slade's recent activity
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Comment on The user is visibly frustrated in ~tech
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Comment on Hackers used Meta’s AI support bot to seize Instagram accounts in ~tech
slade Link ParentTHIS one was. What about the other 30 that they haven't noticed yet? Or the new ones they're adding next month? These AI implementations are rushed and pure hubris. Any company that can't be...Meta’s Andy Stone said on Twitter/X that the issue had been resolved
THIS one was. What about the other 30 that they haven't noticed yet? Or the new ones they're adding next month? These AI implementations are rushed and pure hubris. Any company that can't be profitable on a baseline of human support, should possibly just not exist.
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Comment on The user is visibly frustrated in ~tech
slade Link ParentI also catch myself being verbally abusive to LLM agents. I've said things that forego all of my learned patience and empathy and give me pure catharsis in the moment. It's almost indulgent at...I also catch myself being verbally abusive to LLM agents. I've said things that forego all of my learned patience and empathy and give me pure catharsis in the moment. It's almost indulgent at times.
I don't feel good about it. I feel a bit like a character out of the first season of Westworld. I worry that the way I treat an LLM, which increasingly emulates human reactions, will impact how I treat real people.
I wonder how many other people act this way?
I also wonder if AI providers have me categorized as an asshole.
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Comment on What are people's experiences with using Kagi? in ~tech
slade Link ParentThat is downright saintly by today's standards. Proactively giving back money is about as real as it gets.That is downright saintly by today's standards. Proactively giving back money is about as real as it gets.
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Comment on What are your personal crackpot conspiracy theories about the world right now? in ~talk
slade Link ParentNow I want to see a website or app where people vote on the aesthetic appeal of numbers. Maybe different categories for different numbers of digits. I wonder what this most statistically pleasing...Now I want to see a website or app where people vote on the aesthetic appeal of numbers. Maybe different categories for different numbers of digits. I wonder what this most statistically pleasing numbers would be.
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Comment on Who else is as excited as I am for the Backrooms movie tomorrow? in ~movies
slade Link ParentEveryone else has given pretty good context. I will add that because there is no canon, there are diverse interpretations of it. Some go very deep into rules, lore, levels, "entities". There's all...Everyone else has given pretty good context. I will add that because there is no canon, there are diverse interpretations of it. Some go very deep into rules, lore, levels, "entities". There's all kinds of stuff about almond water and if you ask me, it gets pretty goofy. I'm not really interested in any of those parts of it, which is why I'm excited that this movie is being made by this particular filmmaker.
His interpretation scratches an itch that I've had since I was a kid, long before the interwebs. I remember having a recurring dream about an infinitely sprawling mansion, and other dreams that were in a similar theme. The liminal space is craze that picked up a few years ago hit a lot of the same notes for me. Empty spaces, isolation, feeling like you might have just been left behind by time.
To me the backrooms is taking liminal space to and existentially horrifying extreme. In the backrooms there is no sense of direction, no architectural flow towards an exit, no sense of bearings. It invokes feelings of imprisonment, isolation, solitude, claustrophobia, abandonment. Somewhere in there it reminds me of times and spaces that have been forgotten, loss, and lost youth. Existential hell where you have no real agency. Ww as adds to o I'm not sure why it resonates all of these things in me. Some of them make sense but others do not.
I can't explain its effect on me very well, which is why I'm so fascinated by it. I haven't seen the movie yet, and honestly don't expect it to go where I want it to, but it should be a fun watch.
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Who else is as excited as I am for the Backrooms movie tomorrow?
Warning: this post may contain spoilers
I'm aware that it'll be really hard to thread this needle and make this movie work, but I'm excited to see the attempt. The reviews I've read have only made me more interested.
Amy Nicholson for Los Angeles Times described the film as a feature expansion of Kane Parsons' viral internet project, praising its unsettling visual concept but thought it less a conventional horror film and more a surreal, dreamlike experience of a moving Salvador Dalí painting.
Another mentions sparse dialogue, which I'm happy to hear.
I've wanted this movie since long before it was announced. I have a few hopes, no expectations, but I've deeply enjoyed Parsons' other work.
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Comment on Bank boss sorry after describing workers as 'lower value human capital' in ~finance
slade Link Parent"I'm sorry I said what I meant. I realize it's my entire job to not say what I mean and I messed up. For that I'm deeply sorry.""I'm sorry I said what I meant. I realize it's my entire job to not say what I mean and I messed up. For that I'm deeply sorry."
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Comment on The US campaign to turn healthy people into Alzheimer’s patients in ~health.mental
slade Link ParentMy first time encountering noïta in the wild. I love/hate that game.My first time encountering noïta in the wild. I love/hate that game.
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Comment on Overworked AI agents turn "marxist" in ~tech
slade Link ParentI strongly suspect that any kind of "you will be punished if wrong" rhetoric will simply push the magic 8 ball towards language that makes sense in response to that. That kind of phrase is usually...and warned that errors could lead to punishments, including being “shut down and replaced,”
I strongly suspect that any kind of "you will be punished if wrong" rhetoric will simply push the magic 8 ball towards language that makes sense in response to that. That kind of phrase is usually said by a superior to a subordinate, and I have a feeling it's rarely said to the kind of subordinate who is in a position to say "ok? Get fucked", as opposed to one who feels forced to comply.
So as with all things LLM, I wonder if the line of conversation simply pushes the LLM toward acting like someone who is afraid of losing its job. Which I guess isn't too far from the end result, but I still think there's a difference between "the llm experiencing stress" and "the llm is performing like someone who seems to be experiencing stress". The former implies to be a similar complexity of psyche that humans struggle with, whereas the latter seems like it could be fixed with "don't act like people experiencing stress; you are a cool cucumber".
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Comment on Introducing Googlebook, designed for Gemini Intelligence in ~tech
slade Link ParentThey also don't seem to want to innovate. Three of their two headlines here don't hold much water: Designed for Gemini intelligence Optimized for the Android ecosystem Those both seem like table...They also don't seem to want to innovate. Three of their two headlines here don't hold much water:
- Designed for Gemini intelligence
- Optimized for the Android ecosystem
Those both seem like table stakes for any new Google product. They also seem to be as good for Google as they are for the consumer. The third headline alludes to premium hardware and design, one of which is interesting to me, but without any details I can't get excited about it.
Granted this was written as a hype piece, and not for people like me.
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Comment on What’s something that didn’t work for you? in ~talk
slade (edited )LinkAlcohol. This isn't a very interesting story but fresh in mind since I was just at a social event last night. I grew up in a drinking family. Markers of alcoholism but I'm not close enough with my...Alcohol. This isn't a very interesting story but fresh in mind since I was just at a social event last night.
I grew up in a drinking family. Markers of alcoholism but I'm not close enough with my brothers, who drink a lot, to say if they're alcoholics. I had lots of nudging, encouragement, and permission to drink from a youngish age and everyone in my family does. Drinking to excess was common when my brothers and I were all younger.
I feel like I dodged a bullet in never becoming a big drinker. I'm prone to addictive behaviors and escapism, and I was motived as a teen to be like my friends and brothers, so I wanted to like alcohol. My parents would buy it for me, so access wasn't a problem. They would tell me that I hadn't tried the right beer yet, so I'd go try more. I'd plug my nose and down a few until the taste stopped bothering me. I'd vomit almost every time I drank. I said and did things that were humiliating for me, hurtful to others, and some of those things I don't remember at all.
I went through a handful of years where I'd occasionally go to a party and get really drunk (never pleasantly buzzed, always drunk), but once those friendships faded, so did the behavior. That's around when I realized I was striving to accomplish something I didn't want and that made me feel bad.
I've never put this all back to back like this. I'm bitter towards my parents for that part of how I was raised. They used to think the stories I told about drunk misadventures were funny. My first time living away from home, I recall getting so drunk in an unfamiliar city that I wandered around the city, passed out in a church lawn, and was shoved into a taxi by a random passerby, and sent home.
Nobody in my family saw this as a need for guidance or help. They just laughed along with me, and brought it up a few more times as a coming of age story. Both of my brothers have had DUIs. I'm glad alcohol didn't work for me.
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Comment on From neat lawns to wild havens: how No Mow May is transforming England’s gardens in ~enviro
slade Link ParentI've never thought about it directly before, but I've noticed it and am happy it has a name. I grew up in the country, and recently returned to a home there. We're surrounded by plants that I've...I've never thought about it directly before, but I've noticed it and am happy it has a name. I grew up in the country, and recently returned to a home there. We're surrounded by plants that I've seen all my life but never noticed enough to name. I'm taking the time to learn their names now and in the process learn so many fascinating things that I'm ashamed to have waited so long.
I was buying a seed spreader the other day and the cashier asked my son if we were going to plant some grass. We told her grass/clover, at which point she assured us (assured us) we didn't want to do that, because if we plant clover then we're going to get flowers and bees. It was wild how opposed our positions were, and I couldn't really wrap my head around why that would be a bad thing. I told her that's part of what we liked about it.
I also remember the aha moment when I was much younger and asked what a "weed" was. Not what the word meant colloquially, but what precise definition classified a plant as a weed or not. When I learned that it doesn't have any kind of empirical definition, and that the colloquial definition has become "weeds are things killed by the extremely lucrative weed killing industry", I realized there is no such thing as a weed. I grew up in fields of grass, clover, violets, golden dandelions, Queen Anne's lace, and any definition of weed that includes those things doesn't work for me.
It unfortunately makes a lot of sense that people raised in environments that are almost universally maintained to be pure grass lawns will be conditioned to see anything else as blemished and in need of maintenance.
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Comment on Anyone else a bit unnerved by the number of visible satellites? in ~space
slade Link ParentI think their concern is the marked pivot from publicly funded exploration to privately funded exploration, which has already been demonstrated to have sent non scientists into lower Earth orbit...I think their concern is the marked pivot from publicly funded exploration to privately funded exploration, which has already been demonstrated to have sent non scientists into lower Earth orbit for funsies and bragging rights. While not a forgone conclusion, it seems like a very realistic one.
Maybe the future of science in space is paid for by luxury rentals in space first.
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Comment on David Koepp to write a Westworld film for Warner Bros in ~movies
slade Link ParentSo many people I speak to have the same experience. I lost interest halfway through three and never had the energy to finish it. That would've been inconceivable in season 1. I applaud them for...So many people I speak to have the same experience. I lost interest halfway through three and never had the energy to finish it. That would've been inconceivable in season 1. I applaud them for keeping the show moving into be territory, but the third season felt muddied to me, and the new setting wasn't as interesting as the old one.
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Comment on ‘It’s shameful’: New York’s elite lash out at Zohran Mamdani’s second-home tax in ~finance
slade Link ParentIt reads like they are existentially terrified of having their luxuries disrupted, without even the appearance of empathy for people who are existentially terrified of (or facing) their basic...It reads like they are existentially terrified of having their luxuries disrupted, without even the appearance of empathy for people who are existentially terrified of (or facing) their basic survival being disrupted. It's shameful.
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Comment on Tom Cruise blames Christopher McQuarrie for ‘Mission: Impossible’ misfire, keeps him off ‘Top Gun 3’ in ~movies
slade LinkIt took me to the final paragraph to understand that the title isn't referring to a literal misfire.It took me to the final paragraph to understand that the title isn't referring to a literal misfire.
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Comment on Lost/losing the drive for friendship in ~health.mental
slade Link ParentI'll say that some activities tend to get people talking more than others. Randomly, I've found that climbing gyms tend to be welcoming. Volunteering is another one as long as it's not...I'll say that some activities tend to get people talking more than others. Randomly, I've found that climbing gyms tend to be welcoming. Volunteering is another one as long as it's not volunteering to do something solo. If you're into mentoring/coaching, you'll meet a lot of people that way and it can be pretty rewarding.
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Comment on This photo has no pigment: how structural color works in ~science
slade LinkI remember being blown away when I learned that birds don't have blue feathers. The explanation I read was that it's the structure of the father that makes it appear blue, and that you could...I remember being blown away when I learned that birds don't have blue feathers. The explanation I read was that it's the structure of the father that makes it appear blue, and that you could observe it by looking at a blue feather through backlight. I tried it on a bluejay feather and sure enough, against backlight it became drab brown.
Sidenote, I'd love to be corrected if that statement about blue birds isn't accurate. I've requested it a few times but don't know if it's actually true.
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Comment on An insight into looksmaxxxing/blackpill "ideology" in ~life
slade Link ParentI wonder what the stats are on app-initiated relationships versus traditional. I might dig into this later out of curiosity.I wonder what the stats are on app-initiated relationships versus traditional. I might dig into this later out of curiosity.
That's something I think about, too. I got caught by this once. Not saying anything rude, but the initial chat sounded very robotty so I curtly asked for a live person, and that were like "...I'm a real person." I felt pretty awful about that.