Notices by Dan Hulton (danhulton@hachyderm.io)

@thomasfuchs Every time I feel like I can just do away with my big hairy Ansible scripts with something simpler, it only works for so long, before I need to add "a small Ansible wrapper" to it, just for convenience/security/etc.

Fast-forward a year and I have big hairy Ansible scripts again and I have learned NOTHING.

@thomasfuchs Depending on the conservative:

Teenage girl: Now, I know everyone always wants to rush to put labels on things, but in many cultures, this young lady would be a fully-mature adult, able to date any man of any age she chooses!

@inthehands @joby @suzannealdrich I'm torn on this, because I've known some people I would normally call very good people who were also very religious, and I want to coexist in harmony, too. (1/4)

@thomasfuchs Rephrasing a different way - your involvement doesn't stop with your vote. Even after the election, you have to keep calling, campaigning, raising awareness, protesting if need be, and more.

So cast your vote for the candidate that gives you the best chance of accomplishing something with that next four years of work!

@zspencer @thomasfuchs Oh, we don't need to use "weird." "Creepy" is RIGHT THERE, and it's accurate, and there's nobody good out there self-identifying as such!

I'm keeping "weird" for us, but "creepy", that they can have!

@thomasfuchs Sure, but I mean there's what happens and what he's saying. Yeah, it may go the way of a managed democracy before going directly into authoritarianism, but I don't think that's what he's saying on stage there.

I realize I'm splitting hairs at this point, though, like they're both objectively awful, and anyone who interprets what he said as EITHER of these things and thinks "now there's a guy I'd give my last useful vote to" is a dangerous idiot.

@thomasfuchs I feel like that's an optimistic take on what he's saying there.

But also, it's WAY too nuanced. Like "you still can vote, but you won't have to, because I'll make sure that votes are just for show, and I'll make sure the good choices are made regardless", that's asking a lot of people to read that into what he said.

"You won't have to vote anymore because there won't BE voting anymore because I'm just going to assume direct control" is a MUCH more direct and easier translation.

@thomasfuchs I'd go further and say THE START of Democracy is about electing the best person. You have to keep engaged after that and be aware of issues, contact your representatives, protest and otherwise bring pressure to bear, etc.

And THAT should inform who you vote for. Like you say, there's no perfect candidate, so ultimately you're trying to select the best OPPONENT to have for the next four years. Who do you have the best chance of winning the important fights against?

@thomasfuchs At this point, I don't think anything matters to them anymore. Being loyal matters more than who you're being loyal TO.

ESPECIALLY given that the right-wing media has been preparing heavily for this by downplaying his actions, downplaying the charges, questioning the integrity of the judge, etc.

It's like a version of the narcissist's prayer: "He didn't do it, but if he did, it wasn't so bad, and if it was, who he did it to wasn't important, and if they were, it had to be done."

@thomasfuchs The paint spurting viscerally like blood was so weirdly intensely off-putting.

I feel like if it had been ACTUAL blood, it would have registered as more cartooney and less disturbing.

@thomasfuchs Yeah, but in realtime at a high resolution at a high framerate against complex backgrounds (that I'm pretty sure don't actually have to be static) without ugly "bleed" from said backgrounds?

I know "the same capabilities, only better" isn't really sexy, but it's much MUCH better, and that's still very impressive (at least to me)!

@thomasfuchs I feel like Apple is still using the older (correct) definition of AI, the one that includes ML models and isn't just referring to LLMs. And given that definition, they're pretty correct! This kind of capability has been largely driven by ML models for years -- when you noticed it getting really good, that's when ML models were brought to bear. (1/2)

@thomasfuchs It's just... It's just fascism. It's not even anything new, it's JUST fascism. He's not some big-brain thinker, he's just parroting ideas that failed a century ago, and these dumbshits are eating it up.

Unbelievable.

@thomasfuchs "Conflicting opinions and worldviews" are fine if your conflict is around different ways to end the genocide and which is the better option.

If the conflict is around "are you really sure there's a genocide in the first place?", that person is a fascist or an idiot (but I repeat myself) and ABSOLUTELY deserves to be blocked.

@thomasfuchs There's no way NVIDIA is worth its current valuation. If I had money to play around with, it might be fun to short them, except that I get the feeling that the fallout of all these AI companies going bust isn't going to be anything to ultimately celebrate.

When this bubble pops, it's going to take a good chunk of the "Oh thank god, the economy is finally starting to turn around" sentiment with it, and of course it's not going to be the rich that truly suffer to try to correct it.

@thomasfuchs I tend to think of technical debt as very specific non-optimal choices -- that you expect to have to revisit later at a cost -- in order to make a deadline deemed to be more important than the time loss. It's a deliberate trade-off.

The intent is important. Sloppy programming or poor planning is something else entirely.

@thomasfuchs There's always gonna be people who latch onto a brand as an identity. You criticize the brand, you're criticizing THEM. Doesn't leave a lot of room for healthy dialogue and growth.

But then again, this is true of political parties, politicians, religions, artists, athletes, countries, states, towns, fuckin... Neighborhoods, streets, BUILDINGS.

Some people are desperate to define themselves by something other than themselves.

@thomasfuchs Yeah, and if you put all your eggs in the basket of "haha, Starship go boom," when it stops going boom (and they have a pretty good track record there of pushing hard in research mode, but being reliable on delivery), you lose your credibility to criticize.

@thomasfuchs We should start a Cassandra club. Bonus points if you were out there wearing a mask while people were still laughing at the idea of masks, and extra bonus points if you're still wearing a mask now that people have gone back to laughing at the idea of masks.

@thomasfuchs You can't get filthy stinking rich from "helping society". You CAN get filthy stinking rich from conning people about prime number apes, though.

And if you owned a vast collection of media companies and prioritized getting filthy stinking rich (but I repeat myself), which would you demand your staff write about?