Simon @spoltier@qoto.org

NEW by @lorenzofb: A mysterious government hacking group called "Careto" (aka "The Mask") was once one of the "most advanced threats" of its time, but was never publicly linked to a specific government.

Researchers privately concluded that Careto was working for the Spanish government.

https://techcrunch.com/2025/05/23/mysterious-hacking-group-careto-was-run-by-the-spanish-government-sources-say/

I love using Claude Artifacts, but there's precious little documentation for what it can and can't do - turns out the hidden system prompt includes everything I needed to know, including the full list of libraries it can load https://simonwillison.net/2025/May/25/claude-4-system-prompt/#artifacts-the-missing-manual

News about a new, open-access journal covering original work in the intersection of mathematics and fibre/fiber arts.

Details are on the website :

https://interlace-journal.org

Looks intriguing!

This *definitely* needs to get outside my bubble, so boosts are especially welcome, and if people can suggest more hashtags, that would be great.

#FibreArt #FiberArt #Mathematics #Math #Maths #Journal #Knitting #Crochet #Weaving

More hashtags suggested ... adding here as an edit ... not all are applicable, but ... who knows!

#Knitting #Knitstodon #FiberArts #FibreArts #NeedleArts #Maker #Creator #Crafts #HandMade #SurfFeeds
#PrintMaking #Woodcut #Art #HandMade #Analog #Arte #Xilografia #Grafica #ArtIsForEveryone

Thank you for your indulgence ...

imo don’t pay attention to the “lab leak” part. i think his reaction is probably consistent with the general public. albeit the details of the response change. another friend had a similar reaction. a third friend too (but how a liberal person would react, “why didn’t they regulate???”)

Dr. Meredith Palmer and embedded engineer Akiba(of http://freaklabs.org/ ) joined Chris( @stoneymonster ) and Elecia( @logicalelegance ) this week to talk about lions, terror, conservation, and technology.

Dr. Palmer mentioned a weird bird-giraffe relationship.
Find out about this and other interesting conservation conversations in this week's show:
https://embedded.fm/episodes/501.

Here's that excerpt:

#biology #ecology #science #conservation #engineering

10 SCORES AGAINST TECH FASCISM
⟶ CALL FOR PROJECTS

This call for resistance is not about global fixes or sweeping victories — it’s about finding ways to challenge the current systems with the means available: misdirection, opting out, and pushing back. Resisting in solidarity with others and carving out spaces in which we can develop technological systems that align with collective needs rather than exploiting us.

Apply now until 17 June 2025 for grants ranging from €1’500 to €7’000.

Read the full call for projects here
⟶ https://error417.expectation.fail/406/tech-fascism-not-acceptable

How projects are named at Techaro

ChatGPT's new dossier-from-your-chats feature is a huge change to how it works, and as a power user who tries to control all of the model's input I don't like it at all

“30 messages are good interaction quality (25%); 9 messages are bad interaction quality (7%)” https://simonwillison.net/2025/May/21/chatgpt-new-memory/

Betting on AI risk https://www.strangeloopcanon.com/p/betting-on-ai-risk #AI #opinions

Love this. In his “I Agree” installation Dima Yarovinsky-Yahel took the content from terms of service statements for companies like Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Tinder and printed them out on A4 paper with a standard font size for legal contracts to demonstrate the length of these agreements.

Made some notes on how Cursor works under the hood based on their security documentation - it turns out an organization's list of subprocessors offers a loose form of "view source" for their infrastructure!
https://simonwillison.net/2025/May/11/cursor-security/

In my day job, I work for a media company that focuses on the toy industry.

Apropos of nothing, I decided to add the Mastodon plushie (aka #Plushtodon) to the latest products on our Toy Insider website.

Please boost this so our editors will frustratingly tell me to stop trying to make Mastodon happen.
https://thetoyinsider.com/products/mastodon-stuffed-toy/

We had an awesome chat( https://embedded.fm/episodes/500 ) with Komathi Sundaram about her passion for testing and automation!
We dove into the unique joys of testing vs. development, setting up CI servers, and all kinds of tests.

Here's an excerpt from the show:

#testing #engineering #conference #embedded #electrical #software

If you wanna help me make #Anubis happen, please look into pitching in on GitHub Sponsors or Patreon:

https://github.com/sponsors/Xe
https://patreon.com/cadey

If you're looking to hire world class talent, I know some brilliant people looking for work now. I would love to connect you to them.

Carol Lee: https://www.carol-s-lee-phd.com/
John Flournoy: https://johnflournoy.science/

Find me at: https://www.drcathicks.com/

I've written an unhealthy amount of words on "the cloud" and specifically Europe's woes. In the post below I tie many articles together into a hopefully useful overview. It may be good to know that nothing I write on the cloud is novel or original, I mostly hope to report things as they are. Which is scary enough already! https://berthub.eu/articles/posts/cloud-overview/

Parakeet-TDT-0.6b-V2 - a Hugging Face Space by nvidia https://huggingface.co/spaces/nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v2 (it’s good) #AI #AudioTranscription #OpenSource

how much will the sleep vaccine cost? www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Don’t need much sleep? Mutatio...

I'm looking for a good book that treats high-dimensional geometry. I am in particular looking for something on the geometry of high-dimensional polytopes.

Any recommendations? Please retoot for reach.