Notices by Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al), page 51

@guido Same here.

@ronnie_bonkers @aral

@EUCommission In case Guido’s post doesn’t load for you (I get a 401 error), also see:

https://mastodon.social/@ronnie_bonkers/113261705779237468

Could it be that the “tax the rich” citizen’s initiative doesn’t have the number of votes it could because the site is erroring?

Incompetence or malice?

What transparency is there in how this voting system works? Is there a third-party audit? Published stats on how many votes are not processed due to system errors like this?

@EUCommission

#EU #TaxTheRich #vote #citizensInitiative https://bsd.network/@guido/113261799768356342

@Shellback #NotAllBillionaires

Elon Musk is the most successful person under capitalism.

You tell me what that says about capitalism.

#capitalism #musk #fascism

@rbreich And the most successful person under capitalism at the moment. I wonder what that says about capitalism…

🤔

@fkamiah17 It’s all a game to these fucks.

@guyjantic Democracy, innit?

@stux It’s called their business model.

All billionaires are fascists.

#ABAF

@phire @ag_dubs Alt text: Woman with microphone standing in front of a slide, presenting.

Slide: SO ALL YOUR SOFTWARE SUPPLY CHAIN IDEAS? YOU ARE NOT BUYING
FROM A SUPPLIER, YOU ARE A RACCOON DIGGING THROUGH
DUMPSTERS FOR FREE CODE. SO I WOULD ADVISE YOU TO PUT THESE
RULES IN THE SAME DUMPSTER. AND REMEMBER. I AM NOT A
SUPPLIER. BECAUSE
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS"

The climate crisis in one photo.

(North Carolina, after Helene. Photo by Marvin Joseph, The Washington Post.)

@rgarner Sorry :( If it’s any consolation, I don’t enjoy it either.

That said, it’s far from hopeless and at least we have the skills to try and build alternatives. (That’s what keeps me going, at least.)

Off to breakfast myself now.

Bon appetite :)

🍳🍞☕️

Could anything be more perfect than including a “raisin d’etre” in a post critical of AI thanks to the autocomplete on your phone.

🍇

*chef’s kiss*

@rgarner Oh, without a doubt there are folks like that, who do actually want to do good. I’d be very surprised if any of the ones working at Mozilla are actually AI proponents themselves. But yes, part of the raisin d’etre of Mozilla is to be a honeypot for such folks. It’s always best when they’re contained in environments where we can ensure that they cannot threaten the status quo. And why it’s important for Big Tech to own/control/sponsor the alternatives (see also: Social Web Foundation.)

@rgarner They’re not overlooking it, they just don’t care. They’re the same crowd.

https://mastodon.ar.al/@aral/107070299249803289

@BlumeEvolution

There is a difference between understanding an event, which preserves the mind’s analytic capacity as well as one’s sense of self, and feeling like you are personally living through it. The latter produces not understanding but what Sodaro has called a “prosthetic trauma”, which, she writes, is highly conducive to “a simplistic dualism between good and evil that has important political implications”.

Had my first brush with "AI" in the wild the other day. Went to my optician for the yearly check. Consultation started with a literal verbal disclaimer of "I am not an optician, I am a technician, all the questions are generated via AI and entered in an iPad. Our optician will review the results enabling us to service more clients."

I have F'd eyes. So after half an hour the optician was summoned (from which ever windowless room/cage they keep them in) to re-run the tests.

/1

@justanotheramy Almost as if there might be detrimental cumulative effects of the ever-increasing resource demands of Big Tech’s (capitalism’s) hype and bust cycles?

@natureworks Isn’t the UK free of such pesky regulations now? Long live Brexshit Britain.