Elon ascribing literal sentience to chatbots belies that he's OK with slavery. But it's not OK to pick on the chattel.

onion person@junlper.beer · 2d ago

elon musk has more empathy for lines of code than a majority of humanity

The right wing crash out over asian students celebrating at a UT football game reveals that all along the true goal of reactionary colorblindness was never “meritocracy” but resegregation. (Gift link) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/1...

Even when Ben-Gvir's own genocidal rhetoric is disregarded, there is abundant evidence of action (intentional destruction of water resources, blocking food supplies) bolstering the *already demonstrated motive* for genocide in the Netanyahu regime.

The National@scotnational.bsky.social · 2d ago

NEW: Israel has reacted with fury after the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to a lead investigator who determined that the country was committing genocide in Gaza

*I'm inclined to believe that lots of people do really like lies, as long as the lies are perceived as a flex and they're visibly harming somebody else. #MAGA

Kári Tulinius@kattullus.bsky.social · 5d ago

AI removes the fiction that we’re seeing something real and just makes the image seem like a lie. People like fiction, they don’t like lies.

follow your bliss!

this is what hypertext was made for

jordan@jordantyranny.bsky.social · 4mo ago

A dig-site archive. 603 entries. Specimens, fragments, remains. Fossils, jokes, hidden paths, field notes. Start anywhere. jtierney.net

This is your occasional reminder that generative "AI" in particular could have been developed on public domain materials and/or licensed and compensated works but the major players intentionally, methodically and systemically chose to steal labor from working creative folks instead

These ads go in the same category as brazen, easily disproven lies after ICE killings. It’s not about persuasion. It’s a display of power. They could have passed them off as PAC-funded. They added “paid for by the U.S. government” because they want us to know they can break the law with impunity.

Asawin Suebsaeng@swin24.bsky.social · 2w ago

zeteo.com/p/trumps-whi...

Titan's Northern Lake District - From Ian Regan - https://flic.kr/p/2i1QQBq

Remember when grocery and other stores used to have big rubber pressure maps instead of motion detectors for their doors?

The Facial Expressions of Tethys by artist Julius von Bismarck. A suspended high-sea buoy that moves in real time. Sensors on a twin buoy out in the Atlantic Ocean send live satellite data to motors inside the museum. This makes the indoor buoy copy the exact, real-time movements of the ocean waves.

Awww yisss new Fall of Civilizations video is up. www.youtube.com/watch?v=wP14...

21. Majapahit - Empire of the Islands

YouTube video by Fall of Civilizations

youtube.com

i heard woke is trying to do same-sex bathrooms now... they want our sons pissing next to each other to turn them gay

*God bless 'em, it feels good to see America's wild creatures happy

At last. It'll be a nice autumnal 91 degrees here tomorrow.

Merriam-Webster@merriam-webster.com · 3w ago

IMPORTANT: You can use the word 'autumnal' today.

[Describing them as “superintelligence” or “rogue models” ascribes agency to products rather than to the companies building them. This framing markets these companies’ products as “superhuman” and, at the same time, helps the companies evade accountability for their actions.]

Don’t be fooled by this summer of AI hype

Breathless claims about AGI and new capabilities fall apart pretty quickly under scrutiny.

technologyreview.com

Y'know what would slow down AI development? Fines for every instance of copyright infringement equivalent to what the RIAA had courts impose on people who shared MP3s. That one's for free, Sam.

Gnomon seems to be the biggest disconnect of quality and notoriety in SF of the last 15 years I can think of. Sure, coming out the same year as the finale of the rightly lauded Broken Earth trilogy by SFF titan N.K. Jemisin didn't help, but I still can't believe it didn't get any major nominations.

Django Wexler@djangowexler.bsky.social · 3w ago

I don't think @nickharkaway.com needs help from me, but I find his GNOMON underappreciated in SFF circles. It's an absolutely brilliant Inception-y mystery/thriller thing, one of the best SF I've read in years.

Four years ago today, President Biden said, "The pandemic is over. We still have a problem with COVID." At the time, we were in the 5th COVlD wave. We're now in the 13th.

So this is what they mean when they say, "AI is going to kill us all."

Phil Lewis@phillewis.bsky.social · 3w ago

The U.S. military swung into action to intercept a Chinese ship after an “entirely false” AI-generated intelligence report inaccurately identified what the vessel was carrying It also “almost started a war,” a source told CNN.

Given the outrageous, dangerous, and outright false statements made about how the polio (and other) vaccine was a "fraud" (at the Children's Health Defense conference), here's a reminder of what a massive success it was. RFK Jr. & his minions must be stopped from destroying the US healthcare system.

"No, it will take too long. Let me sum up:"

Starfire’s Deranged Neocon Foreign Policy Podcast@irhottakes.bsky.social · 3w ago

It’s very simple. A reality TV host became dictator because he turned down a role for Sharknado 4 and that’s why the king of outer space, who cheats at Diablo, got to kill Africa. Now the economy is controlled by a sex cult that has something to do with Harry Potter fanfic because of robots.

"the largest theft of labor in human history" "LLMs are a product that destroys its supply chain" Every poor sucker on the hook for millions because they were sharing MP3s shows that individuals get the unlubed dildo of consequences when Microsoft, OpenAI, Google, Anthropic, and others just skate.

Jason Kint@kint.bsky.social · 3w ago

Eye popping. Court just unsealed Summary Judgment motions in New York Times v OpenAI / Microsoft. Easy to see why the AI companies had so many redactions (pink). Their own people wrote the lede for NYT, the "largest theft of labor in human history"... "more and more substitutive..." /1

Can the media please stop using the word “skeptic” to describe cult members and science deniers?

Kate Starbird@katestarbird.bsky.social · 3w ago

My mom had polio when she was five. She was living on a US military base in Japan (1947). Four kids on the base died. She was the only survivor.

I'm trying and failing to compose a coherent response to politicians who say they "oppose transgender ideology in schools," when the only trans "ideology" that matters to me is that trans people exist, trans rights are human rights, and that these assholes should leave trans kids the fuck alone.

Anguish, motherfucker, do you speak it???

@nebula.tv Seriously, I like the first layout and really hate the second. Please revert or add an option back. Can't we let a good design stay what it is anymore?

@nebula.tv is it not possible for there to be a point at which a good functional design can be left alone? I don't want "theater mode" to fill the whole browser window. I was happy when it just used the full width. Can I get that feature back?

SpaceX prematurely sunsetting the Falcon 9 in favor of a vehicle that has never reached orbit and had as many failures as the Saturn V had successes should be treated as a national crisis of both security and science.

Space Telescope Science Institute@stsci.edu · 4w ago

“As a result of exquisite planning by our orbital dynamics team, brilliant execution by the operations team, and a precise launch from SpaceX, Roman has fuel for at least 22 years of potential science operations,” said Jamie Dunn, center director at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. #NASARoman 🔭