I wonder if I should apply to be the UK's next Information Commissioner...

In not massively surprising news (although I am surprised that it took so long), the UK's Information Commissioner has resigned:

> "I have accepted that there have been occasions where I exercised poor judgement and made attempts at humour that were inappropriate and caused offence," he said in a statement on Friday.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0eyq7rnn22o

Time to see what is new in Mastodon v4.7.0 (glitch) :)

Google is marching ahead in locking down Android, via its developer registration mandate.

I am hopeful that we will find a way - through regulatory intervention or otherwise - to preserve software freedom on Android, including for apps available via @nprofile1q... , but I am not overly optimistic.

(Sure, it doesn't affect non-Google Android, but that is irrelevant to many, many Android users.)

https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/06/android-developer-verification.html?m=1

#Android

I bought two more Baofeng radios, at £10 a piece, so that I can lend them to friends when I play Airsoft, so that we can have comms.

I couldn't load my frequency plan, until I realised that these radios come in a "locked" state.

One needs to unlock them first.

Fortunately, that is easily done.

My original two must have been unlocked when I got them.

As someone who really likes RSS, I found this post (which I read via RSS) by @God Emperor of Mastodon (new account) quite interesting:

> No more RSS :: Syntax at Amima

https://michal.sapka.pl/2026/no-more-rss/

I like the simplicity and uniformity of RSS: posts from people whose stuff I want to read, available to me automatically, without regard for whatever styling they might have applied to their site. Just text in a window.

I add and remove feeds quite regularly - as Michal says, sometimes someone's posts just don't gel enough for me so I find myself regularly skipping them.

#rss #selfhosting #posse

A random thought.

Let's suppose that this daft proposed UK social media ban for children, and perhaps age verification for everyone, is coming in 6-12 months.

Some parents will want their children to still enjoy online social lives, without either child or parent giving up their privacy. Same for child-free adults, who will be swept up in this.

I wonder what tangible steps such people could do now, to mitigate if not remove this coming risk.

Downloading from YouTube to build a local archive?

Looking at local gaming servers, to share with friends but not the public?

Small, controlled, social media instances which might be in scope but may not be the subject of enforcement?

(Changing the status quo and bringing in UBI, educating people about changing the law to address harmful functionality, not child users etc.)

Taking a very self-centred view, I wonder how, if at all, the implementation of the UK's proposed age verification / Internet bans will impact me, personally, directly.

Or, conversely, what I might need to do to mitigate or lessen its impact.

(Yes, I know that "whether it impacts Neil or not" is not the point. This is just me pondering, self-centredly.)

Right.

Internet safety / #OnlineSafetyAct in the UK is clearly going to be the topic of the day.

Child protection is essential, but I am highly sceptical of the proposed approach.

Keeping to my "more than three toots should be blogpost" rule, here's a brief - probably entirely as-expected - analysis from me:

https://neilzone.co.uk/content/files/2026-06-15_online_safety_phase_2.html

#UK #Internet #blog

And here's the official announcement of age verification coming to everyone in the UK who wishes to use "social media":

> Social media to be banned for under-16s in landmark government move to give kids their childhood back

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/social-media-to-be-banned-for-under-16s-in-landmark-government-move-to-givekids-their-childhood-back

#OnlineSafetyAct

The price of thermal monoculars / scopes is dropping, but not yet to the point (for me, anyway) of "oh, let's give it a go".

Camomile tea.

Let's see if it helps me sleep better!