smores's recent activity
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Comment on Supporting Markdown Search For LLMs in ~comp
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Comment on C'mon, professors, assign the hard reading in ~humanities
smores LinkWhen I walked into my American-literature class at Case Western Reserve University last fall, I looked at 32 college students, mostly science majors, and expected an uphill battle. As my colleague Rose Horowitch has reported, “Many students no longer arrive at college—even at highly selective, elite colleges—prepared to read books.” One-third of the high-school seniors tested in 2024 were found not to have basic reading skills.
Yet by the end of the semester, as we read the last sentence of Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon, I regretted ever doubting my students. I am now convinced that I was wrong to listen to the ostensible wisdom of the day—and that teachers of literature are wrong to give up assigning the books we loved ourselves. There may be plenty of good reasons to despair over the present. The literature classroom should not be one of them.
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C'mon, professors, assign the hard reading
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Comment on Apple TV picks up rights to Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere books for adaption in ~tv
smores Link ParentHoly cow, these are fantastic! That shardplate is WILD — you said you made the Bondsmith set yourself?? It has so many pieces haha. I love the scale of Nightblood, too! Really the whole Szeth...Holy cow, these are fantastic! That shardplate is WILD — you said you made the Bondsmith set yourself?? It has so many pieces haha. I love the scale of Nightblood, too! Really the whole Szeth cosplay is really spot on
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Comment on Apple TV picks up rights to Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere books for adaption in ~tv
smores Link ParentSurely I'm not the only one that's, like, very interested in seeing these cosplays?Surely I'm not the only one that's, like, very interested in seeing these cosplays?
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Comment on Alternative to Spotify? in ~music
smores Link ParentPersonally I use Plex as my music server and Plexamp as my player. It's available on all platforms, is very pretty and performant, and works super well. It's a really good overall music...Personally I use Plex as my music server and Plexamp as my player. It's available on all platforms, is very pretty and performant, and works super well. It's a really good overall music experience, in my opinion!
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Comment on RCS — SMS via the internet — is good, but it doesn't matter in ~tech
smores Link ParentAs I wrote that, I did realize that Graphene's sandboxed play services might actually let you use RCS haha. Well, good to know, thanks for the correction!As I wrote that, I did realize that Graphene's sandboxed play services might actually let you use RCS haha. Well, good to know, thanks for the correction!
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Comment on RCS — SMS via the internet — is good, but it doesn't matter in ~tech
smores Link ParentYup. This also means that it's not possible to use RCS on most (any?) non-stock Android OSes, like Graphene or CalyxOS or iodeOS. It really sucks! The spec is "open", but so much of the planning...Yup. This also means that it's not possible to use RCS on most (any?) non-stock Android OSes, like Graphene or CalyxOS or iodeOS. It really sucks! The spec is "open", but so much of the planning and design happened in closed-door conversations with Apple and Google engineers that there's no meaningful way for anyone to build an RCS client based on that spec.
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Comment on Where to buy mp3s legally? in ~music
smores Link ParentThey absolutely do, Libro.fm rocks! All of their audiobooks are DRM free, and most can be downloaded as either MP3 or M4B files (M4B is just an MPEG4 file with an audio stream with chapter...They absolutely do, Libro.fm rocks! All of their audiobooks are DRM free, and most can be downloaded as either MP3 or M4B files (M4B is just an MPEG4 file with an audio stream with chapter metadata — you've probably also seen MPEG4 files with .mp4 or .m4a file extensions)
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Comment on Where to buy mp3s legally? in ~music
smores LinkI use Bandcamp where possible, and fall back to Qobuz if Bandcamp isn't an option!I use Bandcamp where possible, and fall back to Qobuz if Bandcamp isn't an option!
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Comment on Federal officers kill another citizen in Minneapolis, National Guard activated in ~society
smores Link ParentIt's part of a strategy to prevent themselves from being identified as ICE agents by the communities they target, and to sow distrust and anxiety overall. I'm a rapid responder in my area, and...Side note: the fact that their gear all says 'Police' I assume is a deliberate tactic to appeal to society's trust in police officer
It's part of a strategy to prevent themselves from being identified as ICE agents by the communities they target, and to sow distrust and anxiety overall. I'm a rapid responder in my area, and it's extremely challenging to get a reasonable noise to signal ratio from community hotline calls because they drive unmarked cars, do not wear identifying badges or insignias, and refuse to identify themselves. Actually, rapid responders can almost always identify ICE (if we're able to speak to them) because they're typically the only law enforcement group that refuse to identify themselves (often even refusing to say whether they're law enforcement).
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Comment on No bull: This Austrian cow has learned to use tools in ~science
smores Link ParentWell I wouldn't have said anything, but since you're on the edge anyway... Some evidence that cows are basically 1000lb, herbivorous dogs:...Well I wouldn't have said anything, but since you're on the edge anyway... Some evidence that cows are basically 1000lb, herbivorous dogs: https://www.tiktok.com/@uncleneilshome/video/7378960607317642542?lang=en
Mostly sharing in jest/joy, but having spent some time taking care of rescued cows at sanctuaries, they really are very playful, social, and intelligent creatures. They don't deserve all of the horror and pain we put them through.
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Comment on Ian's Shoelace Site is still the best site for tying your shoes in ~tech
smores Link ParentTotally agree. I wrote a whole blog post about this, but about a year ago I helped my sister-in-law build some wind chimes. We found this site, Chime Design and Build by Lee Hite, which had more...Totally agree. I wrote a whole blog post about this, but about a year ago I helped my sister-in-law build some wind chimes. We found this site, Chime Design and Build by Lee Hite, which had more information about building wind chimes on one web page than I think I've ever seen about any topic anywhere else. This person had just clearly become absolutely fascinated by wind chimes, and had essentially become one of the only producers of publicly available knowledge on wind chime production techniques.
It's amazing, because making a set of wind chimes is something you can do in a weekend, but only if you have all of this information available to you! I mean, you can obviously do it without any information, but you won't have any control over the sound of the chimes.
But the site feels... fragile! I have no idea who's paying to host it, or how old Mr. Hite is, or what will happen if one day he, or his kid, or their kid, forgets or decides not to renew their hosting plan or domain name. I mean it seems like there's a big enough community around the site that hopefully it's being backed up and someone would re-host it, but there's so many other, similarly amazing sites without such active communities!
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Comment on Anyone here a LISP/schemer? in ~comp
smores Link ParentThe only scheme-like programming I've ever done was a brief stint with Extempore's xtlang. It's a whole programming environment/runtime/stack, primarily used for multimedia livecoding. I arranged...I think LISPs work really well for interactive scripting environments
The only scheme-like programming I've ever done was a brief stint with Extempore's xtlang. It's a whole programming environment/runtime/stack, primarily used for multimedia livecoding. I arranged and performed a piece with it for a class in college, and holy cow it was awesome. I don't think I could imagine doing the same thing with a C-like programming language — the live editing just felt very approachable and natural with xtlang's closure syntax. Extempore's whole thing is that you can dynamically recompile individual closures without interrupting the multimedia loop.
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Comment on Avengers: Doomsday | Fantastic Four and Wakanda teaser in ~movies
smores Link ParentI think that's a fair assessment of the movie, and I was particularly disappointed in the third act (beautiful dragon fight aside), which felt very rushed and out of proportion (very weird to have...I think that's a fair assessment of the movie, and I was particularly disappointed in the third act (beautiful dragon fight aside), which felt very rushed and out of proportion (very weird to have this like tiny little ten-on-ten "war" for the fate of the world, after all that build up about the power of both sides).
I was thinking more about Simu Liu's portrayal of Shang-Chi, which I thought was very engaging and was really the only new character since Endgame that I cared about individually, the way I cared about RDJ's Tony Stark. It felt like a character that deserved more story, and certainly more time to interact with the rest of the universe, and instead we just haven't seen him in 5 years. And the movie was very well received when it came out — audiences clearly resonated with the character.
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Comment on Dimension 20: Gladlands - "Welcome to the Wastes" in ~games.tabletop
smores Link ParentOhhhh I did not know Vic was in this, I'm gonna have to give it a watch, I think they're hystericalOhhhh I did not know Vic was in this, I'm gonna have to give it a watch, I think they're hysterical
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Comment on Avengers: Doomsday | Fantastic Four and Wakanda teaser in ~movies
smores Link ParentI feel like the only post-Endgame movie that actually started to do this was Shang-Chi, and I feel like quite a lot of that potential ended up being squandered (or at least, like, indefinitely...I feel like the only post-Endgame movie that actually started to do this was Shang-Chi, and I feel like quite a lot of that potential ended up being squandered (or at least, like, indefinitely postponed?). Simu Liu has a ton of charisma, Shang-Chi is a very compelling character, and the action in that movie was fantastic. If we had seen him even once in the past 5 years, I think we might genuinely be feeling different about this. Or maybe if he had interacted at all with the Thunderbolts or Captain Falcon at any point. Iron Man 1 and Iron Man 2 came out two years apart! And Captain Americas 1 & 2 were only three years apart.
It doesn't help that it seems like Marvel does not know how to write a good Sam Wilson Captain America movie. Brave New World was.. bad.
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Comment on US to stop processing visa applications from seventy-five nations in ~society
smores Link ParentSure, right now it does not. And potentially that's for economic reasons (China, India, and Mexico are also some of our largest trading partners, for whatever that's worth), and potentially...Sure, right now it does not. And potentially that's for economic reasons (China, India, and Mexico are also some of our largest trading partners, for whatever that's worth), and potentially they're just taking incremental steps, which aligns with pretty much every other action taken by this administration since its first day. It's an administration of compulsive, malicious liars, so it's not like we can take their word for it. I feel pretty comfortable with the assumption that this is part of a well documented fascist/white nationalist plan enacted by a group of well documented white nationalists, though, since it doesn't make much sense through any other lens.
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Comment on US to stop processing visa applications from seventy-five nations in ~society
smores Link ParentSure, but also just part of the overarching plan to pursue a white ethnostate in the US, no? Like there is one thing that (almost?) all of these countries have in common, and it's that a US racist...Sure, but also just part of the overarching plan to pursue a white ethnostate in the US, no? Like there is one thing that (almost?) all of these countries have in common, and it's that a US racist would not consider them “white”.
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Comment on US to stop processing visa applications from seventy-five nations in ~society
smores Link“Some countries” is an… interesting way to describe more than 1/3 of all recognized nations in the world.“Some countries” is an… interesting way to describe more than 1/3 of all recognized nations in the world.
This seems.. fraught. It's true that HTML is more verbose than markdown (and that much of that verbosity is unnecessary information for an LLM unconcerned with style or functionality of a website). But it's also true that HTML has much more semantic information than markdown — something that I would expect to be beneficial to LLMs. Markdown has extremely limited semantics (basically headers and not-headers), compared to the wide array of useful semantic elements available in HTML.
It seems that perhaps a better strategy would be for LLM agents to have HTML pre-processing steps that clean up HTML before actually tokenizing? Strip out styles and scripts, remove class names and non-aria/semantic attributes, and maybe even only provide the LLM with the contents of the header and main elements, if they exist.
Markdown is neat, and useful in many contexts (like the Tildes comment box!), but it is not a good semantic document format. I think it would be a shame to run toward it's use for representing documents on the web, especially if that means running away from HTML.