@cdarwin@c.im2026-01-03 08:20:55
I think being an egocentric asshole as a service is finally falling flat
and people want to hear more about what real living is about.
https://hachyderm.io/@suzannealdrich/115830103893974091
@cdarwin@c.im2026-01-03 08:20:55
@ErikJonker@mastodon.social2026-01-03 15:37:56
Trump is clear about democracy in Venezuela, he doesn't want that... It's all about power, oil and control.
FOX & FRIENDS: What do you think is next for the Venezuelan people now that you have removed Maduro so he can face American justice?
TRUMP: Well, we're making that decision now. We can't take a chance on letting somebody else run it, just take over where he left off. So we're making that decision
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-03-03 22:35:10
Apparently “Minecraft Financial” is calling about a loan offer
I think I’m gonna pass
@tante@tldr.nettime.org2026-02-02 14:30:00
This year my plan is not just to write more but also to write a bit out of my usual wheelhouse. Do something that's not just sociotechnological critique.
Not sure how to get the ball rolling there but I really love what Mike Monteiro is doing with his Newsletter ( https://buttondown.com/monteiro ). Bu…
@shriramk@mastodon.social2026-03-02 23:09:46
In addition to the many things I didn't like about the Natural History Museum in London, one thing I especially disliked is a huge wall given to showing *constellations* (or, as I prefer to think of them, "old-school hallucinations"). Let's have some actual science, people.
@azonenberg@ioc.exchange2026-03-04 01:03:12
Found and fixed a few configs and learned more about systemd units than I wanted.
But now I have two virtual nodes in the CI SLURM cluster and can submit jobs to both of them, which spawn the corresponding VMs.
So I think the next step is probably going to be to figure out how to set up a "github app" so I can accept CI job requests from github to actually spawn the build jobs.
@tiotasram@kolektiva.social2026-03-02 17:12:33
Content warning: Uspol, Iran, necropolitics
Seeing Iran appoint new leaders and continue to fight is seeing the more literal kind of necropolitics in action, as a hierarchical system continues to function while replacing the expendable human parts that it lost. The system is of course changed and influenced (and ultimately was built) by humans, but it has become something undying, or at least almost as hard to kill as an idea, and it maintains a terrible inertia in it's destructive tendencies (e.g., "Morality Police" continue to patrol the streets).
Lest anyone think this somehow expresses approval of US actions, the same logic applies here too: what once had a (thin) verneer of democracy, a system which loudly proclaimed to be controlled by "the people" (but which never was nor was ever intended to be) has lost its paint job, exposing the inhuman machinations beneath. Trump is a symptom, not cause, of an institution built on blood and spoils, whose alignment with the Epstein class (and moreover, their institutions) is ever more apparent with each disregarded law and principle.
Stepping back for a moment, this systems/necropolitics perspective is just a perspective, with its own distortions and blind spots. To paraphrase LeGuin, any institution built by humans can also be changed or destroyed by them. But I think it's very useful to put on the systems goggles in this moment, especially when some are fond of preaching about the dangers of "overwhelmingly powerful systems unaccountable to humans which pursue destructive ends" without actually examining the plethora of existing systems that do just that.
P.S. yes, United Healthcare is another good example of this.
P.P.S. yes I bending the meaning of necropolitics here, but the two are related: these systems would not be so free to profit from human death and suffering if they were more vulnerable to the deaths of their constituent parts. Necropolitics of the standard variety is of course present as companies like Raytheon and Lockeed Martin profit from the carnage. The F-15 caught by friendly fire? Just as profitable for Beoing to replace as one downed by the enemy.
@LillyHerself@Mastodon.social2026-02-03 09:17:51
➡️ Isn't it about time people start paying a little more attention to George Monbiot?
He is on the side of 🌱 survival, and if we don't start paying attention to his analysis of our time now, future historians (if our civilisation survives at all) will wonder why he was not listened to more.
As voters, we must hurry and elect as many people as possible who think like Monbiot, or
👋🏼 goodbye democracy, goodbye environment.
@hex@kolektiva.social2026-02-28 10:20:01
As salty as I am about it, there's also another way to think about this. For anyone who still has connections to folks on the right (which is perhaps unlikely for anyone on this server, I digress), the cult that has consumed them thrives on isolation and grievance.
The words "you were right" have the potential to cut through the programming and open up an opportunity for reconnection. The modern conspiratorial cult of the Right has been built partially around people who were told they were wrong or were crazy. In the vast majority of cases, they were wrong and even when they were right they completely misunderstood why, but we'll skip that for now. Liberals making fun of them (even the times when they definitely earned it) has pushed them further and further into their ideological hole.
The thing about those words, "you were right," in this context is that the way they offer reconnection also requires them to take one little step of betraying their ideology to accept them. So they must choose between maintaining allegiance to a pedophile or finally getting to feel superior after years of living in an illusion of persecution.
Under the ideology of the Right, admitting one is wrong is a weakness. It is admitting defeat. They have to "own the libs" by saying things, things that they know aren't true, in order to feel dominant. But these things are often so absurd that they end up being made fun of, feeling even more weak and pathetic, reinforcing their fear and alienation.
Offering what they're looking for can offer a way out, but only if they're willing to start to recognize the thing they've supported for what it is.
And they were right about some things. They were right that Bill Gates was a terrible person. I've had plenty of liberals defend him based on his philanthropy washing, but he's awful and always has been. The Epstein links make that blatant. They intuitively recognized him and didn't trust him, even if they were wildly off base about *how and why* he shouldn't be trusted... Even if their correct mistrust was leveraged into one of the most destructive conspiracy theories ever (vaccine denial and COVID vaccine avoidance).
They were right about Bill Clinton. He was always shady as fuck. Sure, the people who attacked him at the time turned out to be even more shady but that's not the point right now. He was connected to Epstein and that was always creepy as fuck.
And the Epstein thing was an open secret that liberals ignored for a long time. It was seen as some weird thing that right wing nutjobs believed about the Clintons. But it was true. Not all of it, and there has always been an antisemitic element to the right wing interpretation or Epstein stuff, but his whole pedophile conspiracy was always kind of real.
The whole "Illuminati"/deep state thing is a vast oversimplification, an attempt to make comprehensible an incredibly complex set of interlocking and emergent behaviors. But Epstein did very much want to remake the world, to create a new world order, and he absolutely played a part in it.
The Right wing nutjobs talked about global authoritarianism, Blackhawks flying over American cities, masked men with guns disarming and executing legal gun owners in the streets. That's all happening right now.
The "FEMA concentration camps" are not actually that far off. ICE and FEMA are sister agencies, both under DHS. I'd be more than happy to call that one "close enough" in order to hear some MAGA admit that ICE is, in fact, building concentration camps.
There was always a huge millennialist element to these things. They tended to be connected to "the antichrist." It was absurd, especially for me as someone who no longer identifies as a Christian. But I'll even acquiess that to a degree. The "the number of the Beast" is 666. That's just the sum of the Hebrew spelling of "Nero." Revelations focuses a lot on Nero coming back to life after his death. His death that involved a head wound, thus the line from Revelation 13:3:
> And I saw one of his heads as if it had been mortally wounded, and his deadly wound was healed. And all the world marveled and followed the beast.
The parallels between Trump and Nero are easy to draw, and Trump's ear wound feels pretty on-the-nose for this. I don't believe in "prophecy" in this way. I think that there are patterns, and useful patterns can become encoded in beleif systems. But I will, again, happily call this one "close enough" for anyone on that side willing to also acknowledge it. I'm happy to meet on that common ground, because anyone who accepts it must recognize that their duty is to fight against it.
A lot of these correct nuggets are embedded in a framework of religious extremism and antisemitism. The vast majority of the beliefs holding these together are wildly wrong and incredibly toxic. But by giving some room to feel validated, listened to, understood, can give some room to admit things that were wrong.
Cult de-programming starts with an opening. People have to talk through their own thoughts, hear their own inconsistencies. Guiding questions can help them untangle these things for themselves. And it all starts by having enough room to feel safe, to not feel cornered, to not feel stupid. Admitting mistakes means being vulnerable, and the MAGA cult is built on fear. It's built on exploiting vulnerability and locking it away.
De-programming takes a long time. It's not easy. It takes patience. But every person who comes out does so with a powerful perspective, a deep understanding, that can be turned back against it. The best people at getting people out of cults are former members. Some of the most dedicated antifa are former fascists who understood their mistakes and dedicate their lives to fixing them.
@memeorandum@universeodon.com2026-03-02 15:15:47
How to Think About Trump's War With Iran (Thomas L. Friedman/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/opinion/trump-iran-war-future.html
http://www.memeorandum.com/260302/p44#a260302p44
@cdarwin@c.im2026-02-04 01:25:06
Trump repeats claim that federal government should run elections in some states
Asked by a reporter to explain his suggestion on Monday,
to podcaster-turned-FBI deputy-director-turned-podcaster-again Dan Bongino,
that the US should “nationalize” elections
and have them run by the federal government,
Trump repeats his false claims that elections in states he lost in 2020 were “crooked”.
“If you think about it, the state is an agent for the federal governmen…
@poppastring@dotnet.social2026-03-03 04:35:10
The V-formation maps cleanly to how we think about leadership: someone sets direction, others align behind. But the murmuration model — distributed, adaptive, leaderless — might be closer to how real teams work. https://www.poppastring.com/blog/leadership-from-birds
@kurtsh@mastodon.social2026-03-03 04:02:35
What a roller coaster of emotions. I think everyone should watch this entire documentary about the kindness of strangers across America. (2hr47min)
▶️ I Hitchhiked Across America (Full Documentary) - Discover Connection
https://youtube.com/watch?v=nDWhcHRhrhg&si=PxE_…
@mxp@mastodon.acm.org2026-01-04 00:01:32
@… Yeah, and it would be good to think about that possibility NOW. Greenland is on Trump’s list, and as we’ve seen today, his threats aren’t just empty rhetoric.
@mxp@mastodon.acm.org2026-01-04 00:01:32
@… Yeah, and it would be good to think about that possibility NOW. Greenland is on Trump’s list, and as we’ve seen today, his threats aren’t just empty rhetoric.
@cheryanne@aus.social2026-02-02 21:13:45
I'm feeling all sooky and fragile this morning. It's merely a matter of coping with another broken night's sleep - I think I ended up with about 3 hours all up. So definitely not at my best and brightest today. Not happy, Jan.
#SleeplessInSuburbia
@grumpybozo@toad.social2026-02-03 02:34:31
Watching Maddow talk about municipalities rejecting ICE turning warehouses into prisons.
I conclude that the empty new warehouse built on the old footprint of Eastland Mall less than a mile from me is far from the only giant warehouse built on spec in recent years around the country.
I am troubled by the fact that it’s less than 2 miles from Detroit City Airport. I think I’ll drive by tomorrow and see if they have a tenant yet.
@sjn@chaos.social2026-01-02 20:53:38
I cannot understate how fun I think Marty Sears' "Rat Run" puzzles are, and I'm soooo stoked that season 3 is about to begin!
What is this, you ask?
It's a series of #Sudoku variation puzzles with a funny and clever story-line featuring the exploits of Finkz the lab rat (!)
Love it, love it, love it! 😄
The season 3 teaser puzzle solve:
@peterhoneyman@a2mi.social2026-03-02 19:05:10
we had a toilet issue last year that was diagnosed as "you need a new toilet" so lynn picked one out and printed in big letters on the side of the box was an announcement CAN FLUSH A BUCKET OF GOLF BALLS and it's all i can think about when i twist that lever
@cellfourteen@social.petertoushkov.eu2026-01-03 01:58:28
I realise now GPU tech is way too powerful to be sold at a bargain to normy gamers, hence the enormous price ramp up. Think about the high tech inventions that came DOWN from the space programs into our everyday lives. AI capable hardware came UP from the gaming space, and is now used in crime, research, financing, national security, and the military. Which is alarming for an off-the-shelf technology that is within the reach of every sicko grokking in Muskland.
@inthehands@hachyderm.io2026-01-31 21:59:15
The KKK but with a budget the size of Russia’s military. Running mass detention camps.
Think about that for a minute.
Think about what it could mean, what it •already is•:
https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/into-the-abyss
16/
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-01-02 15:51:35
One of the overall most prolific and never-ending enigmas for me is which speakers people think "sound good".
Like you can have the most garbage tinny piece of shit speakers in a TV or on a laptop and the reviews will be "sounds great!".
Or e.g. Sonos speakers—they sound horrific and people go on about how they're the best thing they've ever heard.
These aren't subjective opinions by the way, you can measure the frequency response etc.
@stephane_klein@social.coop2026-02-28 15:13:11
After more than a year on @… I haven't received any reminder to renew my financial contribution. Is this normal? Is renewal simply left to members' own initiative?
My question on #Loomio :
@tante@tldr.nettime.org2026-03-03 12:40:52
RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116165239429495379
I think that is actually the biggest problem with those systems.
It's not losing some random skill that we have made superflous, it's about taking skills that are the foundation for your a…
@cowboys@darktundra.xyz2026-02-03 14:10:28
Do the Cowboys’ Current Players Fit Christian Parker’s Defense? https://insidethestar.com/do-the-cowboys-current-players-fit-christian-parkers-defense
@ErikJonker@mastodon.social2026-02-03 08:19:49
@joe@toot.works2026-03-01 18:06:13
I thought about trying this out on a trip but it apparently only works at select North American airports and costs significantly more money than $75. I don't think you would get terribly large amounts of value from a butler at ORD. 😏
@markhburton@mstdn.social2026-01-31 17:08:47
I strongly recommend this new book. It is well informed and written well and persuasively.
If you think green tech is the future, that massive deployment of renewables is the answer, then take a look.
99th Day: A Warning About Technology | Gerry McGovern
https://gerrymcgovern.com/books/99th-d
@theodric@social.linux.pizza2025-12-31 18:50:34
Content warning: maybe gross if you think about it (just don't think about it)
It appears I can turn cabbage into both liquid and gas. One day, maybe I'll even figure out how to turn it into plasma!
@midtsveen@social.linux.pizza2026-01-01 01:27:13
As we move into 2026, I want to be clear about where I stand. I support classic psychedelics like psilocybin, psilocin, Mescaline, LSD, and also cannabis, not because I think everyone should use them, but because I believe in the freedom of consciousness.
This isn’t a war on drugs; it’s a war on consciousness itself. The stigma surrounding psychedelics has been built and reinforced by decades of fear-based media and institutional control. Simply talking about these substances bout to s…
@mcdanlj@social.makerforums.info2026-02-28 23:54:49
Beautiful day today, and I went out for a social #POTA activation this afternoon. A new ham with a license only a few days old joined me to learn about POTA. I was going to do SSB instead of CW as a result, but turns out they are more interested in CW and specifically wanted to see a CW activation.
More passers-by stopped by to ask about what we were doing than I think all other activ…
@Archivist@social.linux.pizza2025-12-31 13:17:56
In conclusion, I think the GOTY of 2025 is The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy.
It was extremely ambitious, made by a very small team of very dedicated people that sacrificed their health and well being to show that humans can make long narrative games without needing to use AI, and make a distinctly human piece of art without ever forgetting about their message about war, peace, tolerance, and individual decisions
@timjan@social.linux.pizza2026-03-01 21:21:11
>The following OpenPGP key (0x74C35BC8) is about to be removed:
Reason : Expired on 2026-02-11 11:44:18
It will be successfully removed.
Tomorrow it will be back.
Why I think so? Because it has returned, and I have re-deleted it, practically every day since February 11.
#fedora
@cdarwin@c.im2026-02-03 04:22:11
Trump's coercive policies, including his latest threats against Greenland,
are prompting some foreign investors to think twice about parking their money with Uncle Sam.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-financial…
@NFL@darktundra.xyz2025-12-24 13:45:45
Chargers' Justin Herbert continues 'to think about' playoff flop vs. Texans with rematch on tap Saturday https://www.nfl.com/news/chargers-justin-herbert-continues-to-think-about-playoff-flop-vs-texans-with-r…
@stefan@gardenstate.social2026-01-31 16:15:59
Perhaps I'm not really using the right words.
I think I don't care about backups as much as I want seemless cloud file sync.
dropbox has not been seemless. Google drive does not seem to be working on KDE.
#ubuntu
@nebucatnetzer@social.linux.pizza2026-01-01 16:32:49
If recently played with plain Raw photography a bit on my iPhone.
I find that I can achieve better looking results than with the stock camera's HEIF or ProRaw format.
It mainly just looks less over processed and more natural.
The main downside is that the iPhone limits you to 12 MP but I think it is worth it.
Does someone else do this as well?
Or do you use a different app than the stock camera?
Curious about Android experiences as well.
@bobmueller@mastodon.world2026-02-01 15:30:03
We weathered Winter Storm Fern just fine, but the week ended somewhere deeper: podcasts, music, and an essay that made me pause and think about death and belief. Sometimes the quiet pieces linger longest.
https://www.bobmuellerwriter.com/weathering-the-cold-and-b…
@niqdanger@social.linux.pizza2026-02-02 00:38:18
Lots of people ask about e-readers here so I am going to do the same. I have a TON of readings to do lately for classes. Mostly PDFs of research documents. Think published scholar journal documents, so two column (mostly), tiny font. Lately I've been printing them and reading them on the couch as its easier than reading with a laptop. Plus I can highlight passages with is helpful. While I love using a kindle to read books, its never done well with PDF documents, not to mention moving th…
@radioeinsmusicbot@mastodonapp.uk2026-01-28 18:52:28
🇺🇦 Auf radioeins läuft...
Artful Dodger feat. Michelle Escoffery:
🎵 Think About Me
#NowPlaying #ArtfulDodger #MichelleEscoffery
https://popbeatsseries.bandcamp.com/track/think-about-me-radio-version
https://open.spotify.com/track/5cCemTEpXC71eB5QuVTA0n
@andres4ny@social.ridetrans.it2025-12-30 09:17:47
I was going to make a dumb joke about 2025 "Wrapped" and show a bunch of burritos. But thinking about it made me hungry, so I'm going to go eat a burrito instead. Sorry, but I think this is for the best.
@wraithe@mastodon.social2026-01-01 04:50:55
My wife is watching some video about how there’s a shitload of billionaires and multimillionaires yachts converging on some island for New Years Eve and all I can think is:
“where’s some Japanese Carriers when you need them?”
@benb@osintua.eu2025-12-16 16:31:19
What Ukrainians actually think about ceding Donbas to Russia: https://benborges.xyz/2025/12/16/what-ukrainians-actually-think-about.html
@deprogrammaticaipsum@mas.to2026-01-31 14:05:27
"Speaking about jokes, “Considered Harmful” is one of the most recurring ones in the history of programming. Not that the countless papers, blog posts, videos, podcast episodes, and conference talks that featured these two words as a suffix were funny, but because it is a trigger: one that fires up specific alarms in the systems of software developers, immediately commanding our utmost attention."
@pavelasamsonov@mastodon.social2025-12-30 19:09:57
2016: Figma auto-saves your work.
2026: Figma auto-steals your work.
Figma admins, take a look at the setting that Figma silently opted your entire team into, and think about whether the labor of your designers should be handed away for free, just so Figma can turn around and pitch AI powered layout creation to product managers.
@cdamian@rls.social2026-02-27 10:45:41
Friday Links 26-07
Today is a weird one, so much in engineering is about AI.
Check out the live coding trance video and pretty Stockholm metro videos.
https://christof.damian.net/2026/02/friday-links-26-07.html
@qurlyjoe@mstdn.social2026-01-29 02:25:11
Another thing I wonder about is, who decided to pull off the #Minneapolis operation in the middle of a very cold winter? Did they think it’d be easier somehow than in the summer? Did none of them ever go to #Minnesota in the winter before and see that the people live there don’t give a shit about th…
@asterisk@social.linux.pizza2026-02-01 22:28:41
https://asterisk.lol/blog/atproto-is-a-lie
In tech circles a lot of people have been talking about ATProto as the future of social media or building their latest flashy social network built with it, alongside companies trying to get in as well. The whole thing looked owned by one compa…
@brian_gettler@mas.to2026-02-23 22:38:16
Tomorrow in my History of Here course - one of my department's intro classes - we'll be discussing letters written in response to early-20th-c speeding tickets. My favorite claims it's unfair since he'd sped with so many cars before and never gotten a ticket ("as this is the fifteenth car that he has been the owner of, and has never been fined for speeding, he feels that he is being imposed upon by the commission").
@marcel@waldvogel.family2026-02-27 19:01:31
@eingfoan@infosec.exchange2026-03-01 09:53:05
@… i want a client for Android / #murenaos
Can you think about it
@hikingdude@mastodon.social2026-01-29 16:51:38
While I'm settling now at home and think about having a walk in the dark to prevent just falling asleep right now - I enjoy the memories from a recent hike.
As you can see at the frosty cross, it was a bit chill. -- Actually .. I'm quite undecicive whether I like summer or winter more? Summer is green and all, but in winter I like the chill and the cold ...
Maybe I don't have to prefer a season? Yes, I guess I just call myself lucky that I can enjoy every season.
@pixelcode@social.tchncs.de2026-02-26 00:25:46
The new #Veritasium video about the #XZ vulnerability remains below their usual quality, I regret, although it surely is captivating, at least to a technical audience.
However, I think ordinary viewers might be confused about several aspects, since you need to understand software freedom, the …
@servelan@newsie.social2026-02-19 23:23:02
"They just want to torture and punish transgender people because they don’t like them, period. It has nothing to do with kids or women’s rights or anything else. They just hate the very idea of transgender people and want to make it impossible for them to function in society or even make it criminal. So much for freedom."
Did You Think It Was Just About Girls’ Sports? – Digby's Hullabaloo
https://digbysblog.net/2026/02/19/did-you-think-it-was-just-about-girls-sports/
@aral@mastodon.ar.al2026-01-25 14:30:07
Just got these messages from @seengoals@mastodon.social, one of the members of Gaza Verified, basically accusing me of running a fundraiser for Gaza and keeping the proceeds (I have no fundraiser on any fundraising site anywhere) and extorting me to share his fundraiser or he’ll apparently go public with it.
So here’s what’s going to happening instead: Nabil has been removed Gaza Verified (
@scott@carfree.city2025-12-30 08:32:57
Unpopular urbanist opinion: Low density explains far less of U.S. car dependence than most urbanists think. It's much more about underfunding of bus service, missing sidewalks, lack of safe bike lanes, and other things that are less sexy than gleaming new highrises, which will in fact fail to achieve much mode shift on their own.
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-02-01 15:11:48
If you reply to me and expect an answer, maybe don't call what I said a "bad faith argument".
What do you want me to say?
"Yes, I posted this to specifically upset you personally even though I didn't actually mean it!"
Or, you know, maybe if it makes you feel angry—figure out why.
Anger is an emotion that just tells you something might be wrong. You should take it as sign to think about why you have the feeling. It might be that there is something the matter with your beliefs or what you're doing.
@lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz2026-02-24 00:09:54
Huh, Free Speech Union leader being interviewed on RNZ by Jesse Mulligan right now... Wonder if he'll ask about FSU's Atlas Network connections? The FSU leader is very dark on NZ gov't talking about leaving Twitter as a platform. She's saying the gov't needs to be where the people are... I think this is a deeply flawed position.
@sean@scoat.es2026-02-24 23:39:07
Think about how expensive Uber has become. Now look at this chart (sorry; borrowed it from Reddit; assuming it’s not completely wrong), and draw the simplest conclusion about how much this LLM stuff is going to cost when you’re not getting a handout to subsidize it.
Heck, if a straight line is too hard for you, just ask the LLM.
@rmdes@mstdn.social2025-12-30 00:18:59
Check out this compelling rebuttal of Soteria International's claims regarding the OKC case. Get informed about the facts and perspectives presented in the article by visiting: https://blog.rmendes.net/2024/12/15/rebuttal-of-soteria.html
@izzychambers@vivaldi.net2025-12-30 15:45:46
@… I would start with using Dragon's tools to make its vocabulary and word usage as much like what I intended to write as possible. If I were an established author such as you, I would feed it my most recent work. I would add as many specialized words as I needed. (I had to do these things in my niche legal practice.)
Then, I would think about ways to us…
@rberger@hachyderm.io2026-01-27 20:54:45
This was written by an old friend and I found it pretty packed with good info. It’s also an example of using NotebookLM for research and content development. I found this inspiring enough to give it a try. I’ve found that it is a “Centaur" enabling tech that helps one to create on their own the overall content and leaving details to the NotebookLM tooling.
——
SLOs Can’t Catch a Black Swan: A Classification Framework for Thinking About Incidents -Geoff White
"Your SLOs can be green, and your systems can still be falling over. That doesn’t mean SLOs are broken. It means they were never designed to describe every class of risk we encounter in complex systems.
I’ve released version 1.0 of SLOs Can’t Catch a Black Swan as an open, living framework hosted on GitHub.
This is not a book you read once, and it’s not something you consult in the middle of an outage. It’s a way to think more clearly about incidents—across the incident lifecycle.”
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/slos-cant-catch-black-swan-classification-framework-thinking-white-ybc0c/?trackingId=ShCzMMVCQTChcTi8xT19tg==
@portaloffreedom@social.linux.pizza2026-02-27 12:54:53
Is death standing a cyberpunk game?
I think it fits the estics, in a different way than usual but it does.
I'm not sure about the lore, but in certain ways it does.
The story it's probably the bit that fits the least; it's also quite important so maybe I'm wrong.
@metacurity@infosec.exchange2025-12-22 12:57:40
The SEC's decision to dismiss its lawsuit against SolarWinds and its CISO, Tim Brown, was met with immediate and widespread joy across the cybersecurity leadership community.
But experts say CISOs should start shoring up their internal defenses in case the policy or legal winds shift again.
Check out my latest CSO piece on what the decision means for CISOs. Many thanks to Joe Sullivan, Gadi Evron, Diana Kelley and Cara Peterman for their insights.
What CISOs should know…
@fgraver@hcommons.social2026-02-21 16:42:15
What we think is a decline in literacy is a design problem | Aeon Essays https://aeon.co/essays/what-we-think-is-a-decline-in-literacy-is-a-design-problem
Very interesting essay about what does *not* cause a decline in our attention spa…
@EarthOrgUK@mastodon.energy2025-12-27 12:29:02
A rave from the grave (2009) here!
https://www.earth.org.uk/note-on-UK-policy-modelling-tool.html
I think I was asked by David Mackay to think about this stuff, but did not run with it...
@chris@mstdn.chrisalemany.ca2026-02-02 18:16:51
I might offend some folks with this poll… but I think it's kind of the elephant in the room, my friends.
Q: Is the biggest problem with #Mastodon in general actually the moderation of its biggest instance: mastodon.social?
This is not directed at anyone personally, rather, it's directed at a toxic culture that I see innocent people/victims posting about over and over again.
(mastodon.social is 300K MAU, next one is 12K)
#Fediverse #Moderation #OpenServers #Bullying #Welcome
@Kingu@sakurajima.moe2026-02-24 17:48:56
@blakes7bot@mas.torpidity.net2026-01-26 13:39:21
Series A, Episode 10 - Breakdown
VILA: Let's hope they don't even think about it.
[Farren's office]
FARREN: I've never seen a ship remotely like it before. What do you think, Professor Kayn?
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/110/356 B7B3
@seeingwithsound@mas.to2026-02-24 21:56:13
Thus far about the only known advantage of a visual cortical prosthesis (brain implant for restoring vision) over visual-to-auditory sensory substitution is that you get to see blobs of light (phosphenes) if late-blind https://www.artificialvision.com/neuralink.htm
@gwire@mastodon.social2026-02-25 09:13:34
I think that if you care about long term human maintainability of software, you should be optimistic (at least cautiously) for AI tools for translating, eg, COBOL to other languages.
The decline in the adoption of languages is as real a threat to long-term maintainability as the AI slop-pocalyse people are worrying about.
We've spent decades creating layers upon layers of abstraction to the point where no-one knows how computers work. Telling developers to "Git Gud"…
@aardrian@toot.cafe2025-12-27 15:49:23
“Dear Mozilla, I don't want an ‘Al [sic] kill switch’, I want a more responsible approach for all”
https://hidde.blog/mozilla-ai-kill-switch/
Unlike Hidde, I think the alt text argument is mostly bunk (
@inthehands@hachyderm.io2026-02-26 19:08:44
Still, there are some other things Hypercard did we’d do well to study, even with full-scale tools. Off the top of my head:
- It richly rewarded unguided exploration. Unsuccessful experimentation had a way of leading to paths forward, not just dead ends.
- Much of it worked by direct manipulation: if you want the thing there, you put the thing there. (Unity and Godot both sort of kind of do some descendant of this, but not with the same discoverability and transparency.)
- There was a rich library of good starting points, modifiable examples.
- An empty but functioning new project had essentially zero boilerplate. You didn’t have to have 15 files and hundreds of lines of code to get a blank page.
- Its UI made it easy-ish for newcomers to ask “What can I do with this thing here?” Modern autocomplete and inline docs kind of sort of approximate this, but in practice only for people who already have tool expertise.
- HyperTalk (the programming language) is tricky to write (it’s a p-lang), but it’s remarkably easy to read. You can peer at it with very limited knowledge and make educated guesses about its semantics, and those guesses will be mostly correct. (HyperTalk syntax tends to get the most attention when people talk about this, I think at the expense of the other things above.)
@boris@cosocial.ca2026-01-26 17:30:12
I am about to fly across the country in a bit, and I think I’m going to play Last Epoch the whole way.
It’s an Action RPG that has a fully offline mode. https://lastepoch.com
@hex@kolektiva.social2026-01-20 14:29:06
In the time I've been offline, I've been doing a lot and feeling a lot more mentally healthy. I've been exploring nomadnet a bit, looking at reticulum. I'm definitely going to go back to my break and being online much less regularly.
I actually totally forgot about the anniversary of the shooting, which is the first time that's happened since... uh... the shooting, I think.
I've definitely realized that, on some level, I've definitely used Mastodon (and formerly Twitter) as a coping mechanism, often in order to deal with the stressful things that I've found out about on Mastodon or Twitter.
But, again, none of those things really change our core job: build community. And that's part of what I've been neglecting, and what I can focus on more when I'm not spending as much time talking to people all over the world indirectly. Like, I can just chat directly with folks and talk about this shit.
Yeah, I do think there's value in this community. I don't think it's really screaming into the void (at least, not most of the time). But I know that I need the balance to be way farther on the side of direct engagement with comrades doing and building.
So that's what I'm gonna go back to. I feel as though it's a good sign that with all the writing about getting shot that I've been doing, and all the thinking about that, that the actual anniversary of the shooting I'm actually just thinking about bread.
And that seems like a good note to leave on. I'm gonna go back to some hacker shit.
@qurlyjoe@mstdn.social2026-01-29 00:54:47
Josh Johnson is on tour, in London this week. Here’s some of his routine from yesterday. It’s about 40 minutes. The first part is his basic schtick, but please be sure to keep watching, listening, or skip ahead to 23:00 and watch the next 14 minutes. We think, “it can’t happen here.” It’s happening here, folks. He’s talking, of course, about #Minneapolis. And
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-03-01 02:56:20
For absolutely no reason have to think about Goethe today
O, du Ausgeburt der Hölle!
Soll das ganze Haus ersaufen?
Seh' ich über jede Schwelle
Doch schon Wasserströme laufen,
Ein verruchter Besen
Der nicht hören will.
Stock, der du gewesen,
Steh doch einmal still
@cdamian@rls.social2026-01-30 11:01:51
Friday Links 26-04
It is a bit sad that he is leaving In Our Time, but I enjoyed the interview with Melvyn Bragg.
The blog post about curiosity as a leader is short and great.
https://christof.damian.net…
@LillyHerself@Mastodon.social2026-01-30 12:12:06
RE: https://mastodon.social/@hanse_mina/115982419130505084
Funny, you don't really think about Russia having immigrants...because who would want to live there?
@cheryanne@aus.social2026-02-27 18:08:24
The Holistic Baby And Toddler Sleep Podcast
Join me as we discuss child sleep in a unique way that will make your think about the status quo and provide a new and holistic way of approaching parenting, child sleep and health...
Great Australian Pods Podcast Directory: https://www.greataustral…
@cdarwin@c.im2026-01-28 04:16:31
Calling ICE or DHS a “law enforcement” organization is a joke.
They made no attempt to follow the law while there.
They were given permission to break the law, not follow it.
That has been their training,
and they have been following their training.
So if we pass new law why do we think they will follow it?
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-02-01 02:02:30
Another reply was (paraphrased) "I've asked AI about this and it doesn't think so, therefore you must be wrong".
@NFL@darktundra.xyz2026-01-28 10:36:34
What do NFL players think of tush push, hip-drop tackles and kickoff rules? We asked them https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6999586/2026/01/28/nfl-player-poll-tush-push-kickoff-rules/
@cowboys@darktundra.xyz2026-01-28 12:39:30
What do NFL players think of tush push, hip-drop tackles and kickoff rules? We asked them https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6999586/2026/01/28/nfl-player-poll-tush-push-kickoff-rules/
@memeorandum@universeodon.com2026-02-12 15:11:05
About 6 in 10 think Trump has gone too far when it comes to deploying federal immigration agents in major U.S. cities. (AP-NORC)
https://apnorc.org/projects/about-6-in-10-think-trump-has-gone-too-far-when-it-comes-to-deploying-federal-immigration-agents-in-major-u-s-cities/
http://www.memeorandum.com/260212/p30#a260212p30
@markhburton@mstdn.social2026-02-26 08:41:35
'Advocates of a “progressive alliance” on an anyone-but-Reform basis should look to the experience in France or Germany, where these alliances have shown diminishing returns.
'Sometimes we need to vote tactically to block a far-right win.
'We should still think strategically about the bigger problem, that the far right is competitive at all...'
Three-horse races like Gorton and Denton show electoral tactics alone won’t beat the far right | Morning Star
@hex@kolektiva.social2026-02-25 06:06:41
This is as good a time as any for a thought experiment.
You're in Nazi Germany. You know about the camps, you know what they do, you see the ash fall, you smell it. People who resist alone are killed, some are sent to the camps too. You're afraid to even talk to people about it for fear that they'll turn you in.
You think back to when the camps were being built. You had all the warning signs, but you didn't know how to interpret them. You could believe it would happen. You thought you'd have a chance to vote him out. You thought there might be another way. You thought maybe things would turn out differently if you just sat tight, kept your head down, kept yourself safe.
You see a family being dragged from their home. You know they will be killed. You want to fight, not just for them but for yourself. You opposed Hitler, and at any point you know you could be on the list... Even if you do nothing.
You wish you could rise up, shoot the SS, open the gates, fight it all. You know you aren't alone, but you don't know how to connect with the people who want the same thing.
Using the knowledge we have now, what should you have done in the preceding months and years to connect, to build a community that would open up all paths of resistance?
There were people who resisted. We know it wasn't enough.
Gun laws in Nazi Germany were very similar to US laws in that Nazis were largely free to own guns and everyone else was not. Unlike the US, where "others" have historically controlled using the fear that they might be randomly executed, Germany did codify it. Red flag laws were one more step in the US towards that codification, and there will be more.
When Nazis were taking away those guns, the social networks didn't exist to make resistance possible for most folks. But some Jews were able to resist.
It wasn't the guns that made the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising possible, though they definitely helped. The Warsaw Ghetto uprising was made possible by labor organizing in the precessing years.
If there were more uprisings like that, the Holocaust could have been stopped if not prevented. Social networks make resistance possible. Guns are only useful tools to resist authoritarianism *after* you build a community able to support that resistance, and they are only one of many tools made useful by that community.
Getting guns is easy, and not always necessary. Building community is hard. Guns won't keep you safe. Community will.
Single acts of resistance may slow the machine down, but to actually bring down a monster you need to be able to attack more than once. You need a society of resistance. If you are afraid now, build that. Talk to people while it's still safe to do so. Ask them where their red line is. Talk to neighbors. Figure out your network.
Take the steps you need now to keep your neighbors safe, to keep yourself safe.
#USPol
@inthehands@hachyderm.io2025-12-27 19:19:47
All these breathless articles about people forming weird relationships with LLMs, ruining marriages or going down psychological rabbit holes because of the emotionally compulsion-forming quality of having something that always says yes to you?
I think that’s happening to people in management, too, in their professional lives — and they’re making purchase decisions around it.
9/
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-01-30 23:55:04
If you're an American, I'd like you to watch Alec from Technology Connection here starting at about 1:16:30 (link contains jump to that time).
Ideally of course watch the whole video too, but the end here is I think really important because there's so few people who saying this so clearly.
https://youtu.be/KtQ9nt2ZeGM?t=4594
@cdamian@rls.social2026-02-06 12:25:20
@cdarwin@c.im2026-01-29 15:18:54
In an interview with MS NOW’s Alex Witt over the weekend,
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Maryland)
indicated that a nationwide
general strike might be the next thing needed in order to oppose
Donald Trump’s authoritarianism.
Raskin made clear to viewers of the program that he didn’t believe a general strike, on its own, could bring about huge changes,
but rather that it had to be done in conjunction with other actions.
“We’re not going to have one magic soluti…
@inthehands@hachyderm.io2026-01-25 16:21:02
I’ve had this contingent of the language police show up in my replies a few times now over the word “cosplay,” and look…
OK, I get it, I get the instinct to say “Don’t drag me into this!” and I applaud the effort to push fascists out of communities, yes to all that…
…and also we need to recognize that what ICE is doing absolutely •is• cosplay. The word means “costume play.” It refers to assembling and wearing costumes that are not necessarily functional, but show affinity for a particular subculture by reproducing characters from that subculture’s popular narratives.
ICE are cosplaying Call of Duty. That is an accurate description of what’s happening. (Listen to “Gear.”)
I make software and I make music. I don’t think either one of those things •should• be about violence. I don’t •want• them to be about violence. But both are used in the service of violence, like it or not. I shout the violence out whenever it shows up. But would be ridiculous for me to point at what Palantir does and say “That’s not software!” Unfortunately, it •is• software. To deny that would be beyond self-defeating; it would be irresponsible.
ICE •is• doing cosplay, and we hate it. It’s an insult to the cosplay subculture. It is an insult to the whole of humanity. Fascism creeps into all of our spheres, into every beloved craft and community, and the response is never to pretend it’s not there. The response is to drive it out.
@…
https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@wildrikku/115956545807535535
@hex@kolektiva.social2025-12-26 19:31:33
RE: https://pawb.fun/@itsOasus/115787031750775789
"Starting a company is really just about getting a credit card and frantically spending as much as possible until you're profitable. Don't worry about the debt. It's not going to be your problem."
This would be a useful metaphor if it wasn't just how these people think. Anyway, thanks for the free bugs. You'll never be able to pay enough consulting fees to keep from being hacked repeatedly forever.
This is how the system collapses. At some point it simply isn't possible to sustain the crushing weight of incompetence.
@cdarwin@c.im2025-12-29 19:06:39
#Security #guarantees were discussed during Zelensky's two-hour meeting with Donald Trump at his residence in Mar-a-Lago in Florida, which ended without a breakthrough.
In the draft agreement, U.S. security guarantees for Ukraine are outlined 👉for a period of 15 years,
with a possibility for extension…
@hex@kolektiva.social2026-02-21 21:10:33
After the whole Adam Something "dating advice for leftist men" thing, I realized I should probably write something about that. I didn't, but I realized I should. Here I am sort of getting around to it.
I had a friend call me an "elder" at one point. I was like 35 at that time, but like... a lot of old leftists are just dead or in prison, so we take what we can get I guess. Being also an elder in the sense that I'm an elder millennial, who is also a parent and married for almost 10 years and all that, I guess I'm technically qualified.
So here it is, dating advice for (straight cis) leftist men:
1. Don't.
That's it, actually. That's the whole thing. Let me explain a bit.
First of all, this is dating advice for neuroatypical folks. We're way overrepresented in both extremes because this system wasn't built for us. And that's who is *the most* confused by all the relationship stuff, and most likely to try to apply all this masculinity/manosphere bullshit. I'm also talking a bit from experience here, as a neruo-spicy trying to "figure out" how to date within a paradigm entirely built around neurotypicals and their relationships. It's garbage. Throw it out. There's nothing worth saving.
His video had some line comparing not having sex to your house being on fire. I'm not gonna bother to quote it because I'm busy with actual life. But like, that's exactly what I'm talking about. I recognize that and it's horribly destructive. Men who buy in to patriarchy actually believe this, because those men value themselves based on (hetro) sex. Yeah, if you think you're worthless because you aren't "getting laid" then yeah, you're gonna feel like that's an emergency.
"Dating" as a paradigm turns humans into roles. It dehumanizes us all, and thus makes human connection much harder. It is a game that, like thermonuclear war, can only be won by not playing.
When you abandon "dating" and just act like a human, everything starts to be easier. There's no such thing as being "friend zoned" because you're just friends. Sometimes friendships become other things, sometimes they don't. It doesn't actually matter, because if you're actually there for friendship then you don't *need* anything else.
My grandma, at 98 I think, gave me some advice. My grandparents always got along well, and were married for enough decades that I listened really closely. She told me I should just do things I loved to do and everything else would work itself out.
And it kind of did.
I understand the fear, the idea that you'll die alone. I get that. I get the loneliness. It all hits a lot harder when you have ADHD emotions and past trauma. I get that. But that fear is self-manifesting. When you build your confidence, when you don't *need* to be "in a relationship," you have more room to actually build relationships. For me, dating was dehumanizing. When I abandoned that, I was able to actually be a good partner, and I was able to find my partner.
I would advise against marriage as well, but we did get married for legal reasons. It can still be hard to maintain that, to see each other as people rather than roles. That becomes extra hard as parents. But the times that we cut through that are the times we're closest. Those are the times when it becomes easier to remember that we're both humans and all human relationships need tending.
Roles don't need to be tended because they are classifications. Classifications are static. But relationships between humans are not. Humans are messy and chaotic. Humans have all kinds of complex needs and desires.
So yeah, don't date. Just be a human and see what happens. Maybe google "relationship anarchy" and see where it takes you.
If you have ADHD, it can be especially useful to understand that relationships with neurotypical folks can be especially difficult. Assume you're incompatible with 90% of the population as your baseline, and you'll start to understand why the standard "dating" thing has made you feel so alienated and miserable.
Neurotypical folks generally have no idea that atypicality exists, much less how it impacts relationships. Having to conform to a neurotypical relationship just adds additional mental strain unless you find someone (really special) who can do at least some of the work.
The ADHD thing was especially important for me. There were so many things I was told to do in specific ways by neurotypicals that never worked for me. Their advice always made me feel like a failure. When I was finally diagnosed, I realized they were just giving advice for the wrong type of brain. It was advice I could never use. Basically all dating advice I ever got fell into this same category.
That's my braindump. Maybe I'll develop it more in the future, but I'm busy so maybe not. I hope it helps someone who is struggling like I was.
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-02-19 21:08:58
When I’m totally innocent that’s what I say too
“I’m the expert in a way because I’ve been totally exonerated so I can speak about it. I think it’s a shame. I think it’s very sad. I think it’s so bad. It’s very, very sad. To me, it’s a very sad thing. When I see that, it’s a very sad thing.”
@hex@kolektiva.social2025-12-16 17:09:35
One of the things that made organizing a lot easier with the GDC was a thing called "GDC in a box." It was a zip file with all kinds of resources. There was a directory structure, templates for all kinds of things like meetings and paperwork you had to file (for legal reasons) and "read me" files.
We had all kinds of support. There were people you could talk to who had been there. There were people you could call to walk through legal paperwork (taxes). Centralized orgs are vulnerable and easy to infiltrate. They're easy for states to shut down. But there are benefits to org structures.
I think it's possible to have the type of support we had with the GDC, but without the politics of an org (even the IWW). I hope this most recent essay has some of the same properties. I hope that it makes building something new, something no one has really imagined before, easier.
This whole project is something a bit different. It's a collective vision and collective project, from the ground up. Some of it has felt like a brain dump, just getting things that have been swimming around in my head down somewhere. But I hope this feels more like an invitation.
Everything thus far written is all useless unless people do things with it. Only from that point does it become a thing that lives, a thing with its own consciousness that can't be controlled by any individual human.
Tech billionaire cultists want to bring a new era of humanity with AGI. That is definitely not possible with LLMs, and may not be possible at all. But there is a super intelligence that is possible, though it's been constrained by capitalism: collective human intelligence.
The grand vision of the tech dystopians is that of the ultimate slave that can then enslave all humans on their behalf. I think we can build a humanity that can liberate itself from their grasp, crush their vision, and build for itself a world in which people will never be enslaved again. Not only do I think it's possible, I think it's necessary. I think there are only two choices: collective liberation or death.
And that's what I plan to write about next time to wrap this whole project up. Today things often feel impossible. But people talked about the Middle Ages as though they were the end of the world, and then everything changed in unimaginable ways. Everything can, and will, change again.
"The profit motive often is in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings."
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io2026-01-19 13:43:34
So I think about one of the central thesis of Joseph Weizenbaum a lot.
It’s essentially an extension of “there’s no technical solutions to social problems”; it posits that computers are widely used to immortalize and amplify social problems while preventing reforms.
And it has gotten much worse since he wrote about this in the 1970s.
Two of the examples he gives are nation/world-wide stock exchanges and automated trading (lead to wealth concentration and gambling), as well as highly complex but wasteful, punishing and unfair welfare systems (instead of e.g. UBI).