@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

samueljohnson

@samueljohnson@mstdn.social

Scientist, MBA, ex IT professional, Irish & European
Lived 30+ years on 4 continents, now back in Ireland.

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

jon, to random
@jon@gruene.social avatar

Stunning trip. And Mostar has a brutalist station. Needs a bit of upkeep, but quite a building!

River in the valley
Running beside the river
Mostar station

samueljohnson, (edited )
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@jon In India "preponing" flights was a thing, as I discovered to my cost (despite arriving in plenty of time, ie a couple of hours). Maybe it's better now.

The nonchalance with which this was communicated, as if it was routine enough that one should have anticipated it, was quite Alice in Wonderland.

brianklaas, to random
@brianklaas@journa.host avatar

One of the great things about independent bookshops is that when you give a talk at them they might put out a special sign where someone perfectly draws the cover of your book in chalk, like this:

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@brianklaas Nice but pity they couldn't get your name right. Your podcast would have reached more people. I still miss it, and George's great production (esp the music, which was terrific).

fatsam, to random
@fatsam@mstdn.social avatar

After 2000, lots of people sneered that the Y2K bug had been a big nothing, massively overhyped.

They were idiots. If the vast amount of Y2K remediation that took place hadn't, planes might well have fallen from the sky, nuclear power plants might well have melted down. I worked on two projects myself to fix bad 2 digit dates.

We get to the other side of the current Nazi infestation, the same idiots are going to say, "See, you were just hysterical."

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@fatsam If you need detailed evidence that the Y2K bug was real and had real consequences. 👇

Most potentially adverse consequences were averted by the expenditure of trillions of $ over many years in advance of the year 2000, and in some cases in the nick of time.

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/what-really-happened-in-y2k

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

Michael Lewis @mwl is only $633 short of his next reward level ($50,000) on his Kickstarter funded project offering a book (or for $15 an e-book) on how to run your own mail server, that is, to take back control of your data, now likely being used for training AI.

It's not for everyone, of course. There are some non oligopoly options (I use Fastmail, an ethical employee-owned business, and have done since early 2001) that are preferable to risks of DIY failures. 1/2

https://io.mwl.io/@mwl/112563980034953743

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

But, if you have even a modest technical aptitude and willingness to swim against the tide (preferring the Fediverse to Twitter eg) this could be a good investment.

I'll do it with one of my low-volume secondary email addresses. There are pitfalls but this book is intended to make them avoidable.

If not for you: it could make a good gift for someone you know.

(It's now $15 for 5 books)

Now $583 to go, and 4 days left.

2/2

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

Upton Sinclair got it long ago:

When man's income* depends on his not understanding something you can count on his not understanding it.

*ego for some is a form of income

https://mastodon.social/@AnnemarieBridy/112561341119811638

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

Shifting baseline syndrome: unexpected catastrophic change that sneaks up on us slowly.

Coined by a former colleague with respect to fish stocks and relevant to so much else. Here, to privacy.

https://burn.capital/

Some want to break the only organisation capable of taking back control. 🇪🇺

They'll get no vote from me today.

sjvn, to random
@sjvn@mastodon.social avatar

In my early computing days, when computers were big and programs were small, I used the TI Silent 700 Terminal, which used thermal paper instead of a CRT for its display. Yes, it was a pain.

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@sjvn But it purred beautifully. We had one in a house I shared w two CS undergrads in 1978 who had "borrowed" it to WFH. Found a printed chat in the kitchen one morning with someone using a terminal on campus, including the lines

YOU'RE AT HOME?!
I'M IN BED.

Had to use punch cards years later in grad school the US.

As William Gibson might have said, Dennis Jennings was already there, just not evenly distributed.

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

Have now seen several more ads from Hermann Kelly, one of Ireland's foremost nativist bigots.

"Ireland is full" he claims.

Fact: our population, uniquely in Europe, is lower than it was in the 1840s.

"A million non-native born" he bleats.

Fact:

Most Irish people favour reunification and peaceful assimilation of c. 1m non-Irish (British). Many, possibly most, EU migrants in NI support reunification.

ALL are welcome in our diaspora-friendly society.

HK can FRO

https://mstdn.social/@samueljohnson/112543472693569055

jon, to random
@jon@gruene.social avatar

Welcome to today's thread - South East Europe Day 02 31 May 2024 - Tallinn - Lelle - Pärnu - Häädemeeste

Crossing these borders:
None – only crossing Estonia, getting close to Latvia

These borders on the borders map:
https://umap.openstreetmap.fr/en/map/crossborderrail-all-the-borders_935041#8/58.744/24.192

Today's routes on the routes map:
https://umap.openstreetmap.fr/en/map/crossborderrail-all-the-borders_935041#8/58.744/24.192

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@jon Estonians are impressively smart. In case you haven't seen this: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/12/18/estonia-the-digital-republic

(train reading material 😉)

jon, to random
@jon@gruene.social avatar

They have a handy map of where I’m going tomorrow 🙂

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@jon Have someone else send a transcript / video.

andymckay, to random
@andymckay@mastodon.social avatar

I gave Jira AI a try. So I typed this into AI to see what would happen. Was not disappointed. Well alright I was. Haven't found it give a useful or correct answer yet.

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@andymckay Why did nobody think of this before?! It's fantastic.

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

Donald Trump verdict: guilty on all 34 counts. 👌👏

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@sellathechemist No appeals. Sentencing next on 11 July.

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@sellathechemist @Teri_Kanefield is a non-partisan expert worth a follow for US legal analysis.

stevelord, to random
@stevelord@bladerunner.social avatar

New blog post from me about making active decisions about what's important to me around the software I use: What I Want From Technology

https://thedorkweb.bearblog.dev/what-i-want-from-technology/

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@stevelord Much to agree with. I use Tiddlywiki among other things (Obsidian, Joplin and several others) which may be worth a look.

Privacymatters, to random
@Privacymatters@mastodon.social avatar

The first social media babies are adults now. Some are pushing for laws to protect kids from their parents’ oversharing

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/05/29/us/social-media-children-influencers-cec/index.html?

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@Privacymatters The US's absolutist position on free speech is going to make progress on this difficult. Families of victims of serial killers who tried to prevent killers profiting from book and film deals under "Son of Sam" laws in NY and CA had Supreme Court overrule those laws. It's going to take a privacy amendment or something similar but as long as govt likes buying the data that isn't looking on the cards. 🤷‍♂️

dajb, to random
@dajb@social.coop avatar

Well, after having leased an Polestar 2 for eight months, this will be the first night I get to charge it at 7.5p/kWh

This car has cost me a fortune so far. Hopefully, I'll manage to recoup some of that, and the £1k EV charger installation cost over the remaining 16 months of the lease.

(It's super fun to drive though, so that makes up for some of it)

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@dajb Surely you'll use the charger on your next EV?

FWIW my favourite EV source of information is Mr EV's YouTube channel. @tillathenun. Mrs EV is a delight. Better than Top Gear.

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

A case of the mail being in the Czech

https://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2024/may/29/royal-mail-takeover-daniel-kretinsky-ofwat-fines-water-companies-business-live

dajb, to random
@dajb@social.coop avatar

I think everyone can relate to this systems archetype!
https://dougbelshaw.com/blog/2024/05/29/tb871-archetype-1-fixes-that-fail/

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@dajb Ofc, not all unintended consequences are negative. Viagra (sildenafil)'s effect was discovered as side effect of a treatment for heart problems. I'm assuming it causes more benign results than negative!

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

https://mastodon.green/@davidallengreen/112523959168869114

Droll story about a desire to finish toast* in this characteristic piece from DAG.

*reminds me somehow of the sad tale of one of Sultan Mehmed's brothers who asked to be allowed to finish his chestnuts before being strangled with a bowstring (recounted in Constantinople - City of the World's Desire by Philip Mansel), even if revolution isn't necessarily a death sentence.

logickinlambda, to random
@logickinlambda@mastodon.social avatar

I will pin this post at the top because I know this is a concerning topic which not many seem to aware.

This will also be an alert to my reasoning.

https://joanwestenberg.medium.com/the-death-of-critical-thinking-will-kill-us-long-before-ai-781fdd23cc7c

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@logickinlambda

> a multi-generational decline in reading comprehension

Zero evidence is adduced to support the proposition. I read reports in the 1970s that the average age at which people read Lord of the Rings eg (today Harry Potter?) has declined steadily. At the time it was being read by older teenagers.

What has changed is social media allowing morons to form groups, chose their own facts and shout down experts, not reading ability or comprehension.

Post propter ergo hoc failure.

mwl, to random
@mwl@io.mwl.io avatar

Kickstarter Update

https://mwl.io/archives/23601

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@mwl Never did hear back from Kickstarter but managed to back today using different browser (Firefox instead of Brave; same plugins, so 🤷‍♂️).

samueljohnson, to random
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

The take over of the Internet by billionaires just might have passed its peak w the acquisition of Twitter and the growth since of federated instead of centralised, algorithm-driven social media.

Too many still use billionaire-controlled email when Internet mail uses open standards. If you care to take back control you may like to consider

  1. https://Fastmail.com

Employee-owned business. Ethical. Better than Gmail.

  1. Self-hosting

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mwlucas/run-your-own-mail-server/

$15 "How-to" e-book.

sjvn, to random
@sjvn@mastodon.social avatar

C. Gordon Bell, Father of the PDP-8 and VAX, Has Died.: https://thenewstack.io/c-gordon-bell-father-of-the-pdp-8-and-vax-has-died/ by @sjvn

Bell transformed the technology world from his start at DEC in the 1960s until his work at Microsoft Research in the 2020s.

samueljohnson,
@samueljohnson@mstdn.social avatar

@sjvn Making me feel old 😬. I was one of the first 3 VMS programmers on the first VAX sold in Ireland (and RSX on PDP 11 earlier. Followed shortly after by all the things in yr bio footnote, in the US). I can remember the promo video extolling the unimaginable 4.3 gigabytes of VM. It was a blast.

The video was confidential at the time and was "borrowed" from a locked room in Galway in order to make the sale (an entrepreneur jumped out the window and took it to Dublin). 🤣

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