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You can think of flying to Mars like one of those art films where the director has to shoot the movie in a single take. Even if no scene is especially challenging, the requirement that everything go right sequentially, with no way to pause or reshoot, means that even small risks become unacceptable in the aggregate.

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Journalism is as usual writing news they could have written last year and should have if they weren't dreaming that somehow we'd escape End of Democracy 2.0 (spoiler: we didn't). Who is Elon Musk? Until I read his Wikipedia profile last week, I only had a vague idea. I want...

Something you hear from Democratic politicians and MSNBC hosts. "We know why Musk is cutting so much, it's to fund a huge tax cut for billionaires." They don't actually know that and I doubt it's true. Show me another example where Musk did anything to benefit anyone but himself? Why should he share the loot he's grabbing with other rich folk? What did they do to help? Nah I think it's all for him, with a taste going to the Trump and Putin families. He's going to use his new power to buy something else. The question is what? What else could he want? I imagine he wants all the money in the world not just the most.

Can you imagine how livid developers of other AI platforms are that Musk gets exclusive access to all the private information stored in US government databases.

Imagine Bezos calling Trump.

"Hey I thought we were friends. I can send you another billion. 2 billion? 100 billion?"

"Call Elon, if he says it's OK I'll sign the order."

Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, Oracle, OpenAI, etc etc.

This is the 78th edition of People and Blogs, the series where I ask interesting people to talk about themselves and their blogs. Today we have Ben Werdmuller and his blog, werd.io To follow this series subscribe to the newsletter. A new interview will land in your inbox eve...

You do not have to use generative AI.

AI itself cannot be held to account.

If you use AI, you are the one who is accountable for whatever you produce with it.

There are contexts in which it is immoral to use generative AI.

Correcting or fact checking generative AI may take longer than just doing a task yourself, or with conventional AI tools.

You do not have to use generative AI.

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Thursday session

Ich habe einen neuen Podcast! 🎉 …naja, nicht ganz ☺️ Aber ich darf (neben Courtney Robertson, Dave Lockie und Robert Jacobi) eine Show auf @dothewoo.io hosten! Knapp 17 Jahre nach der ersten und fast 14 Jahre nach der letzten Episode des OpenWebPodcasts darf ich wieder mit Gästen über das Fediverse, das IndieWeb, das OpenWeb im […]

My main problem with AI is not that that it creates ugly, immoral, boring slop (which it does). Nor even that it disenfranchises artists and impoverishes workers, (though it does that too). No, my main problem with AI is that its current pitch to the public is suffu...

I’m currently very much enjoying Cody’s “Alone Atop Mt. Fuji” pop-up newsletter. There’s something about this type of content that’s appealing to my brain. And I’m not talking about the fact that it’s a newsletter or the fact that I enjoy Cody’s writing and pictures. I’m tal...

This is perhaps a slightly contrarian take on the failure of Humane’s pin. Eventually I believe there will be a successful product like it. It will need to be simpler, though. No laser. Cheaper. Faster. I won’t judge the team too harshly for being so ambitious. They probably...

I'm starting to use the rewrite of my thread publisher on Bluesky. Here's an example. And here's the version of the thread without being broken up into 300-character chunks (you can get it by clicking in the metadata box below the text of the post). I don't like it. The software is as good as it can be, given the extreme limits of the twitter-like environment. I went all the way with this, but I'm not sure I'm going to release it. But I'm going to keep using it, and maybe I'll think of something that makes it fun or worthwhile, or maybe I'll just chalk it up to another learning experience.

Once again Maddow is must-watch destination TV this year. Keep on going. One thing to watch out for, Bluesky will disappoint you. Don't blame them when it happens, because they can't be as good as you all think they are. They are a startup in a tough market. Sooner or later Musk is going to aim at them (maybe he already is) and they will have to seek refuge somewhere, and all big tech companies are bastards, not bros. There isn't one of them you can trust with your democracy. So keep that in mind, and when yous see open billionaire-proof social networks rise up, give them a little of that Rachel love.

Favorite part of the SNL50 show. Eddie Murphy impersonating Tracy Morgan, while standing next to him on Black Jeopardy. It's really hard to see the resemblance between today's Eddie and young Eddie, but there it was, the comic brilliance. Then they ask the real Tracy if they are related and he said he doesn't see it.

Yes it's me I'm the pride of Cucamonga.

In the Catskills, we've been getting so much snow this winter and super cold weather and huge winds. And Trump & Musk. A quadruple threat.

One more thing. I like watching Maddow nowadays. She seems unstuck. And she's talking straight to the Repubs, and not with resignation, with the idea that maybe finally enough is enough, and they might work with us to save what we can of this great country. Also like that Bernie Sanders is on the road campaigning in swing districts that are held by Repubs, to see if he can squeeze out a few defectors from the ranks of House Republicans. Very important, because the Repub margin there is only 3. Just have to flip 2. America has to start moving now, or it's going to take a long long time to come back from this. The sooner we all get that, and that we are part of it, the better things will turn out, imho.

I don't like social networks as they're currently configured. The idea that it's some kind of conversation -- no it really doesn't resemble a conversation. I would like to try a social network that didn't have the concept of replying to a post. Give each other a little more ...