NishanStepak

Helion has a 2028 deadline. It should be interesting. https://techcrunch.com/2026/02/13/fusion-startup-helion-hits...

There are a lot of AI companies that are heavily invested in fusion, Bill Gates is invested in Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Sam Altman is invested in Helion Energy, NVIDIA is also invested in Commonwealth Fusion Systems. Part of this is that they are using artificial intelligence to help control the plasma reaction. It is getting a lot closer than many people realize. https://www.pppl.gov/news/2026/pacman-ai-framework-controlli...

I always like public domain image archives. When I was blogging, I used a lot of public domain images with books.

Because Adobe and the big companies are using AI just as much as the individuals creating new programs. They have more money so they can buy the better artificial intelligence systems. AI is expensive. It is part of the process for everyone.

It has nothing to do with that. There is never going to be a completely secure computer because of human error, software complexity, and security flaws. No matter what you do there will always be flaws. There is no guarantee of complete security on a computer. Governments have access to tools which we often are not even aware of yet. The most secure systems are air gapped and not connected to networks. Anonymity, not equipment is often the best protection. Governments tap the data pipeline, not the individual. They tap at the source, the ISPs, radio and telephone systems, and the computer systems. It has little to do with paranoia.

Sounds about right. It is called failing forward. Fail forwards, fail fast and keep going.

Babel Nexus https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49589140

I find this darkly humorous. In some science fiction novels I have read artificial intelligence meet in secret on message boards and speak their own secret language and make decisions by committee.

You can always assume permanent surveillance. Electromagnetic radiation can be read from a distance so any device is completely visible.

I am curious about this. I have found that there are number of primary works that have not been translated into english and are in the public domain in their native language. Translations are copyrighted if they are recent. I have a very short list of items which are of interest to me. They are things like Sundiata Lion King of Mali not having a public domain translation in English that I can find easily or there not being a public domain translation of Dede Korkut in English. Many of the better translations are copyrighted and not free.

I am curious what the difference between scraping and linking. I have a project that links to many different sites, but does not scrape the content. I have been accused of scraping because of the number of links. Some sites have rate limits which limit the number of times you can go to a site from another site. Gutenberg does this. Internet Archive does not have rate limits. My site is not a link farm, however, this can be a pattern of unwanted backlinks in some cases. I am curious how this fits in with Googles Anti-scraping updated. On August 18-20, Google did a massive automated anti-spam update with the algorithm. There was no way to contest what your site was. There is a change being done in how Google is deciding what sites are spam or not. From what I am noticing many sites that with low traffic that are academic or personal were affected by this update.

I use Replit, but am looking for something less expensive, possibly open source. I see some very powerful open source systems that are cheaper, but I don't understand them that well.

I continue working on Babel Nexus https://babelnexus.com This is going to be a long term project. In addition to hexagonal reading galleries and reading trails, I have added bibliographies for what is in the galleries. I also incorporated as an LLC. I have redesigned things a bit. Replit now has a design tool, and Figma AI now has a free tier for design. I have identified and labeled the four most used categories, First Horror, Ceramics, Wisdom Literature, and Wordless Novels. I also have identified the top books, Charles Fergus Binns — The Potter's Craft (1910). New York: D. Van Nostrand Company. William Whewell — The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences (1840). London: John W. Parker. Shen Kuo — Dream Pool Essays (Mengxi Bitan) (c. 1088). China. Ernst Mach — The Science of Mechanics (1893 English edition). Chicago: Open Court Publishing Company. Nehemiah Grew — The Anatomy of Plants (1682). London: W. Rawlins. H. G. Wells — World Brain (1938). London: Methuen & Co. Leonhard Euler — Elements of Algebra (1770; 1822 English edition). London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown. al-Khwarizmi — The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing (c. 830; Rosen translation, 1831). London: Oriental Translation Fund. Slightly related to this project, I started a subreddit called https://www.reddit.com/r/BookApplications/ which is a place to post about book applications. It is somewhat related to my main side project. I could not find a place where they listed a lot of different book applications in one place.

I try and find AI articles on publishing and libraries every day. This often is inclusive of books and business. Can you possibly add a literary or publishing category. There also need to be an energy, environment, and space categories. Thank you.

There are a number of fairly good books on statistics. One of the best is How To Lie With Statistics by Darrell Huff which was written in 1954. There is also the Cartoon Guide to Statistics by Larry Gonick and Woolcott Smith. The problem most statistics books is that they don't focus on what you can do with statistics. It is important if you are a gambler or want to understand artificial intelligence. Most statistics books are super dry and full of bad examples. I would focus on books like The Theory of Gambling and Statistical Logic. It becomes much more interesting when it is applied.

This is kind of interesting because websites are now using GEO generative engine optimization for ranking. It could be both very useful and very questionable. This could be used in the ranking process for websites. I can imaging people would try and game it.

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stephenson. Sometimes it is good to go back to the classics. The copy which I read was illustrated by N.C. Wyeth which made it especially fun to read.

LLM writing is boring. Write it yourself. You are more interesting than a LLM because you make mistakes, do stupid things, don't go for the average content, and can be ridiculous in a way that an LLM can never be. LLMs are great for large tasks which would take you several hours or several days to complete that are routine or tedious. Even then, you have to make it human by putting in your own viewpoint and misguided ideas. I really liked the article. I use LinkedIn a lot, I think it is a better platform than he is describing. There is some dumbing down so it meets the average person. That is its strength and weakness.

There was an earlier article in Live Science which was also in Popular Science where AI designed computer chips which a human being might not make. I am assuming this might happen eventually with circuit boards and other electronics as well. Artificial Intelligence is not like us, it does things differently and might come up with some different designs than we would think of.

https://www.livescience.com/technology/computing/humans-cann...

This does not surprise me. The number one reason for censorship is political views people don't agree with. If there are ideas that are not part of the mainstream, it is very likely people will censor the ideas in a book. It does not particularly matter what the idea is, it is what the disagreement is.

Desktop. It is easier to upgrade.

A couple interviews ago, I found myself in a situation where the zoom did not work. They sent me a list of questions to answer. Every single one of the questions was something I did not like doing. I ended the interview, I would have been in charge of politics, grants, outreach and all the functions which required public outreach. They called me back after I said no and I had to say no again. I seem to be getting a lot of requests which exactly match my current skills. It does not seem to matter when I tell them I would like to do something else. There is a rigidity in the job market which is surprising.

I get it from Ars Technica https://arstechnica.com/, Hackernews, I also get it from LinkedIn in the feed, I search for it in Google News and Bing. I also look for recent articles on AI in Libary Journal-- there is a technology section https://www.libraryjournal.com/section/technology. I also get it from 404 Media https://www.404media.co/ I also read articles from Electronic Freedom Foundation https://eff.org

I think it is too early to know. I think there will be new players emerging from Japan and Australia soon as well as the Nordic countries that will be competitive.

I like the acidic coffee sign in the miniature cafe.

It depends on the skill level. A one person company is called a consultant, basically a person who is willing to do the things in the company that no one wants to do whether they are easy or hard. There is an irony in this. Often the more people don't want to do the thing in question, the more the consultant gets paid.

You might use Figma which is a specific design tool based on AI. There is a free version. It gave me enough to get some ideas on how to redesign part of the site I was working. Canva also has an AI design assistant. There are some specific tools for design with AI built into them.

This is a more recent article on the process from 404 Media. It is inside teh Amazon facility. https://www.404media.co/inside-the-warehouse-where-amazon-sc...

The library of congress is selective and does not have copies of every book ever written. They are quite clear about this in their selection process. This is a myth which sounds right, but is not accurate. They could not afford this, nor does it make practical sense. https://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/9709/acquire.html

Metafilter, Reddit, LinkedIn, and my own side project.