Recent Entries

From The Week in Westminster at 2025-05-17 11:00:00

17/05/2025 (p0lbs4n2.mp3)

Radio 4's assessment of developments at Westminster

From More or Less: Behind the Stats at 2025-05-17 06:00:00

How dead is the internet? (p0lbq3mb.mp3)

In the early 2020s, a conspiracy theory started circulating online known as the “dead internet theory”.

This suggested that, instead of a vibrant digital super-community where people freely share things like cat videos and conspiracy theories, the internet was instead basically dead - an AI dystopia controlled by the deep state, where almost everything you see and interact with is generated by computers. The theory that the internet is 100% dead can be easily disproven, but the theory does hint at something real. The internet certainly is full of “bots”, autonomous bits of software that are definitely not alive.

In this episode, we investigate one specific claim about the number of these bots on the internet - the idea that more than half of internet traffic is bots. Where does this claim come from, and is it true?

Presenter/producer: Tom Colls Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown Sound mix: Giles Aspen Editor: Richard Vadon

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-16 20:25:41

The empire strikes back with F-bombs: AI Darth Vader goes rogue with profanity, slurs

Fortnite AI voice trained on James Earl Jones spoke curse words and insults before patch.

From The Incomparable Mothership at 2025-05-16 17:00:00

766: That's 2K! (9324b06b-5983-48fd-8e9c-aacc09534104.mp3)

We return once more to 1995, this time for a movie set at the turn of the century! It’s “Strange Days,” a cyberpunk movie with only a little bit of cyber but a lot of punk, along with grease and stink....

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-16 14:55:28

Communications Backdoor in Chinese Power Inverters

This is a weird story:

U.S. energy officials are reassessing the risk posed by Chinese-made devices that play a critical role in renewable energy infrastructure after unexplained communication equipment was found inside some of them, two people familiar with the matter said.

[…]

Over the past nine months, undocumented communication devices, including cellular radios, have also been found in some batteries from multiple Chinese suppliers, one of them said.

Reuters was unable to determine how many solar power inverters and batteries they have looked at...

From The Django weblog at 2025-05-16 12:54:21

Our Google Summer of Code 2025 contributors

We’re excited to introduce our Google Summer of Code 2025 contributors!

These amazing folks will be working on impactful projects that will shape Django’s future.\ Meet the contributors 👇

A. Rafey Khan

Project: Django Admin – Add Keyboard Shortcuts & Command Palette. Mentors: Tom Carrick, Apoorv Garg

Rafey will work on making Django Admin faster and more accessible through keyboard-driven workflows. Excited to see this land!

Farhan Ali Raza

Project: Bring django-template-partials into core. Mentor: Carlton Gibson

Farhan will be enhancing Django’s template system by adding first-class support for partials—making componentized templates easier than ever.\

Saurabh K

Project: Automate processes within Django’s contribution workflow. Mentor: Lily Foote

Saurabh will work on streamlining how contributors interact with Django repo—automating repetitive tasks and improving dev experience for all. \ A huge shoutout to our mentors (and Org Admin Bhuvnesh Sharma) and the broader Django community for supporting these contributors! 💚\ \ Let’s make this a summer of learning, building, and collaboration.

From Ink Stained Wretches at 2025-05-16 09:45:00

Chair Force One (NEBM9285671420.mp3?updated=1747345732)

Watch This Episode on YouTube! It’s oh so good to be back in the studio. We’re kicking off with Trump’s Gulf tour, the scoops about the scoops on the Biden books, “Mar-a-Lago face,” and much more. Wretch on! If you have a story you want to discuss with us, email us at wretches@nebulouspodcasts dot com. Time Stamps: 2:00 - Front Page 50:29 - Obsessions  57:28 - Reader Mail 1:00:12 - Favorite Items Show Notes: Mediaite: WHCA Rages as Trump Excludes Major News Wire Services From Middle East Trip I Might Be Wrong: The Qatari Plane Scandal is Different Because Morons Understand It Newsweek: Saudi Arabia Rolls Out Custom Mobile McDonald's for Trump Visit The Daily Beast: Biden Aides Had a Secret Plan to Get the President a Wheelchair, New Book Claims Axios: Exclusive: Biden aides discussed wheelchair use if he were re-elected, new book says CNN: First on CNN: New book reveals how Biden’s inner circle kept Cabinet from him in final two years of presidency The Dispatch: The Temptation and the Fall of the Media The New Yorker: Is Jeff Bezos Selling Out the Washington Post? The Washington Post: Bill Belichick, Jordon Hudson and the making of a PR disaster The Washington Post: MLB reinstates Pete Rose and others, paving way for Hall of Fame consideration The New York Times: Can I Wear a Sheath Dress Without Looking Like a MAGA Woman?The Free Press: How Qatar Bought America The Dispatch: Feelings, Facts, and Our Crisis of Truth Teen Vogue: News Influencers Are Reaching Young People, and the Media Is Trying to Keep Up Politico: The First Thing George Santos Should Do in Prison The Washington Free Beacon: The Surprising Ways That Siblings Shape Our Lives

From A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry at 2025-05-16 06:41:26

Collections: Alexander Goes West (A Silly Counterfactual)

This week we’re going to do something a bit silly, in part because I have to prepare for and travel to an invited workshop/talk event later this week and so don’t have quite the time for a more normal ‘full’ post and in part because it is fun to be silly sometimes (and we might … Continue reading Collections: Alexander Goes West (A Silly Counterfactual) →

From GoodFellows: Conversations from the Hoover Institution at 2025-05-15 16:38:28

The Plane Truth: Playing Chicken with China, Trump Goes Gulf-ing, Tensions in South Asia (GoodFellows_2025-05-14_wip021_podcast_9nr60.mp3)

America and China take a 90-day time-out in their dispute over tariffs; President Trump’s tour of the Middle East—the first overseas trip of his second term—raises unsettling questions about both his regional strategy and his family’s business dealings; and hostilities between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan raise questions of behind-the-scenes great-power machinations amidst “Cold War 2.” Hoover senior fellows Niall Ferguson, John Cochrane, and Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster discuss what’s at stake in these various parts of the globe. After that: the three fellows debate the severity of Chinese espionage in America’s universities; and how AI’s ability to shortcut the learning process will impact the future of higher education.    Recorded on May 14, 2025.

From Net Assessment at 2025-05-15 15:48:00

The Paradoxical Power? (Audio__The_Paradoxical_Power_v1.mp3?dest-id=808287)

An immense and growing national debt, entrenched political polarization, and falling levels of patriotism might lead some to conclude that the position of the United States in the world is weakening compared to other major economies. Michael Beckley looks at other measures, including geography, wealth, alliances, and demographics, and concludes that “This is the paradox of American power: the United States is a divided country, perpetually perceived as in decline, yet it consistently remains the wealthiest and most powerful state in the world—leaving competitors behind.” But, he says, all is not well: an urban-rural divide and a “hollow internationalism” threaten our stability and security. Chris, Zack, and Melanie talk about whether the United States is in decline, how our advantages might create vulnerabilities, and how dysfunction at home affects America’s ability to wield influence abroad.

Chris has a shoutout for Gabe Murphy and his work on base realignment, Zack has a remembrance of recently-passed security scholar, practitioner, and mentor Joseph Nye, and Melanie criticizes the Biden administration for not coming clean about the extent of failure of the Gaza Pier.

Links: 

• Michael Beckley, “The Strange Triumph of a Broken America: Why Power Abroad Comes with Dysfunction at Home,” Foreign Affairs, January/February 2025.

• Michael Beckley, “The Age of American Unilateralism,” Foreign Affairs, April 16, 2025.

• Christopher Preble, “Trump’s Rise: Who’s to Blame?” Cato at Liberty, March 3, 2016.

• Alexander Cornwell, "US, Israel discuss possible US-led administration for Gaza, sources say," Reuters, May 7, 2025.

• Supporting Stimson, https://www.stimson.org/support/

• Gabe Murphy, “Base Instincts: A Case for Base Realignment and Closures at Home and Abroad,” Taxpayers for Common Sense, May 2025.

• John Hendel, “The $42 Billion Biden Internet Program Frustrating Dems in Swing States,” Politico, September 4, 2024.

• Alex Horton, “Biden’s Gaza Pier Was More Dangerous and Costly than Previously Known,” Washington Post, May 7, 2025.

• John Arnold, Immigration chart, X, May 11, 2025. 

From The Django weblog at 2025-05-15 15:00:00

Our new accessibility statement

Happy Global Accessibility Awareness Day! We thought this would be a fitting occasion to announce our brand new Django accessibility statement 🎉

Did you know that according to the WebAIM Million survey, 94.6% of sites have easily-detectable accessibility issues? We all need to work together to build a more inclusive web (also check out our diversity statement if you haven’t already!). There are accessibility gaps in Django itself too. This statement improves transparency, and clearly states our intentions. And we hope it encourages our community and the industry at large to more widely consider accessibility.

How to use this statement

Read it, share it with your friends, or in a procurement context!

• Use it to understand where there are gaps in Django that need to be addressed on projects.
• And opportunities to contribute to Django and related projects ❤️
• Factor it into legal compliance. For example with the European Accessibility Act. Starting June 2025, accessibility becomes a legal requirement for large swaths of the private sector in the European Union.
• Share it with venues for Django events to demonstrate the importance of accessibility for their competitiveness.

How you can help

Take a moment to provide any feedback you might have about the statement on the Django Forum. Let us know if you would prefer additional reporting like an ATAG audit, or VPAT, ACR, or any other acronym. Let us know if you’d like to contribute to the accessibility of the Django community! 🫶

From The Briefing Room at 2025-05-15 13:22:00

What is Israel's plan for Gaza? (p0lbdvhw.mp3)

Dire warnings of famine in Gaza, a broken ceasefire and the threat by the Israeli government of a new “intense” offensive which would forcibly displace Palestinians to an area in the south of Gaza and perhaps out of the strip altogether, plus the latest release of a US hostage. This is the war between Israel and Gaza 19 months on from the deadly attack by Hamas which killed 1200 people in Israel and took 251 hostages.

So what chance of peace between Israel and Gaza? Can a new ceasefire be negotiated with US backing or will Israel go it alone and forcibly occupy most of Gaza?

Guests:

Yolande Knell, BBC Middle East Correspondent Anshel Pfeffer, Israel Correspondent at The Economist, Yossi Mekelberg Senior Consulting Fellow, Middle East and North Africa Programme, Chatham House Shibley Telhami, Professor of Government and Politics at University of Maryland and a non resident senior fellow at Brookings Institution.

Presenter: David Aaronovitch Producers: Caroline Bayley, Nathan Gower, Kirsteen Knight Production co-ordinators: Sabine Schereck and Katie Morrison Sound Engineer: David Crackles Editor: Richard Vadon

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-15 13:18:49

Spies hack high-value mail servers using an exploit from yesteryear

Attacks spilled contacts and emails from targeted accounts.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-15 12:00:33

AI-Generated Law

On April 14, Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, announced that the United Arab Emirates would begin using artificial intelligence to help write its laws. A new Regulatory Intelligence Office would use the technology to “regularly suggest updates” to the law and “accelerate the issuance of legislation by up to 70%.” AI would create a “comprehensive legislative plan” spanning local and federal law and would be connected to public administration, the courts, and global policy trends.

The plan was widely greeted with astonishment. This sort of AI legislating would be a global “...

From Strong Message Here at 2025-05-15 09:45:00

Yes or No? (p0lb60x8.mp3)

Comedy writer Armando Iannucci and journalist Helen Lewis decode the utterly baffling world of political language.

This week, Helen and Armando take a step back and look at whether we're seeing the death of nuance in political debate. Is everything boiled down to 'yes or no' questions? What are the shibboleths of modern politics, and does the language you use, or decline to use, put you firmly on one side of a debate?

Listen to Strong Message Here every Thursday at 9.45am on Radio 4 and then head straight to BBC Sounds for an extended episode.

Have you stumbled upon any perplexing political phrases you need Helen and Armando to decode? Email them to us at strongmessagehere@bbc.co.uk

Sound Editing by Kate Mac Production Coordinator - Katie Baum Executive Producer - Pete Strauss

Produced by Gwyn Rhys Davies. A BBC Studios Audio production for Radio 4. An EcoAudio Certified Production.

From The Django weblog at 2025-05-15 05:55:48

DjangoCon Europe and beyond

We had a blast at DjangoCon Europe 2025, and hope you did too! Events like this are essential for our community, delighting both first-timers and seasoned Djangonauts with insights, good vibes, and all-around inspiration. This year’s conference brought together brilliant minds from all corners of the globe. And featured early celebrations of Django’s 20th birthday! ⭐️🎂🎉

After launching in 2005, Django turns 20 in 2025, and the conference was a great occasion for our community to celebrate this. And work on the sustainability of the project together.

We need more code reviews

Our Django Fellow Sarah Boyce kicked off the conference with a call for more contributions – of the reviewing kind. In her words,

Django needs your help. Every day, contributors submit pull requests and update existing PRs, but there aren't enough reviewers to keep up. Learn why Django needs more reviewers and how you can help get changes merged into core.

We need more fundraising

Our Vice President Sarah Abderemane got on stage to encourage more financial support of Django from attendees, showcasing how simple it is to donate to the project (get your boss to do it!). We have ambitious plans for 2025, which will require us to grow the Foundation’s budget accordingly.

Annual meeting of DSF Members

Our Board members Tom Carrick, Thibaud Colas, Sarah Abderemane, and Paolo Melchiorre were at the conference to organize a meeting of Members of the Django Software Foundation. This was a good occasion to discuss long-standing topics, and issues of the moment, such as:

• Diversity, equity and inclusion. Did you know we recently got awarded the CHAOSS DEI bronze badge? We need to keep the momentum in this area.
• Management of the Membership at the Foundation. With different visions on how much the membership is a recognition or a commitment (or both). There was interest in particular in sharing more calls to action with members.
• Content of the website. A long-standing area for improvement (which we’re working on!)

All in all this was a good opportunity for further transparency, and to find people who might be interested in contributing to those areas of our work in the future.

Birthday celebrations

There was a cake (well, three!). Candles to blow out. And all-around great vibes and smiles, with people taking pictures and enjoying specially-made Django stickers!

Up next

We have a lot more events coming up this year where the Foundation will be present, and bringing celebrations of Django’s 20th birthday!

PyCon US 2025

It’s on, now! And we’re present, with a booth. Come say hi! There will be Django stickers available:

PyCon Italia 2025

Some of the PyCon Italia team was there at DjangoCon Europe to hype up their event – and we’ll definitely be there in Bologna! They promised better coffee 👀, and this will have to be independently verified. Check out their Djangonauts at PyCon Italia event.

EuroPython 2025

We got to meet up with some of the EuroPython crew at DjangoCon Europe too, and we’ll definitely be there at the conference too, as one of their EuroPython community partners 💚. There may well be birthday cake there too, get your tickets!

Django events

And if you haven’t already, be sure to check out our next flagship Django events!

• DjangoCon Africa 2025, in Arusha, Tanzania 🇹🇿 in August.
• DjangoCon US 2025, in Chicago, USA 🇺🇸 in September.

Thank you to everyone who joined us at DjangoCon Europe, and thank you to the team behind the conference in particular ❤️. DjangoCon Europe continues to show the strength and warmth of our community, proving that the best part of Django is truly the people. See you at the next one!

From The Rest Is History at 2025-05-15 00:05:00

565. The Great Northern War: Revenge of the Cossacks (Part 2) (GLT1223770243.mp3?updated=1747251724)

After establishing the city of St Petersburg, what was Peter the Great’s next step in his titanic struggle against Charles XII of Sweden, for mastery of northern and eastern Europe? What drastic, brutal action did he take against Poland, to slow the Swedish advance into his territories? And, after the defection of one of his oldest and most important allies - the leader of the Ukrainian Cossacks - to the Swedes, could Peter and his army survive to fight on?  Join Dominic and Tom as they discuss the next and deadliest stage of the Great Northern War: from action-packed military conquests, and harsh marches into the depths of a northern winter, to great betrayals, and the outbreak of the battle that would decide the fate of two of Europe’s mightiest rulers…  The Rest Is History Club: Become a member for exclusive bonus content, early access to full series and live show tickets, ad-free listening, our exclusive newsletter, discount book prices on titles mentioned on the pod, and our members’ chatroom on Discord. Just head to therestishistory.com to sign up, or start a free trial today on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/therestishistory. For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah Akude  Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-14 23:16:14

OpenAI adds GPT-4.1 to ChatGPT amid complaints over confusing model lineup

Two new AI models join 7 others, leaving some paid users wondering which one is best.

From The Media Show at 2025-05-14 17:36:00

The weather influencers taking social media by storm, Sir Peter Bazalgette, reporting the mushroom murder trial in Australia (p0lb7gv9.mp3)

Ros Atkins and Katie Razzall on the week's big media stories from around the world. What next for presenter Jo Coburn who leaves Politics Live next week after nearly thirty years with the BBC? She's covered the tumultuous years of the Scottish and EU referendums, Brexit, the pandemic, lockdown and shifting political landscape. We hear about her highs, lows, and plans for the future. Who to trust for news in the India/Pakistan conflict as disinfomation spreads across the media from all sides? Shayan Sardarizadeh a senior journalist at BBC Verify has been monitoring the situation. Nino Bucci the justice and courts reporter at Guardian Australia tells us about the mushroom murder trial which has gripped the interest of the global media. As the BBC's Director General Tim Davie delivers a speech about the unique role the corporation can play in the future, the media executive Sir Peter Bazalgette considers the long term future for all public service broadcasters in the UK. And the weather influencers taking social media by storm. Are they as reliable as traditional forecasters? We hear from Max Velocity, a YouTube weatherman based in the United States and ITV's Laura Tobin.

Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Assistant Producer: Lucy Wai

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-14 17:05:01

Upcoming Speaking Engagements

This is a current list of where and when I am scheduled to speak:

• I’m speaking (remotely) at the Sektor 3.0 Festival in Warsaw, Poland, May 21-22, 2025.

The list is maintained on this page.

From The Django weblog at 2025-05-14 13:00:00

DSF member of the month - Simon Charette

For May 2025, we welcome Simon Charette as our DSF member of the month! ⭐

Simon Charette is a longtime Django contributor and community member. He served on the Django 5.x Steering Council and is part of the Security team and the Triage and Review team. He has been a DSF member since November 2014.
You can learn more about Simon by visiting Simon's GitHub Profile.

Let’s spend some time getting to know Simon better!

Can you tell us a little about yourself (hobbies, education, etc)

My name is Simon Charette and I'm based in Montréal. I've been contributing to Django for over a decade mainly to the ORM and I have a background in software engineering and mathematics. I work as a principal backend engineer at Zapier where we use Python and Django to power many of our backend services. Outside of Django and work I like to spend time cycling around the world, traveling with my partner, and playing ultimate frisbee.

Out of curiosity, your GitHub profile picture appears to be a Frisbee, is it correct? If so, have you been playing for a long time?

I've been playing ultimate frisbee since college which is around the time I started contributing to Django. It has been a huge part of my life since then as I made many friends and met my partner playing through the years. My commitment to ultimate frisbee can be reflected in my volume of contributions over the past decade as it requires more of my time during certain periods of the year. It also explains why I wasn't able to attend most DjangoCon in spring and fall as this is usually a pretty busy time for me. I took part in the world championships twice and I played in the UFA for about 5 years before retiring three years ago. Nowadays I still play but at a lower intensity level and I am focused on giving back to the community through coaching.

How did you start using Django?

Back in college I was working part time for a web agency that had an in house PHP framework and was trying to determine which tech stack and framework they should migrate to in order to ease onboarding of their developers and reduce their maintenance costs. I was tasked, with another member of the team, to identify potential candidates and despite my lack of familiarity with Python at the time we ended up choosing Django over PHP's Symphony mainly because of its spectacular documentation and third-party app ecosystem.

What other framework do you know and if there is anything you would like to have in Django if you had magical powers?

If I had magical powers I'd invent Python ergonomics to elegantly address the function coloring problem so it's easier for Django to be adapted to an async-ready world. I'm hopeful that the recent development on the GIL removal in Python 3.13+ will result a renewed interest in the usage of threading, which Django is well equipped to take advantage of, over the systematic usage of an event loop to deal with web serving workloads as the async world comes with a lot of often overlooked drawbacks.

What projects are you working on now?

I have a few Django related projects I'm working on mainly relating to ORM improvements (deprecating extra, better usage of RETURNING when available) but the main one has been a tool to keep track of the SQL generated by the Django test suite over time to more easily identity unintended changes that still pass the test suite. My goal with this project is to have a CI invokable command that would run the full Django test suite and provide a set of tests that generated different SQL compared to the target branch so its much easier to identify unintended side effects when making invasive changes to the ORM.

Which Django libraries are your favorite (core or 3rd party)?

• DRF
• django-filter
• django-seal (shameless plug)

What are the top three things in Django that you like?

• The people
• The ORM, unsurprisingly
• The many entry points the framework provides to allow very powerful third-party apps to be used together

You've contributed significantly to improving the Django ORM. What do you believe is the next big challenge for Django ORM, and how do you envision it evolving in the coming years?

The ORM's expression interface is already very powerful but there are effectively some remaining rough edges. I believe that adding generalized support for composite virtual fields (a field composed of other fields) could solve many problems we currently face with how relationships are expressed between models as we currently lack a way to describe an expression that can return tuples of values internally. If we had this building block, adding a way to express and compose table expressions (CTE, subquery pushdown, aggregation through subqueries) would be much easier to implement without denaturing the ORM by turning it into a low level query builder. Many of these things are possible today (e.g. django-cte) but they require a lot of SQL compilation and ORM knowledge and can hardly be composed together.

How did you start to contribute to the ORM? What would be the advice you have for someone interested to contribute to this field?

I started small by fixing a few issues that I cared about and by taking the time to read through Trac, mailing lists, and git-blame for changes in the area that were breaking tests as attempted to make changes. One thing that greatly helps in onboarding on the ORM is to at least have some good SQL fundamentals. When I first started I already had written a MSSQL ORM in PHP which helped me at least understand the idea behind the generation of SQL from a higher level abstraction. Nowadays there are tons of resources out there to help you get started on understand how things are organized but I would suggest this particular video where I attempt to walk through the different phases of SQL generation.

Is there anything else you’d like to say?

It has been a pleasure to be able to be part of this community for so long and I'd like to personally thank Claude Paroz for initially getting me interested in contributing seriously to the project.

Thank you for doing the interview, Simon !

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-14 12:03:40

Google’s Advanced Protection Now on Android

Google has extended its Advanced Protection features to Android devices. It’s not for everybody, but something to be considered by high-risk users.

Wired article, behind a paywall.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-13 21:31:11

Google introduces Advanced Protection mode for its most at-risk Android users

A single flip of a settings button enables a host of defenses against hacking.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-13 15:58:26

GOP sneaks decade-long AI regulation ban into spending bill

Sweeping provision would halt all local oversight of AI by US states.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-13 14:00:17

New attack can steal cryptocurrency by planting false memories in AI chatbots

Malicious "context manipulation" technique causes bot to send payments to attacker's wallet.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-13 12:07:54

Court Rules Against NSO Group

The case is over:

A jury has awarded WhatsApp $167 million in punitive damages in a case the company brought against Israel-based NSO Group for exploiting a software vulnerability that hijacked the phones of thousands of users.

I’m sure it’ll be appealed. Everything always is.

From School of War at 2025-05-13 10:35:00

Ep 197: Mick Ryan on the Ukrainian Battlefield (NEBM6646220568.mp3?updated=1747094364)

Mick Ryan, retired major general in the Australian Army and author of  The War for Ukraine: Strategy and Adaptation Under Fire, joins the show to discuss the evolving battlefield and cycles of change and innovation going on in Ukraine.  ▪️ Times      •      01:35 Introduction     •      02:17 Touring the front      •      05:11 No place safe     •      07:01 Change       •      11:24 Wire guided drones        •      15:31 Task organization        •      20:38 Drone defense          •      22:49 Is artillery dead?     •      26:39 Rethinking procurement      •      30:34 2014          •      33:07 Putin’s objectives     •      36:05 Formula for ceasefire        •      38:02 A just solution        •      39:41 Surprise is alive and well      Follow along on Instagram, X @schoolofwarpod, and YouTube @SchoolofWarPodcast Find a transcript of today’s episode on our School of War Substack

From Wittenberg to Westphalia at 2025-05-13 02:54:08

Episode 100B: Power of the Popes with Gregg of Popeular History (media.mp3)

In part 2 of my discussion with Gregg, we examine the concept of Papal supremacy in the middle ages based on the evidence already discussed in the show, and how the modern Catholic Church might feel about it in terms of later doctrinal developments.

https://www.popeularhistory.com/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-12 18:04:20

New pope chose his name based on AI’s threats to “human dignity”

Pope Leo XIV warns AI could threaten workers as industrial revolution did in the 1800s.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-12 12:01:34

Florida Backdoor Bill Fails

A Florida bill requiring encryption backdoors failed to pass.

From Wittenberg to Westphalia at 2025-05-12 02:36:50

Episode 100A: A Very Catholic Conversation with Gregg of Popeular History (media.mp3)

In part a of today's episode, Ben sits down with Gregg from Popeular History Podcast to discuss things about modern Catholicism, such as how many murders is too many murders. Fun Fact: This episode was recorded during the sede vacante between the death of Francis and the election of Leo XIV.

https://www.popeularhistory.com/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From The Rest Is History at 2025-05-12 00:05:00

564. The Great Northern War: The Battle of the Baltic (Part 1) (GLT2662789070.mp3?updated=1746998405)

How did the Great Northern War, which saw Sweden pitted against Peter the Great’s Russia and her allies, and would transform Europe forever, begin? Who was Charles XII, Sweden’s King, and a worthy antagonist for the formidable Peter? What terrible miscalculation saw Russia’s Danish allies brutally knocked from the war in its early stage? What dreadful havoc did Peter’s Cossacks wreak upon the Eastern Baltic? And, who was the young farm girl who would go on to capture the heart of a Tsar?  Join Dominic and Tom as they discuss Peter the Great, the early stages of the tumultuous Great Northern War, and his scandalous marriage to a serving girl? The Rest Is History Club: Become a member for exclusive bonus content, early access to full series and live show tickets, ad-free listening, our exclusive newsletter, discount book prices on titles mentioned on the pod, and our members’ chatroom on Discord. Just head to therestishistory.com to sign up, or start a free trial today on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/therestishistory. For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah Akude  Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From The Week in Westminster at 2025-05-10 11:00:00

10/05/2025 (p0l9b9z2.mp3)

Sonia Sodha delves in to the latest developments at Westminster.

Sir Keir Starmer celebrated not one, but two, new trade deals this week: with the United States and India. But has Britain got good deals? The Labour chair of the Business and Trade Select Committee, Liam Byrne, and former Conservative trade minister and UK trade envoy to the US, Sir Conor Burns, discuss the merits of the agreements.

Following the local election results, in which Reform UK made strong gains at the expense of the main parties, restive Labour MPs have been making their feelings known to the Prime Minister about the government's performance. One of those MPs, Jo White, chair of the Red Wall Group, joined Joe Dromey, General Secretary of the Fabians, to discuss whether Labour needs a change of direction.

A spate of recent cyber attacks on retailers including M&S and Co-op have caused alarm in business circles and in government. Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden this week said the attacks were a "wake-up call" for business. To discuss that Sonia speaks to Ciaran Martin, former chief executive of the National Cyber Security Centre and now a professor at Oxford University.

And, to reflect on the 80th anniversary of VE Day, Sonia is joined by Lord Michael Heseltine, former Deputy Prime Minister, who witnessed the celebrations in 1945, and Alex Baker, the first Labour MP to represent Aldershot - the home of the British Army.

From More or Less: Behind the Stats at 2025-05-10 06:00:00

Warren Buffett’s brilliant bets (p0l98k2b.mp3)

Warren Buffett has announced he is stepping down as CEO of his company, Berkshire Hathaway.

Buffett is one of the richest people in the world, and is widely held up as the greatest investor who ever lived. He’s also been remarkably critical of other masters of the financial universe.

Tim Harford talks to Financial Times journalist Robin Wigglesworth, author of the book Trillions, about Buffett’s money making method, and how he used a massive bet to make a point about hedge funds.

Presenter: Tim Harford Producer: Tom Colls Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown Sound Mix: Giles Aspen Editor: Richard Vadon

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-09 22:29:02

New Lego-building AI creates models that actually stand up in real life

Carnegie Mellon "LegoGPT" system uses physics checks to ensure models don't collapse.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-09 22:05:31

Friday Squid Blogging: Japanese Divers Video Giant Squid

The video is really amazing.

As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered.

From A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry at 2025-05-09 17:07:21

Fireside Friday, May 9, 2025 (On Lighter Bows)

Fireside this week! First off, it seems like last week’s post on the Hollywood myth of archery volley fire really got out there, so if you are a new reader just joining us, welcome! If you are in to discussions of historical tactics with an eye towards correcting common myths in games and film, you … Continue reading Fireside Friday, May 9, 2025 (On Lighter Bows) →

From The Incomparable Mothership at 2025-05-09 17:00:00

765: Precognitive Moon (aed4d87c-f488-41ed-8e92-ed59831b429b.mp3)

The highest-grossing film of all time is straight-up sci-fi and yet in 15 years at this place we’ve never talked about it. That ends now, as we put on our oxygen masks and venture out into the moon of Pandora to meet the local Na’vi and the interloper Sky People and discuss why James Cameron’s “Avatar” became an enormous hit and then disappeared entirely (other than the theme-park attactions) until re-emerging with a sequel that was also an enormous hit....

From School of War at 2025-05-09 10:38:00

Ep 196: Thomas Bruscino and Mitchell G. Klingenberg on Mapping Warfare (NEBM1410302892.mp3?updated=1746653600)

Thomas Bruscino, professor at the U.S. Army War College, and Mitchell G. Klingenberg, assistant professor at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, join the show to discuss their article "Making War Upon the Map" The U.S. Army’s Forgotten Map Problem, Meade’s Gettysburg Campaign, and Depicting Operational Art.  ▪️ Times      •      02:05 Introduction     •      03:12 What’s missing?      •      06:17 A modern problem     •      09:27 Meade takes command       •      11:29 Seeing both sides        •      15:41 South Mountain        •      22:54 Lee’s mistakes           •      30:11 Meade’s good choices      •      36:32 Mapping in 2025     •      41:51 Visualization          •      47:37 Developing doctrine Follow along on Instagram, X @schoolofwarpod, and YouTube @SchoolofWarPodcast Find a transcript of today’s episode on our School of War Substack

From Ink Stained Wretches at 2025-05-09 09:45:00

Deep Dish on The Pope (NEBM3815780531.mp3?updated=1746755655)

This week, we say hello to a new pope and goodbye to Nate Moore—Chris’s AEI research assistant, but more importantly, a fellow wretch who’s been a big part of the podcast. We also talk about the Pulitzer winners and the media’s coverage of the declining health of John Fetterman and Joe Biden. Wretch on! Time Stamps: Front Page:  02:22Obsessions:  27:43Reader Mail:  36:10Favorite Items: 38:53 Show Notes: New York Magazine: The Hidden Struggle of John Fetterman AP News: Sen. John Fetterman raises alarms with outburst at meeting with union officials, AP sources say BBC: Five takeaways from Biden’s BBC interview The Pulitzer Prizes: 2025 Pulitzer Priz Herald Leader: The favorite didn’t win the KY Derby again. Here’s what happened behind Sovereignty The Washington Free Beacon: Exclusive Analysis: Kamala’s Stepdaughter, ‘Textile Artist’ Ella Emhoff, Skips Leg Day as Often as She Shaves Her Armpits (Never) Politico: Biden enlists veteran Democratic operative to help defend his reputation (edited)

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-08 21:23:21

AI use damages professional reputation, study suggests

New Duke study says workers judge others for AI use—and hide its use, fearing stigma.

From GoodFellows: Conversations from the Hoover Institution at 2025-05-08 21:01:00

Peace Through Strength: The Good Fellows on Harvard, Europe, Warfare & Niall Gets Busted (GoodFellows_2025-05-06_wip02_podcast_7hzyg.mp3)

Harvard University and the Trump administration do battle over civil rights, funding, and tax status. Europe confronts unpleasant realities as it honors the 80th anniversary of VE Day. And the Pentagon contemplates how new weaponry and technology will change the future of warfare.  It’s all part of a special “bring your own topic” episode of GoodFellows, which also examines the recent White House national security shakeup; the merits of a June 14 parade to celebrate the US Army’s 250th anniversary (it’s also President Trump’s 79th birthday); and the legacy of legendary “value investor” Warren Buffett as he steps down as Berkshire Hathaway’s CEO. Finally, with Mother’s Day approaching, the fellows reflect on the remarkable women who brought them into the world. Recorded on May 6, 2025.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-08 19:45:20

Fidji Simo joins OpenAI as new CEO of Applications

Simo will oversee business operations while Altman focuses on research and compute.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-08 19:27:52

DOGE software engineer’s computer infected by info-stealing malware

The presence of credentials in leaked "stealer logs" indicates his device was infected.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-08 15:37:38

Trump admin to roll back Biden’s AI chip restrictions

Officials call previous framework "unenforceable" as May 15 deadline looms.

From The Briefing Room at 2025-05-08 14:02:00

What are rare earths and why does everyone want them? (p0l905gb.mp3)

President Trump has signed a minerals deal with Ukraine, which will give the US access to some of Ukraine’s natural resources. The US president also said he’d like to take over Greenland and even Canada. Why? Well one reason may well be the rare earths and critical minerals found there. Critical minerals are vital for almost every industry from the manufacturing of computers to fighter jets. But in recent years the rise of green technologies has been fuelling demand for minerals used to make batteries for electric cars and other renewable infrastructure. One country dominates the minerals market - China - which has repercussions for the rest of the world, including the US. David Aaronovitch and guests discuss what and where these minerals are, why everyone wants them and how the rest of the world can compete with China.

Guests:

Ellie Saklatvala, Head of Nonferrous Metal Pricing, Argus, a provider of market intelligence for the global commodity markets. Henry Sanderson, author of ‘Volt Rush, the Winners and Losers in the Race to Go Green’ and Associate Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute Sophia Kalantzakos, Global Distinguished Professor in Environmental Studies and Public Policy at New York University in Abu Dhabi and the author of 'China and the Geopolitics of Rare Earths' Olivia Lazard, a senior fellow affiliated with the think tank, Carnegie Europe and Berggruen Institute

Presenter: David Aaronovitch Producers: Caroline Bayley, Nathan Gower and Kirsteen Knight Production co-ordinator: Gemma Ashman Sound engineer: David Crackles Editor: Richard Vadon

From In Our Time: History at 2025-05-08 10:15:00

The Battle of Clontarf (p0l35n1c.mp3)

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss one of the best known events and figures in Irish history. In 1014 Brian Boru, High King of Ireland, defeated the Hiberno-Norse forces of Sigtrygg Silkbeard and allies near their Dublin stronghold, with Brian losing his life on the day of battle. Soon chroniclers in Ireland and abroad were recording and retelling the events, raising the status of Brian Boru as one who sacrificed himself for Ireland, Christ-like, a connection reinforced by the battle taking place on Good Friday. While some of the facts are contested, the Battle of Clontarf became a powerful symbol of what a united Ireland could achieve by force against invaders.

With

Seán Duffy Professor of Medieval Irish and Insular History at Trinity College Dublin

Máire Ní Mhaonaigh Professor of Celtic and Medieval Studies at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of St John’s College, Cambridge

And

Alex Woolf Professor of Medieval Studies at the University of St Andrews

Producer: Simon Tillotson

Reading list:

Howard B. Clarke, Sheila Dooley and Ruth Johnson, Dublin and the Viking World (O'Brien Press Ltd, 2018)

Howard B. Clarke and Ruth Johnson (ed.), The Vikings in Ireland and Beyond: Before and After Clontarf (Four Courts Press, 2015)

Clare Downham, ‘The Battle of Clontarf in Irish History and Legend’ (History Ireland 13, No. 5, 2005)

Seán Duffy, Brian Boru and the Battle of Clontarf (Gill & Macmillan, 2014)

Seán Duffy (ed.), Medieval Dublin XVI: Proceedings of Clontarf 1014–2014: National Conference Marking the Millennium of the Battle of Clontarf (Four Courts Press, 2017)

Colmán Etchingham, ‘North Wales, Ireland and the Isles: The Insular Viking Zone’ (Peritia 15, 2001)

Colmán Etchingham, Jón Viðar Sigurðsson, Máire Ní Mhaonaigh and Elizabeth Ashman Rowe, Norse-Gaelic Contacts in a Viking World (Brepols N.V., 2019)

David Griffiths, Vikings of the Irish Sea (The History Press, 2nd ed., 2025)

James Henthorn Todd (ed. and trans.), Cogadh Gaedhel re Gallaibh: The War of the Gaedhil with the Gaill, or, the Invasions of Ireland by the Danes and other Norsemen (first published 1867; Cambridge University Press, 2012)

Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, Brian Boru: Ireland's greatest king? (The History Press, 2006)

Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, ‘Tales of Three Gormlaiths in Medieval Irish Literature’ (Ériu 52, 2002)

Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, ‘Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib: Some Dating Consierations’ (Peritia 9, 1995)

Brendan Smith, The Cambridge History of Ireland, vol. 1, 600–1550 (Cambridge University Press, 2018), especially ‘The Scandinavian Intervention’ by Alex Woolf

In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio Production

From Strong Message Here at 2025-05-08 09:45:00

I Want My Country Back (with Phil Wang) (p0l8sx0q.mp3)

Comedy writer Armando Iannucci and journalist Helen Lewis decode the utterly baffling world of political language.

This week, following Reform's announcement they will remove all flags from all council buildings under their jurisdiction - other than the Union Flag and the St George's Cross - Helen and Armando are joined by Phil Wang to discuss Britishness, Englishness, Scottishness, Irishness, Welshness and Malaysianess.

Listen to Strong Message Here every Thursday at 9.45am on Radio 4 and then head straight to BBC Sounds for an extended episode.

Have you stumbled upon any perplexing political phrases you need Helen and Armando to decode? Email them to us at strongmessagehere@bbc.co.uk

Sound Editing by Chris Maclean Production Coordinator - Katie Baum & Sarah Nicholls Executive Producer - Pete Strauss

Produced by Gwyn Rhys Davies. A BBC Studios Audio production for Radio 4. An EcoAudio Certified Production.

From The Rest Is History at 2025-05-08 00:05:00

563. Peter the Great: Bloodbath in the Kremlin (Part 2) (GLT4388388819.mp3?updated=1746630890)

What abominable mischief and hedonism did the seventeen year old Peter the Great revel in during his strange and remarkable travels through Europe, before truly stepping into the role of Tsar of all the Russias? Did it serve a secret political purpose? What was the outcome of the first war he chose to wage against the Ottoman Empire? Why did he go on a crucial and possibly dangerous diplomatic mission disguised as a member of his own staff? And, when news reached him from Russia, of a mutiny that directly challenged his rule, what gruesome revenge did he wreak…? Join Dominic and Tom as they discuss in lurid technicolour, Peter the Great’s early life and rule: his flamboyant “gap year” and foreign travels, his early military conquests, his drastic reforms to Russia, and the outbreak of the Great Northern War, which would see Europe transformed forever. The Rest Is History Club: Become a member for exclusive bonus content, early access to full series and live show tickets, ad-free listening, our exclusive newsletter, discount book prices on titles mentioned on the pod, and our members’ chatroom on Discord. Just head to therestishistory.com to sign up, or start a free trial today on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/therestishistory. For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah Akude Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-07 23:04:58

WhatsApp provides no cryptographic management for group messages

The weakness creates the possibility of an insider or hacker adding rogue members.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-07 19:08:58

VMware perpetual license holders receive cease-and-desist letters from Broadcom

Broadcom says it may audit VMware users.

From The Media Show at 2025-05-07 17:32:00

Self-professed media diva Tina Brown and Chris Best, cofounder of the publishing platform Substack (p0l8sxtm.mp3)

Ros Atkins & Katie Razzall talk to the self professed Media Diva Tina Brown. The former editor in chief of Tatler, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, and the founding editor in chief of The Daily Beast talks about the changing media landscape and her recent move onto the online publishing platform Substack with her Fresh Hell diary. She's joined by Chris Best cofounder of Substack. Allegations that Viktor Orban is subsidising supportive media outlets with the BBC's Central European Correspondent Nick Thorpe and after Reform UK’s successes in last week’s English elections the BBC’s chief political adviser Ric Bailey, Anna Gross from the Financial Times and James Heale from the Spectator consider how the media has handled Nigel Farage in this campaign – and over the years.

Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Assistant Producer: Lucy Wai

From The Django weblog at 2025-05-07 15:00:00

Django security releases issued: 5.2.1, 5.1.9 and 4.2.21

In accordance with our security release policy, the Django team is issuing releases for Django 5.2.1, Django 5.1.9 and Django 4.2.21. These releases address the security issues detailed below. We encourage all users of Django to upgrade as soon as possible.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-07 12:03:03

Chinese AI Submersible

A Chinese company has developed an AI-piloted submersible that can reach speeds “similar to a destroyer or a US Navy torpedo,” dive “up to 60 metres underwater,” and “remain static for more than a month, like the stealth capabilities of a nuclear submarine.” In case you’re worried about the military applications of this, you can relax because the company says that the submersible is “designated for civilian use” and can “launch research rockets.”

“Research rockets.” Sure.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-07 01:26:14

Jury orders NSO to pay $167 million for hacking WhatsApp users

The verdict is a major victory for opponents of exploit sellers.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-06 14:26:37

Data centers say Trump’s crackdown on renewables bad for business, AI

Without renewables, it's nearly impossible to meet growing power demand from AI.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-06 12:03:21

Fake Student Fraud in Community Colleges

Reporting on the rise of fake students enrolling in community college courses:

The bots’ goal is to bilk state and federal financial aid money by enrolling in classes, and remaining enrolled in them, long enough for aid disbursements to go out. They often accomplish this by submitting AI-generated work. And because community colleges accept all applicants, they’ve been almost exclusively impacted by the fraud.

The article talks about the rise of this type of fraud, the difficulty of detecting it, and how it upends quite a bit of the class structure and learning community...

From School of War at 2025-05-06 10:40:00

Ep 195: John Hillen on Strategic Thinking (NEBM6392662537.mp3?updated=1746494099)

John Hillen, James C. Wheat Professor in Leadership at Hampden-Sydney College and author of The Strategy Dialogues: A Primer on Business Strategy and Strategic Management, joins the show to talk about how to think strategically in war, business, and life. ▪️ Times      •      01:55 Introduction     •      02:31 An Army start      •      05:17 Cold War ends     •      10:14 The Gulf         •      13:15 Changing styles        •      18:00 73 Easting       •      22:59 Policy and business           •      26:09 Strategos      •      29:04 In the doing     •      32:17 Inside out & outside in         •      36:41 Seeking horizons      •      42:22 Goals are not strategy     •      43:42 Call of Duty        Follow along on Instagram, X @schoolofwarpod, and YouTube @SchoolofWarPodcast Find a transcript of today’s episode on our School of War Substack

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-06 01:05:55

Man pleads guilty to using malicious AI software to hack Disney employee

Fake image-generating app allowed man to download 1.1TB of Disney-owned data.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-05 22:37:21

Signal clone used by Trump official stops operations after report it was hacked

Mike Waltz needs to find a new app.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-05 21:18:31

OpenAI scraps controversial plan to become for-profit after mounting pressure

The nonprofit board will retain control, but now investor billions hang in the balance.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-05 20:05:13

Hundreds of e-commerce sites hacked in supply-chain attack

Attack that started in April and remains ongoing runs malicious code on visitors' devices.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-05 17:02:53

Another Move in the Deepfake Creation/Detection Arms Race

Deepfakes are now mimicking heartbeats

In a nutshell

• Recent research reveals that high-quality deepfakes unintentionally retain the heartbeat patterns from their source videos, undermining traditional detection methods that relied on detecting subtle skin color changes linked to heartbeats.
• The assumption that deepfakes lack physiological signals, such as heart rate, is no longer valid. This challenges many existing detection tools, which may need significant redesigns to keep up with the evolving technology.
• To effectively identify high-quality deepfakes, researchers suggest shifting focus from just detecting heart rate signals to analyzing how blood flow is distributed across different facial regions, providing a more accurate detection strategy...

From More or Less: Behind the Stats at 2025-05-05 06:00:00

Bonus episode: The Autism Curve (p0l7zdx1.mp3)

An interruption to your regular podcast feed: the first episode of a new BBC Radio 4 series investigating the steep rise in autism diagnoses.

The Autism Curve looks into the data that has prompted arguments - and conspiracy theories - about what’s behind the rapid rise. It goes on to explore changes in what autism is, who gets to define it, and whose experience counts.

In this first episode, Ginny Russell discusses her 20-year study that showed an astonishing eightfold rise in new autism diagnoses in the UK on an exponential curve. And Professor Joshua Stott explains how a surprising discovery at a dementia clinic led him to calculate that that enormous rise in diagnoses may still undercount the country’s autistic population by as much as 1.2 million.

Listen to the rest of The Autism Curve here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002bszl

Archive: BBC; CSPAN; Fox News; CNN.

Presenter: Michael Blastland Series Producer: Simon Maybin Editor: Clare Fordham Sound mix: Neil Churchill Production Co-ordinator: Gemma Ashman

From The Rest Is History at 2025-05-05 00:05:00

562. Peter the Great: The Rise of Russia (Part 1) (GLT5535116202.mp3?updated=1746343076)

Why was the early life of Peter the Great - Tsar and autocrat of all the Russias, who endures to this day as an iconic symbol of Russian might - drenched in blood and violence? What amalgamation of court politics and family feuding saw him catapulted to the role of Tsar against all the odds? What did he do during the course of his colourful life and tumultuous reign to earn the moniker ‘the Great’? And, why is he considered by many, the father of Russia?  Join Dominic and Tom as they launch into the early life of one of history’s most bombastic rulers - Peter the Great; the conditions in 17th century Russia, the violent palace coup that nearly destroyed him as a boy, and his road to the Great Northern War that would later make his name, and change the fate of Europe.  The Rest Is History Club: Become a member for exclusive bonus content, early access to full series and live show tickets, ad-free listening, our exclusive newsletter, discount book prices on titles mentioned on the pod, and our members’ chatroom on Discord. Just head to therestishistory.com to sign up, or start a free trial today on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/therestishistory. For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah Akude  Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From The Week in Westminster at 2025-05-03 11:48:00

03/05/2025 (p0l82cxk.mp3)

Radio 4's assessment of developments at Westminster

From More or Less: Behind the Stats at 2025-05-03 06:00:00

Donald Trump: 100 days fact-check (p0l7z3tc.mp3)

On the 29th April US President Donald Trump took to the stage in Michigan to celebrate his first 100 days in office.

This is a milestone in American politics, but is everything he claims the administration has achieved true?

The BBC’s US National Digital Reporter Mike Wendling joins us to fact-check President Trump’s claims on immigration, the stock market, fentanyl and….eggs.

Presenter: Lizzy McNeill Producer: Tom Colls Production Coordinator: Brenda Brown Sound mix: Jack Morris Editor: Richard Vadon

From A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry at 2025-05-03 00:14:57

Collections: Why Archers Didn’t Volley Fire

This week we’re looking at a specific visual motif common in TV and film: the arrow volley. You know the scene: the general readies his archers, he orders them to ‘draw!’ and then holds up his hand with that ‘wait for it’ gesture and then shouts ‘loose!’ (or worse yet, ‘fire!’) and all of the … Continue reading Collections: Why Archers Didn’t Volley Fire →

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-02 22:02:18

Friday Squid Blogging: Pyjama Squid

The small pyjama squid (Sepioloidea lineolata) produces toxic slime, “a rare example of a poisonous predatory mollusc.”

As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven’t covered.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-02 21:14:58

Microsoft’s new “passwordless by default” is great but comes at a cost

The move is part of an industry-wide push for users to adopt passkeys.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-02 19:04:07

Privacy for Agentic AI

Sooner or later, it’s going to happen. AI systems will start acting as agents, doing things on our behalf with some degree of autonomy. I think it’s worth thinking about the security of that now, while its still a nascent idea.

In 2019, I joined Inrupt, a company that is commercializing Tim Berners-Lee’s open protocol for distributed data ownership. We are working on a digital wallet that can make use of AI in this way. (We used to call it an “active wallet.” Now we’re calling it an “agentic wallet.”)

I talked about this a bit at the RSA Conference...

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-02 17:39:26

Claude’s AI research mode now runs for up to 45 minutes before delivering reports

New feature searches hundreds of sources to build a document—but is it accurate?

From The Incomparable Mothership at 2025-05-02 17:00:00

764: Books About Towers (f4cab8ae-6aff-489d-83b6-fe21fea23cc5.mp3)

Our walk through the 10 different novels nominated for the Hugo and Nebula awards in 2025 begins! In this episode we discuss “Sleeping Worlds Have No Memory” by Yaroslav Barsukov, “A Sorceress Comes to Call” by T. Kingfisher, and “Someone You Can Build a Nest In” by John Wiswell....

From Net Assessment at 2025-05-02 15:44:00

Is Arms Control Dead? (Net_Assessment_-_Episode_2_v2.mp3?dest-id=808287)

Chris, Melanie, and Zack consider Rose Gottemoeller’s claim that arms control is not yet dead, but essential. Are there realistic prospects for a new arms control deal? If the Trump administration seriously seeks agreements with Russia and China, what should we demand? And what concessions might we offer? And what should be the objective of any new arms control agreements? Grievances for the Pentagon’s slow-motion train wreck, to worrisome reports of deep cuts at the State Department, and for the Trump administration’s reported minerals deal in Ukraine. Zack offers a heartfelt attaboy to his mentor Richard Armitage, who passed away earlier this month after a lifetime of service. Attas also to Secretary of State Marco Rubio for not cutting State more, and to the Carnegie Endowment for a new report on the foreign policy attitudes of Generation Z.

Links:

• Rose Gottemoeller, “Arms Control Is Not Dead Yet: America Should Pursue Parallel Nuclear Negotiations With China and Russia,” Foreign Affairs, April 15, 2025

• Christopher S. Chivvis and Lauren Morganbesser, “What Gen Z Thinks About U.S. Foreign Policy,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, April 17, 2025

• Geoff Wilson, Christohper Preble, and Lucas Ruiz, Gambling on Armageddon, Stimson Center, February 19, 2025 

• Nancy A. Youssef, Alexander Ward, and Vera Bergengruen, “Polygraph Threats, Leaks and Infighting: Pete Hegseth Rattled by Pentagon Chaos,” Wall Street Journal, April 24, 2025

• Supporting Stimson, https://www.stimson.org/support/

• “Armitage’s Story,” Last Days in Vietnam clip, PBS, https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/lastdays-armitage/.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-02 12:03:11

NCSC Guidance on “Advanced Cryptography”

The UK’s National Cyber Security Centre just released its white paper on “Advanced Cryptography,” which it defines as “cryptographic techniques for processing encrypted data, providing enhanced functionality over and above that provided by traditional cryptography.” It includes things like homomorphic encryption, attribute-based encryption, zero-knowledge proofs, and secure multiparty computation.

It’s full of good advice. I especially appreciate this warning:

When deciding whether to use Advanced Cryptography, start with a clear articulation of the problem, and use that to guide the development of an appropriate solution. That is, you should not start with an Advanced Cryptography technique, and then attempt to fit the functionality it provides to the problem. ...

From School of War at 2025-05-02 10:35:00

Ep 194: Mark Moyar on the Vietnam War (NEBM6789526178.mp3?updated=1746139778)

Mark Moyar, William P. Harris Chair of Military History at Hillsdale College and author of Triumph Regained: The Vietnam War, 1965-1968,  joins the show to explain the major inflection points of the Vietnam War. ▪️ Times      •      01:58 Introduction     •      02:47 The “orthodox view”      •      05:51 Dominos     •      08:41 A Maoist vision         •      12:42 1963        •      15:30 Henry Cabot Lodge       •      21:10 Slow erosion           •      24:57 Ground troops      •      30:10 Morale     •      33:39 Nixon in office         •      37:30 Triangular diplomacy      •      39:31 Vietnamization fails      •      43:09 American mistakes          •      47:31 Wanting out      •      50:10 Aftermath   Follow along on Instagram, X @schoolofwarpod, and YouTube @SchoolofWarPodcast Find a transcript of today’s episode on our School of War Substack

From Ink Stained Wretches at 2025-05-02 09:45:00

Dudes, man (NEBM3341695026.mp3?updated=1746131498)

Chris and Eliana are back, starting with Trump’s 100-day media blitz, Tim Walz’s code-switching, the private group chats shaping American politics, and—most importantly—the origin of Jo Jo potatoes. Wretch on! Time Stamps: Front Page: 1:29 Obsessions: 1:03:31 Reader Mail: 1:11:31 Favorite Items: 1:18:36 Show Notes: The Atlantic: Read The Atlantic’s Interview With Donald Trump Time: Read the Full Transcript of Donald Trump’s ‘100 Days’ Interview With TIME Axios: Scoop: White House launches Drudge-style website to promote Trump The Atlantic: The War That Would Not End Semafor: The group chats that changed America The New York Times: A Progressive Mind in a Body Made for the ‘Manosphere’ The Wall Street Journal: Questioning Biden’s Capacities Was Taboo a Year Ago. Now It’s Everywhere. The New York Times: The Dispatch Buys SCOTUSblog, a Supreme Court Mainstay  The New York Times: A Hot Accessory, at the Intersection of Faith and Culture  The New York Times: Vietnam on The Move Awful Announcing: Bill Belichick issues statement defending Jordon Hudson’s actions during CBS interview  ESPN: Son of Falcons coordinator Ulbrich admits to Sanders prank  The New York Times: How Ozempic Is Shaping Weddings  The New York Times: ‘60 Minutes’ Chief Resigns in Emotional Meeting: ‘The Company Is Done With Me’  The New York Times: Paramount Board Clears Possible Path for Settling Trump’s ‘60 Minutes’ Lawsuit The Washington Post: She tried to expose Russia’s brutal detention system — and ended up dead The Washington Post: Streaming services should step up to make C-SPAN great again  The New York Times: The Unabomber’s Brother Turned Him In. Then Spent 27 Years Trying to Win Him Back.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-01 22:32:27

Time saved by AI offset by new work created, study suggests

Survey of 2023–2024 data finds that AI created more tasks for 8.4 percent of workers.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-05-01 22:00:02

Why MFA is getting easer to bypass and what to do about it

Why multifactor authentication based on one-time-passwords and push notifications fails.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-05-01 17:02:50

US as a Surveillance State

Two essays were just published on DOGE’s data collection and aggregation, and how it ends with a modern surveillance state.

It’s good to see this finally being talked about.

From The Briefing Room at 2025-05-01 13:41:00

Are India and Pakistan on the brink of war over Kashmir? (p0l7lt88.mp3)

Tension is high in Indian administered Kashmir following the killing on 22nd April of 26 civilians almost all of whom were Hindu tourists. They were visiting Pahalgam - an area often described as the “Switzerland of India”. Militants opened fire on them and in the days since relations between India and Pakistan, which both claim Kashmir in full but only administer it in part, have deteriorated. India accuses Pakistan of supporting the militants and Islamabad rejects the allegations. This is the latest attack in a decades-long dispute over the region. David Aaronovitch and guests ask what happens next and what sort of a response we are likely to see from India and also Pakistan?

Guests: Andrew Whitehead: Former BBC India correspondent and expert on Kashmir and its history, author of ‘A Mission in Kashmir’ Anbarasan Ethirajan: BBC South Asia Regional Editor Husain Haqqani : Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington DC and former Pakistan ambassador to Sri Lanka and the US Michael Kugelman - South Asia analyst based in Washington DC and author of Foreign Policy magazine’s South Asia Brief newsletter Sumantra Bose: Professor of International and Comparative Politics at Krea University in India and author of Kashmir at the Crossroads: Inside a 21st-Century Conflict

Presenter: David Aaronovitch Producers: Caroline Bayley, Nathan Gower, Kirsteen Knight Production co-ordinator: Gemma Ashman Sound engineers: Sarah Hockley and James Beard Editor: Richard Vadon

From In Our Time: History at 2025-05-01 10:15:00

The Gracchi (p0l1mrf2.mp3)

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the brothers Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus whose names are entwined with the end of Rome's Republic and the rise of the Roman Emperors. As tribunes, they brought popular reforms to the Roman Republic at the end of the 2nd century BC. Tiberius (c163-133BC) brought in land reform so every soldier could have his farm, while Gaius (c154-121BC) offered cheap grain for Romans and targeted corruption among the elites. Those elites saw the reforms as such a threat that they had the brothers killed: Tiberius in a shocking murder led by the Pontifex Maximus, the high priest, in 133BC and Gaius 12 years later with the senate's approval. This increase in political violence was to destabilise the Republic, forever tying the Gracchi to the question of why Rome’s Republic gave way to the Rome of Emperors.

With

Catherine Steel Professor of Classics at the University of Glasgow

Federico Santangelo Professor of Ancient History at Newcastle University

And

Kathryn Tempest Lecturer in Roman History at the University of Leicester

Producer: Simon Tillotson

Reading list:

Appian (trans. John Carter), The Civil Wars (Penguin Classics, 2005)

Valentina Arena, Jonathan R. W. Prag and Andrew Stiles, A Companion to the Political Culture of the Roman Republic (Wiley-Blackwell, 2022), especially the chapter by Lea Beness and Tom Hillard

R. Cristofoli, A. Galimberti and F. Rohr Vio (eds.), Costruire la Memoria: Uso e abuso della storia fra tarda repubblica e primo principato (L'Erma di Bretschneider, 2017), especially ‘The 'Tyranny' of the Gracchi and the Concordia of the Optimates: An Ideological Construct.’ by Francisco Pina Polo

Suzanne Dixon, Cornelia: Mother of the Gracchi, (Routledge, 2007)

Peter Garnsey and Dominic Rathbone, ‘The Background to the Grain Law of Gaius Gracchus’ (Journal of Roman Studies 75, 1985)

O. Hekster, G. de Kleijn and D. Slootjes (eds.), Crises and the Roman Empire (Brill, 2007), especially ‘Tiberius Gracchus, Land and Manpower’ by John W. Rich

Josiah Osgood, Rome and the Making of a World State, 150 BCE-20 CE (Cambridge University Press, 2018)

Plutarch (trans. Ian Scott-Kilvert and Christopher Pelling), Rome in Crisis (Penguin Classics, 2010)

Plutarch (trans. Robin Waterfield, ed. Philip A. Stadter), Roman Lives (Oxford University Press, 2008)

Nathan Rosenstein, ‘Aristocrats and Agriculture in the Middle and Late Republic’ (Journal of Roman Studies 98, 2008)

A. N. Sherwin-White, ‘The Lex Repetundarum and the Political Ideas of Gaius Gracchus’ (Journal of Roman Studies 72, 1982)

Catherine Steel, The End of the Roman Republic, 146 to 44 BC: Conquest and Crisis (Edinburgh University Press, 2013)

David Stockton, The Gracchi (Oxford University Press, 1979)

In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio Production

From Strong Message Here at 2025-05-01 09:45:00

The Official Language of the United States (p0l7c3cs.mp3)

Comedy writer Armando Iannucci and journalist Helen Lewis decode the utterly baffling world of political language.

This week, a look over the pond at Trump's first 100 days. How have his administration used language to further their agenda? From the Gulf of America, to Making Showers Great Again, Helen and Armando examine how the US government is finding linguistic tricks to set the terms of debate.

Listen to Strong Message Here every Thursday at 9.45am on Radio 4 and then head straight to BBC Sounds for an extended episode.

Have you stumbled upon any perplexing political phrases you need Helen and Armando to decode? Email them to us at strongmessagehere@bbc.co.uk

Sound Editing by Chris Maclean Production Coordinator - Katie Baum & Sarah Nicholls Executive Producer - Pete Strauss

Produced by Gwyn Rhys Davies. A BBC Studios Audio production for Radio 4. An EcoAudio Certified Production.

From The Rest Is History at 2025-05-01 00:05:00

561. The Golden Age of Japan: Secrets of the Imperial Court (Part 2) (GLT9428275194.mp3?updated=1746033394)

In the vibrant but vicious golden age of Imperial Japan, how did women use writing as a way to secure their status, and express their deepest desires? Who was Sei Shōnagon, the witty courtier whose account of life around the Japanese Empress during the iconic Heian period, provides a scintillating insight into this colourful world? And, behind the sophisticated melee of the Imperial court, with its elegance and decorum, what risks and hazards haunted every aspiring courtier…? Join Tom and Dominic for the climax to their tantalising journey into the beating heart of Imperial Japan, and the remarkable woman whose moving, keenly perceptive, but also slyly venomous, insights into this complicated arena, bring it flamboyantly to life. The Rest Is History Club: Become a member for exclusive bonus content, early access to full series and live show tickets, ad-free listening, our exclusive newsletter, discount book prices on titles mentioned on the pod, and our members’ chatroom on Discord. Just head to therestishistory.com to sign up, or start a free trial today on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/therestishistory. For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah Akude Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-30 19:36:26

Windows RDP lets you log in using revoked passwords. Microsoft is OK with that.

Researchers say the behavior amounts to a persistent backdoor.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-30 18:52:06

Millions of Apple Airplay-enabled devices can be hacked via Wi-Fi

Hackers can run their code on AirPlay devices thanks to a collection of bugs known as AirBorne.

From The Media Show at 2025-04-30 17:32:00

Piers Morgan, the impact of the Supreme Court ruling on sex and gender for the media (p0l7f3gk.mp3)

Katie Razzall and Ros Atkins talk to Piers Morgan about his new Youtube venture Uncensored. What are the implications for the Media of the UK Supreme Court's ruling that the legal definition of a woman should be based on biological sex? Rosamund Urwin Media Editor at The Times and the New Statesman Associate Editor Hannah Barnes and author of Time to Think: The Inside Story of the Collapse of the Tavistock’s Gender Service for Children”, jane fae from the charity Trans Media Watch and Dominic Casciani the BBCs Legal and Home Affairs Correspondent discuss.

Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Assistant Producer: Lucy Wai

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-30 12:30:40

The end of an AI that shocked the world: OpenAI retires GPT-4

A look back at GPT-4's legacy as OpenAI pulls the pioneering 2023 AI model from ChatGPT.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-04-30 12:12:02

WhatsApp Case Against NSO Group Progressing

Meta is suing NSO Group, basically claiming that the latter hacks WhatsApp and not just WhatsApp users. We have a procedural ruling:

Under the order, NSO Group is prohibited from presenting evidence about its customers’ identities, implying the targeted WhatsApp users are suspected or actual criminals, or alleging that WhatsApp had insufficient security protections.

[…]

In making her ruling, Northern District of California Judge Phyllis Hamilton said NSO Group undercut its arguments to use evidence about its customers with contradictory statements...

From GoodFellows: Conversations from the Hoover Institution at 2025-04-29 19:36:48

Tangled Up in Blue with Rep. Ro Khanna: Tariffs, Trump, and Progressive Capitalism (GoodFellows_2025-04-28_-_Ro_Khanna_wip02_podcast_88jk8.mp3)

Rejected by voters last November, the Democratic Party is perhaps afforded new life given President Trump’s decline in popularity and economic uncertainty ahead. What is the party’s message?  Rep. Ro Khanna, a prominent progressive voice whose California district includes parts of Silicon Valley, joins Hoover senior fellows Niall Ferguson, John Cochrane, and H.R. McMaster to discuss tariffs and the use of executive power, “blue state” mismanagement, the feasibility of a “Marshall Plan” for economically downtrodden parts of America, plus the chances of Democrats parting ways with their “old guard.” After that: the three fellows weigh in on the Trump presidency at the 100-day mark, the future of Catholicism after the death of Pope Francis, tax exemption for universities, their go-to takeout food (pizza yes; haggis, no), plus two April landmarks—the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Lexington and the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon. Recorded on April 28, 2025.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-29 19:03:46

Trump admin lashes out as Amazon considers displaying tariff costs on its sites

"This was never approved and is not going to happen," says Amazon.

From School of War at 2025-04-29 12:33:00

Ep 193: Douglas Murray on Israel’s War and its Global Consequences (NEBM5606419226.mp3?updated=1745926743)

Douglas Murray, journalist and author of On Democracies and Death Cults: Israel and the Future of Civilization, joins the show for a wide ranging conversation that covers Death Cults, anti-Semitism, and recent shifts in the Right. ▪️ Times      •      01:42 Introduction     •      03:00 9/11 origins      •      09:50 It’s not 1939     •      13:45 Death cults         •      19:16 “I’m not a fascist, I’m an idealist.”        •      23:51 Vasily Grossman       •      37:05 What’s going on with the Right?          •      49:07 Nostalgia for the absolute      •      54:10 Regaining balance   Follow along on Instagram, X @schoolofwarpod, and YouTube @SchoolofWarPodcast Find a transcript of today’s episode on our School of War Substack

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-29 12:15:43

AI-generated code could be a disaster for the software supply chain. Here’s why.

LLM-produced code could make us much more vulnerable to supply-chain attacks.

From Schneier on Security at 2025-04-29 12:03:43

Applying Security Engineering to Prompt Injection Security

This seems like an important advance in LLM security against prompt injection:

Google DeepMind has unveiled CaMeL (CApabilities for MachinE Learning), a new approach to stopping prompt-injection attacks that abandons the failed strategy of having AI models police themselves. Instead, CaMeL treats language models as fundamentally untrusted components within a secure software framework, creating clear boundaries between user commands and potentially malicious content.

[…]

To understand CaMeL, you need to understand that prompt injections happen when AI systems can’t distinguish between legitimate user commands and malicious instructions hidden in content they’re processing...

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-28 23:04:26

ChatGPT goes shopping with new product-browsing feature

ChatGPT will now recommend products to be bought offsite—but no sponsored ads just yet.

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-28 22:43:43

Backblaze responds to claims of “sham accounting,” customer backups at risk

Short seller publishes report detailing allegations about Backblaze's financials

From Schneier on Security at 2025-04-28 19:17:27

Windscribe Acquitted on Charges of Not Collecting Users’ Data

The company doesn’t keep logs, so couldn’t turn over data:

Windscribe, a globally used privacy-first VPN service, announced today that its founder, Yegor Sak, has been fully acquitted by a court in Athens, Greece, following a two-year legal battle in which Sak was personally charged in connection with an alleged internet offence by an unknown user of the service.

The case centred around a Windscribe-owned server in Finland that was allegedly used to breach a system in Greece. Greek authorities, in cooperation with INTERPOL, traced the IP address to Windscribe’s infrastructure and, unlike standard international procedures, proceeded to initiate criminal proceedings against Sak himself, rather than pursuing information through standard corporate channels...

From Biz & IT – Ars Technica at 2025-04-28 12:00:59

iOS and Android juice jacking defenses have been trivial to bypass for years

New ChoiceJacking attack allows malicious chargers to steal data from phones.

From The Rest Is History at 2025-04-28 00:05:00

560. The Golden Age of Japan: Lady Murasaki and the Shining Prince (Part 1) (GLT6500007351.mp3?updated=1745795270)

At the height of Imperial Japan, during a golden age of court intrigue, colourful pedantry, hierarchy, and sophistication, who was the legendary lothario and emperor’s son, Genji? What can the Tale of Genji - a great masterpiece of Japanese literature - tell us about this remarkable and alien world, and the imperial family at the heart of it? Who was the woman who wrote it, at a time when in the West it would have been unthinkable? What was the influence of China, Japan’s powerful neighbour, on the world the text describes? And, does the story hold the secrets to the divine power of the Japanese emperors…? Join Tom and Dominic as they discuss the thrilling and romantic Tale of Genji; the historical man behind the myth, and the glorious world of Imperial Japan, with its glittering court.  _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah Akude  Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From The Django weblog at 2025-04-26 15:58:08

New-features github repo and project

New Feature Request/Proposal Process with GitHub Repository

Django is experimenting with a new GitHub repository specifically designed to manage feature ideas and their progression. This is a significant shift away from the previous process of posting those to the forum.

Introducing the Django Features Repository

The Django Steering Council has launched a new GitHub repository at https://github.com/django/new-features dedicated to managing feature requests and ideas. This repository works in conjunction with a GitHub project to provide more efficient tracking of feature ideas as they move through various stages of consideration.

Why This Matters for Django Developers

This new approach aims to addresses several challenges the Django community has faced with feature requests:

1. Community involvement: Clear guidelines on how to participate in feature discussions
2. Structured workflow: A defined path from idea to implementation
3. Better resource allocation: Prioritization based on community support and feasibility

The New Feature Process Flow

The process follows a workflow with several key decision points:

1. New Idea Submission: Community members submit feature ideas as GitHub issues
2. Community Support Phase: The community reacts with emojis and comments to express support or concerns
3. Evaluation for Core Inclusion: The Steering Council determines if the feature belongs in Django core or whether it is more appropriate as a 3rd party package
4. Implementation Planning: Through an expedited DEP (Django Enhancement Proposal) process

How to Participate

Have a Feature Idea?

If you have an idea for improving Django, the process starts by creating an issue in the new repository. Before submitting, review the new feature process documentation to understand what to expect.

Want to Help Shape Django's Future?

There are three key areas where community involvement is needed:

1. Community Support Assessment: Review open tickets and share your support using emoji reactions
2. 👍 For features you would use
3. 👎 For features that might cause problems
4. 😕 For features you're indifferent about

5. 🎉 For easy wins

6. Core Evaluation: Help determine whether features should exist in Django core or as third-party packages

7. Implementation Volunteering: Assist with implementing, reviewing implementations, and maintenance of approved features

Benefits for the Django Community

We believe this new process can help with:

• Clearer communication: Understanding where a feature stands in the process
• More efficient feature development: Resources directed to features with demonstrated community support
• Better separation of concerns: Distinguishing between features that belong in core versus those better suited as third-party packages
• Reduced friction: Expedited processes for smaller feature requests

Providing Feedback

If you have thoughts about the new process itself, we'd love to get feedback through the Django Forum.

Conclusion

The experimental new feature repository represents is one of several steps Django is taking in order to try and improve the contributor experience journey. By providing a structured, transparent process for feature requests, Django aims to better serve its community while maintaining the framework's quality and sustainability.

For developers interested in contributing to Django or proposing new features, this new system should provide clearer expectations while making it easier to locate and participate in the discussion around a specific feature.

Check out the repository at https://github.com/django/new-features to learn more and start participating in this new adventure.