Notices by Jeff Miller (orange hatband) (jmeowmeow@hachyderm.io)

@inthehands Perhaps the language of stage magic and mentalist cold readings is appropriate for distinguishing the play to the audience from the content and rhythm of the interactions, and the use of LLMs as instruments.

I have trouble seeing beyond the terrible synergy of the financial bubble and the motivated reasoning of the boosters to the genuine positive applications and the real costs and limits.

Working with conversational support and workflow agents before the bubble, I could see that there were really good ways to use them, "everybody wins" ways, but a temptation to cheap out on creating the right interaction context for that case.

@skinnylatte Benioff talks over his execs at an all-hands, doesn't respect his team. Can't turn off the salesman evangelist personality.

@thomasfuchs CVS was pretty efficient in Seattle* as well. Have a restful post-shot day. (I was tired and cranky after mind)

*CVS picked up the pieces after Rite Aid overreached by acquiring regional chain Bartells.

@skinnylatte @darius (takes note of Simurgh) I have a friend who lives near Emeryville, though our regular stops are Arizmendi, Café Colucci, and Rudy's Can't Fail.

@skinnylatte <3 "What happens to people when computers happen to them?"

@skinnylatte I endorse all of these fine beverages.

@skinnylatte See the Elvis Presley x Richard Nixon picture for another example. Elvis wanted to join the predecessor of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elvis_%26_Nixon

@skinnylatte There is a big India Day festival in downtown Seattle today.

@skinnylatte "This is all just a long-winded way of saying that while your current job, and healthcare, depends on building the Torment Nexus, your best bet might be to start thinking of fields that don’t require building the Torment Nexus to earn a living."

unfortunately my other field was astronomy

@thomasfuchs synergistic damage to the US economy and research sectors, so: no?

@thomasfuchs Improved jacket, for sure.

@skinnylatte I was in ops behind Microsoft's enterprise chatbot offering, and it seemed like a few business customers did very well using the chatbot as a FAQ responder and context gatherer to unburden and assist human support staff.

I fear SF's city government facts bot may not be well enough supervised, but my e-gov insider friend departed some years ago.

@skinnylatte Endemic in rodents

@inthehands Discoverable UI is so powerful.

@inthehands I had a terrible usability experience with the iPhone my first time, though my point of comparison was the HTC Dream.

Mostly my feeling was that the iPhone touchscreen was impossibly awkward for a person with fingertips of my size.

A couple years later, Google's employee holiday gift was a touchscreen phone. And that was the last time I had a phone with a real keyboard.

Touchscreen controls let the designer do everything in software, but they also got us autocomplete as a necessity, and hinder the usability advantages of muscle memory.

@thomasfuchs Appreciation for sharing the Weather Channel report format revival. And it detected my location by IP address!

My own weather report revival project is an homage to Tamsin Bowles' Weatherpixie, at https://pixiereport.com/ .

Hope you're staying cool.

@skinnylatte wow, no kidding on the wind.

https://pixiereport.com/metar?location=KMRY

Wind: from the WSW (250 degrees) at 14 MPH (12 KT) gusting to 26 MPH (23 KT)

And even breezier at SFO today.

https://pixiereport.com/metar?location=KSFO

Wind: from the W (270 degrees) at 30 MPH (26 KT) gusting to 45 MPH (39 KT)

@inthehands Original from @sarahtaber https://mastodon.online/@sarahtaber/114699899186653035

@inthehands The financial bubble around generative model technology is pretty much the primary feature I see.

Since there's current value to repackaging any effort around the bubble's hot buzzwords, it makes it that much harder to understand what any given technological effort is doing.

@skinnylatte "Chi Pants" had a central gusset patch rather than a central seam, more robust for squatting and stretching.

The original company doesn't seem to be in business, but "Dash Hemp" of Santa Cruz advertises pants of that design.

Maybe a fan of the original would have a recommendation.