@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

zakalwe

@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com

Culture Special Circumstances, detached.

pp desc for vision impaired: The N7 (Systems Alliance Special Forces) Seal from the Mass Effect games.

Neuro-spicy. Aspie pretending (sometimes badly) to be human (at least, it often feels that way) while fighting depression and chronic insomnia. Aspiring mostly-SF writer, burned-out IT geek, humanist who wants to see us make at least a token effort to stop enshittifying our entire planet. Is there really anything so incredibly, soul-threateningly terrible about the idea of giving a shit about other people?

Something I said pissed you off? It may be a misunderstanding, I'm far from immune to foot-in-mouth disease. Please check with me before you assume it was malicious. It most likely wasn't. If I don't think you're someone worth talking to, I just won't talk to you in the first place, period.

Follow-backs: If you have something to say, sure. No posts? Nothing to say? What would be the point? In the words of @PatternChaser, "I don't follow back, I follow interesting." I'm trying to keep the signal-to-noise ratio in my feed high. Still, if you follow me and I see it, I will do my best to at least find time to look. I can't guarantee I won't miss it, I'm not awake 24/7.
(And sorry, but don't expect me to follow you if you're posting the same dozen posts, day in, day out, day after day after week after month. In fact I'll most likely mute you.)

Came here to put words into my mouth so you could attack me over something I didn't say? (Yeah, sadly, it's happened.) Just don't. I WILL block your ass. Nobody has time for that shit.

Geek Stuff: I run Gentoo Linux, and I maintain a personal overlay with packages for dev-perl/Tk-MListbox, sys-apps/procmeter3, net-misc/icbm, media-sound/perljammer, app-crypt/sherpa, and app-editors/xnedit. Of those, net-misc/icbm and media-sound/perljammer are my own projects.

#nobot #writer #geek #linux #mysql #Gentoo #nosystemd #science

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

micchiato, to random
@micchiato@mastodon.social avatar

#Obama should have codified #Roe as promised. #Biden should have codified Roe as promised. Campaigning on the Court is a ploy to GOTV and to raise more campaign cash:

“We really need a book titled ‘Those Who Knew Roe Was Never Enough and the the SC would overturn Roe.’ There are thousands such people.”

https://bsky.app/profile/prisonculture.bsky.social/post/3ktidd632dg27

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@Jennifer @Mary625 @micchiato Obama was a huge disappointment. He hardly delivered on any of his big campaign promises. He ran on "hope and change", and delivered mostly "same old same old."

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

How much alone time vs socializing do you need?

For me there are a few people who are usually equalizing, and I can just be around them, so I won't count that. But generally, I find about 3 times a week, I'm game for socializing. A day in between to rest is usually nice, but the larger the gathering or if we go somewhere particularly noisy or I'm meeting new people that involves more effort, and my social battery empties sooner. I'm very curious where everyone else falls on this!

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@RickiTarr About half a dozen people is really my comfort limit. Much over that, and I get overloaded and need to go find some quiet. Especially if there are LOUD people.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

The Epaulette shark is only about 9 million years old as a species, making it the most recent branch in the shark family. And it is slowly but surely evolving into a land animal!

You will have to choose your side!

HELP THEM! “We' missed you, pal!” “Their filthy Water" "If you see a Horrid Beast evolving, welcome them home.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@RickiTarr I, for one, WELCOME our new landshark comrades-in-arms! 😁

ayoub, to Israel
@ayoub@spore.social avatar

bombed a displaced persons camp after designating it a humanitarian area in . Reports of dozens of civilians killed.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@maddad @MikeImBack @enoch_exe_inc @Mary625 @ayoub Not sure they have any people LEFT in Gaza. Israel has been selectively targeting them and is trying to shut them down. (And has banned them from Israel iirc)

flexghost, to random
@flexghost@mastodon.social avatar

** IT’S HERE! FRIDAY NIGHT MUSIC THREAD ON #MastodonMusic **

Tonight’s theme is:

🛼📺🎞️👾 TOTALLY 80s! 🕹️🎸💿💾

—
🎵 Like, gag me with a spoon! Another decade theme night?

Take a chill pill and post totally tubular bodacious music from the 80s along with what you’re drinking. 🎶
—

🍷 Axel F / Tears for Fears / DeBarge / Sade / Madonna / Simple Minds + Sex On The Beach🍸

Post often • share • make some friends

Compilation of 80s music videos and ...I love them. People think the 80s had the worst music? 90s were meh with some flashes of brilliance. And has pop music even changed since the 2000s? Clear channel garbage: you're wrong.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@flexghost How did it get to be Friday already?

dangillmor, to random
@dangillmor@mastodon.social avatar

The cops who tortured a bogus murder "confession" out of a man -- even threatening to kill his dog along the way -- are still employed by the Fontana, Calif., police department. The city's taxpayers paid for the $900,000 lawsuit settlement.

https://www.sbsun.com/2024/05/23/fontana-pays-nearly-900000-for-psychological-torture-inflicted-by-police-to-get-false-confession/

This tells you everything you need to know about police impunity.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@dangillmor The police are aimost THE LAST PEOPLE EVER who should be above the law, second only to the lawmakers themselves.

_L1vY_, to random
@_L1vY_@mstdn.social avatar

I've said it before but I'll say it again.
It's not that everyone I know who had has developed terrible new medical issues.
It's that everyone I know who has developed terrible new medical issues recently had Covid.
And in every case I'm thinking of, it's become a health crisis within about three months of their most Covid bout. (Usually not a bad bout, either.)

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@_L1vY_ A recent SciShow video mentioned that there is growing evidence that Covid is associated with measurably increased risk of multiple cancers.

cstross, to random
@cstross@wandering.shop avatar

Study Finds That 52 Percent of ChatGPT Answers to Programming Questions Are Wrong

https://futurism.com/the-byte/study-chatgpt-answers-wrong

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@cstross I see upon reading that the article states, "AI platforms like ChatGPT often hallucinate totally incorrectly [sic] answers out of thin air."

While this is true as far as it goes, I believe it misstates — and understates — the problem. A more accurate statement of the problem is, "Large language models hallucinate ALL of their responses. Some of the hallucinations merely happen to coincide well with reality." But you cannot obviously tell them from the ones that don't.

They do not understand anything. They are not designed for understanding. What they are designed to do is very specifically to generate grammatically correct output that looks convincing.

zakalwe, to random
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/american-airlines-lawsuit-camera-bathroom-b2549541.html

On Monday, a lawyer representing [American Airlines] wrote in a filing that the [9-year-old] girl should have been aware that a device [secretly placed by an American Airlines employee] was recording her while she was using the bathroom.

Dear American Airlines,
WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!?

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Have y'all ever had someone act like you were hurting them somehow by just liking a food?

Any time I buy or make kimchi, my Mom says it's so gross and she doesn't want any and just on and on. I never offer it to her, or make group food with it, but for some reason she seems offended by it, and I don't know why.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@MaryAustinBooks @RickiTarr One of the big mistakes most people make with Marmite is using FAR TOO MUCH.

Try spreading just the tiniest almost-transparent smear of it on the sliced cheese when making a grilled cheese sandwich. Or put a teaspoonful into a pot of stew.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@mentallyalex @RickiTarr I do not object to tofu. It's merely so difficult to make it actually taste like ... well, pretty much anything, really. Even starch-based packing peanuts have a more interesting texture.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@mentallyalex @RickiTarr My first wife had a Buddhist temple cookbook that had some recipes that made it taste pretty good. But it was, I think, baked, then marinated, then fried.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Y'all, I like all the Treks, I can't deal with your fighting, please think of the children.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@NickGates @RickiTarr Oh god. Of ALL of them, I COULDN'T STAND Lower Decks. It's not even a crossover between Star Trek and a good Saturday morning cartoon.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

If the gods exist, it's mighty presumptuous to think they have our best interests at heart, or even think about us at all.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@RickiTarr @skribe The network bears the responsibility for Season 5 being the mess it was. JMS had to cram all the rest of the story arc into Season 4 because they said "We're cancelling at the end of 4", which was just an insanely stupid decision because the audience demographics were GREAT, and then they said "We changed our minds, find a Season 5 storyline now"
​:blobfoxfacepalm:​

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@RickiTarr @skribe Yeah, the telepath arc is not widely popular.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@RickiTarr Honestly I think there's a lot to like in DS9. It is among the better Trek shows. Much better than for instance Voyager, which was not only rubbish, it was insulting rubbish. Janeway was the best part of Voyager. I'm not sure whether the worst was the "Water is scarce in this region of the galaxy but the problem is solvable by stealing it" level plots, or the stupid "emergency medical hologram".

(I mean, Robert Picardo did as much as was humanly possible with the role, but it was still a stupid idea. I hate it when writers use "hologram" as shorthand for "magic geewhizzium that can do anything the plot requires". I keep waiting for a movie where nobody can figure out how the victim drowned far from any body of water, and the great plot reveal is that he was murdered with holographic water. HOLOGRAMS DON'T WORK THAT WAY.)

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@strypey @RickiTarr Good point. As I said, Robert Picardo couldn't possibly have done any better with the character than he did. That doesn't change that the concept was pure handwavium.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@strypey @RickiTarr Well yeah, it is kind of a recurrent issue with ALL Star Trek technology. 😅 The whole "solid hologram" thing is a particular peeve of mine, though.

Though as you 100% correctly point out, the Doctor didn't gain the ability to physically interact with things until a lot later. I'd completely forgotten that detail, and stand corrected. (It's been a loooong time since I watched Voyager.) That does make the idea a lot more reasonable — but also a lot less useful, until he gains that capability. I suppose he can still diagnose people's injuries and instruct them how to treat themselves, though, or instruct others in what to do. A sort of ambulatory expert system — a consulting physician, not a trauma surgeon.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@strypey @RickiTarr That's still an advanced alien, right? 😁

(Or was it actually a human time traveler?)

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Sometimes the way people phrase things is so telling. For instance, telling women they should be "taking care of" their husband and children. Another adult doesn't need taken care of like a child, what you want is for women to be a Sex Mom.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@HunkThunderzone @RickiTarr But maybe it would get the attention of techbro CEOs who keep whining that nobody wants to work¹ any more.

¹ ... sixty hour weeks at wages they can't live on

ChrisMayLA6, to climate
@ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us avatar

So while you & I might think its necessary to speed up the Green Transition & enhance/accelerate measures to reduce emissions, Shell's shareholders disagree.

The firm has just sought & obtained agreement from investors to slow down its measures to mitigate its environmental impact & reduce progress towards its own (already weak) climate targets.

More reason(s) the fossil fuels sector cannot really be central to climate response(s).

We don't have the time to slow down!

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@IveyJanette @pete @Mary625 @KimSJ @GhostOnTheHalfShell @Npars01 @ChrisMayLA6 And then the Ivy League schools of business management realized that they could normalize plundering the entire heart of the economy for its assets, and nobody would stop them.

GottaLaff, to random
@GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

Biden slams 'outrageous' ICC warrant for arrest of Israeli leaders - AFP

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@GottaLaff There is nothing outrageous about it.

The longer a US president waits to jump that AIPAC "third rail", the worse it's going to get.

GottaLaff, to random
@GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

Greg Sargent 🧵 1/…

Media coverage of Republicans stampeding to NYC to attack Trump's trial as illegit is marred by euphemism. This isn't just "currying favor" w Trump or "expressing loyalty" or auditioning to be his VP. It's placing Trump over rule of law

Rs are attacking judge, witnesses, prosecutors & trial as illegitimate. This isn't just helping Trump evade the gag order. The point is also to display in spectacle form that their fealty is to him over the rules that make the system function

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@GottaLaff At what point do we start calling this open rebellion?

StillIRise1963, to random
@StillIRise1963@mastodon.world avatar

What I find most disgusting is all the people who knew Diddy was abusing Cassie and others and kept their mouths shut because of money. I have no respect for that shit. It’s INDEFENSIBLE.

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@StillIRise1963 We have GOT TO STOP WORSHIPPING MONEY.

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

** IT’S HERE! FRIDAY NIGHT MUSIC THREAD ON #MastodonMusic **

Tonight’s theme is:

✨🏅☄️ TOP SHELF! 🎀🏆✨󠁯󠀭

—
🎵 Post FULL ALBUMS that are a 10/10 all the way through along with what you’re drinking. 🎶
—

  1. Iron Maiden - The Number of the Beast
  2. Genesis - Selling England By The Pound
  3. Aesop Rock - The Impossible Kid
  4. Fleetwood Mac - Rumours

(Multiple submissions welcome)

Oban 14

Post often • share • make some friends

zakalwe,
@zakalwe@plasmatrap.com avatar

@flexghost VNV Nation's Automatic was a hell of a tough act for even VNV Nation to follow.

(Though Transnational is RIGHT UP THERE too)

I also have to mention Within Temptation and The Silent Force. Dear gods, Sharon den Alt's voice.

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