Dave T-W @davoloid@qoto.org
- Location
- Mostly London
- Pronouns (plz)
- he/him
Just another worried little citizen of this modern-day Pompeii. Techie at UCL, working on Process Automation with MS Power Platform. Scatterbrain, interested in education, languages, Space and lots of disparate things. sorry.
Keeping my space toots at @astrodad as an experiment in self-moderation :)
*Background banner is a photo Yorkshire flag in blue and white, in front of a classic bell tent, in a field of similar tents at a festival.
Joined Oct 2022
My thoughts on the excellent #Barbie movie.
Also, as a Duolingo fan and a Birkenstock widower, I felt seen.
My thoughts on the excellent #Barbie movie.
Wow, #Barbie Movie is even better than I'd hoped for. The #Ken side of stuff is even funnier when you've watched the Real World Kens like Ben Shapiro react in the comically predictable ways that we are familiar with. Or Tucker Carlson with his Glowing Testicles of Masucilinity.
One aspect of the real world that was not covered (because it doesn't all have to be about the menz) was the fact that boys also played with dolls, they were just called Action Figures. If it was typical in society for boys and girls to play with their dolls/action figures *together*, we might be in a different place.
After all, that's what we do in the real world as functional adults, right? Me and my Barbie built our dream house together, our car is one we chose together because it suited our needs.
The Real World Kens are never going to get it, and that's fine. But the big fella with a bushy beard sitting next to me, who was "dragged along by his missus" certainly got it. He gave a big soppy sigh at *that scene near the end* and I knew he was probably holding back the tears.
Brief visit to #Cambridge and a quick spin round the Fitzwilliam Museum, a collection of pottery and artefacts from around the world. Was too busy looking at 1000 year old Chinese and Korean bowls that look like you could buy now in a high-end homeward shop.
When kiddo ran out of spoons, we grabbed some lunch then headed to the #Museum of #Computing #History, an excellent collection and interesting displays, that should be in a much more prominent location than at the back of an industrial estate.
UK technology sector is a huge part of our economy, and yet we can't give this organisation the proper support? For shame. Any big companies that have made their profits around Silicon Roundabout could lob some pocket change here.
Dave T-W
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Dave T-W
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Anders Nielsen, military analyst and Naval Captain at the Royal Danish Defence College about the termination of the grain deal: it's not all clear, but it's quite possible to become a bad news for the Russian fleet.
▪️ Originally, the grain deal was made for 120 days, then extended several times, despite threats from Russian authorities to terminate Russia's participation. At the moment of signing, Russia was hoping that by the time the first 120 days passed, Ukraine would have lost. The deal was viewed as a PR-stunt aimed at developing countries - dependent on grain supplies, yet unable to help Ukraine in the war. In the end the grain deal became a particular benefit for Ukraine, while Russia was not in position to exit the deal: under the circumstances of the growing international isolation Russia could not afford to be accused of creating a food crisis by African countries.
▪️The Russian navy is not capable of fully blocking Ukrainian ports. They can target Ukrainian ports, or their submarines can sink one or two ships with torpedoes, but for a true naval blockade it's necessary for a navy to be present in the zone or navigation in order to inspect the ships. Ukraine now has land-based anti-ship missiles and quite technological sea drones. In some ways, during the grain deal, Russia controlled the Ukrainian fleet by not allowing any other cargoes, except for the grain. They also delayed their inspections and created a queue of ships.
▪️ Many thought that the Russian authorities would extend the grain deal, since leaving it would be worse for Russia than staying. However, the explosion on the Crimean Bridge on July 17 created significant delays in the Russian logistics (and also personally insulted Putin), so he couldn't just simply re-sign the deal. As a result, Russia posed some unrealistic conditions for the grain deal renewal, including lifting some of the sanctions. No one will go for it, however, since at the time of the next grain deal renewal, their demands might include lifting more sanctions.
▪️ It looks like Russian authorities weren't ready for the possibility of the bridge being blown up. Their reaction was not really consistent. The declaration that from now on every ship will potentially be seen as a carrier of military cargo is pretty vague. Later, one of the Kremlin officials specified that the ships will be inspected.
▪️ A naval blockade has clear rules. It has to be announced in advance and then warn passing ships about inspections. You can't just shoot at them. The Russians, of course, can spit on international laws, but they still need to get close enough to know exactly where the ships are. This, in turn, will bring the Russian navy into the range of Ukrainian missiles and unmanned brander drones. The Russian Armed Forces will probably continue shelling ports in the near future, in the hope that this will scare the ship owners enough.
▪️ However, in the long run, the Russian leadership faces a number of unpleasant dilemmas. At the moment, everyone is accusing them specifically of using food as a weapon. If they send a fleet to enforce the blockade, they risk losing ships. If they don't, they look like losers. The Russian Armed Forces also have to spend expensive missiles to destroy grain. From a Ukrainian perspective , the Russians could spend missiles on much more important targets than grain.
▪️ It is possible that the timing of the Kerch Bridge attack was calculated by Ukraine as a trap for the Russian Federation. Ukrainian leadership may have decided to raise the stakes by pushing through the expansion of the "grain deal" to other commodities. From Ukraine's position, the "grain deal" was an authorization for Russia to engage in a "discount blockade" where the Russians controlled the passage of ships through inspections. Ukrainian leadership could have decided to disrupt this partial blockade by taking advantage of the weakness of the Russian fleet.
Source: https://t.co/vQaHKJWV8D
Quick visit with the folks and kiddo to the #Cartoon #Museum in #London. A small place full of classic frames by British cartoonists and #comics, from early Gilray to The Guardian's Steve Bell.
Here, Ella Baron has created a graphic reportage on the plight of women in #SouthSudan.
There's also a section on Norman Thelwell, who satirised factory farming trends back in the 50s and 60s.
Not far from Oxford Circus on Wells St.
Dave T-W
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#Ukraine #war : UK criticised for 'lack of understanding' of #Wagner 's activities in #Africa
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66308864
If you are a regular listener of #TheGlobalJigsaw you have found out a lot about what they are doing there, if not then you could check out the episodes on the Central #African Republic #CAR and #Mali
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w13xtvrk/episodes/downloads
Dave T-W
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I miss written tutorials. I hate how every tutorial is a YouTube now. I don’t want to watch 15 minutes and forget to pay attention for the second that has the detail that I am missing or it just doesn’t show. Even short tutorials are 3 minutes when it could have been a ten second read. I want to skim a page and go directly to the point. Has writing really become that hard to do?
Dave T-W
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In my attempt to make Mastodon a nice place to spend time on. I am looking to follow people who are interested in #retrocomputing #scriptwriting #retrogaming #ukulele #accordion #theatre
Please follow and I will follow back.
Dave T-W
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Found an XSS on a fairly big site.
The people running it didn't respond to my contact requests.
Found the developer and told them.
They fixed it. I asked if there was a bug bounty and got this charming reply.
I wasn't expecting riches, but a "thank you" would have been nice!
Dave T-W
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For a less technical summation and why it matters...
Dave T-W
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Dave T-W
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In case you think taking sightseeing trips in the middle of a catastrophe is a new and dumb phenomenon just remember Pliny the Elder died in 79 CE after travelling *into* the eruption that destroyed Pompeii, because he wanted to check it out.
Dave T-W
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Dave T-W
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Important sets:
ℂ the complex numbers
ℕ the natural numbers
ℚ the rational numbers
ℝ the real numbers
𝕏 the set of fascists wannabes
ℤ the integers
Dave T-W
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Hi, we're a tech startup run by libertarian Silicon Valley tech bros.
We're not a newspaper, we're a content portal.
We're not a taxi service, we're a ride sharing app.
We're not a pay TV service, we're a streaming platform.
We're not a department store, we're an e-commerce marketplace.
We're not a financial services firm, we're crypto.
We're not a space agency, we're a group of visionaries who are totally going to Mars next year.
We're not a copywriting and graphic design agency, we're a large language model generative AI platform.
Oh sure, we compete against those established businesses. We basically provide the same goods and services.
But we're totally not those things. At least from a legal and PR standpoint.
And that means all the laws and regulations that have built up over the decades around those industries don't apply to us.
Things like consumer protections, privacy protections, minimum wage laws, local content requirements, safety regulations, environmental protections... They totally don't apply to us.
Even copyright laws — as long as we're talking about everyone else's intellectual property.
We're going to move fast and break things — and then externalise the costs of the things we break.
We've also raised several billion in VC funding, and we'll sell our products below cost — even give them away for free for a time — until we run our competition out of the market.
Once we have a near monopoly, we'll enshitify the hell out of our service and jack up prices.
You won't believe what you agreed to in our terms of service agreement.
We may also be secretly hoarding your personal information. We know who you are, we know where you work, we know where you live. But you can trust us.
By the time the regulators and the general public catch on to what we're doing, we will have well and truly moved on to our next grift.
By the way, don't forget to check out our latest innovation. It's the Uber of toothpaste!
2002: SpaceX.com
2023: U+0020 X.com
#x
Dave T-W
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The correct takeaway for Labour re Uxbridge is that the Conservatives cynically exploited ULEZ, a policy they started, a policy to save lives, a policy that impacts a tiny number of polluting vehicles for gain and Labour's campaign failed to point this out.
Labour need to understand, the Conservatives will do anything, lie, cheat and more to win.
Labour need to be robust in calling out the lies and support policies that improve the environment and save lives.
Dave T-W
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Twitter, rebrand, MySpaceX
Dave T-W
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🔥 WOW!! Italy's new Prime Minister @giorgiameloni addressed the Kremlin assets in the Italian Parliament who want her to withdraw support for Ukraine because, according to them, it's "better to live in a dictatorship than to die."
- Location
- Mostly London
- Pronouns (plz)
- he/him
Just another worried little citizen of this modern-day Pompeii. Techie at UCL, working on Process Automation with MS Power Platform. Scatterbrain, interested in education, languages, Space and lots of disparate things. sorry.
Keeping my space toots at @astrodad as an experiment in self-moderation :)
*Background banner is a photo Yorkshire flag in blue and white, in front of a classic bell tent, in a field of similar tents at a festival.
Joined Oct 2022
