@richard_merren@mastodon.social
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

richard_merren

@richard_merren@mastodon.social

Not internet famous and totally fine with that

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

Sardonicus, to random
@Sardonicus@mastodon.social avatar
richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@Sardonicus Fun quote, but also a deeply privileged attitude that's not actually a whole lot of fun for a whole lot of people.

cwebber, to random

have you heard of this new programming language called ruby?

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@cwebber Pretty sure that the correct spelling is Lithp.

BarneyDellar, to random
@BarneyDellar@mastodon.scot avatar

Thanks @mekkaokereke. I had never realised that the battle for the Alamo in Texas was never a battle for freedom or liberty. It was a battle for the right to keep slaves. Mexico had banned slavery, so white Texans fought to be able to carry on owning slaves. https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/146405

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@BarneyDellar @mekkaokereke We had a whole year of Texas history in school, but for some reason this fact was never discussed.

They never showed us this document either, which pretty definitively proves that the Civil War was explicitly about Slavery: https://www.tsl.texas.gov/ref/abouttx/secession/2feb1861.html

Probably just a simple clerical error that caused this stuff to be left out of the curriculum.

futurebird, to random
@futurebird@sauropods.win avatar

People are so weird and squirmy about the term "species" --especially with reference to humans and our closest extinct cousins. Someone will ask "Are Neanderthals the same species as us or a sub species?" as if this was a very meaningful and serious question. As if some adjudicator will emerge with golden scales and weigh the answer.

We're related to them, some are our ancestors. We don't know very much about them.

What more do you want?

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@futurebird People want species to be neat little boxes that everything fits in with no fuzz or overlap or estimation. Nature (and pretty much everything in reality) is much weirder than that.

emilygorcenski, to random

Why is search so broken just absolutely everywhere? It is 2023, and somehow search is considerably worse than in 2013 and arguably 2003. I’m not even talking like, google searches, but I’ll get to that in a sec. I’m talking the entire practice of making information findable

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@emilygorcenski Same reason your grocery store puts staple products like bread, milk, eggs, and veggies as far apart as possible--it's not designed for your convenience but rather to extract as much from you they can.

ct_bergstrom, (edited ) to random
@ct_bergstrom@fediscience.org avatar

Was it just a few months ago that Musk tweeted this same meme and then deleted it after being informed that the quote is from a neo-Nazi pedophile rather than Voltaire?

What changed in the interim that now makes him now quite happy to post it anyway?

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@ct_bergstrom He's spent the las six months silencing his critics on Twitter, so maybe he's posting this as a reminder to everyone that he's in charge and he won't tolerate criticism?

ct_bergstrom, to random
@ct_bergstrom@fediscience.org avatar

"I want to see you go out there and smile like you just shot your roommate in the buttocks for eating last Hot Pocket."

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@ct_bergstrom Hot pockets are terrible.

maxkennerly, to random
@maxkennerly@mstdn.social avatar

On the one hand, OMG WTF, it was a horrendous series of misjudgments for a lawyer to rely on ChatGPT to write their brief, including citations.

On the other hand, this is another example of widespread confusion about what, exactly, ChatGPT does—confusion that OpenAI promotes.

It's Spicy Autocomplete. That's it. It verifies nothing. It spits out words based on opaque calculations.

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.575368/gov.uscourts.nysd.575368.32.1.pdf

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@maxkennerly They say that ChatGPT is going to take my job away, but it seems like there will be plenty of work available when the people using ChatGPT get fired.

ifixcoinops, to random

See these two?

Take a hard, close look.

First pic, Reddy Kilowatt, your electric servant, friendly anthropomorphized electric arc with a lightbulb nose, wants to be everyone's pal.

Second pic, Mister Ouch, anthropomorphized electric arc, pictured here screaming while smiting a child.

Do you see it?

THEY'RE THE SAME FRIGGIN' GUY.

image/jpeg

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@ifixcoinops Grandfather: There are two electric avatars fighting within you, friendly Reddy Kilowatt and evil Mister Ouch.
Grandson: Which one will win?
Grandfather: They'll both kill you. Electricity is fucking deadly.

GottaLaff, to random
@GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

Here’s How Bad ’s Post- Town Hall Ratings Have Been
1/…🪡
https://www.thedailybeast.com/heres-how-bad-cnns-post-trump-town-hall-ratings-have-been

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@GottaLaff These viewers are leaving Fox in protest because the company fired the guy who lied to them repeatedly. The viewers were OK with the lies, and the network was OK with the lies, and (strangely) the rest of their industry has been pretty much OK with the lies as well.

mastodonmigration, to random
@mastodonmigration@mastodon.online avatar

Clarification

You do not have to worry about your mastodon.social (m.s) account being defederated.

There is a well meaning, but misleading post currently promoted that suggests you should move your m.s account because:

  1. "Instance admins are considering defederating them"
  2. "Their admin is making spam accounts easier to create."

Very few, if any, instances are considering blocking m.s, and the recent spam attacks are worthy of sober discussion, not hyperbole. [more]

1/

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@mastodonmigration It is overly generous to call the post "well-meaning," but otherwise, thank you for this good explanation thread.

baldur, to random
@baldur@toot.cafe avatar

“Can a Writers Strike Save Hollywood from Monopoly?” https://mattstoller.substack.com/p/can-a-writers-strike-save-hollywood

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@baldur I didn't read the article, but I am not at all surprised to hear they are making a movie out of the board game Monopoly. Chutes and Ladders would probably be a better choice.

SimonRoyHughes, to random
@SimonRoyHughes@thefolklore.cafe avatar

Time to move off mastodon.social, folks, before its unmanageable dead weight gets it defederated.

(NB! This is a constructive use of quoting.)

From: @rysiek
https://mstdn.social/@rysiek/110368117503482865

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@rysiek @BalooUriza @SimonRoyHughes These arguments always carry the assumption that people who use mastodon.social are sheep-like morons who will just sit back and tolerate this "drop the moderation ball" decline you speak of. If my m.s experience starts to fill with spam or Nazis or cryptobros, I'll move and so will most other users. But for many years it has been good. We don't need your paternalistic protection from possible future incidents.

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@rysiek I apologize if I have offended you, but please recognize that your tone is quite paternalistic, even in this post. If you want to make the argument that the fediverse would be better with smaller sites, and talk about how it affects your own hosting efforts, I am interested and listening. But we don't need you to warn us to leave our instance now due to possible impending danger from possible future doom scenarios ("it might be too late"). Give us some credit.

mcnees, to random
@mcnees@mastodon.social avatar

The free speech absolutist has logged on.

Shot and chaser:

image/jpeg

richard_merren,
@richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

@mcnees This was almost a good Matt Yglesias tweet, which is very rare.

jwildeboer, to random
@jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net avatar

deleted_by_author

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    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @jwildeboer The fact that this rating system is zero-based leads me to believe it was created by a machine and not a human, who would have started with one. Or, even more likely, would have used a weird letter-based rating system developed by a committee with abbreviations that accidentally translated to a dirty word in some other language.

    jeff, to random
    @jeff@newsie.social avatar

    deleted_by_author

    •
    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @jeff @ruud When I find an affinity site that suits me, do I switch to it? Do I join it in addition to my current identity? Do I just browse it and follow people I am interested in? Answer: any of these is OK.

    WillRobinson, to random

    How do we stop the MAGA Republicans from forcing the US into a debt ceiling economic catastrophe? Mint a $1 trillion platinum coin. It would be fast, legal, and no bigger than a regular coin.

    https://www.businessinsider.com/debt-ceiling-solution-mint-a-trillion-dollar-platinum-coin-2023-5

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @WillRobinson It is a stupid, make-believe solution to a stupid, make-believe problem. So it's perfect.

    rysiek, (edited ) to random
    @rysiek@mstdn.social avatar

    This is your irregular reminder are fucking dicks:
    https://www.vice.com/en/article/a3xk3p/adobe-tells-users-they-can-get-sued-for-using-old-versions-of-photoshop

    > Adobe Tells Users They Can Get Sued for Using Old Versions of Photoshop

    We need tools to get to the point where they can replace Adobe tools. Open alternatives are great, but they are sadly not there yet to replace Adobe tools for professionals.

    And won't be unless projects like @inkscape get enough funding to develop to a point of being viable alternatives.

    Yes, it is in no small part about the money.

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @rysiek @inkscape @Krita @Blender

    Don't leave out @GIMP and @darktable!

    ct_bergstrom, to random
    @ct_bergstrom@fediscience.org avatar

    Pamela Paul is weaponizing misunderstandings about peer review in the NY Times.

    "The authors argue that science should instead be independent, evidence-based and focused on advancing knowledge. This sounds entirely reasonable. Yet the paper was rejected by several prominent mainstream journals..."

    Even if that were an accurate description and there were no other problems with the paper the fact that something is rejected from several top journals is hardly evidence that science is broken.

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @ct_bergstrom Conservative columnists think they are entitled to be published by anyone they submit something to, and any rejection is clear evidence of unfair consideration due to left-wing bias. They really got spoiled by the NY Times' decades-long project of creating a safe space for conservative columnists.

    feditips, to random
    @feditips@mstdn.social avatar

    I don't think people are realising the danger the Fediverse is in.

    The only thing stopping corporations and VCs taking over this place is that the Fediverse is spread out on many different servers, which makes it very difficult to purchase.

    If most of the Fediverse ends up on mastodon.social, which is now a strong possibility, there will be nothing to stop most of it being sold to Musk or Zuckerberg or whoever.

    The bigger mastodon.social becomes, the more likely a buyout is to happen.

    (1/4)

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @feditips This is a ridiculous suggestion. Fracturing the fediverse over a completely arbitrary benchmark is like burning a village in order to save it. I've been happy on this server for many years. Except for a few hiccups it has been stable and available, I am happy with the moderation, and the users are friendly and well disposed to follow (and boost) accounts on other servers. That you would want to block my access to other users over your theoretical concerns is maddening.

    malwaretech, to random

    I wrote some JavaScript that prevent Twitter Blue user's tweets from ever even showing up in the timeline and can also autoblock them based on follower count.

    video/mp4

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @malwaretech This is also easily controlled through the url without any Javascript at all.

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @malwaretech Just make sure that "twitter.com" does not appear anywhere in the address.

    (Sorry... you walked right into that one.)

    jhilden, to random
    @jhilden@vis.social avatar

    This webstore has a great Stock of ”Sorry, as an AI” products.

    https://www.proshop.fi/?s=sorry+as+an+AI

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @jhilden We should start seeing that on tattoos and menus soon as well.

    cwebber, to random

    Hey I've been hearing a lot about ActivityPub could someone please tell me how it works?!?!?!?! THANKS!

    richard_merren,
    @richard_merren@mastodon.social avatar

    @cwebber

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