Tootfinder

Like all the rest of the nerds, I did a bit of tech support on family computers.
They're all popping up windows from scam virus scanners lying that subscriptions need to be renewed or machines are unprotected. People don't know how to remove these things. Luckily they also don't really know how to pay the subscription.
Their phones are updating on them. Changing where buttons used to be. Removing options. Forcing people to register to use they things they have been doing for years.
They don't know how to register.
Things pop up asking for passwords and they have no idea who is asking or which password to use.
I tell them that I don't really understand why they keep using Windows now it is so shitty and awful. They say they don't know how to use anything else. The fact they don't really know how to use windows either doesn't seem to register.
The tech corporations have given up completely on being user friendly. They are all deliberately user hostile and exploitative now.
Corporate tech is terrible. The industry is failing it's users, abusing them. People don't even know there is any other way. They are just giving up on achieving their tasks until someone can fix the pop-ups and subscription boxes and passwords and 2fa for them.
Tech sucks now. Sucks hard.
#tech #christmasTechSupport

Right, folks, so there is an account on mastodon.social (@8124@mastodon.social) that has been libelling me and others, defaming us as antisemites for the longest time.
They just sent the posts attached.
They have been reported to mastodon.social and I have raised my concerns with them and yet no action has been taken against that account even though the account has been suspended on at least three major Mastodon servers and limited on at least four others.
It is not limited…

The case for my 28g QRP dual-ported (9:1 and 49:1) unun cracked from tightening one of the terminal screws too tight, and from having printed the box with too few perimeters, so it wasn't really strong enough. I had designed it so that the coax was integrated into the case, so I had to cut the case apart to remove the still-functional electrical components for re-use.
At least this gave me a chance to confirm that I hadn't blown up the ferrite from overheating it!

60 years ago tonight, the merry pranksters' first informal acid test, held at ken babbs's place outside santa cruz, where the grateful dead did not play (& all purported flyers are almost certainly fake). below text from dennis mcnally's bio & i wrote about it for the 50th.

Lol - John Carpenter's 1988 They Live.
Starring famed 80s wrestler Roddy Piper - who coined "I'm here to kick ass and chew gum and Im all outa gum!" - who discovers a pair of special sunglasses that show the world as it really is: we are subliminally controlled by aliens using global warming to make Earth's atmosphere similar to their homeworld, depleting its resources
`DISRUPT! SHIFT PARADIGMS! MOVE FAST BREAK THINGS!`

Microsoft says it supports the OpenAI board moving to form a public benefit corporation and recapitalization, and now holds a ~$135B OpenAI Group PBC investment (Microsoft)
https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2025/10/28/the-next-chapter-of-the-m…

The next chapter of the Microsoft–OpenAI partnership - The Official Microsoft Blog
Since 2019, Microsoft and OpenAI have shared a vision to advance artificial intelligence responsibly and make its benefits broadly accessible. What began as an investment in a research organization has grown into one of the most successful partnerships in our industry. As we enter the next phase of this partnership, we’ve signed a new definitive...

S-cones (which respond to short wavelengths) are very few in the fovea center
so causing a so-called S-cone blind spot
(Williams et al., 1981)
but they peak in number on the foveal slope at about 12% of the population
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK11515/

S-Cone Pathways by Helga Kolb
There are differences in the genetic structure and locus of the S-cone visual pigment compared with the L- and M-cone pigments (Nathans et al., 1986), yet the S-cones are common to all vertebrate retinas and always form a consistent 8-10% of the cone photoreceptor population (Marc, 1982; Kolb and Lipetz, 1991).The S-cones are however, very few in the fovea center so causing a so-called S-cone blind spot (Williams et al., 1981) but they peak in number on the foveal slope at about 12% of the popu…

Just had a visit from Fellesforbundet at the workplace. To be honest, we get a lot of visits from Fellesforbundet since they are located in a building right across the street from my well-adapted industrial company.
Fellesforbundet is a reformist, bureaucratic union affiliated with the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions (LO). It is not syndicalist and operates with a hierarchical structure, including elected leadership and regional divisions.
The union primarily negotiates…

A couple of days of just layering varnish and painting which didn't change anything visibly enough to bother with photos. But today, the windowed doors are starting to be completed. Three of them up.
This is what really makes the difference and makes it suddenly reminiscent of the Tardis.
Hopefully it'll be finished next week, they say. But they have said that before. The windowed doors have to be finished, the detailing to make the doors look panelled, handles, holes for cables, there's a bit of coving I decided to add to help carry wires and lights across the gap above the desk. More painting. Mirrors to be glued to doors.
We shall see :fingers_crossed:

We had a surprise opportunity to go to the beach this weekend, near Southport NC. I have the weird preference to sling my hammock under the house, between the clotheslines, instead of sleeping indoors. Half camping? I use a big rubbermaid box as my "suitcase" and put my shoes on it overnight... It was cold at night, but an underquilt and reflecting bubble insulation in the hammock, with an inflatable mattress on top of my down sleeping bag, kept me cozy.
My wife and I went to …