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It's 9:13 AM Eastern and I'm glad you're alive.

Thank you for being here with me.

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@AmberWavesofFlame Also he banned ALL the accounts of the guy that was posting the information, not just the one that was posting it. Which is hard to account for.

@AmberWavesofFlame The thing is that he came in saying that anything that wasn't illegal would be allowed, because Freedom of Speech. Then when it impacted HIM he went back on that, without a hint of acknowledging that his initial promise was actually a bad idea and he was wrong.

(Also that information is still / already public. If we wants to do something about that, he has to talk to the FAA and Congress, not just ban some guy from Twitter.)

AI Art stuff; maybe a little light plagiarism 

"The Mona Lisa" produces obvious (but much worse) variants, but that's definitely out of copyright...

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so, how do you typically take your morning coffee?

#ColeensPolls

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@coleens_ That's not what I thought that song was about, I admit...

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This cartoon hits hard.

It hits even harder when you notice the 2007 publication date in the lower right corner.

#climate #environment #nature #COP15 #COP27 #sustainability #PredatoryDelay

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ICYMI ‘Gaslighting’ Is Merriam-Webster’s Word of Year
First def =“psychological manip of a person usually over extended period of time that causes victim 2 question validity of own thoughts, perception of reality, or memories & typically leads 2 confusion, loss of confidence & self-esteem, uncertainty of one’s emo or mental stability, & a dependency on perpetrator.”

2nd, defines “gaslighting” as “act or practice of grossly misleading someone espec 4 one’s own advantage.” smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/

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Here’s a poem in the shape of a Christmas tree. It’s called ‘Needles’.

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Cat Harpists!

A cat playing a harp may not be the first image that comes to mind in cat employment, but "string plucking" is awfully close to "scratching the sofa" and the soft, mindful melodies of cats accompanying their pleas for treats can only please the ethereal animal spirit.

One job danger for the Cat Harpist is the tickling of the whiskers in the vibrating strings; alas, but that is a small price to pay for bringing joy to their lower tier human caretakers.

Riiiiiiiiight.

#AI #Cats

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Heading home from Old Faithful this afternoon we encountered a group of bison braving the 150F water while crossing the runoff of Excelsior Geyser. The cold air causes heavy steam to rise and surround the bison.

AI Art stuff; maybe a little light plagiarism 

It has been brought to my attention :) that there are at least two phrases on which Midjourney (v4) is so overtrained that it would be hard to argue that the outputs aren't derivative works: "afghan girl" (which produces slight variations of the justly-famous Steve McCurry photo of Sharbat Gula) and "starry night" (which produces somewhat more varied variations of the van Gogh De sterrennacht).

The Midjourney folks have actually banned "afghan girl" (and even "afgan girl") as prompts; seems likely that this is to help prevent their users from using their system to do something that might be violating copyright.

I wonder if there are other phrases that produce something so famously linked to them that they are instantly recognizable. And if so, how many are still in copyright.

This has somewhat softened my prior opinion that the training set is so large that it will basically never reproduce a single image from it. I do still think it's pretty rare, and only in extremely famous cases that occur a ridiculous number of times in the set. But still!

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I'm pleased to share that there is a new TV show based on the National Treasure movies and it has everything you could possibly want from a TV show that is based on those movies

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If you friend prefers Jeff to Jeffrey or Kate to Katharine or CJ to any single name at all, you easily remember and adapt.

Pronouns are literally that easy.

The only reason to dismiss or denigrate someone’s chosen identity is *your* bigotry. Not linguistic complexity.

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When people ask for good books to help #decolonize their histories, I typically like to suggest Young Readers editions.
These take tough topics and make them a lot more accessible especially for non-readers.
This is also a great way to introduce these topics to the entire family.
paperbacksandfrybread.com/prod
#bookstodon #books #indigenous #amreading

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birdsite 

Two people sit in the middle of a landfill. One of them says:

"We should leave."

The other responds:

"Think of what will happen to this place if we do."

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Hello! Today’s #ArtAdventCalendar is a big 4ft high #acrylic on canvas depiction of the New Horizons spacecraft on the first ever flyby of Pluto and its moon, Charon. I painted this piece before there were any clear photos, so with the help of an astronomer pal, I guessed using what info I had. It was pretty close to accurate! This #painting hangs in my #art studio. #sciart #astronomy #science

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