hurting all the “right” people. So we’re on the right track.

he FSF, which started Free software and seeks to protect it in perpetuity, has just said (yesterday evening) “it received two major contributions totaling around $900,000 USD.”

Those people could, instead, buy several houses. But no.

Instead they chose to give ‘firepower’ to the FSF, the real and true protector of Free software, unlike opportunistic copycats or splinter groups. “One of the reasons for my complete resignation from the organization is the deception of a volunteer who gave them a bequest of €150,000,” Daniel Pocock recalled. Last year when he ran for European politics he said: “Research found that some of the world’s largest companies have spent over $120,000 trying to censor me even before I announced my candidacy. I guess that I might have something to say that is in the public interest.”

Last year and again this year my wife and I filed three lawsuits against men who had attacked women and Free software luminaries [1, 2, 3].

They were on the payroll of monopolists when they did this.

Lawsuits are not cheap, but they are the necessary thing to do in this situation.

In life, people must make sacrifices to do what’s right and just.

“Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents.”

-Mark 12:41-12:44

“He also saw a poor widow put in two very small copper coins. “Truly I tell you,” he said, “this poor widow has put in more than all the others. All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.””

-Luke 21:2-21:38

Reposted from Techrights

echrights wrote about this several times before, but it is worth repeating because a lot more is known now.

That is relevant because, as an associate put it:

TIL: Signal (app) is *only* for smartphones and even the desktop version
will not work without first registering via a smartphone instance. Not good.

Can I install Signal Desktop without a mobile device?

No. Signal Desktop must be linked with either Signal Android
or Signal iOS to send and receive messages.

Security theatre

“I would presume the connections are logged externally and at the minimum timing correlations can be made,” the associate noted.

Also, under oath, you might be compelled to admit you spoke over Signal or other digital means to a Serial Strangler from Microsoft about how to sue Roy.

That actually happened. And we have proof (under sworn oath).

That’s good to know, as it’ll prove relevant in the future.

That serves to prove that Brett Wilson LLP lied to me and also about me many times. Lying to a Court about a person isn’t a trivial thing to do. It’s also legally risky.

After more than 2 months since their own clients sued them (Yanpolsky and another v Brett Wilson LLP and another) they still appear to have filed no defence [1, 2, 3, 4].

I don’t want to comment much more at this stage, except note that now there is substantial proof of what we’ve said all along and got defamed for. How much will they spend to silence me?

ome years ago I reported about crimes in Microsoft [1, 2] and even crimes against women, perpetrated by Microsoft employees. Days (or about a day) later I got SLAPPed by associates of these people (who are also connected to Microsoft).

Years earlier the same happened after I had reported crimes at the EPO.

Right now I report on some more Microsoft crimes and substance abuse at the EPO. Crimes at Microsoft are routine, but some are more personal than others. Sometimes the companies can ‘personify’ matters to make the disputes seem like anything but corporate muzzling (like Philpott at EPO).

As a result, there is more heat and costs.

That does beg the question: how safe is it to be an investigative reporter in the UK?

Put another way: is it possible to really report on crime in the UK?

Or only the crimes detested by the state?

Back in 2009 we saw how the UK Ministry of Defence was classing Investigative Journalists among “Terrorists” or something to that effect.

Society where crimes cannot be reported – or cannot be safely reported on – would look something like Putin’s Moscow. We do not want that, do we?

think I’ve not embarked on an airplane since 2018 (Berlin) and we’re just 7 weeks away from 2026. It’s not that I didn’t go anywhere in the UK (for instance we were in Belfast the following year; that’s Northern Ireland, just a boat trip away) and a fortnight ago we went to London. It’s just that I promised myself not to waste energy on flights unless I absolutely need to (sometimes we must attend funerals and such; something like a conference is never a necessity).

The trip to Berlin was OK, but the flights and airports were not pleasant, with various delays among other issues.

I don’t miss air travel and have no imminent plan of boarding a plane.

I miss nothing about flights.

To most people in Western countries, due in part to peer pressure, it’s more difficult not to hitch planes than to conform/obey expectations.