Mastodon Feed: Posts

mattblaze@federate.social ("Matt Blaze") wrote:

Very long lenses like the 400mm, with their narrow field of view, are essential for some compositions (such as this one), but I find I only rarely actually use them. In fact, the longest lens I have for my main medium format camera system is 180mm (which yields the 35mm equivalent view of about a 120mm), and I hardly ever use even that for the most of the photography I do.

For wildlife photographers, on the other hand, 400mm is practically a wide angle.

mattblaze@federate.social ("Matt Blaze") wrote:

This was captured with a DSLR and a 400mm lens, which contributed to the compressed perspective. The conductor boarding the leftmost train is essential to the composition, I think.

Ewing, NJ ("West Trenton") is the last stop on SEPTA's commuter trains from Philadelphia on the former Reading Railroad's line to northern NJ. CSX freight trains still use the tracks north of the station, beyond the end of the overhead electrified wiring used for passenger service.

mattblaze@federate.social ("Matt Blaze") wrote:

Commuter Trains, Ewing (West Trenton), NJ, 2010.

All the pixels, no ticket required, at https://www.flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/4377309058

#photography

fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:

My friend Rob made this and was so generous to gift it to me. #StarWars #DarthVader

pzmyers@freethought.online ("pzmyers 🕷") wrote:

I just had a nostalgia rush.

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/07/06/they-dont-make-em-like-this-anymore/

Boosted by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
LauraJG@deacon.social ("Laura G, Sassy 70’s") wrote:

Utagawa Hiroshige (Japanese, 1797–1858). New Year's Eve Foxfires at the Changing Tree, Oji, No. 118 from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo, 9th month of 1857. Woodblock print, sheet: 14 3/16 x 9 1/4 in. (36.0 x 23.5 cm); image: 13 3/8 x 8 3/4 in. (34.0 x 22.2 cm), this impression in the collection of the Brooklyn Museum. #arthistory #asianart #woodblock #woodblockprint #printmaking

From the museum: “In the late 1850s, while Japanese color prints were dominated by themes of the fantastic, Hiroshige emphasized the realities of the observed world in his work. However, here he has ventured into the world of spirits. It was believed that on New Year's Eve all the foxes of the surrounding provinces would gather at a particular tree near Oji Inari Shrine, the headquarters of the regional cult of the god Inari. There the foxes would change their dress for a visit to the shrine, where they would be given orders for the coming year. On the way, the animals would emit distinctive flames by which local farmers were able to predict the crops of the coming year.”

pzmyers@freethought.online ("pzmyers 🕷") wrote:

Are you arachnophobic? Take the quiz!

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/07/06/im-arachnophobic/

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
torgo.com@bsky.brid.gy ("Daniel Appelquist") wrote:

Elon Musk does not get a redemption arc. He's done.

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

Revealed: the far-right, antisemitic men’s club network spreading across US | https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/05/far-right-mens-clubs-old-glory

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
Adrenochrome ("Claudia Zahn") wrote:

💗😽Every year, in #Minneapolis, cat people tour their neighbourhood to see each other's cats!

#Cat #Cats #CatsOfMastodon #CatsOfFediverse #Caturday #EveryDayIsCaturday

Attachments:

• video: 9f65232979662e7f.mp4

Boosted by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
Unixbigot@aus.social ("Kit Bashir") wrote:

Every Mad Engineer (it’s like Mad Science, only it works) knows that her next project should always justify a new tool purchase. I always wanted a set of hydrospanners, so—surprise!—i’ve fitted a repulsorlift drive to your wheelchair. Lift control on the left, throttle on the right. Keep it under a hundred for the first five hours runtime. Happy birthday, darling.

#Tootfic #MicroFiction #PowerOnStoryToot

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
wdlindsy@toad.social ("William Lindsey :toad:") wrote:

"The United States government is no longer able to protect us from real hazards, such as flash floods, because it’s shifting funds to fake hazards, such as a non-existent immigrant crime wave.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has been stripped down so much it can barely respond to emergencies, yet it’s funding detention centers such as 'Alligator Alcatraz' in the Florida Everglades."

~ Robert Reich

#Trump #DOGE #NWS #NOAA #Texas #FEMA
/9

https://robertreich.substack.com/p/sunday-thought-a-national-reckoning

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
rooktallon@dragonscave.space ("Rook") wrote:

Anyone out there who plays doom using the Brutal Doom mod can guide me on how to get it to work with the Steam version of Doom?

Boosted by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
anji@metalhead.club ("Matthijs De Smedt") wrote:

Beautiful composition and performance. And I’ve never seen this kind of “hurdy-gurdy acoustic guitar”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gT88vv28jdQ&feature=youtu.be

cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen") wrote:

But also... in a better world there would be a community around computer "normies". There'd be support instead of relentless economic pressure. Instead we just let Microsoft or Apple bully us around in the name of shareholder value and executive bonuses. And society praises these "geniuses" for boiling the oceans to give us wrong answers to known questions.

cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen") wrote:

My PC at home is a refurbished computer I bought for $200 back in 2019, so it was already "outdated" when I got it. Nobody is pressuring me to upgrade.

My mother-in-law bought a brand new computer a year after that, and now Microsoft tells her it won't run Windows 11.

I know I'm coasting on the dregs of our consumerist, throw away society, but it's just so striking how much you can save with a little knowledge and a little time.

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
matthew_d_green@ioc.exchange ("Matthew Green") wrote:

This battle will keep playing out over and over again until they achieve something that their own citizens have made it clear they don’t want. https://www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-privacy-security/the-eu-wants-to-decrypt-your-private-data-by-2030

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
bert_hubert@eupolicy.social ("bert hubert 🇺🇦🇪🇺🇺🇦") wrote:

The attempts by law enforcement & governments to subvert end-to-end encryption are ongoing. The European Commission is going to spend a year thinking about their new "Roadmap for law enforcement access to data", and they are (genuinely) asking for people to join their expert group to help. Here I urge you to join that group (also because I can't): https://berthub.eu/articles/posts/possible-end-to-end-to-end-come-help/

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
fifonetworks@infosec.exchange ("Bob Young") wrote:

Adobe is now processing all your PDFs in the cloud, by default. The setting to “Enable generative AI features in Acrobat” was on, and I didn’t know it until I opened a document and Adobe asked me if I wanted a document summary. It’s annoying to have to click “No,” so I opened settings to disable the prompt.

THE PROBLEM
I sign Non-Disclosure Agreements for many of my clients. Adobe is a potential leak of protected information. I don’t know what Adobe does with this information. I don’t know what they store, or for how long. I don’t know what country (or countries) the data is stored in. I don’t know what LLMs are trained with this data. And I don’t need to know. What I need to know is that they won’t use default opt-in as a legal excuse to wiretap my information.

I recommend that you check your Adobe settings on all devices, for all Adobe accounts.

#CallMeIfYouNeedMe #FIFONetworks

#cybersecurity

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
Nonya_Bidniss@infosec.exchange ("Nonya Bidniss :CIAverified:") wrote:

"'The fewer the number of weapons that are delivered to Ukraine, the closer the end of the special military operation,' the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. To be clear, by 'the end of the special military operation,' he means the defeat of Ukraine."

Trump, who now controls all 3 branches of the U.S. Govt through both intimidation & threats and complicity, and is rapidly turning the U.S. into a Putin-style police state, has always curried his master Putin's favor. He's a traitor, doing favors for our worst enemy while Putin laughs at him. Supplying Ukraine with everything it needs to be victorious in defending its territory against the Russian invasion would be in the U.S. national interest because Putin won't stop there. But we have a traitor in the White House.
#Ukraine #Russia #Trump
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/07/putin-trump-russia-ukraine/683414/?gift=3%5FisfPUpVHwKI0co1coCrM4q%5FjJ%5FLi6rSpACRc9ByIQ

Boosted by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
AverageDog ("Nils M Holm") wrote:

A few weeks ago I wondered what it takes to turn a small LISP-1 into a LISP-2. Turns out it takes just a few hours to get most things right, then some days to iron out a few subtleties, and then a couple of weeks to polish it into a piece of art.
MICRO COMMON LISP is a tiny, purely symbolic, microscopic subset of #CommonLISP. It runs in less than 64K bytes of memory, even on #DOS (tiny model) or CP/M. Here it is:
http://t3x.org/mcl/
#CPM #LISP

jscalzi@threads.net ("John Scalzi") wrote:

Tell me you're about to go mask off fascist without telling me you're about to go mask off fascist

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/04/openai-altman-july-4-zohran-mamdani.html

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

“The second lesson is that while ideas matter, expert ideas do not necessarily matter. Past fiscal debates have divided economists and policy wonks… This time around there was almost no debate: Wonks from across the political spectrum opposed the legislation. ... Even some of the authors of Mr. Trump’s first-term tax cuts were critics of the budget number gimmicks that went into this new law. None of them changed the outcome…”

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

“the lessons of this last round [are] all that much more crucial. Don’t get bogged down in details; focus on the idea behind the details. Don’t be overly timid; not everyone is going to be a winner, and getting past this is going to require raising taxes on more than just the top 1 percent. And as much as I hate to say it, don’t be too beholden to the wonks, though some of us are really pretty nice”

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/05/opinion/democrats-budget-bill-trump.html?unlocked%5Farticle%5Fcode=1.UU8.9Wa-.Ybnxw10O88D2&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

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

“The third lesson is that you can overcome opposition to a bill that delivers a direct loss to far more people — and a direct win for far fewer — than conventional wisdom would suggest is possible… unpopularity alone does not mean that Republicans made a mistake by passing it. Legislating requires hard choices and leadership... Nothing gets done if we live by short-term polling…”

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

“before Democrats — and hopefully some Republicans — even try to fix the damage, they should learn the lessons of how the Republicans got all this done…

The first lesson is that ideas really do matter. This legislation did not happen because the public or lobbyists were clamoring for it… Trump and congressional Republicans wanted it and were willing to overcome public disfavor and opposition from vested interests… oligarchy is the wrong lens through which to view this political moment...”

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

“Officials who use their public positions for private gain threaten the integrity of our most important institutions. Greed makes governments — at every level — less responsive, less efficient and less trustworthy from the perspective of the communities they serve.”

Justice Jackson

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

“Justices Jackson and Sotomayor are the only members of the court who have served as trial judges. In the last term, Justice Jackson repeatedly criticized the majority for undermining the authority of their colleagues on the front lines.

In the dissent that prompted Justice Barrett’s rebuke, she decried the majority’s “dismissive treatment of the solemn duties and responsibilities of the lower courts.””

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/05/us/supreme-court-ketanji-brown-jackson.html?unlocked%5Farticle%5Fcode=1.UU8.gj28.ZcP50QWJdAKi&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Boosted by jwz:
dnalounge@sfba.social ("DNA Lounge") wrote:

Drink special for After Life: Fine then, I will make my own political party, with blackjack and hookers -- bumbu rum, ginger, lime

Attachments:

• gifv: 41b3b7a9a76ad826.mp4

Boosted by ChrisWere@toot.wales ("Chris Were ⁂🐧🌱☕"):
pinkprius@chaos.social ("pinkprius [en]") wrote:

Average Mac Sufferer vs. Average Linux Enjoyer :fairydust: