Mastodon Feed: Posts

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

Celebrate your spiders on the 8th of October!

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/10/08/on-the-8th-of-october/

baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason") wrote:

Reading tech dudes enthuse about Sora , “it lets me feel like a TikTok creator”, just confirms to me that these shitbirds are simultaneously lazy as hell and have no taste.

(There’s literally zero barrier to entry for becoming a TikTok creator.)

Boosted by fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻"):
robb@social.lol ("Robb Knight") wrote:

I don’t like the person I become when I have really bad internet

∞ https://rknight.me/notes/202510081449/

Boosted by fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻"):
404mediaco ("404 Media") wrote:

Podcast: We talk all about Sora 2, Apple and Google removing ICE-spotting apps, and a massive update to our Flock reporting.

🔗 https://www.404media.co/podcast-the-final-boss-of-ai-slop/

Boosted by db@social.lol ("David Bushell 👻"):
codepo8@toot.cafe ("Chris Heilmann") wrote:

Abandonware of the web: do you know that there is an HTML tables API?
https://christianheilmann.com/2025/10/08/abandonware-of-the-web-do-you-know-that-there-is-an-html-tables-api/

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

The Sharpie S-Gel click-top pen.

Beautiful indigo blue ink that glides across the paper with just the right amount of scrape. Satisfying clicky top— decent resistance and a pleasant click sound.

#WellDesignedThings

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

Wow, it's almost as if this is an ill-advised revenge prosecution at the behest of an irrational demented rage addict

https://abcnews.go.com/US/central-witness-undermines-case-james-comey-prosecutors-concluded/story?id=126311648

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
SeanCasten ("Sean Casten") wrote:

The good news is global. The bad news is domestic as the US is increasingly failing to keep up with the cheap energy transition. Committing to run an economy based on resource extraction is a proven way to get your ass kicked. We need to do better.

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

I wonder if @stilgherrian has been following this story:

"The operation started in Australia as a beta test, before expanding to Europe, South America, and other parts of the world, sweeping up messages from cartels to biker gangs to hitmen to money launderers."

https://www.404media.co/cocaine-in-private-jets-and-sex-toys-what-the-fbi-found-on-its-secretly-backdoored-chat-app/?ref=daily-stories-newsletter

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

Even the “respectable” thought leaders on the Right are clearly not arguing from within a consensus that America should exist as a pluralistic democracy. To Caldwell, that’s a dangerous pipe dream, lacking the necessary national cohesion; and more importantly, it’s an affront to the “natural” order.

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

Important to note that Christopher Caldwell, the guy who gets to defend Hegseth’s rabidly bigoted, sexist speech in the New York Times, wrote a whole book about how the Civil Rights Act constitutes an illegitimate departure from the Constitution.

So, of course he is on board with imposing white male domination.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/07/opinion/pete-hegseth-speech-dei.html?smid=tw-share

Boosted by jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein"):
SeanCasten ("Sean Casten") wrote:

This is remarkable. The world added more solar and wind capacity in 2024 than we added demand. 100% of demand growth PLUS 9% to retire dirtier sources. Cheap energy keeps winning. https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/global-electricity-mid-year-insights-2025/

db@social.lol ("David Bushell 👻") wrote:

Every day the same shit often multiple times a day. You won't win, Microsoft!

Boosted by ChrisWere@toot.wales ("Chris Werewolf ⁂🐧🌱☕ 🎃💀🕸🐺"):
ChrisWere@toot.wales ("Chris Werewolf ⁂🐧🌱☕ 🎃💀🕸🐺") wrote:

Slightly ranty post of Discord's data leak, the online safety act, and compulsory IDs in the UK.
https://chriswere.wales/posts/discord-users-are-first-victims-of-uks-online-safety-act.html

Boosted by baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason"):
mhoye ("mhoye (temporarily spooky)") wrote:

In 2022 Tianyi Zhang demonstrated an interactive debugger and testing framework for machine learning models: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LekgPnRt1g

Earlier this month Horace He and colleagues demonstrated that the nondeterminism in ML models is a solvable problem:

https://thinkingmachines.ai/blog/defeating-nondeterminism-in-llm-inference/

(The culprit is floating point error plus gpu core scheduling races.)

Prediction: combining these techniques is going to put the entire (stupid, embarrassing, humiliating) idea of prompt engineering behind us for good.

baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason") wrote:

“Copilot in Excel: Understanding the Limitations - Office Watch”

https://office-watch.com/2025/facts-are-slippery-copilot-excel/

This isn't great.

Boosted by kornel ("Kornel"):
DamonCrowley@mindly.social wrote:

Last night's Supermoon rising over Yosemite National Park 🌕 💦

While it looks otherworldly, this effect was achieved through a long-exposure composite and careful alignment of natural light. A breathtaking example of creative astrophotography meeting perfect timing.

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

This new version of the Monster Mash is kinda scary.

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/10/08/pretty-damn-scary/

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/4Iu3gJ5Kirk

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

So now Trump is making extortionate demands of our universities. Stay strong! Except for Texas, which is ready to cave already.

https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/10/08/youre-gonna-give-us-what-we-want-or-else/

Boosted by baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason"):
glyph ("Glyph") wrote:

it doesn't actually work; a vibe-coded framework is never going to help structure your systems anywhere near as well as one that is the result of human judgement and discernment, even one with a hefty pile of legacy junk associated with it. but management is not going to be able to see this; structurally, managers see the benefits and have a much harder time measuring or even perceiving the costs

Boosted by baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason"):
glyph ("Glyph") wrote:

but the scary part of this article is the bit where vibe coding *reads* to corporate interests as an alternative to open source, in that you can externalize your infrastructure development and maintenance costs onto OpenAI's VC investors instead. slightly higher overhead per developer, but no need to deal with pesky human beings who might start to agitate for more resources, so the reduction in hassle is worth the cost

Boosted by baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason"):
glyph ("Glyph") wrote:

corporations have been reluctant to "give back" because while it can produce good press, if you start "giving back" to the "community" too much, then the cost savings you got from externalizing your complement starts to erode; if you're going to give money to some tech, might as well own it

baldur@toot.cafe ("Baldur Bjarnason") wrote:

“Dewaffling the tech industry | deadSimpleTech”

https://deadsimpletech.com/blog/dewaffling%5Ftech

> A lot of people in tech think that, even if they don't agree with the ideas, there are no harms associated with the free discussion of race science, eugenics, and the benefits of dictatorship and fascism

It’s early yet, but I feel pretty confident this is going to be the best thing I read today

Gargron ("Eugen Rochko") wrote:

Grasmere.

📷 Pentax KX
🎞️ Kodak Portra 400
🔭 Pentax M 50mm/1.7
⚗️ Come Through Lab

#BelieveInFilm #FilmPhotography #AnalogPhotography #35mm #LakeDistrict #TheLakes #Cumbria

Mastodon wrote:

We’re thrilled to be bringing you a upcoming feature to help you find your people on Mastodon: Packs. (Or something… we’re still figuring out the name.)
As always, we want to build this important feature for the community WITH the community.
Read this blog post about our approach and let us know what you think!

https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2025/10/our-ideas-about-packs/

db@social.lol ("David Bushell 👻") wrote:

some of my best friends are LLMs

WhatsApp more like SlopsApp 😔

Boosted by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
waldo.net@bsky.brid.gy ("Waldo Jaquith") wrote:

The second news story was Deloitte charging the Australian government $290k for a report that was generated by an LLM, full of nonsense. These consulting firms aren't just *talking* about using AI in lieu of having smart people research and think hard—they're actually doing it.

Deloitte to partially refund A...

Boosted by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
alcinnz@floss.social wrote:

Visual Regression Testing for External URLs With Playwright - Matthias Ott:
https://matthiasott.com/notes/visual-regression-testing-for-external-urls-with-playwright

Boosted by adam@social.lol ("Adam"):
mijo@social.lol ("L. Carlos Pando :prami:") wrote:

Este post de Nick Simson habla de cómo ha ido agregando detalles únicos a su blog, pequeños easter eggs y cosas ocultas. Me encanta porque yo hago exactamente lo mismo con mi blog.
—
Make yourself smile
https://nicksimson.com//notes/2025-10-04-make-yourself-smile.html

Boosted by adam@social.lol ("Adam"):
lmorchard@masto.hackers.town ("Les Orchard") wrote:

The thing that was frustrating me to watch on Twitter is frustrating me again on Bluesky.

Folks pouring so much effort into a thing they seem to think is theirs and absolutely never will be. Doesn't matter how much noise or how many petitions or how many shitposts.

You can't own a social network by just occupying it and emanating presence and making noise. You are *ballast*, packing peanuts, slight impulses on a metrics dashboard. They'll do it without you

https://mastodon.social/@timberwraith/115335296048643030