Notices by Ben Royce 🇺🇦 🇸🇩 (benroyce@mastodon.social)

#AI is going to kill us, but not in the typical scifi way: robots with laserguns or controlling nuclear bombs

That's too flashy. It will be far more mundane

It's going to kill us via the firehose of falsehood

The tricky part:

The problem is not making people believe lies

The problem is making us all so cynical, we disbelieve truth

In a world where nothing is trusted as true, only bias remains, and this will lead us down dark and familiar societal paths

1/x

The nature of #progress isn't about judging from perfection, it's about moving in the right direction

#SameSexMarriage is not legal in #SouthKorea, but applaud the country, because:

"South Korea officially recognises same-sex couples in national census"

https://www.thepinknews.com/2025/10/22/south-korea-same-sex-couples-national-census/

It's always a struggle. Every incremental victory should be cherished

Judge on moving forward or moving backward (and thus, excoriate backsliding countries like the #USA), not absolute position

#LGBT #LGBTQIA

“Defending Women from #Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government”

biological truth, darling science illiterates:

#intersex individuals have been observed in mammals, fish, reptiles, invertebrates, etc

anthropological truth: #trans people have existed in all societies, for all time

but

we can't live real truth

we have to fit simpleton brainfarts from the walnut sized craniums of bigoted pinheads, that "truth"

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2025/10/president-will-now-force-airlines-to-guess-passengers-genders-if-they-have-x-gender-markers/

#LGBT #LGBTQIA

In the natural world, what is the probably the efficient traveler?

Probably a fish like a salmon

Not a horse. Not a bird like a pigeon. And a mouse is surprisingly inefficient

And not a human

But

Put us on a bicycle and it seems we have the entire natural world beat *and* all of our machines 😲

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-human-on-a-bicycle-is-among-the-most-efficient-forms-of-travel-in-the/

#Trump killed funding for #PBS in July

With funding shortfalls, who will step up?

#BobRoss

30 of his #paintings will be auctioned by American Public #Television, 100% of proceeds benefiting APT and PBS

The first 3 paintings will be auctioned on November 11

Bob's paintings rarely hit the market

In fact, all 30 of the paintings up for auction haven't been seen since they were created on live #TV, they simply went into storage

🌲 Happy Little Trees 🌲

https://www.npr.org/2025/10/08/nx-s1-5566744/bob-ross-paintings-auction-public-media

#Art #Painting

The world is a confusing place. You do what people want and they aren't satisfied 😂

"#Cholera outbreak worsens amid conflict in #Sudan"

"Across the country, millions are struggling to access clean water, sanitation, and healthcare, leaving them increasingly vulnerable to preventable illnesses such as cholera and #dengue fever. Of the over 7.4 million internally displaced people, more than 54% are women and girls. As of 13th October 2025, the Federal Ministry of Health reported 120,496 cholera cases and 3,368 deaths nationwide"

https://www.care.org/media-and-press/cholera-outbreak-worsens-amid-conflict-in-sudan/

💔 🇸🇩

But really, who are we to judge?

For our lives as well are often spent in pursuit of the virtual instead of the real

"...

You’re not making art, you’re making disgusting, over-processed hotdogs out of the lives of human beings, out of the history of art and music, and then shoving them down someone else’s throat hoping they’ll give you a little thumbs up and like it. Gross.

..."

3/4

#ZeldaWilliams #RobinWilliams #AI

"...

To watch the legacies of real people be condensed down to ‘this vaguely looks and sounds like them so that’s enough’, just so other people can churn out horrible #TikTok slop puppeteering them is maddening.

..."

2/4

#ZeldaWilliams #RobinWilliams #AI

#AI #ZeldaWilliams

"...

And for the love of EVERYTHING, stop calling it ‘the future,’ #AI is just badly recycling and regurgitating the past to be re-consumed. You are taking in the Human Centipede of content, and from the very very end of the line, all while the folks at the front laugh and laugh, consume and consume."

4/4

- #ZeldaWilliams, #RobinWilliams' daugther

👏 👏 👏

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/oct/07/robin-williams-daughter-zelda-hits-out-at-ai-generated-videos-of-her-dead-father

https://www.instagram.com/zeldawilliams/

"Please, just stop sending me #AI videos of Dad. Stop believing I wanna see it or that I’ll understand, I don’t and I won’t. If you’re just trying to troll me, I’ve seen way worse, I’ll restrict and move on. But please, if you’ve got any decency, just stop doing this to him and to me, to everyone even, full stop. It’s dumb, it’s a waste of time and energy, and believe me, it’s NOT what he’d want.

..."

1/4

#ZeldaWilliams #RobinWilliams

@tomjennings

what the holy fuck?

also isn't "Erewhon" a dystopian novel where people are punished for not being healthy?

this is a real company?

#DianeKeaton has passed

#RIP

😔

#Lifegoals:

You win an illustrious prize

But you have no idea

Because you're in #digitaldetox and completely unreachable

'Jeffrey Bluestone, a friend of Ramsdell’s and co-founder of the lab, said the researcher deserves credit but he can’t reach him, either.

“I have been trying to get a hold of him myself. I think he may be backpacking in the backcountry in #Idaho,” Bluestone told AFP.'

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/oct/07/nobel-committee-unable-to-reach-medicine-prize-winner-hiking-off-grid

#Nobel #NobelPrize #Medicine

@irelephant

you're replying to a post in which it is demonstrated that a suspension from #bluesky affects #blacksky

to ignore that, and yet still say what you just said, is rather cultish of you

so, ironic indeed

am i a cultist for championing #mastodon over bluesky?

i can be suspended from your server, calckey.world

doesn't affect my reach with other servers:

the #fediverse is truly #decentralized

meanwhile, i ask you to look at the post above again

because #reality is not a cult

@irelephant

great!

i love how you repeat the cultish devotion to promise over reality

truly wonderful

#bluesky is centralized. not technologically, but in implementation

and yet it is your feverish irrational devotion to "maybe someday!" over the simple reality that true #decentralization is already here, for years, on #mastodon/ #fediverse

"but i got it working!"

yes, and i implemented #reddit's code and i'm running a clone of reddit so reddit is not centralized! gotcha!

🤦

cultists

More #Bluesky #drama for you

Someone was suspended

Death threats? Plain criticism? I didn't investigate

But:

The suspension affects #Blacksky as well

All this talk about the *promise* of #decentralization

But that is not the reality

Cultists buy the promise and ignore the reality

Come to #Mastodon / #Fediverse

Oh we have drama too

Some instance suspend out of capricious bullshit, a Spanish Inquisition

But you still have reach:

We are truly #decentralized

https://bsky.app/profile/gregpak.net/post/3m2htgspjkc26

"Just yesterday, someone told me to speak less about the war. They said Germans are tired of it. But last night, Russian #drones flew over #Munich airport.

So I ask you: do you think today it is acceptable to talk about the war?

In #Ukraine, there were thousands of #women who were smarter, more talented, and better than me. They should stand on this stage today. But #Russia killed them. Some are now in captivity..."

1/2

#UkraineWar #Germany #Europe #Deutschland