Governor Newsom’s veto of SB 961 should make it clear to advocates and policymakers that we should organize and push for speed-limiters—which would actually prohibit people from speeding—rather than merely a single beep when you go 10 mph over the speed limit. No compromises ✊✊

Still running both this account and my new one (@alpha) simultaneously, but at some point in probably a couple weeks, will pull the trigger on migrating.

It's normal to sit up and take notice when someone you hardly know and who is in a position of authority baselessly accuses you of doing something dishonest or unethical, because it's hard to shake the notion that the bad thing you're being accused of is something they are already well acquainted with.

Early in my solo career, I spent a lot of time talking to businessmen in Russia, who invariably would at some point accuse me of taking bribes to write unflattering things about them or their businesses. I soon learned that those individuals were accustomed to paying journalists in their country to write unflattering stories about others.

This reminds me of behavior in various state and federal GOP efforts to "secure" the vote, which has led to a flood of state proposals that effectively make it harder for people to vote, register, or have their vote count. "We can't let them steal this election again" is the refrain, even though it was never stolen in the first place. But it might very well be this time.

"ProPublica, the nation’s leading nonprofit investigative newsroom, is in search of a full-stack senior product engineer to lead work on our publishing systems and core website." If this sounds like you, I'd love to work with you. https://boards.greenhouse.io/propublica/jobs/4403685006 #getfedihired #journalism #engineering #jobs

I'm always interested in exposure to management advice from unconventional sources... and there's a leaked PDF floating around called "HOW TO SUCCEED IN MRBEAST PRODUCTION" which appears to be the onboarding document for new members of the MrBeast YouTube production company

It's 36 pages long, so I put together some of my own notes from reading it here: https://simonwillison.net/2024/Sep/15/how-to-succeed-in-mrbeast-production/

“It is harder to write code with $X.”

and

“It is easier to write CORRECT code with $X.”

is a pair of statements that comfortably can be true at the same time, making people uncomfortable because holding two thoughts at once is distressing.

This is a Toot about Rust, Python type hints, testable code in general, …

Ig Nobel prize awarded to a researcher whose work shows data on longevity is 'rotten from the inside out.'

The so-called Mediterranean diet may be pension fraud.

https://theconversation.com/the-data-on-extreme-human-ageing-is-rotten-from-the-inside-out-ig-nobel-winner-saul-justin-newman-239023

Giving GoToSocial a try out at @alpha. Anyone have any Fediverse frontend recommendations?

Why does Unicode not have a code point for the cool S?

[interior: Unicode consortium]

> Hey, should we have a glyph for a pointing finger?
Absolutely
> What about filled and outlined triangle?
Sure, but make them all different sizes.
> What about arrows?
Yeah, make tons but never a full set pointing in all directions. I'm talking seven 3D arrows but they all face right.
> Dominos?
Fuckin' all of them, man. Horizontal and vertical. Let's take that part seriously.

Lots of people seem to be confused. There are three very separable problems:

• Sending billionaires to Mars.
• Making it possible for humans to survive the trip to Mars.
• Making it possible for humans to survive on Mars.

The second two are in no way a prerequisite for the first.

ultra realistic colony builder on mars where no matter what you do everyone dies very quickly. the UI is full of future building upgrades that you can't unlock

Lovely article on one of the successes of government, which really go sorely underreported: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/interactive/2024/michael-lewis-chris-marks-the-canary-who-is-government/

Today is the daaaaay

free advice to people starting a discord: you do not need more than two or three channels at most

you need the "everyone is in here / general / chat" channel, you need the "ostensibly nsfw but everyone talks about trauma" channel, and you need the slow moving "i took a selfie/look at my cat" channel

i am being a little facetious but i keep bumping into places with more channels than active users

you just need to keep all the activity in one place & only split things off when it's annoying

For those that don't know, I help run a giant women in technology slack group (more than 10,000 members!)

It's not just open to software and computer folks, however much that's the main group.

If you're a woman in biotech, in industrial science, in manufacturing or engineering, any technical field or technical line of business, you're welcome to join. It's very big tent about 'tech' and 'woman' both.

HMU for an invite

representation is important. thank you unicode team.

Instead of coding exercises maybe companies should ask candidates to go through the team’s toolchain setup docs and see how they get on. If they hit a brick wall and say “Actually, thanks but no” then they pass the interview.

At the end of the day a piece of wood or a bit of an assembly line doesn't usually have an opinion about the fact that you're weighing it.*

People are not like this. People notice when they are measured. Hence, we must think carefully about how we attempt to measure the experience of people and who gets into our sample because of it.

*pragmatically speaking -- physics & philosophy discussions about uncertainty principle for another day!!