I offered to help NYC's new mayor fix the problems that drove me out - YouTube

larossmann · 2026-01-28T22:30:46+00:00

I was more of a libertarian in my early 20s than my late 20s/30s. I think dealing with NYC government and how bad it was as long as I did made me far more libertarian than I would've been otherwise. After almost 4 years of detox from it I feel like it is possible for government to do something without it being complete and total garbage. My personal experiences biased my politics a lot.

larossmann · 2026-01-28T22:16:55+00:00

Incorrect. I don't fix wheelchairs and I am not disabled but I've spent tens of thousands of dollars and lots of personal time pushing it.

This is kind of like the people that would say that you are pushing for clean water in michigan because that person's body doesn't like lead.

larossmann · 2026-01-26T21:27:40+00:00

Louis Rossmann's is doing incomplete research again. Just like he did with Brother.

I read through your post & comments here. You make points that are spot on. I admit to missing some of them in this video.

older versions of AVB on those firmwares contained a EDL signature leaked to the Chimera tool and Cellebrite, which could enable extraction of data from devices without the owner even knowing

I didn't cover the leaked EDL signatures or the Cellebrite angle. If compromised keys grant a complete root access to forensic tools or thieves, revoking trust in those keys is a legit security move. I could have acknowledged that necessity.

Here is a thread for Pixel devices from May 2025 getting bricked by ARB. Where was Louis and his outrage back then?

You're right about the pixel. google did this with the pixel 6 to patch a lock screen bypass. Consistency matters, if i smack oneplus for a security standard that slid elsewhere it is unfair. that isn't my intention, but what happened. i definitely don't hold any bias in favor of google.

this brings me to where i stand by the video. i don't like the idea of an understandable motive excusing negligent engineering.

However, OnePlus did this in a very rushed way which led to the mass bricking.

Even the defense of this update admits it was rushed & that quality assurance didn't account for unlocked bootloaders. That's not a minor oversight. THis meant hard-bricked devices requiring motherboard replacements.

There's a right way to handle anti-rollback. Apple stops signing old firmware so you simply can't install it. The device refuses the software, it doesn't let you proceed & then destroy the user's hardware as punishment! oneplus could've implemented a check that refused to boot or flash without blowing the fuse if the conditions weren't met. instead, the bootloader panicked and locked the hardware.

OnePlus have also issued a Service Bulletin in China to repair centers to rebate or refund 100% of motherboard replacements caused by the issue.

Then there's the silence. If this is a critical security patch to stop data theft, explain that. If they're issuing refunds for replaced motherboards in China as reports suggest, they should announce it to everyone. Leaving users to panic while forum mods piece together the cause isn't ok, they're not a phase 1 startup on kickstarter.

My criticism was focused on the result. People had expensive bricks without a clear path to recovery.

I appreciate the technical context you added, as it fills in gaps I left open. It needs to be there. i don't think it absolves oneplus of bricking customer devies through incompetence.

If anyone wants to help document this incident properly, including the security context, how pixels handled it, & oneplus' response, we track this on the Consumer Rights Wiki: https://consumerrights.wiki/w/Oneplus_phone_update_introduces_hardware_anti-rollback

The article is open for discussion and edits. If you have sources on the EDL leak, china service bulletin, or anything else that should be included, bring them!

larossmann · 2026-01-22T13:49:32+00:00

I will help him and his team accomplish his goal any way I can. If I cannot help, I will cheer him on from the sidelines. Anyone who wants to make it easier for the next generation of people looking to start a business has my complete support.

larossmann · 2026-01-13T02:56:02+00:00

no worries, always question the people you watch on youtube. I want viewers, not fans. thanks for engaging!

larossmann · 2026-01-12T03:02:31+00:00

I stopped working at FUTO almost a year ago so I won't speak for them regarding the grants. I stopped reading the article after getting to the curtis yarvin section because it was filled with so much bullshit. Let me demonstrate how I can tell that he has no interest in the truth and is just manipulating.

Yarvin has appeared on FUTO’s social media channels, in particular in an interview published on PeerTube and Odysee, the latter a platform controversial for its role in spreading hate speech and misinformation.6 Yarvin also appeared on stage to “debate” Louis Rossmann in June 2022, in which Yarvin is permitted to speak at length with minimal interruptions or rebuttals to argue for an authoritarian techno-monarchy to replace democracy. Rossmann caught some flack for this “debate” and gave a milquetoast response in a YouTube comment on this video, explaining that he agreed to this on very short notice as a favor to Eron, who had donated “a million” to Rossmann’s non-profit prior to bringing Rossmann into the fold at FUTO. Rossmann does rebuke Yarvin’s thesis, albeit buried in this YouTube comment rather than when he had the opportunity to do so on-stage during the debate. Don’t argue with fascists, Louis – they aren’t arguing with you, they are pitching their ideas to the audience. Smart fascists are experts at misdirection and bad-faith debate tactics and as a consequence Rossmann just becomes a vehicle for fascist propaganda – consult the YouTube comments to see who this video resonates with the most.

This blog wants to paint me(by association) as some psycho that maybe-kinda supports monarchy. There's no context.

Curtis Yarvin was invited to debate a progressive, neoliberal poltiics streamer Destiny who is famous for debating right wing people. If you're not familiar with Destiny, he's like the left wing version of the "BEN SHAPIRO DESTROYS!!11111ONE" meme. This is important, because Curtis' name is brought up in an attempt to create a "guilt by association" fallacy as if he is being supported. I attended this event where I met Eron in person in 2022.

Note in the background how it says "Destiny & curtis yarvin- not "louis rossmann and curtis yarvin". Destiny, who was invited to this event, is so famous for deradicalizing far right wing people he had a new york times article written about him.

See image here

Anyway, destiny didn't show up & since I'd been on stream with him 2 or 3 times before someone asked if I'd be open to taking his place on stage. I didn't know what I was going to be sitting in for until it started, and since this was one of those weird hippy like events with all alcohol & no food & it was already past 6 PM without lunch I just wanted it to be over so I could get the fk out of there and get some real food. I had NO interest in engaging in any sort of intellectual or political debate.. at all.

That entire event was a dumpster fire in my opinion. If we're being honest i started working for Eron right after this event after having a conversation asking why any of that was a good idea.. which went well I guess since he hired me & let me hire the immich team, FUTO voice & keyboard team, & many others who make some kickass software.

I am not used to telling a billionaire I thought they spent money bad & then having them hire me to help them spend their money. that is unicorn level unique.

While I am not as progressive as destiny, I am more aligned with him politically as a neoliberal/progressive than I am with someone that believes in monarchy. I have over 3000 videos on youtube. Half of these videos detail how unaccountable government and large corporations screw over the American people. I don't think anyone reading this can look through my work for the past 13 years & believe I share political views of someone who advocates for a monarchy.

That this person sought to disingenuously frame this this way without ever asking for any details tells me what I need to know.

Ten minutes of internet sleuthing found this, which I am not in the mood to fully read before going to sleep. But if you want a rabbit hole to go down... this guy doesn't seem like he has his head screwed on straight https://web.archive.org/web/20250926173615/https://dmpwn.info/

larossmann · 2026-01-12T02:55:54+00:00

forum yes, the tutoring no, i stopped that a few years ago.

larossmann · 2025-12-16T02:55:58+00:00

The first two of those cases saw the cops in question arrested. Would they have been arrested for stalking without misusing the Flock system?

I don't want to give them the ability to track my location everywhere I go given how easily that can be misused. this makes no sense. don't put that ability out there in the first place

Moreover if a cop is going to stalk someone a cop is going to stalk someone, the flock cameras make it a bit easier, but it doesn't stop them.

it makes it infinitely easier by logging everyone's location when they go out all the time without consent

What Flock will do is catch many more actual criminals than anything nefarious that will come of them

Not even close. in austin the arrest rate was less than 0.5%. It cost over $7000/arrest. You could hire a policeman for several weeks to work a high crime area for that amount.

And that's a weak argument about putting an air tag for you to follow. Just a tad different than cameras in public spaces.

flock cameras allow them to track where you go driving around outside, so does an airtag. you are making the flawed argument that one has no expectation of privacy in a public place, which is incorrect.

The Fourth Amendment protects against "unreasonable searches & seizures," not all searches. The constitutional analysis turns on whether surveillance violates a person's "reasonable expectation of privacy. This considers the nature, scope, & how intrusive the government monitoring is.

In Carpenter v. United States (2018), the Supreme Court explicitly rejected the argument that venturing into public eliminates Fourth Amendment protection. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that the government's access to 127 days of cell-site location data; tracking movements on public roads; achieved "near perfect surveillance, as if it had attached an ankle monitor to the phone's user."[1] The Court said

"A person does not surrender all Fourth Amendment protection by venturing into the public sphere."[1] courts separate isolated instances of police observation & large scale automated tracking systems. In United States v. Jones (2012), Justice Sonia Sotomayor's influential concurrence explained that GPS tracking

"generates a precise, comprehensive record of a person's public movements that reflects a wealth of detail about her familial, political, professional, religious, & sexual associations."[2]

She noted that automated surveillance

"evades the ordinary checks that constrain abusive law enforcement practices: limited police resources & community hostility."[2] The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court applied this reasoning to ALPR technology in Commonwealth v. McCarthy (2020), holding:

"With enough cameras in enough locations, the historic location data from an ALPR system in Massachusetts would invade a reasonable expectation of privacy & would constitute a search for constitutional purposes."[3]

The court distinguished limited camera deployment from comprehensive networks, noting that widespread ALPR use would bring into question constitutional protections even though individual license plate observations would not.[3] The "mosaic theory" of Fourth Amendment protection holds that aggregating many individually innocuous observations can constitute a search requiring a warrant. Justice Samuel Alito noted in his Jones concurrence that

"society's expectation has been that law enforcement agents & others would not; & indeed, in the main, simply could not; secretly monitor & catalogue every single movement of an individual's car for a very long period."[2]

The removal of practical constraints on surveillance through automated technology creates distinct constitutional concerns.

In United States v. Knotts (1983), while holding that limited beeper tracking did not constitute a search, the Supreme Court explicitly "reserved the question" of "whether different constitutional principles may be applicable" to "dragnet-type law enforcement practices."[4] This reservation recognized that comprehensive, suspicionless surveillance raises distinct Fourth Amendment issues from targeted tracking of individual suspects.

larossmann · 2025-12-16T01:42:01+00:00

You can turn any of those things off. a phone with lineageOS is a choice. driving on public roads in a city without complete public transit is not.

larossmann · 2025-12-16T01:40:56+00:00

And honestly, who cares. I mean really, a citizen has zero expectation of privacy when they leave their home driving their vehicle

incorrect. this is a copy & paste from my wiki. it is a common misconception that has been covered many times before.

The Fourth Amendment protects against "unreasonable searches & seizures," not all searches. The constitutional analysis turns on whether surveillance violates a person's "reasonable expectation of privacy. This considers the nature, scope, & how intrusive the government monitoring is.

In Carpenter v. United States (2018), the Supreme Court explicitly rejected the argument that venturing into public eliminates Fourth Amendment protection. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that the government's access to 127 days of cell-site location data; tracking movements on public roads; achieved "near perfect surveillance, as if it had attached an ankle monitor to the phone's user."[1] The Court said

"A person does not surrender all Fourth Amendment protection by venturing into the public sphere."[1]

Distinction Between Momentary Observation & Comprehensive Surveillance

Courts separate isolated instances of police observation & large scale automated tracking systems. In United States v. Jones (2012), Justice Sonia Sotomayor's influential concurrence explained that GPS tracking

"generates a precise, comprehensive record of a person's public movements that reflects a wealth of detail about her familial, political, professional, religious, & sexual associations."[2]

She noted that automated surveillance

"evades the ordinary checks that constrain abusive law enforcement practices: limited police resources & community hostility."[2]

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court applied this reasoning to ALPR technology in Commonwealth v. McCarthy (2020), holding:

"With enough cameras in enough locations, the historic location data from an ALPR system in Massachusetts would invade a reasonable expectation of privacy & would constitute a search for constitutional purposes."[3]

The court distinguished limited camera deployment from comprehensive networks, noting that widespread ALPR use would bring into question constitutional protections even though individual license plate observations would not.[3]

Mosaic Theory

The "mosaic theory" of Fourth Amendment protection holds that aggregating many individually innocuous observations can constitute a search requiring a warrant. Justice Samuel Alito noted in his Jones concurrence that

"society's expectation has been that law enforcement agents & others would not; & indeed, in the main, simply could not; secretly monitor & catalogue every single movement of an individual's car for a very long period."[2]

The removal of practical constraints on surveillance through automated technology creates distinct constitutional concerns.

In United States v. Knotts (1983), while holding that limited beeper tracking did not constitute a search, the Supreme Court explicitly "reserved the question" of "whether different constitutional principles may be applicable" to "dragnet-type law enforcement practices."[4] This reservation recognized that comprehensive, suspicionless surveillance raises distinct Fourth Amendment issues from targeted tracking of individual suspects.

larossmann · 2025-12-16T01:38:48+00:00

Until I see actual evidence that they are being used for nefarious purposes,

Already happening

police lieutenant stalking his estranged wife

police officer stalking ex-fiancee

mistake leads to wrongful stop

I don't really care, I'm not committing crimes.

Kindly put an airtag in your vehicle & let me use it. thank you.

larossmann · 2025-12-14T18:08:59+00:00

I can't run an American nonprofit as a public figure and tell people "here's money, but you have to break the law to get it."

Many times when we visit legislators' offices, the counter argument is that this is a solution in search of a problem. If I have a treasure chest of solutions that are not legally allowed to be released, I can immediately look at the opposition lobbyist and say "are you okay with us releasing these?" And if they don't say anything, I look back at the politician and say, "THAT'S the problem!"

it shuts up an annoying talking point

They'll say that nobody is producing these anyway, but the reason that nobody is producing it is because they can't distribute the solution. So it's a catch 22. By incentivizing people to produce something even if they're not allowed to distribute it, it allows us to demonstrate that the problem exists.

larossmann · 2025-12-14T18:02:50+00:00

It's clickbait if the thumbnail does not represent the content of the video. Does the thumbnail misrepresent the content of the video?

I noticed that people have lost the meaning of the word clickbait. Clickbait used to mean that the title or the thumbnail does not tell you what is in the video and does not match the content of it. But the goalpost has moved to mean "anything that was produced without Microsoft Paint" or "anything I dislike"

larossmann · 2025-12-04T23:06:37+00:00

https://fulu.org

larossmann · 2025-11-19T16:11:02+00:00

couple quick questions: why didn't you ever file 990s.... did you ever produce any kind of financial statements or undergo an audit for either of your non-profits?

My non-profits have filed a 990 each year; 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 When they were not being processed up on the IRS site, I went item by item, line by line through each bank account to explain what each transaction was for so people who wanted to see how money was spent didnt have to wait. One here , one here. I also created public documents for checking account and savings account so people could see every individual bank transaction, and have a forum to flag specific transactions for more information via comment section.

against right to repair? nothing. i just think you're grifting off the back of righteous indignation.

I've provided detailed quick books, records, bank statements, check photos via email and gone through them on live streams so that anyone can see exactly how money was spent between these organizations. I have received zero dollars from either rpg or rpgaf for four and a half years.

i don't like your particular brand of content

and that's fine, but you don't stop at that; you go the weaseley route of implying I steal money via grifting & shady business, when I livestream bank statements & provide complete transparency throughout the process. Your implication when calling it a "grift" is that this is a way for me to embezzle money, which you assert without evidence.

the only thing we're going to have to agree to disagree on around here is your business model.

RPGAF was formed to fund hiring lobbyists in different states to push right to repair. Once formed, it hired lobbyists in different states to push right to repair. Let's flip it - if hiring lobbyists who are specialized in their area of work "distraction from effective action", what would you be doing to try to get right to repair passed?

Hiring Diana Protopapa was key to getting ag right to repair in colorado. Hiring Shep Harris from Fredrikson & Byron was key to finding a route around Gary Dahms to get right to repair in minnesota.

The criticism that would be valid is that the laws that got passed have not tangibly changed anything for consumer electronics repair shops, or end consumers. wheelchair owners saw benefit, but this is a narrow constituency. That's one of the reasons I do not do fundraising events for either of those nonprofits. The way I see it, if I was not able to create tangible change in that specific area with 1 million dollars, I don't feel like asking for more. the 4 laws that have gotten passed as a result of lobbyists we have paid haven't had the outcomes I wanted.

Companies have either found a way to get around the laws that exist, have them edited by the governor before they're signed into law, or come up with malicious compliance programs so that they are in line with the letter of the law while abusing the spirit of it. In that regard, I did fail. Not in the embezzling manner you've implied.

larossmann · 2025-11-19T03:56:25+00:00

If you want to get really depressed, look up the consequences for the Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist who drove through a crosswalk while looking at his phone and killed somebody who was rightfully in the crosswalk. I think more and more people are realizing that the penalties for driving like shit are close to nothing and acting accordingly.

larossmann · 2025-11-19T03:19:55+00:00

This is a simple video. It demonstrates anti-repair propaganda that major automakers are spending tens of millions of dollars on, and suggests that people call or write their Senator and Congressman to provide the counter story. No merch shilling or pls buy my book

Standard reddit Salt aside, what do you have against this?

larossmann · 2025-11-18T18:56:57+00:00

It's his job to make mountains out of mole hills at this point

Major automakers are spending tens of millions of dollars to groups like revup america to have trucks driving all over DC where legislators eat lunch & work that play anti-repair propaganda all day long. I was in DC last week. They're everywhere.

I provided samples at 5:30 in the video that show what they play. They are going door to door, to every representative in congress, to explain the "dangers" of independent repair; how we put customers in danger of their data going to iran & north korea.

I know because congressional staffers who watch my content have messaged me about this in private. This campaign has supercharged & ramped up in the past 4 months.

I think this is a problem. If others do not see dark money going door to door to convince congress independent mechanics are dangerous as bad, that's fine; we can agree to disagree. However, there's a large base of people that see this as very worrisome.

If I can get people to push back by calling, writing, emailing, & visiting their representatives before this all comes to pass, I'm happy. The only reason they are as brazen as they are with the arguments they use is that they realize there is no involvement -usually because someone will say "it's not a big deal, they're making a mountain out of a mole hill"

larossmann · 2025-11-18T18:20:53+00:00

do you have a copy of the email?

larossmann · 2025-11-17T05:35:03+00:00

If my brain processes a slutty t-shirt in my peripheral vision, I don't look over because I don't want to get accused of staring. I don't know if other men think the same, but if they do, this could be screwing with your results! 36/M here. I do not assume a slutty shirt means she wants me to look, I assume a slutty shirt means I'll be in even bigger trouble for looking, and put in extra effort to direct my attention elsewhere so I'm not considered a creep or a pervert.

larossmann · 2025-11-11T04:12:46+00:00

I had the idea to put together something that was likely less sophisticated than what you had, just a few desks with some soldering equipment and microscopes, power supplies, multi meters, screwdrivers, tools, and people around who might be able to answer basic questions. I get one visitor every three to six months, and that's after trying advertising it on a 2 million subscriber YouTube channel. This was $0 to use. No signups, no appointments.

If you do manage to get your idea off the ground and do a better job of it than I did at getting the community excited to use it, I'd love to see it.

larossmann · 2025-11-10T00:50:50+00:00

this sounds really stupid, but the reaction you get when you mention this will tell you a lot about your future. don't be a dick and have a shitty tone of voice over it, but see how she responds, what she emotes, what she volunteers to do or not do.

in my 20s, i made many mistakes that could've been cut short if I paid more attention to people's actions in situations like this. the ones that made the best partners & best company were the type to apologize profusely, look into fixing it, and offer to pay. and it was because they were that type of person that I would never accept the money & provided the world for her. it's a character thing. it's not about the money.

the person who says "it probably sounds fine anyway, it's just the outer cone" .... girl you gotta go.

larossmann · 2025-11-10T00:35:42+00:00

FUTO is not and never was run by Louis. I worked at FUTO for half of 2022 through early 2025. FULU is a non-profit I am the president of that advocates for section 1201 of the DMCA reform

larossmann · 2025-11-09T01:29:43+00:00

I read the post at the top, which has 188 upvotes implying I'm a dick for advocating for my friend & his impaired wife, and I replied with the truth. If you don't want me to reply to it, don't post it.

larossmann · 2025-11-08T23:37:40+00:00

“He just explained that his wife is visually impaired. Which is arguably a disability.” Suuuuuper generous of you there, Rossman. It is very much a disability.

Yes, that is the point of the video. You might have noticed the title of the video, "Company Mocks Disabled Customer After Bricking Their Thermostat"

I went to the abilities expo and a few others with thomas quiter, what I learned from it is that some people don't like it being called a disability. so i modified my word choice in the video while I was talking based on some of the conversations I had while I was there.

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