Amarok's recent activity
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Comment on 'Consider Phlebas' series set at Amazon from Charles Yu and Chloé Zhao in ~tv
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Comment on 'Consider Phlebas' series set at Amazon from Charles Yu and Chloé Zhao in ~tv
Amarok LinkShould I be excited or overcome with dread? Banks is on a very short list of peak science fiction writers - the source material is as good as it gets. This is a post-scarcity society that makes...Should I be excited or overcome with dread?
Banks is on a very short list of peak science fiction writers - the source material is as good as it gets. This is a post-scarcity society that makes Star Trek look quaint and Star Wars look unimaginative. It's ten million dollars per episode do it any kind of justice at all. I'd say it's about as close to a realistic, optimistic vision of a future with super-intelligent AI as anyone has ever written. Summed up simply, it's space hippies with guns and if done well it will sell as much popcorn as a theater can stock. The source material is of unimpeachable quality.
Looking at Charles Yu he does have writing and story credits for most of the first season of Westworld, which was excellent. Not much experience, but at least one solid gold star to his name there. Pity they didn't keep him around for the following seasons. Chloe Zhao has a lot more experience, however she produced nothing even close to that level of quality. The Eternals was a tepid waste of film if I'm being generous.
So, what's the over/under on this show going 180' off from the plot of the book within two episodes? That would be where I stop watching. If they can manage to nail it down, great, I'm here for all ten seasons.
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Comment on I'm alarmed by the apparent lack of an actual deep state in ~society
Amarok LinkIf it exists at all, it lies within the Pentagon, Department of Defense, and a number of military playgrounds way out west where gargantuan industrial facilities bearing names like Lockheed lurk...If it exists at all, it lies within the Pentagon, Department of Defense, and a number of military playgrounds way out west where gargantuan industrial facilities bearing names like Lockheed lurk among the volcano fields and bomb test craters. So far, Trump has not taken his audit into these areas, he's blustering his way up to them. He's hitting soft targets like the IRS that will make him popular and put democrats in the uncomfortable position of having to defend the IRS to the public. When he starts auditing the Pentagon things might get interesting.
I think what's really going on here is pretty straightforward. Trump's strategy is 'cut everything and see who screams'. Anything that was fraud or covert or just moronic (like most of it so far) won't have anyone coming forward to fight to get that money reinstated. The corruption can't make a protest without outing itself and its participants, so it gets cut... and probably investigated later on by the DOJ and FBI.
As for the rest, he's forcing any spending agencies to justify their funding legally with the courts through a judge who reviews and upholds or denies Congress' mandate to spend it. Same with all the employee terminations - prove it's illegal and you can come back to work, meanwhile we audit. It's a total dick move, but if you want to audit the entire fed in under two years, it's a practical way to get that done. Meanwhile DOGE runs the numbers, makes the reports, and upgrades everything it rampages through from the late 1950s mindset to modern methodology.
If the shadow state exists and it decides it wants Trump off the board, Air Force One will crash on takeoff due to an unspecified engine failure. That's their usual method these days, assassins are too messy and unreliable, while aircraft have such a terrible safety record. :p
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Comment on Have you altered the way you write to avoid being perceived as AI? in ~tech
Amarok LinkNope. I ignore people who whinge about it because they can't tell the difference - if they aren't that bright, ignoring them saves me time since I don't have to bother replying. I've been accused...Nope. I ignore people who whinge about it because they can't tell the difference - if they aren't that bright, ignoring them saves me time since I don't have to bother replying. I've been accused of being an AI many times, and I take it as a compliment instead. Reading a book a day for decades does make you better at written communication.
Consider this. AI has finally made it viable to create the internet's longest debated, most desired, and yet still conspicuously missing technology: the stupid-filter. The ability to detect rampant stupidity in written language. Attempts have been made in the past with bayesian tools, but they don't work very well. Large language models, on the other hand, are capable of doing this.
If you think the people whinging about everyone more articulate than they are is bad now, just wait until any comment that isn't at a minimum 10th grade level of English is instantly removed or automatically fact-checked, cited, and sourced the moment it gets posted. They'll never get a word in edgewise again. The average commenter can forget about being taken seriously by anyone outside of 4chan.
I don't have a problem with that, since most people providing 'expert' commentary aren't experts, they are just stroking their ego. Good news for brain work, bad news for bullshit, terrible news for trolls, spammers, and shills. It will happen just because nobody likes moderating comments and nobody has the time for it. Everyone will outsource it to LLMs as their electricity cost comes down. ;)
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Comment on What is the purpose of government? in ~society
Amarok Link ParentThe most frustrating part of the problem is that even if one were to incarnate a perfect social contract, it won't survive fifty years of contact with reality. Things fall apart, people change,...The most frustrating part of the problem is that even if one were to incarnate a perfect social contract, it won't survive fifty years of contact with reality. Things fall apart, people change, tastes change, new things come along every day. Combine that with the challenges of scope creep, nepotism, laziness, the hard challenge of scaling past Dunbar's number, and just plain chaos mixed in by chance. Entropy is a harsh mistress.
This isn't a problem that can ever be 'solved', it can only be managed with variable degrees of success... at least until we get to something more akin to post-scarcity, if that's possible. Somehow we default to be in 'everything is always falling apart' mode and success happens 'exactly as everything comes together for the next step' so we can jump to the next rock.
That only works until we run out of rocks to stand on. Hard to learn to fly when you're always trying not to slip off and fall in the river.
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Comment on What is the purpose of government? in ~society
Amarok LinkStep above the politics and look at it from a meta perspective. It's pretty simple - it's supposed to embody and support the 'social contract' of society. The patterns of behavior that the group...Step above the politics and look at it from a meta perspective. It's pretty simple - it's supposed to embody and support the 'social contract' of society. The patterns of behavior that the group chooses to live by. Everything else is more a discussion of 'which patterns', 'how to achieve them', and 'how to pay for it all'. That's where the arguments begin.
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Comment on Is this a coup? in ~society
Amarok Link ParentNo worries, I'm an old hat at talking politics so I don't offend. You are right, it's almost entirely propaganda. Repeat it until it sticks. I'm disappointed that trick always works. The truth of...No worries, I'm an old hat at talking politics so I don't offend. You are right, it's almost entirely propaganda. Repeat it until it sticks. I'm disappointed that trick always works. The truth of the mandate he has is that around 7% of people who usually vote blue voted red this time. Not independents who always swing around, I mean 7% of hardcore democrats voted for him this time. That is pretty unusual, but it has more to do with the DNC trying to cover up Biden's health and anoint Harris by fiat than anything to do with Trump. One does not skip the primary in America if one expects to win, period.
So Trump's smallish mandate does not come from anything that he himself did. It comes from blue rage, and just plain angry Americans who don't care about policy as much as they care about shaking up the fed to punish them. They sent Trump in like a vengeful nuke to break the government so all the people working in government get to feel their pain and suffer. Mission accomplished and then some. If nothing improves, next time they will send someone even worse than Trump and they will send him in with a bigger mandate. They don't care which color the party is, they want results.
Despite doing more damage than a rabid Tasmanian devil let loose at the start of the world championship domino tournament, Trump is fulfilling campaign promises. He's used his tariffs to bully Mexico and Canada into border security action, just like he said he would. They aren't paying for a wall, but they are paying into the border now. He is saving billions from being wasted through the audits. He's reducing the budget and cutting redundant employees. He just secured a half trillion dollar mineral deal in Ukraine. It's week three. Care to guess what week fifty looks like at this pace? I don't. :P
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Comment on Is this a coup? in ~society
Amarok Link ParentFor sure. With his mandate, no way the Republicans impeach him, and I don't think it is possible without their votes. Their constituents would riot and they'd lose re-election. Repealing expanded...For sure. With his mandate, no way the Republicans impeach him, and I don't think it is possible without their votes. Their constituents would riot and they'd lose re-election. Repealing expanded powers, however, is something very near and dear to the hearts of every Republican, and would be a far easier sell than impeachment.
They might wait to do it, though, for strategic reasons - at least until after the 2026 mid-terms or until after Trump has already done most of what they want him to do. I suppose it depends on how much the other Republicans hate him - and a lot of them do even if they are paying lip service right now. Frankly I think everyone is still shell shocked that any president has the capacity to do something like this in... three weeks total time. Absolutely no one is used to a government that moves this fast in America. It only ever happens when one party wins a blowout and gets a majority in the house and the senate, allowing them to ignore the other party completely. Trump didn't get that, thank god. He's just pretending that he did.
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Comment on Is this a coup? in ~society
Amarok Link ParentHmm, it does look like it changed in 2020, I wasn't aware of that myself. After digging into it, looks like some provisions were renewed and some expired, but I'm no expert on the nitty gritty of...Hmm, it does look like it changed in 2020, I wasn't aware of that myself. After digging into it, looks like some provisions were renewed and some expired, but I'm no expert on the nitty gritty of it. I just know that expanded executive order power comes directly from it, and Trump is certainly still using those powers.
That'd mean it's not a simple 'repeal' of the original, instead you'd have to hunt down and deal with the separate parts still in effect, or have congress pass something that overrides it. Either way though, ball is in Congress' court on this one. They can reign him in.
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Comment on Is this a coup? in ~society
Amarok Link ParentOh, no argument from me there. In fact, all of your points are fair, but they won't stop this from happening. My point is that this audit is about fifty years overdue and I'm glad that at least...but there's no way that an audit of wasteful spending is worth the damage that is being caused.
Oh, no argument from me there. In fact, all of your points are fair, but they won't stop this from happening. My point is that this audit is about fifty years overdue and I'm glad that at least one good thing is coming out of this mess - cuts to pointless spending. Americans have already seen enough negligence reported so that audits like this are going to be back on the agenda in politics again for a long, long time.
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Comment on Is this a coup? in ~society
Amarok Link ParentI honestly chuckled at that one. :) I would agree that the Patriot Act has been... a wash at best, and frankly just a very very very bad idea all around. We all knew it, but there was no holding...I honestly chuckled at that one. :) I would agree that the Patriot Act has been... a wash at best, and frankly just a very very very bad idea all around. We all knew it, but there was no holding back that knee-jerk reaction to being attacked. Hey, at least Bernie was smart enough to vote no on it from day one. The democrats do have their own populist in house, not that they'd ever have the balls to use him. He could have crushed Trump, and so could Tulsi or Yang (who had 10% of Trump's base loving him) for that matter. The DNC needs to up their game big time or face collapse and be replaced by something a lot less... geriatric in nature.
We don't get a third party. Instead, we get one party reforming and collapsing and refactoring (which the Republicans have done now) and they crush it until the other party goes through the same process and comes back swinging. Better start your engines for 2028 right now and get out in front of it, guys. We need you back in there asap.
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Comment on Is this a coup? in ~society
Amarok LinkI see it very simply. This is one hundred percent on Congress alone. Trump is a total non-factor in this mess despite being the source of so much consternation. His expanded executive powers...- Exemplary
I see it very simply. This is one hundred percent on Congress alone.
Trump is a total non-factor in this mess despite being the source of so much consternation. His expanded executive powers derive from the Patriot Act and its tampering with the 'separation of powers' principle (plus twenty years of scope creep that both Obama and Biden were only too happy to encourage). Those presidential powers, and many forms of inter-agency co-operation (largely information-sharing), plus all the expanded citizen spying powers, vanish the instant that act is repealed. It would hamstring Trump's entire plan instantly and all he would be able to do about it is pout.
Fun fact, the Patriot Act was written to be sunset the moment it becomes 'objectionable' to continue with those expanded powers, so it's designed to be cancelled from day one. I think it might be unique in that regard, even the nearly unanimous count of representatives voting for it during the 9/11 hysteria had some inkling they were playing with fire. Well, here we are, nice going guys. Real smart move there.
It never has been cancelled because dealing with separation of powers is a colossal pain in the ass (as intended). Our government does not want to give up 'easy mode' and go back to 1995. On the other hand, public support for repealing the Patriot Act would be astronomical, it's a slam dunk. It is wayyyy past the expiration date. We know what we are doing now when it comes to terrorism - we've had just a bit more experience over the two and a half decades since it passed.
Trump and the federal judges get to go back and forth playing cat and mouse over technical details. Trump will easily win that fight because he does fifteen things to abuse his power every day before lunch. It is a total (and astonishingly effective) blitz. By the time the judges can even review a single action from today's crisis menu weeks or months later, the damage is already done and it's a moot point. Every judge and lawyer in the country couldn't keep up with this pace even with unlimited resources (which they do not have). For every order they block, he'll re-issue it again with legal objections amended for (or not) just to chew up their time - and worse, he'll spin every tiny setback in his momentum on those 'activist' justices to turn public opinion against them (successfully, too).
This will continue for Trump's entire term (and his third one, which he already hinted he'd run for) unless Congress steps up and takes back the power it used to have by repealing the Patriot Act. Simplest problem in the world to have, and to solve. I find it amusing that nobody has even talked about this in the media yet. The government would rather live through Trump than give up those powers and do things the proper American way again.
Fun fact about federal departments. Congress controls the purse strings, and they may also both create or close federal agencies - but never run them at all or be involved in running them in any capacity. Those agencies do report information to Congress, but they answer to the courts and the president, not to Congress. Technically, no federal agency has to interact with or answer congress on anything, ever - though that's never how things have been run before. It's not typically adversarial until some senator with an axe to grind starts hunting for classified information above their station - then they get stonewalled.
The question of if the executive branch can create departments of its own volition, or repurpose them (which is how DOGE was put together) is an awful lot more dicey because it's never been formally codified, it's always been a seat of the pants affair. Several presidents have created smaller departments or repurposed them in the past, though it's not very common. I think the EPA, DOD, and NASA are the big three created by presidents rather than Congress (though NASA was later authorized by Congress, so they are safe). Yes, that means Trump can legally close and fire the entire EPA with a single pen stroke, and Congress can't do a damn thing about it (except recreate it the next day under their own authority, which they won't because Republicans). Don't tell the pumpkin and maybe the EPA will last the year, but I doubt it. I'd bet they are next after the DOE.
What Trump did to create DOGE out of Obama's IT force is legal and has precedent. It's dirty pool certainly, but that does not matter because he does have that power, and that power does not come from the patriot act either.
I wouldn't worry about the US Military falling for a coup, though. Their oath is not one of blind loyalty, it is one of protecting the country from foreign and domestic threats - which means in the event of an actual coup, they will be escorting Trump directly to jail the same afternoon. The generals have to believe in the president's orders and intent in order to follow them, and every single soldier in the army is not to follow orders that violate their conscience. Trump has no options to compel the military to do anything they see as a danger to the country, and that's by design.
America does not have coups, but we do have asshole parties that occasionally make a mess of things, just like this. The worst that happens here is they jail everyone on down the line for the presidency, the acting president fires everyone who was involved and appoints a new cabinet, then we have an election. In order to coup this thing you'd have to coup all three branches and the military halfway down from the top with accomplices, and that's never going to happen. It's too many people to even keep that sort of thing a secret.
You'd have better luck convincing Texas and California to secede together on the same day, if you want to create a proper shitstorm for the USA. Stop confusing the world's longest running democratic republic for a poor young country with no experience in this stuff. We've done it all before, and we'll do it again too, until we get good at it. Sit back and enjoy the Trump show and stop panicking (unless you work for the fed, in which case that early retirement severance is pretty generous and probably looking mighty good right now).
Instead take the time to appreciate that baby himmler is still locked into adult day care, he just can't see it for what it is anymore. The more he pisses off the entire government, the more they will all come together and bend rules to weigh him down. Seriously, Trump is not Nixon, not even close. In all of this perhaps our courts will awaken from their eternal slumber and remember that they still have the final say on the law in this country. I'd consider that real progress.
I must admit that despite all the shenanigans, I am richly enjoying the neverending expose of our ludicrous budget allocations. So far nearly all of the things I see Musk going on about are things I would never support with taxes, period. It's well past shameful or disgusting, it's gone to pure schadenfreude at this point. I am digging the audit, and I'd like to audit the entire government this way, top to bottom, including the federal reserve, and claw back every last penny - and do it every single year for the rest of time as well. If this is how our money is spent, that has to change, or it's time for a tax strike.
Once upon a time, that was a core purpose of the Republican party, back in the Goldwater era. Reagan ended that with his big spending push, and once the republicans saw that nobody was complaining, they were thrilled to back him up. It's been a surprise to see Trump bring sensible budgeting cuts back with such gusto. Pity he's just doing it to score populism points for whatever he's planning in the future. Right audits, wrong reasons for them. I'll take what I can get, I guess. /facepalm
I cannot even imagine how insane this mess must look to the rest of the world.
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Comment on The United States of pizza, mapsplained in ~food
Amarok Link ParentI've been to Wooden Heads in Kingston a couple of times, and I think Canadians have nothing to apologize for when it comes to pizza. Y'all are doing just fine in my book - I would never have...I've been to Wooden Heads in Kingston a couple of times, and I think Canadians have nothing to apologize for when it comes to pizza. Y'all are doing just fine in my book - I would never have discovered the magic of chicken and apple butter on a wood fired pizza anywhere else. :)
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Comment on PlayStation Network is still down after fourteen hours and no one knows why in ~games
Amarok Link ParentIt could also be that they hired someone fresh to come in and run a do-over on their systems. If they were truly concerned about security liabilities, turning it off until it's secured is a good...It could also be that they hired someone fresh to come in and run a do-over on their systems. If they were truly concerned about security liabilities, turning it off until it's secured is a good move most companies would at least consider making. They might not announce it if departments are all on flux and things are chaotic. Usually if it goes down at end of business on a Friday, it's up by start of business on a Monday. I'd bet they are patching. We will see if the incoming team bit off more than they can chew if it's still down after the weekend.
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Comment on Tildes feels like the last bastion of the Information Superhighway in ~tildes
Amarok Link ParentI abused my executive mod power and linked the announcement of Tildes into the listentothis sidebar (last item) and across the stylesheet's announcement banner. It sat there for about five years...I abused my executive mod power and linked the announcement of Tildes into the listentothis sidebar (last item) and across the stylesheet's announcement banner. It sat there for about five years before the new mods noticed and took it down, right in front of every single listentothis user who was paying any kind of attention to the music tsunami.
I invited all of reddit's cratediggers with that, though I wasn't flashy about it. Modding flashy was never my style anyway, my uses of green over there were to crack jokes, or post community curated content. Let's just say I recognize a lot of people's musical tastes and obsessions here from the early days of l2t - you can change your handle but not the music you love. Kinda amazing what being ten years older does for everyone's perspectives and attitudes and tastes.
I don't do bestofs for listentothis anymore, but I never stopped doing my own bestofs and mixtapes - which aren't as short or conservative as the official content was. Listening for other people is exhausting, but since I only have to listen for myself now I can cover ground much faster, plus I have about 2000 artists I'm following that listentothis helped me find. My real payment for all the mod work. :)
Fun fact, Deimos is an ex-listentothis mod. We invited him on to install Automoderator for us when only a couple dozen subreddits were even using it, and he coded some custom features just for listentothis to implement a curated content system. I saved the gold star badges in listentothis for the people who wrote code for the place, that was a real contribution. Curation did not catch on with many users, but it did surface the top content better than reddit's voting mechanics and it proved the mentality we're using here truly works, at least to me.
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Comment on I hate the new internet. I hate the new tech world. I hate it all. I want out, and I can't be the only one. in ~tech
Amarok LinkTaking your technology stack back is possible. Lucky for all of us someone else already took the time to document exactly how to do it in grandma terms with full technical details intact. the...Taking your technology stack back is possible. Lucky for all of us someone else already took the time to document exactly how to do it in grandma terms with full technical details intact.
- the ultimate guide to an open source life (intro, 13m)
- Part One (video, 6.5 hours)
- Part Two (video, 6.5 hours)
- Introduction to a Self Managed Life by FUTO software (tech docs, 900 pages)
This is what happens when FUTO pays Louis Rossman with arabica beans.
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Comment on I hate the new internet. I hate the new tech world. I hate it all. I want out, and I can't be the only one. in ~tech
Amarok Link ParentFor what it is worth, that's typical in my experience. The old phpbb forum I ran for our EQ server's community had a politics forum, and that was about 30% of the forum's total traffic. This was...For what it is worth, that's typical in my experience. The old phpbb forum I ran for our EQ server's community had a politics forum, and that was about 30% of the forum's total traffic. This was pre-9/11 when politics was a dull, boring affair that Clintons were trying to make sexy. It's a hotter topic now so I'm sure that 30% figure would be higher today. Politics tends to be 'current events' oriented which means there is always new stuff to talk about , and Trump has the ludicrous speed dial cranked up to plaid.
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Comment on I hate the new internet. I hate the new tech world. I hate it all. I want out, and I can't be the only one. in ~tech
Amarok Link ParentOnly until 2028? You're such an optimist. ;)Only until 2028? You're such an optimist. ;)
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Comment on US CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid’s origins in ~health
Amarok (edited )Link ParentWell, I do think it would be pretty easy to put everyone coming into and out of the facility into a mandatory two week quarantine individually - a trailer or cabin or other small domicile on site...Well, I do think it would be pretty easy to put everyone coming into and out of the facility into a mandatory two week quarantine individually - a trailer or cabin or other small domicile on site yet isolated. Being locked up for two weeks after you arrive at the lab, and for two weeks after you get out but before you leave the site, would prevent humans from being able to accidentally carry pathogens into the general population. Sure, it sucks for the researchers, but that's why we pay them more money to work in desolate places even now. The teams that rotate into and out of antartica already are a fine example of how to do it like this without burning out your people.
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Comment on US CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid’s origins in ~health
Amarok (edited )Link ParentI imagine someone working there looking to make a few bucks under the table by selling previously infected animals (for lunch or pets or livestock) instead of destroying them like they were...I imagine someone working there looking to make a few bucks under the table by selling previously infected animals (for lunch or pets or livestock) instead of destroying them like they were supposed to do. Probably got away with it for a long time too.
I still don't see anyone answering the question of why any gain of function research is allowed to take place within one hundred miles of any city, town, or village. It should be going on in antarctica or the sahara or a remote island where the bugs (and any escaped animals) die rapidly in the outside environment and have nothing around the site to infect in the first place. The only proper place to do this safely is where there are no streets outside for miles in every direction.
All the labs are still located in cities. This tells me that no one has ever taken this issue seriously. I guess a legit pandemic is not enough of an inconvenience to make changes in how this research is managed. It doesn't matter if it did or did not leak from a lab - the possibility that it could should not even be in the cards by virtue of the containment protocols used.
I hope you're right. A fun optimistic scifi romp would be a massive hit when most of their competition is some flavor of boring or dystopian.