Dan Sugalski

Guy who bakes, snarks, writes, and codes.

Currently at Google (my second search engine employer!), previously at Bloomberg.

One time Perl 6 pumpking, lo these many years ago, as well as core perl contributor and part-time VMS perl port maintainer. I have written the occasional article, mostly on perl. (but once upon a time long ago on the Amiga. Those were the days...)

Currently not in France. Dammit.

Public Key

npub1dsssjeuvwxc0fyn8n43sscr76ttm07pgq98uv903kqvqdflk78tsvehw6j

NIP-05 Address

wordshaper_at_weatherishappening.network@mostr.pub

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsxcggfv7x8rv85jfne6ccgvpld94ahlq5qzn7xzhcmqxqx5lm0r4ckpaz29

Author Public Key

npub1dsssjeuvwxc0fyn8n43sscr76ttm07pgq98uv903kqvqdflk78tsvehw6j

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Last Notes

2024-08-19 14:38:34

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@npub1g8e…qdqf I suspect this kind of traffic bankruptcy will progress like many other bankruptcies -- slowly, and then extremely quickly.

2024-08-12 15:07:27

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@npub1psd…9sr7 Looks like it's from Rhymes with Orange: https://comicskingdom.com/rhymes-with-orange/2024-08-12

2024-08-05 17:36:07

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@npub1f6a…pnql It's also pretty telling that so many of these companies are willing to have a paper trail of these projects kept in discoverable media.

2024-08-02 19:10:26

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@npub1j3f…vd5h It's not surprising that social media engagement is down, but I'd really love to know if actual website traffic for the news orgs is down, since in a lot of ways that's more important

2024-07-31 15:36:26

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@npub1p45…89jz That seems kinda horrifying, honestly. Is there any legitimate hope that the number of QUIC back ends shrinks? (Not to 1, because that's probably too much to ask for)

2024-07-22 17:44:27

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@npub1v2s…mqq5 I suspect Trump is *extremely* cranky that people aren't talking about him right now.

2024-07-12 16:17:48

We (and by "we" I mean Google) should really, really, aggressively derank these zombie websites that have been resurrected and are shambling across the internet leaving maggot-laced goo behind.
https://arstechnica.com/ai/2024/07/ilounge-and-the-unofficial-apple-weblog-are-back-as-unethical-ai-content-farms/

2024-06-11 14:12:26

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@npub14zv…gvhs /me looks at the recent Recall thing
No idea how this kind of thing happens. They're usually so thoughtful and competent in their activities.

2024-06-07 14:23:47

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@npub1psd…9sr7 See, this is why you never give these people lists of Things Not To Do. They just read the list, think "you're not the boss of me!", and then run down it like a checklist.

2024-05-13 10:38:28

Whenever I see someone has been censured for “their beliefs” without the specific beliefs being listed I always assume racism, sexism, fascism, homophobia, or transphobia. So far I have very rarely been wrong. Unfortunately. https://zirk.us/@nickbwalking/112432932655011050

2024-05-12 11:06:59

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@npub198t…hasj I’m not sure if it would be a good thing or a bad thing if you ended up visiting Cambridge (the one in Massachusetts) on a day that MIT’s swap fest was going on…

2024-05-05 09:57:54

I had wondered why the Mediterranean was so blue. I assumed it was the extra salinity but apparently (mostly) not.
http://epistimograph.blogspot.com/2011/04/blue-waters-of-mediterranean.html?m=1

2024-04-23 08:55:16

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@npub1psd…9sr7 “welcome to the future Phillip K. Dick promised you. You know what you’ve done to deserve this.”

2024-03-11 00:12:05

“Haphazard and largely self-serving” pretty much sums up Elon, so this tracks. https://press.coop/@seattletimes/112074126920473230

2024-02-27 21:23:44

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@npub1psd…9sr7 @npub1933…jggw Oh, yeah, I know they don't exist now. I'm not sure wrist-mounted BP will *ever* exist, though non-invasive glucose monitoring might one of these days. (Maybe if they get very clever with lasers and such. Maybe)

2024-02-27 20:20:30

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@npub1psd…9sr7 I can't say I'm surprised. All the Apple Car rumors made me wonder "where's the value for Apple here and why should they bother?" and I could never figure out an answer that seemed worth the hassle.
Apparently that's true of people inside Apple too.

2024-02-27 18:27:37

Anyone got recs for some good lore-heavy Warhammer 40k novels? I got hooked on a [lore YouTube channel](https://www.youtube.com/@Scholarslore) and, well... time to indulge in optimistic far future fiction.

2024-02-20 18:40:58

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@npub1psd…9sr7 This is the thing that gives people who don't cheat the hardest time wrapping their heads around. It's *never* just one time, it's the one time you noticed.

2024-02-16 00:23:42

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@npub1u27…3qfq it may less be that people think Jitsi is good and more that the repeated egregious security flaws and shadiness in Zoom’s past has made people think they’re still untrustworthy. (Jitsi may be too, just we’re less aware of its issues)

2024-02-10 19:45:01

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@npub1psd…9sr7 @npub1cr2…wps8 neither have I, come to think of it. Are we sure the superbowl even exists? It could just be an elaborate prank being played on us.

2024-02-10 15:53:07

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@npub1yyx…qa5g the people involved are incapable of feeling shame so i suspect that’s not going to be much of a deterrent

2024-02-02 18:33:54

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@npub1psd…9sr7 actually dammit, that'd be pretty neat and I think I may have nerd-sniped myself.

2024-02-02 18:33:25

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@npub1psd…9sr7 I need to order one of these so I can start work on my no-doubt blockbuster app "Tentacles Squirming at the Edge of Your Vision for Apple Vision Pro"

2024-01-23 18:00:52

Weird watching worlds collide. I was listening to Make Me Smart on my lunch walk and heard @npub1ag4…d2a5 namecheck both @npub1su4…a0dw and @npub1yyx…qa5g

2024-01-09 21:23:14

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@npub1p0w…22r5 So, was this a "the judges are extremely skeptical of you, to make sure that when they agree with you it's bulletproof" or a "the judges were extremely skeptical of you because just laughing at you and throwing you out of the courtroom for being a gibbering clown is undignified" kind of skeptical?

2024-01-09 15:03:13

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@npub18wj…lvmv That has been my Big Take on all this AI bullshit. If your entrance essay can be AI'd away then it's clear it was never useful for its stated purpose (judging competence) and is now no longer useful for its *actual* purpose (gatekeeping).
Not that "just stop !@$!$ gatekeeping" is ever going to go anywhere, but 🤷. We've had "AI" for a lot of these things for years, we just called them "private tutors" before.

2024-01-09 14:49:20

One thing I *do* hope we get from the AI nonsense that's flying around everywhere is the death of boilerplate and bullshit privilege-gates like cover letters and entrance essays and such.
In many cases if you have something that can be done by AI it's a sign that thing needs to just die or should be automatic. And yeah, I'm looking *right* at programming languages -- if you have sufficient boilerplate in a language that AI autocomplete is valuable then *fix your language* to remove the need.

2023-12-14 17:55:40

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@npub1vs7…a6g3 Tom Lehrer's A Christmas Carol, of course.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtZR3lJobjw

2023-12-09 21:38:35

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@npub1psd…9sr7 Are we taking bets on how likely it is that the folks they were going to deport to Rwanda were going to be funneled into sweatshop work for Infosys?

2023-11-21 17:44:30

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@npub1pfe…e2dm @npub143y…3g53 Desperately trying to be the main character in a badly written fanfic based on a novel they didn't understand.

2023-11-17 13:16:29

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@npub1r47…wytr Depends on your setup, I guess. With both Amazon and Kobo, because they have Mac desktop apps, I know that when I yoink them into Calibre's library for backups I can read them in anything that'll read an ePub. I'm pretty sure folks on Windows boxes can do the same, and for Nook books too.
Dunno if that's the case for Linux, and I'm sure it's not the case if you're in a device-only (just tablet/phone/ereader) environment. So YMMV, of course.

2023-11-17 13:10:47

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@npub1r47…wytr I've found Calibre is excellent for my preserve-for-backup needs, as it'll handle backing up kindle, nook and kobo books. Plugins are required but that's always the case with calibre it seems.
I am all in on pro-ebook, mostly because they don't weigh anything. I'm fond of paper, to be sure, but the utility and ease of carrying of ebooks ends up outweighing that for me.

2023-11-16 15:56:39

Yet another reason to not buy ebooks from a store that doesn't let you have the files available locally in a way that you can still use them once the reader/hardware goes away.
This is why I moved from Nooks to Kobos -- B&N dropped mac support so any new purchase could vanish at any time, which sucks. I am happy to exchange money for ebooks (and, looking at my library, do a bit more than I probably ought) but I would like to keep reading them into the future.
https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/16/23963663/barnes-and-noble-nook-old-models-support-store-shutdown

2023-11-06 22:31:07

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@npub1psd…9sr7 if there was a live shot of her with a dalek eye stalk protruding from her forehead I would assume it was real and not prosthetic.

2023-11-02 19:58:05

Been reading @npub1v2s…mqq5's thread on the trump bench trial and as someone who was adjacent to the financial industry for years I gotta say the amount of casual fraud on display has been pretty impressive. As has the amount of self-proclaimed incompetence, but I suppose when you're facing down a whole bunch of really bad charges the last thing you should be worried about is your public reputation.
https://mastodon.social/@GottaLaff/111341218964329485

2023-11-01 20:50:52

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@npub1mp3…qjxj Exchange insurance is generally pretty heavily subsidized. As is mine, honestly, just I can see the employer share of it and that share is large. (about $1000 every two weeks)
Even with that, the actual out of pocket costs in the US are quite a bit higher than out of pocket (and, indeed, *uninsured* out of pocket) costs in other places.

2023-11-01 18:07:22

US healthcare is just stupidly, ridiculously expensive. Just went through the open enrollment stuff and my medical insurance costs about $1225 every two weeks between my share and my employer's share.
Still have all kinds of copays and deductables, of course. As one does. ("Amusingly", my out of pocket costs for fully covered things is a bit higher than the completely-uninsured costs for the same things in France)

2023-10-21 14:26:27

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@npub1psd…9sr7 Zombie bites provide long lasting protection from hazardous WiFi and 5G radiation, you know. Why do you hate radiation protection?

2023-10-21 12:34:47

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@npub19lt…qfjk sure, but the risk is asymmetric, which is why you’re unlikely to find this—anyone who stands a service like this up is going to be attacked so fast that it won’t be up long enough to be useful.

2023-10-21 12:29:04

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@npub19lt…qfjk I admit that my first thought there is “this is not as good an idea as it might first seem” since it would only take one of the many threat actors out there to compromise the service for everyone to have a very bad day.

2023-10-20 12:11:01

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@npub1psd…9sr7 I’m honestly surprised nobody’s doing that. From a rich persons POV the return on that should be pretty amazing for nearly no actual cost. There’s a bonus set of “I get to be an Art Patron” feels to go with it.

2023-10-18 06:58:11

Wow. Charging new users? For *X*? You kinda need a valid value proposition for folks to want to do that.
Can’t wait to see what their new user signup numbers look like. (Or maybe it’s a clever way to monetize all the disinformation bots. That would actually be clever)
https://9to5mac.com/2023/10/17/x-twitter-charging-new-users/

2023-10-16 20:45:52

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@npub1yyx…qa5g it’s pretty reliable that any time one of these guys puts out something labeled a manifesto that they’re about to do the equivalent of saying “that kaczynski guy had a manifesto? Well, hold my beer!”

2023-09-22 16:28:11

I’m waiting for some AI douchebro to announce they’ve just released their newest LLM, trained exclusively on public domain sources — the voynich manuscript, the necronomicon, and the Creative Commons release version of “Don’t Create the Torment Nexus”

2023-09-20 02:11:32

I’m pretty sure that at this point Post is just flat out lying about serving sizes for their cereal. My husband likes the honey bunches of oats with strawberries and that’s already tiny (11 ounces in a box) but they claim one serving is one cup, which is 41 grams.
I weighed a cup of cereal just to see. 62 grams. No packing or shuffling or tamping down, just grabbed a dry cup measure and filled it carefully to the top.
This isn’t just shrinkflation, it’s also a blatant lie. Bastards.

2023-09-13 14:37:29

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@npub1mp3…qjxj Well, I'm setting this up so my husband's iOS devices can get through the Great Firewall without too much hassle, so I'm pretty sure that ssh tunnels won't do it here.
I've seen a rec for SoftEther and it seems straightforward enough to set up.
We'll see, this may be the weekend's project.

2023-09-13 13:57:59

It's finally time to figure out how to set up a VPN server on the home server. Bah. On the one hand I'm sure this will be a lot more reliable than the one that MacOS Server used to stand up (I had to have a cron job auto-restart that one and it still wasn't that great), on the other it means I need to find and install a VPN server and configure the router to deal with it.
At least it seems fairly straightforward, just the kind of annoying sysadmin stuff I was frankly glad to stop doing.

2023-09-12 20:12:42

This is depressing. I've enjoyed AirBnBs in the past but at this point I'm pretty well convinced they should be either forbidden or very tightly (like 90 days out of the year) restricted.
From @npub1hgr…2e7r https://www.texasobserver.org/short-term-rentals-airbnb-vrbo-neighborhoods/

2023-09-11 12:56:38

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@npub1l0s…pgrv I fully support the continuing bikification of NYC, though the idea that the NY cops will be in any way a useful part of it is something I find simultaneously hilarious and unlikely.

2023-09-01 18:08:45

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@npub1psd…9sr7 The only reason we can assume TESCREAL *isn't* run by the Elder Gods is the flaming incompetence of all involved. Frankly if Nyarlathotep *was* responsible it'd be a far better run movement/organization/wankfest.

2023-08-29 02:39:02

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@npub1r2f…wacd I have this one from Satechi: https://satechi.net/products/165w-usb-c-4-port-pd-gan-charger
I liked it enough to get a second. They’re great for travel too. (They have a standard power cord, so making it EU or UK compatible costs… $4 for an alternate cord. It’s great)

2023-08-21 16:48:17

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@npub1psd…9sr7 Oh! Nice, and I was actually looking for something like this to replace a failing Smart Keyboard, so this is wonderfully timed. Thanks!

2023-08-06 22:39:09

We really ought to impose a federal tax on businesses that force people to commute into the office for jobs that can be WFH. Something we use to fund climate change mitigation projects to help offset the damage caused by the people forced to commute.

2023-08-03 17:42:45

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@npub1vs7…a6g3 I use Ivory and am quite happy with it.

2023-08-01 20:10:05

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@npub1vs7…a6g3 ...wait, *that's* the story behind the callsign?

2023-06-28 13:11:30

Today's random reminder:
1) Enable 2fa on all your accounts where you can
2) *not* SMS if you have another option
3) Google Voice is a fine last-chance SMS option but not for the account associated with the GV account
4) SAVE YOUR RECOVERY CODES SOMEWHERE THAT DOESN'T REQUIRE ACCESS TO YOUR ACCOUNT TO GET TO THEM!
A lot of people fail at that last one, including me. Also including my sister-in-law who lost her phone on a bus in Panama.
Seriously, recovery codes are great, which is why you should print them out and, if you have someone you trust to hold such things, you should send a screenshot of them to for safekeeping.

2023-06-13 23:59:06

It’s no wonder there’s all the bleating about people getting back to the office. I suspect quite a bit of that comes from building owners and their astroturfing PR firms.
Maybe if we worked on making cities more livable so people were there because it was home, rather than work, they’d be a bit more resilient.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/06/12/office-real-estate-san-francisco/

2023-06-07 13:17:45

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@npub1mp3…qjxj It's not even making things suck! (though in this case it was an update to Acrobat Reader so the suck is kind of implied) It just changed the process a bit without any notice, which threw my mom off a bunch and left her confused as to what's going on.
Honestly if it had popped up a big "should I install an update" box or something like that... it still would've sucked, honestly, but at least there would've been an indication that something was changing or going to change. As it was she was left wondering what she did wrong and what was going on.

2023-06-07 12:53:04

The absolute fastest way to be utterly enraged with every single part of modern computing is to try and walk someone with a brain injury through one of their regular tasks after some random piece of software has pushed an update in the background.

2023-06-06 23:35:39

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@npub1hvd…9sq9 Marc Andreessen is, paradoxically, not the smartest man in the room even when the room only contains Marc Andreessen. It’s a hell of a superpower but he makes it work.

2023-06-05 17:27:06

I'm amused that it's 2023 and iPhones are finally getting contact transfer functionality that Japanese phones had back in the '90s.

2023-05-31 20:48:30

Watching the chatter around Reddit charging for API access and it seems sad for a lot of people. Mostly, honestly, it looks to me like someone at Reddit's going "you want to scrape our content to train your AI? Well, shitbird, you're going to *pay* for that" which is honestly not unreasonable.

2023-05-26 15:26:45

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@npub198t…hasj That's a bit high. I start getting fuzzy brained around 900-1000, which I suspect you'd hit within 45m to an hour. Some extra ventilation in the Portable Panopticon is probably in order.

2023-05-26 13:31:11

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@npub198t…hasj I admit, I am *really* curious what the CO2 levels are like in there after a while of use. (They get surprisingly high in my office at home, and I think it's got quite a bit more volume than your dome does)

2023-05-22 13:29:12

A semi-regular reminder that streaming pays artists crap, and if there are tracks or albums you listen to frequently then you should buy what you can of them. Anything is good, honestly, since the artist cut from just one track sold on iTunes is more than a few thousand streams of the same track on any of the streaming services.