I’m reading The SIGMA Surrogate by Jt Lawrence 📚, my first recommendation from StoryGraph. Strong women lead in a cyberpunk world, light erotica (sans heavy romance) thriller by a woman writer. Refreshing and fun.
Rethinking and reorganizing my life - with org-mode
I used to be more organized. At least, that’s what I think.
When I was working as a desktop technician, I added all my tasks into a file called “Oh Snap,” which I cleared every week. Every Monday morning, I would go over my Oh Snap file and archive done tasks, remind myself of and write notes of existing tasks, and make sure a weekly backup was created.
In my current role, my tasks mostly grow into projects. Besides some quick things, like creating an announcement or an alert for our website, these projects usually take weeks; some even take months. Going over my Oh Snap file every week stopped making sense.
But when I stopped my weekly routine, I also stopped organizing tasks. Now I have one big file mixed with personal and work tasks, some active and some complete. It’s an intimidating blob of “stuff,” and just looking at it makes me want to run away to a video game instead.
I also write less about what I do in my personal life unless it’s complicated enough with several todos and a packing list or if I have the itch to write, which is when I pull out my journal. This means that a lot of useful information never gets saved. Things like map snippets with locations (easy in Emacs), links to pictures I took with descriptions, and the people I got to know - all of that is not written and gets lost.
This made me realize that the weekly routine around my Oh Snap file was one thing; organizing different tasks and events into categories is also important. I don’t mean just “work” and “personal,” which are too vague and big to work with. Categories should be a rough outline of familiarity, a way to frame and save things for better retrieval later. For example, “vacations” might be a better category than “events” (too general), and both are better than just “personal” (way too general).
A good category is like an apartment building where I know certain past events happen. If I want to see pictures of my niece from last Thanksgiving, a “family” or “holidays” category would make sense; at work, if I want to recall when I created certain announcements for the website, then “website” or “announcements” is a good category for that.
So now I’m trying to figure out a couple of things. First, when should I visit my projects file, which is a dump of everything I do, and move things out into their categories. Second, what are these categories? We shall see what I come up with.
Microsoft vent num. 104
My Work-related 365 Microsoft account has been acting up for months. The error message showed me the server that refused to sign me in, citing some security concerns, and there was another problem: that server was not the one my account was supposed to connect to.
Then, a couple of weeks ago, Microsoft Edge started to refuse to let me sign in and sync my account, citing the same error and the wrong server address. That was the final straw since I wanted to keep my work environment in Edge.
Microsoft support has been unhelpful, as always, but they went a step further this time. When the representative followed up, I informed them that I ran a reset script buried inside their app package for OneDrive. They replied: “Yes, that’s what I told you to do.”
Being unhelpful is one thing. Taking credit for my research and solution is another. I didn’t see an option to rate the agent, and I have more important things to do than keep a grudge, especially since the error returned one day after the reset, but I should have probably written a scorching email 😡.
This morning, I removed all Microsoft accounts and any associated Microsoft configuration files on my Mac (com. Microsoft, etc.) I re-installed Edge, and so far, it lets me sync.
I’m not planning on going back to OneDrive or to any desktop application from Microsoft any time soon if I can help it. This Mac being my work computer though means I need to test and write documentation for such applications.
Maybe I can run a virtual machine, another Mac, to keep Microsoft in a cage. The thought of it makes me feel better.
The problem with having an espresso machine at home is getting spoiled.
Instant coffee tastes horrible. Starbucks coffee is either too watered down or too bitter.
On my walk, I passed by a local firehouse, where they cleaned and prepared one of their fire trucks.
Nat’s dad’s surgery went fine, and everything turned out OK. I find myself sitting on a sofa I haven’t set on for over 5 years since Nat moved in with us.
The father is originally from Ukraine, and there’s food that reminds me of my childhood. The best part is the homemade pickled tomatoes. He knows how to make them just with the right amount of garlic, sugar, and vinegar. I had to stop eating more of them or risk stomach pain.
I walked the dog, a passive-aggressive mix of a Corgi and a Jack Russell. She had to be carried downstairs, and I could tell she was holding herself back from snapping at me when I grabbed her. She understood that if she wanted to go outside, I was the only option she had today. I understood that if I wanted to go somewhere, I needed to forget about it because she was in charge. It worked out OK.
What’s left at this point is to grab a good cup of coffee somewhere, as instant coffee doesn’t' agree with me (that’s OK - I don’t agree with it either).
Why should more FOSS enthusiasts check out Stable Diffusion
I’m enjoying my exploration into AI image-generation quest. It’s been a rewarding experience, but I can’t shake the feeling I need to start each post like this with an apology because, you know, AI image generation.
Unlike other OpenAI’s DALLE or Midjourney, Stable Diffusion is open source and does not require using the cloud. You can run it at home, on your own hardware, provided you have enough juice for it (an average gaming rig should be good enough to start).
Stable Diffusion gets a bad wrap because… well, Let me ask you this: What happens when you give a boy a tool that can create any picture he wants? What do you think is the first thing that boy will create the second the door closes and the lights are off?
But that doesn’t mean you can’t use it for other things. Having AI image generation as open source makes a big difference. It’s up to you to use it as you see fit. It’s up to you to train it and provide it with images (you can create a model based completely on images of yourself or your artwork; stealing copyrighted work is not necessary). It’s up to you to learn how to use it, and man, there’s a lot to learn.
If you’re a fan of FOSS and Linux, you’d probably like to know that Stable Diffusion can run on Linux. In fact, that’s its native environment. It’s not as nearly as simple as typing a prompt into Imagen, Google’s AI image creation tool, but if you’re a Linux veteran, I doubt that’s a problem for you.
And I hope you’ll try it. We need more people who can develop and understand AI technology that is independent of big tech AI poison that is everywhere. We actually have a chance to develop a moral, responsible, and private AI tool - all the good stuff we FOSS techies appreciate. And now is the time. Before the entire field is swallowed completely by capitalistic greed.
There are some interesting links on Mastodon this morning, but following them is impossible. Paywall here, turn off your ad blocker there.
Can I at least see if I’m interested first? Let me come in, sit down, take my coat off, something… yeesh.
We woke up at 4:30 this morning to go to the hospital for my partner’s dad. Nothing too bad, but unpleasant. So instead, a picture from yesterday’s sunset. We really get some beautiful ones sometimes.
Reddit: 2FA log-in is blocked when using VPNs. I had to disable my 2FA on Reddit.
Giving my IP to Reddit is worse than having enhanced security for one of my accounts there.
A pleasant surprise: a community garden at a local school on my evening walk. 📷
Micro.blog did it again: sneaking another good thing unnoticed. Everyone’s recommendations are in their profile.
So people I already follow and find interesting automatically recommend other interesting people I should follow. In a way, this comes to remedy my grump from yesterday, which amounts to not finding enough people to follow.
Another excellent update from the online community I enjoy being a part of.
It seems like I slept more than 7 hours today, but I don’t believe it. I don’t remember any of it.
…Which is a very good sign. Days like these are like small miracles 🛏️
Heart of Stone, 2023 - ★
I couldn't finish watching this one. This movie has a plot aimed at my horny teenage self at 12.
I loved Rotten Tomatoes' one-liner summary: "Gal Gadot remains an entertaining action star, but she's no match for Heart of Stone's thinly written characters, generic plot, and rote set pieces."
An attempt at a female James Bond was made - and blown. The plot is obvious, but the spoon-feeding is strong with this one anyway, just in case someone misses it.
There's an AI / Minority Report copycat style thrown into the mix to keep things up to date (I didn't finish watching, but I'm sure the AI turns out to be evil, or at least terribly incompetent, because duh) and non-stop action, which works for Gadot as Wonder Woman but fails badly for Rachel.
This would be another case of a good actor suffering from terrible writing... except that Greg Rucka is actually good at what he does (Old Guard, quite a few good comics in DC and Marvel), so I'm not sure what happened here, blaming Netflix is too easy.
Just spit it out already
In my search for independent blogs, I’ve encountered 1.5 depressing patterns. I’ll start with the 0.5 because that’s probably what you’re wondering about.
Most blogs I encounter belong to techies (programmers, web developers, etc.) and discuss tech stuff. We live in an age where everyone talks tech and everything is tech, so that doesn’t say much; hence the 0.5.
The other more problematic thing is the once-a-month blogs. It goes like this: I find someone interesting. They have something to say. I want to read more, but there’s only a handful of posts starting somewhere toward the end of last year.
At some point in time, I made up a rule: don’t follow blogs that don’t publish a blog post at least once a week. This might sound harsh, but this is my rule, so bite me. But there’s more to it. When I find someone interesting online, I get curious not just about what they write but also who they are. The ordinary things that are scattered around the more readworthy stuff. It feels more human to me, like meeting a friend. I enjoy thinking, “Hey, I wonder what platform Jack is experimenting with today,” or “Let’s see what’s on Brandon’s mind this morning.”
If I don’t write for more than two days, I find it difficult to write again. Suddenly, it’s not just a matter of writing whatever’s on my mind; I have to have something important to say, I can’t just write. And that’s where things get stuck: it’s not that I don’t have what to write about; it’s that there are too many things competing, so I rather just get up and check if I need to do dishes instead. With too many options, writing becomes a chore.
Take this post, for example. I was browsing through the referrals of this blog, found two personal blogs that I liked (from software developers, of course), and a mere collection of 5 - 6 posts leading back to the beginning of the year. I signed, felt sad about it, and before I knew it, I was writing about it. That’s it. No choosing, no thinking, and here we are.
So hey, if you’re one of those once-a-month folks who struggle to express yourself, do me a favor: don’t wait for that something. It ain’t coming because it’s already there. Just spit it out already.
Trust the readers to navigate around your morning coffee or your dog pictures to find your important stuff, because they will, and they’ll get to know you better along the way.
Gave up on Red Team Blues by Cory Doctorow 📚 at about 80%.
Started OK and never got better. This book could benefit from focusing on the story or the technical knowledge, but Doctorow tries to do both, ending up with a lukewarm plot and online privacy techniques that should be explained further.
A little coffee shop comic 📷 anyone?
If Google tells you to jump off a cliff...
Growing up you were probably asked by your parents “If everyone jumps off a cliff, will you jump too?” when you did something stupid. The idea is to appeal to your logic and critical thinking, which should (hopefully) prevent you from doing something stupid you know is stupid because everyone else is doing it.
So if Google’s new brilliant AI tells you to put glue in your pizza, you wouldn’t do it, right? Because some reporters would do what it takes to draw more eyeballs to their articles:
Google AI said to put glue in pizza — so I made a pizza with glue and ate it
I knew my assignment: I had to make the Google glue pizza. (Don’t try this at home! I risked myself for the sake of the story, but you shouldn’t!)
Hey, at least she’s telling us we shouldn’t do it. Not that it’s going to help: some people are just dumb.
She also did the research:
I did use Google to make sure that “nontoxic” glue was indeed semisafe to eat. Google’s AI answer said that small quantities might lead to an upset stomach but not, say, death. That’s good enough for me.
And since it was good enough, she made the pizza and ate it. Google said so.
What does this all mean? For me personally, this means that I’m an idiot who eats glue. But what does it mean for Google and the future of AI-powered search?
I don’t doubt Katie Notopoulos is smarter than what she pretends to be for this article. Her article is now trending all over the place, and hey, she even made it to this blog.
It’s time to stop blaming Google for what it’s supposed to do, minimum work for maximum profit, and to apply common sense. And tech journalism… well. Tech journalism. What can I say?
Ads in games soon in fully-priced AAA games
In-game ads are a natural progression of advertising, especially as the gaming industry is expected to grow to $583 billion by 2030. In-game ads are a natural progression of advertising, especially as the gaming industry is expected to grow to $583 billion by 2030.
Unfortunate and maddening but true. In a world where you pay a premium on top of premium to get ad-free experience, paying “only” full price is not enough.
EA CEO Andrew Wilson confirmed the company is considering putting ads in traditional AAA games — titles that players purchase up-front for around $70 apiece.
Games are expensive. Making games is expensive, too. But AAA games always bring in more money than ever, and there are other ways to get people to pay for games. I’m worried about horribly-placed-immersion-breaking ads coming soon to a game near you.
With Memorial Day around the corner, work should be slow enough to allow me to explore ComfyUI. This is a good time to visit image creation in AI if you’re curious about Stable Diffusion. No big tech involved, just a cup of coffee and a bunch of hungry brain cells.
Kagi Search: 3 weeks in
After three weeks of using Kagi, it’s growing on me. It took a while to figure out how: I’m searching the web directly more than I used to.
With DDG, searching would be one of the tabs. I’d often open other tabs automatically, like a dictionary tab, Reddit and Wikipedia. With Kagi, I’m not doing that because there is no need.
Another big difference is how they use AI in Kagi. Here’s a picture to illustrate:
The search ends with a question mark, which is how I ask for AI to show. No question mark, no AI. Simple. That idea of initial consent like that before shoving AI in your face (looking at you, Microsoft!) already makes all the difference.
Then, the AI lists the sources it uses, and not only that, it offers links to those. A quick scan tells me if something in the sources doesn’t make sense (for example, if I search for something debatable and Twit-Ex shows up as a source). To me, that’s a responsible use of AI.
Kagi’s shortcuts and bangs also grow on me slowly. If I want to go to the website instead of searching about that website, all I need to do is start the search with an exclamation point, like “!twitter”. If I want to read a full-length Wikipedia article about something, I can type in “!w twitter”. Image results are also better than those of DDG, especially with the filters.
I keep discovering value in Kagi, and even though it feels a bit on the expensive side to me, for now it’s worth it.