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We would terrify

I’m not sure why that thing comes to my store, or where it takes that coffee, but I am sure it’s for someone or something else. I can recognize the bad temperament of an unpaid intern anywhere, and I can only hope whatever dark lord it serves is content with its beverage, for its sake and mine. I seem to be doing well so far.

Source: [WP] You are a barista in a 24 hour coffee shop. Every night at 3:33am a demon appears for the Dark Lord’s latte. : WritingPrompts

We have been of coffee service.

We will be of coffee service.

We would terrify Read More »

Trust google at your peril

It really is that simple: No one trusts Google. It has exhibited such poor understanding of what people want, need and will pay for that at this point, people are wary of investing in even its more popular products.

Source: Stadia died because no one trusts Google | TechCrunch

The wake-up call was when google killed google reader, but it was ignored by a lot of people cos it was a free service.

Then there was G Suite (Legacy Free). They got a lot of people to rely on google services and then proceeded to straight up betray them. People still didn’t care cos it was also “free service”.

But now with Stadia people will care cos the cost of this cancellation won’t be paid by google— they already wrote off the money. The cost will be borne by developers who trusted google with their games.

I’m somewhat safe as I do pay for some google services but I am looking for alternatives now. Microsoft is not a particularly viable option.

Trust google at your peril Read More »

Coders came up with NFTs

As a rule, the coders liked to code and make computers do new stuff, and the sysadmins liked to make sure said computers worked smoothly. Coders would eagerly explain that with some easily acquired new kit, they could revolutionise things for the business, while sysadmins would roll their eyes and ask how this would affect user management, or interoperability, or stability, or account management, or some other boring subject no-one wanted to hear about anymore.

Source: zwischenzugs

And for the past ten years coders have ruled the world and have broken it into ever smaller pieces for the marketers to be able to sell them to others.

Sysadmins still make sure to prevent coders from breaking organizations but we can only do so much.

Coders came up with NFTs Read More »

Cost 3.1 Billion in today’s USD, it did

Forget solidarity: the global south will not survive this century without climate justice. You in the west are talking about paper straws, we in the global south are talking about reparations.

Source: The west is ignoring Pakistan’s super-floods. Heed this warning: tomorrow it will be you | Fatima Bhutto | The Guardian

A clear example of flooding in this scale has already happened in California, of all places: The Great Flood of 1862:

  • Heavy rains over the preceding months.
  • Record amount of rain in a short period of time.
  • Knowledge from Native people was ignored. Their lore had passed down knowledge of such events.
  • Sacramento was underwater for three entire months after the storms causing the flooding passed, forcing a move of the state capital from Sacramento to San Francisco.

This is just one instance. The lack of infrastructure maintenance in the US will prove very, very costly. Just look at New Orleans.

The US should be bracing for a very watery future.

Cost 3.1 Billion in today’s USD, it did Read More »

They all evolve until you can text people on them.

Instagram’s co-founders, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger created a mobile social network based on visual storytelling. The impetus provided by the early photography-centric approach turned it into a fast-growing phenomenon. For Facebook, it was an existential threat. And it was worth spending nearly a billion dollars to own, control, and eventually subsume. And that’s precisely what Facebook has done.

Source: Instagram is dead – On my Om

As stated by Zawinky’s Law:

“Every program attempts to expand until it can read mail. Those programs which cannot so expand are replaced by ones which can.”

In the age of social media I suppose email is passé, so apps expand until they can do what every other social media app does

They all evolve until you can text people on them. Read More »

This livejournal page is a LOTR Heritage Post

What do we know about Tom Bombadil? He is fat and jolly and smiles all the time. He is friendly and gregarious and always ready to help travellers in distress.

Source: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil: km_515 — LiveJournal

Iarwain Ben-Adar, Oldest and Fatherless. It always cracks me up to see this post making the rounds again.

This livejournal page is a LOTR Heritage Post Read More »

A DALL-E, but for music

In short, TikTok virality isn’t great for sustained careers, but it does represent a monumental shift in what it means to make audio as an art.

Source: The Unlikely Odds of Making it Big on TikTok

The length of a tiktok video is perfect to have some audio as the carrier of an action within the video, but it is rarely the main thing to be consumed in the video itself.

How long before someone figures out how to create music via machine learning? Something may already exist that I’m not aware of.

A DALL-E, but for music Read More »

AFAIK this was accomplished

The new scheme uses names usually derived from the location of the interface in terms of hardware buses etc: eno1, wlp1s3. The idea was that this provides “Predictable Names”, though as it turns out the main thing that’s predictable about it is that calling it this will cause furious users to pop up disputing the appropriateness of that name. (Can we just skip all that here, please?)

Source: NetworkInterfaceNames – Debian Wiki

I lol’d

AFAIK this was accomplished Read More »

I’d pay money for this ish, too

Source: How I wish I could organize my thoughts

We are dying for something like this. Recently acquired an iPad Pro and we’re absolutely over the moon at how easy it is to take handwritten notes with it! Had a job interview and it was an absolute relief to not have the clacking of my keyboard be a distraction during the phone call. But dovetailing with the linked post, there is nothing out there that is open source that can even interface with the iOS Notes app, or any non-iOS applications that even try. Apple know they own this and it’s not because they’re good, but rather that no one else is even willing to try and compete.

There’s nothing out there, and I looked hard for a couple of days.

We’re willing to use closed source apps but it they do have interface with Nextcloud for file sync, or at least DAV. But yeah there’s nothing out there. That’s even before we bring up file compatibility. I feel this is something Mozilla could do but they’re sucking on that google dick too hard to care.

Most devs truly think you carry your laptop with you everywhere you go and can just bust it out to take notes and… no, that’s not how it works for people who aren’t in the IT sector full time.

But no, most developers out there would rather figure out how to sell your data to facebook and google because a problem like this is Too Hard™.

I’d pay money for this ish, too Read More »

♪ fonts fonts fonts

Honestly it’s probably more like 90% of the work! Am I right! I am joking! (Am i????) this is a design humor account #fonts #fontstudio #design

Source: Honestly it’s probably more like 90% of the work! Am I right! I am joking! (Am i????) this is a design humor account #fonts #fontstudio #design

It’d be awesome if social media platforms allowed some form of searching text people put up on their video, like subtitle metadata or something. It’ll never happen cos they depend on this kind of thing to keep you there.

But in this case, she’s talking about

♪ fonts fonts fonts Read More »

Maybe someday

Once mutually wary, farmers and scientists are working jointly to save a key ecosystem — and an endangered salamander.

Source: Mexican Farmers and Scientists Share a Mission: Saving a Wetland

via Ars Technica.

You don’t see an article about Xochimilco in English, much less have it pop up on Ars Technica. One of my great regrets while living in Mexico City is we were never able to make it all the way out there.

Maybe someday Read More »

Specially for bike locks!

@md_recovery_addict

Forgot your Master lock combination? You can recover it in less than 2 minutes! Follow for more tips like this. #masterlock #lockrecovery #ilearneditontiktok #schoollife

♬ FEEL THE GROOVE – Queens Road, Fabian Graetz

Forgot your Master lock combination? You can recover it in less than 2 minutes! Follow for more tips like this. #masterlock #lockrecovery #ilearneditontiktok #schoollife

Source: Forgot your Master lock combination? You can recover it in less than 2 minutes! Follow for more tips like this. #masterlock #lockrecovery #ilearneditontiktok #schoollife

Friends don’t let friends use combination locks.

Specially for bike locks! Read More »

Moro would chew him and then spit him out

Instead, Gaiman thinks that everything that went wrong with Princess Mononoke, “came down to Harvey Weinstein being petty.” He tells a story of how, after the film’s first official screening at the New York Film Festival, Weinstein informed Gaiman that he planned to renege on Disney’s deal not to cut the film.

Source: Princess Mononoke: The masterpiece that flummoxed the US – BBC Culture

Not only a rapist of people but of films too.

Moro would chew him and then spit him out Read More »