floof.org
The Rocket City Trash Pandas were featured on the English Wikipedia's front page yesterday.
Their mascot is amazing?? https://www.milb.com/rocket-city/community/mascot-appearances
Schedule an appearance from Rocket City Trash Pandas mascot, Sprocket!MiLB.com
W-where did all the beautiful days at #EAST go? This thing was over so fast, I can't believe it 
At least I came back with a lot of stunning memories and wonderful new friends.
Thank you so much @Argon1001 and Maru for making this con such a special and unforgettable experience. You guys are the best 
🐕: Maru
🗺️: EAST 12, Suhl - Germany
📷: @Argon1001
#fursuiteveryday #furry #furryfandom #fursuit #fursuiter #fursuiting #east12 #furrycon
A whopping 80% of new US electricity capacity this year came from solar and battery storage
The number is set to rise to 96% by the end of the year
https://www.techspot.com/news/104451-whopping-80-new-us-electricity-capacity-year-came.html
Solar alone made up 60% of the 20.2 gigawatts of fresh capacity that went online from January through June. A large chunk of this can be attributed...Zo Ahmed (TechSpot)
Okay, putting it out for all who want to read:
I'm writing a fantasy novel. It's very isekai, inspired by countless anime I love to watch.
Currently at 36 chapters and will continue with a new chapter EVERY SINGLE DAY forever, or until I stop.
Work on foyer reveals John Sainsbury’s note buried in extension to London’s National GalleryMartin Bailey (The Art Newspaper - International art news and events)
Amazon is convenient. But multiple times recently I've discovered stuff; ordinary stuff, cheaper elsewhere.
Example today:
Patterson & Ilford Film Processing Starter Kit
£99.00 on Amazon
or you could go (as I did) to a non-gigantic behemoth company, Bristol Cameras, who are literally a camera shop... in Bristol, and pay £81, including delivery, for the exact same item. And give the business to a small firm who might possibly appreciate it.
Sadly it is often the case Amazon prime free delivery makes the difference to make Amazon cheaper. Not always, I agree.
Also, the Amazon "comes on Saturday" and "comes on Sunday", and "comes on bank holiday Monday" factor that few others manage, sadly.
I have moved on from Whisky from Amazon now, though...
Friend sent me this and it made me realize how many people see the writing on the wall, yet are entirely powerless to prevent this from happening.
Not that many of us are blind to the fact that democracy is under threat, yet our ability to stop the billionaires from crushing it entirely is limited.
We are watching the collapse of a system that brought us tremendous wealth and technological advancement. And the billionaires, in their quest for more personal wealth, are willing to sacrifices all our lives for it.
So, have you ever thought your devices were listening to what you were saying, and then ads for that thing would show up...and all the pundits kept telling us it was coincidence and we were just seeing patterns because people seek patterns?
Yeah...naw. @404mediaco in their tradition of breaking all kinds of news, would like to tell you that you're not insane, and the pundits were wrong.
404 brings receipts: Cox Media Group (CMG) says it can target adverts based on what potential customers said out loud near device microphones, and explicitly points to Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Bing as CMG partners.
MindSift boasted about targeting advertisements by listening to peoples’ everyday conversations through microphones in their smart speakers.
Here's the deck, read it for yourself: https://www.404media.co/heres-the-pitch-deck-for-active-listening-ad-targeting/
(free signup may be required, iirc, but if you've got spare change, consider subscribing too. They're doing yeoman's work out here on the data front.)
#Enshittification
404 Media previously reported Cox Media Group (CMG) was advertising a service that claimed to target ads based on what potential customers said near device microphones. Now, here is the pitch deck CMG sent to prospective companies.Joseph Cox (404 Media)
Last repost: the city of Amsterdam has asked renowned graphic designer Karel Martens to come up with a pattern to paint on streets with a 30km/h speed limit so they would visually appear smaller and thus reduce speed.
Article in Dutch https://www.amsterdam.nl/ingenieursbureau/nieuws/nieuwsberichten/nieuws/2024-jul-dec/karel-martens-ontdekken/
PSA: how to not get tricked regarding quantum computing
when the quantum-computing hype train says "we only need x qubits to do terrifying thing" they're talking stable, error-free qubits, sometimes called "logical qubits"
when the quantum-computing hype train says "we just built a computer with y qubits" they're talking about physical qubits, which today are not stable, error-free qubits.
we're not even sure how many physical qubits it takes, on average, to get a logical qubit. some experts think dozens. others estimate in the thousands. some people think we can reduce that number using AI or other tricks.
"I have five cars" does not necessarily mean that all five work. "I have a thousand qubits" does not necessarily mean I can run a thousand qubits' worth of processing.
This is why quantum computing news always makes it sound like we're around the corner from world-altering capabilities, but quantum computers have so far not altered the world very much.
Regex isn't hard enough, so I present you with a crossword where all hints are regular expressions!
I confess at first it looked like the hints don't contain enough information to solve the puzzle but after some slow but steady progress I can confirm that they do 🤣
The original puzzle is from https://puzzles.mit.edu/2013/coinheist.com/rubik/a_regular_crossword/
I shared this on my blog: https://mathspp.com/blog/problems/regex-crossword
Can you solve this crossword where all hints are regular expressions?mathspp.com
Not "hallucination", just bullshit !
"The machines are not trying to communicate something they believe or perceive. Their inaccuracy is not due to misperception or hallucination. As we have pointed out, they are not trying to convey information at all. They are bullshitting."
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10676-024-09775-5
Recently, there has been considerable interest in large language models: machine learning systems which produce human-like text and dialogue.SpringerLink
When my son was 10, he gave me a card for my birthday.
In it, apart from the usual wishes, was a hand-written link to a YouTube video. 40-odd characters with random letters and numbers, carefully calligraphed by a 10 year old.
It took me 3 attempts to land at the correct page.
I got rickrolled.
I need this machine really badly.
#books #reading #comics #humour
Checks and balances …Tom Gauld (The Guardian)
I don't know if you're allowed to be attracted to an artist's interpretation of your own sona...and yet, here we are... 
Super cool 5min comm painted on a NYC parking ticket envelope by the phenomenally talented @fexazaur during the AAC Barking Lot pop-up last night!
I will always boost this quote; that’s just the rules. But the image doesn’t have alt, so here’s the key text:
“Sometimes people use ‘respect’ to mean ‘treating someone like a person’ and sometimes they use ‘respect’ to mean ‘treating someone like an authority’
“and sometimes people who are used to being treated like an authority say ‘if you won't respect me I won't respect you’ and they mean ‘if you won't treat me like an authority I won't treat you like a person.’” https://mstdn.ca/@Schteve/113023778195165583
Attached: 1 image @Jorsh@beige.party @mmiasma@mastodon.sdf.orgMastodon Canada
Happy Fursuit Friday! At TFS last weekend, I tried doing a little photoshoot with help from a couple friends! 💙
The rest will be uploaded later, but here's one of my favorites.
📸 @kalysta.bsky.social
🧵 @poeproductions
#FursuitFriday #Fursuit #Furry #Otter #TFS #TFS2024 #FurrySiesta
Cirba Solutions officially opened its expanded lithium-ion battery processing plant, using funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.Canary Media
Apparently it’s International Dog Day 🐺
How would you caption this photo of me? Wrong answers only
📸 @chadthegryph.bsky.social
I'm not sure what bit of my brain is responsible for this, but I just have a habit of accumulating *stuff*.
Things that seem interesting, or are cheap, or look like they might be useful.
The problem is that when I realise "oh I've got too much stuff", I absolutely fail at getting rid of things.
It's the sort of "this is just a bit too nice to straight up throw away, but finding someone who might use it is a bit of a stretch"
