@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

pgroce

@pgroce@mastodon.social

Is “Phillip of Mastodon” anything? Idk, feels obvious.

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pgroce, to random
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@b0rk I have a history bachelors, that’s it. (And 25 years in the field.) My experience with algorithms is that you need to know what’s available, and when you need to use it you can learn it then.

Most of the time the authors of standard libraries have done their jobs, and the default is sensible enough. (And better written too!) You only need to crack a book if there’s a problem.

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@b0rk And since you’re interested in specific algorithms that came up: Space-filling curves, for visualizing one-dimensional data usefully in two dimensions. (Think Hilbert curves and the XKCD map of IPv4 space.)

Even if a standard implementation existed, you must decide whether your data is appropriate for it. Do the distributional properties of the data play nice with the way the curve projects it?

Better to know how to reason about algorithms than to know algorithms.

hacks4pancakes, to random

Everyone keeps sending me that news article about the German railway trying to hire a DOS and Windows 3.1 expert. You don’t understand- that is my whole job. That’s literally my normal day to day cybersecurity career.

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@hacks4pancakes Are you suggesting that old farts who kind of miss IRQs and having to know the difference between extended memory and expanded memory should be pivoting to ICS?

Does this magical place also have 2.x Linux kernels and Minix? Perl…4?

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@hacks4pancakes Local Pentester Would Rather Secure DOS Boxes from Buffer Overflows Old Enough to Drink Than Threat-Model S3. Consensus of Security Experts: “Honestly, Same”

Teri_Kanefield, (edited ) to random
@Teri_Kanefield@mastodon.social avatar

I got hit with a wave of this:

💠 It's also the fault of the Democrats
💠People who think that we have time for slow progress are privileged
💠Voting doesn't help. We voted in 2020 and 2022 and the Democrats Did Nothing.

They seem to come out in election years, almost like a stealth campaign to elect Republicans.

I assume that there are people in that wave who are genuinely confused, but ignorance can also be dangerous.

It worked in 2000. Blaming the Dems helped elect George W.

I block them.

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@Teri_Kanefield Those who argue that a measure isn’t good enough are failing to make the case that it isn’t good. Maybe you think there should be more direct action? Great. Vote too.

hacks4pancakes, to random

Hide your pretty .. something’s… from … hugs, and cake

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@hacks4pancakes I feel like you could credibly offer to let me live a thousand years…for a price.

0xabad1dea, to random

you ever have a computer problem suddenly clear up for absolutely no apparent reason and feel more distressed about that than the original problem

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@0xabad1dea A friend of mine who runs a lab will yell at you if the printer’s not working and you power-cycle it.

He’s learning everything about the world in a depth-first search.

kennwhite, to random

God damnit
https://arstechnica.com/security/2023/10/1password-detects-suspicious-activity-in-its-internal-okta-account/

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@kennwhite I wonder if they’ve ever considered running their own internal SSO. It’s probably still a bad call, but considering how high-value they are, they incur non-negligible risk attackers pivoting into them from compromised vendors. And their business is credential management….

anderspuck, to random
@anderspuck@krigskunst.social avatar

Bluesky definitely feels like a beta product at this point. Just got an account, and I am pretty underwhelmed. But they have quote posts…

From: @Poe
https://gamepad.club/@Poe/111255213298529581

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@anderspuck Life finds a way.

Screenshot from Ivory. Other popular third-party apps have similar support.

Not that support in the core is unimportant, but widespread adoption may be closer than we think.

anildash, to random
@anildash@me.dm avatar

I’ll write a fuller response later, but when billionaire tycoons who profit from genocide say that they want to become “supermen” while explicitly endorsing colonialism, that’s not optimism. That’s fascism with a smile. I actually make stuff, and help other people make stuff, and genuine optimism (technological or not) looks like community, nurturing, organizing and empowering — not indulging billionaires who profit from genocide.

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@anildash Optimism looks like altruism–being willing to make yourself vulnerable for something bigger, trusting that you are safe to do so. Building bigger war chests and bank accounts and trying to anabdon this planet for another one are signs of paranoia and fear, not optimism.

But hey, we can mix Italian fascism and Orwellian “war is peace” fascism here, this is America!

kissane, to random
@kissane@mas.to avatar

If you want to destroy your brain with frothy SV technocapitalist rhetoric as well as the news this week, this would be a fantastic starting point. I’ve been staring at it for awhile and I’m just going to have to come back to it later.

https://a16z.com/the-techno-optimist-manifesto/

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@kissane What does it say that I look past the goatse (I know what THAT says) and wonder if the pixellated bit is supposed to be artistic, or if it’s them hiding a watermark/logo on content they used without permission?

hanse_mina, (edited ) to Ukraine
@hanse_mina@nafo.uk avatar

“Ukraine will need to destroy Russian artillery and inflict casualties that thin Russian reserves…It will be slow and grinding with constant competitive adaptation. It may not produce spectacular victories for social media consumption.”

https://warontherocks.com/2023/09/biting-off-what-it-can-chew-ukraine-understands-its-attritional-context/

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@hanse_mina Not sure if you meant that you got it via Major General Ryan, but the byline on this article is Robert Rose.

A fascinating article nonetheless, thanks for bringing it to all of our attention.

mattblaze, to random
@mattblaze@federate.social avatar

TIL that gold bars are prominently stamped with traceable serial numbers.

In unrelated news, I will no longer be accepting gold bars as payment for bribes. I apologize for any inconvenience.

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@JessTheUnstill @mattblaze This technique loses effectiveness if you get cute (fraudulent) with assessed value and lose your business license. So maybe don’t do that.

…wait, are we still being hypothetical?

rikefranke, to random
@rikefranke@bagarrosphere.fr avatar

I am on three social media platforms but it’s only here that people keep complaining about paywall articles (btw, I always post gift articles, but they can only be opened so many times). Why does Mastodon feel journalists don’t need to get paid?

pgroce,
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

@rikefranke I normally try to avoid adding noise to the signal, but fwiw I really appreciate your posts, whether they have a paywalled link or not. You add in slug/pull quotes, so I get the idea even when I don’t click through.

Mastodon needs more voices like yours. Your insights considerably elevate the discourse here on technology, foreign policy, national security, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Thanks very much for doing that, in whatever way you choose.

pgroce, to writing
@pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

Random piece of advice for nonfiction writing: Make the TOC your abstract. If it doesn’t tell your story in miniature, there’s something wrong with your structure.

If you don’t have chapter/heading/etc. titles for some reason, put dummy ones in and read it that way. And consider adding them in, if you can, but the improvement in structure is worth the work, even if they never see publication.

Teri_Kanefield, (edited ) to random

deleted_by_author

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    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @Teri_Kanefield It’s gratifying to see you get right to the point like that. The ideals of the document and the system it enables are great, greater far than the lived principles and systems of the authors.

    It also reminds us that everyone struggles to be good, and good can come from that struggle even if it isn’t wholly successful.

    zackwhittaker, to random
    @zackwhittaker@mastodon.social avatar

    Hotel and casino giant MGM Resorts is blaming a "cybersecurity issue" on a massive outage affecting multiple properties. Its websites are down, guest access and room keys are affected. Even ATMs and slot machines are down.

    More by @carlypage: https://techcrunch.com/2023/09/11/mgm-resorts-cybersecurity-issue-outage/

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @hacks4pancakes @fuzzface @zackwhittaker @carlypage I just realized slot machines are OT

    ncweaver, to random
    @ncweaver@thecooltable.wtf avatar

    I have a bad feeling that the NFL's gratuitous embrace of gambling, especially "fantasy football" where individual player behavior matters a lot, that in 5 years there will be a massive, massive match-fixing scandal.

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @ncweaver It will be linemen. Huge impact on the game, hard to see when they’re throwing, not nearly as well-paid as the “position players,” bleak quality-of-life outlook post-retirement.

    Other major threat vector: “Insider trading” by medical staff.

    So many ways to lose here.

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @mekkaokereke @ncweaver Okay, I stand corrected. Too many ESPN highlight reels I guess. 😀

    Curious where you think the nexus of low pay and high impact is? The training/medical team still feels like an insider risk.

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @mekkaokereke @ncweaver I was a little lazy with my threat model here. I think The NFL’s Next Great Gambler will:

    1. Want the money–maybe because their peak $$ is lower than those around them, maybe because health is priceless, maybe other reasons

    2. Be able to either influence the game or acquire inside info in subtle ways that reliably privilege their bets

    Linemen felt obvious, but maybe not. Surely coaching staff are well-watched. Med staff still seem risky.

    cstross, to random
    @cstross@wandering.shop avatar

    Good grief the mansplainers are out in force this morning, trying to tell me which weird random text processing package of the month I should FORCE my publishers (hint: billion dollar multinationals) to adopt in place of the Word/InDesign/PDF workflow they finally standardized on after a decade or two of growing pains ...

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @passenger This also explains Amazon and Twitter. And cars, now that I think of it.

    And, at the outer limit, Vladimir Putin.

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @passenger His whole appeal to Russians is “You don’t have to, and in fact shouldn’t, care about politics. Just let me do it, I’m good enough to keep that part of your life running while you do the stuff you care about.”

    A good enough tool to sort of get by.

    Teri_Kanefield, (edited ) to random

    deleted_by_author

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    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @Teri_Kanefield Is there something in the right-wing extremist bylaws that says you have to have at least one dude who looks like Jeff Sessions on the payroll at all times?

    kissane, (edited ) to random
    @kissane@mas.to avatar

    If you're involved in tech in some way—very broadly defined—could you give me a very quick no-Googling-to-refresh-your-memory answer to this to help me calibrate a thing I'm working on?

    "What I know right now about what happened with Facebook in Myanmar during the Rohingya crisis in 2016-2017 is…"

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @kissane Fwiw, this is what this poll looked like on my phone. I made my selection because I knew more than nothing, but had no idea what I was supposed to have had knowledge of. (The atrocities? Facebook’s specific activity? Etc.)

    I mention this because I could see it biasing the sample enough to create problems.

    pgroce,
    @pgroce@mastodon.social avatar

    @kissane Yeah. And I appreciate the absurdity of “That poll you posted on social media may have bias issues.” 🙃

    Hope it gets you some insight, and thanks for sitting with this uncomfortable material.

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