Nostr notes by Cassandra 🔜 San Francisco (for real!)

There's something truly dismal about watching foss go slop. ...

2026-05-14T22:46:17+02:00

There's something truly dismal about watching foss go slop. Like, free software was supposed to be about ideals, a better vision for what computing could be. The rampant misogyny, transphobia, abelism, and racism already showed how limited that vision was, but now it seems like it doesn't exist at all.

Just... volunteer work for giant corporations. The same extractive vision of computing, but now coupled to a Reagan regime oppression of labor rights and environmental deregulation.

Is there a word for reading a phone screen over someone's ...

2026-05-12T00:06:35+02:00

Is there a word for reading a phone screen over someone's shoulder? Especially when it's be accident?

If not, may I propose "pheavesdropping?"

I'm glad that analogy worked for you! I'm also glad that ...

2026-05-06T20:13:32+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…aetd
_________________________

I'm glad that analogy worked for you! I'm also glad that it sounds like you aren't overextrapolating that analogy or teaching others to do so.

But context collapse means that I see that post fairly often without the rather critical context that it is just that, a loose and imperfect analogy, and not a literal translation. I'm trying to call out that that context collapse is occurring, not saying that it's a bad analogy in the first place.

I feel like you're rather badly missing my point? Regardless, ...

2026-05-06T20:11:30+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…ne58
_________________________

I feel like you're rather badly missing my point?

Regardless, no, I disagree entirely that symbolic notation is like explaining threads. It's core to what math *is*. I'm not arguing against analogies, but overextrapolating from those analogies does real harm to understanding math. It's why we get bullshit like the "monads are an arrow" meme and other kinds of anti-intellectualism in programming discourse.

Analogies are great if you know how far to take them and harmful if you lose that.

I think my point still stands? The state of math education sucks, ...

2026-05-06T19:48:33+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…0csd
_________________________

I think my point still stands? The state of math education sucks, but that doesn't make the math less important. In particular, we shouldn't lose important semantics like that a series doesn't imply execution order (or indeed, execution at all).

It's fine as an analogy, so long as the limits of that analogy are kept in mind?

RE: https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@shana/116526661413699845 This ...

2026-05-06T19:44:16+02:00

RE: https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@shana/116526661413699845

This is cool, but I'm far too much of a math nerd to not point out that this misses a subtle and important distinction between for-loops and summation notation.

For-loops imply an order of evaluation, but summation notation is purely declarative. The terms are ordered, yes, but not in the sense of evaluation.

quoting
note16pt…2rf8

Regular reminder to self

RE: https://mastodon.world/@signalapp/116478659183004819 This is ...

2026-04-27T23:51:45+02:00

RE: https://mastodon.world/@signalapp/116478659183004819

This is a good thread. I like how carefully they take responsibility for where they could have done better, and at the same time very clearly state what isn't a problem with Signal.

quoting
note1cct…lpfj

A response to recent reporting in Germany, in service of clarity and accountability:

First, it’s important to be precise when it comes to critical infrastructure like Signal. Signal was not “hacked” — in that our encryption, infrastructure, and the integrity of the app’s code was not compromised. 1/

It's a good evening to not post anything that will get you or ...

2026-04-26T06:47:09+02:00

It's a good evening to not post anything that will get you or your instance admin a visit from the Secret Service or the FBI.

If you have friends that are only on Bluesky, please tell them to ...

2026-04-25T03:41:51+02:00

If you have friends that are only on Bluesky, please tell them to take this seriously. Bluesky is speedrunning the whole path into becoming another right-wing hell chamber.

Like, don't have to leave per se, but invest some time in independent social media and have a backup plan.

https://mas.to/@jf_718/116461732601156180

wearily reaches up and resets the sign It has been [0] days ...

2026-04-20T23:20:26+02:00

*wearily reaches up and resets the sign*

It has been [0] days since I have been unable to learn critical information about a local business because it was posted exclusively to Instagram, and in particular behind a login gate.

Hell, let me make that even more clear and even more explicit. ...

2026-04-17T21:34:50+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…5yva
_________________________

Hell, let me make that even more clear and even more explicit. Abusive parents exist. Granting parents *as a category* the technological powers needed to oppress and abuse children is a betrayal of our collective duty to children, because those powers *will* be used by abusive parents to harm children.

Think of it in terms of the "what would 4chan do" or "what would a domestic abuser do" rules for evaluating technological products.

That last part is important, too. This isn't about parents, ...

2026-04-17T21:29:08+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…4u5e
_________________________

That last part is important, too. This isn't about parents, it's about kids. I pay taxes that include funding education because as someone who isn't a parent, I still have a responsibility to kids. Parents have a unique kind of duty as immediate guardians, but responsibility of care doesn't end with parents.

So-called "age verification" laws punish kids, they don't protect, care for, and support kids. They betray that societal responsibility that we *all* bear.

The kid in that case needed help and support, not punishment. No, ...

2026-04-17T21:26:36+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…ded5
_________________________

The kid in that case needed help and support, not punishment. No, it's not a good idea to send lewd photos of yourself to someone who will betray that trust and violate your boundaries, but sometimes kids make mistakes, even very serious ones — punishing them is not upholding the responsibility of care that all of us in society, parents or not, owe kids.

Re: protecting kids vs exerting ownership over kids, I keep ...

2026-04-17T21:24:57+02:00

Re: protecting kids vs exerting ownership over kids, I keep coming back to the teen girl who was charged with possession of child porn... of herself. Kids do ill-advised things all the time, like sending lewd photos to untrusted recipients. If that gets them jailed, branded as sex offenders, gets their cloud accounts locked, or otherwise punished, then they aren't being protected, they're being oppressed.

It has just been pointed out to me that the tool everyone is ...

2026-04-17T00:29:35+02:00

It has just been pointed out to me that the tool everyone is using to make fun of GitHub for turning into a flaky slopware service is itself slopware.

https://github.com/mrshu/github-statuses

I am so angry and disappointed at all the left- and center-wing ...

2026-04-16T23:50:26+02:00

I am so angry and disappointed at all the left- and center-wing commentators who bought into the right-wing framing of "parent's rights" as being more important than children's rights.

Like, I'm sorry, but parents have *responsibilities to* kids, not *rights over* kids. Kids aren't property, they're living, breathing *people* who deserve care and love and privacy and dignity.

One of the more obvious ironies of the whole thing is that ...

2026-04-16T21:34:21+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…gdy3
_________________________

One of the more obvious ironies of the whole thing is that someone *should* think of the children, and should do something *for* the children, like regulating advertising markets and recommendation engines that reward radicalization pipelines, or making sure that children aren't locked into transparent-backpack surveillance state models of computing for their entire lives.

Kids need safe places to be *private* with other kids, and that's exactly what age verification takes *away*.

RE: https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@eniko/116408040807982777 Once ...

2026-04-16T21:31:42+02:00

RE: https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@eniko/116408040807982777

Once fascists find a wedge, they generally don't give up on it until that wedge stops working.

Age verification is just such a wedge, and it's working really really well for the fascists, especially when it comes to wedging apart the "won't someone think of the children" wing of the center-right controlled opposition.
nostr:note1erjnswpzhclrkdcapmwqm5pfz3qdg95lnh65tvpgfpks6w7csqxsnfq96c

Look at what happened with Claude Code. We learned via the source ...

2026-04-16T18:06:44+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…q3cj
_________________________

Look at what happened with Claude Code. We learned via the source code leak that the whole thing is a Rube Goldberg machine of shoddy regexes and Markdown snippets telling Claude to lie, and yet proverbial moments later, Anthropic announces a new product that *totally works this time I swear* and all of a sudden discourse about AI tools "working" is completely reset.

Getting stuck in that discourse loop opens you up to being perpetually distracted from the far more important ethical problems.

Man, every part of this blog post sucks. ...

2026-04-16T17:51:51+02:00

Man, every part of this blog post sucks.

https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2026/apr/15/eternal-november-generative-ai-llm/

This is what happens to discourse when the focus is on whether AI tools "work," necessarily a complex and shifting topic that gives bad-faith actors lots of room to sow confusion, and not on the ethical catastrophe caused by adopting or allowing AI products into OSS development processes.

The thing I actually wanted to say about AI today, before the ...

2026-04-06T23:31:27+02:00

The thing I actually wanted to say about AI today, before the whole world jumped the shark yet again.

WHY WOULD YOU WRITE AN ARTICLE ABOUT HOW TERRIBLE SAM ALTMAN IS ...

2026-04-06T23:23:37+02:00

WHY WOULD YOU WRITE AN ARTICLE ABOUT HOW TERRIBLE SAM ALTMAN IS AND HOW AWFUL AI IS AND THEN USE A SLOP IMAGE AT THE TOP

So, since the "the fediverse needs to be open to new ...

2026-04-06T19:53:35+02:00

So, since the "the fediverse needs to be open to new ideas" canard is going around again, let's just be clear. AI is not a new idea, it's the oldest idea in the tech industry.

It's the idea that capital can embrace, extend, and extinguish computing, the idea that industry is more important than labor, that the climate crisis is an externality not worth worrying about. AI is the idea that stocks matter more than people.

Like, you don't need LLMs, the things that work, work well, ...

2026-03-31T22:42:16+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…ljcj
_________________________

Like, you don't need LLMs, the things that work, work well, and that have worked well for decades are all there, being called by the chatbots... you can just actually use those without 500k lines of spaghetti code and markdown files tricking you into thinking that the JSON parser is alive and has feelings.

Reading analysis of the Claude Code leak (not reading the code ...

2026-03-31T22:40:33+02:00

Reading analysis of the Claude Code leak (not reading the code itself, of course) is evidence towards what I had kind of suspected, that the whole thing is a giant magic trick not only in the straightforward LLMentalist way, but also in the sleight of hand way off making you think that this pile of regexes and JSON schema validation loops is *actually* the LLM doing LLM things.

In case you thought I was kidding. ...

2026-03-29T00:52:37+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…96sa
_________________________

In case you thought I was kidding.

I'm going to make it very personal here. As a trans woman ...

2026-03-25T23:36:16+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…lzxp
_________________________

I'm going to make it very personal here. As a trans woman whose government is trying to erase my existence, and as someone who spent twenty years of her life building some of the tools that you're now reporting on, I am much more concerned about the US government getting my health data through fully legal means than I am with a third-party nation state doing so via quantum cryptanalysis.

(1/2)

So like, QKD is probably useful in some ways, but the biggest ...

2026-03-25T22:49:39+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…ey0h
_________________________

So like, QKD is probably useful in some ways, but the biggest practical challenge with it is always finding out how to not either let your attacker control the QKD system or leak your key to the attacker once you have it. Physics doesn't help you with either of those parts of the problem.

This is a thread about adopting PQC for security while also adding AI to all of your fucking data handling workflows.

A bit over a decade ago, my partner @npub1d3a…gkm4 got their ...

2026-03-25T22:47:45+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…8jj2
_________________________

A bit over a decade ago, my partner Sarah Kaiser (npub1d3a…gkm4) got their PhD in large part by showing that if you shine an *even brighter* laser into commercial QKD systems, you can even destroy the detectors they use to prevent that kind of attack. That attack involves things like putting 60W of laser power down a telecom fiber, but they came up with novel ways of doing so, despite that being wildly out of safety specs.

It's very fun work.

A lot of current QKD devices use what are called ...

2026-03-25T22:45:37+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…2mjn
_________________________

A lot of current QKD devices use what are called "single-photon regime CCDs" as part of how they work. Those devices have a well-known problem that if you shine a very bright light on them, you can synthesize whatever output you'd like them to produce. An attacker can basically remotely control your QKD system that way and make it produce a fake key that they already know.

So you didn't need to "break" BB84, you just needed ...

2026-03-25T22:41:07+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…dr02
_________________________

So you didn't need to "break" BB84, you just needed to sit there with a microphone and you could read out the whole key. It doesn't matter how much physics guarantees the safety of your encryption if you go and tell the adversary what your key is.

For BB84, that deeply did not matter, it was a proof of principle. But in the 41 years since, that problem — that side channels exist — keeps getting forgotten.

Gather 'round classical friends and semiquantum adversaries, ...

2026-03-25T22:39:12+01:00

Gather 'round classical friends and semiquantum adversaries, it's story fucking time.

You may have heard of this fun new thing called "quantum key distribution" that uses the laws of physics to guarantee secure, unbreakable encryption. The first demonstration of QKD, known as "BB84" after its authors and the fact that it was built in 1984, had a bit of a problem, though. Sure, it was unbreakable but the mirrors used to send bits made different sounds based on whether they were sending a 0 or 1.

Like q-day only matters to me personally if I have nation state ...

2026-03-25T22:24:31+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…6jju
_________________________

Like q-day only matters to me *personally* if I have nation state adversaries in my threat model, but in that case there's also a lot lower hanging fruit I need to take care of first before QCs are my biggest worry. Also, any institution that both is adopting PQC and AI is an institution that at *best* can't tell the difference between their red and blue teams.

My thoughts on the second one are complicated. One of the authors ...

2026-03-25T22:20:15+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…7gfe
_________________________

My thoughts on the second one are complicated. One of the authors is pretty reasonable (we've even interacted here a few times) and I have no criticism of her or her expertise.

I also think that, out side of very specific infosec contexts, "Y2Q," "q-day" and other such concepts are actively misleading to laypeople. The PR, from that perspective, seems to be mostly reasonable aside from the specific evidence cited for advances in QC, but has escaped containment.

I don't know how to explain the set design for Machine ...

2026-03-25T07:21:36+01:00

I don't know how to explain the set design for Machine Girl's show tonight other than "j-e-n-o-v-acore."

That's surprising to me, every time I've accidentally ...

2026-03-23T21:33:55+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…3v8v
_________________________

That's surprising to me, every time I've accidentally waded into Bluesky, I immediately run into AI bros. Like, in seconds.

I get stock market valuations are always ridiculous, but what in ...

2026-03-21T15:51:01+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…8d5a
_________________________

I get stock market valuations are always ridiculous, but what in the fuck does it *mean* for OpenAI to be "worth" $800 *billion*. Like, what the fuck did Altman do, go individually pickpocket $100 from every person on the goddamned planet?

These numbers are completely absurd. ...

2026-03-21T15:44:08+01:00

These numbers are completely absurd.

https://pivot-to-ai.com/2026/03/20/openai-anthropic-spacex-to-trash-stock-market-ipos-for-2026/

Yes, and to wit, there's already more than one ...

2026-03-20T23:59:31+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…e3r9
_________________________

Yes, and to wit, there's already more than one Claude-extruded PR in core CPython. The impact seems fairly small so far, given that it's not very many commits yet, but that's not a *good* sign.

Long and short of it being, if you think OpenAI, a weapons ...

2026-03-20T06:53:11+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…sjzy
_________________________

Long and short of it being, if you think OpenAI, a weapons contractor who is gleefully helping the US bomb Iran, buying out Python tooling is a bad thing, then follow through. Don't hem and haw about AI in OSS: oppose it.

Oppose AI in the negative sense, ban it where you can, shout (without harassing) until the ink has rubbed off your keycaps. Oppose AI in the *positive* sense by building specs and parallel tooling.

But whatever you do, please don't make the problem *worse* by allowing AI.

But it's also true from a labor rights perspective. You ...

2026-03-20T06:50:31+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…3krt
_________________________

But it's also true from a labor rights perspective. You cannot undermine the value and power of labor without also eroding that balance I talked about in the very beginning of this thread. Individual workers can say no, they can bend corporate policies towards public good through malicious compliance or outright defiance. They can form temporary alliances of convenience.

AI products cannot. They are designed to enclose, and can only ever enclose.

Every single PR that is extruded or summarized by an AI product ...

2026-03-20T06:48:30+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…hw9z
_________________________

Every single PR that is extruded or summarized by an AI product weakens exit strategies by undermining parallel tooling. Our choice to adopt AI, or even to insufficiently oppose its adoption, means we are that much more vulnerable to *infrastructure* becoming enclosed.

That's true in the obvious way: in the most generous interpretation of AI, if you're renting your brain, someone else can jack the prices on you or turn off projects they don't like.

So: an exit strategy relies on good specs and parallel tooling. ...

2026-03-20T06:45:27+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…czp0
_________________________

So: an exit strategy relies on good specs and parallel tooling. For ruff, we have parallel tooling. For ty, we have good specs. For uv, we have both.

That only matters if we take that exit, but we're still in the kinda-sorta OK case to some approximate degree.

But what about the next time some infrastructure gets yoinked out from the Python ecosystem? How do we make sure we keep having good exit strategies?

That's when I get back to the first fact: AI is an attack on open source.

As I mentioned earlier, it's a bit more difficult to have ...

2026-03-20T06:43:13+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…24ly
_________________________

As I mentioned earlier, it's a bit more difficult to have good exit strategies with ruff, given that the specs around linting are much more loose. It's even harder to have a good exit strategy for ty, even though there's good specs, because there's not a great type checker to use instead¹.

___
¹As has been pointed out to me, mypy is, for all its strengths and weaknesses, not a type checker. It doesn't follow formal mathematical type checking rules, it follows linting heuristics.

Using GitHub was great back in the day. They gave OSS projects a ...

2026-03-20T06:41:10+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…wvec
_________________________

Using GitHub was great back in the day. They gave OSS projects a lot of free shit that was hard to get elsewhere. But it's clear in retrospect that we needed more and better exit strategies.

With the Astral buyout, it's a good reminder that uv came with very sensible exit strategies almost built-in: reliance on openly developed and published specs. But that only works because PDM exists, and that in turn only works because PEPs are collaboratively developed, and so forth.

Because let's face it, we depend on some pretty fucked up ...

2026-03-20T06:38:54+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…warj
_________________________

Because let's face it, we depend on some pretty fucked up shit in software development. Much of the shit that we depend on that isn't currently and actively fucked up is in immediate danger of becoming fucked up, a la OpenAI buying out Astral.

So it's a matter of knowing how, when you adopt a new tool or technology or whatever else, you will eventually stop using it.

Point being, I'm not criticizing specific individuals here. ...

2026-03-20T06:37:38+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…hzax
_________________________

Point being, I'm not criticizing specific individuals here. While I think there are some specific individuals who have made this situation demonstrably worse, on purpose, and for their own personal ends, that's not germane here, and so I'll keep those specifics to myself for now.

Rather, I want to talk about exit strategies.

The consequence of those two facts strikes me as being that lots ...

2026-03-20T06:36:08+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…msjj
_________________________

The consequence of those two facts strikes me as being that lots of people are doing good work, much of it at evil companies, and that that tension pretty much defines this motherfucking cursed industry. If your job depends on making AI numbers go up, that means your job depends on undermining open source. Sometimes you can malicious compliance that into helping open source as well, and hoping the two balance in an overall helpful direction.

Second, the unfortunate reality of the software and hardware ...

2026-03-20T06:33:54+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…rwux
_________________________

Second, the unfortunate reality of the software and hardware industries is that funding for the public commons is nearly non-existent. To get anything done, it either has to serve the interests of some company, or has to get done by tricking leadership of one or more companies into believing that their interests are best served by expanding the public commons.

So yeah, lots of folks in the industry have to walk the line between doing good within a system, and that system being extractionist.

A few thoughts on Astral / OpenAI, now that the emotions have sat ...

2026-03-20T06:31:56+01:00

A few thoughts on Astral / OpenAI, now that the emotions have sat for a bit.

First, let me start by noting that AI is an attack on open source, inherently, by necessity, and at a structural level. That argument is bigger than Astral, but the short version is that you cannot simultaneously expand the public commons and work towards it's enclosure; moreover, if the public commons do not stand for the public good, then it's not really a commons any more.

I am primed and ready to absolutely dissolve into histrionics ...

2026-03-19T19:09:45+01:00

I am primed and ready to absolutely dissolve into histrionics over the astral buyout. Outside of Anthropic or Palantic, there's not too many companies who could have done as much damage to the Python ecosystem by buying out astral.

The part that really depresses me, though, is that Python *already* has been taking severe damage from AI vendors, and this seems like pouring gigantic amounts of gasoline onto that fire.

Jesus fucking Christ. ...

2026-03-19T18:25:06+01:00

Jesus fucking Christ.

https://openai.com/index/openai-to-acquire-astral/

That was easy. So far, this has been a somewhat less polished and ...

2026-03-19T06:30:16+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…307h
_________________________

That was easy. So far, this has been a somewhat less polished and significantly less consent-respecting Linux distro. I appreciate that the AI encumbrances mostly defaulted to off... mostly.

OK, I have no earthly idea about how to get DNS working on here, ...

2026-03-19T06:28:03+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…h6ym
_________________________

OK, I have no earthly idea about how to get DNS working on here, but at least installing Xcode was surprisingly automatic, and also installed git. From there, uv and pdm worked exactly like they do on Linux.

Now for golang.

I mean, I guess fuck me for firewalling out common public DNS ...

2026-03-19T06:18:14+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…6pgj
_________________________

I mean, I guess fuck me for firewalling out common public DNS servers that malicious devices could use to exfiltrate data.

Yep. It's DNS. Sigh.

2026-03-19T06:13:09+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…ufh0
_________________________

Yep. It's DNS. Sigh.

Huh. It seems like all outgoing traffic turns off when Tailscale ...

2026-03-19T06:10:58+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…v3kp
_________________________

Huh. It seems like all outgoing traffic turns off when Tailscale is on? Or maybe it's DNS? Time to investigate!

- Running `clang` at the command line in an SSH session brings up ...

2026-03-19T06:07:04+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…gm5f
_________________________

- Running `clang` at the command line in an SSH session brings up a GUI window on the KVM. Huh.

I will say, in terms of zero to having a working SSH server, ...

2026-03-19T06:06:09+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…gy4g
_________________________

I will say, in terms of zero to having a working SSH server, macOS is much easier than Windows and not as easy as Ubuntu or Mint.

- Yay! pubkey SSH works over Tailscale! Now I don't need to ...

2026-03-19T06:04:28+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…ez3q
_________________________

- Yay! pubkey SSH works over Tailscale! Now I don't need to do everything through the KVM!

- Installing Tailscale causes a wild number of different scary ...

2026-03-19T06:00:42+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…ktuz
_________________________

- Installing Tailscale causes a wild number of different scary looking system prompts to show up all at once.
- `sudo tailscale up`: command not found

- It didn't ask me for a machine name, and now it's ...

2026-03-19T05:55:38+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…2vkc
_________________________

- It didn't ask me for a machine name, and now it's something absurd.
- Oh, right, I've got to add zsh to the list of shells I think about, right up there with bash, nushell, and pwsh. Meh.

- Why does clicking the wallpaper do that? What is going on? - ...

2026-03-19T05:41:39+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…v3q5
_________________________

- Why does clicking the wallpaper do that? What is going on?
- How did it pre-populate my deadname as the account name when I very much so have changed it on my Apple account?
- Where is the terminal? Oh, right, under Spotlight.

This is not Apple's fault per se, but it is very funny. ...

2026-03-19T05:37:33+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…e276
_________________________

This is not Apple's fault per se, but it is very funny.

Thoughts on my first Apple system: - I don't remember having ...

2026-03-19T05:36:59+01:00

Thoughts on my first Apple system:

- I don't remember having to give my phone number to Linux when I installed.
- I think I've seen three UI toolkits in the setup screen so far?
- Dear *gods* I have to hit "skip" or "not now" or "maybe later" a *lot*.

What in the fuck is your point? Do you really think I'm an ...

2026-03-18T01:05:25+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…x8ka
_________________________

What in the fuck is your point? Do you really think I'm an Apple fangirl?

Hell, my experiences trying to get Windows to do even basic ...

2026-03-17T21:56:02+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…c5dy
_________________________

Hell, my experiences trying to get Windows to do even basic end-user stuff makes me very firmly convinced that Linux is, on the whole, easier to use. But then Zoom ships broken software that doesn't work right on Linux, the whole world uses Word, and and and.

I haven't used macOS in six years or so, but I have the first Apple computer I've ever bought in the mail so that I can try and make cross-plat software. I doubt I'll find it easier to use, personally, but who knows.

OK, I even agree with some of what you're saying, but... how ...

2026-03-17T21:53:44+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…xmh4
_________________________

OK, I even agree with some of what you're saying, but... how does that help?

Like, free software shouldn't have to compete, it shouldn't be the case that not only does free software avoid DRM, e-waste, AI, and whatever other fuckshit is going on in the tech industry, it *also* has to be easier to use and in an environment that's designed to be hostile towards free software.

But wow if saying how things should work got us there, I'd be a *much* happier person.

Like stories about glassholes getting their due? Stories about ...

2026-03-16T23:08:37+01:00

Like stories about glassholes getting their due? Stories about slopbros meeting karma in real time? Stories about people behaving badly in court?

Why not all three?

https://www.404media.co/witness-caught-using-smartglasses-in-court-blames-it-all-on-chatgpt/

NVIDIA is not helping anything by calling DLSS 5 a "GPT ...

2026-03-16T21:31:15+01:00

NVIDIA is not helping anything by calling DLSS 5 a "GPT moment in gaming." Games media isn't helping by referring to "biggest change since NVIDIA invented ray tracing eight years ago."

Like, AI companies make their money by sowing confusion, and using that confusion to make bullshit like LLMs seem like an ordinary technology that does ordinary things.

[ed: see below for a very solid argument as to why DLSS 5 actually is slop, and why that's not actually an expansion of the term]

"it would be funny if microsoft managed to get a clue" ...

2026-03-16T04:13:04+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…7c22
_________________________

"it would be funny if microsoft managed to get a clue"

yes, yes it would

Put differently: this is the Electron killer, for better or ...

2026-03-15T19:26:53+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…xv8x
_________________________

Put differently: this is the Electron killer, for better or worse, and not in the way that Apple killed Flash.

When PCs ship with 8 GB or less of RAM, application companies don't give a fuck, and so we get a proliferation of Electron and Electron-like platforms that consume gigantic amounts of RAM. That won't fly on something like the Neo.

made the point that the Neo is an implicit promise from Apple ...

2026-03-15T19:23:09+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…y74a
_________________________

made the point that the Neo is an implicit promise from Apple that macOS will run just fine on 8 GB of memory for the next 8 years.

But I think it goes farther than that: Apple made a reference device for application developers. They've never been shy about enforcing requirements on developers, and this is an interesting positive side to that: developers now have a huge incentive to make applications that fit within modest memory limits.

Everyone has a MacBook Neo take, so here's mine. Apple has, ...

2026-03-15T19:21:06+01:00

Everyone has a MacBook Neo take, so here's mine.

Apple has, in my opinion, been a net negative for computing, and to a stunning degree. They've normalized DRM for software so completely that it will possibly take decades to get back the rights that we lost. They've used that power to make life worse for queer folks and to cozy up to the Trump administration.

But. There's something fascinating about the Neo.

The problem I'm trying to solve, yet again: - I'm trans, ...

2026-03-15T00:51:08+01:00

The problem I'm trying to solve, yet again:

- I'm trans, and I hate my fucking voice so much I get dysphoric when I hear it.
- I have a local-only no-cloud voice recorder that I would like to use for taking notes on the go.
- I have a device I made (kind of, it's in progress) for backing up things that look like USB mass storage devices to self-hosted storage.
- I would like to be able to plug my voice recorder into that device, and have notes come out, without having to hear my own voice.

Looking for something less fucking awful than Whisper, which is ...

2026-03-15T00:37:11+01:00

Looking for something less fucking awful than Whisper, which is harder than it should be now that OpenAI has drained all the oxygen out of the room. Most of the tools I would have used in the past haven't been actively maintained since circa 2020, sadly.

Vosk looks neat in some ways, but then I get to the "models" page and see that it's trained on GigaSpeech, but I can't find anything about the provenance of the data in that dataset.

AI has now damaged almost every part of a reasonable OSS stack, ...

2026-03-12T23:21:23+01:00

AI has now damaged almost every part of a reasonable OSS stack, from systemd to Python itself.

We need to understand that blast radius, to understand where and how energies can be spent, whether it's reverting that damage, working with governance to prevent and contain damage, or whether it's forking damaged projects entirely.

We cannot afford the luxury of time on this one. We need to understand the problem **now**.

I dunno, I'm pretty pumped to read them all!

2026-03-11T03:28:40+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…2p0y
_________________________

I dunno, I'm pretty pumped to read them all!

It blows.

2026-03-11T03:17:41+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…7n3c
_________________________

It blows.

I am begging people to just be normal about software for one. ...

2026-03-04T20:38:45+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…grte
_________________________

I am begging people to just be normal about software for one. fucking. day.

I was not planning on crashing out over AI today, I was planning ...

2026-03-04T20:36:40+01:00

I was not planning on crashing out over AI today, I was planning on reading screenplays.

But I also was not planning on having a package I was seriously considering taking a dependency on doing a rugpull.

All very good questions, and ones I would rather have answered by ...

2026-02-28T03:10:00+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…vx4x
_________________________

All very good questions, and ones I would rather have answered by a competent legal journalist and not Lunduke.

To be sure, I'm not trying to say it's not real, but PC ...

2026-02-28T02:06:11+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…w9ds
_________________________

To be sure, I'm not trying to say it's not real, but PC Gamer seems to have relied on Lunduke as a source, and seems to have in particular relied on Lunduke's reading of the bill.

I am not a legal expert or lawyer of any kind, so I don't know that that reading is accurate. It might well be, but if so, that's in spite of and not because of Lunduke's reading.

"via the Lunduke Journal." That's a right-wing ...

2026-02-28T00:40:55+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…hlue
_________________________

"via the Lunduke Journal."

That's a right-wing disinfo site, it's more than a little disturbing to see PC Gamer treating them as a reputable source.

RE: https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@aeva/116139660363700373 This, ...

2026-02-27T01:27:43+01:00

RE: https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@aeva/116139660363700373

This, this, this.

The pro-AI side keeps making unhinged, wild, and completely irresponsible claims. Burden of proof has to mean something.

quoting
note1650…6fgg

You don't need to prove that these companies have a real product. The burden of proof is on them.

Anthropic is a public benefit LLC registered in the State of ...

2026-02-27T00:44:41+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…dx04
_________________________

Anthropic is a public benefit LLC registered in the State of Delaware.

This puts them alongside other Delaware PBLLCs like Bluesky, OpenAI, Warby Parker, a wholely owned subsidiaries of Proctor & Gamble and Danone, and many others. The laws around PBLLCs in Delaware are infamously lax, with very little oversight provided.

https://delcode.delaware.gov/title8/c001/sc15/

This whole thing smells of bad-faith LessWrong chaff about having ...

2026-02-27T00:16:40+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…htr2
_________________________

This whole thing smells of bad-faith LessWrong chaff about having morals.

I'm sorry, but my read is pretty deeply that this is ...

2026-02-27T00:13:55+01:00

I'm sorry, but my read is pretty deeply that this is Anthropic using a mundane contract dispute to run marketing about AI alignment and safety.

They already dropped their "safety pledge" citing the tired old inevitably saw, partner with Palantir, and their products were already used in the illegal and immoral raid on Venezuela.

https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:m65ifh7vn5zdgs7izcmht4gy/post/3mfscnstnrk2s

AI doesn't work¹, so it's easy to forget that larger ...

2026-02-22T23:45:13+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…m9t8
_________________________

AI doesn't work¹, so it's easy to forget that larger point, I suspect? That *even if* AI did work (and again, it doesn't), it still would need to be critically examined from an ethical perspective.

Failing to do so is how we have massive surveillance networks today.

___
¹Here again, referring to the wave of current hype products. Boosters love wearing the ML shit that does work as a shield against criticism.

I don't have time nor the inclination to argue that point ...

2026-02-22T23:42:33+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…am49
_________________________

I don't have time nor the inclination to argue that point with them further when it comes to AI. But I do think there's a broader point that is worth critical examination, especially as tech continues to build out surveillance, age verification, automated filtering and censoring, and other tools that do immense damage when used by authoritarians.

We *cannot* afford to evaluate tech purely based on whether it "works" or not.

Yesterday, had an argument with an AI booster. I'm not going ...

2026-02-22T23:40:25+01:00

Yesterday, had an argument with an AI booster. I'm not going to link, both because I don't want to platform that and because I don't want anyone to go harass them. But what I thought was very interesting was that I asked point-blank if there was any degree to which ethical problems with LLMs could make them not want to use AI — they told me no, there was not, and implied that they evaluated AI purely on the basis of its efficacy.

Sure, but we're not talking about "which tool is best for ...

2026-02-21T01:54:16+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…aq3q
_________________________

Sure, but we're not talking about "which tool is best for driving a nail that I own into a wall that I own," we're talking about "is it ethical to use a technology built on fascist ideology and stolen work, that carries unconscionable environmental costs, and that's used to disrupt labor movements to perform a task that that technology is fundamentally unsuited to?"

It's quite fair to have a very firm "no" by way of answer to the second question.

I'm not personally sure I'd go quite that far. Someone I ...

2026-02-20T23:28:27+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…a6xj
_________________________

I'm not personally sure I'd go quite that far. Someone I respect said something I vehemently disagree with, it happens. I don't think it'd be reasonable of me to insist that my heroes, as it were, agree with me on even all the important things.

I'm only being as pointed with the above because what he said is *also* something a lot of far worse people have said, and now they have more ammo.

I wouldn't be saying all this if it was just Doctorow, ...

2026-02-20T23:24:04+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…5h5f
_________________________

I wouldn't be saying all this if it was just Doctorow, I'm even fine disagreeing with people I deeply respect. But he's not the only one saying shit like this, and I think it's worth calling out the broader rhetorical point.

(What do I mean when I say I'm not open to changing my mind ...

2026-02-20T23:22:28+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…djeq
_________________________

(What do I mean when I say I'm not open to changing my mind on the issue at the moment? I mean that when I've tried to be open minded, I get flooded with bad-faith bullshit and outright propaganda. My being closed-minded here is a temporary and reasoned position about conserving my own energies, and not letting people DDoS my rationality. I don't think that the Discourse™ around LLMs is *currently* at a place where opposition to boosterism benefits from open-mindedness.)

Hell, if you disagree with me and think I'm wrong on the ...

2026-02-20T23:17:43+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…85uf
_________________________

Hell, if you disagree with me and think I'm wrong on the merits, then by all means make that argument! (Preferably not in my mentions, I'm tired of this whole debacle and am not personally open to changing my mind on LLMs right now.)

But "purity culture" isn't an argument, it's an appeal to the idea that holding principles is *bad*.

No, opposing LLMs isn't "purity culture." I've ...

2026-02-20T23:08:55+01:00

No, opposing LLMs isn't "purity culture." I've seen this now from quite a few different people, and I disagree vehemently. It is good, actually, to have moral principles and hold to them, even when people with more money than you find said principles annoying.

I know it's old news, but I just keep shaking my head at ...

2026-02-20T21:16:11+01:00

I know it's old news, but I just keep shaking my head at AI-generated passwords and wondering how it ever got this bad.

I hate this, but I think I hate it strictly less than anything ...

2026-02-18T01:25:02+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…cc5f
_________________________

I hate this, but I think I hate it strictly less than anything else I can think of, including doing nothing.

Hot take: looking for a single silver-bullet Discord replacement ...

2026-02-10T21:34:59+01:00

Hot take: looking for a single silver-bullet Discord replacement is solving the wrong problem. Corporate power has pushed us towards everything-apps, but it's OK for the tool you use to communicate with other users of an open source project to look different from the tool you use to text your spouse and the tool you use to run voice chats with your gaming guilds.