Yep, and do it

Microsoft is changing how you log in to your accounts

The company said Thursday that users logging in to Microsoft 365 workplace software, Copilot, Xbox and Skype can now use “passkeys” rather than traditional passwords or an authenticator app. That means whatever biometric authentication (such as a thumbprint or face ID) you use to open your phone or computer will be all you need to access your Microsoft account. Passkeys are available on desktop and mobile browsers starting Thursday, with support for mobile apps in the coming weeks, the company said.

Actually I've been doing it for a couple of months now but if Thusrday is good enough for WaPo it's good enough for me. It works fine, and it's easy to set up.

You will need, however, a password manager or an authenticator app; there are a number of good ones available free.  

The New York Times…

 …has noticed the little bloom of protests taking place on college campuses around the U.S. and is concerned about what affect this may have on someone named Mr. Biden.

But as clashes on some campuses became increasingly destructive and arrests mounted across the country, Mr. Biden increased the distance between himself and some of the more radical activism on campuses. In remarks on Thursday, he struck a balance between defending free speech and describing what he saw as the limits of acceptable protest.

"Acceptable protest" is a provocative concept, to be sure. If the Times has assumed its readers will understand it, they have erred. But then I am only one. 

Is an acceptable protest a protest at all?

The plumbing…

 …is being worked on in the house today, which means the water to my apartment needs to be turned off for a little while. And it's remarkable how often I have to remember that while reaching, as is my deeply ingrained habit, for a faucet handle. 

This matter of ingrained habits and learned assumptions is one of the reasons we have flourished as a species. Imagine how it would be if, turning up at your place of work every morning, you had to relearn how to do your job again from scratch. Every day, forever, would be your first day there. (All of which is conditioned on whether you could figure out how to get to your place of work every morning successfully.)

Imagine if, every morning when you wake up, you had to decide whether the floor next to the bed would be a safe place to stand. And whether to take the risk.

It'll be nice when they get finished down there and I can get a few dishes washed.

Big suckers

 

The kids are fine

Franklin Tech student welds artistic bench for French King Bridge

Coates embarked on studying the bridge, counting and analyzing its beams and the structure’s colors. She used her time in class between the months of October and April to design and weld the bench by using metal inert gas (MIG) welding, a skill she’s used since her sophomore year. Coates noted she is in welding shop every other week to balance her academic work.

Getting old…

…somebody said, is like living in the same house all your life and then suddenly, unexpectedly, realizing somebody has moved all the furniture around and the pictures are hanging in different places. I'm having one of those moments now.

When did people start protesting with masks on?

I guess it's been going on awhile — OK, I'm slow.

I thought the whole idea about protesting was to stand up for something, and how can you stand up if you have no face? (Never mind. You know what I mean,)

A secret protest makes no sense.

And what is it if it's not about the style?

Well, this is discouraging

Seventy-five years of reading newspapers and only today I find out the National Equirer was the "go-to" national tabloid.

The National Enquirer was the go-to American tabloid for many years. Donald Trump helped change that

And it's too late. It's not the go-to national tabloid any more. Donald Trump changed it.

Should I despair or should I be glad?

The Return of the Tulip Sisters

 

If I knew what I was talking about…

…I think I might describe this as passive agressive. But I don't, so I'll just call it dense.

It's Columbia University's Center for Student Success and Intervention.

Which looks to me like a disciplinary board.

But a really, really. really nice one.

From Rand

Is the sun slowly setting on U.S. power? That depends on us.

That's the think tank, not the author — and from David Ignatius of The Washington Post:

This decline is “accelerating,” warns the study. “The essential problem is seen in starkly different terms by different segments of society and groups of political leaders.” There’s a right-wing narrative of decline and a left-wing one. Though they agree that something is broken in America, the two sides disagree, often in the extreme, on what to do about it.

Empires end, history records, but how?

Half a century of getting nowhere fast

 Washington, D.C., April 26, 2024 - High-level officials inside the Nixon administration debated climate change and the impacts of sea level rise, extreme temperatures, and fossil fuel consumption as early as 1969, according to declassified documents posted today by the National Security Archive’s Climate Change Transparency Project.

Earth Day was earlier this week, the 22nd.

Way too much work…

What It Means to Be Fraysexual—Everything You Need to Know

This identity is on the asexual spectrum, and it has its own flag: The colors are four stripes of blue, cyan, white, and gray. The blue represents strangers, the cyan acquaintances, white for lack of attraction, and gray for sexual attraction confusion.

…keeping up with this.

Avoid.

(I was fooling around with Edge, Microsoft's default web browser. It's one of the many variants of Google's Chrome currently littering the virtual landscape…and not a bad one, as these things go. This story just popped up on its overly busy Home Screen.)

A (nearly) lost internet gem

The Jargon File

It's mirrored on multiple servers. A search-engine query or just clicking on the link above will get you there. It's also in our Work Avoidance Hall of Fame, without the "the": Filed under J.

Answers every (relevant) question you ever had.

And most of us grew up with it

Why the U.S. struggles to replace millions of lead pipes. ‘We’re just stuck.’

The cost of drinking contaminated water can last for decades. There is no safe level of exposure to lead, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It can cause developmental delays, difficulty learning and behavioral problems. Even low-level exposure can cause permanent cognitive damage, especially in developing children…

Is it any wonder we're "stuck"? 

Twenty-two words…

…is all it takes… 

Students protesting on campuses across US ask colleges to cut investments supporting Israel

Students at a growing number of U.S. colleges are gathering in pro-Palestinian encampments with a unified demand to end investments supporting Israel’s war in Gaza.

…for "ask" to become "demand."

[Intro to an Associated Press video report.]

It's almost May, and the Class of 24 is going to have quite a send-off.

Maybe need to fine tune this

 WASHINGTON — President Biden hailed Wednesday as “a good day for world peace” after signing into law a $95 billion foreign aid package…

…which includes $87 billion for war fighting (Ukraine and Israel), plus $8 billion for Taiwan (just in case) and, oh yeah, $1 billion for "humanitarian aid." (Maybe that's the world peace part.)

And something about TikTok. Who knows.

[Story, New York Post.]

AWOL rampage

Escaped army horses careen through London, crashing into vehicles

Pictures and footage of the horses were shared widely on social media. At least two horses were seen bolting through the streets and sidewalks. One smashed into a double-decker tourist bus.

Two of them, at least. Doing the careening. Household Cavalry fell off.