Florian Alexander

The whole world needs to know about this! Seriously. We all know JPG (or JPEG), the digital format that shrunk file sizes and changed how we store photos forever. It’s the reason the world fell in love with sharing images. But now, it’s being replaced by JPEG XL. And it’s time everyone realized that the mastermind behind it is Polish. This is the story of a brilliant Polish mind. Dr. Jarek Duda is arguably the only living Pole whose scientific method is embedded in billions of devices across the planet. He developed a data compression method called ANS (Asymmetric Numeral Systems), which is now a standard component in modern electronics. Because of ANS, websites load faster, devices use less energy, and our internet bandwidth is used much more efficiently. It’s already baked into products from Apple, Facebook, Google, and the Linux kernel. He could have been a billionaire. But he chose not to patent his method, and to this day, he says he has no regrets. He believes that by keeping it open, his work has changed the lives of millions, perhaps billions of people. Even so, there is a deep sense of injustice in how he’s treated, hardly anyone remembers that he is the true father of this technology. Even though companies like Google and Microsoft have tried to patent the ANS method as their own, I want to use this post to set the record straight and give credit where it’s due: to a Polish genius. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone as humble as Jarek. But this isn’t just a story about the past. For years, Jarek has been working seven days a week, starting at 7:00 AM, on a solution that could revolutionize quantum computing. Jarek, I hope you keep that incredible drive going. Thank you for your time. We cannot let this name be forgotten. A Polish scientist has fundamentally changed the course of technological history. @duda_jarek

Hard to tell if measles vaccine works

🔴 "Eine 13-jährige Schülerin erstellt ein Instagram-Profil. Sie postet über ihren ersten Schultag, die Schulkantine und dass sie ihren letzten Milchzahn verloren hat. Ein paar Wochen später: 5.000 Freundschaftsanfragen. 6.700 Follower. Fast ausschließlich erwachsene Männer. Die größten Gruppen: Nigeria, Ghana, Dominikanische Republik. Die Reaktion von Meta? Eine Einladung, den Account zu monetarisieren. Der entscheidende Punkt: Das Mädchen existierte gar nicht. Der Account wurde vom Attorney General des US-Bundesstaats New Mexico erstellt... als Undercover-Experiment. Die Ermittler wollten wissen, was passiert, wenn sich ein angeblich minderjähriges Mädchen auf Metas Plattform anmeldet. Und sie dokumentierten systematisch, was der Algorithmus ausliefert. Jetzt steht Meta deshalb vor Gericht. Der Fall ist juristisch besonders interessant, weil er eine zentrale Schutzmauer der Tech-Plattformen angreift: Section 230. Bisher konnten sich Plattformen darauf berufen, nur „Host“ für Inhalte zu sein und nicht für das Verhalten der Nutzer zu haften. New Mexico argumentiert anders. Nicht der Content sei das Problem. Sondern das Produktdesign. Der Staat wirft Meta vor: – Algorithmen würden systematisch Kontakte ermöglichen, die Minderjährige gefährden – Sicherheitsversprechen würden öffentlich kommuniziert, intern aber nicht eingehalten – Plattformmechaniken würden problematische Interaktionen sogar verstärken Der Beweisansatz ist ebenfalls neu. Die Ermittler analysieren nicht interne Dokumente oder nachträgliche Statistiken. Sie haben live dokumentiert, was die Plattform einem angeblich minderjährigen Account tatsächlich ausspielt. Das Verfahren könnte enorme Auswirkungen haben. Wenn Gerichte anfangen, Plattformdesign statt Inhalte zu regulieren, verändert das die gesamte Haftungslogik der sozialen Netzwerke. Dann geht es nicht mehr nur darum, was Nutzer posten. Sondern darum, wie Plattformen Verhalten systematisch erzeugen. Im Product Design auch als Dark Patterns bezeichnet. Und genau dort liegt die eigentliche Macht moderner Plattformen. Nicht im Content. Sondern im Design der Systeme, die entscheiden, was wir sehen, wen wir treffen und wie sich Netzwerke bilden. Der Fall New Mexico vs. Meta könnte deshalb einer der wichtigsten Tech-Prozesse der nächsten Jahre werden." (Text: Ümit Eroglu, LinkedIn) -- Quellen und weiterführende Informationen: de.linkedin.com/posts/umit-bey… dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1… courthousenews.com/new-mexico-acc… bbc.com/news/business-… techpolicy.press/tracker/new-me…

Tja. 😌

New ad by the Norwegian Consumer Council: "A Day in the Life of an Ensh*ttificator"

In season 3 of the U.S. House of Cards, President Underwood recess-appoints his wife as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, a plotline described at the time as "absurd" and "contrived"

Autoland Deutschland in a nutshell: In einem Dorf bei Hannover wird heute ernsthaft ein Pilotprojekt für Tempo 30 innerorts wieder abgeschafft. Der Grund: Es hätten sich einfach zu wenige Autofahrer daran gehalten. Was für ein Unsinn. Tempolimits sind keine freundliche Empfehlung. Sie sind geltendes Recht, was durchgesetzt gehört. In Deutschland kann man fürs Schwarzfahren in den Knast kommen. Wenn du dich aber als Autofahrer nicht an die Regeln hältst, werden sie abgeschafft. Diese Doppelstandards sobald es ums Auto geht, müssen endlich ein Ende haben!

Vance in 2016: I'm never a trump guy. This video was deleted from Twitter by Elon Musk, you know what to do !!!

All diese Orte haben heute die höchste Temperatur an einem Tag zwischen Anfang Dezember und Ende Februar gemessen - jeweils seit Messbeginn, ist in der Tabelle angegeben. Entsprechende Zahl von Stationen mit einem Kälterekord für diesen Zeitraum: null. Wie schon seit vielen Jahren. Wenn man dumm, deutsch und rechts ist, leugnet man den Klimawandel. Sonst nicht.

Vielen Dank für die gute Zusammenarbeit! augsburger-allgemeine.de/dillingen/grat…

Sport ist Mord! Aber mit dem 1. Wurf!!! Smiley! Weltkulturerbe Flunkyball - Infos im nächsten Tweet...

My mate suddenly quit his job at BMW. He gave absolutely no indication he was leaving.

Remember iron lungs? No? That's because vaccines work

Went down the rabbit hole on this one. The answer is actually wild. 5,000 years ago, Sumerian merchants in modern-day Iraq needed a number that's easy to divide. They picked 60. It has 12 divisors (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30, 60). Base-10 only has four. That's 3x as many ways to split something evenly, which matters when you're dividing grain and wages and can't handle repeating decimals. The counting method is the best part. They used their thumb as a pointer on the three bone segments of each finger. Four fingers, three segments, that's 12 per hand. Track multiples of 12, on the other hand, and you hit 60. No pen needed. Merchants in parts of Asia still count this way today. The system spread from Sumer to the Babylonians, then eastward to Persia, India, and China, and westward to Egypt and Rome. By 1800 BC, Babylonian students were using base-60 to calculate the square root of 2 to six decimal places on clay tablets. One student's homework from 4,000 years ago, now at Yale, holds the most accurate computation found anywhere in the ancient world. The Greeks adopted it for astronomy, which locked it into navigation, cartography, and eventually clocks in the 14th century. People have tried to kill it. During the French Revolution in 1793, France mandated decimal time: 10 hours per day, 100 minutes per hour, 100 seconds per minute. New clocks, new laws, the whole thing. Lasted 17 months. Workers hated getting one day off every ten days instead of one every seven. They tried again in 1897. Scrapped by 1900. The metric system replaced feet and pounds across most of the world. But 60 minutes in an hour? Untouchable. 60 is just too good at being divided. You can split an hour into halves, thirds, quarters, fifths, sixths, tenths, twelfths, or twentieths and land on a whole number every time. Try that with 100, and you get ugly decimals for thirds, sixths, and most common splits. 5,000 years of civilizations looked at that math and came to the same conclusion: 60 wins.

Und wenn KlimaaktivistInnen irgendwann verstehen wollten, dass das Waldverbrennen, das noch klimaschädlicher ist als alle Fossile, auch in die Aufzählung gehörte, sind wir bei der Wissenschaft angekommen. Aber schwurbeldeutschsprachige Grüne haben es halt zuhause auch gerne gemütlich™️, obwohl selbst das Verbrennen von Altöl etwas weniger klimaschädlich wäre-

Ich helfe dem wirren Dieter gerne weiter: Linke wurden vertrieben, saßen im KZ und wurden ermordet Nazis haben Linke (und unzählige andere Menschen, die ihrem völkischen Welt- und Menschenbild nicht entsprachen) verfolgt, vertrieben, gefoltert und millionenfach ermordet…

My colleague Marty Weil is one of The Post’s last living ties to Watergate. He’s covered stories that range from local crime to the Sept. 11 attacks to whimsical weather musings. After 60 years, he was laid off yesterday by email. nytimes.com/2026/02/05/bus…

Letter Roman Giertych: “Dear Mr. Ambassador, Your position that you will not maintain relations with Włodzimierz Czarzasty, who was elected by a parliamentary majority representing the majority of Poles, is simply outrageous. The times when ambassadors dictated to Poles who should hold what office in Poland are over and will never return. We want good relations with the United States, but your representatives will not choose the authorities of the Republic of Poland for us. I have never been a fan of Włodzimierz Czarzasty, but in this matter, as a Member of Parliament, I stand firmly behind him. Your President first insulted Polish soldiers and then demands support for his dreams of receiving the Nobel Prize. The times when Nero, under threat of punishment, demanded recognition for his musical talents have been regarded as the beginning of the decline of the Roman Empire. From the Polish perspective, Donald Trump’s efforts to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, while at the same time hanging a photograph of himself with the greatest criminal of our times—Putin—are similar to Nero’s demands for awards and praise. If you do not like the Polish authorities, please change your job. In Poland, Poles will democratically decide who holds the highest offices. Please come to terms with that. And please tell your President to apologize to Polish soldiers, and especially to the families of those of our heroes who fell while carrying out a NATO defense mission. Yours sincerely, Roman Giertych”

Poland won't applaud Trump’s vanity project, the Nobel Peace Prize. Today a major diplomatic row broke out between the U.S. and Poland because Włodzimierz Czarzasty (the Speaker of the Sejm) took a very public stand against Donald Trump. The catalyst was a formal request from U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and Israeli Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana, asking international leaders to co-sign a nomination for Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. Czarzasty flatly refused. U.S. Ambassador Tom Rose responded by blacklisting Czarzasty, declaring that the U.S. Embassy would have "no further dealings, contacts, or communications" with him effective immediately. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk joined the fray, telling the U.S. Ambassador that "allies should respect, not lecture, each other. Roman Giertych then wrote a letter (see in the comments), escalating the rhetoric by comparing the demand for the Nobel Prize to the vanity of the Emperor Nero. Here is what Włodzimierz Czarzasty said: Włodzimierz Czarzasty: “Building new platforms like the 'Peace Council' by the United States is, in my opinion, deceptive. We must strengthen the European Union, NATO, the UN, and the WHO. Our security lies there. President Trump, in my opinion, destabilises these organisations by representing a policy of force and conducting transactional politics. This often breaks principles, values, and international law. His interpretation of history—for example, regarding the participation of Polish soldiers on missions—and his instrumental treatment of other territories, like Greenland, means I will not support the Nobel request for President Trump. He does not deserve it."

Still reeling that my four years covering the war in Ukraine for The Washington Post are up — right before the invasion anniversary. I plan to stay in Kyiv because this story is more important than ever. So please reach out with opportunities.