Spent the week exploring RSS feeds and the OpenAI embeddings API, in conjunction with pgvector on Postgres, to explore preferences and soft "more like this/less like that" information feeds.
And I think this could be an interesting adjust to our product...
Holy shit. Yeah. The Life With Althaar podcast has gone from cute to all the feels to damn this is amazing. Per suggestion from one of the creators I'm going to hold at ep30 until they start producing again, but... Highly recommended.
https://www.flutterby.com/archives/comments/33774.html
Friend asked me to install a transducer pickup in their acoustic guitar. Step 1 is build a 9v battery holder, and this piece of pull saw blade is super brittle, so hope that I can anneal it with a propane torch...
Daaang. Life with Althaar took an episode or 3 to land with me as sitcom, and I've been enjoying it, but ep 18 is a real kick in the feels as well.
https://www.geminicollisionworks.com/life-with-althaar
Trying to get the raw vector values out of a JavaScript query of a pgvector database, same query in the command line Postgres shows me everything, but in JS it's giving me a single null value.
Because work has been ChatGPT heavy, I asked it, and, let the record show, it has not been helpful.
I am calling a square dance in June, and I have been asked to provide interstitial music. Which means blocks of 4-5 minutes of music that should contrast with the 4/4 126BPM music I'll be using for the dance, but should still keep the energy up and keep the floor excited. And can have lyrics.
What are your favorite absolute bangers? Any genre or instrumentation.
Today in "sci fi held are supposed to be smarter than this, maybe the genre really is over?", World Con chair admits to using ChatGPT rather than search for info on panelists.
https://seattlein2025.org/2025/04/30/statement-from-worldcon-chair-2/
https://pivot-to-ai.com/2025/05/01/seattle-worldcon-science-fiction-convention-vets-panelists-with-chatgpt/
It's kinda terrifying that ya say something like "genocide is bad" and the trolls come out of the woodwork replying with "Israel is justified."
I assume that this is largely Russian psy-ops, but damn the world is weird.
C++ coders: The way that LLVM exploits undefined behavior may be a little extreme.
Vibe coders: What if, and hear me out, we didn't even expect the same behavior from the same inputs?
I'm having trouble reading things like this as anything other than a desire for more undefined behavior in programming languages.
https://mashable.com/article/llamacon-mark-zuckerberg-ai-writes-meta-code
If 30% of code at Microsoft is being written in a language that doesn't reliably compile to the same output, doesn't have a formal spec or grammar, and only has indirect error checking, what does that say about the languages specific to programming that we've been using?
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/29/satya-nadella-says-as-much-as-30percent-of-microsoft-code-is-written-by-ai.html
Reading Dennis Yi Tenen's "Literary Theory for Robots", talking about Athanasius Kircher's Mathematical Organ, and it's a good reminder to not dismiss shiny tech just because it is, but also to not let the well created wrapper convince us that there's more intelligence there than actually is.
Tried to write "order of magnitude", auto-corrupt suggested "order of manure". In the context (answers from LLMs on browser share vs ClouldFlare data), I'm not sure it was wrong.
Being excited about "AI" in 2025 is like watching someone pull a rabbit from a collapsible top hat and envisioning feeding humanity with endless hasenpfeffer.
Sometimes it seems like we're putting more effort into figuring out how to get the best output from LLMs than we are into figuring out how to get the best output from humans.
North Bay Python, enjoying @glyph@mastodon.social's comparison of Python to excavators, and making Python smaller and simplar, and running over a good half of the reason why I've felt like every time I started a project in Python I've regretted not using C++ (the other half involves compile-time type checking).
#NBPy
I mean, on the one hand, yes, brandishing firearms bad, on the other hand, I'd be hard-pressed to vote for a conviction:
"... to investigate a report of a man brandishing a firearm towards a door-to-door salesperson. The initial reporting party told the communications center that a homeowner was in possession of a firearm and was actively chasing the salesperson."
I get it.
https://local.nixle.com/alert/11550977/
Look, I try to shop local, I try to support the people doing business in my city, but if you list yourself on https://www.publicsquare.com/ I'm gonna make an effort to avoid doing business with you. No matter how convenient your establishment is.
If the prosecutors blow the Luigi Mangione case because of misconduct like eavesdropping on attorney calls, I will laugh and laugh and laugh...
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/luigi-mangione-pleads-not-guilty-federal-murder-stalking-charges-rcna202974
North Bay Python: Maddy Muscari talking about ethics washing in AI, "real ethics is praxis, it's loud, it's messy, it's people first". So far this feels in-line with my belief that we need to be framing AI primarily in adversarial terms. #NBPy
North Bay Python: Watching @amethyst@n7.gg shoehorn Perl idioms into Python with decorators is making me wish we had more fun languages that thought better about performance while balancing what with safety. #NBPy
At North Bay Python listening to @skinnylatte@hachyderm.io talk about Fintech to fin tech, and the comparison of the current Silicon Valley environment to the the sardine over-fishing of the Monterey Bay gives me hope. #NBPy
Ended up driving the 3 miles to North Bay Python this morning because of logistics, but wasn't sure where to park so walking over the hill, and glad to get the morning with lupine. #NBPy
Thinking about, back in the 1900s at a tech gathering in Marin, asking a school board member who was talking passionately about bringing technology into the classroom about the curriculum need that was driving his fervor.
Aside from typing, I'd bet every skill that was taught in those labs is now obsolete. Every piece of software now completely different.
This is a post about "AI" in schools.
"I did not get this diagnosis because I want disability money or a therapy animal or a special star beside my name. Instead it has given me an opportunity to reexamine my life and my perception of myself."
https://researchbuzz.me/2025/04/21/researchbuzz-27th-anniversary-and-my-ability-to-use-the-toilet-unassisted/
I was going to post yet another "Google's AI overview doing wacky bullshit", but then I saw this claim that "AI Overviews ... now has 1.5 billion users per month".
And, like, yes, it's all of us looking at how stupid it is, but let's stop giving this idiocy oxygen.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/24/alphabet-googl-q1-earnings-report-2025.html
We'll know we've achieved AI when the conversation includes "I'm sorry ..., I can't do that".
Can you imagine ChatGPT or Gemini telling you "I'm sorry Dave, I can't do that" rather than just spewing bullshit that sounds remotely plausible? Not happening.
The Redwood Rainbows had a tie dye party this weekend that we couldn't attend, but they had a bunch of dye left over, so we figured we'd use it up before it went totally bad. Then it soda ash didn't fully dissolve, so... We'll see what we got tomorrow.
Ya say "wardriving" to kids these days, and they have *no idea* what you're talking about...
It's like they weren't even alive in the days when Linksys was the wireless provider of choice.
Discussion is happening about upgrading the KBYG Zoom forum experience. I haven't had luck with getting Camo to feed my phone camera into Zoom. Suggestions (including hardware processes) for upgrade paths for real-time broadcast of in-person events.
I'm capturing handheld mics through the sound system via a Behringer U-PHORIA UMC202HD, so I think this is about better video (camera recommendations? multi-camera?), and how to manage it.
Fun day with the quadricycle at the Petaluma Butter and Egg Days parade, in it with the Safe Streets Coalition folks, and then hanging out with Sean and friends at LivXplore.
Private chat with friends who work in public health talking about Trump initiatives in the FDA and CDC, and how there's lots of indication that nobody in the current administration understands how things already happen there.
And I'm seeing lots of parallels between that and the Nextdoor mobs.
Seeing a tour early bird special with "those who've already booked have had their balance adjusted", and now I'm wondering how many of those folks are stumbling!
On remapping Ctrl-c : "I can't imagine a reason that I would ever do this though".
That's because Julia is a *good person* who would never mess with, say, their coworkers who left a terminal unsecured. Or something. Hypothetically.
https://social.jvns.ca/@b0rk/114354706858380448
Making a tool to hold the pickup for gluing into this Harmony 4 string.
Well poop, of it is gonna bend it needs to get hotter than that, or I need to heat it while I bend it. Maybe I need to approach this differently.
Friend asked me to install a transducer pickup in their acoustic guitar. Step 1 is build a 9v battery holder, and this piece of pull saw blade is super brittle, so hope that I can anneal it with a propane torch...
So, uh, what about other woodwinds?
At the Cool Petaluma Future Fest and there is one electric vehicle that is really turning heads.
At Luccheso Park for the Cool Petaluma Future Fest, and the geese with their little ones are giving us the serious side-eye.
My neighborhood is like a third of the way to "The Italian Job"
"Glandweed", huh? Pretty among the lupines, though, along the road over the hill at Ries Ranch, where North Bay Python is held. #NBPy
Ended up driving the 3 miles to North Bay Python this morning because of logistics, but wasn't sure where to park so walking over the hill, and glad to get the morning with lupine. #NBPy
The Redwood Rainbows had a tie dye party this weekend that we couldn't attend, but they had a bunch of dye left over, so we figured we'd use it up before it went totally bad. Then it soda ash didn't fully dissolve, so... We'll see what we got tomorrow.
Fun day with the quadricycle at the Petaluma Butter and Egg Days parade, in it with the Safe Streets Coalition folks, and then hanging out with Sean and friends at LivXplore.
Docks are filling up for the parade tomorrow...