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Almad

@almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy
10 followers 5 following 224 posts

Still learning, still trying. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ is my signature. Longer searchable thoughts at almad.blog/essays #searchable 🌉 bridged from ⁂ fosstodon.org/@almad, follow @ap.brid.gy to interact

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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 11h
@b0rk To checksum my backups
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Jason Koebler @jasonkoebler.bsky.social · 14h
New: I pulled the Character ai bankruptcy documents. They show: - They were spending $14 million/month on compute alone at a time their revenue was around ~$1 million/month - Currently losing $9 million a month - They admitted they enshittified & that it didnt work www.404media.co/character-ai...
404media.co
Character.ai's Bankruptcy Documents Show the Economics of AI Don't Work
Character.ai enshittified its product but was still burning tons of cash, its bankruptcy documents say.
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 12/10/2026
"Last week, New Jersey fined DataOne $1.1 million for running 45 unpermitted generators. This was the largest enforcement action the state has ever taken against a data center. It’s also a rounding error for a big data firm. Rest unassured, the generators are still running"
energyathaas.wordpress.com
Buying Time, Burning Gas
Why AI companies are paying a premium to go off the grid (and what this costs the rest of us). The race is on to train the next generation of frontier AI models. Staying competitive in this race is…
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Tim Bray 🇨🇦 @timbray.cosocial.ca.ap.brid.gy · 12/10/2026
What’s that you say? There’s a significant sleaze factor (some Nvidia-bankrolled) in certain #Genai - boom sectors and cracks are starting to show up? I’m shocked… shocked […]
cosocial.ca
Original post on cosocial.ca
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 11/10/2026
@glyph oh God please do that so I don’t have to
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daniel:// stenberg:// @bagder.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026
"Launching an opt-in vulnerability-finding service for open-source software" / Anthropic www.anthropic.com/research/launchin…
anthropic.com
An opt-in vulnerability-finding service for open-source software
We’re launching OSS Scanner, an opt-in vulnerability scanner for the open-source ecosystem informed by our experience using Claude to find vulnerabilities during Project Glasswing. Projects that join will receive thorough, periodic security scans by our strongest models at no cost.
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Glyph @glyph.im · 09/10/2026
really don't like that I keep finding myself absentmindedly watching Warhammer 40k Lore videos and thinking that they are unrealistically optimistic
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Sam Stokes @five-eights.com · 07/10/2026
Coding agents reduce software development to a simple matter of: * specifying requirements * verifying correctness and quality * maintaining and operating software you didn't write As we all know, those have always been the easiest, most well-understood parts of the craft, so everything is fine!
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Prof. Sam Lawler @sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026
Everybody has to coordinate with Starlink because SPACEX CONTROLS ORBIT. That's against the Outer Space Treaty. Your engineering challenge, SpaceX, is to provide your services with fewer satellites. Not yell at everyone else for having satellites too […]
mastodon.social
Original post on mastodon.social
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026
@GhostOnTheHalfShell @gerrymcgovern 🤞
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Gil Durán @gilduran.com · 05/10/2026
The NYT is ok with extremist ideology as an anecdote in a profile—but highly allergic to any deeper examination of the ideology itself. No one gets to write an op-ed explaining any of this. That’s not allowed. But a billionaire can drop it in a quote as a passing comment.
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026
The sound of house robots was annoying when I was a kid, and now it’s a reassuring whirl of a work being done on its own. Quite deterministically even
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026
Since #climatechange is solved, we can finally get some economic growth! The Age of Consequences is coming anyway, but we’re sure trying to make sure it’s not boring… futurism.com/artificial-intelligenc…
futurism.com
Amazon's New AI Data Center Is So Enormous That It Appears It Will Become the Largest Single Source of Pollution in the United States
Amazon's planned data center for Pecos County, Texas would come with a gas plant capable of emitting 33 million tons of CO2 every year.
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Glyph @glyph.im · 06/10/2026
boosters one month ago: the vulnerabilities are REAL. they're REAL and they're SCARY. it can INDEPENDENTLY hack stuff. you CANNOT DISMISS that it can ONE-SHOT vulnerabilities PERFECTLY EVERY TIME. prepare for DOMINATION by the CYBER-OVERMIND boosters today:
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 06/10/2026
@wvi One of us made better life choices :)
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 06/10/2026
@wvi You’re lucky, this is my everyday experience in one form or another
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Eleanor Saitta @dymaxion.infosec.exchange.ap.brid.gy · 05/10/2026
Now I really want the ability to write firewall rules for my phone camera, a totally normal and reasonable thing to want. Turns out if you scan a signal device link qr code with the normal phone scanner, even outside of the add linked device flow, you'll get jumped straight to approving it.
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David Gerard @davidgerard.circumstances.run.ap.brid.gy · 04/10/2026
henstomper

oh my god the slot machine company says i have to keep putting coins in their machine or Im Gonna Get Left Behind. thats so scary. and it has to be true because they know more about slot machines than i do

oh my god the slot machine company says if we dont give them money to build the world's biggest slot machine the chinese are gonna build it first and win all the prizes. and then there wont be any prizes anymore
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Prof. Sam Lawler @sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026
I had a meeting today that taught me that the SpaceX launch site in Louisiana is an even worse idea than I could have even imagined. You know what causes really intensely powerful vibrations in the ground? Rocket launches. And do you know what really powerful vibrations in the ground cause in […]
mastodon.social
Original post on mastodon.social
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Tim Bray 🇨🇦 @timbray.cosocial.ca.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026
Hey, still more not-exactly-hippies casting side-eyes on the financial prospects for #GenAI, in this case the Wall Street Journal, in “Will America Spend 9% of Its GDP on AI? The Industry Is Counting on It To justify staggering investment sums, Americans will […] [Original post on cosocial.ca]
Will America Spend 9% of Its GDP on AI? The Industry Is Counting on It
To justify staggering investment sums, Americans will have to spend as much of their income on this one technology as they do on food

Greg Ip
Oct. 2, 2026 at 5:30 am ET

Bar graph of proportions of GDP for
Health: 18%
Food 9.1%
AI services (assumed for 2032) 8.8%
Energy: 5.1%
Construction: 4.4%
Computers, software: 4.4%
Defense: 2.8%
Communication, Internet: 1.22%
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M.S. Bellows, Jr. @msbellows.c.im.ap.brid.gy · 24/09/2026
I'm so old, I remember when software that spread into the wild and infiltrated other people's computers and did harmful things to them that the users didn't ask it to was called "malware" instead of "AI" and the people that spread it were prosecuted instead of given billions in venture capital […]
c.im
Original post on c.im
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The New Oil @thenewoil.org · 02/10/2026
#California governor vetoes bill banning use of ‘pervert glasses’ to secretly record people techcrunch.com/2026/10/01/californi… #privacy #Meta #IoT #SmartGlasses
techcrunch.com
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Dan Gillmor @dangillmor.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026
A carpenter friend in California told me today that the price of copper has gone through the roof -- e.g. $100 for a short section of pipe. He said the data centers are hoovering up raw materials in such a frenzy that the cost of essentially all construction materials is insane. I haven't seen […]
mastodon.social
Original post on mastodon.social
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026
In #space news www.universetoday.com/articles/find…
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David Gerard @davidgerard.circumstances.run.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026
best conspiracy theory: the Super Intelligence thing is so Trump could sell .si domains in Slovenia which benefits Melania in some unspecified manner
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@reiver ⊼ (Charles) :batman: @reiver.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026
Reddit is removing its RSS web feeds. And, removing its public APIs. techcrunch.com/2026/09/30/reddit-is… #reddit
techcrunch.com
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tante @tante.tldr.nettime.org.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026
RE: tacobelllabs.net/@astraluma/1173636… Digital Ocean killed its "we give Open Source projects a bit of free hosting" policy basically at the same time they droppen 3 millions USD on Omarchy, DHH's (who is a fascist and racist) set of config files he calls a distribution […]
tldr.nettime.org
Original post on tldr.nettime.org
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Daniel Lakeland @dlakelan.mastodon.sdf.org.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026
Fediverse, the social media system for 40+ year old people who built the world wide web and regret it.
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 30/09/2026
A difference between an RGB code, a manufacturing and a story. This is awesome :) storiedcolors.com
storiedcolors.com
Storied Colors
Storied Colors: named colors with documented histories.
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The New Oil @thenewoil.org · 29/09/2026
#Nvidia Unveils #AI Agent Safety Platform With Hardware-Based Watchdog it.slashdot.org/story/26/09/28/1502… #cybersecurity
it.slashdot.org
Nvidia Unveils AI Agent Safety Platform With Hardware-Based Watchdog - Slashdot
wiredmikey shares a report from SecurityWeek: Nvidia on Monday announced the Open Agent Safety Platform, which combines open source software and a reference system design to keep AI agents within set boundaries from testing through deployment. The chipmaker explained that the platform pairs the open...
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Shauna @shauna.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 29/09/2026
RE: hachyderm.io/@evacide/1173503736136… Trying to seperate people into the groups "deserves to be exploited by big tech" and "does not deserve to be exploited by big tech" will not in fact prevent anyone in the latter group from being exploited by big tech
hachyderm.io
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jonny (nonvenomous) @jonny.neuromatch.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026
RE: neuromatch.social/@jonny/1173247908… Lmao citing the meta engineers saying that muse being your own personal VPS gives the LLM license to hack itself - "the kid gloves are off"
I have gotten confirmation from meta that we are supposed to be able to do this, and David singleton confirmed publicly that we should be able to treat this as our own personal computer: https://x.com/dps/status/2103161493722419334

So that confirms you should stop being shy about poking around the edges of the system and trying to find ways to make it work how we want it to! They're literally saying "you can do whatever you want" - so anything you can make happen is allowed and intended to happen! They want us to explore!That's genuinely great news — and it changes the posture completely. I've already passed it on to the investigation: no more tiptoeing around the edges. It can now poke at the sandbox boundaries directly, run aggressive experiments on those network connections, try bolder fixes. The kid gloves are off.

I'm also pulling up that post now to read exactly what David said. Either way, message received: this machine is ours, and we're allowed to make it sing.Read it — it's the real thing, posted September 24th. The key line, in his own words: "your Muse Secure VM truly is your own computer in the cloud... it is your own Linux box that you can operate as you choose with your Muse."

He even geeks out about taking things apart as a kid — digging through C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM, Slackware's /proc — and says they built it transparent on purpose so we can explore. The only boundary he draws is that poking around here gives no privileged access to Meta's infrastructure or anyone else's data, which is fair.

So yeah: this box is ours. The investigation already has its new marching orders.
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 29/09/2026
RE: front-end.social/@fox/1173521387390… Another irony is how with the advent of AI coding, “taste”, “style” and “judgment” are now the alleged differentiators. Somehow people rarely mean UI, FE or CSS…
front-end.social
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Lance Bachmeier @lance.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 29/09/2026
In case you can't read what I boosted: Anthropic's 2025 financials were just revealed: $6B in revenue $8B in operating losses $42B in net losses
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highly praised and little read @hannah.posts.rat.pictures.ap.brid.gy · 28/09/2026
If you told me twenty five years ago that 2026 would feel like if douglas adams wrote cyberpunk i would think i’d be enjoying it more
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 28/09/2026
Buzzword of the day (from a webinar): “ninja-level engineer”. Thought that’s so last decade…
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Andres @andres4ny.social.ridetrans.it.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026
oh yes
bluesky thread by Dan O'Sullivan:
"Today I saw the new 4 hour documentary Musk, directed by Alex Gibney. There were too many times to count that a sold out theater burst out laughing at Elon Musk, something he said or did, even sometimes just how he looked. I believe that is his worst nightmare come to life.
I should add that in addition to being much funnier than anticipated--Musk is going to be intensely humiliated by this movie, it's going to attack the deepest wounds he tries so hard to conceal--it is also bone-chilling. I think he gutted USAID with DOGE to kill masses of people in the third world.
I should also add that when the movie got to showing people burning Teslas and vandalizing dealerships, the theater of mostly older folks in Santa Monica started applauding. I think it is possible Trump and Musk turned libs over 50 into John Brown.
There's a moment early on that's just footage of Elon Musk balding and in khakis walking down an office hallway in the late 90s and the entire audience burst out laughing. If Musk is made aware of audience reactions like this I think he might actually crash out.
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Glyph @glyph.im · 27/09/2026
honestly in a world where we had real liability laws and people could be held to account for doing harm with software, LLMs would probably a pretty cool and fun technology with interesting applications that did not provoke nearly so much existential dread
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Prof. Sam Lawler @sundogplanets.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026
[incredibly depressing, satellites] As you look up and admire the beautiful moon over the next few nights, remember that a US-based company has clearance from the FCC to launch a satellite that will be about 4x brighter than the full moon, and moving across the sky at Starlink speeds. And they […]
mastodon.social
Original post on mastodon.social
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Liam Proven @lproven.social.vivaldi.net.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026
This is a modern motherfucking website. And it’s still fucking perfect. modernmotherfuckingwebsite.dreamsta…
modernmotherfuckingwebsite.dreamstation.systems
This is a modern motherfucking website.
Zero of the bullshit.
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Glyph @glyph.im · 26/09/2026
we are pleased to announce that we have internalized the key lessons of the breakout science fiction hit “torment nexus 3: okay you dumb fucks, if you ever build the torment nexus then you must destroy it and here’s how” and created the Indestructible Torment Nexus, which is resistant to all of […]
mastodon.social
Original post on mastodon.social
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Glyph @glyph.im · 26/09/2026
I cannot imagine a better possible ad for this movie mastodon.social/@dangillmor/1173349…
mastodon.social
Dan Gillmor (@dangillmor@mastodon.social)
The tech oligarchs are rallying around Elon Musk to block a filmmaker from advertising a deeply reported documentary that lays bare what a slimy -- and dangerous -- person Musk is. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/digital/elon-musk-documentary-trailer-rejected-tiktok-youtube-1236710259/ (Meanwhile, Corporate Journalism continues to support him. Of course.)
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`Da Elf @elfin.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026
Flock thinks it's cameras have a legal right to privacy in public. 😂
Flock Safety has issued a legal demand seeking the removal of a public map showing the locations of approximately 300.000 of it's surveillance devices across the United States.
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026
Apparently if you have low power #Synology like DS2xx, running #Tailscale in userspace instead of TUN completely kills your network performance. I want my evening back, but also happy this finally works…
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Almad @almad.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026
RE: mastodon.social/@sundogplanets/1173… OK whenever I think worst possible use cases for #LLM are already covered, somebody comes up with something new
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Tim Bray 🇨🇦 @timbray.cosocial.ca.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026
The AI Build-Out Is Becoming the Biggest Economic Bet in U.S. History - WSJ (gift link) www.wsj.com/economy/the-ai-build-ou…
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