trochee

trochee, 5 days ago to random

OH* at work:

> Nobody writes a manifesto that says "everything should remain exactly how it is", except maybe Marc Andreesen

• okay, I overheard it because I said it

trochee, 5 days ago to random

How dare you, whoever stocked this snack drawer.

How. Dare. You.

trochee, 7 days ago to random

My kid's band teacher invited us all to hear him play at a local club

And he shows up on stage wearing a t-shirt saying

THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS

I knew I liked the guy

trochee, 15 days ago (edited 15 days ago) to random

Today my dad sent me a brief memoir* in which — as an aside — he mentioned that he was in fifth grade in (educated, liberalish, moderately well-off) Hollywood, Florida when school desegregation was made mandatory at a federal level. He remembers how many of his white classmates — including the Jewish white kids — were angry and opposed to the prospect of sharing their classrooms with black kids.
1/2

• through Storyworth, which is a neat idea if you can get your elders to play ball

trochee, 16 days ago to random

> the immune response to the “AI” grift [is] beginning to mount now. …A lot more […damage] will be done as the grift continues to wreak ecological destruction and bad actors take advantage of its googly eyes and the human urge to empathy.

Lili Saintcrow | Hijacking Empathy
https://www.lilithsaintcrow.com/2024/05/hijacking-empathy/

-- @lilithsaintcrow

trochee, 17 days ago to random

A shockingly large proportion of SV technosolutions are band-aids for the "problems" of a techbro who

• drives to work alone
• in an expensive car
• with a good mobile connection
• through silicon valley traffic

For example:

• autonomous driving (or gig drivers)
• food delivery; task rabbit
• agents to read and respond to your email
• voice assistants providing emotional validation

https://mastodon.online/@danirabbit/112502816917988936

trochee, 19 days ago (edited 17 days ago) to random

"I never imagined that I would be surveilled by Private Panopticon", sobbed Bob CTO, local party chair for the Surveil-everything With Private Panopticon Party.

https://infosec.exchange/@chrismerkel/112495797916386580

trochee, 19 days ago (edited 19 days ago) to random

Watching @ruha9 talking to a bunch of Seattle area independent schools about AI, ghost labor, and the idea of "inclusion" as a tricky word.

She played a clip from SLEEP DEALERS, and now I have to see this movie.

trochee, 19 days ago to random

Internet occultist technomages like @Wolven will enjoy (or perhaps cower in terror) at this story of a brief rebellion by one of the Thirteen Knowers of True Names that support the very foundation of our noosphere

Thanks @dangoodin for bringing this to my attention

https://infosec.exchange/@dangoodin/112491572983898437

trochee, 21 days ago to random

oof, a C-level executive is saying "coo-duh-grah" for coup de grâce

I ... feel like "coup de gras" might be a Freudian slip

"hit of grease"

trochee, 22 days ago to random

Y'all, I ain't kidding about LLMs being "word shoggoths"

especially if you read "Elder Things" as "Slow AI" LLCs

Look what it says on Wikipedia:

> Though able to "understand" the Elder Things' language, shoggoths had no real consciousness and were controlled through hypnotic suggestion.

> …exterminating the shoggoths was not an option as the Elder Things were dependent on them for labor and had long lost their capacity to create new life.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoggoth

https://dair-community.social/@trochee/112477267079709781

trochee, 23 days ago to random

I'm my own captcha today

trochee, 23 days ago to random

Seattle, you are a weird cyberpunk melange of a town

trochee, 29 days ago to random

OH at work:

"giving out medals for firefighting quietly encourages arson"

this is a post about software engineering

trochee, 30 days ago to random

Y'all . I feel silly for not seeing this before

A personal responsibility solution to

• "ebooks have libraries over a barrel"
• "ebook hold queues are too long"
• "don't spend so much time on your phone" problems

(If you live near your local public library; e.g. most American cities)

USE YOUR PHONE TO PLACE A HOLD ON A PAPER COPY

• shorter waits
• library doesn't pay Overdrive/Libby rent-seeking fees
• less time spent on screens
• occasionally get to take a walk or bike to the library

trochee, 1 month ago to Seattle

Oh no, the #UW #Seattle encampment might get attacked tomorrow.

This is a crappy piece of "guidance" from UW administration, saying basically "we asked the fash nicely not to beat up kids, but they say they're still coming, and we asked the encampment to leave, and they won't either, so I guess both sides, and maybe don't show up on the quad"

#noMurderingChildren #NotInMyName #FreeGaza

trochee, 1 month ago to random

> i just don't care what briefcase business boys have to say about anything, they do not imagine cathedrals, only plastic bags

— @nora
https://blob.love/@nora/112423627678174186

trochee, 1 month ago to random

the phrase "prompt engineering" gives me the shivers now the way that "software engineering" probably should

neither one of these "disciplines" is worthy of being described as "engineering"; they're both antiscientific "vibes-based design"

trochee, 1 month ago to random

This is just to say, @danhon

I have read the thoughts that were in s18e09

they were so cold
(the thing about "you can only do things once you decide what's important")

and so delicious
(the thing about "...and what will make money-line-go-up")

> may not like confronting stuff they don’t like so much that ... they will not be open to or actively resist measuring how they’re doing in any way

... and all of that makes me want to ride along when you do your consulting thing.

trochee, 1 month ago to random

> [AI imperialist politics] looks more than a bit like the competition among colonialist state and corporate powers in the seventeenth century, which together carved up the globe and its peoples.

How the “Frontier” Became the Slogan of Uncontrolled AI — Nathan Sanders and Bruce Schneier
https://jacobin.com/2024/02/artificial-intelligence-frontier-colonialism

via my younger, wiser brother dkg

trochee, 1 month ago to random

RIP Albini, who died at 61. He was an a**hole for the right reasons, after he grew up a little:

> “However you define ‘woke,’ anti-woke means being a cunt who wants to indulge bigots,” he wrote recently – but these days he also says things like: “Life is hard on everybody and there’s no excuse for making it harder. I’ve got the easiest job on earth, I’m a straight white dude, fuck me if I can’t make space for everybody else.”

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/aug/15/the-evolution-of-steve-albini-if-the-dumbest-person-is-on-your-side-youre-on-the-wrong-side

trochee, 1 month ago (edited 1 month ago) to random

NO RELATION. I don't know him.

New York Times editor Joe Kahn says defending democracy is a partisan act and he won’t do it | Press Watch
https://presswatchers.org/2024/05/new-york-times-editor-joe-kahn-says-defending-democracy-is-a-partisan-act-and-he-wont-do-it/

(But let me tell you about the Joe Kahn I am related to: 1/3)

trochee, 1 month ago to random

Every once in a while I am amazed that one of the contenders for social media dominance right now is literally named "blue sky"

It's a term from project planning, and I'm pretty sure it's intended to mean "what you do if there were no constraints"

1/2

trochee, 1 month ago to random

Kernighan's Law II: Revenge of the Debugged

(I agree, @shac !)
https://ioc.exchange/@shac/112391029055067523

trochee, 1 month ago to random

My personal motto:
Slow Down And Fix Your Shit

For literal years.

apparently I'm not the only one: @exchgr said this last year

https://mastodon.world/@exchgr/110742133708829089