A stream of links that I share without comment. They may be things I intend to read later, things I've read, things I find interesting, etc. My blog with actual writing is at: https://stuff.interfree.ca and you can find me on the fediverse @fastfinge@interfree.ca.
They’re available in the latest beta.
Parliamentary committee accuses government of slow progress and lack of ambition
Even in Kentucky the assault charge isn’t going to stick.
Today, June 12, 2025, Cloudflare suffered a significant service outage that affected a large set of our critical services, including Workers KV, WARP, Access, Gateway, Images, Stream, Workers AI, Turnstile and Challenges, AutoRAG, and parts of the Cloudflare Dashboard.
On Call: Abusive manager had to be told there's no such thing as an atomic laptop
Masquerade as the BCE Inc. Giga Hub with the WAS-110 or X-ONU-SFPP
Understanding the parity principle in accessibility, using rick-rolling as an example.
Microsoft announced that a new Edge feature allowing employees to share passwords more securely in enterprise environments has reached general availability.
DNS-BLM checks if your domains are flagged as malicious on blocklists. - Hutch79/DNS-BLM
Published at least one shitpost!
Our anonymous submitter, whom we'll call Carmen, embarked on her IT career with an up-and-coming firm that developed and managed eCommerce websites for their clients. After her new boss Russell walked her around the small office and introduced her to a handful of coworkers, he led her back to his desk to discuss her first project. Carmen brought her laptop along and sat down across from Russell, poised to take notes.
Russell explained that their newest client, Sharon, taught CPR classes. She wanted her customers to be able to pay and sign up for classes online. She also wanted the ability to charge customers a fee in case they cancelled on her.
Dan Mancina built a fully adaptive skatepark for individuals who are blind or visually impaired, as well as those with physical disabilities.
A page to learn more about LociTerm and related topics.
Welcome to WWDC 2025 As has been the case for many years now, Apple kicked off this year's Worldwide Developers Conference by announcing all the major software changes coming to all your favorite devices later this year. We got a look at everything we can expect in iOS 19, watchOS 12, and... No, wait, that's not right--they changed the name!
The Web Era arrives, the browser wars flare, and a bubble bursts.
Apple has announced updates to the AI models that power its suite of Apple Intelligence features across iOS, macOS, and more. But according to the company's own benchmarks, the models underperform older models from rival tech firms including OpenAI.
This application allows users to input text and generate Text-to-Speech (TTS) audio using different models. Users can then listen to the generated audio and vote on which version they prefer. The a...
One bot even sang to me
An Ottawa-based pest control company called Sucker Free says they’ve had a dramatic rise in calls for mosquito treatment so far in 2025.
DNS4EU, an EU-based DNS resolution service created to strengthen European Union's digital sovereignty, has become reality.
Your clients would also prefer not to be named here.
Who, Me?: If you like it to keep working, don’t put a ring on it
A great start.
Ahead of its annual Worldwide Developer's Conference (WWDC), Apple has announced the winners and finalists for its 2025 Apple Design Awards--including 2 winners in the Inclusivity Category: Speechify and Art of Fauna: Cozy Puzzles.
The Quality of Life Index for Persons with Disabilities includes more than 80 indicators that will be used to measure whether the province is making progress on improving the well-being of people with disabilities.
Discover seven accessibility features anyone can use to improve customization and productivity.
A major development showcasing the potential for the open social web was unveiled Thursday at the online conference known as FediForum.
Why Accessible Procurement Matters
Customer told Ars that the website wouldn’t offer a full refund.
Kagi Small Web is an initiative by Kagi, a privacy-focused search engine company, designed to surface and promote content from the "small web." The "small
Frederico planned to celebrate the new year with friends at the exotic international tourist haven of Molvania. When visiting the area, one could buy and use a MolvaPass (The Most Passive Way About Town!) for free or discounted access to cultural sites, public transit, and more. MolvaPasses were available for 3, 7, or 365 days, and could be bought in advance and activated later.
It may cover other things too, things that also are not “emergencies.”
: TAG team spotted the V8 bug first, so you can bet nation-states weren’t far behind
Who, Me?: Some people will do anything to avoid an all-nighter
Environment Canada had issued a severe thunderstorm warning for the Ottawa area and said the storm could produce wind gusts of up to 90 km/h.
FediIndex data on Betula. Very interesting! 1.3.0 is still used by some, 1.2.0 has ceased to exist. Third of all instances are hosted in Russia.
I wish it knew more Betula instances though.
Recently, while scrolling on Tik Tok, I saw a video from Tab Buddies where they were promoting their product, aptly named the Tab Buddy. It’s a small gadget that helps you open soda cans, and…
On Call: After three service calls, user reflected on their utter stupidity
The Nuance Audio hearing glasses offer a fresh take on over-the-counter hearing aids, offering a stylish and discreet option to assist with your hearing and vision.
by Tonya R. Moore The latest Ace Double features stories by two authors who both write under pseudonyms. John Rackham is the pen name of electrical engineer and author, John Thomas Phillifent, whose works include three novels from the popular American spy fiction universe series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. Phillifent was a prolific author, the … Continue reading [May 28, 1970] A pair of Saras: Flower of Doradil and A Promising Planet →
3Play Media releases its 2025 State of ASR Report, testing and comparing the top speech-to-text technologies.
Our anonymous submitter, whom we'll call Craig, worked for GlobalCon. GlobalCon relied on an offshore team on the other side of the world for adding/removing users from the system, support calls, ticket tracking, and other client services. One day at work, an urgent escalated ticket from Martin, the offshore support team lead, fell into Craig's queue. Seated before his cubicle workstation, Craig opened the ticket right away:
Google's Play Integrity API is making it harder for users with rooted phones or custom ROMs to access certain apps. Here's what's changing.
It's a holiday in the US today, so we're taking a long weekend. We flip back to a classic story of a company wanting to fill 15 different positions by hiring only one person. It's okay, Martin handles the database. Original - Remy
A curious email arrived in Phil's Inbox. "Windows Support Engineer required. Must have experience of the following:" and then a long list of Microsoft products.
Phil frowned. The location was convenient; the salary was fine, just the list of software seemed somewhat intimidating. Nevertheless, he replied to the agency saying that he was interested in applying for the position.
by Arturo Serrano When I was appointed, in recent weeks, as a cultural attaché of the Colombian embassy in Bonn, I was beside myself with excitement about the prospect of imbibing from the richness of Teutonic civilization, whose light was but briefly obscured during the war. I say this without intending in any manner to … Continue reading [May 26, 1970] A Regrettable Case of Runaway Apophenia (Erich von Däniken's Memories of the Future) →
Windsor's new blind darts league is bringing blind and partially-sighted people together — offering both a sense of inclusion and joy.
Anthropic publish most of the system prompts for their chat models as part of their release notes. They recently shared the new prompts for both Claude Opus 4 and Claude …
Who, Me?: Life in a corporate aquarium didn’t go swimmingly
On Call: For once, the IT department was rewarded for finding the fix, and the perfect-if-unexpected fixer
Hey, Alphabet or Google or Chrome or whomever in that illegal monopoly continues to release things to the web platform that are full of accessibility barriers, I have what I think is a straightforward request. My Request Please, if your team cannot explain how the thing satisfies all WCAG Success…
More information about the end of support for Pocket.
For AI to be beneficial in accessibility tech, the people who use it must be involved in its development.
After years of growth, industry turmoil has left the accessibility community at a standstill.
Bell apologized to customers for the massive internet outage that hit Ontario and Quebec Wednesday morning, and detailed the underlying cause.