GPT-5.5 isn't the best coding companion by a long way, but I do love the banter. "That’s macOS Bash being ancient." Yes, shiny new machine, talk down your elders.
Phillip de Wet
@phillipdewet.bsky.social
Sometimes on thestack.technology and sigstat.substack.com. Editor, columnist, ex News24, Business Insider SA, Mail & Guardian, Daily Maverick. Living in Canterbury, writing about tech and geopolitics, learning about AI, advocating risk-adjusted writing.
OMG, Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler is totally real, just with kebabs. Kebab firm fined £500k for selling lamb that was mostly skin and fat - and sometimes goat. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Kebab firm fined £500k for selling lamb that was mostly skin and fat
Kismet Kebabs are found to have engaged in "considerable dishonesty", Swansea Crown Court finds.
bbc.co.uk
CALL FOR SOURCES: Have you been through a multi-stage interview recently? Have you hired someone after a multi-stage interview? I'd love to speak to you for a story I'm working on for Nature Careers. Please share and DM if you'd like to chat.
I suspect the phrase "globalise the intifada" will be hotly debated in the United Kingdom next week. And the heat may be worth it. South Africa kept a lid on "kill the Boer" by going legal rather than political. That avoided trouble, but also resolution. sigstat.substack.com/p/south-afri...
South Africa went legal on its version of "globalise the intifada". Political debate is better. Maybe.
The chant Julius Malema adopted had South Africa look deeply at its rules rather than its collective navel.
sigstat.substack.com
Random AP at what is effectively public wifi at the AWS Summit London. I'm trying to pretend I'm not impressed.
I feel like @nytimes.com and LinkedIn need to have a games coordination council. A numeric CrossClimb is nice, a graphic Connections is interesting. Both on the same day is just discombobulating.
Amazing to see how fast the markets swing when Donald Trump says "good and productive conversations" with Iran – without a breath of counterparty confirmation. In theory the there is pre-verification risk (of the US just plain lying) built into the *pricing*, but it sure doesn't show as *lag*.
When users revolt against your pricing strategy: "... more than 300 regular travellers trade tickets for trains between Folkestone and London, often ones purchased well in advance—to secure the very cheapest fares—but which are no longer needed." folkestonedispatch.substack.com/p/commuters-...
🚄 Commuters bemoan ‘eye-wateringly expensive’ fares for packed Folkestone trains
Plus: Car park's ANPR cameras to be scrapped after unsuccessful trial, and lorry driver charged with dangerous driving after crash
folkestonedispatch.substack.com
It takes guts to lead you (news-site) newsletter with a hot cross bun taste test. And editorial leadership more open-minded than the average. But if you follow the data, that is what some audiences want. They won't say it when asked, but their clicks speak for them, eloquently.
If you are watching for signs of AI recursive self-improvement, take note of OpenAI's latest claim on #FirstProof. It's been messy, and the proofs are still not validated, but it points to genuine novel discovery, potentially fully automated. www.thestack.technology/openai-tease...
OpenAI teases new model with "chaotic" First Proof test
After "chaotic sprint" attempts with rule-breaking human prompting, OpenAI believes it can now beat First Proof type challenges with a simple prompting strategy.
thestack.technology
First government-level partnership deal in Africa for @anthropic.com it is is with... Rwanda. South Africa and Nigeria have a lot to learn from Rwanda's approach. It should be at a reputation disadvantage, but somehow it keeps getting the Western outreach. www.anthropic.com/news/anthrop...
Anthropic and the Government of Rwanda sign MOU for AI in health and education
Anthropic is an AI safety and research company that's working to build reliable, interpretable, and steerable AI systems.
anthropic.com
The OpenClaw news today reminds me of this ancient* post by @commaok.xyz on building an app while shopping. The sub-head has haunted me ever since: "Creating is faster than searching". The realisation hasn't really broken beyond devs yet, but any day now commaok.xyz/ai/just-in-t... * 2-month-old
Just in time software
I didn’t plan to write software in the grocery store last night. I was tired and hungry, kids in tow. My long shopping list sat in a text message. I wished I could check items off as I found them. Ide...
commaok.xyz
I love ads. Not only because they have largely paid my bills all my life, also at a philosophical level. But those damn Anthropic ads about AI and ads are living in my head. I may have to switch from ChatGPT to Claude for language work just to avoid thinking about the big picture a little longer.
In the late 90s, the CIA World #Factbook was indispensable. There weren't many comprehensive reference works freely available, and it came with rock-solid provenance. Now the source is untrustworthy, with the US going post-truth, meh, no big loss. www.cia.gov/stories/stor...
Spotlighting The World Factbook as We Bid a Fond Farewell - CIA
cia.gov
This is why writing columns rules. "Nobody was in an armchair, nobody was smoking a pipe, and I was probably the person closest to having a beard, but it works better if you imagine everyone sitting around in armchairs, smoking pipes, and stroking their beards." www.news24.com/opinions/col...
Phillip de Wet | How do you solve a problem like democracy? | News24
UK liberals are trying to pre-empt Reform UK taking control of the BBC, and find themselves facing a fundamental problem, writes Phillip de Wet.
news24.com
The first world is so weird. In Johannesburg, buildings are hijacked on an enterprise basis, with (non-owner) slumlords using violence and threats as a profit driver. London's equivalent is "rental arbitrageurs", who unlawfully sub-let and don't pay the rent. www.the-londoner.co.uk/claudio-is-s...
'Claudio is Scamming'
How an Italian charmer is duping the owners of London’s priciest properties
the-londoner.co.uk
Gaining traction in Japan this week: some eye-popping results for LLMs on the Common Test for University Admissions. Lifeprompt has been running the experiment for four years. Gemini and Claude did pretty well, but look at GPT! Red means a perfect score. lifeprompt.net/news/w-j19fvl
Holy frigging hell. Chief Constable: [offers hallucinated intelligence] MPs: Is this AI? CC: Nope, Google. MPs: Google AI? CC: "We do not use AI." /time passes/ CC: ... but we do use "Microsoft Co Pilot" thing.... Erm, sorry? www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c3...
Police chief admits misleading MPs after AI used in justification for banning Maccabi Tel Aviv fans
An intelligence report referred to a football game that never existed - Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood will make a statement later today.
bbc.co.uk
Today, for the first time ever, I seriously considered buying a small inflatable boat from a supermarket in order to use what was, as recently as Wednesday, a footpath. European weather is weird.
The Guardian@theguardian.com · 8mo agoStorm Goretti batters UK with heavy winds and snow
What should South Africa – specifically the GNU – do about Venezuela? Mpumelelo Mkhabela has nuanced thinking about that. I don't think the rest of the world cares about anything other than what comes out Cyril Ramaphosa's mouth. @news24southafrica.bsky.social open.spotify.com/episode/6Mqi...
Spotify – Web Player
open.spotify.com
It's not just me, right? I feel if you mean human models on a runway, you need to specify, otherwise you mean LLM.
On this day in 1965, Britain introduced the 70mph (call it 110kph) speed limit, to the outrage of sports car drivers. Which, judging by this BBC report at the time, skewed heavily towards women. Quite amazing to watch now, given today's social norms. www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-e...
BBC Rewind: Anger at 'dawdling' 70mph speed limit
Drivers protest over the introduction of speed limits on motorways, which were trialled from 1965.
bbc.co.uk
Some of the best fast food, supermarket, and car companies do everything they can to guarantee franchisees get a great return. Because that is provably good for everyone. If you have to defend allegations you caused their suicide, you've fucked up. www.theguardian.com/business/202...
New laws to be considered after ‘harrowing stories’ from ex-Vodafone franchisees
Concerns about power imbalance in franchise agreements amid claims over firm’s treatment of small-business owners
theguardian.com
My media literacy message remains "the media: not as bad as you think!" Simultaneously, we we need to arrange some field trips to Rwanda for editors. I'd go so far as to say it should be a statutory requirement.
I still firmly believe we're witnessing the end of American hegemony, first political and then cultural. But I could still spot three out of four famous Los Angeles street names in NYT Connections earlier this week.
Most of 2025: CENSORED BY ORDER OF GRU The paper version has a complete key that shows those are the "unconfirmed" attacks with preliminary classification. Even that, though, undermines excellent copy that makes a powerful point, before the chart makes it look like thumb-suck scaremongering.
FT Edit@ftedit.ft.com · 9mo agoRussian attacks in Europe are, by nature, scattergun and hard to track. But the scale is now such that analysts believe the escalation is strategic rather than opportunistic, designed to trigger public fear and policy paralysis. The attacks are a test of Europe’s mettle – and Russia is taking notes.
I still remember the arguments that you can't make money from free software, that open source is inherently unsustainable. (With a lot of that coming from Microsoft...) After Confluent, IBM will have spent well over $50 billion on OSS acquisitions since 2018 www.thestack.technology/ibm-to-buy-c...
IBM to buy Confluent – and treat it like Red Hat?
More than $50 billion on OSS acquisitions later, some in the Kafka community hope IBM brings stability, others worry about the impact.
thestack.technology
This turned into the hook for today's @news24southafrica.bsky.social column. The apparent involvement of a South African legislative party in sending mercenaries to fight for Russia is no big deal in Washington, but you'd better believe Brussels is watching. www.news24.com/opinions/col...
Phillip de Wet | Just as well for SA that the US and Russia are allies right now. But Europe… | News24
Once upon a time, the deployment of South African mercenaries to Russia’s front line would have exploded the US-SA relationship, but it will hurt SA in Europe, writes Phillip de Wet.
news24.com
Phillip de Wet@phillipdewet.bsky.social · 9mo agoSouth Africa gets angry if you call it a Russian ally. It has told Ukraine it can be a neutral mediator. ALSO, one of the parties in the legislature apparently paid to send (probably unwitting) mercenaries to fight for Russia. With deep involvement by the immediate family of a former President.