ThrowdoBaggins's recent activity
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Comment on Ottawa's big bet on world's largest cricket farm ran into a simple problem: the 'yuck factor' in ~food
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Comment on The cognitive dark forest in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI’ve certainly heard of the myth (maybe grounded in truth, but I’ve never thought to check) where a dude gets frustrated by something in software that he uses, frustrated at having his bug reports...I’ve certainly heard of the myth (maybe grounded in truth, but I’ve never thought to check) where a dude gets frustrated by something in software that he uses, frustrated at having his bug reports and/or error tickets ignored, and so eventually gets a job in the company, fixes the bug, and immediately resigns. Your comment here feels like the inverse, where you just send your good idea out into the world in order to have a company absorb it and produce their own version.
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Comment on What’s something you’re putting up with? in ~talk
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI only recent came across these concepts from a video by one of my favourite acoustic science YouTubers! I’m interested, but not sure if Australia has the population density (or RF broadcast...Meshtastic and “stingray”
I only recent came across these concepts from a video by one of my favourite acoustic science YouTubers! I’m interested, but not sure if Australia has the population density (or RF broadcast laws/allowances) for it to work here. But definitely something I could see myself picking up as a hobby, especially since it would mean more practice with low stakes soldering that’s cheaper than getting into the whole world of tiny combat robotics (the other soldering hobby I’ve been considering)
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Comment on Job hunting absolutely sucks right now in ~life
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI imagine that’s possibly part of it but I think causality is the other way around — when companies realised they could patch things on the fly, they stopped caring about building robust systems...I imagine that’s possibly part of it but I think causality is the other way around — when companies realised they could patch things on the fly, they stopped caring about building robust systems and just slapped the “we’ll fix it in post” sticker on everything they touched, because there were suddenly much lower consequences for shipping trash if your complaining customers could just get a hotfix a few weeks later.
I imagine if all these smart devices couldn’t get updates, there would be a lot more people returning “malfunctioning” devices and getting a refund, which would hurt the company’s wallet and incentivise actual change.
Edit: but yes as Tukajo pointed out, even this is a fairly generous interpretation, and probably only a small part of the picture if it’s considered in board rooms at all.
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Comment on That one study that proves developers using AI are deluded in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentGiven that DeepSeek has shown that you can use the outputs of an expensive model to train your own model and achieve enormous gains for a fraction of the cost, I can’t imagine a world where anyone...Given that DeepSeek has shown that you can use the outputs of an expensive model to train your own model and achieve enormous gains for a fraction of the cost, I can’t imagine a world where anyone could increase the cost of their offering and not be immediately undercut. I don’t know what the solution long term will be, but unless companies find a way to prevent that from happening, either they keep burning money to remain “winning” in the arms race, or they stop being able to compete against the other firms who still have cash to keep going.
Regardless, I’m fascinated to see how things will play out. Maybe it will be like the space race of the last century — in order to hit the next milestone, you have to spend unsustainable amounts of money, but there won’t be any long term industry for a few decades until general technology/engineering catches up, and you’re no longer a (pardon the pun) moonshot pushing the very frontier of human ability, and instead just riding a bit ahead of the wave.
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Comment on In noisy surroundings, your techniques to learn to center attention and ignore distraction? in ~life
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentLoops aren’t quite your standard earplugs, they’re explicitly designed with a hole through them to let sound through, and they only l take the edge off particularly intense or distracting noise.Loops aren’t quite your standard earplugs, they’re explicitly designed with a hole through them to let sound through, and they only l take the edge off particularly intense or distracting noise.
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Comment on Norwegian influencer buys failed property development in Spain to build ‘self-sufficient’ eco-community – Modern Eco Village plans to erect 500 homes, schools and shops in ~design
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentOh my gosh, I’ve never come across a benchmark like that, but it definitely puts into perspective how abysmal house prices are in Melbourne Australia.Going by the 1:5 income:house price ratio rule-of-thumb
Oh my gosh, I’ve never come across a benchmark like that, but it definitely puts into perspective how abysmal house prices are in Melbourne Australia.
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Comment on US Pentagon leverages AI in Iran strikes amid feud with Anthropic in ~society
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentWait, are large language models deterministic? I’ve always assumed not, because if I open a new window and copy paste the exact same prompt, the result can be different. Maybe only slightly...Personally, an algorithm is (at least somewhat) deterministic and can be tested and debugged.
AI can do this as well.
Wait, are large language models deterministic? I’ve always assumed not, because if I open a new window and copy paste the exact same prompt, the result can be different. Maybe only slightly different, but even an infinitesimal difference in output from the same input means it’s not a deterministic algorithm underneath.
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Comment on I need to talk to someone with social mobility experience, and I'm out of ideas in ~health.mental
ThrowdoBaggins LinkI’m currently on a similar path to you, and currently I’m in a place where I’ve aggressively reduced my spending and also have a decent paying job, and last year I finally hit the milestone of...I’m currently on a similar path to you, and currently I’m in a place where I’ve aggressively reduced my spending and also have a decent paying job, and last year I finally hit the milestone of more $ going into “life savings” every month than I’m paying rent each month. I figure currency conversion might make numbers misleading, but this ratio is, I feel, a good place to be.
I’ll admit that luck has played a part in my first step. I was able to pivot from a low wage supermarket job into a corporate job, because I took a (possibly irresponsible) leap in 2022 because everyone was talking about how it was totally an employee’s market. Even then, I quit my old job before I had a new one lined up, and ended up living off savings for three months, which is why this could have been a much bigger risk if it didn’t pay off. Even with the skills I’ve developed since then, I don’t think I would be able to pull off the same attempt in 2026, so lucky timing (or “grabbing the opportunity when it presented itself” if I was more of a bootstraps boomer) is a big part of how I took this first step.
However, not long after I made that step, I watched a video by Economics Explained which described how entire national economies develop, and how they transition to what we call “advanced economies”. I can’t remember which video it was, because it’s a concept that repeats in a number of videos as they examine different countries. The general arc seems to be that countries go from natural resource/extraction economies (mining, oil drilling, farming etc) to processing/synthesis economies (smelting, manufacturing, construction etc) to knowledge/service economies (finance, engineering, advanced manufacturing etc).
I’ve been starting to apply this same model to the possible trajectory of my own career, and in broad terms it seems to be applicable. In general, physical jobs like warehouse or factory work tend to be lower paid, and difficult to turn into higher paid jobs. However, within my supermarket job, I was able to move from shelf stacking to more customer service type roles, which didn’t necessarily pay better but had more of a career trajectory into 2IC and management type roles. And from my customer service role, I was able to move into the junior levels of management. I believe the reason I was able to move into the corporate world was because customer service included transferable soft skills. And now that I’m on the bottom rungs of the corporate world, I can see a pathway to specialise and eventually climb up to better paying roles (albeit probably not up to c-suite or executive positions) by picking up experience rather than entirely from retraining and education.
With all this said, I’m not sure if the pathway I’ve identified is something you’d be interested in, having a much lower ceiling that plants me firmly in middle class income levels. But I find it to be a helpful framework to think about things — a poor country with abundant resources cannot switch into a manufacturing or service economy overnight, but it’s certainly a trajectory they can aim for and build towards. For my own life in particular, slow and steady growth with more certainty is much more attractive than explosive but risky growth, but I somewhat get the impression you are approaching this post with more urgency than my ideas would offer.
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Comment on What are some bands you regret not seeing live (or, just never had the chance to see in the first place)? in ~music
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentPretending I’m a time traveller from the future, letting you know that future-you is in another one of these kinds of threads 15 years from now, looking back, and saying “damn I know there were...She's touring this year and actually coming to cities within 4-6 hour near me, but the tickets are super $$$.
Pretending I’m a time traveller from the future, letting you know that future-you is in another one of these kinds of threads 15 years from now, looking back, and saying “damn I know there were challenges but I wish I hadn’t missed this one”
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Comment on What would you do with a video game style inventory? in ~talk
ThrowdoBaggins LinkSome assumptions for my use of powers here: I only need to be capable of lifting something above my head to be able to store it, I don’t actually need to lift it above my head for the action. the...Some assumptions for my use of powers here:
- I only need to be capable of lifting something above my head to be able to store it, I don’t actually need to lift it above my head for the action.
- the object does not need to be a willing participant.
Step 1, I start going to the gym and get hella swole
Step 2, I use my powers to make enough money to start travelling the world on a whim
Step 3, kidnapping billionaires by handshake
I’ll leave it up to the reader to decide what happens to the contents of my inventory when I eventually die of old age, but they’re probably not being released voluntarily by me
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Comment on What are you working through? in ~life
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentIn a small way, I can relate to this bit. My partner and I have been together for long enough that people are usually surprised to learn that we’re not actually married. We’ve talked about it...as if we arent basically married with all the "sickness and in health" that entails
In a small way, I can relate to this bit. My partner and I have been together for long enough that people are usually surprised to learn that we’re not actually married. We’ve talked about it plenty of times, and I make sure to actively bring it up every few years to make sure we’re still on the same page (it can be so easy to just assume the status quo remains, without actually checking in on it) but we’re both in agreement that it’s not something in the cards.
In the past year, some financial complications with siblings has meant a review of my parents wills and medical power of attorney if required. It’s got me thinking about maybe working on those marriage-adjacent legal things that you usually get (eg if either of us are hospitalised, my partner or I might have trouble with visitation rights etc) even if we’re not wanting proper actual marriage at this stage.
I know it’s not the same, your situation is more challenging with just straight up losing access to necessary supports, but reasons aside that vibe of “excuse you I am very committed to this relationship and you don’t get to push me away if things get difficult” is something I can relate to.
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Comment on Palantir was allegedly hacked, exposing CIA collusion and deep-rooted global surveillance/meddling in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins LinkSo... they downloaded a copy of the Epstein files...? /noiseaccumulated the biggest archive of blackmail material
So... they downloaded a copy of the Epstein files...?
/noise
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Comment on The mega-rich are turning their mansions into impenetrable fortresses in ~finance
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentThe same issue I have with lots of these kinds of theories is that if “their” intention was to keep this a secret from “the rest of us” then they’ve done a bad enough job that this one dude is...The same issue I have with lots of these kinds of theories is that if “their” intention was to keep this a secret from “the rest of us” then they’ve done a bad enough job that this one dude is literally making a living from spreading it around.
There’s quite a lot wrong with the numbers and timelines you’ve painted here, but I suppose the core of every good conspiracy theory (if that’s what we call this) is a handful of technically-correct or verifiable details which paint the overall picture as more realistic than it actually is.
Firstly we know that the magnetic poles flip every ~100,000 years and that we’re probably overdue another one by now, but we also know that it’s not some huge release of energy that moves continents around. But this magnetic pole reversal is the kind of thing that takes a long time to happen, which means we will have plenty of heads up that it’s starting to happen well before it’s actually causing issues. Even if it’s a blip on geological timescales, that can still mean decades or centuries.
Second, you mentioned that the solar system drifts in and out of a major dust ring on a cycle that repeats every 12,000 years, and the implication of “that’s why governments are acting the way they do” implies that we’re due for another event “fairly soon”. For example, if the harmful part of the cycle was still 2,000 years away, there would be no need to be taking action today. We can’t even imagine the level of technology we’ll have in 500 years into the future so no point preparing today if it’s a while away. But this premise is immediately counteracted by your suggestion that biblical or historical record confirms this cycle — the bible is about 2,000 years old at best, and our oldest writing is from a bit over 5,000 years ago, well short of the 12,000 year cycle you’re talking about. Even at the most generous interpretation, where the 12,000 year cycle includes passing through the plane of the galaxy twice per cycle, and we’re due for another within a few years, that’s still 6,000 years since the last one, and we don’t have written record that far back.
We do have spoken record dating back much further - Aboriginal Australians have oral traditions passed down over generations which include Dreamtime narratives which relate to natural events that occurred around 37,000 years ago. If these people have passed down localised geological events and accurate star maps over that timescale, they would have experienced this 12,000 year cycle cataclysmic debris event 3-6 times by now, and their star maps would not be accurate if the land they lived on had been rapidly rotated on lava flows.
Thirdly, people are people, and I have a hard time believing politics of 50 years ago is so dramatically different from politics today — specifically with regards to the moon missions, it’s much easier for me to believe the space race was a dick-swinging competition between USA and USSR than it is to believe that collecting rocks from the moon to verify some theory in secret without telling the rest of the scientific community was the point of billions and billions of dollars pushing the very limits of engineering to get people safely into space and back again. I feel like scientists are much more well known for sharing their discoveries with the international scientific community, with little regard for international politics or secret keeping.
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentOkay excellent, glad to hear there’s enough similarity in features for the ability to whip up an isolated group of channels etc. I’m no network wizard but the concept of a “server” these days —...That way you can send a single invite code to your friends for the space, and it should allow your friends to join every room in the space, and have them grouped neatly together. You should be able to adjust power / permissions levels from there
Okay excellent, glad to hear there’s enough similarity in features for the ability to whip up an isolated group of channels etc.
And yes, Discord calling random groups a "server" has grated on me for years
I’m no network wizard but the concept of a “server” these days — for every service that uses the word! — seems so far removed from what a server actually is, especially with all these cloud services and mirrored local/nearby versions for lower latency. (is this called “edge hosting” or something like that?)
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI recently looked into TeamSpeak and oh my gosh they’ve come such a long way! TS6 even looks like it’s 90% of the way to being feature matched for Discord, or at least considering the features...I recently looked into TeamSpeak and oh my gosh they’ve come such a long way! TS6 even looks like it’s 90% of the way to being feature matched for Discord, or at least considering the features that I personally care about. It’s probably the one that I’m going to try to push for among my friends, if there’s ever a preference for leaving discord
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentYou mentioned hosting, which unfortunately might be a dealbreaker. I think I might be the most technically competent person of my friends groups, but self hosting or home server stuff is currently...You mentioned hosting, which unfortunately might be a dealbreaker. I think I might be the most technically competent person of my friends groups, but self hosting or home server stuff is currently beyond my ability, and will likely be beyond my available time and energy to learn for the foreseeable future.
When you say “join another server” could my friends and I create our own small instance within someone else’s server, preferably private and invite-only with my friends? Or would it just be finding a space within a larger combined server where anyone can drop in or drop out? I know different services use different language to mean different things, so I’m trying to understand this Matrix platform and how much or how little it can translate from my existing experiences with Discord.
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI just wanted to reinforce your point and weigh in on this one. I’m in Australia and I guess my Discord account got flagged as “potentially not an adult” because I was asked to verify my age a few...Privacy-protecting process. Discord and k-ID do not permanently store personal identity documents or users’ video selfies. Images of a user's identity documents and ID match selfies are deleted directly after their age group is confirmed, and the video selfie used for facial age estimation never leaves their device.
I just wanted to reinforce your point and weigh in on this one. I’m in Australia and I guess my Discord account got flagged as “potentially not an adult” because I was asked to verify my age a few months ago.
I’ve already had my ID picked up in Optus’ horrendous data breach a few years back, so I’m careful about not giving my ID to companies, even ones I should ostensibly be able to trust, via any digital means. If any phone company needs my ID ever again, I’m happy to physically walk into a store and have it verified manually, but I’m not comfortable with it being digitally stored given how clearly that leads to breaches.
So when Discord popped up offering these two options — give them my ID or try the AI video-selfie feature — I decided to test out the claims of “no video leaves your device” and “on-device processing”. To do this, I used my phone, and navigated through the prompts until it asked for camera access. Turned on airplane mode and accepted — oops something went wrong. Followed the prompts multiple times, turning on airplane mode at various different stages, including waiting until the next page had loaded, but ultimately there was no point at which I could cut the internet connection and still have the system verify me.
This tells me with confidence that a live internet connection is required for the age recognition feature, which means the claim of “on-device processing” is dubious at best, but likely an outright lie. It also means it’s impossible for anyone to verify the claim that the video selfie “doesn’t leave the device”.
It’s so disappointing because I genuinely don’t think it would be particularly difficult to design a system which did the same thing without having data leave your device, but they’re not even bothering to pretend that’s what happens.
Edited my second paragraph to be a bit less needlessly combative.
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Comment on Voyager Technologies CEO says space data center cooling problem still needs to be solved in ~space
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentIn that case I think you might have made the situation even more complicated, because the combo foundry + data centre has a place to put the hot and a place to put the cold, so the problem is only...In that case I think you might have made the situation even more complicated, because the combo foundry + data centre has a place to put the hot and a place to put the cold, so the problem is only how to effectively move heat around where you need it as you need it.
But having them isolated, with stored heat bricks to be shipped off to the other facility, means you’re already working with the challenge of moving heat around, but with the added complexity of trying to capture industrial levels of heat in a relatively small object that somehow doesn’t melt the pods/shuttle that ferries back and forth between the facilities, and also now your heat needs to be quantised into “how much useful heat (or cold) can this brick hold without being damaged” rather than just moving heat around continuously.
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Comment on Voyager Technologies CEO says space data center cooling problem still needs to be solved in ~space
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI think the problem with this idea is that waste heat is usually not hot enough for industrial applications. And because the system will always try to move towards equilibrium, if you have enough...Smelting? Welding? Refining? This is the topic I have done the least research into. We use heat to do these things on earth. If we mine other planets and/or asteroids it may make more sense for a lot of the refining and manufacturing of those raw materials to happen in space before moving back into the atmosphere. Especially if waste heat is a cheap and plentiful source of energy.
I think the problem with this idea is that waste heat is usually not hot enough for industrial applications. And because the system will always try to move towards equilibrium, if you have enough heat for industrial applications, eventually your whole satellite/space base will be that temperature, and any electronics will have failed long before you get there. The system is always trying to average the temperature across the whole satellite.
There’s an interesting XKCD What-If? about a hairdryer sealed in a box, and what to expect, which touches on equilibrium of energy input and external temperature assuming it’s in an atmosphere which is convecting away the heat. But it also looks at the simplified relationship between energy input and heat, because all the energy you pump into the system has to go somewhere. So if it’s not radiated away, then it’s sticking around.
With things like heat pumps, you can move it around a bit, so you can make one room hotter while you make the other room colder. Theoretically (but I don’t think we have the current technology to achieve) you can get to the kinds of extremes where you have some parts of your satellite cool enough to run a data centre, and the other end hot enough to run a foundry. But you have to constantly be adding energy into the system just to run these heat pumps, because thermodynamics is always trying to bring the whole satellite towards the average temperature. And heat pumps that we have in houses will dramatically lose efficiency when trying to operate outside the narrow ideal band of temperatures they’re designed for, so you would definitely need to be using different technology to enable foundry-to-cool room levels of heat pump effectiveness.
Resilience from diversity in the food we eat is always a good idea, especially with the accelerating rates of climate change, because you never know when a disaster will knock down one of the pillars you’re relying on. Taken to an extreme example, championing a reduction in variety leads to effectively monoculture. I don’t think I have deep enough understanding to explain why food monocultures are bad but I’m hoping this isn’t something I need to win you over on.
To your specific example of beans, I know enough people who have legume intolerances who would have a really rough time if they tried to switch to beans for their protein intake. I’m not going to suggest it would be impossible, but certainly would be a challenge.