Tootfinder

wiki_talk: Wikipedia talk networks
Interactions among users of 10 language-specific Wikipedias: Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. Nodes are registered wiki editors, and an edge represents a user i having written a message on user j's talk page. Edges are timestamped. The precise dates of the snapshots are uncertain.
This network has 397635 nodes and 1031378 edges.
Tags: Social, Communication, Unweighted, Multigra…

Language conversations have become highly performative,
with a fixation on the words people are using,
not why they’re using them
or what they’re reaching for when they deploy language
like “crazy,” “lame,” or the r-word
(currently experiencing a resurgence in popularitythanks to Elon Musk).
The language is a metaphor:
We call something “insane” because that word carries a specific baggage and burden.
But the fact that mental illness is stil…

Language Wars
Conversations about language were supposed to be a starting point rather than an ending one.

"What color is your function?" is a wonderful title. It's so good, the title alone could win the Sundance Festival.
But that post is about a JavaScript-specific limitation (not applicable to other languages), and some wishful bikeshedding about syntax (which turns out to be a leaky abstraction that makes locking ambiguous, very problematic in low-level languages).
But *color* is so catchy. It's not well defined that post, but you can't have "color"…

Swift: the language with a `sending` keyword that's specifically designed for non-`Sendable` values.

A look at various quirks in AI-generated prose, mainly influenced by "overfitting" in AI models, as humans increasingly mimic AI language in writing and speech (Sam Kriss/New York Times)
https://www.ny…

Why Does A.I. Write Like … That?
If only they were robotic! Instead, chatbots have developed a distinctive — and grating — voice.

A feature which I'm really looking forward to is brewing in #Python packaging: Specifying default extras.
The aiocoap library I maintain can (and is tested to) work with no other dependencies than Python, but most users will like the additional features such as pretty-printing support, or more security options than just TLS. So far, they have to `pip run --spec "aiocoap[all]" aio…

PEP 771 – Default Extras for Python Software Packages | peps.python.org
PEP 508 specifies a mini-language for declaring package dependencies. One feature of this language is the ability to specify extras, which are optional components of a distribution that, when used, install additional dependencies. This PEP proposes a me...

Lineages of carnivorous mammals that established on new continents diversified faster— even before they moved into new territory. That suggests those lineages have diversified specifically because they're better competitors https://doi.org/10.1086/738413

Disable JavaScript — How to disable JavaScript in your browser
Nowadays almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs arbitrary code, through the web browser, on the visitor's computer. It is supposed to make web pages functional for specific purposes but it has proven its potential to cause significant harm to users time and time again. […]
✋ …

Disable JavaScript
Instructions on how to disable (deactivate) JavaScript in web browser and why.

A small #SpaceTelescope and two really small ones should launch 10 hours from now from Vandenberg, including the #exoplanet observer #Pandora: see https://skyweek.wordpress.com/2026/01/05/allgemeines-live-blog-ab-dem-5-januar-2026/#Jan09 for many links including papers describing the three satellites and https://spaceflightnow.com/2026/01/10/live-coverage-spacex-to-launch-1st-twilight-rideshare-mission/ and https://www.space.com/space-exploration/launches-spacecraft/watch-spacex-launch-nasas-pandora-exoplanet-studying-satellite-on-jan-11 for more and some of the three dozen other payloads, too.

wiki_talk: Wikipedia talk networks
Interactions among users of 10 language-specific Wikipedias: Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. Nodes are registered wiki editors, and an edge represents a user i having written a message on user j's talk page. Edges are timestamped. The precise dates of the snapshots are uncertain.
This network has 541355 nodes and 2424962 edges.
Tags: Social, Communication, Unweighted, Multigra…