Entries for #m
The World according to Seeming
Listening today: The first 5 tracks off the pre-order album The World by Seeming.
Another album that Daneel put me onto. They introduced me to Seeming a while back and the band never dissapoints. Raw, synthy and shouty, music filled with joy and ennui.
Redditor passionately explains why geeky 80’s kids are confused with ChatGPT
Man, I felt this Reddit post so hard.
u/Quick_Butterfly_4571 passionately explains why geeky 80’s kids are confused with ChatGPT
So, you'd lay it all out, step-by-step, just to be super sure that you were helping and not confusing the kindred spirit you found half a world away.
Happy Birthday Godzilla
More than seven decades after producer Tomoyuki Tanaka, director Ishirō Honda, and special effects master Eiji Tsuburaya first unleashed Godzilla in Japanese theaters on November 3, 1954, the King of the Monsters remains a beloved symbol of imagination and cinematic innovation.
Source: How to Celebrate Godzilla Day 2025
Godzilla really goes through candles.
In Praise of RSS and Controlled Feeds of Information
In Praise of RSS and Controlled Feeds of Information | Tom Burkert
Also, unlike algorithmic feeds, it allows me to pick what category of my interests I am in the mood for. If I’m in the mood for something lighter, I can just look into my “Fun” folder to check out new stuff from The Oatmeal or xkcd. If I feel like reading something more thoughtful, I’d dive into my “Reads” folder for The Marginalian or Sentiers.
A Robot, a Nazi and a Poorly diguised Russian walk into a timeline...
A cartoon in 2 frames:
Frame 1
Nurse: Are you OK love?
Minister: Yes I’m just hearing legitimate concerns from real voters
Frame 2
Nurse: That’s a robot, a Nazi and a poorly-disguised Russian
[Show that the people he is talking to are precisely these characters]
I am sorry, but everyone is getting syntax highlighting wrong
Syntax highlighting is a tool. It can help you read code faster. Find things quicker. Orient yourself in a large file.
Like any tool, it can be used correctly or incorrectly. Let’s see how to use syntax highlighting to help you work.
Niki Tonsky makes some good points.
Why We Need "Shortwave 2.0"
On RADIOWWORLD, Kim Andrew Elliott guest writes about an old technology that could come back to help us route around the coming billionaire-and-fascist-censored internet:
Radio is the ultimate internet circumvention tool because it is not the internet. And it can’t be tracked.
This brings us to “Shortwave 2.0.”
Shortwave 2.0 won’t reach the audience of millions as in the heyday of shortwave decades ago. It will reach those who seek comprehensive, reliable, credible information. This audience will be technically inclined: radio amateurs, hobbyist shortwave listeners, scholars, technology enthusiasts and government and military personnel with access to receivers. They will pass on the information they have received to the larger audience.
Then comes this kicker:
An important feature of Shortwave 2.0 is that it is not limited to audio.
Starting about 2010 I was introduced to the digital modes of amateur radio. I was amazed that such a weak signal, in noisy conditions, could produce text. At that same time, VOA, RFE/RL and RFA were starting to feel the effects of internet blocking, especially in China and Iran. These two developments, combined, pointed to radio as a possible solution.
Starting in 2013, I was able to test the concept in “VOA Radiogram,” an experimental weekly program on the Voice of America. Instead of voice and music, we transmitted, on a conventional amplitude-modulated double sideband transmitter at Greenville, N.C., the warbles of the amateur radio digital modes.
The big advantage of text via shortwave is that it can be received successfully in poor reception conditions, in which voice broadcasts are difficult to comprehend. Text can be read and re-read, and passed on to others through personal media.
White leftists, fake allyship, and liberation
eva on Mastodon:
I need for folks to be better than that, white leftists have got to get their shit together because the fact of the matter is, their contributions are needed. We are not so blessed with solidarity and comrades that we can out-organize fascism without them. It's the truth.
Worldwide, the people of the global majority do not have the luxury of waiting for most of y'all to get your heads out of your collective asses on white supremacy. Stop huffing the fucking Klan glue and get serious. It's past time.
Public Service Broadcasting (band)
Daneel tuned me onto a new band recently, and I've become enamored.
Public Service Broadcasting is a rock group from the UK that creates instrumental music that trends a bit electronic and includes samples of... public broadcast radio from the UK. It's great music that warms my NPR and New Deal-loving heart.
Public Service Broadcasting (band) - Wikipedia
You can find them on Bandcamp, and in Apple Music (the two places I can access them).
The "The War Room" EP is not available on Apple Music, so go give them money (I gave them £10, the asking price is £4 I think) for a great EP.
Goodbye, YouGov
4 years ago, as #Covid19 was just beginning to crest across the world, I started a new postiion as Senior Python Engineer at YouGov. I enjoyed my work immensely and got to help build some truly interesting things (more on that later 😁).
Sadly, Aug 01, 2024 was my last day at YouGov. I worked with the great people in the Research Platforms department for 4 years, helping to build and improve the systems that connect our amazing Panel to the research surveys that guide many organizations' product and political decision-making.
I worked with a great crew and especially want to say thank you to Allan Crooks and Clayton Butler, and the teams they led, for their leadership, and their inspiration adn guidance.
There are too many other folks to list, but I hope they know how much I enjoyed working together to do good things.
So now I'm looking for a new position focusing on #python #webservices #backendsystems, and/or #dataengineering. In addition to getting deep into technical solutions, I really enjoy working across teams to fully understand use cases, stakeholders' pain points, and help define solutions that have the best ROI possible.
Check out my resumé at https://monkinetic.blog/resume.
Posting in your own site means #Facebook #instagram or #YouTube can’t decide if your writing is worth monetizing or not.
I can't seem to find documentation on what content types #Mastodon supports in the actual "status" content. I've seen posts with inline links and basic formatting, but don't know how to post them.
When you've managed to make it too hot for cacti to survive, you've broken the desert #climatechange #cacti #heatwave
Cacti need to cool down at night or through rain and mist. If that does not happen they sustain internal damage. Plants now suffering from prolonged, excessive heat may take months or years to die, Hernandez said.
Climate Change in micro
This is a little picture of what #climatechange means: Sitting on my back porch in Arizona this morning at 5:45am, enjoying only the second summer monsoon rain this season. Sipping a coffee in a damp wind, with the temperature at 82ºF (28ºC).
(SORRY, LOST IMAGE)
I realized that -- after nearly a month of temperatures over 110ºF (43ºC), a record-breaking length of time even in Arizona -- I had forgotten what 82º felt like. This is not typical, normal, or a cyclic phase.
This is a permanent, ongoing, man-made problem.
Replying to a Mastodon post from the blog
Fedi/Mastodon programmers... with the #MastodonAPI, and given a url to a post on any instance (assuming I have access to the toot from my account), how might I get my instance to fetch it and give me a "local" ID that is suitable for passing as the "inReplyToID" in a toot payload?
Wondering if I need to:
- perform a search (https://docs.joinmastodon.org/methods/search/)
- find the relevant status in the results
- use the ID for the status
Would that be the "local" ID #MastodonAPI #fediverse #programming #blogging #indieweb
An Education for Settlers on Indigenous Peoples Day
Yehuda Rothschild republished (with permission) a presentation (Archive.org link) by Lara A Jacobs, Mvskoke citizen and Native scientist, on settler colonialism - what is it, what is colonization, what happened when settlers (in North America) arrived.
The whole thing is excellent, and I hope there's a video version, or one is done one day.
Some particular points I want to mention/synthesize:
Colonization is not a historical event, but a continuous process that requires ongoing support through social and legal systems and institutional violence.
Colonization doesn't just mean moving in and kicking out indiginous people, though it definitely means that. It's also continued occupation of their "lands, waters, and environments", the forced breakup of families and communities through unjust and cruel laws and foster systems, the intentional obliteration of native peoples' languages, cultural practices, and value systems (often through forced fostering and the original residential homes).
We (the White European Settlers) operated -- and still operate -- under a value system and ideologies that are manifestly destructive (the following is quoted):
- Conquer and defeat their surroundings
- Biases against undeveloped areas
- Associated uncivilized areas with evil
- Commodity-based utilitarianism (e.g., extractive practices)
- Extraction of 'natural resources' (e.g., forest products, marine fisheries, mining, etc.)
- Capitalism
All of these in direct opposition to the beliefs, ideologies, and practices of Native cultures and communities, which had been existing largely in balance with their environments for many thousands of years before settlers arrived.
There is much much more in the slides that were shared and I'm grateful to Lara and Yehuda both for making these available.
If I was going to work in #government and had my choice it would probably be at the US Digital Service.
We collaborate with public servants throughout the government to address some of the most critical needs and ultimately deliver a better government experience to people. We work across multiple agencies and bring best practices from our various disciplines.
Also found out they are now hiring #remotework employees, a few years ago they were DC-local only. 🤔