The Alphaville Herald
type: channel
description: Always Fairly Unbalanced
date: 2016-09-22T04:18:10Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
generator agent: http://wordpress.org/
items: Interview with alt-right Pepemancer and Kek/Trump supporter, weev
items: Breaking: The Herald is Back!
items: Moth Wing Avatars Swarm In Memory of Osprey Therian
items: Refunds For Banned Second Life Players!! SHOCK!!!
items: NSA’s Keith Alexander Loses YouTube War
items: Bruce Schneier’s Bat Signal Alarms Internet Engineers
items: Op/Ed: Barrett Brown Prosecutor Inadvertently Indicts Criminal Justice System
items: Why Thank You Federal Prosecutor, that Was Soooo Thoughtful!
items: Philip Rosedale Humiliated By Second Life Voice – SHOCK!!!
items: FBI Summer Reading List!

Interview with alt-right Pepemancer and Kek/Trump supporter, weev
type: item
date: 2016-09-22T01:27:03Z
creator: Urizenus Sklar
subject: Featured
subject: Interviews
subject: Psyops and Propaganda
description: weev with a recent tat In this Herald Instant Classic © interview, we talk with Andrew Auernheimer (aka weev) about his white supremacist politics, his work for the Daily Stormer website, the Kek/Trump political agenda, and his involvement in the pepe the frog meme-storming of Hilary Clinton’s campaign. Pepe and Hillary have words For readers [...]
encoded: weev with a recent tat In this Herald Instant Classic © interview, we talk with Andrew Auernheimer (aka weev) about his white supremacist politics, his work for the Daily Stormer website, the Kek/Trump political agenda, and his involvement in the pepe the frog meme-storming of Hilary Clinton’s campaign. Pepe and Hillary have words For readers that have not followed the recent dust-up between the Clinton campaign and the alt-right some background may be in order. Hillary Clinton recently gave a speech about the alt-right, in which she remarked that half of Trump’s supporters belonged in “basket of deplorables.” Shortly thereafter, the Clinton campaign posted an article on its website, in which it made reference to Pepe the frog, insisting that the green frog was not innocent, but antisemitic, and her campaign called out the Trump campaign for using the Pepe meme. This was echoed by Rachel Maddow, but a number of media outlets subsequently mocked the Clinton campaign for this claim, including the New York Post, which ridiculed her on its website, saying “In 2016, a presidential candidate declared war on a cartoon frog.” However, as devoted Herald readers know, in the Hall of Mirrors ™, things are not always as they seem. In this story, weev gives Uri the inside scoop on all the pepemancy and explains how pepe was converted from a harmless meme into a plague of frogs for the Clinton campaign. According to weev, the operation was largely driven by the crew at the Daily Stormer, and the goal was to troll the Clinton campaign into saying something ridiculous. We took thousands of kids, trained them in basic graphics, got them bullying journalists with custom Pepes. There was this one girl that would constantly get Pepes raping her dismembered corpse every day. Basically we explicitly targeted journalists and Hillary campaign staffers relentlessly. We drove these people insane, a plague of frogs was upon them for a year, and suddenly they are screaming in public about a ca…

Breaking: The Herald is Back!
type: item
date: 2016-09-20T21:35:26Z
creator: Urizenus Sklar
subject: Announcements
subject: Featured
subject: Media
subject: New Media
subject: News
description: After a long hiatus, the deciders at The Alphaville Herald have opted to resume publication of the Internet’s most fairly unbalanced © news source. Netizens will of course rejoice at this news, but some, lost in their 2016 cynicism might ask “why?” The Herald, of course began as the Toto-too of virtual worlds, pulling back [...]
encoded: After a long hiatus, the deciders at The Alphaville Herald have opted to resume publication of the Internet’s most fairly unbalanced © news source. Netizens will of course rejoice at this news, but some, lost in their 2016 cynicism might ask “why?” The Herald, of course began as the Toto-too of virtual worlds, pulling back the curtains on the hidden workings of virtual worlds and virtual paramilitary organizations – detailing the dark furry underbelly of virtual world culture, including its griefers and memes and politics and dark dark places. What has changed? Why return now? Longcat was long in Second Life Well, virtual worlds have not changed, but so-called Real Life has. In fact Real Life has become a virtual world – not The Spectacle, as foretold by Guy Debord, nor a simulacrum, as Baurdrillard imagined – but a straight-up video game. All the trolls and memes and griefers and the whatthefuckedupedness of Second Life have spilled out into so-called Real Life and turned the 2016 election season into an endless parade of fort longcats. Pepe has replaced Pool’s Closed, and weev has replaced Grimmy Moonflower, but these changes are cosmetic. Pepe comes to real life We could have sat this one out, but that would be irresponsible to our loyal readers and jealous haters. They *could* make some popcorn and pull up a lawn chair and watch as the Bowsers of American politics sling poo at each other, but without the Herald’s thoughtful analysis, the popcorn would not be as tasty, the lawn chair not as comfortable, and the poo slinging would appear less artful. No, you need the Herald to help you through this, and we aim to deliver. We are here for you. Because we care. And remember: The Ban Hammer (tm) now works in Real Life too, so be careful, because it can come down on you “for any reason or no reason.” Meanwhile, stay tuned.

Moth Wing Avatars Swarm In Memory of Osprey Therian
type: item
date: 2013-12-14T23:12:51Z
creator: Pixeleen Mistral
subject: Featured
subject: News
subject: News from Second Life
description: About three dozen avatars gathered today in Bodega sim to honor the memory of long-time Second Life resident Osprey Therian. Ms. Therian's real-life typist Vivian Kendall passed away December 9th after battling a number of health issues. Her impact on the Second Life community - particularly older players - was significant, and she clearly planned [...]
encoded: About three dozen avatars gathered today in Bodega sim to honor the memory of long-time Second Life resident Osprey Therian. Ms. Therian's real-life typist Vivian Kendall passed away December 9th after battling a number of health issues. Her impact on the Second Life community - particularly older players - was significant, and she clearly planned for the future, hoping to live on as a fiction character with her own twitter feed. a swarm of moth winged avatars take flight I have attended my share of Second Life memorial services, and would like to congratulate Justin Esparza on a well run event. I particularly enjoyed watching the avatar swarm attach their moth wings and fly away - a touching tribute. Osprey Therian memorial The crowd included a number of SLebrities. Game god Torley Linden (cleverly disguised in a pink suite with watermelon tie) was present under the alt account Torley Sr. Also in attendance was well-known entrepreneuer Stroker Serpentine, and internet troll Prokofy Neva Neva. The tone of the memorial was such that the excitable Neva somehow managed to avoid mentioning the menace of technocommunist conspiracies even once and instead distributed Osprey's moth feelers to augment the avatar moth wings used for the flight to Iris Moth Temple. Everyone was on their best behavior, and discussed ways to allow Vivian Kendall's fictional character Osprey Therian to continue her virtual existence. Let us hope that Torley can help smooth over any problems that might arise with the transfer of control of Osprey's account and assets. Torley and Prokofy stand united in advancing the Osprey Therian fictional character cause [09:57] Torley Sr. (torley.olmstead): Hey Ilia, Bixyl... [09:57] Bixyl Shuftan: And yes, it's been a while [09:57] Marianne McCann: A fine bunch of avatars [09:57] Torley Sr. (torley.olmstead): Tish! [09:57] Holocluck Henly: heya Bix [09:57] Justin Esparza wonders if Magellan Linden will show up today or tomorrow... [09:57] Robin Sojourner: Lot…

Refunds For Banned Second Life Players!! SHOCK!!!
type: item
date: 2013-11-25T01:19:02Z
creator: Pixeleen Mistral
subject: Featured
subject: News from Second Life
subject: Scammers, Griefers and Goons
description: Ban hammer rebounds, hits Linden Lab's wallet One ex-player hopes for $60,000 USD refund as class action settlement mandates payments to exiles Over the last several days, players banned from the Second Life virtual world have begun receiving notification of a proposed class action settlement (full text here) which will pay the involuntary exiles for [...]
encoded: Ban hammer rebounds, hits Linden Lab's wallet One ex-player hopes for $60,000 USD refund as class action settlement mandates payments to exiles Over the last several days, players banned from the Second Life virtual world have begun receiving notification of a proposed class action settlement (full text here) which will pay the involuntary exiles for their virtual land and both the USD and L$ spacebux currency in their accounts. The former players also have the option of either accepting a $15 USD payment for their inventory of virtual goods, or selling the goods on Linden Lab's Marketplace web site. For those who dabbled in virtual land on a large scale, Linden Lab's $1000 USD sim setup fee will be refunded. With refunds for virtual land holdings set at L$ 2/square meter, and the exchange rate set L$ 252 per USD, payouts for virtual land barons could be significant. Those who formerly owned entire sims are looking at refunds of about $1500 for a sim -- each sim is 65,536 square meters in area. Philip Rosedale and Linden Research admit no wrongdoing, but are willing to settle I contacted former land baron Intlibber Brautigan - who was suddenly banned in 2009 while in possession of ~40 sims. Mr. Brautigan did some back of the envelope calculations and said, "Excellent. So that's 42 sims, times 1000 bucks plus 130k L$. So that's almost 60K US I'll get just for the sims". Intlibber Brautigan Brautigan went on to say that the money will be shared with shareholders in his former Second Life ventures: If I am able to recover money from this settlement, it will be divided among BNT shareholders, BNT Financial shareholders and ACE shareholders, according to their last recorded portfolio holding at the time our assets and accounts were stolen by LL. I thank all our shareholders for their patience in the past few years as this legal process has run its course, and their faith that I have always acted in their best interest to the best of my abilities. As for his personal shar…

NSA’s Keith Alexander Loses YouTube War
type: item
date: 2013-10-30T02:05:46Z
creator: Pixeleen Mistral
subject: Featured
subject: New Media
subject: News
subject: Psyops and Propaganda
subject: War and militias
description: 1.6% approval rating for Alexander's vision of Cybersecurity Why does everyone hate my video? Strategic blunder is probably the best description of the last week's decision to publish Jessica Tozer's 30 minute interview with General Keith Alexander on YouTube. What were they thinking? After the strangely-edited video was placed in the free-fire zone of open public [...]
encoded: 1.6% approval rating for Alexander's vision of Cybersecurity Why does everyone hate my video? Strategic blunder is probably the best description of the last week's decision to publish Jessica Tozer's 30 minute interview with General Keith Alexander on YouTube. What were they thinking? After the strangely-edited video was placed in the free-fire zone of open public YouTube ratings, the General has been subjected to continuous withering enemy fire from viewers. Apparently Keith "collect-it-all" Alexander's vision of NSA unconstitutional blanket surveillance is not popular. As of this writing, the video has 247 "likes" and 14,889 dislikes. Doesn't Alexander have someone in PR to advise against this sort of doomed propaganda social media outreach? With a 98% downvote rating, the NSA will need more than a oddly-staged video with narco-ambient background music to persuade the public. Or is this part of an effort to throw Alexander under the bus? Cowboy Keith seems to have some enemies in the security establishment based on a recent less-than-complimentary piece in Foreign Policy. A convenient scapegoat might be useful to distract the public from deeper systemic issues. Alexander poses with his co-star: a yellow extension cord Even after putting aside the motivation for the video, I was left with questions. It would be interesting to know why someone couldn't find a better chair for the General Alexander to perch on for this video. I understand Alexander enjoys the Star Trek motif at Fort Belvoir's "Information Dominance Center", but his chair in this video is less than impressive. I'd also like to know why yellow extension cord on the floor is effectively a co-star in the video. The yellow power cord appears frequently as the camera pans back and the editors try to vary the scene without ever showing Ms. Tozer speaking. YouTube voting irregularities? Despite an overwhelmingly negative reaction from YouTube viewers, a certain amount of paranoia has been evident in the comm…

Bruce Schneier’s Bat Signal Alarms Internet Engineers
type: item
date: 2013-09-14T18:14:45Z
creator: Pixeleen Mistral
subject: Featured
subject: Hacktivism
subject: Mafias, Gangs and Virtual Governments
subject: Privacy and Surveillance
description: Pixeleen Mistral interviews Mark McCahill to calm Herald technical staff I realized something was terribly wrong when The Herald's electronic press fell *out of sync* with the soothing retro-euro-disco thump of Daft Punk's Random Access Memories playing in the editorial offices. Normally the technical staff are careful to avoid harshing the mellow of the writers, [...]
encoded: Pixeleen Mistral interviews Mark McCahill to calm Herald technical staff I realized something was terribly wrong when The Herald's electronic press fell *out of sync* with the soothing retro-euro-disco thump of Daft Punk's Random Access Memories playing in the editorial offices. Normally the technical staff are careful to avoid harshing the mellow of the writers, but now the clatter of the press was fighting a winning battle against the sound of a Moog module synced to the click track in "Giorgio by Moroder". I didn't even want to think about what might happen by the time "Get Lucky" rolled around. A familiar voice could be heard yelling "THIS SHIT WILL NOT STAND!" from the machine room as a mob of enraged engineers chanted WTF? NSA? WTF!! NSA!! GIMPED ELLIPTIC CURVE CYPTO? NO FUCKING WAY!!! The chaotic cacophony of enraged engineers completely overwhelmed Daft Punk when the door opened and the mob spilled into the offices brandishing cross-compilers, git repos, malformed packets, Macbook Pros, and carpal tunnel wrist braces - the tools of their trade. I put down the copy of Vanity Fair I had been reading. A tall black-clad figure marched across the newsroom and slammed an iPad on my desk, nearly upsetting my glass of coconut water. "Did you see this shit, Pix?" Smiling sweetly, I asked, "Is there something wrong, Mark?", then glanced at the iPad and frowned. Mark McCahill - one the the Herald's technical staff - had been reading The Guardian again. I was eventually able to shoo the other engineers back to work with the promise that I would talk to McCahill and see if there might be a coherent story for Herald readers - but I had my doubts. We'd been through this scene before. Over the summer, as whistleblower Edward Snowden's leaks corroded what little remaining credibility the Obama regime might have, the engineers grew increasingly angry. Strangely enough, most engineers want to build systems that benefit society, believe in the rule of law, and even take constit…

Op/Ed: Barrett Brown Prosecutor Inadvertently Indicts Criminal Justice System
type: item
date: 2013-09-10T21:41:59Z
creator: Alphaville Herald
subject: Featured
subject: Hacktivism
subject: Legal Issues
subject: Op/Ed
subject: Privacy and Surveillance
subject: Psyops and Propaganda
subject: Uncategorized
description: by Biff Baker, Prosecutors Gone Wild! (tm) Desk In a recent article here in the Herald, Urizenus Sklar argued that the US Attorney in the Barrett Brown case was attempting to smear Barrett by listing a whole number of allegedly bad attributes of Barrett and then publishing them in a public court document. I [...]
encoded: by Biff Baker, Prosecutors Gone Wild! (tm) Desk In a recent article here in the Herald, Urizenus Sklar argued that the US Attorney in the Barrett Brown case was attempting to smear Barrett by listing a whole number of allegedly bad attributes of Barrett and then publishing them in a public court document. I think Uri missed the bigger picture here. Not that Uri is wrong. But Uri missed the fact that larded into the US Attorney's comments is a tacit indictment of the entire US criminal justice system. The US Attorney's screed against Barrett looked like this: Perhaps without realizing the prejudicial effects on brown the media repeatedly has publicized potentially inadmissible and prejudicial information such as Brown’s … anarchist ideology… troubled childhood and alternative schooling, declaration that he is an atheist, use and abuse of ecstasy, acid, heroin, and marijuana, lack of steady employment, claimed diagnoses of ADHD and depression, associates descriptions of Brown as a junkie, name fag, moral fag, court jester… Now, the question is this: Why on God's Green Earth should it be impossible, or even difficult, for someone who is an atheist, or someone who is depressed, or someone who has ADHD or someone who lacks steady employment, or someone who has used drugs to get a fair trial in this country? You see the deep point here is that implicit in the US Attorney's statement is the admission that for people who are even just a tiny bit outside of the mainstream, the justice system can not be counted on to be fair to them. Any perceived flaw which sets you outside of a Norman Rockwell ideal is enough to ensure that the justice system, if you find your way into it, will grind you to pieces. Tiny pieces. If you are depressed, you cannot count on the justice system to be fair to you. If you use marijuana, you cannot count on the justice system to be fair to you. If you had alternative schooling or raised by alternative parenting, you cannot count on the justice system…

Why Thank You Federal Prosecutor, that Was Soooo Thoughtful!
type: item
date: 2013-09-08T23:33:10Z
creator: Urizenus Sklar
subject: Featured
subject: Hacktivism
subject: Legal Issues
subject: Psyops and Propaganda
description: While everyone seems to be down on the federal prosecutor who is trying to ring up Barrett Brown for 105 years for sharing a link to a Pirate Bay data dump, I wish to be a contrarian here. I say, hey, the prosecutor actually has Barrett’s best interests at heart. I know this because she [...]
encoded: While everyone seems to be down on the federal prosecutor who is trying to ring up Barrett Brown for 105 years for sharing a link to a Pirate Bay data dump, I wish to be a contrarian here. I say, hey, the prosecutor actually has Barrett’s best interests at heart. I know this because she said so in making her case for a media gag order on Mr. Brown. You see, the gag order is *not* to protect the prosecution from media scrutiny of its actions in this case. Au contraire! You see, really, they want the gag order to protect Barrett from the bad things that people might say and think about him. As the prosecutor says: Perhaps without realizing the prejudicial effects on brown the media repeatedly has publicized potentially inadmissible and prejudicial information such as Brown’s … anarchist ideology… troubled childhood and alternative schooling, declaration that he is an atheist, use and abuse of ecstasy, acid, heroin, and marijuana, lack of steady employment, claimed diagnoses of ADHD and depression, associates descriptions of Brown as a junkie, name fag, moral fag, court jester…” And not only was the prosecutor thoughtful enough to think of all the possible bad things one might say about Barrett, but she took the trouble to write them down so we could have them. And then she put them in a court document. And published it. And then a gag order was placed on Barrett and his defense team. Just so, you know, they wouldn’t damage his reputation by responding to these claims. prosecutor's gag order: list bad things that might be said, then muzzle the target Of course the ultimate concern is that all that chatter out there would make it impossible to impanel an impartial jury. Because people in the Dallas region are following this case in sooo religiously (being rabid readers of The Nation and all). And if there are two thing a Texan cannot abide it’s moralfags and namefags! Gosh, I’m so happy I live in a country where politicians appoint kind, thoughtful prosecutors that have…

Philip Rosedale Humiliated By Second Life Voice – SHOCK!!!
type: item
date: 2013-09-07T23:14:03Z
creator: Pixeleen Mistral
subject: Featured
subject: News from Second Life
description: Captured on a YouTube video saying he had been flailing about for an hour trying to get his voice working for a live interview in Second Life, company founder Philip Rosedale confessed to having endured a "crazy painful" struggle with the declining virtual world platform. The former game god attempted to make the best of [...]
encoded: Captured on a YouTube video saying he had been flailing about for an hour trying to get his voice working for a live interview in Second Life, company founder Philip Rosedale confessed to having endured a "crazy painful" struggle with the declining virtual world platform. The former game god attempted to make the best of a bad situation by marveling that there are still active players in the game - not an uncommon sentiment, but perhaps not the most politic thing to admit. Philip Rosedale: gob smacked by Second Life trouble? "That was crazy painful. I guess my first thought is, its so inspiring what a great community we've still got here, even with - I mean look at me, I'm the guy who created this thing and it just took me an hour to get this working" - Philip Rosedale The strangely pale and wax-like Rosedale appears to have been suffering from life-threatening blood loss at the fangs of in-world vampires -- or possibly from some bad decisions in his avatar skin and animation selections. Previous incarnations of Philip look significantly more lively. sparkle-crotch biker-bar Philip poses, circa 2010 Apollo Manga's 30 minute video documents Rosedale's visit to the Second Life for an interview by Emcee Widget as part of the festivities surrounding Burn 2 - a virtual Burning Man celebration held in-world. Formerly known in Second Life as Philip Linden, Rosedale recently left Linden Lab and launched HighFidelity - a new venture that may someday be a competing platform. Now that he is no longer on Linden Lab's staff, Rosedale was forced to drop the "Linden" last name which denotes staff members. But Rosedale still has some pull, since he was not forced to use the standard-issue "Resident" last name, and instead is the only Second Life player with Rosedale as a last name. only one player with the last name Rosedale Rosedale's struggles could explain a problem that Hamlet "Hammie" Au of the Linden Lab fanboy site New World Notes is concerned about - falling revenue due to …

FBI Summer Reading List!
type: item
date: 2013-09-07T21:43:35Z
creator: Urizenus Sklar
subject: Featured
subject: Hacktivism
subject: Herald Literary Suppository
subject: Legal Issues
subject: New Media
subject: Privacy and Surveillance
subject: Psyops and Propaganda
subject: Uncategorized
description: Barrett Brown Yes, summer is winding down, but it isn't too late to cram in some late late summer reading. And who better to suggest good solid reading, but the FBI. Dell Cameron, writing in the Daily Dot, has the goods. He gives us the 20 online publications concerning Barrett Brown that the prosecution considers [...]
encoded: Barrett Brown Yes, summer is winding down, but it isn't too late to cram in some late late summer reading. And who better to suggest good solid reading, but the FBI. Dell Cameron, writing in the Daily Dot, has the goods. He gives us the 20 online publications concerning Barrett Brown that the prosecution considers "must read." Or is that "don't read". Hmm these lists are so confusing... Here is how Mr. Cameron lays it down. I attended the gag order hearing on September 4 and listened as the U.S. government spoke candidly about the journalists who've covered Barrett's case. Twenty articles were admitted into evidence from various writers and websites. Much to my surprise, the U.S. government has great taste in journalism. I've collected the online articles it selected as evidence against Barrett Brown for your reading pleasure. You want to know who made the list, don't you? Well to see it you just gotta click through! [link] Spoiler though, some of the names will be familiar to Herald readers!