cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/52789617

Wanted to share an app I just came across. I was trying to use Dolphin with Pixel 8 pro on graphene and it just wouldn't stop stuttering. So I looked into it and found this fork of Dolphin that emulates way smoother and is just better. If you're into emulation and want to give Wii another shot then check this out!

discuss

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/45401980

Archived

They called the police. They showed their wounds. They begged for protection.

But when two women in China tried to escape their violent husbands, the system that promised to protect them looked the other way, until it was too late. One woman died from being beaten. The other woman was left severely injured.

Their stories rippled across the Chinese internet, setting off a wave of anger over how authorities treat domestic violence as a private family matter, even as state media has called for "zero tolerance” of abuses.

China’s leader, Xi Jinping, said the country needed to "resolutely combat all forms of violence against women” when he spoke at a global summit for women in Beijing last month. But he has also fostered a culture that emphasizes women’s traditional role at home, creating a reluctance among the police and courts to break families apart even when there is violence.

Activists say that the resulting inconsistent enforcement of laws has led to most cases going unpunished. A crackdown on nonprofit groups has made things worse by shutting down volunteers who once helped to provide aid and support to victims of domestic abuse.

[...]

China has a wide-ranging anti-domestic violence law that was signed into law in 2016 and covers both physical and emotional abuse, and includes legal tools that authorities can use, like protection orders and mechanisms for reported cases to be expedited.

"The law on paper is quite advanced,” said Xin He, a law professor at the University of Hong Kong. But when it comes to enforcement of the law, the authorities are failing many victims, and there are not enough social workers to support victims,” He said.

"The system has a lot of inadequacies, which is why you see a lot of women that feel so helpless.”

[...]

"When the police intervene, then they will emphasize staying in the marriage. The police often see their role as a mediator,” said Minglu Chen, a senior lecturer at the University of Sydney who studies gender and politics in China. "There are also cultural forces in China, because the family is seen as a source of stability and any wrongdoing that happens within the family, you have to keep it in the family.”

[...]

A woman named Ms. Xie, who chose not to disclose her first name, told state broadcaster CCTV she was attacked by her husband more than a dozen times over her three-year marriage and that she had repeatedly asked the police to detain him.

In April 2023, she went to a court in Chengdu to seek a restraining order but was turned away. The court argued that the case was outside its jurisdiction because her husband was not originally from Chengdu.

[...]

When her husband found out that Ms. Xie had applied for a restraining order, he beat her for hours. She was sent to a hospital the next day, where doctors found that her liver, kidney and small intestine had ruptured. Her injuries, which included a broken nose and ribs, left her in critical condition for a week.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/45401479

Archived

[...]

Deflation signals a lopsided economy where supply dwarfs demand. That hurts companies, which in turn hurts workers. As consumption weakens, businesses spend less, economic activity slows, debt burdens rise, which then causes more deflation. The downward loop, known in economics as a deflationary spiral, feeds on itself once entrenched.

The trend also carries global implications: cheap Chinese exports can depress prices abroad, strain relations with trading partners, and create knock-on effects for multinational companies. Global institutions are sounding the alarm, with the International Monetary Fund projecting that consumer inflation in China will average zero this year — the second-lowest of nearly 200 economies it tracks. The Bank of Korea warned in July that China could export deflation to its trading partners.

[...]

And the problem could be even worse than they realize. China’s official CPI figure — which offers limited item-level detail and is shaped by a complex methodology that isn’t transparent — has hovered around zero since early 2023, occasionally posting modest gains. Bloomberg News analyzed prices for dozens of products in 36 major cities as well as both official and private data across China to get a sense of how much cheaper things have become on the ground. We looked at items in categories like food, groceries, consumer goods and services, as well as housing costs and price changes for specific car brands.

[...]

Across the market, company results show the same pressures: the share of “zombie” firms — those whose profits can’t cover interest payments on their debt — rose from 19% to 34% over the past five years; capital and R&D spending fell for most companies, a first in a decade; and more than a third of companies across industries cut jobs in 2024.

[...]

Last year, salaries at private companies — which employ over 80% of China’s urban workforce — grew at the slowest pace on record. In industries like manufacturing and IT, wages fell for the first time in official statistics for private firms. A private survey on salaries, before being discontinued last year, showed average pay offers in 38 cities dropped 5% between 2022 and 2024. Even in China’s prized “new economy” sectors like AI and new energy, entry-level salaries are down 7% from their 2022 peak.

Meanwhile, households have boosted their savings to the equivalent of around 110% of China’s gross domestic product last year, the highest ever, indicating consumers are expecting lower prices in the future and heightened economic uncertainty.

[...]

There is no suggestion that the situation in China will be reversed. Despite slight seasonal upticks on holiday spending, persistent weakness across both the industrial and consumer sectors indicates China’s prices are on track for a third consecutive year of deflation in 2025. And that matters: the longer prices sag, the greater the risk that growth in the world’s second-largest economy could slow for years — even decades.

Prolonged deflation would also be virtually unprecedented for a major economy since World War II, with the lone exception of Japan, which just this year escaped its own painful battle of over a decade of weak prices and deflation. It’ll also become harder for China to climb into high-income status sustainably, or to surpass the US in economic size. Years of rising incomes and property gains had fueled dreams of upward mobility, but now deflation is quietly hollowing out the confidence of China’s once-aspiring middle class.

[...]

For Zhu, the economics professor at CEIBS, there is little time to waste for China to get itself out of this deflationary spiral. The government must pour more money into encouraging consumption — to the tune of half a trillion dollars — via unlimited vouchers for households to drive spending. If not, China’s economy is in dangerous trouble, he said.

“Historically, deflation is extremely rare,” said Zhu. “If prices are down for three years and inflation doesn’t come back, then people will believe it won’t come back. And that’s when China becomes Japan.”

I want to know if it's reasonable to expect a degree of privacy with stock android.

A pretty good reminder not to take important advice from reddit

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/38782740

As gradually leaked the last days by various news outlets, the EU Commission has secretly set in motion a potentially massive reform of the GDPR. If internal drafts become reality, this would have significant impact on people's fundamental right to privacy and data protection. The reform would be part of the so-called "Digital Omnibus" which was supposed to only bring targeted adjustments to simplify compliance for businesses. Now, the Commission proposes changes to core elements like the definition of "personal data" and all data subject's rights under the GDPR. The leaked draft also suggests to give AI companies (like Google, Meta or OpenAI) a blank check to suck up European's personal data. In addition, the special protection of sensitive data like health data, political views or sexual orientation would be significantly reduced. Also, remote access to personal data on PCs or smart phones without consent of the user would be enabled. Many elements of the envisaged reform would overturn CJEU case law, violate European Conventions and the European Charter of Fundamental Rights. If this extreme draft will become the official position of the European Commission, will only become clear on 19 November, when the "Digital Omnibus" will be officially presented. Schrems: "This would be a massive downgrading of European's privacy ten years after the GDPR was adopted."

Drinking caffeinated coffee is safe for people with atrial fibrillation and may help protect against recurrence of the disorder, a new study finds.

More than 10 million Americans live with atrial fibrillation, or A-fib, a common heart disorder that causes heart palpitations and can lead to heart failure, blood clots and stroke. Doctors have long tried to understand whether caffeine — which can increase heart rate and blood pressure — appears to trigger episodes that feel like a fluttering or thumping in the chest and cause dizziness or breathlessness.

“There is no standard advice for atrial fibrillation and caffeine,” said Dr. Gregory Marcus, a cardiologist and professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, who led the DECAF (Does Eliminating Coffee Avoid Fibrillation?) study. “It is very common for me to encounter patients who have stopped drinking caffeinated coffee only because their physician has told them to do so because of their atrial fibrillation.”

AI pattern matching is a black box. You can’t know how a decision is made until it’s too late to unmake it. A private surveillance firm plugging AI into policing doesn’t democratize safety or create objectivity, it accelerates suspicion based on existing grievances.

Except when it’s designed to suspect nothing. Flock’s response to controversies about privacy has included supposed “transparency” features, as well as tools that it claims will enable “public audits” of searches and results. And if your small police department that’s turned to Flock as a “force multiplier” doesn’t have the staff to run audits? No worries: “To support agencies with limited resources for audit monitoring, we are developing a new AI-based tool.… This tool will help agencies maintain transparency and accountability at scale.” Using an AI to monitor an AI is a level of absurdity Philip K. Dick never quite got to. Maybe someone can write a ChatGPT prompt for a novel in his style.

I think Dick would recognize another irony: AIs surveilling AIs surveilling us sounds like a dispassionate threat from without, but the ghost in the machine is that we cannot scrub away the passions and resentments that incite the obsession to begin with. The paternalism that launches the drone for our good doesn’t curb the risk that something will go wrong. When you use sophisticated technology to pursue vengeance, you are not elevating the action to a cause. Involving an AI doesn’t make violence an abstraction. An automated vigilante isn’t impersonal, just efficient.

After footage surfaced showing Israeli Ambassador to Austria, David Roet, calling for the "death penalty for children" involved in "Israel’s" war on Gaza, a German-Moroccan Jew who attended the meeting said counter-terror police later raided his home and seized his electronic devices.

The footage went viral online but was ignored by major outlets in Austria and Germany. Instead of investigating the ambassador’s remarks, authorities targeted him for sharing the ambassador's footage, a move he said "disturbed some Zionists in high places" and reflected "the complicity with which European countries obey and execute their orders."

That's it that's the post

Vladimir Putin is stuck in his military campaign against Ukraine and could be preparing for another attack, said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in an interview with The Guardian.

The Kremlin is currently waging a hybrid war against Europe while testing NATO's red lines.

Zelenskyy warned that Russia could open a second front against another European country before the war in Ukraine ends.

"I believe so. He can do that. We must forget about the general European scepticism that Putin first wants to occupy Ukraine and then may go somewhere else. He can do both at the same time," he said.

SponsorBlock, Timestamps, and Generated Summary below:

SponsorBlock Timestamps:

1. 0:00.000 - 0:07.700 Intermission
2. 0:07.700 - 1:53.000 Clip: Russia's Support for Venezuela Against US
3. 1:53.000 - 1:56.500 Intermission
4. 1:56.500 - 3:18.000 Clip: Israel's Declining Influence in US Politics
5. 3:18.000 - 3:21.100 Intermission
6. 3:21.100 - 3:24.500 Hook/Greetings
7. 3:24.500 - 6:11.400 Intro: Israel's Declining Influence and Propaganda Push
8. 6:11.400 - 6:23.000 Kshama Sawant Joins the Conversation
9. 6:23.000 - 1:28:44.900 Main Conversation: Zohran Mamdani's Victory, Revolutionary vs. Electoral Politics, Genocide, and Imperialism
10. 1:28:44.900 - 1:28:50.500 Interaction Reminder
11. 1:28:50.500 - 1:30:15.221 Unpaid/Self Promotion

Video Description:

Timestamps:

1. 0:00 Intro
2. 3:45 Zohran Mamdani Already Capitulating to Capitalists
3. 39:41 The Fake Ceasefire Deal
4. 1:11:24 Democrats Say Trump Needs Permission to Commit War Crimes

Tags:

#usnews #uspolitics #zohranmamdani #kshamasawant #geopoliticsinconflict #nickcruse #usimperialism #Trump #workingclass

Generated Summary:

This program, hosted by Nick Cruse, begins with commentary on international affairs, arguing that Russia is successfully challenging US imperialism by supporting Venezuela, and that Israel's influence over US politics is declining. The main segment features an interview with Kshama Sawant, who is running for Congress against Rep. Adam Smith.

Their discussion centers on the recent electoral victory of Zohran Mamdani in New York. While both agree the win represents a working-class repudiation of Zionism and Wall Street, they offer a critical analysis. Sawant contrasts Mamdani's approach—which she characterizes as making backroom deals with capitalists and operating within the Democratic Party—with her own record of building militant, independent working-class movements that successfully won major reforms like a $15 minimum wage and strong renters' rights in Seattle. The conversation expands to critique the Democratic Party's complicity in genocide and imperialism, using her opponent, Rep. Adam Smith, as a prime example. The key takeaway is that substantive victories for the working class require a revolutionary, independent socialist movement that engages in class struggle, not electoral politics within capitalist parties.

Analysis & Key Takeaways

Nick Cruse's Analysis:

• International Relations: Positions Russia as a key counterweight to US imperialism, highlighting military support for Venezuela as evidence of Western weakness.
• Domestic Politics: Argues that support for Israel is collapsing across the political spectrum and that Zionist influence now relies heavily on censorship and propaganda.
• Electoral Strategy: Is deeply skeptical of politicians like Zohran Mamdani who run as Democrats, viewing their outreach to billionaires and condemnation of certain left-wing slogans as major red flags that indicate a future of capitulation to the capitalist class.

Kshama Sawant's Analysis & Key Takeaways:

• The Mamdani Victory: It is a positive sign of working-class anger and a desire to fight back, but the obstacle is not mass consciousness but the capitulatory leadership offered by figures like Mamdani and the DSA.
• A Revolutionary vs. Reformist Strategy: The core of her argument is that you cannot win lasting, substantial reforms for the working class by making peace with the capitalist class and its political parties (Democrats and Republicans). True change requires "pitch battle, class struggle."
• Proven Model for Change: She points to her record in Seattle as proof that using an elected office as a platform to build a defiant, independent mass movement—one that directly confronts and names its political enemies—is the only way to win major victories. She positions her campaign against Rep. Adam Smith as the national extension of this strategy.
• On Genocide and Imperialism: The complicity of the Democratic Party (including the Progressive and Black Caucuses) in the Gaza genocide and ongoing US imperialism exposes its fundamental role as a party of capitalism. She explicitly calls out Rep. Adam Smith for his pro-genocide votes and his continued advocacy for a massive U.S. military presence abroad.
• The Path Forward: The working class must build a new, independent political force based on militant struggle and international solidarity, exemplified by her congressional campaign's demands to end all military aid to Israel and win free healthcare for all by taxing the rich.

About:

Kshama Sawant:

Kshama Sawant is not a career politician. She is an activist who brings a passion for social justice to her work as a public servant. As a member of the City Council, Kshama pledges to be a voice for workers, youth, the oppressed and the voiceless. She only accepts the average workers’ wage and donates the rest of her six-figure salary to building social justice movements.

https://www.kshamasawant.org/

Nick Cruse:

Citizen journalist Co-Founder #TenDemands Board Member: National RCV [https://www.breaktheduopoly.com/] KC Tenants KC Sunrise [https://allmylinks.com/socialistmma]^[[1] https://substack.com/@socialistmma]

Revolutionary Blackout Network (RBN):

Blacking Out Corporate Propaganda and Educating for a Revolution.

“You can jail a Revolutionary, but you can’t jail the Revolution.” -- Fred Hampton (1948 - 1969)

We should focus our actions, time, and resources on Direct Action, Mutual Aid, and Community Outreach. If you do engage in Electoral Politics do not support the Duopoly (Red or Blue Team). No War but Class War!

Welcome again to everybody. Make yourself at home. In the time-honoured tradition of our group, here is the weekly discussion thread.

☭ Matrix homeserver and space
☭ Theory discussion group on /c/theory@lemmygrad.ml
☭ Find theory on ProleWiki, marxists.org, Anna's Archive, libgen

Archived

[...]

Since the national security law was implemented, Hong Kong police have issued a series of international arrest warrants for individuals residing abroad. So far, none of the 34 individuals placed on the wanted list have been turned in. Nevertheless, they are under intense pressure, even if they live in a democratic country like Canada, as alleged transnational repression by China spreads.

Tay and five other pro-democracy activists living abroad -- Tony Chung Hon-lam, Chung Kim-wah, Carmen Lau Ka-man, Victor Ho Leung-mau and Chloe Cheung Hei-ching -- were charged under the law and subjected to bounties the same day. Tay, who spoke out via his online platform HongKonger Station, is accused of inciting secession and for colluding with foreign forces, two of the four crimes that became punishable under the vaguely worded law. The two others are subversion and terrorist activities.

[...]

"Transnational repression is not only real, but aggressive and sophisticated," Tay said. According to the couple, relatives who still live in Hong Kong were also affected, as Tay's cousin and his wife were taken in by the police and asked to assist with the investigation against Tay.

Dennis Kwok Wing-hang, a former pro-democracy Hong Kong lawmaker who was placed on the wanted list and hit with an HK$1 million bounty before Tay, has also felt the heat in Canada. Despite being a Canadian citizen, Kwok told Nikkei in Tokyo in late October that he has moved to the U.S. with his family because he feels safer there.

Kwok was virtually forced to flee Hong Kong in November 2020, and became stateless at one point, as his passport was canceled by the city. He was subsequently able to reinstate his Canadian citizenship, which he had surrendered to run for office in Hong Kong in 2016.

[...]

Explaining the situation in Canada, Kwok said that many "in the Chinese community have been reading up a lot of pro-Beijing propaganda news." This, he said, has "colored" their views. He argued that unlike in the U.S., "United Front" activities promoting Chinese influence and interests have been "very successful for decades" in Canada.

[...]

For the "first time, democratic countries feel that authoritarian regimes are reaching into their own territories, affecting what [their own] citizens can do within their own borders," said Kwok, who has co-founded a think tank in the U.S. called the China Strategic Risks Institute. Whether the pressure is coming from China, Russia or Iran, he believes such campaigns have given democratic policymakers a wake-up call.

[...]

Kwok called on Western governments to do more. "You're talking about democracy activists, dissidents, that are residing lawfully in those countries, that are [under] direct pressure," he said. "We need a lot of policy response in that respect."

Hey everyone,

We're excited to finally share the results summary of the survey we posted in this community a few months ago! A massive thank you to the n=2158 active self-hosters from communities like r/selfhosted on Reddit and c/selfhosted on Lemmy.World who participated. Your input has led to a comprehensive academic paper that investigates the core reasons why we stick with self-hosting over the long haul.

Our study examined which factors most influence the Continuance Intention (the desire to keep using) and Actual Usage of self-hosted solutions. We confirmed that self-hosting is a principle-driven and hobby-driven practice, challenging traditional models of technology adoption.

The Top 3 most important Positive Drivers for Continued Self-Hosting

The most significant positive predictors of your intention to continue self-hosting were all rooted in intrinsic satisfaction and personal gain, rather than just basic utility:

1. Perceived Enjoyment (The 'Fun Factor'): The sheer joy, pleasure, and personal satisfaction of configuring, maintaining, and experimenting with your own systems is a powerful, primary motivator for long-term engagement.
2. Perceived Autonomy (Control/Digital Sovereignty): The desire for explicit control over your data and services, and the rejection of vendor lock-in inherent in third-party cloud services, is a fundamental driver.
3. Perceived Usefulness: The belief that your self-hosted solution efficiently delivers specific personal outcomes (e.g., operational efficiency, powerful features, and privacy) is important, but its influence was less pronounced than Enjoyment or Autonomy.

The Critical Role of Technical Skill

We found that your self-assessed technical ability, or Perceived Competence, acts as a crucial link between wanting to self-host and actually doing it. Having a high intention to keep self-hosting is only half the battle. Your confidence in your technical skill is what gives you the self-assurance to handle the necessary, demanding tasks like maintenance, security, and updates. Importantly, a certain critical threshold of knowledge is required before competence starts driving that actual, continuous usage.

Other Key Insights

• Privacy Matters: Concerns about privacy in cloud services positively influence the decision to stick with self-hosting.
• The 'Push' Factor: If a user reports high Trust or high Autonomy when using commercial cloud services, they are significantly less motivated to continue self-hosting. This confirms that dissatisfaction with the commercial cloud effectively "pushes" people toward decentralized alternatives.
• Maintenance Isn't a Dealbreaker: The high effort and time required for upkeep, or Perceived Maintenance Cost, was not a statistically significant factor for giving up on self-hosting. Our intrinsic motivation is powerful enough to absorb the necessary effort.

Implications for the Self-Hosting Ecosystem

For developers and the community, these findings suggest that sustained usage depends not only on functionality but also on fostering empowerment and a great user experience. By making self-hosting more enjoyable and reinforcing the user's sense of digital sovereignty, we strengthen the intrinsic motivation that fuels this movement.

Thank you again for helping us publish this research on the future of decentralized digital solutions! This work would not have been possible without your participation.

The full open-access article "A Model of Factors Influencing Continuance Intention and Actual Usage of Self-Hosted Software Solutions": https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/22/10009

cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/41530810

Migrants in Europe stand by the basic values of democracy, according to a new study by the University of Mannheim in Germany.

“Our results show: immigrants support the core democratic principles to a similarly high degree as people without a migratory background,” says Professor Marc Helbling, sociologist at the University of Mannheim focusing on Migration and Integration and Executive Board member of the Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES).

You find the download link for the study here: Liberal democratic values among immigrants in Europe: Socialisation and adaptation processes

Helbling and his team analyzed data from the European Social Survey (ESS) and the SVR’s [Expert Council on Integration and Migration's] German Integration Barometer.

High support for democratic basic values all over Europe

The results of the study show that both migrants from democratic countries of origin and those from authoritarian countries are highly supportive of core democratic norms, such as free elections, equal rights, minority protection, and independent courts. On the ESS scale from 0 to 10, the mean level of support for these values throughout Europe is at 8.56 for migrants. For non-migrants, the level of support is at 8.48. For Germany in particular, the Integration Barometer data with a scale from 0 to 3 show very similar values, more specifically 2.67 and 2.66. “These, in all cases, very high mean values hardly differ between the individual groups of people,” Helbling explains.

Experience with democracy in country of origin has a positive effect

The research team found a small but statistically significant difference between immigrants from highly authoritarian countries, such as Eritrea, Saudi Arabia, or Iran, on the one hand and migrants from more democratic countries, such as India, Turkey, or Romania, on the other. “People who have lived in a very authoritarian system for many years tend to develop slightly weaker democratic attitudes. Conversely, people who have lived in more democratic countries for a long time show a bit more support for democracy. However, the difference is really small,” Helbling explains. “In principle, democratic basic beliefs are shared across cultural and national borders and, as a rule, solidified with increasing democratic life experience,” the social scientist sums up.

Problematic minorities within all groups

Despite the overall high level of support for democracy, there is a small minority among immigrants who reject it. According to the researchers, the share of this group accounts for a medium single-digit percentage. This value is almost exactly the same as the one for people without a migratory background, Helbling emphasizes: “Our analyses show that anti-democratic attitudes are not specifically a migration-related phenomenon. There are critical minorities within all population groups.”

...