RickJWagner

Meanwhile, other threads are blasting data centers for their energy consumption. At least that use seems like it should be somewhat efficient.

Bot armies ( trained to be inefficient to avoid detection ) streaming music over the wire en masse seems pretty wasteful. I wonder how many others are doing it?

Some things are just wrong, no decent person would do them.

Abuse the elderly. Pull fire alarms for fun. Kick animals.

Swatting is one of these.

I volunteer at a pregnancy center, counseling young men with pregnant girlfriends.

Probably the most common trait among confused young men is the lack of a solid example growing up. Most of the boys were either abandoned by their father as a young boy or never saw him while he was in prison. The results are devastating.

“The models are becoming a lot more capable,” Mr. Olah told me…

I greatly enjoy and respect the ideas espoused by Morgan Housel. In his latest podcast, he describes his impressions of a recent investor information meeting. Morgan said the improvements made in LLMs in just the last 90 days have been astounding, and that there is no indication things are slowing down.

Having followed Housel for a while, I believe him.

I’m sorry to read this and read the threads. I hope it somehow gets better.

In my 15 years at Red Hat, peak time were the Jim Whitehurst years. RHEL was huge, Middleware made relevant products, and OpenShift was born. People loved Red Hat— there was a couple married at Summit, and Shadowman tattoos were not uncommon.

It was a great time at a great company. After Jim, it wasn’t the same.

Even beyond the buyout.

IBM stock was around $120 for a while, then doubled and went as high as 300. It’s now settled in the low 200s.

Holding Red Hat through IBM was really nice.

Commenting only on the writing, congratulations to the writer. Descriptive, well worded, English better than most native language users. Impressive.

For those interested in the political leanings of Politico and Newsguard:

https://www.allsides.com/news-source/politico-media-bias

https://www.commerce.senate.gov/press/rep/release/sen-cruz-s...

Caveat lector.

That is interesting. I’d like to see stats on the ages of the papers authors. I’ll be amazed if they are on the younger side of the scale.

I asked how to redeem an Ibond.

It gave back a good answer. Looks like a good thing to me. ( To those with a political axe to grind, please apply your criticisms to government sires put in place by your side. I think we’ll find no website is perfect, and many government web pages are indeed useful. )

In grade school we sang a song “picking up pawpaws, put them in a basket…”

Now I know what they would have tasted like.

Per Reddit itself and Google, astroturfing is especially bad in political subreddits. Attempting to shape public perception is a big business.

Weinstein is doubly bad. At the same time he was raping starlets and blacklisting victims, he cultivated a ‘woman friendly’ public image, famously bankrolling Hillary Clinton’s campaign and acting as an industry mentor to Obamas daughter.

I’ve got a Corolla hybrid. Fantastic car— great basic utility, reasonable comfort, zero sporting pretension and an honest high 50s mpg.

If you consider one, be sure to get blind spot detection in the mirrors. I didn’t, it is the worst car I’ve ever had for blind spots.

For those serious about retirement preparation, I heartily recommend the Bogleheads community. They offer free, simple, proven ideas that can be life changers.

Source: personal experience. Retired a bit early 2 years ago, much credit to Bogleheads.

I retired at 59 about 2 years ago. My career was coding and product development, I put together some ideas about what I’d code after I left the workplace.

To my surprise, I haven’t missed it at all. Playing music, reading for pleasure and language studies ( to help with a part time volunteer gig ) have totally met my needs. You never know.

A few years back a great doctor working at a local children’s hospital took his own life. News said he’d become despondent over children dying when he couldn’t save them. The whole thing is heartbreaking.

About seemingly nice cats… Anyone remember Pinky the cat?

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/in1ANEEba2s

In the long run, inflation is probably the most potent tool in the government toolbox for managing the debt. Raised interest rates are the brakes on that tool.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see above average inflation sporadically jumping up for a while.

The whole point of inflation is to reduce demand? Please further explain, including your ideas about causes and effects.

Yes. It is a tax. He raised a tax.

You might argue it is inflationary.

Arbitrarily decided by the person with political convictions blinding them.

Yes, it happens to both sides. People convince themselves their side always makes right decisions, the other side always wrong.

The truth is that the secret sauce is in the pendulum going back and forth. The excesses of one side are soon erased by the other. It is working, as it has for many years.

Almost a good reply, but Baldwin tried saying he did not pull the trigger. ( Nobody believed him. )

A visit to Disney World introduces some questions that bring doubts to this article. The park is overrun with young families, with a great many speaking English as a second language. They don’t seem to be top percenters, but they’ve got cash for tickets and food. ( The food seems to be priced about 5x what I’d imagine it to be at a real store. )

If they truly are poor, they’re surely living YOLO.

I used to use the two car method. I was single and carefree, so I had a Corvette and a hot rod El Camino. Perfect for a young shade tree mechanic.

Then I was taking a long trip in the El Camino and overheated, cracking the heads. While the machine shop work was underway, one of the half-shafts driving the Corvette broke loose, severely beating the underside of the car.

It was bitterly cold January, and I was left going to work on a bicycle.

I sold both classics and bought a new Saturn. Much less style, but much more reliability.

If coding is ever solved, and if software does it, sloppiness probably won’t matter much.

Code will become throwaway stuff, like the results of AI prompts. Cook it up, test it for adequacy, and run it. When something comes along that adds new requirements, just update the requirements/prompt and make a new one.

Test suites will be important.

I might be a potential user. I find myself being polite in AI prompts sometimes.

I guess it can’t hurt, just more practice at polite interactions. ( The prompt phrasing, not the language. )

No, of course not. Illegal deisenfranchisement is a horrible thing.

But we must be sane, please. After all the hysteria about Georgias election integrity measures, a Democrat ( Warnock ) won the senate seat. Federal courts ( under the Biden administration ) discredited criticisms, and 99% of Georgians reported having no trouble voting.

Stop being hysterical.

Here, read about it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Election_Integrity_Act_of_2021

Wow, that is cool.

I’m curious about Steve’s banjo. He usually ( but not always ) plays in Scruggs style, which should result in wear on the head down by where the pinky is anchored. But this banjo shows wear up above the strings, where a clawhammer player usually shows wear.

Either this is one of Steve’s clawhammer practice banjos or the wear is from a previous owner, I’d guess.

After the Georgia ‘disenfranchisement’ Democrats won, proving all the hysteria is just hogwash.

Americans of all kinds ( including minorities ) want voter ID and election security. Stop repeating DNC talking points.