Mastodon Feed: Posts

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

I now understand that Google is messing with OpenAI much more seriously than I had understood before:

https://not-just-memorization.github.io/extracting-training-data-from-chatgpt.html

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

this is amusing
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2024/12/certain-names-make-chatgpt-grind-to-a-halt-and-we-know-why/

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
drrimmer@aus.social ("Matthew Rimmer") wrote:

'A bloodbath': HIV field is reeling after billions in U.S. funding are axed
https://www.science.org/content/article/bloodbath-hiv-field-reeling-after-billions-u-s-funding-axed
USAID's promises to support lifesaving efforts are broken, putting millions
in peril #access2meds #HIV #AIDS #UNAIDS

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
faraiwe@mstdn.social ("Faraiwe") wrote:

Ooph

Mike Fernandez bought this ad on NYT

#TurdReich #gop #coup #USPol

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
skinnylatte@hachyderm.io ("Adrianna Tan") wrote:

"In December 2024, the median down payment in the San Francisco metro area was $375,000, according to real estate company Redfin, which analyzed data from the 40 most-populous U.S. metro areas"

https://archive.ph/SSucf

#SanFrancisco #Housing

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
KimPerales@toad.social ("Kim Perales") wrote:

🚨”EXTRAORDINARY FULL PAGE AD in today’s New York Times by Cuban American businessman Mike Fernandez savaging the Trump Administration and calling for GOP senators McConnell, Murkowski, Collins, Tillis, Young, & Curtis to band together to stop him!”
-F Amanda

#USPol #Republicans #Coup #Trump #ConstitutionalCrisis #Resist

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
inthehands@hachyderm.io ("Paul Cantrell") wrote:

OK, from the replies, some useful tidbits:

- To end a Tesla lease early, you don’t have to pay the full amount remaining — only the balance •minus• the car’s current resale value.

- Cars depreciate, so you’ll lose some money. But…

- …if the used market is dropping fast, Tesla’s official resale value will probably lag behind reality. Thus breaking a lease actually •can• take money straight out of Tesla’s pockets.

- To maximize this strategy, people should break their leases •soon• and •simultaneously•. Coordinate a campaign!

Would still really, really, really like somebody with professional expertise to work all this out.

#TeslaTakedown https://hachyderm.io/@inthehands/114089737787084906

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
Ultraverified@mastodon.sdf.org ("Ultra Verified") wrote:

That Trump embraces homicidal maniacs like Netanyahu, while attacking Zelenskyy tells me everything I need to know.

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

no sh*t, Sherlock

https://flipboard.com/@cnn/politics-17jf08kfz/-/a-auKhAbnIQ0arUfWEEyIicQ%3Aa%3A132361178-%2F0

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
adamparkhomenko.bsky.social@bsky.brid.gy ("Adam Parkhomenko") wrote:

Sorry you couldn’t have eggs this morning here’s your crypto reserve

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
kfitz@hcommons.social ("Kathleen Fitzpatrick") wrote:

Friends and colleagues: if you have published work that has previously been made available via #PubMed or other federally-controlled architecture, I strongly encourage you to find other ways to share it. For instance: KC Works is a non-profit, community-governed repository (built on top of CERN's InvenioRDM). We support all fields, all languages, all geographical locations. Join us and ensure that your work can remain available to all. https://works.hcommons.org

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
mike@thecanadian.social ("Mike Fraser :Jets:") wrote:

@jeff There's always a cartoon.

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

Dear Lazyweb: anyone have any recommendations for a hosting company?

we are to the point of needing to look at adding one or two more machines/VM-slices & thus seperating dev & prod functionality & persistence mechanisms Real Soon Now.

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
quazarsamcoupe@mastodonapp.uk ("Quazar") wrote:

I'll be making my way to the Retro Computer Museum's Legendary Gathering in Leicester next Saturday (8th March). Anyone here also going?

Will happily talk for hours about my 32 years of development for the SAM Coupe! I'll have a selection of SAM/retro goodies with me; some interfaces, SAM Revival magazines and my new SAM PCB keyrings which help support everything I do for the SAM.

Event page:
https://retrocomputermuseum.co.uk/events/legendary-gathering-793-137-318-850-682-246-642-864-494-790/

#retrogaming #indiedev #gamedev #8bit #chiptune #demoscene

Boosted by adam@social.lol ("Adam Newbold"):
maique@social.lol ("maique :prami_pride:") wrote:

🛞 I thought these chains were meant to provide extra grip in the mud/snow. Turns out there’s another reason why they’re installed. HUGE tires too.

Quiz time?

pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:

I guess our navy doesn't need fuel, or harbors, or friends.

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/03/02/treat-your-allies-like-crap-this-is-what-you-get/

pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:

Removing basic principles is a prelude to violating them.

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/03/02/why-delete-rules-unless-you-plan-to-break-them/

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

this is very cool

https://www.perplexity.ai/page/undergrad-improves-hash-tables-tqLA4e%5FZRgqQ3OY6n9xCVg

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

Blue Ghost moon landing: Firefly’s lander touches down on the moon | CNN

https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/01/science/blue-ghost-mission-moon-landing

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
pitrh ("Peter N. M. Hansteen") wrote:

EuroBSDCon 2025, Zagreb, September 2025

The Call for Talk and Presentation proposals for EuroBSDCon 2025 is now open.

Enter your submission at https://events.eurobsdcon.org/2025/

Please also visit the main website https://2025.eurobsdcon.org/ for information about the conference.

See you in Zagreb!

#eurobsdcon #bsd #conference #freebsd #openbsd #netbsd #unix #development #devops #freesoftware #libresoftware @eurobsdcon

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net ("Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:") wrote:

TIL about Weimar+, created as reaction to the Trump administration to combine the forces of (for now) France, Germany, Poland, Spain and United Kingdom to support Ukraine. This might very well result in military support independent of NATO too, see the closing statement: "We are therefore working together to strengthen our collective defence capabilities."

https://www.eeas.europa.eu/delegations/ukraine/statement-weimar-support-ukraine%5Fen

Thx to @mfierst for the info!

#EU #NATO #Ukraine #WeimarPlus

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
edgeofeurope ("Rob van Kan") wrote:

Elections are over, knife attacks in Germany and surrounding German speaking regions are over.
Sometimes you need to notice the little things.

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
Robinbannks ("Robin Bannks") wrote:

Lou.

b. March 2, 1942 Listen to my Lou Reed playlist on Amazon Music ... #loureed #birthday #classicrock #legends #music #musicsky #musiciansky #rockmusic

https://robinbannks.wordpress.com/2025/03/02/lou-2/

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
dogzilla@masto.deluma.biz wrote:

I’m sharing this because I want this headline to preserve the utter stupidity of this moment in American history

——

Texas Official Warns Against ‘Measles Parties’ Amid Growing Outbreak | WIRED https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/02/texas-official-warns-against-measles-parties-as-outbreak-keeps-growing/ https://www.wired.com/story/measles-parties-texas-outbreak/

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

‘During a cabinet meeting Wednesday, US Health Secretary and anti-vaccine advocate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. responded to a question about the outbreak, offering a variety of inaccurate information. Kennedy downplayed the outbreak, falsely claiming that "it's not unusual." But, this is an unusual year for measles in the US… the number of US measles cases this year has already surpassed the total case counts from eight of the previous 15 years. And it is only February.’

https://masto.deluma.biz/@dogzilla/114092709689601296

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
baekdal ("Thomas Baekdal") wrote:

I'm getting really tired of European politicians and press downplaying the European market and capabilities. Yes, it would be much better for everyone to have a good alliance and partnership with the US, but Europe is massive on its own.

sources: GDP (Wikipedia, Army size (Macrotrends, spending (government websites + estimated/wikipedia)

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

we were supposed to have learned this lesson by 1880:

“In the early 19th century, positions in the federal government were held at the pleasure of the president—a person could be fired at any time. The spoils system meant that jobs were used to support the American political parties.” - Wikipedia

“A nation cannot effectively serve its people if it is gutting and rebuilding the civil service every four years.” - David French, NYTimes 2 MAR 25

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

this is the harsh reality of our times:

“Even if Democrats sweep the midterms in 2026 and defeat the Republican candidate in 2028, that lesson will still hold. Our allies will know that our alliances are only as stable as the next presidential election — and that promises are only good for one term (at most).

It’s extraordinarily difficult — if not impossible — to build a sustainable defense strategy under those circumstances. It’s impossible to enact…”

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/02/opinion/trump-ukraine-zelensky-usaid.html?unlocked%5Farticle%5Fcode=1.004.9Qo0.0kJw7wxBFWBf&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:

I really wish this was run by someone else…

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/28/style/john-schwarz-peoples-union-economic-blackout.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
datacoop@social.data.coop wrote:

A few days ago, data.coop blocked Meta/Threads on our Mastodon instance.

The decision has been under way for some time. The instance (as everything else in data.coop) is owned and run by our members. In order to block, we needed to change our guidelines, which was a decision for our members. We see this as a strength, that it's the community making the decisions, not a single person or a group of few people.

Read more about the decision (in Danish) on our website: https://data.coop/blog/defederating-meta/