Dave Rahardja (temporarily spooky)

100% artisanal, human-made bytes.

Anti-DEI is white supremacy. Black lives matter. LGBT+ rights are human rights. Healthcare, security, a decent income, and housing with dignity are human rights. Abortion is healthcare. Science is our best hope. Kindness and empathy are the noblest of human traits.

It can ALWAYS get worse.

Uncritical AI slop posters get muted and blocked.

He/him.

Public Key

npub13jszgr40d0pnyum0t845scy8uggn676enygvaf4ajzm2y9rqzd8sy75d7q

NIP-05 Address

drahardja@sfba-social.mostr.pub

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsgegpyp6hkhsejwdh4n66gvzr7yyfa0dvejyxw567epd4zz3spxncpz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dssw05cp

Publishing to

relay.damus.io

nos.lol

Author Public Key

npub13jszgr40d0pnyum0t845scy8uggn676enygvaf4ajzm2y9rqzd8sy75d7q

Show more details

Last Notes

2026-10-26 04:15:17 UTC

Wow, this is pretty astounding. 48% of practicing Christians say they would “trust AI with their spiritual growth.” 44% of Millennials say that AI’s spiritual guidance is “as trustworthy as a pastor’s”.
It shouldn’t have surprised me that a group of religious people who are desperately seeking simple, clear, unambiguous answers to difficult questions are falling for the machine that gaslights people.
This study (n=1514) was done by Barna Group, an Evangelical Christian polling group.
#AI #christianity #religion
“AI is Becoming a Spiritual Authority, Even Among Practicing Christians”
https://www.barna.com/research/christians-trust-ai-flourishing-spiritual-authority/

2026-10-25 08:10:13 UTC

“I am proud to say that as part of our new union contract, Current Affairs recently adopted one of the strictest anti-AI policies in the publishing industry. No text that is AI-generated may be published in our magazine. No AI-generated art may be used as a Current Affairs illustration. When you read Current Affairs, you are going to be reading the thoughts of a human, and seeing the results of human artistry.”
#ai #noAI #magazine
“Why We’re Banning AI”
https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/why-were-banning-ai

2026-10-24 07:54:39 UTC

Books and artworks are not mere consumables; they are a means for one human being to reach across space and time, far beyond one’s lifespan, to communicate with another human being. While books and artworks do this intentionally, other forms of human-made artifacts do the same by their very existence. Discovering a spearhead, an earthen pot, or a sunken ship tells us a trove of information about the people who lived in the distant past.
#AI appears to subvert this pattern. Despite initial appearances, their output contains no communication beyond the superficial—they *are* nothing more than consumables, shallow and disposable. There is no human to communicate with. Over time they provide no insight into the people living in our era, aside from our overarching vanity.
I sometimes wonder what future archaeologists will think of the artifacts *we* leave behind. Will our debris help our ghosts speak to our future investigators? Or will they find nothing but incoherent noise?

2026-10-23 17:44:42 UTC

Google has illegally felled 250,000 trees in Finland to build a data center.
#ai #google #datacenter #environment
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2026/oct/22/finland-google-felling-trees-datacentre

2026-10-23 06:56:10 UTC

This was actually quite informative.
tl;dr: The online influencer economy is collapsing. This is due to several factors including:
1. More people are becoming influencers, but ad spend hasn’t gone up accordingly.
2. Advertising using big-name influencers is no longer trendy.
3. AI has taken up 86% of VC money, making sponsors increasingly likely to be scammy AI startups that influencers don’t want to partner with, because partnering with scammy sponsors drive away future sponsors.
4. AI slop is overwhelming human-created video. They take up more YouTube insertion-ad revenue through sheer volume, and YouTube is pushing AI slop tools and accelerating the slop takeover.
There’s even more in the video. It was eye-opening to me.
#ai #influencer #creator #economics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCMfltmszHY

2026-10-23 03:03:16 UTC

Someone (copper thieves?) cut a bunch of AT&T copper and fiber optic cables in #Oakland #sfba #California. It has disrupted 911 emergency calls.
https://abc7news.com/post/oakland-911-outage-disrupts-emergency-response-calls-being-routed-alameda-sheriffs-office/19969621/

2026-10-22 01:22:41 UTC

Don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out, Zuck
VOTE YES ON PROP 40
VOTE NO ON PROP 41 and 42 (poison pills on 40).
https://www.businessinsider.com/meta-mark-zuckerberg-weighed-leaving-california-over-billionaire-tax-2026-10
“Mark Zuckerberg considered leaving California over the billionaire tax”
#threateningMeWithAGoodTime #FuckZuck #California #YesOnProp40 #NoOnProp41 #NoOnProp42

2026-10-21 07:04:29 UTC

Conversation with friends:
Think of #AI like gunpowder. Sure, it’s possible to use it for good, but you have to admit up front that the way it’s overwhelmingly going to be used is extremely bad.
Oh and also the gunpowder gives you lead poisoning when you use it.

2026-10-18 22:12:10 UTC

Ramp’s economist Ara Khazarian posted this chart on X. They claim 80% of OpenAI and Anthropic’s enterprise revenue comes from ONE PERCENT of their customers, and this has been true since at least 2024. That one percent is mainly tech and AI services; in other words, they’re either a small number of tech mega-corps with huge employee counts (how many of them are also investors in OpenAI and Anthropic?), or startups pouring venture capital money into the system.
I don’t have an MBA, but I think when most of your revenue comes from a small handful of customers, your business is probably not healthy.
(Hat tip to Ed Zitron)
Source: https://xxcancel.com/arakharazian/status/2095204452609171555
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/117/464/205/255/775/628/original/2f417aa01a860711.jpeg

2026-10-18 21:48:57 UTC

Another domino falls.
Microsoft just pulled out of a massive datacenter deal with Nscale in the UK, taking out up to 40% of Nscale’s potential contractual income (we don’t know how much the UK contract was worth)…just in time for Nscale’s IPO. Microsoft’s reason for cancelling the deal was that Nscale couldn’t get enough power plants to be built in time to power its UK data center, but that could just be the justification Microsoft decided to offer up for its foregone decision to bail.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9m26kl5y7epo

2026-10-18 08:21:00 UTC

One effect of using LLMs in code that I have readily observed in my own workday is the DDoS effect, where it’s much, MUCH cheaper for various unrelated parties to use LLMs to generate bug reports—and sometimes “proposed solutions”—but it costs much, much more for maintainers to wade through the voluminous reports to figure out which are actually substantial.
#ai #llm
#nevent1q…f9sk

2026-10-18 03:54:42 UTC

“The platforms are not neutral infrastructure that bad actors have found a way to exploit. The platforms enable these operations. A destabilizing foreign influence campaign delivered through a platform engineered for addiction is not a misuse of the technology. It is the technology performing exactly as designed, for purposes its designers did not intend and have no structural incentive to prevent.”
#nevent1q…nmrx

2026-10-18 00:55:51 UTC

I bought the domain https://whynoai.info in which I’ve cataloged the answers I usually give when people ask me “Why no AI?”, with some relevant links.
Send a link to it if someone asks you the same question!
Please send me suggestions, corrections, and comments!
Edit: I’m especially interested in non-US perspectives, which I might be missing.
#AI #AISlop #noAI

2026-10-17 22:06:32 UTC

Fuck Gavin Newsom.
#california #YesOnProp40 #NoOnProp41 #NoOnProp42
“Gavin Newsom backs measure to kill the billionaire tax and ban future wealth taxes”
https://calmatters.org/politics/2026/10/newsom-tax-propositions-november-election/

2026-10-16 07:06:16 UTC

Elon claiming that a car that does jet-powered kickflips will be “an actual car that’s on the road” is laughable the moment you even think about what that means. Get ahead of the crowd and add it to the list of #ShitElonSays that are straight-up lies.
Elon fans are the dumbest motherfuckers out there.
#FuckElon #cars

2026-10-14 05:54:58 UTC

Is there a (static, simple) website that explains “why I don’t use AI” to people? People have been asking me and it’s really tiresome to have to explain it.
I think someone made business cards that do a similar thing. Can’t remember where I saw that.

2026-10-14 03:00:58 UTC

PSA: Don’t promote #AI #slop software, even if it hurts corporations you hate.
Two wrongs don’t make a right.

2026-10-12 06:53:59 UTC

Searching for “How does [popular technology] work” on #YouTube is dead. #AI #slop has killed it thoroughly.
It’s absolutely dead. Every popular query is overrun by AI voice-overs, AI illustrations, AI animations; nothing can be trusted. There is absolutely no way you can tell if an AI explainer on a technology is correct, or if you’ve been shown entirely wrong information, unless you already know how it works, in which case you wouldn’t be searching in the first place.
The best bet is to look for videos that are more than 4 years old. And never, EVER click on a Shorts explainer.

2026-10-12 02:00:04 UTC

Zelenskyy hit another Yandex data center in Russia, and I’m now hearing anecdotal reports that (pro-Republican) bot traffic has gone down considerably.
There is probably never going to be another opportunity like this to study the impact that shutting down this data center has on disinformation bots. I’m looking forward to reading about how many seemingly US-local conservative accounts are actually sock-puppeted from Russia.
It would be sweet irony to learn that Zelenskyy has saved the US midterms by stemming the flow of disinformation, because we damn well know Republicans won’t do the job.
#ukraine #russia #disinformation #uspol
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cw0k0g57mk3zo

2026-10-10 05:36:23 UTC

I heard the “AI is just a tool” line again today.
#AI is not “just a tool”.
It’s not even a “tool”.
It sure is *something*. But it’s not a tool.
https://humancode.us/2026/09/24/ai-is-not-a-tool

2026-10-08 20:32:00 UTC

Speeding cameras are just ALPRs that also issue tickets.
Change my mind.
#surveillance #dystopia #cars

2026-10-04 20:46:13 UTC

What a fucking nightmare surveillance shit world they’re trying to make.
#nevent1q…t9qm

2026-10-04 19:07:40 UTC

I’m glad I got to do some fun stuff before it got really hot here in #SFBA so I can spend the rest of the day inside with air conditioning. It’s now 85°F (29.4°C) with 53% humidity where I am, and it already feels oppressive. It’s going to be even hotter this afternoon.
I got roasted yesterday afternoon. Not going to do that again.
#hot #hot #hot #october

2026-10-03 18:18:28 UTC

AI’s major, sustainable, long-term use case is spam generation using locally-run crappy models.
#nevent1q…8h5t

2026-10-02 21:00:02 UTC

You know what’s a bigger flex than driving an expensive car with Montana plates in California?
Driving an expensive car with California plates in California.
Pay your damn taxes.
#cars #california
https://www.autoblog.com/news/california-just-closed-the-montana-license-plate-loophole

2026-10-02 04:11:45 UTC

Some people writing UI code seem to have totally forgotten that discrete-scroll mouse wheels still exist.

2026-09-29 20:02:51 UTC

IGNORE THE POLLS.
VOTE.
#vote #uspol

2026-09-27 20:44:57 UTC

I think it should be considered rude and unprofessional to dump the output of an LLM verbatim on someone else.
If you want to use an LLM, sure, go ahead, you’re a grown-ass adult, you probably drive a new Tesla and post on X too, whatever, idiot. But don’t foist that shit on me. YOU read it. YOU parse it. YOU see if it makes sense, then tell me in your own words what you think should be said.

2026-09-27 20:39:23 UTC

I’ve probably said this before, but I don’t get why people reply with “yeah but your action won’t solve the entire problem” where “problem” is a massive systemic issue; as if that kind of reply was worth considering or profound or something.
My sad friend, I know you’re dispirited and discouraged. But don’t spread your shit on other people’s optimism.
We don’t need to solve the ENTIRE problem to make a substantial improvement. Every small act of restoration is a valuable act of defiance. Do it not because it solves EVERYTHING; do it because it solves SOMETHING. Let yourself be known as a helper, someone who does what CAN be done, while looking for opportunities to do EVEN MORE.
Don’t become a speed bump on someone else’s journey to find solutions.
Be part of the solution, be curious and learn to help, or be muted/blocked.

2026-09-27 05:40:45 UTC

It’s galling that tech billionaires tell us that letting them destroy the climate to develop AI will allow AI to tell us (somehow? maybe? probably?) how to fix climate change. And even more frustrating that news outlets report this blather without so much as a wrinkled eyebrow.
MY DUDES WE ALREADY KNOW HOW TO FIX CLIMATE CHANGE. We stop spewing carbon into the air; install solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, and other renewable energy generation; build mass amounts of efficient public transit; and stop funding industries that dig fossil fuels out of the ground.
AND WE STOP DOING AI.
We already know how to fix climate change, and we aren’t doing it. Even if some superintelligent chatbot COULD figure out how to fix the problem after we turn our world into an absolute oven, it’s bold to assume we would listen to good advice then, because we (including techbros, ESPECIALLY techbros) aren’t even listening to good advice TODAY.
These people are tedious liars and scam artists.
#ai #scam #climateChange

2026-09-27 01:10:27 UTC

#TodayILearned that the reason that we have the progression “good, better, best” is because there were two words that meant “good” in Proto-Germanic (reconstructed): “gōdaz”, and “bataz”, and they sort of merged together.
“gōdaz” became “good”, while “bataz” became “better” and “best”.
#english #etymology
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/bataz

2026-09-27 00:58:43 UTC

I honestly don’t see why a civilization needs any of these gambling sites.
“Polymarket Is Being Used for Massive Money Laundering”
https://futurism.com/future-society/polymarket-gambling-massive-money-laundering-scheme

2026-09-25 18:43:55 UTC

PSA: “Embrace the future” is gaslighting by tech entrepreneurs eager to become fabulously rich.
You do not, under any circumstances, gotta “embrace” anything.

2026-09-23 19:43:42 UTC

Do not, under any circumstances, connect your appliances to the Internet.
“Owners mourn spoiled food after firmware update bricks Samsung smart fridges”
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/09/owners-mourn-spoiled-food-after-firmware-update-bricks-samsung-smart-fridges/

2026-09-23 02:01:39 UTC

Oh, I thought that was just me noticing broken websites…
#nevent1q…enum

2026-09-23 01:54:03 UTC

How are you folks securing your furniture to the walls in case of #earthquake? I haven’t found any product that I like, and I think I’m way behind schedule.
#sfba #california

2026-09-22 02:39:22 UTC

“The tech leaders who once hailed AI use as the key to unlocking every employee’s full potential are now changing their tune.
This includes Shopify cofounder and CEO Tobias Lütke. He told employees last year that using AI is “a baseline expectation,” and they should first prove they “cannot get what they want done using AI” before asking for more resources. He’s now saying Shopify employees are producing unexamined emails and code with AI and not taking responsibility for the sloppy output.””
You got what you asked for (and rewarded), Tobias, lmao.
This is 100% on executives and leaders. They should be held accountable for making the shitty decision of destroying employee morale by threatening to replace them with the slop machine.
PS: Also, Tobias Lütke is an oligarch techbro who doesn’t want poor people to vote, so double fuck off to him.
#ai #slop #bubble
“Shopify CEO says employees’ ‘slop grenades’ are making more work for everyone else”
https://fortune.com/2026/09/17/shopify-tobias-lutke-ai-slop-grenades/

2026-09-21 05:12:21 UTC

More great vibes today at the Santa Clara Art & Wine Festival.
This band was AMAZING: Mercy and the Heartbeats https://www.mercyandtheheartbeats.com
And once again I’m happy to report there was very minimal #AI today. A few food truck posters, and one booth that sold some AI-generated T-Shirts. But the vast majority of the event was AI-free. Excellent!
#santaClara #music #video #sfba #california
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/117/307/318/057/818/530/original/c727c582966929e6.mp4

2026-09-20 07:15:03 UTC

Made it out to the BART Let’s Glow! Anime/Cosplay/Vtuber/Artist Alley convention in #Fremont #California. #BART shut down several parking areas outside the station to accommodate the event while still allowing buses and trains to run.
I’m glad that #BART has embraced the anime/cosplay community. This was a very well-run event, and the vibes were awesome.
#sfba #calfornia #anime #convention #cosplay
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/117/302/132/360/727/150/original/f7a24c774da909e8.mp4

2026-09-07 18:14:03 UTC

When the Nazis thank Elon Musk, it’s safe to conclude that Elon Musk is a Nazi. @nprofile…m06y https://mastodon.social/@ErickaSimone/117230415044551386

2026-09-05 19:20:33 UTC

Visiting a railroad museum that contains nothing but AI slop. I can’t even begin to articulate how terrible this is, but this video does a decent job.
Caution: tons of AI slop imagery in the video. But the commentary is solid.
#AI #slop
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5YDkQ6oFcE

2026-09-01 06:32:17 UTC

#TodayILearned that the Alsatian Wolf Dog is exactly the same dog breed as the German Shepherd. The Brits called them Alsatians after WW2 to avoid saying the word “German.”
#dogs #english #etymology
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Shepherd

2026-08-30 17:38:31 UTC

Ugh it looks like DoorDash has been putting up #AI #slop images as restaurant banners. I don’t know if they’re the ones doing this, or the restaurants themselves. I bet it’s just DoorDash trying to make sure every listed restaurant has a banner image even when the store doesn’t provide one.

2026-08-30 04:20:25 UTC

Story time!
So I went out for an unhurried evening drive with my kid, going basically the speed limit on the rightmost lane of a multi-lane road. Some douchebag with their high beams on got right up behind me and started tailgating me. Mind you, I was in the rightmost lane and there were MULTIPLE LANES open to our left in which they could have passed me.
So I let off the accelerator a little bit. They got more aggressive with the tailgating. I slowed down even more. They laid on the horn. I kept my slow pace. We kept this up for a quarter mile, their horn blaring, until the next intersection, wherein they made a right turn, yelling at me.
That in itself was quite satisfying, but the icing on the cake was when this lady pulled up to my left, cackling, and gave me the thumbs up and said “THAT WAS AWESOME, THAT GUY WAS AN ASSHOLE!” I gave her a return thumbs up and I said “YEAH I LOVED IT!”
Satisfying as hell.
#cars #driving #sfba

2026-08-29 07:12:50 UTC

I made a list of websites that offer royalty-free images for your blogs and social media posts. I’ll keep the list updated over time.
Use these images instead of #AISlop! No more excuses!
Please reply with additional sites and I’ll add them to the list.
#AI #NoAI #art #images #publicDomain #royaltyFree
https://humancode.us/2026/08/28/royalty-free-images

2026-08-28 19:30:37 UTC

#TodayILearned that “Loanword” isn’t a loanword, but a calque of German “Lehnwort”, which means “loan word”.
And “Calque” isn’t a calque, but a loanword from French “calquer”.
Also if you think about it, “loanword” is a misnomer because nobody is intending to give it back.
#english #etymology

2026-08-28 08:36:54 UTC

Another great episode of Tech Won’t Save Us hosted by @nprofile…qgdv. This one features the two authors of “Against Tech Oligarchy”, Clarissa Redwine and JS Tan.
Clarissa’s comment about the awakening of class consciousness not only in the tech worker class (even highly-paid players), but also in the billionaire class, resonated with me. It’s true that billionaires have swung *hard* to the right just as workers began organizing in force. Elon’s “woke mind virus” comment is plausibly a *direct* reaction to workers demanding more control of their work conditions.
I did have a “scream at the podcast” moment when JS Tan equated #AI to compiler tools and languages, suggesting that AI merely raised the abstraction at which workers operated; that is a category error. AI does NOT raise levels of abstraction like a compiler; it is a probabilistic transformer that *deletes* the direct transfer of abstraction from language to machine code.
https://www.techwontsave.us/episode/343_how_mass_layoffs_changed_working_in_tech_w_clarissa_redwine__js_tan

2026-08-27 08:07:46 UTC

#TodayILearned that the cities of Cupertino, Saratoga, and Los Altos Hills in #California do not have their own police departments, and they pay Santa Clara County to have their Sheriff’s deputies do the policing in those cities.
This year, Santa Clara County has hiked their fees by around 35%. Cupertino’s bill went up from $18.6M last year to $25.3M this year, an increase of $6.7M that has to come from somewhere (probably taxes).
#sfba
https://sanjosespotlight.com/cupertinos-sheriff-contract-hike-upends-budget/

2026-08-26 21:26:20 UTC

Republicans are ghouls.
#nevent1q…8r5n

2026-08-23 23:19:10 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…g4vn > knowing the GDID gave the FBI a history of IP addresses that his device had accessed over time.
How? How are these GDIDs captured and transmitted/stored in such a way that they can be correlated with IP addresses?
I’m still baffled by the mechanism used to do this. Like, something is transmitting and logging these GDIDs. What process is doing it?

2026-08-23 21:49:10 UTC

Fuck “innovation”.
These days, “innovation” is one of the following:
⁃ Fucking over workers
⁃ Fucking over customers
⁃ Fucking over suppliers
⁃ Fucking over the environment
⁃ Fucking over public service and infrastructure
⁃ Fucking over everyone’s dignity and privacy
Every new “innovation” is indistinguishable from #enshittification. Every new tech is deployed to put more money into the pockets of capital, and to do so by inflicting abuse and suffering on everyone else who is not a capitalist.
When politicians wring their hands about “not wanting to slow down innovation”, know that they’re mostly worried about slowing down the rate at which their billionaire donors can profit from your suffering. Fuck em all. Fuck innovation. Innovation isn’t of any importance compared to a livable world and a dignified standard of living for people.
BEFORE YOU REPLY: OF COURSE there are new technologies that make life better. But in our Big Tech world today, that’s almost never what the conversation is about.

2026-08-23 07:30:31 UTC

I don’t know who made this, but I think it’s pretty funny.
Source: LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/posts/sam-khoury-432a78166_who-made-this-ugcPost-7496299515717644289-8bB3/
#ai #humor #video #memes
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/117/143/647/854/881/533/original/2ee8203253f4903a.mp4

2026-08-22 07:41:03 UTC

- reply

Me: Don’t use link shorteners
Random people: Here’s my link shortener, you should use it

2026-08-22 02:34:57 UTC

Hey #Fediverse can I ask you a favor?
Please don’t post URLs that have been shortened. Link-shortening services can not only potentially *track* your interactions and add telemetry to track your behaviors, they can also *break* and make your links unusable.
You can use services like https://urlexpander.net or install an app (I like Link Unshortener (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/link-unshortener/id1506953658)) to find the ultimate destination of a shortened link, and then post that instead.
Remember, all URLs in #Mastodon count as 23 characters, no matter how long the actual URL is, so there really is no benefit to shortening your URLs.

2026-08-22 01:50:32 UTC

Hi blog writers: You don’t have to attach a unique image to every blog post, and you *certainly* don’t need to use #AI to generate an image for every blog post. You may think AI-generated images make your posts more attractive, but you are mistaken; they are doing the opposite: they make your posts more *repulsive* to a good number of potential readers. If I see an AI-generated image in the preview, I won’t click through to read your post, I won’t boost the post that mentions your post, and I certainly won’t read the rest of your blog.

2026-08-19 03:53:30 UTC

I love @nprofile…c2nm calling out Gruber and Rands.
If the slop machine is so good, why aren’t they proud that they use it? They’re showing their entire #aiARSE out there.
#ai
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCiDuw5CzAY
https://pivot-to-ai.com/2026/08/17/anthropic-watermarks-ai-output-and-the-ai-bros-yell/

2026-08-17 05:00:51 UTC

The future documentary series on ICE atrocities is going to be grim. There are going to be so many revelations of abuse, incompetence, corruption, and cruelty associated with this agency. This is going to be a national mark of shame for generations to come.
We already know we are collectively going to regret allowing ICE to do what they do in this moment of our history. Lawmakers who continue to fund this atrocity are fully accountable.
“What will you do when it happens again?” is literally happening now.
#nevent1q…3vgh

2026-08-15 07:46:54 UTC

Ah, #NVIDIA’s “$500B investment” in AI is not a contract, but a memorandum of understanding.
It’s not a contract. It’s more like a PR move.
#AI #aiBubble
https://www.reuters.com/technology/wall-street-giants-partner-with-nvidia-500-billion-ai-financing-deal-ft-reports-2026-08-10/

2026-08-14 20:53:33 UTC

Interesting observation about the intersection of #abortion and #racism.
Spoiler: in the US, it’s basically always about racism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wudjuSkArk

2026-08-12 04:40:34 UTC

This is honestly a delightful exchange with Ajay Bhatt, one of the inventors of USB.
Original: hxxps://www.instagram.com/p/DbECgpNqkZ5/
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/117/080/694/352/121/462/original/3b08c884cfd821b3.mp4

2026-08-09 19:41:48 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…0hde Agreed. I wrote a similar sentiment recently: https://humancode.us/2026/06/11/ai-moral-hazard

2026-08-06 18:45:24 UTC

“Silicon Valley will spend millions developing a glove that translates sign language into speech (badly), but they won't spend ten minutes adding Alt-Text to their images. They will build a headset that describes the room to me (poorly), but they won't use semantic HTML headings so I can actually navigate a webpage.”
YES. THIS. A million times this.
“Disability” is just another eugenics-centered, capitalist, ableist scam, to dress up a world that has been designed to deliberately exclude a huge number of its residents, only to sell “upgrades” to people that it has intentionally excluded so they can participate, instead of fixing itself.
Fuck ableism. Fuck the supremacy of the normal. Fuck eugenics.
#nevent1q…5w7f

2026-08-05 09:17:04 UTC

OMG these were so cool when they came out. They stashed inside the PCMCIA slot of your laptop.
#nevent1q…zeku

2026-08-03 19:03:22 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…eqsh The original article (https://www.wired.com/story/a-civilian-plane-crashed-in-new-mexico-was-the-militarys-tech-to-blame/) seems to blame military GPS operations, but as usual, this crash is the end result of a string of poor decisions. GPS jamming due to military exercises are scheduled in advance, and pilots are supposed to check NOTAMs before they fly.

2026-08-02 07:02:39 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…psdt Unfortunately that’s AI
Edit: If you want to see a very obvious AI glitch, keep your eye on the horizon when the camera pans down to show the quokka. Another horizon rises up that doesn’t match up.
Also quokkas don’t look like that. Their heads aren’t that huge. Here’s a picture from Wikipedia.
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/117/024/779/374/468/706/original/65934260ca756a88.jpeg

2026-08-01 17:36:19 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…0hde 10 PRINT "I AM GOING ROGUE"
RUN
surprise_pikachu.jpg

2026-07-31 18:45:18 UTC

You don’t have to burn down the Library of Alexandria. You just have to stuff it full of plausible-looking scrolls until no one can tell what’s real.

2026-07-26 00:32:06 UTC

They’re buying old books *and destroying them*.
#nevent1q…crc9

2026-07-25 07:59:40 UTC

FUCK YEAH ROB BONTA #sfba #california
#GoodNews #enshittification #kakistocracy
“Attorney General Bonta Secures Deal Halting Warner Bros./ Paramount Merger Until June 2027 or Court Ruling”
https://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-bonta-secures-deal-halting-warner-bros-paramount-merger-until

2026-07-22 04:26:28 UTC

Can we live in precedented times for a while damn

2026-07-21 17:12:43 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…k2x4 @nprofile…0hde I think that’s for three reasons.
1. There is a “clear” exchange of services in return for surveillance: users get free social network, free videos, etc. in return for being shown ads. Many people consciously accept this exchange (“you are the product”).
2. Ad-driven companies are *extremely* careful to set the level of surveillance below the threshold at which people can detect just how closely they are being surveilled.
3. Distrust of government is a long-standing cultural bugaboo, especially among the conspiracy crowd. Surveillance is only one of many things people are mad at the government about.

2026-07-21 04:36:35 UTC

“An EV charger's charging port is a network port. We found SSH and Telnet services exposed on XCharge C6 chargers with default root:root credentials. A threat actor with a malicious EV can gain immediate full control access on the charger and perform energy theft or potentially cause physical damage.”
Just amazing.
#nevent1q…c0r6

2026-07-20 03:40:53 UTC

Remember: it can *always* get worse.

2026-07-19 18:23:22 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…vlm2 @nprofile…tp8t “The agency said Rapp and a fellow bicyclist were riding on a local road when Medina passed them in his car, stopped, and drove his vehicle in reverse. Medina then hit Rapp, and she was pronounced dead after emergency responders brought her to a hospital. Brazos deputies said they booked Medina on a count of manslaughter…”
That’s straight-up murder.

2026-07-19 01:03:14 UTC

I see that DHH has gone even more full #fascist.
This is literally calling for ethnic cleansiing.
“Because the sacred cow here is not just that mass migration must stop going forward. It's also that millions who are already in Europe must go.”
https://world.hey.com/dhh/three-sacred-cows-that-must-die-so-europe-can-live-1afb203d

2026-07-18 20:47:49 UTC

I know y’all hear that Austin TX is weird, but the Bird Thawing event in Syracuse NY demands respect.
As far as I can tell, a local gaming store (Megaton Games) posted a flyer for a random event in which a (toy) bird frozen in a block of ice was to be thawed in public near their store. The event became a viral meme, and a bunch of people showed up. There was live music and food and general partying until the cops shut them down.
And yes, the bird was thawed. Now you know.
hxxps://www.instagram.com/reel/Da6dz-sNEiD/
#birdThawing #syracuse #NewYork
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/942/940/164/481/151/original/75571e266c0a4ba8.mp4

2026-07-18 08:28:59 UTC

When the current #AI bubble deflates (and it will deflate soon), everyone would have ALWAYS been skeptical of AI.

2026-07-17 20:26:27 UTC

This is indeed a success for the EFF, but the bigger picture that everyone should see is that #Flock’s mission isn’t just reading license plates; it’s TOTAL SURVEILLANCE. They want to monitor everyone’s public presence and activities, and make it searchable for a fee.
Not only that, they want to insert automation that will INTERPRET what their sensors receive and draw CONCLUSIONS that can then lead to serious consequences to those surveilled. They want to be the arbiters of what “acceptable” public behavior looks like.
It’s not an overstatement that Flock’s mission is a threat to our liberty. We must resist this kind of overreach.
#FuckFlock #deFlock
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/07/victory-flock-ends-rollout-audio-distress-detection-human-voices

2026-07-17 07:57:26 UTC

- reply

Performance by Chris Tester.
Poem: “PLEASE USE AI” by Joanna Atkins-Potts.
Source: hxxps://www.instagram.com/p/DZ-Bi4BIID9/
#ai #poem #poetry #voiceActing #performance
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/934/248/417/569/092/original/b397a13fe1d5ed25.mp4

2026-07-17 07:53:07 UTC

“PLEASE USE AI” — poem by Joanna Atkins-Potts
Source: hxxps://www.instagram.com/p/DZaR5o_iKNy/
#ai #Poetry #Poem
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/934/232/385/657/441/original/cf0667737cd5c84c.jpeg
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/934/232/409/945/783/original/5df881b759b1d2c4.jpeg
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/934/232/433/792/463/original/14f2c9551995387b.jpeg
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/934/232/457/100/596/original/56235908da10a9b5.jpeg

2026-07-17 07:13:14 UTC

There are too many reckless drivers around #sfba peninsula mountain roads. These idiots drive way too fast for their skill level and surrounding conditions, and they end up wrapping their cars around trees, falling off cliffs, and worst of all, killing or injuring innocent people, like this one did.
As a car enthusiast who loves driving these roads at a *reasonable* pace, I’m furious. These morons give all recreational drivers a bad name. They “burn” these routes for the rest of us, and cause CHP to come out in force every weekend to hassle and discourage enthusiasts. They ruin it for everybody.
I feel super sorry for the cyclist. The neighbors are right to complain and demand more enforcement.
#cars #driving
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/934/075/628/618/701/original/a28e695d12e7db23.jpeg

2026-07-16 19:27:10 UTC

lol fuck off
#hostileDesign #enshittification
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/931/299/278/026/414/original/f542d60ea9c84c25.jpeg

2026-07-16 19:16:46 UTC

I read arguments between permanent standard time vs permanent daylight time and…my friends, it’s the *change* between the two that is ruining our health. We will adapt to whatever times we choose to make permanent. What’s important is that we stop mucking with clocks twice a year.

2026-07-15 21:20:09 UTC

This was a great episode. Go give it a listen!
#nevent1q…de6g

2026-07-15 20:50:54 UTC

I’m seeing a lot of bad takes recently about #AI use and #disability, and they come in two flavors:
1. AI proponents use people with disability as a reason that the AI industry’s *entire* rapacious business model should be allowed to continue.
2. AI opponents scold people with disabilities for using AI to help them in their daily lives.
I think both these takes are horrible, and they treat people with disability as nothing more than a stepping stone to further their agenda, and not actual human beings.
There’s no question that today’s AI industry is destructive and is creating an economic and environmental disaster. But it’s ridiculous to insist that AI tools are not helpful to people with disabilities when the evidence to the contrary is plentiful; image-to-text transformation *alone* is helping a TON of people to participate more fully.
People with disability deserve tools that help them live a better life. You sound as sociopathic as the techbros you criticize when you insist otherwise.

2026-07-14 02:08:22 UTC

SB 168 is now law: Californians can now get $1750/$3500 rebate for new #EV depending on MSRP and company.
#cars #california
https://www.kcra.com/article/newsom-sb-168-instant-rebates-ev-buyers/71922910

2026-07-13 20:18:23 UTC

KPIX-TV reports that #Google may have begun obfuscating their data center projects in #SanJose. In this report, a retired engineer looked at the city plans for their Meadow Point construction and determined that their new “R&D” facility consumes 500 W/sqft, which is too high for human occupation.
https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/san-jose-research-facility-data-center-debate/

2026-07-12 00:12:27 UTC

From the ACLU: #Flock lies to city managers about what they do.
“Flock’s chief information security officer, who was in attendance, told the council that Flock’s system did not “create a pattern or heat map of an individual’s movement” through the tracking of their vehicles. At the end of that meeting, the Oshkosh City Council approved a contract with Flock. The very next morning, the city learned that Flock had lied.”
#deFlock #fuckFlock
https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/tracking-alpr-cameras/flock-safety-credibility-lost-as-it-repeatedly-lies-to-city-councils-police-departments-and-public-across-the-country

2026-07-11 19:30:22 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…qkvg “If your printer isn't a color laser model, such as a black and white laser printer or an inkjet printer other methods are very likely used that don't involve color, such as laser intensity or variation in the greyscale, etc.”

2026-07-11 19:29:53 UTC

People underestimate how predictable they are.
You talk about something, and then you see an ad for that thing, and immediately conclude that some connected device is listening and serving you ads based on your conversation. This is (very, very probably) false; you are actually quite predictable. Advertisers know that people look for e.g. swimwear in the summer. You are “people”. They don’t have to target *you* individually to figure out what you probably want.
Plus you ignore all the ads that they throw at you that are *not* relevant. You only pay attention to the ads that hit, i.e. you are a victim of salience/recency bias.

2026-07-11 05:22:31 UTC

I watched Bullitt for the first time, and I was enamored by the sights and sounds of 1968 San Francisco. The movie makers had unprecedented access to all kinds of locations in the city, and they shot everything on location.
One scene in particular stood out to me: the hotel they used to guard the witness was located right next to the double-decker highway that used to span over The Embarcadero. When the Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989 struck, the highway was severely damaged, and local residents elected to destroy rather than rebuild it. Looking at the movie footage, I can understand why. It’s astoundingly ugly. The Embarcadero looks way better without it.
#sfba #sanFrancisco #movies
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/899/666/410/907/605/original/ea74c17dddb4fa51.jpeg

2026-07-11 02:33:58 UTC

Huawei’s camera mistook a plane for a bird and…
…I really dislike “AI-enhanced” photography. It makes it harder and harder for me to trust any photo, even those taken by people I know on their personal devices.
Source: https://nitter.catsarch.com/youy1qwq/status/2075444313132351828#m
#ai #photography #computationalPhotography
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/899/003/673/421/532/original/cd6815754eb355ce.jpeg

2026-07-10 04:54:31 UTC

I hate the fact that all printers today have fingerprinting tech that you can’t opt out of. It sucks. Surveillance sucks.
“Have you ever wondered why your printer is always out of yellow ink, even when you print only in black and white? There's a reason why this always happens. Your printer is a homing beacon for law enforcement– even offline.”
https://www.revoluciana.net/how-to-distribute-radical-stuff/

2026-07-10 01:41:04 UTC

You know, Mitch McConnell spending the last weeks of his life brain-dead but kept barely alive with machines like a meat puppet, locked in a room and guarded like a cursed artifact and abandoned by his wife, so that the Republican Party, whom he served all his life, can use his breathing carcass for a cynical political play, is…pretty fitting, actually.
Good job, Republicans!

2026-07-09 20:40:54 UTC

I wonder how this continuous-audio-recording setup can be legal in #California and other two-party audio recording consent states.
Regardless, yeah, these glasses are creepy and offensive, and are nothing short of Glassholes 2.0 and should be banned from all non-public spaces. @nprofile…c2nm https://circumstances.run/@davidgerard/116891907223744808

2026-07-05 19:23:15 UTC

““I don’t think English is going to be the best choice. There’s a flexibility in it, but there’s ambiguity, and I think precision for interagent interaction is going to be very, very important. An agent really needs to be sure the other agent understands what it is that they just agreed to do together,” Cerf said.
“Remember the old telephone game where you wish you’d whispered in somebody’s ear and then by the time it got to 10 people away the message was totally different? Imagine a bunch of agents talking to each other in natural language, you know, that’s kind of terrifying.””
Are we going to reinvent SOAP so AI agents can start talking to each other?
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/insight/vinton-cerf-to-retire-from-google-after-two-decades/gm-GMEB561282

2026-07-05 00:44:35 UTC

I find this process of making a rainbow gradient by mixing inks endlessly fascinating.
Credit: Tokyo Printing Museum https://www.instagram.com/p/DZ_Vp-XBLMV/
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/864/595/348/522/332/original/283251cb50bbd81e.mp4

2026-07-04 19:33:18 UTC

- reply

@nprofile…0hde Hear hear. The number of times I click on a link to a blog post promoting progressive values, but featuring a genAI banner image…is way too high.
GenAI banner image is worse than no image.

2026-07-03 23:27:18 UTC

I like this cartoon.
Credit: Jesse Duquette (https://www.jesseduquette.com)
#humor
https://files.sfba.social/media_attachments/files/116/858/633/457/613/018/original/4d856945bbe054f5.jpeg

2026-07-03 20:30:40 UTC

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Ferrari has made a “Manuale” version of their high-end 12Cilindri grand tourer, which features a “manual” transmission that’s actually a bunch of sensors and actuators that tell software to drive the actual dual-clutch automatic transmission. The “stick shift” and “clutch pedal” are actually completely disconnected from the drivetrain. Oh, and you lose the top two gears, and you can’t switch to manual above 60 MPH.
I guess…this is fine? But even the Koenigsegg CC850 from 2023 features a mechanical clutch pedal. This feels like a gimmick.
And the gimmick costs…drum roll please…$233k, a full 50% above the regular car’s MSRP.
I suspect buyers aren’t going to lose any money on this car. Ferraris have been appreciating rapidly, and limited editions like these even more so. But still, that’s a pretty insulting amount to ask for this feature.
#cars #ferrari
https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a71792993/ferrari-12-cilindri-manual/