swaldman

swaldman, 5 months ago to random

Somebody found a cellphone that had fallen out of that 737 Max with the hole in the side. It had fallen 16,000 feet and was still working.

(Yet if I drop mine on the floor....)

Whoever made that case should be winding up their marketing department 😂

https://twitter.com/SeanSafyre/status/1744138937239822685

ChrisMayLA6, 5 months ago to Horizon

For my (erstwhile) while colleagues, the deadline for applying for funds to 'pump-prime' your applications to #Horizon, now that #RishiSunak has agreed our re-entry to the EU's main #research support programme, is in 16 days time.

The fear is (and the reason for the support) that in the three years we have excluded ourselves from the programme, we will not only have lost research capacity (researchers leaving the UK), we may also have lost expertise & even willingness, on EU grant applications!

swaldman, 1 year ago to random

Some interesting tech info on the cell broadcast test today.

TLDR: It only works if you're on 4/5G. It's broadcast, not targeted, so no queue or buffer: If your phone doesn't notice it while the alert is being broadcast, you don't get it.

And 3 probably did it wrong.

https://twitter.com/davwheat_/status/1650149573313085441

swaldman, 6 months ago to random

Regardless of anything else, the Rwanda policy continues to depend - as it always has depended - on a central piece of doublethink : that Rwanda is both,

(a) a safe country in which refugees can prosper free from persecution or fear of deportation
(b) a scary place that should act as a deterrent.

I don't think it can be both, at least for most people. And that contradiction hasn't changed since it was first proposed.

swaldman, 6 months ago to random

No Bing, no Edge, no upselling: De-crufted Windows 11 coming to Europe soon | Ars Technica

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/europeans-can-soon-strip-bing-edge-other-microsoft-cruft-from-windows-11/

Government doing (IMHO) its job of restraining corporate excess.

I wonder whether .uk will benefit.

swaldman, 7 months ago to random

UK officials use AI to decide on issues from benefits to marriage licences

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/oct/23/uk-officials-use-ai-to-decide-on-issues-from-benefits-to-marriage-licences?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

> Exclusive: findings show uncontrolled and potentially discriminatory way technology used in Whitehall and some police forces

swaldman, 7 months ago to photography

Is there a free-as-in-speech, or even ethically-run, equivalent to Flickr? I don't expect free-as-in-beer - storage costs, after all - but something I trusted like Dreamwidth would be lovely... Wonder if there's a fedi app?

#photography

swaldman, 1 month ago to random

Pluralistic: Boeing’s deliberately defective fleet of flying sky-wreckage

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/01/boeing-boeing/#mrsa

"Boeing is, effectively, a government agency that is run for the benefit of its investors. It performs its own safety inspections. It investigates its own criminal violations of safety rules. It loots its own coffers and then refills them at public expense."

swaldman, 6 months ago to random

Reasons to hate Adobe's subscription model, n of m: Implementation seems to assume you always have an internet connection. Just discovered that without one, Creative Cloud will not start, which means no access to Adobe fonts. Possibly no access to apps either, though I didn't test this.

swaldman, 16 days ago to random

Here is Google's AI search recommending actions that will generate a significant quantity of hot chlorine gas in people's homes.

Mozilla have a petition: https://foundation.mozilla.org/.../google-ai-overviews/

swaldman, 3 months ago to random

Boeing whistleblower found dead in US - BBC News

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-68534703

> Prior to his death, whistleblower John Barnett was testifying against Boeing over concerns about standards.

swaldman, 4 months ago to random

So Alabama's new method of executing people is to deprive them of oxygen? And they claim that this is "not cruel"?

The UN does not agree...

swaldman, 2 months ago to random

What the hell is this colander thing? Do Americans think that looking at the sun through one is a safe substitute for a dark filter? 🫠

swaldman, 2 months ago to random

Israel-Gaza live: UN security council passes resolution calling for immediate ceasefire, as US abstains

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2024/mar/25/israel-gaza-live-unrwa-aid-north-gaza-un-security-council-vote-ceasefire-middle-east-latest?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

This is momentous.

Now, what is going to happen when Israel ignores it?

swaldman, 1 month ago to OpenAI

Somebody has filed a #GDPR complaint about #OpenAI, because they are unable to correct false personal data that is produced by #ChatGPT.
This should be interesting to watch.

https://noyb.eu/en/chatgpt-provides-false-information-about-people-and-openai-cant-correct-it

swaldman, 5 months ago to rainbow

Today I had a spectacular view of a 180 degree rainbow over Maeshowe, #Orkney and also something I've never seen before: A reflection #rainbow, where light has bounced off water (over the hill) before refracting in the atmosphere. Spent some time going "huh?" before finding a website that explained it.

I was also inside the tomb close enough to midwinter to see the sun shine along the entrance passage into the core - but while special, that was less exciting than the unusual rainbows!

Reflection rainbow: At the root of the main rainbow, another rainbow seems to fork off it at a different angle.

swaldman, 5 months ago to random

Toyota testing safety of car seatbelts for pregnant people: Great.

But why the **** are we only doing this in 2024??!

https://www.repairerdrivennews.com/2024/01/03/toyotas-research-hub-tests-seatbelt-safety-for-pregnant-women/

swaldman, 22 days ago to random

Oh, dear.

Launching a comms campaign asking everybody to have bottled water, food, etc., for national resilience: Sensible.

Doing it on the same day that you call a general election? Maybe not the best look 😂

swaldman, 22 days ago to random

This sequence of news updates (bottom to top) is bringing me joy.

swaldman, 15 days ago to random

One of the ways in which many of the costs of LLMs are externalities, forced onto other companies.

Web hosts generally welcome search engine crawlers, as (at least historically) they will help people find the site.
But LLM crawlers are pulling information from the site in order to use it for the LLM owner's profit, to the site owner's detriment.

https://fosstodon.org/@kate/112524141250923512

swaldman, 5 months ago to random

Scotrail doing a valuable service, here, in stopping me feeling bad about giving up on window cleaning over the winter.

(but really, when you have a service that is subsidised on the basis of tourism and scenery.....)

swaldman, 4 months ago to random

Another #WorldCon, another #Hugos controversy.

This one is different in nature to previous ones, and perhaps more predictable, but not a good look.

swaldman, 5 months ago to random

The coming enshittification of public libraries (specifically their ebooks)

"OverDrive, from its monopoly position, has begun the cycle of purposeful enshittification... And if OverDrive goes belly-up at some point in the future, crushed by KKR’s leveraged debt, it’s going to take down access to the digital catalogs of nearly every public library in North America."

https://buttondown.email/ninelives/archive/the-coming-enshittification-of-public-libraries/

ChrisMayLA6, 1 month ago to random

Here's a good overview of long-term health in the UK, showing the BBC can still do good journalism

With research from Health Foundation & others, its clear that the country's long term crisis is centred on three health issues:

chronic pain;
type 2 diabetes; and
mental health problems

As the HF summarise:
'Access to health care has become more difficult, while those fundamental building blocks of health - such as good housing and adequate incomes - are under strain'!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-68849843

swaldman, 5 months ago to random

SMBC is spot on today...

(source: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/that-thing)