Mastodon Feed: Posts

slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:

TFW you have exactly the set of Mastodon followers you deserve.

Boosted by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
fugueish@wandering.shop ("Chris Palmer") wrote:

https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/women-jobs-and-charlie-kirk

Boosted by db@social.lol ("David Bushell 🪡"):
vale@fedi.vale.rocks ("Vale") wrote:

Generative AI output has passed the point of being distinguishable, and I’m saying that as someone fairly in the know. I can no longer discern AI content generated by cutting-edge models from other media.

Here are some thoughts regarding that.

https://vale.rocks/posts/detecting-ai

#ArtificialIntelligence #AI #LLMs

Boosted by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
jonty@chaos.social ("Jonty Wareing") wrote:

This is real and I need to have a lie down

slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:

I don't know who needs to hear this, but the only statistically defensible use for Mastodon polls is jokes. Everything else is presumptively an exercise in confirmation biases.

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

The irony of Jimmy Kimmel being censored by the same sort of people who loved him on The Man Show

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

It is, of course, utterly fitting that the mascot of ABC's parent company is a mouse, the rodent that symbolizes cowardice and timidity.

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

Gilligan's Island - hardly the first thing that comes to mind when talking about edgy social commentary - named the shipwrecked boat the "Minnow" as a direct dig at then-FCC chair Newton Minow. Minow had famously referred to TV programming as a "vast wasteland", and this was their way of thumbing their nose at him.

Someone needs to name something similarly small and feckless after (current FCC chair and comedy critic) Brendan Carr.

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

It would be disturbing enough if Kimmel's show had been pulled (at the FCC's behest, no less) for speaking ill of Charlie Kirk. But the monologue wasn't even about Kirk. It was about the hypocrisy and opportunism of those using Kirk's murder to advance a right-wing narrative.

Comedy can be a sharp weapon, but this was, frankly, hardly the stuff of Lenny Bruce.

We are living in very dangerous times.

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

“She hadn’t forgotten all her military training; one point she certainly recalled being taught was that anything that looked like an outrageous coincidence was probably enemy action.”

— The Hydrogen Sonata (Culture Book 9) by Iain M. Banks
https://a.co/8oHp8yC

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

With a few exceptions (mostly towers atop downtown switching offices in populated areas), no one was trying to make any of this utilitarian communications infrastructure *beautiful*. It was form strictly following function, built to be reliable and rugged.

But there was, I think, quite a bit of beauty to find in it. I wonder if we'll look at our current neighborhood cellular towers, now often regarded as a visual blight, the same way decades after they're (inevitably) also gone.

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

The San Jose Oak Hill Tower is unique in a number of ways. This particular concrete brutalist design appears not to have been exactly replicated elsewhere; it was site-specific. It sits atop an underground switching center (that was partly used for a military contract), which explains the relatively hardened design.

Today the underground switch is still there, owned by AT&T, but the tower space is leased to land mobile and cellular providers. The old horn antennas at top are disconnected

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

For much of the 20th century, the backbone of the AT&T "Long Lines" long distance telephone network consisted primarily of terrestrial microwave links (rather than copper or fiber cables). Towers with distinctive KS-15676 "horn" antennas could be seen on hilltops and atop switching center buildings across the US; they were simply part of the American landscape.

Most of the relay towers were simple steel structures. This brutalist concrete platform in San Jose was, I believe, of a unique design.

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

Captured with the Rodenstock 50mm/4.0 HR Digaron-W lens (@ f/4.5) on a Cambo WRS-1600 camera (with about 15mm of vertical shift to preserve the geometry), the Phase One IQ4-150 back (@ ISO 50) in dual exposure mode (which preserves a couple stops of additional dynamic range into the shadows).

The tower's shape is irregular; it tapers slightly.

The wide angle and panoramic orientation give a bit of context, alone on a hill (which is being rapidly encroached by adjacent residential development).

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

AT&T Long Lines "Oak Hill" Tower, San Jose. CA. 2021.

All the pixels, none of the per-minute long distance charges, at https://www.flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/51261791084

#photography

Boosted by adam@social.lol ("Adam"):
jason@social.lol ("//Jason") wrote:

2020: Block all the trackers!

2025: Check out the cool new AI browser I use!

🤦‍♂️

Boosted by jwz:
kenwhite.bsky.social@bsky.brid.gy ("Stand With Chicago Hat") wrote:

And yes, I am going to keep shitting on Ezra Klein until one of us is dead, and depending on fate and cosmology, probably after that. It’s Ezra’s obligation to work to find common ground with me.

Boosted by jwz:
bulletsweetp@mastodon.world ("ijw") wrote:

@SafeStreetRebel

Meanwhile, NYT: "beloved highway"

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

Hot take but I think the orange iPhone Pro looks sick. It's the coolest thing Apples done in a while.

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

#ios26 feels like a whole-lotta fluff and not much substance. I've yet to come across a change made that I feel is an improvement. And I love a new OS! This is change for the the sake of. #LiquidGlass

Boosted by denschub@schub.social ("Dennis Schubert"):
rail@flufftech.net ("rail 🦊") wrote:

i am not getting a better timed shot in this lifetime

honestly what the fuck what are the odds of catching this

#photography #trainspotting

NfNitLoop ("Cody Casterline 🏳️‍🌈") wrote:

Before you come for me with your pitchforks:

Dependency Injection? Good!

Dependency Injection Frameworks, however, always seem to make the same awful tradeoffs that mean you're left debugging some surprising/unexpected/nondeterministic behavior at runtime that you could have just specified explicitly at compile-time.

NfNitLoop ("Cody Casterline 🏳️‍🌈") wrote:

Dependency Injection Framework
→
D.I.F.
→
Die In (a) Fire

Coincidence? Well, yes. But still...

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

baaaaaa…

(root veggies & lamb)

Boosted by ChrisWere@toot.wales ("Chris Werewolf ⁂🐧🌱☕ 🎃💀🕸🐺"):
chriswere.wales@rss-parrot.net ("🦜 ChrisWere.Wales") wrote:

Starmer’s AI gamble risks Labour’s future

chriswere.wales/posts/starmer’s-ai-gamble-risks-labour’s-future.html

Labour is continuing to punch itself in the face over its approach to artificial intelligence. The party has abandoned both its climate pledges and its commitment to public safety as Prime Minister Keir Starmer stupidly embraces the tech industry’s AI…

Boosted by jwz:
workingclasshistory ("Working Class History") wrote:

#OtD 17 Sep 1849 abolitionist Harriet Tubman and her brothers escaped from slavery. Her brothers decided to go back, forcing Harriet to do the same. But shortly after, Harriet Tubman escaped again, then helped rescue hundreds more enslaved people https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/8941/harriet-tubman-escapes-slavery

Boosted by jwz:
SafeStreetRebel@sfba.social ("Safe Street Rebel") wrote:

Four years ago, SSR was started to make the great highway permanently car-free. Now, sunset dunes is one of SF's most popular parks. Like the embarcadero and central freeway removals, there may be more fights ahead, but we're not going back.

The recall shows a few things:
-Reactionary politics is inherently unsustainable; the recall-loving, pro-car base that engardio relied on to win in '22 immediately turned on him the minute he did his only visionary act
-Initial data indicates the recall—despite getting some prog engagement—was driven by conservative voters who refuse to acknowledge we live in a city and deny our climate emergency
-More D4 voters voted yes on prop K than yes on recall. This vote was not a referendum on the park

Boosted by jwz:
fatsam@mstdn.social ("Daniel Keys Moran") wrote:

There is no meaningful difference between Charlie Kirk and Charlie Manson. Neither of them killed people themselves. Both of them had targets they wanted dead.

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

♬️ DESIRE at DNA Lounge tonight: Wed Sep 17, 8pm!
https://www.dnalounge.com/calendar/2025/09-17.html?utm%5Fsource=sp%5Fma
#dnalounge #desire #johnnyjewel #synthpop #italodisco #livemusic #concert #sanfrancisco

Attachments:

• gifv: 0bb1560bb21a368f.mp4

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
kenwhite.bsky.social@bsky.brid.gy ("Stand With Chicago Hat") wrote:

There are two ways you can consume this: “Obama is a weakling who is tacitly endorsing Charlie Kirk because he’s not using the language and tone I would,” or “a professional communicator is making a point, I may not be the audience, and his primary aim may not be my personal emotional needs.”

RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:5masqigebv6augvgz62uko5i/post/3lyzr42jlt22a