Crowbar Kernel Panic

Bo McCoy

certainly entertaining and hopefully helpful we strive to cover the topics at the heart of the Linux gamer. From Proton to Vulkan, from Linux native to voiding the warranty. We discuss news and updates from the Linux community, our gaming habits and wanderings along with reviewing a game each week.

  1. há 3 dias

    Episode 62: Flock Cameras Are Tracking Your Car Right Now

    Bricks & Minifigs. Reckless Ben. And 130,000 license plate cameras that don't need a warrant to find out where you've been. This week we go down a rabbit hole that starts with a viral Lego lawsuit and ends with Flock Safety — the AI-powered license plate camera network now watching roads in nearly every state. We cover how the cameras actually work, the documented abuse cases (including a Mauldin, SC officer fired for running 166 unauthorized searches on an ex's vehicle), the security researcher who hacked one in under 30 seconds, and what Flock just changed about their data retention policy after the backlash. Also: a Unifi container migration that took down an entire Proxmox server, a home lab AI fishing app that met its match at a river with zero signal, and a decade-old Sonic Drive-In robbery story that turns out to be the perfect real-world case study for "would a camera have actually proven anything?" 0:00:00 – Cold open / why Bo doesn't have headphones 0:09:15 – Unifi's new podman container crashes an entire Proxmox host 0:16:30 – K3s, Rancher, and the trout-fishing app that needed cell service it didn't have 0:20:00 – The AI-generated support ticket that gave it away 0:21:00 – The Reckless Ben / Bricks & Minifigs Lego saga, explained 0:37:00 – How that story sets up the real topic: Flock Safety cameras 0:40:00 – How ALPR cameras actually work (it's not facial recognition) 0:44:30 – Documented abuse cases: officers tracking exes with zero oversight 0:47:56 – Benn Jordan's camera hack: Android, root access, and a USB port 0:53:32 – DeFlock.me and the 130,000-camera map 0:56:49 – Pushback, regulation, and "who watches the watchers" 1:01:37 – Flock's retention policy change: 30 days to 7 1:12:24 – The counter-proposal: put cameras on the cops too 1:14:04 – Bonus story: the Sonic robbery and why cameras wouldn't have helped 1:24:29 – Next week: expensive hard drives, and the next Home Lab episode 🔗 Sources & Further Reading DeFlock — crowdsourced ALPR camera map: https://deflock.org/ Benn Jordan, "We Hacked Flock Safety Cameras in under 30 Seconds": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uB0gr7Fh6lY Flock Safety's official response to the retention policy change: https://www.flocksafety.com/blog/flock-guardrails-address-lpr-privacy-concerns-and-police-transparency AP News coverage of the retention policy change: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2026/aug/13/amid-public-backlash-surveillance-tech-company-flock-announces/ (AP wire story) Mauldin, SC officer terminated for 166 unauthorized FLOCK searches on an ex's vehicle: https://www.foxcarolina.com/2026/08/14/mauldin-officer-accused-using-flock-cameras-over-160-times-track-ex/ Bricks & Minifigs–Reckless Ben controversy overview: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bricks_%26_Minifigs%E2%80%93Reckless_Ben_controversy Reckless Ben's channel: https://www.youtube.com/@RecklessBen 💬 Got a comment we should read on air? Drop it below — we read every one. 📧 crowbarkernelpanic@pm.me

  2. 14/07/2025

    Episode 56: Stop Killing Games: Who Really Owns What You Buy?

    In this episode of Crowbar Kernel Panic, we dive headfirst into the Stop Killing Games initiative — a global pushback from gamers, preservationists, and developers against the increasing trend of publishers shutting down games, removing them from stores, or making them unplayable even after purchase. From Ubisoft delisting The Crew to the short lifespans of live-service games like Rumbleverse and Knockout City, we explore the big question: Do you really own a game once you’ve paid for it? We break down: The origins of the Stop Killing Games movement High-profile shutdowns and delistings What happens to single-player games with always-online DRM Publisher ethics: Should they patch games to work offline before decommissioning? Legal and moral questions around cracking and emulation The role of the modding community and emulators in digital preservation How platforms like Steam, GOG, and Epic compare in this landscape Why indie developers and players alike should care about this trend Along the way, we share our personal takes on digital ownership, recall games we lost to shutdowns, and ask if we’re headed toward a future where even single-player experiences come with an expiration date. To close the show, Bo gives a quick update on his ongoing Godot card game project, ShadowLight — a solo dungeon-crawler inspired by dark fantasy themes, with a twist on time, memory, and resource management. If you care about preserving games, owning what you buy, or just want to hear what it’s like to build a game from scratch while the industry melts down around you — this episode’s for you. 🚀 Stay Connected: YouTube: https://youtu.be/3R1rYNJw1_Q Send us an email at CrowbarKernelPanic@pm.me Join us on Discord. https://discord.gg/Nx6HgaAuZ3 Music from this episode "Bit Quest" and "Basic Implosion" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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certainly entertaining and hopefully helpful we strive to cover the topics at the heart of the Linux gamer. From Proton to Vulkan, from Linux native to voiding the warranty. We discuss news and updates from the Linux community, our gaming habits and wanderings along with reviewing a game each week.

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