⊥ᵒᵚ Cᵸᵎᶺᵋᶫ∸ᵒᵘ ☑️ @falken@qoto.org

Keir Starmer: There is no money to keep old people warm in winter. Soz, lol.

Also Keir Starmer: We are devoting an unlimited amount of money to a pothole-spotting robot, because I understand that:

1. The entire UK road network already has cameras pointing at it, especially rural B-roads.

2. Potholes are undetectable to the human eye.

So, this has been in the works for a while, arguably most of last year. I intend to transfer my personal ownership of the Mastodon trademarks and assets, incl. copyright over my code, to the Mastodon non-profit, and transition to a different role at the organization.

Just arrived in the mail from The Great White North, The Expanse season 5 crew gift BT speaker with luna motif. Also an unofficial/aftermarket MRCN "legitimate salvage" license plate frame arrived at the same time, completing the Legitimate Salvage theme for today. #scifi #TheExpanse

@Edent that's easy to predict.

If there was a pothole there 180 days ago, and no pothole today, there will be another pothole in <180 days.

Because councils are somehow both "cheap" and "wasteful", contractors are workshy gobshites with long-term maintenance contracts, and the motorist is just the poor schmuck in the middle wishing that road tax was still a ring-fenced thing.

@an0key @CenturyAvocado @revk @neil And every smart meter comms hub will need replacing in the “south” of England and all of Wales. They use Telefonica’s 2G network, while in the “north” it’s Arqiva’s long-range radio network.

Quotation marks because the divide is a bit arbitrary, with the south starting below Liverpool. 🙂

@fesshole never mind Fesshole, this experience needs documenting as one of those jobs that future generations will never have heard of, like a telephone exchange operator, or a lamplighter.

Tech to fix potholes, a brief incomplete history:

2025, AI obviously
2024, "Advanced Imagery System"
2021, "Drones and 3D printing"
2020, "Data from Uber and Deliveroo"
2020, "An AI app for cyclists"
2017, "Cars of the future"
2013, "A smartphone app for cyclists"

I took a sick day off work on a Friday. I wasn't really sick, there was a concert that I had tickets to. At the concert I bumped into my manager, who had also taken a sick day to be at the concert. We vowed to never mention it to anyone and enjoyed the day. Best manager.

Today Mastodon is taking another step towards its founding ideals: independence and non-profit ownership. We're transferring ownership of key assets to a new, European not-for-profit entity, ensuring our mission remains true to a decentralised social web, not corporate control. #MastodonNonProfit

https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2025/01/the-people-should-own-the-town-square/

OK, here's the "AI Opportunities Action Plan". https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ai-opportunities-action-plan/ai-opportunities-action-plan

It's *utterly* meaningless; not a single mention of any actual *need*, or *how* any of this will help people. And the section on public sector data proves to me that the person that wrote it has never ever been near any public sector data problem.

Pure magical thinking, techwash handwaving and shiny buzzword-based money grabbing. Ignore it and move on.

Our iOS app will be available this week!

Timing is everything.

“Scores of universities and research institutions in Germany and Austria on Friday announced their intention to drop their presence on the online messaging platform X (formerly Twitter), saying its algorithms were opposed to a discourse based on scientific and democratic integrity.”
https://amp.dw.com/en/german-institutions-depart-x-a-day-after-musks-weidel-talk/a-71266331

@nixCraft
The last guy that left or got fired is the reason things are screwed right now.

Calling all German #MessagePad 2100D users, Eckhart Köppen has announced a localized test patch for the Y2025 bug. Please make sure to read the instructions before applying the patch.

http://lists.newtontalk.net/pipermail/newtontalk/2025-January/002770.html