Kevin Marks

Reading your thoughts, if you write them down first.

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npub1rg6tx7qv6gqy70ju5s86z7g37akxdmcu9xq85e9f25uj4d9shxzs8gnanz

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KevinMarks_at_xoxo.zone@mostr.pub

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsp5d9n0qxdyqz08ew2grap0yglwmrxauwznqr6vj542wf2kjctnpgpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumt0wd68ytnsw43qdytwkp

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relay.mostr.pub

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npub1rg6tx7qv6gqy70ju5s86z7g37akxdmcu9xq85e9f25uj4d9shxzs8gnanz

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Last Notes

2024-08-25 16:30:58

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@npub16u7…uend would offshore wind work for Iceland? (Not for crypto nonsense, but for households)

2024-08-24 07:16:46

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@npub13q3…hr6l Wasn't that how Knuth got started on TeX?

2024-08-19 08:28:23

After the riots, Keir Starmer should tell us the truth about our country. This is why he won’t | Nesrine Malik | The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/aug/19/riots-keir-starmer-racist-anti-immigration-narratives-truth
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/987/739/315/579/063/original/b7ee5e32afe01edc.png

2024-08-08 21:27:47

If you have been wondering what was going on in the UK this week, this is a great explanation https://myblackface.wordpress.com/2024/08/08/riots-cartwheels-and-brains-interrupted/

2024-07-31 22:50:25

The British Medical Association just came out against the Cass Review and in favour of comprehensive trans care in the UK https://www.bma.org.uk/bma-media-centre/bma-to-undertake-an-evaluation-of-the-cass-review-on-gender-identity-services-for-children-and-young-people
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/883/546/356/287/014/original/e80865b6e871bbd0.png

2024-07-30 11:38:10

The reason calling MAGA weirdos weird works is Wilhoit's law:
“Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.”
If you tell them they're the out-group their entire worldview collapses and they imagine what it would be like if they were on receiving end of habitual cruelty.

2024-07-28 15:31:32

Tax tech companies to build nuclear and wind generation in Ireland time. https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jul/23/ireland-datacentres-overtake-electricity-use-of-all-homes-combined-figures-show
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/864/833/614/946/441/original/20e8c3c542c1128b.png

2024-07-24 08:33:34

Reporting of the latest UBI test programme is ignoring the key finding, obvious to anyone who knows low income people, that their first impulse was to spread the wealth to others.
This thinking is so alien to economists and financial types that they barely discuss it. https://www.openresearchlab.org/findings/key-findings-spending
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/840/540/831/762/356/original/0064a02a4f15c381.png

2024-07-14 16:37:40

https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2024/07/the-coming-storm-part-2.html
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/785/821/325/610/327/original/3e2113535baf0b5e.png

2024-07-10 22:54:34

“At rehearsals there have been cultural differences – for example, the LSO understood the word “glock” to mean the percussion instrument the glockenspiel, rather than a gun.” https://www.theguardian.com/music/article/2024/jul/10/hip-hop-band-cypress-hill-makes-1996-simpsons-joke-come-true-london-symphony-orchestra

2024-07-06 08:29:56

This Zadie Smith essay sums up my gen X feelings of daring to hope that government could uplift rather than immiserate people https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jul/03/zadie-smith-on-hope-trepidation-and-rebirth-after-14-years-of-the-tories

2024-07-04 13:47:47

I voted, but the UK doesn't give you "I voted" stickers (apparently it was proposed in 2013 and only 1 person voted for it) so I made my own.
If you voted, post it too
https://petition.parliament.uk/archived/petitions/41319
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/728/530/293/848/227/original/98ccbf0889f0f420.png

2024-06-15 18:19:33

@npub139w…wrrr full 1984 Stewart Brand quotation below. It's always been complicated
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/622/014/957/494/653/original/b973b1bb352032a8.png

2024-06-05 12:36:54

If you're a UK person overseas, you still have time to get voting sorted: https://www.gov.uk/voting-when-abroad - if you have more than one possible residence to register where someone can proxy for you, try this to choose https://tacticalvote.co.uk/where-to-vote/

2024-06-05 11:17:18

https://shareopenly.org/ is a very neat idea by @npub1qh9…4re7

2024-06-02 15:29:12

How long before someone at Meta builds the Dot and Bubble user experience for Instagram?

2024-05-26 18:37:05

“That’s why it’s so seductive, because it can speak to us, and express itself very eloquently. But it’s a gigantic vampire—it sucks up all of human creativity, throws it into its network, and then spits it out again. There’s no one home there. It doesn’t feel like anything to be an LLM.” https://nautil.us/what-counts-as-consciousness-579734/

2024-05-23 12:18:26

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@npub19lt…qfjk we have a site to tell you where the transmitter with the strongest signal is https://www.bbc.co.uk/reception/check-for-transmitter-faults/

2024-05-18 20:52:46

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@npub1lrv…tth9 the question is how we provide them with a place to gossip about their stories that can be influenced usefully by non-journalists too

2024-05-10 23:25:35

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@npub1vu7…nmuv night sight on phone, long exposure on a big camera. It's a lot fainter with naked eye if there's any street or house lighting

2024-05-07 12:14:11

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@npub1hyk…3p33 my classic discussion of this, first on medium, then wired, is now on my own site as the others keep putting paywalls in the way: https://www.kevinmarks.com/unreadable-web

2024-05-07 08:29:49

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@npub1k08…6xvn are you using SVG?

2024-05-03 08:26:33

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@npub198t…hasj if you want really lightweight dropdown menus, try https://projects.verou.me/awesomplete/

2024-04-26 19:54:52

https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/the-millennial-captcha

2024-04-13 17:24:22

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@npub1r9j…4h54 Getty has over 3 million photos in the public domain taken by people. https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/photos/free-use

2024-04-07 15:30:49

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@npub1yyx…qa5g to be fair, your law holds - "No!" is the correct response to that headline

2024-04-02 18:53:18

Before we had NTP, there were the BBC pips
Seriously...: Do We Still Need the Pips?
Episode webpage: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0hmjcdr
Media file: http://open.live.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/6/redir/version/2.0/mediaset/audio-nondrm-download/proto/http/vpid/p0hmj8zx.mp3

2024-03-22 21:10:38

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@npub1psd…9sr7 surely what they really want is a lava tube train.
Subsurface makes so much more sense on the moon

2024-03-22 12:48:10

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@npub1yyx…qa5g I hadn't seen this, but why didn't they use part of the actually blue part of the flag? Under the main red cross for example

2024-03-12 23:17:04

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@npub1grx…uxfe the UK ones have totally got this

2024-03-10 21:11:49

“Indeed in October, while talking about the massive job losses expected as a result of AI, Altman said “I’m not afraid of that, at all. In fact, I think that’s good.” On November 18, the day after he was briefly fired from his CEO role, his perspective on getting laid off shifted.“I’m hurt and angry, and I think this sucks,” he said.” https://www.fastcompany.com/91040797/what-the-digital-streaming-revolution-of-the-2000s-can-teach-us-about-the-ai-revolution-today-according-to-a-former-musician
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/112/073/448/214/219/653/original/38ef97952919a305.png

2024-03-07 10:32:43

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@npub16u7…uend have you tried 3rd party keyboards for this? I find MSFT's SwiftKey useful

2024-02-28 14:26:16

We need to end the pretence that burning wood is doing anything useful for the climate emergency. Change the law. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-68381160

2024-02-27 12:01:50

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@npub1728…q433 @npub1typ…c8hh It almost makes sense in Dubai as for most of the year it is too hot to walk outside, while still being ridiculously over the top.

2024-02-22 23:31:48

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@npub1h8s…cvp3 did this one land upside down too?

2024-02-16 20:21:02

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@npub198t…hasj do you have Malka Older's Mimicking of Known Successes?

2024-02-15 13:31:24

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@npub1typ…c8hh have you heard the original Wish You Were Here with the violin solo by Grapelli? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bm4sDyCW0k8

2024-02-13 09:14:15

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@npub198t…hasj did you just adapt DMCA takedown trolling for the fediverse?

2024-02-10 14:07:13

“Steve Jobs said, “What’s the Super Bowl?” [Antosz] said, “Well, it’s a huge football game that attracts one of the largest audiences of the year.” And [Jobs] said, “I’ve never seen a Super Bowl. I don’t think I know anybody who’s seen a Super Bowl.”” https://archive.is/20240209172522/https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/09/arts/television/super-bowl-apple-1984-ad.html

2024-02-07 22:06:53

In which our heroine, Molly White, @npub1xkg…gph9 explains in excruciating detail how Chris Dixon has Read, Write, Pwned himself https://www.citationneeded.news/review-read-write-own-by-chris-dixon/

2024-01-31 16:19:32

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@npub1typ…c8hh @npub14uk…2erc isn't that the Google Cardboard version? ViewMaster even made one https://www.theverge.com/2015/10/9/9480941/mattel-view-master-vr-headset-hands-on

2024-01-29 23:20:38

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@npub1lrv…tth9 the disruption happening is cargo ebikes, which are affordable and can replace most car journeys.

2024-01-28 09:20:30

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@npub1zyl…t54n sounds like a cargo ebike to me

2024-01-27 16:51:31

“If governments are willing to spend billions incentivizing rooftop solar, they can simply spend billions installing rooftop solar – no Slow AI required” — @npub1hyk…3p33
https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/27/here-comes-the-sun-king/#sign-here

2024-01-22 12:54:20

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@npub1typ…c8hh http://stuartcheshire.org/rants/InfoHighway.html

2024-01-20 13:36:11

A bloke in the pub is telling his mate how amazing ChatGPT is, and he used it to write a legal disclaimer and I am trying hard not to say anything.

2024-01-20 01:29:40

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@npub1utv…87lr are you getting one though? I miss keeping up on your splurges on Rocket

2024-01-18 00:43:04

Knowledge Navigator, but at the end the battery runs out on his Apple Vision Pro and he's back in his unlit basement.

2024-01-12 08:26:56

So Facebook thinks votes for women are controversial. Is this Thiel's influence?
https://boardgamewire.com/index.php/2024/01/11/facebook-bans-ads-for-award-winning-votes-for-women-board-game-claims-sensitive-social-issue/ https://www.huffpost.com/entry/peter-thiel-women-democracy_n_5747079be4b03ede4413f6f5

2024-01-07 11:58:39

One of the best discussions of LLM's I have read https://buttondown.email/ninelives/archive/language-is-a-poor-heuristic-for-intelligence/

2024-01-06 17:09:25

James is excited about the future of the web https://jamesg.blog/2024/01/06/the-web-is-yours/ #indieweb

2023-12-29 10:38:45

“The broader trends amongst students, teachers, and even policy makers, is that every group is willingly adopting a tool that supplants the broad scope of human learning and ability with a narrow tool that generates a pastiche of whatever was posted online.”
https://medium.com/bits-and-behavior/more-than-calculators-why-large-language-models-threaten-public-education-480dd5300939

2023-12-26 23:46:24

Well this is a mess. I'm glad I haven't used my main email address for any apple related stuff, but I'm sure I have silently lost messages from people because I don't use messages on Mac at all
https://maya.land/monologues/2023/12/26/laptop-of-the-magi-apple-antitrust.html

2023-12-25 15:20:17

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@npub1grx…uxfe @npub1xzm…eykm there's a choice in the filter ui
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/111/641/730/319/387/557/original/ab8a9b244ee16661.png

2023-12-22 08:26:10

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20231214-nine-breakthroughs-for-climate-and-nature-in-2023-you-may-have-missed

2023-12-21 18:19:35

This is a good point - I had COVID-19 for the second time, testing positive on Sunday 10th December and negative on Saturday 16th December. I spent the week in bed, reading Persuasion and half-watching anodyne TV. https://mastodon.social/@augieray/111619581517706894

2023-12-13 18:47:50

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@npub1w7a…tpn3 given that I have seen 20 copies of this post already I think his federation protocol is delegated manual-until-it-hurts

2023-12-12 15:12:48

“it was Facebook traffic that warped most digital media executives into futile aspirations of moguldom, and it’s the fast-receding tide of Google search traffic that has turned those same characters into frantic, mewling content goblins, desperately trying to force-feed AI-generated affiliate garbage into a robot that hates them.” https://www.theverge.com/c/features/23993135/twitter-breaking-news-history

2023-12-12 00:36:37

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@npub1u27…3qfq the photo is posted at https://events.indieweb.org/2023/12/meta-s-data-dialogue-on-threads-interoperating-in-the-fediverse-d8d2bQYjBP0L

2023-11-28 22:31:20

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@npub1s97…lg0g I'm with you on peat bogs, but a lot of grouse moors could support trees if fenced, and a Dinorwig or two could work on the rockier parts of the Yorkshire Moors.

2023-11-24 01:37:38

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@npub1utv…87lr Dorothy is a serious singing commitment, well done

2023-11-24 01:34:15

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@npub1utv…87lr my sons did it as community theatre (one as Oz, one as the tin man)

2023-11-23 13:03:43

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@npub1s97…lg0g building them on the grouse moors and not burning those any more seems like a win. There's a grouse moor for sale in Great Ayton at the moment that could be reforested

2023-11-18 17:52:25

Altman said, "Four times now in the history of OpenAI—the most recent time was just in the last couple of weeks—I’ve gotten to be in the room when we push the veil of ignorance back and the frontier of discovery forward."
When someone tells you they are fighting Rawls Theory Of Justice, believe them
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/11/report-sutskever-led-board-coup-at-openai-that-ousted-altman-over-ai-safety-concerns/

2023-11-16 11:29:49

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@npub1a4c…t2kf @npub17qe…v7la You know how lucrative car dealerships are though…

2023-11-10 19:05:55

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@npub1gxl…h23x @npub1psd…9sr7 @npub1dfn…52v4 young Heinlein did understand money (you can see it explained well in For Us The Living and even Beyond This Horizon) but he lost it later on. The post stroke novels remind me of talking with post stroke or Altzheimer relatives where occasionally they come up with amazingly lucid personal narratives, but they can't maintain coherence for very long.

2023-10-26 01:40:05

I found it - Tailwind's final form https://github.com/marmelab/universal.css

2023-10-19 18:39:00

Not a great sign at King's Cross "passengers on platform 0, kindly refrain from boarding the service as we're not sure which one it is yet"

2023-10-17 07:34:35

Don't read Andreessen's spurious nonsense, read Deb's brilliant book about Infrastructure instead. You'll learn something important from it https://mastodon.social/@debcha/110499188257156021

2023-10-17 05:49:22

I have given a pretty faithful version of progress, law, morality, only to conclude that after all everyone dances to his own personal boomboom, & that the writer is entitled to his boomboom: the satisfaction of pathological curiosity a private bell for inexplicable needs; a bath; pecuniary difficulties; a stomach with repercussions in tile; the authority of the mystic wand formulated as the bouquet of a phantom orchestra made up of silent fiddle bows greased with filters made of chicken manure.

2023-10-17 05:09:30

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@npub1typ…c8hh @npub15du…7pww @npub1xv6…dj4s he quotes it too, except he substitutes 'technology' for 'poetry'

2023-10-14 16:15:51

Couldn't find the colander, using the cocktail sieve for the eclipse. #eclipse 🌙
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/111/234/262/464/137/343/original/42f876644e8193fb.jpg

2023-10-05 15:42:41

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@npub1hyk…3p33 they've already tried pivot to video a couple of times - hence the Tucker Carlson show there. Blocking links to other sites, as well as slowing them is already part of the playbook.

2023-09-26 19:48:16

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@npub1utv…87lr OK, you can be my canary this time. I am updating my EC2 images to Rocky 8 from Centos 7 soon, and was hoping not to change too many other variables

2023-09-26 19:43:14

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@npub1utv…87lr all of them? I'm wondering what I should make the final MacOS version on my 2020 Intel iMac as I doubt that they have been really focused on that generation since they went all Apple Silicon.
It's main role is as a dev machine, so emulation of Linux servers helps.

2023-09-01 21:04:32

Radiolab just reposted the Diana Deutsch episode, which is one of the best bits of radio ever - how sound clips sometimes behave so strangely
Radiolab: Touch at a Distance
Episode webpage: http://www.wnycstudios.org/story/touch-distance-2309/
Media file: https://chrt.fm/track/53A61E/pdst.fm/e/dts.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/waaa.wnyc.org/radiolab_podcast/radiolab_podcast090123_touchdistance.mp3?awCollectionId=15957&awEpisodeId=1357784

2023-08-15 23:44:47

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@npub1hvz…mle9 any relation to the theatrical use of "house" meaning audience? As in "counting the house" or "full house tonight"

2023-07-29 00:07:08

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@npub1qmc…v6gx thank you again for your humane and human approach to qualitative research, and your lucidity. The fediverse needs this, though I'm not sure it has earned it.

2023-07-28 17:08:43

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@npub1typ…c8hh thanks for the useful link - medium is getting increasingly annoying about sending me useless ones

2023-07-28 15:05:48

well done @npub1utv…87lr https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/jul/28/taylor-swift-fans-earthquake-seattle

2023-07-19 07:09:58

@npub1p5q…w2sf draw for me Mao's little red book covered in Elmo's long red fur photorealistic

2023-07-19 07:00:10

@stablehorde_generator draw for me Mao's little red book covered in Elmo's long red fur style:realistic

2023-07-11 21:21:28

This is good news and the image preview is really special https://snarfed.org/2023-07-11_bridgy-fed-status-update-2

2023-07-10 23:19:27

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@npub1pfe…e2dm are you trying to preserve the structures and values that your model doesn't understand or reject them? (or silently ignore them)
This feels like one of those JSON vs C struct boundaries

2023-07-10 23:11:51

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@npub1pfe…e2dm is this like a ORM migration, or like Go interfaces where if you add the right methods you can use it ? What kind of changes are you planning for?

2023-07-05 13:11:06

Mark Zuckerberg is competing directly with Twitter's main use case by launching a new app called Threats.

2023-07-05 01:59:44

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@npub1lrv…tth9 do we know if they still have firehose access? If they're crawling twitter urls they'll be blocked too.

2023-07-01 18:52:10

Ironically, embedding Musk's rate-limiting tweet on my website still works, even though viewing it on twitter doesn't for most people https://www.kevinmarks.com/muskfootgun.html

2023-06-28 07:11:13

@npub1jtm…rxtn I get a warning saying its for an older version of android. I think that will mean it doesn't show up in searches too. (I'm on Android 13)
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/110/620/591/423/944/698/original/ea1b7ce032d0a436.png

2023-06-18 22:50:13

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@npub1ykg…g4jv I have in the past looked at an NDA from a bigco and edited each clause to be mutually binding, signed it and handed it back.
When they say "I can't sign this, I don't have the authority" we can maybe have a useful conversation.

2023-06-12 09:07:40

I suspect @cstross said a bit more than this to the NYT, but I'm also enjoying the idea of Accelerando as a serious futurist book. Do we need a “I was promised spacefaring virtual lobsters, but all I got was this lame chatbot” t-shirt?
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/110/530/452/325/317/410/original/63f026236d2de4d7.png

2023-05-30 16:16:50

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@npub1qrt…acaq https://twitter.com/DerBren/status/1663500637739384832?s=20

2023-05-06 13:52:28

In the coronation, Penny Mordaunt played the role of strange lady distributing swords
https://xoxo-media.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/110/322/066/632/376/716/original/50db690cf8dcfb25.jpeg

2023-05-04 22:08:07

“The point of the Midas parable is that greed will destroy you, and that the pursuit of wealth will cost you everything that is truly important. If your reading of the parable is that, when you are granted a wish by the gods, you should phrase your wish very, very carefully, then you have missed the point.”
https://www.newyorker.com/science/annals-of-artificial-intelligence/will-ai-become-the-new-mckinsey

2023-04-24 10:04:37

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#[0] Persistence, taste and luck. Eugen built a solid fediverse client and server based on the OStatus stack, then listened to the users about features, and worked with the standards folks to adopt ActivityPub.
The client API is well put together, and reminds me of twitter pre 2010.
The tech stack used for hosting is tractable for sysadmins, it's not too weird.
The luck part is having 5 years of this iteration in place before Twitter got ruined by a buffoon.

2023-04-22 15:43:44

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#[0] https://scottishscientist.wordpress.com/2015/04/15/worlds-biggest-ever-pumped-storage-hydro-scheme-for-scotland/

2023-04-12 01:14:26

Why did Substack name them "Notes" and not "Subtexts"?

2023-04-06 15:17:01

I was warning about machine learning generating bland cliché by default, but it looks like we've been doing that collectively for a while now https://www.alexmurrell.co.uk/articles/the-age-of-average

2023-04-01 00:22:15

Elon tomorrow: I'm pleased to announce that we finally managed to get the clown car out of the gold mine.