New server means a new #introduction
Hi, I am a design executive in Europe who started as a backend developer in Missouri.
My life has taken many turns, but I’ve always benefited from the advantage of being a white cishet male who is stereotyped as credible. Hopefully, I leave this planet more equitable than I found it.
I strive to apply critical analysis to everything yet also find solidarity with everyone.
While I value “strong opinions, weakly held”, I do indulge in strongly-held opinions on a few issues. I’ll thread them here so you can make an informed decision on whether to follow or block me:
#onthisday 107 years ago, thousands of white workers vented the rage of their economic oppression by rioting and murdering their Black fellow citizens of East St. Louis.
The city has never recovered, but as a white child of the region I was taught to see the dismal state of the east side as a symbol of Black failure. This local civil war of 1917 was never even mentioned.
@babadookspinoza what, then, is the path to influence for those who care?
What positive forces can we amplify, to counter the cynical use of capital to free itself from social and ethical constraints?
@norbipeti @futurebird it’s as if ranking content by the relative authority of others who endorse it by linking might work. We could call this PageRank and write a whitepaper about how it only works if the algorithm is deployed by a company that resists the allure of advertising money.
@lproven and yet the photo depicts an unrealistically humane environment
@burningbird I'm so glad to see you're still active online. I have fond memories of blog-back-and-forth discussions of web standards with you and the likes of @simon and Clay Shirky … 20 years ago. 👴🏻
These boys and their ilk across cultures are why we can’t live in peace. Humanity needs to hold ourselves to a higher standard of civilization than this shit.
https://mastodon.social/users/burningbird/statuses/112509979549484728
@pgcd @futurebird with Kagi, I can at least rate sites and filter them out of my search results. But I wish I got to tag them for why, to add to a list like this.
(I'm not sure it's be useful, but it would *feel* productive.)
I have no privileged knowledge, but suspect this work from Microsoft is a good analog for how we will see Apple approaching AI. Small models trained on focused, curated data: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2024/04/microsofts-phi-3-shows-the-surprising-power-of-small-locally-run-ai-language-models/
@Julie I think I’d rather we err towards seeing humanity in objects than see humans as objects.
@mcc maybe not color-rich enough for you but I have to shout out Boox for making solid, well-performing e-ink tablets that are a joy for reading.
@tvdv oh brother.
Don’t worry, I’m not boomer enough for D66 yet. (I am old enough to like Timmermans, though.)
"As long as it takes," for Ukraine to be destroyed?
This morning, russian troops fired 15 missiles at Kharkiv and the Kharkiv Oblast, killing seven civilians and injuring 16. The missiles targeted civilian infrastructure, including a railroad facility and a printing house.
Ukraine's second-largest city is being reduced to rubble for a third year, while Ukraine is unable to defend it because of a ban on the use of Western weapons to strike missile launchers on russia’s territory
📹place_kharkiv
Eating meat is an unnecessary indulgence that is environmentally irresponsible and ethically questionable. Your acquired taste for flesh does not change this. “But I need protein” arguments only demonstrate willful ignorance.
One of the biggest mistakes of the 20th century was remaking (and dissolving) our cities to accommodate the automobile. It doesn’t have to be this way; there are plenty of examples of how societies can prioritize health and quality of life over the transient, unsustainable joy of vroom-vroom.
While I value “strong opinions, weakly held”, I do indulge in strongly-held opinions on a few issues. I’ll thread them here so you can make an informed decision on whether to follow or block me:
Seriously pissed about this. Offering $10,000 in seed funding for a Deviant Art alternative built on ActivityPub. Q&A below or email your pitch to info@moth.social. https://slate.com/technology/2024/05/deviantart-what-happened-ai-decline-lawsuit-stability.html
