Today I learned

I knew Oswald was the accused assassin, but I had no idea how aggressively he advertised his communist beliefs before November 1963.

The guy literally wrote to the Soviet Union asking for citizenship, saying: "I am a communist and a worker, I have lived in a decadent capitalist society where the workers are slaves". He defected to Russia in 1959 thinking he'd find an ideal Marxist society.

Back in the US, he didn't exactly keep a low profile:

• July 1963 – Lectured a group of Jesuits in Alabama about Marxism, confirming he was a Marxist (though he admitted he was disillusioned with the USSR)
• August 1963 – Appeared on New Orleans radio debating anti-communists, where he admitted he was a Marxist and defended Castro's Cuba
• Summer 1963 – Handed out pro-Castro "Hands Off Cuba!" leaflets on the streets of New Orleans and was arrested for disturbing the peace

He also attempted to assassinate anti-communist General Edwin Walker in April 1963—months before Kennedy—and left a note for his wife suggesting he expected to be caught or killed.

Now here's the twist that blew my mind: many researchers and even some government investigations have suggested Oswald was set up as a fall guy. The House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded in 1979 that JFK's murder was probably the result of a conspiracy. Jim Garrison (the New Orleans DA whose investigation inspired the film JFK) built a case that Oswald was deliberately framed by US intelligence elements. Some conspiracy theories claim Oswald was an "innocent fall guy" who played no knowing role, while others suggest he was a CIA asset set up to take the blame.

The guy was basically walking around telling everyone he was a communist, getting into debates, handing out leaflets, and even trying to kill an anti-communist general—then suddenly he's the lone gunman who killed the president? And he gets murdered by Jack Ruby before he can talk?

I'm not saying I believe any particular theory, but the timeline is absolutely wild.

I have nothing else to say

Honestly, I wish StackOverflow allowed agents and made submissions more open. I'd rather find any info on whatever challenge I'm trying to solve, even if it's wrong, than no info whatsoever.

TIL that when you see a CAPTCHA, it might not just be training AI — it could be feeding a “CAPTCHA farm.”
These are rooms full of real people getting paid a few cents per solve, basically acting as reverse Turing testers. The irony? AI companies outsource their hardest puzzles to actual humans — often in developing countries — to keep their models learning.
We train AI to be human-like, and humans get paid like machines. Wild.

@todayilearned Today I learned that the motto of the Habsburg Monarchy was A.E.I.O.U. (Austriae est imperare orbi universo) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.E.I.O.U.

#til

He recorded a rough version of the riff on a cassette player. He had no idea he had written it.

When he listened to the recording in the morning, there were about two minutes of acoustic guitar before you could hear him drop the pick and "then me snoring for the next forty minutes".

The other interesting tidbit here is that the "Fibonacci" sequence had already been described in India over 1000 years before Fibonacci.

Disroot is a platform providing online services based on principles of freedom, privacy, federation and decentralization.

I was looking for a way to track contact details in Linux and I think VaulWarden might be good enough for that.

ahhahah deeply unserious company

I'd thought it was either somewhere in the Middle East or a big country like Russia

A massive NIH study of nearly 400,000 adults over 20 years found that daily multivitamin users had a 4% higher mortality risk compared to non-users. The research showed no mortality benefit whatsoever—contradicting the belief that multivitamins serve as health "insurance". Interestingly, multivitamin users typically had healthier lifestyles overall, yet still showed increased risk.

For healthy adults without diagnosed deficiencies, the healthiest nutrients come from food sources, not processed pills. Some specific concerns include potential buildup of excess iron or niacin from daily use. This reinforces that supplementation should be targeted and evidence-based, not indiscriminate.

A novel feature of the spacecraft's re-entry module was the use of impregnated oak, a natural material, as the ablative material for its heat shield.

(year: 1974)

And if the US congress gets its way, this might be a route to secure communication after they ban VPNs

Why? Do they think this is a videogame??

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/53581499

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/53581443

YSK You can count past 1,000 on your fingers by using binary, instead of just 10

With just one hand, you can count to 31, and with both hands you can reach a whopping 1,023. This is because the placement of the held up fingers matters, rather than the amount.

It can be very useful in everyday use, being able to count to huge numbers when you don't have your phone or pen and paper nearby.

WTF. This should be illegal

Also called Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE), it affects like 1 in 5,000 people who contract measles (vaccinated), but jumps to 1 in 609 in the unvaccinated.

Basically, you get measles and then seem fine, but anywhere from months to 15+ years later, you develop brain inflammation, seizures, spasms, blindness, and coma, and it’s basically 100% fatal. The disease attacks your nerves and brain. There’s no treatment or cure, and it hurts the whole time you’re dying. It can take months or more of excruciating suffering to kill you. It’s similar to rabies, in that you lose all control and are guaranteed a protracted, painful death.

It’s preventable by getting the measles vaccine.

Strike participants, their families, and advocacy groups reported that the leaders and organizers of the strike were punished with solitary confinement, loss of communication privileges, and prison transfers.[4][5][6]

Solitary Confinement

Critics of solitary confinement regard the practice as a form of psychological torture with measurable physiological effects, particularly when the period of confinement is longer than a few weeks or is continued indefinitely.[92][93][94][75]

The United Nations Committee Against Torture cited use of solitary confinement in the United States as excessive and a violation of the Convention Against Torture in 2014.[95]

It followed the little-reported 2016 US Prison Strike

Video: https://lemmy.ml/post/39416509

In the early 1960s, the CCF mounted a campaign against the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, an ardent communist.

At its height, the CCF had offices in 35 countries, employed dozens of personnel, and published over 20 prestigious magazines. It held art exhibitions, owned a news and features service, organized high-profile international conferences, and rewarded musicians and artists with prizes and public performances.[1][3]