redwall_hp's recent activity
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Comment on Summer Eternal presents: Red Rooster, an incendiary RPG in ~games
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Comment on Fridges in French supermarkets hit by cyber attack in ~tech
redwall_hp Link ParentPresumably they also minimize power consumption by adjusting compressor parameters based on store traffic, local power grid conditions, time of day, etc. We're long past the "smart grid" becoming...Presumably they also minimize power consumption by adjusting compressor parameters based on store traffic, local power grid conditions, time of day, etc. We're long past the "smart grid" becoming a thing. It's pretty normal for appliances in many regions to prioritize operation during off-peak hours or react to an overloaded grid...and industrial refrigeration is considerably more energy intense than home appliances.
I've even opened and closed a door on a cooler before and had it lock and display an indication that it was too close to the temperature ceiling and needed to cool. That one wasn't in a store, though. It was a glorified vending machine where you take the item out of one of the coolers (or a non-cold shelf) and scan it on the self-checkout thing.
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Comment on Fridges in French supermarkets hit by cyber attack in ~tech
redwall_hp (edited )Link ParentI read that as they're old machines that don't have an update mechanism. Like they shipped with remote management features but not a means to provide internet based updates, because that wasn't as...I read that as they're old machines that don't have an update mechanism. Like they shipped with remote management features but not a means to provide internet based updates, because that wasn't as much of a thing years ago.
The situation is probably less consumer IoT device and more "this industrial equipment can plug in to a router, and a computer on the network is supposed to talk to them." Then someone just gains a point of ingress into that network and can send messages to the connected fridges.
One would assume that a large enough chain has ongoing maintenance contracts for their equipment, for parts and software. If they're just rolling with old, discontinued stuff and buying parts to keep things going, it long since ceased to be the manufacturer's responsibility. Long term support ain't free.
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Comment on Software developers are not okay in ~tech
redwall_hp (edited )Link ParentNot voluntarily, but the hypothetical the AI zealots breathlessly advocate for is the complete destruction of virtually all knowledge work positions. That means people being forced to injure...Not voluntarily, but the hypothetical the AI zealots breathlessly advocate for is the complete destruction of virtually all knowledge work positions. That means people being forced to injure themselves doing those jobs for survival. (We're not magically getting a post-scarcity utopia from a group of techno-fascist billionaires.) Even a fraction of that population changing over would drastically increase supply of labor...and suppress demand, since there will be fewer people who can afford things like houses that need renovation, which would harm the trades even faster.
Of course, I would expect serious violence long before that point. There have to be at least a few unibombers among the population of <all office workers>.
Moreover, such a situation also would completely destroy the economy. If your main export is the product of knowledge workers, and you're racing to eliminate them for...something plenty of countries already have sufficiently replicated, well, good luck being able to afford to import all the things you don't manufacture (which building supply chains for is a pipe dream) when you've devalued your primary exports.
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Comment on Solo developer rebuilds Adobe Creative Suite in Rust using Claude, releases it free to all in ~tech
redwall_hp Link ParentThat's actually another important point. Merely saying "this is like $trademark, but $different" can be considered trademark infringement, since you're advertising your product with their name....That's actually another important point. Merely saying "this is like $trademark, but $different" can be considered trademark infringement, since you're advertising your product with their name.
You don't see car ads saying "this is basically our CR-V clone." It would not end well.
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Comment on Solo developer rebuilds Adobe Creative Suite in Rust using Claude, releases it free to all in ~tech
redwall_hp (edited )Link ParentClean room reverse engineering is legal, yes. It's widely understood that having the same people do the reversal as the implementation from the derived spec is a good way to get your ass sued into...Clean room reverse engineering is legal, yes. It's widely understood that having the same people do the reversal as the implementation from the derived spec is a good way to get your ass sued into the ground. (This goes way back to things like the cloning of the IBM PC: one team with a test bench poking signals into the system and taking readings, and a fully separate team using their written spec to build a compatible BIOS.)
A straight decompile and port into another language would still be infringing (just as publishing a translation of a novel is infringing). Decompilation is one thing that you never want to do while doing legal reverse engineering, because you're exposing yourself to implementational details.
If no decompilation happened, we get into the untested minefield of "is a leak of the source or a decompilation in the training set?" That's a risk. Any indication that code is sufficiently similar will be used as evidence of infringement.
Regardless, an individual probably can't afford to be sued by Adobe in the first place. This is exactly the kind of case I've been waiting for (though my money was on a Microsoft product)...if this were to go to court, it could establish case law that will make LLM use scarier to lawyers than GPL software. (And then they'll find out that they were trained on GPL code and often emit it verbatim...)
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Comment on Popcorn! What's the best way to make it? in ~food
redwall_hp LinkRegardless of method, the secret is it has to be popped in oil mixed with Flavacol. This is why movie theater popcorn tastes the way it does and air popped stuff tastes like sadness.Regardless of method, the secret is it has to be popped in oil mixed with Flavacol. This is why movie theater popcorn tastes the way it does and air popped stuff tastes like sadness.
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Comment on Fall 2026 | Which anime do you look forward to? in ~anime
redwall_hp LinkThe big one is Apothecary Diaries, which is one of my favorites from recent years. (Easily above Frieren, which I also enjoyed.) Its third season just started (but I have to wrap up Doctor Stone...The big one is Apothecary Diaries, which is one of my favorites from recent years. (Easily above Frieren, which I also enjoyed.) Its third season just started (but I have to wrap up Doctor Stone before starting it), and there's a standalone movie coming out this winter as well, between the two planned cours.
In a setting inspired by 1400s-1500s China, an apothecary's daughter gets indentured to work in the emperor's private palace, where she basically ends up solving murder mysteries and such, and slowly uncovering more hidden things about her associates and her own past. It's a court intrigue show with a lot of drama and humor, and Maomao is a great character. (There's a strange balance between being smart and how are you still alive?)
Black Clover is also returning after a cliffhanger that's lasted for something like four years. (I suspect COVID lengthened what was supposed to be a shorter gap surrounding the movie.)
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Comment on Software developers are not okay in ~tech
redwall_hp Link ParentWe already had years and years of overall software quality becoming a trash fire. I don't think anyone is excited about OS updates anymore, and practically every application has something that...We already had years and years of overall software quality becoming a trash fire. I don't think anyone is excited about OS updates anymore, and practically every application has something that people feel breaks after an update. Software is getting larger and larger and consuming more resources to do the same things, as heavy frameworks are stacked up and companies rely on JavaScript crude for desktop and mobile applications. Things are slow on expensive (and getting more expensive) hardware when they don't need to be.
And that's just from the user-facing side. The industry is full of people who don't know what they're doing and software robustness is a constant fight between the people who care about quality and the people who just want to say LGTM and merge. And that attitude stacks up technical debt that makes work harder in the future or bites you with a production incident.
Now that LLM usage is everywhere, that fight is getting harder. People throw PRs down faster, apparently look at and test them less, and more people are just rubber stamping them without looking at the chances. This is essentially shifting a massive amount of work onto more senior developers who are baby sitting more.
Just the other day I caught someone submitting a config file change with a unit test testing the configuration, and multiple other people approved the PR before I blocked it. Not testing the configuration loader/parser, which already had through tests; Claude made a new test file to test that the configuration changes were set as it expected. Seriously, you don't write code to test runtime configuration (which already has full coverage for the functionality the config drives).
Software quality is cooked, and the experience for end users is going to get much worse if this madness doesn't die down. And probably kill people as this affects cars, planes, heavy machinery, infrastructure, etc..
I'd hope medical device companies learned from THERAC-25, but hey, it's the future now. Let's just let Claude worry about it. /s
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Comment on Software developers are not okay in ~tech
redwall_hp Link ParentNo, if anything a hypothetical drop in demand for skilled knowledge work would increase the labor pool of people for manual labor and drive the pay down even more. Technical work pays more because...No, if anything a hypothetical drop in demand for skilled knowledge work would increase the labor pool of people for manual labor and drive the pay down even more.
Technical work pays more because a limited number of people can do it and it takes a large upfront investment in time to be able to do it professionally. Unskilled manual labor is something that anyone who's able-bodied can do.
Things like agriculture don't have more of an automation push because people are already paid next to nothing and developing the automation would cost more. Robots largely took over heavy manufacturing decades ago—it's largely large machinery building cars, for example. (Except for cheap commodities where it's cheaper to pay people in a heavily-outsourced area, like sewing shirts.) People do the dexterous in-between jobs, but that's the next big push. There's a reason why Hyundai/Boston Dynamics is working on hands for Atlas right now.
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Comment on Man shot by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in New York City's Marble Hill, authorities say in ~society
redwall_hp (edited )Link ParentPassive voice is propaganda, not journalism. Same for removing context. They're also not opinions, but the actual reality of the situation. (Attempted murder, I guess, since they buried that the...Passive voice is propaganda, not journalism. Same for removing context. They're also not opinions, but the actual reality of the situation. (Attempted murder, I guess, since they buried that the victim survived being shot.)
Fact: NYPD responded to gunshots from ununiformed and masked individuals.
Fact: ICE is operating as a paramilitary organization, by definition. Not calling it that serves only for propaganda issues, because the public knows that's a bad thing.
Fact: ICE operatives brandished firearms in front of a crowd.
Fact: ICE actively shot, multiple times, at a driver in a vehicle, with a child present.
I would also accept "ICE paramilitaries assaulted (with a deadly weapon) and handcuffed" an individual, among many other milder options that don't frame the actions in the passive voice or appeal to authority by framing them in the context of a police action narrative device.
If someone shot one of them, you can bet it would be written in the active voice, which is all you need to know about the thumb-on-the-scale that is actually happening.
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Comment on Man shot by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in New York City's Marble Hill, authorities say in ~society
redwall_hp LinkTired of ICE sanewashing by journalists. "Officers" were not trying to "arrest" someone. And this was not a case where "One ICE agent fired seven rounds at the car, striking the 28-year-old Oscar...Tired of ICE sanewashing by journalists. "Officers" were not trying to "arrest" someone. And this was not a case where "One ICE agent fired seven rounds at the car, striking the 28-year-old Oscar Belgal in the neck." Passive voice everywhere.
A gang of armed paramilitaries murdered a person in service of fascists, while wearing no apparent uniform.
Tisch said NYPD officers who were in the area responded to the scene after hearing reports of shots fired.
"When they arrived, they encountered several men in various forms of attire, including some in construction-style vests, face masks and at least one carrying a long gun," she said.
That is not the appearance or behavior of legitimate federal law enforcement agents. That's a gang of armed criminals.
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Comment on The return of phones with physical keyboards? in ~tech
redwall_hp Link ParentIt took me way too long to figure out that っ, the smol つ is xtsu.It took me way too long to figure out that っ, the smol つ is xtsu.
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Comment on Was watching a history YouTube video when I realized they are all AI in ~tech
redwall_hp Link ParentThat's an unspeakable crime against typography.That's an unspeakable crime against typography.
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Comment on Ella Langley’s ‘Choosin’ Texas’ finally breaks Mariah Carey’s all-time record for weeks at US no. 1, eclipsing ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’ in ~music
redwall_hp (edited )Link ParentSo even if somebody listens to radio, there's a hard line between your pop stations and country stations, and someone usually listens to one vs the other. And the former is much more likely to...So even if somebody listens to radio, there's a hard line between your pop stations and country stations, and someone usually listens to one vs the other. And the former is much more likely to appear in TV or film that I'd be likely to watch, or be on random InstaTok noise people in my household are watching or whatever. "Listening to country music" is usually a deliberate choice rather than something that organically pops up, like one has to deliberately seek "christian rock" (thank fuck).
I'm definitely familiar with Sabrina Carpenter (and Chappell Roan) and know at least one Doja Cat song. I did hear A Bar Song a bit when that came out. I could also tell you that Bruno Mars had a hit this year with Lady Gaga, and had APT a year or two back with ROSÉ. I watched Bad Bunny's halftime show at the sportsball thing and ignored the sportsball. I'm selective about the pop I like, but I'm past my teenage phase of pretending it's all bad, especially now that I dabble in making music.
I definitely can't say I know what a Choosing Texas is (other than that maybe Texas should respect peoples' right to certain choices) and I don't care to. It's possible I unknowingly heard it in the background at Texas Roadhouse (easily the cheapest steak in the area) but wouldn't have clocked it...and that wouldn't speak well of its distinctiveness if that were true.
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Comment on Ella Langley’s ‘Choosin’ Texas’ finally breaks Mariah Carey’s all-time record for weeks at US no. 1, eclipsing ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’ in ~music
redwall_hp LinkRolling Stone certainly has...a take. "Working class": a genre glamorizing a lifestyle that revolves around owning a bunch of valuable farmland, inherited from people who totally didn't own people...Rolling Stone certainly has...a take.
"Working class": a genre glamorizing a lifestyle that revolves around owning a bunch of valuable farmland, inherited from people who totally didn't own people or violently take the land from Native Americans.
Not working class: anything Black or Latin musicians did, I guess.
I mean, damn right I want nothing to do with rural southern republican lifestyle or music aimed at it. Give me some funk or house.
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Comment on Jon Watts is our ‘Star Wars: Episode X’ director in ~movies
redwall_hp (edited )Link ParentIf we go by older things (Expanded Universe before the Disney nation attacked), it actually happened the other way around: the Red Sith were a singular species with a massive lowercase-e empire...If we go by older things (Expanded Universe before the Disney nation attacked), it actually happened the other way around: the Red Sith were a singular species with a massive lowercase-e empire that oppressed many worlds, and their warrior caste were the ones the Yavin ruins were built for. They were based on a planet called Korriban, and were later followed by Exar Kun's Sith, and later (?) Revan. The "rule of two" Sith were something that came millennia later. They're basically LARPing.
The original Jedi were a rebellion against the original Sith empire, and their developed philosophy was a direct reaction to that abuse of power.
At least, that's my half-remembered understanding from one point in time. There was also a Sith empire following the Hyperspace War...which is depicted on the wall of Palpatine's office in the prequels. This particular one is considered modern canon, as it has references in the films. (And I've been saying for years that would be an excellent thing to explore.)
Some form of this probably would make for a good movie, but I highly doubt the untitled "origin of the Jedi" film that Disney does have on their roadmap will be anything like that. It will probably be a coup de grâce on the foundations of the whole series instead.
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Comment on Jon Watts is our ‘Star Wars: Episode X’ director in ~movies
redwall_hp LinkTitle crawl: "It's unclear how, but the Empire has returned somehow." Please, just move forward or backward a few hundred years and let the Skywalkers rest in peace, and have some damn Jedi doing...Daisy Ridley’s Rey will feature in this new set of sequels in some capacity, though it’s currently unclear how.
Title crawl: "It's unclear how, but the Empire has returned somehow."
Please, just move forward or backward a few hundred years and let the Skywalkers rest in peace, and have some damn Jedi doing space samurai things.
The Ninth Jedi, Andor aside, is the best Star Wars we've had in a long time.
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Comment on Wikipedia's list of the best video games: how many have you played, and what's missing? in ~games
redwall_hp Link ParentThis is causing me to remember something that's making me question my sanity, because no videos online match what I remember. Circa 2002-2004, an arcade I frequented had a game in the Puzzle...This is causing me to remember something that's making me question my sanity, because no videos online match what I remember.
Circa 2002-2004, an arcade I frequented had a game in the Puzzle Bobble series in the US. I vaguely remember it saying something like "Bust-a-Move EX" on the cabinet. It had the glossy bubbles, little chirp sound when firing, and a two player mode where each player got a launcher. I recall the little green dinosaur character operating the launcher.
It was the loudest cabinet in the place and would occasionally play this tune that's absolutely burned into my memory, but none of the attract mode videos I can find match my memory.
It had that PS1/N64 era "short PCM samples" sound, with a happy, fast synth melody that would be interrupted by this "tchk!" (kind of sneeze like) sound. (Something like: Da da da da da da da. Da da da da da. Da da da da da da da dadadada tchk!)
It was in a bowling alley, and whenever the owner flipped the breaker for that room (the arcade was off during less-used hours, presumably to save power) it would come on and shortly be doing that. So I heard it many, many times. (It was also right next to Marvel vs Capcom and Time Crisis.)
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Comment on Owners mourn spoiled food after firmware update bricks Samsung smart fridges in ~tech
redwall_hp Link ParentA contract negotiated by single party and signed by one with no legal counsel, essentially by coercion since you've already bought a product, is legally questionable. Despite what the world has...A contract negotiated by single party and signed by one with no legal counsel, essentially by coercion since you've already bought a product, is legally questionable. Despite what the world has suddenly pretended is reasonable in recent decades.
Actually taking them to court, EULAs are probably effectively toilet paper in a lot of cases. Just like when Disney tries to get out of a wrongful death suit because a Disney+ EULA says you're subject to arbitration.
I love You, Colonel Sanders?