Not wanting “algorithms” on mastodon’s feed because TWTR uses coersive algorithms is like not wanting to use any math because capitalism uses math.

Stop conflating bad, manipulative use of algorithms w/the general use of (open/visible) algorithms for personal control over data you see.

Chronological display IS AN ALGORITHM.

Mastodon’s feed ISN’T JUST CHRONOLOGY (it has filters, algos re boost freq, etc).

Mastodon’s feed could be a LOT better.

I WANT an algorithmic view I can adjust!

tiny 🧵

WTF, am I “middle-aged” now? When did this happen? I don’t like it!

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/03/14/opinion/middle-age-millennials.html

I love the reframing of AI as "backward-looking" as opposed to "forward-looking" because it’s trained on data from the past to recognize and figure out patterns. #StochasticParrotsDay

@cstross

RT @0xgaut
Microsoft released copilot in Excel, and it is officially caught up with Google on the AI race.

Fantastic to watch.

Another banger of an Isaac Chotiner interview. This time he's grilling Barney Frank on this whole deal where he's been sitting on the board of Signature Bank.

https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/why-barney-frank-went-to-work-for-signature-bank/amp

(For non US people: Frank was one of the most left leaning Congress members in recent US history. He introduced a lot of bank regulations after the 2008 financial collapse. Signature Bank is a bank that recently collapsed. It is remarkable that he was involved.)

Also amazing: how tech people will not be able to comprehend that releasing broken products (which they know to be unreliable) to the public is bad thing.

For example, LLMs can give wrong medical advice. This is literally going to kill people.

"AI” is also used to: close bank accounts for "suspicious activity”. Taking away children from parents for “suspected abuse”. "Pre-crime” detection. And many other things.

This is not some game or some fun demo stuff. These are real products.

One of my developer superpowers is writing documentation that doesn't make you go cross-eyed reading it. About two years ago, I added a nugget to one doc that was fairly critical, saying "to prove that you read this far, message me with your favorite dinosaur."

Two years later, I still get these. Best professional decision I ever made.

One thing that many people have requested is notification icon badges for Toot!. The main reason they have not been implemented is that I've always found the use of notification badges a very toxic pattern to drive addictive behaviour on social media apps, always trying to nudge you back to opening the app.

What?

LEFT-PAD PROBLEM is evolving!

LEFT-PAD PROBLEM evolved into DOCKERHUB PROBLEM!

https://mastodon.social/@bagder/110029589346386740

EDIT: Of note: https://www.docker.com/blog/we-apologize-we-did-a-terrible-job-announcing-the-end-of-docker-free-teams/

Repost inspired by @lilithsaintcrow 's recent poll:

Omg "dashboard" is originally something that protects the riders from the spatter splashing up from the horse's asses in front of the vehicle

Fellow data scientists who build dashboard will recognize their experience here

https://bird.makeup/users/vanschneider/statuses/1635649985847894018

oh my god, you can turn off those fucking EVIL sign in with #google popovers on random websites

https://myaccount.google.com/
> Security
> Signing in with Google
> Google Account sign-in prompts

Re-stumbled across https://logseq.com/ recently and this fits my brain so much better than other alternatives that I’ve been trying and using.

Give a person a program, frustrate them for a day.

Teach a person to program, frustrate them for a lifetime.

https://fabiensanglard.net/html/index.html

I wonder if anyone’s built a statically generated blog using HTML and XSLT…

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/03/microsoft-teams-3d-avatars-will-be-able-to-take-your-meetings-for-you-in-may/

I was wondering when VTuber-esque tech would start making its way to Zoom/Teams/etc. Zoom does have animal avatars, but they’re not super high quality yet…

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/01/homelessness-affordable-housing-crisis-democrats-causes/672224/

To explain the interplay between structural and individual causes of homelessness, some who study this issue use the analogy of children playing musical chairs.

…

You can say that disability or lack of physical strength caused the individual kids to end up chairless. But in this scenario, chairlessness itself is an inevitability: The only reason anyone is without a chair is because there aren’t enough of them.

…

Simply making homelessness less visible has come to be what constitutes “success.”