Year: 2024
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And while we're talking about AI.
It took a disproportionate about of time to find the right (tiny) link, but eventually I managed to opt-out of my content being used to train Facebook's AI. They don't make it easy, do they?
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Screenshot of a Facebook message, including the text "we will honour your objection... we won't use your public information from Facebook... for future development and improvement of generative AI models"
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Google turns to nuclear to power AI data centres
As Google invest in next-generation nuclear generation to provide electricity to their energy-hungry AI datacentres, so they can keep providing shit answers to everyday questions, I'm optimistic that maybe after the LLM fad fizzles out we'll be left with new power technologies that can benefit all of humankind.
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You know that you REALLY needed that coffee when you:
1. get out a mug,
2. turn on the coffee machine,
3. load the dishwasher while you wait for the coffee machine to warm up,
4. can't find your mug any more, oh shit it's in the dishwasher 🤦
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A red mug being filled by a coffee machine.
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eBay UK have changed their terms to (a) remove seller fees for most private sellers, but (b) instead of paying-out immediately, payouts are four times a year (or on-demand).
That sounds like they're trying to keep money in their ecosystem. The hope is, I guess, that by paying sellers in virtual "eBay Pounds" rather than actual money in the first instance they'll encourage those sellers to become buyers again (either of other listings, or of eBay's postage and other services). You can cash out anytime you like, but you can never leave.
You see the same technique used e.g. by the National Lottery, who pay out "small" winnings into your online account, knowing that the vast majority of winnings are on the order of only a few times more than the value of a ticket, and so players will be more-likely to "re-invest" if they're not paid-out directly.
Or maybe I'm just being cynical.
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This evening I pushed against my illness-addled brain to try to sit in on the fortnightly Zoom call with the Three Rings dev team. Unfortunately it seems like the primary symptom of my cold is an inability to string words together.
At one point, I apologised to by colleague "Beff" (I meant "Bev", but I had just been talking about "Geoff") that I couldn't work out how to stop "scaring my screen" (well, I suppose Halloween is coming up...). Then, realising my mistake, explained that it was a bit of a "ting-twister".
I should just go to bed, right?
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Firsts and Lasts
I was listening to the bats flying silently above me while I watched the Perseids, the other month. When was the last time I was actually capable of hearing their echolocation? I simply can't remember, because it didn't feel significant at the time.
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London Transport 25
Girl on the Net diverts from her usual sex blogging to write about taking a date on a 25-forms-of-transport tour of London, and it's delightful.
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Playing simultaneous games against both children might have been less challenging if they hadn't both kept trying to start fights with one another at the same time! 😂
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Two frustrated-looking children each sit in front of a separate chessboard (the photographer is presumably playing both of them).
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Calm after the storm
Rosie, who like me never even considered taking Automattic's alignment offer, writes about her experience of this week's meetup.
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I'm back home from Mexico (and feeling a little worse for wear), where this young lady wanted to let me know that I was sorely missed.
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Dan, lying on a sofa under a brown blanket, on top of which is a contented-looking French Bulldog.
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Meetup Magic
As I come to the end of a week in Mexico with ~400 of my the smartest, friendliest, open-source-loving geeks I could wish to know, I come to realise that Automattic's meetups are just... magical.
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Goodbye, Tulum! You were delightful, if very hot. It's time for me to head back to the UK.
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Dan, wearing a rainbow bandana, with an ornate ice cream cornet in a Mexican city.
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EXIF geodata, and what if you took a picture on the moon?
Cassie Jones asks what EXIF photo metadata would - or should - look like for a photograph taken on the moon. It got me thinking, a bit.
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Hurricane Milton
From safely outside of its predicted path, just around the Yucatan coast, Hurricane Milton seems like a forboding and distant monster. A growing threat whose path will thankfully take it away, not towards, me. My heart goes out to the people on the other side of the Gulf of Mexico who find themselves along the route of this awakened beast.
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It's a bit hard to perform close-up magic to an audience 40 metres deep, so I pre-recorded my favourite card trick! Then I talked over it, explaining to colleagues from my division why it's my favourite bit of slight-of-hand, and what great magic tricks have in common with great code.
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Dan, standing on a stage, holding up five fingers while a video screen behind him shows a close-up of his hands displaying five playing cards.
I feel like I'm likely to have to perform a lot more illusions at the bar later today!