ceoln @ceoln@qoto.org

"Microsoft has hired a director of nuclear technologies to oversee a program to develop small-scale atomic reactors to power datacenters as an alternative to fossil fuels"

What could possibly go wrong when ClippyAI manages your uranium cores?

https://www.theregister.com/2024/01/23/microsoft_nuclear_hires/

Fluid becoming solid becoming wonder – stunning cyanotype prints of ice formation by artist Meghann Riepenhoff, with some stunning words by @RebeccaSolnit https://t.co/owphaR0nfl

2/ And while I’m at it, my dear friend Wiley Miller’s strip, Non Sequitur, killed it today too:

https://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur/2024/01/21/

Bang on:

"our government is more interested in removing homeless people from view than removing homelessness itself."

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/jan/21/hostile-architecture-is-making-our-cities-even-less-welcoming?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

In modern times, when rich people levy taxes against poor people to support their lavish lifestyles, they don't use government to do it. They use corporations. We call these private sector taxes "profits", and we have been effectively sold the lie that they are not only just, but beneficial to us, and necessary for our economic survival.

#NewAristocracy

Remember that tech people like DHH paved the way that made it fine in media to speak badly of DEI--something only happening because racism and white superiority are now cosplaying as "valid criticism".

Yo, Rails Core team, how's it going over there in racism HQ?

https://www.wsmv.com/2024/01/18/person-chicken-suit-spotted-roaming-nashville-after-snowfall/

I multiply vectors all the time of course. Well, instruct my machines to do it and that works if I try enough combinations.

That's mostly a dot product I think but I mostly don't have to think about why it works, I just try the combinations all day until it does.

This talk explaining why multiplying vectors is so confusing was good though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htYh-Tq7ZBI

Post Canada's #OnlineNewsAct and Meta's ban on Canadian news content, sharing journalism on social media has been tough to say the least.

And yet The Tyee has seen much growth here on #Mastodon.

We want to see how far we can go. If you enjoy coming across Tyee stories on your Mastodon feeds, share our profile with your friends, or repost this toot, to help us get to 6,000 followers. 🐘🌟🗞

🧛📓

Went to see #StuartLee at the Leicester Square theater.

He's fun and funny and dissecting his own comedy in front of your very eyes.

Felt like I'd heard it before quite a lot. Maybe should leave it more than a year before next time.

You sometimes see other comics copying the way Lee disparages his own audience explaining why some got the joke and others didn't.

He does that great, and continues to be hilarious, but the rest of y'all should stop doing that.

Everything I said to my friends during the break about how if you refine your audience constantly and narrow it down to just the devoted, you end up with an audience consisting of people just like you, he repeated only funnier in the second half.

Still love Stew. Great stuff.

I was on Twitter/X for several years and as the COVID pandemic started it became a key way for people to communicate--scientists, clinicians, policy-makers, advocates. But since Musk took over many have fled and the place has become incredibly toxic (yes, I am slow to learn that not all things get better...). It's just really filled with hate now of all kinds. I just deleted my account. I feel free.

#frost so #chill
#happysnow

I've followed these spear campaigns against municipal broadband since 2005 when #UTOPIA started laying out their fiber to cities in #Utah.

Now that I work for one of the ISPs on the UTOPIA fiber network, I have an even closer view of what Big Telecom is doing to undermine communities rolling out their own public fiber infrastructure.

"Covert" and "sleazy" is only a fraction of the terms I would use.

https://www.techdirt.com/2024/01/18/telecom-monopolies-are-once-again-funding-covert-sleazy-local-attacks-on-community-broadband-networks/

"A learning experience is one of those things that says, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that."
Douglas Adams

Hospitals owned by private equity firms are the most in harming patients, staff, and more. https://arstechnica.com/health/2024/01/hospitals-slash-staff-services-quality-of-care-when-private-equity-takes-over/

Not surprising really, but I'm glad it's reported.

There's no point in having institutions of soft power if you don't use them when fundamental principles are at stake.