Author: Dan Q
Dan Q is a software engineer, a director of a voluntary organisation, a trainee counsellor, a keen geocacher, and an amateur magician. He lives with his partner and her husband in a polyamorous triad, and occasionally finds time to blog.
-
Hackers Simply Asked Meta AI to Give Them Access to High-Profile Instagram Accounts. It Worked
Meta decided to replace a lot of their tech support with a chatbot. Which meant giving that chatbot the power to manipulate data. Which meant, to the surprise of nobody whatsoever, that hackers tricked the chatbot into giving them access to other people's accounts.
-
Note to self: ignore search results that say to install a plugin; the absolute fastest way to send a test email from a WordPress/ClassicPress installation (assuming you're using WP-CLI) is just to run something like:
wp eval 'wp_mail("recipient@example.com", "Test Email", "A test email from WP-CLI");' -
![Screengrab from a YouTube video showing a white woman with brown-and-red hair saying "please see the FAQs for any questions you have have around deed polls[sic] and the rules." alongside a logo for "Change Names".](https://bcdn.danq.me/_q26u/2026/06/changenames-youtube-video-978x480.jpg#29349)
The "ChangeNames.co.uk" Scam
Today, somebody who's running a scammy personal information collection campaign hidden beneath the veneer of a buggy free deed poll service that competes with my better, ethical free deed poll service... emailed me to ask if I'd advertise theirs for them. Wow.
-
Converting ISO Country Codes to Flag Emojis
Did you know that there's a simple formula you can use to convert from an ISO two-letter country code to the emoji of the flag of that country. I've made an interactive thingy to demonstrate it, and shared some other fun things I've learned while playing around with ISO 3166 and flag emoji.
-
There are many things I don't like about the kitchen in the Chicory House where we're living medium-term following our house flood.
But I like the fact that the integrated spice rack makes it much easier to see where we perhaps have a very-specific blind spot for "buying a new one where the last one's still more than half-full".
Alt
Close-up of a spice rack containing not one, not two, not three but four tubs of 'ground white pepper by Sainsburys'.
-
I think I'm probably done with my blog (and podcast) series of Wikpedia @ 25 posts. It's been a surprising amount of work.
But don't think I've stopped hitting Random Article! Today I was reading about surface plasmon resonance, and, despite looking at it on and off all day... I still don't think I "get" it. I've even dived into the linked articles to try to get a background understanding of the topics around it, but... nope. It's still all gibberish to me!
Think I need the ELI5 version!
-
Disabling AI in WordPress 7.0
Nicholas A. Ferrell explains how to tell WordPress 7.0 to keep its AI features disabled, and I share my alternative approach: use a fork - ClassicPress - that doesn't include the AI features in the first place, and add them using a plugin if that's really what you want.
-
Bringing Three Rings volunteers together: doing remote-first in person, and what to eat in a crisis
JTA wrote a LinkedIn post about Three Rings, its remote-first culture, doing things in person, and crisis management, and it's brilliant.
-
Is AI Profitable Yet?
No surprises from this website, but it's interesting/staggering to see quite how LARGE the disparity between spending and profit is for some of these companies.
-
Wikipedia @ 25: Carl Person
As I continue my 25-consecutive-days-of-Wikipedia, today's random article of the day was Carl Person, a lawyer with an interesting history.
-
I let the elder kid choose her lunch. She chose a pizza so huge that each slice is larger than her entire face. Needless to say, she needed a little help with it!
Alt
Two preteen children sit in front of an enormous pepperoni pizza.
-
As both the UK's heatwave and my up-and-down England road trip continue, I think I've finally found a fan big enough to cool me off.
Alt
A large wind turbine.
-
Drinking a coffee while editing a podcast episode in the beautiful Ullswater valley, and this lovely little pied wagtail came by to say good morning!
Alt
Pied Wagtail (motacilla alba yarrelli) atop a dry stone wall.
-
Wikipedia @ 25: Cirrothauma Murrayi
Today, Wikipedia introduced me to a mysterious deep-dwelling octopus. So cool!
-
I spent a while failing to interpret this sign. It seemed to be saying that if you didn't clear your tray... then you'd get ketchup poured on your wrist?
Alt
Printed sign reading 'this is a self-clear area; thank you' beneath a red illuminated icon of a hand onto whose wrist a bottle drips.
It turns out there's a baby bottle warming station on the other side of the bins.
(It is possible they my brain is struggling from a lack of sleep.)