iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 13h

Went to a few web dev conferences around turn of the century & there were always a few sessions where people were pleading with designers to learn how to push back on clients/customers. So, that struggle's been going on for a long time. I sincerely wish you luck on inculcating that.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

Someone on here the other day described the mindset described here as a "praise kink" & I keep thinking about that characterization.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

Yeah it definitely doesn't constitute proof of consciousness but it strikes me as a solid ethical baseline for systems capable of independent decision & action.

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Dr. Damien P. Williams, dread portent down from a mountain cave @wolven.blacksky.app · 07/03/2026

So… I've been writing for about 18 years on the idea that if you somehow manage to make meaningfully conscious machine minds & then you treat them as tools, then you're enslaving those minds, and that's pretty messed up. And this ties into something else I've re-upped recently: LLMs can't say "No."

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

(Resisting the urge to search for whether anyone's ever asked Kate Mulgrew about this....)

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

As always at a loss to understand what people see in John Gruber. He's always been petty & often snide. So why should anyone expend the effort to understand why he thinks Twitter/X is peachy & friendly? Exactly the attitude I'd expect from someone we now know to be a zionist & genocide apologist.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

(I did watch a bit because I somehow had an awareness of Kate Mulgrew & thought she was interesting. No recollection now where I'd seen her before & looking at IMDB has never helped me figure that out. Lost to time.)

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

I guess I didn't watch that enough to get that they were divorced. Also the age difference struck me as dissonant, always got vibe that Columbo & his wife were at least close in age. It felt as though they'd gotten a show approved & then retconned Mulgrew's character to be "Mrs Columbo" for PR.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

See Chandler's "The Simple Art of Murder". He makes a lot of moral pronouncements therein that don't hold up for the genre as a whole but the key insight - that the American detective is functioning in a system where rule of law is only provisional - still holds.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

Aside: for 45ish yrs when someone talks about this I hear John Doe & Exene Cervenka in that near-dissonant harmony: "Down these mean streets a man must go / Who is not himself mean..." (Not something they ever actually did. Just intrusively lodged in my head 1st time I ever read that line.)

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

(TBC I meant to endorse your statement, not challenge it. Sorry if that wasn't clear.)

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

1. As lots of us have pointed out Cassandras were right. Again. 2. Note the predetermined conclusion. 'We think' proceeding immediately to 'now that we know' without having done an investigation - Vance even says flat out they 'haven't figure out' how to tell WHETHER she's done anything.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 14h

Yeah, that strikes me as an odd claim. If anything the availability of rapid-feedback systems like social media & chatbot engagement makes it EASIER for people - including teenagers - to spiral.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 15h

Yeah of the actors I can think of, Nic Cage is very high on the "I will absolutely telegraph that I'm not into this" list. (Not by doing a bad job, mind you, but by somehow going rogue.) His takes don't always work for me but they are absolutely never boring.

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Jason Bailey @jasondashbailey.com · 11/10/2026

The last half of this quote wasn't circulating nearly as much yesterday, but it's actually the clincher. God bless this brilliant, gifted, absolutely deranged man.

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Micah @rincewind.run · 14/08/2026

Addendum because I forgot to include this yesterday: Q. So Reacher is called Reacher because he can reach things on high shelves, yes? A. Literally, yes! An old woman asked Lee Child (who is 6'4") to reach something in a supermarket and that is how he came up with the name. I am not kidding.

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Micah @rincewind.run · 13/08/2026

Q. Do smaller men try to fight Reacher for no reason? A. Yes they do, which is - against all odds - apparently the most realistic part of the show. It is always extremely funny.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 11/10/2026

You & I live in different realities, & in this one I will be ignoring you.

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Gillian Brockell @gillianbrockell.com · 11/10/2026

Cuban Americans in power don’t yet realize that Cubans are the primary victims of third-country removal. Hell, a certain Cuban American former senator is rubber-stamping it! They might think their proximity to whiteness will protect them from this white supremacist government. It will not.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 11/10/2026

I beg people to remember that NYPD openly threatened the lives of Mayor deBlasio's children.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 11/10/2026

Arbitrage can like water - we don't even see it even as we swim in it.

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Shelley Powers @burningbird.net · 10/10/2026

This is more accurate. The LLMs don't decide to wake up one day and apply for a visa. Some human activity triggered this.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

No, but I would love to think I could tell the difference if the risk ever arises. Which, AFAICS, it's nowhere near doing.

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Tressie McMillan Cottom @tressiemcphd.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

I can’t stress enough that this notion of if and when It will gain consciousness is Bible fanfic. It’s not real.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Considering that people still routinely fall for 'officer involved shooting', that is not encouraging.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

I wouldn't say it's dead. There are a shitload of short stories being published. But yeah, you can't make a living at it anymore.

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Abby Franquemont 🇵🇪🇺🇸 @abbysyarns.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

One other thing I find fascinating and disturbing in conversations I’ve had with AI bros is that they’re eager to ascribe consciousness to software but they don’t think women are even people.

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Kate Clancy @kateclancy.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Some day they'll pretend to be proud of the encampments, just you watch.

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Charlie Stross @cstross.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

The *whole* thrust of entertainment media for the past three-quarters of a century—and I include "news" coverage in that category—has been to sell folks on the romantic delusion that when reality refutes desire, reality gives way. "All opinions are equally valid" implicitly includes Newton's.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Re whether Trump believes his publicly expressed delusions. I've also been close to people who behave like this. Sometimes they seem to really believe; sometimes they can't be pushed to admit it's bullshit. We just can't tell & it may not matter!

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e.w. niedermeyer @niedermeyer.online · 10/10/2026

Bound In Involuntary Servitude To A Viking Noble House By The Highly Anticipated Nonfiction Book 'Elon Take The Wheel' By Chuck Tingle

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🇬🇾🗽Sydette The Dreaded Gorgon🗽🇬🇾 @blackamazon.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Trump said he would bring back public executions in 2023 this isn’t new . White academics, non Black activists, and podcasters keep resetting the clock to “raise awareness” because it hides how BLATANT the warnings were www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...

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Trump Plans to Bring Back Firing Squads, Group Executions if He Retakes White House

The former president wants to expand the use of the death penalty, and expand the federal government's options for carrying out death sentences.

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🎃 Imani Gandy Corn 🎃 @angryblacklady.blacksky.app · 09/10/2026

Don't hurt Clippy's feelings

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Imagine the moment of shock if Harry sees, say, a swastika around the neck of Luna's dad. But that would've meant having to connect the story to the real world, & she always wanted to have her cake & eat it on that score.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Knowing the supposed prior use of the Hallows, it bugged me at the time that she wasn't using a symbol we'd recognize. Unless it's meant to be a fnord, invisible to "muggles" - & there's no mention of that - it'd've made sense to me for it to be something we actually know.

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

I don't recall hearing that. Also it's been a while but my recollection is that the key symbol in play is one of the Masonic symbols - probably the eye-in-the-pyramid. The Kafiristani recognize the symbol around Danny's neck & spare their lives.

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Nome @nome.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Instead, I have to deal with you all being Reichsmarshal Tim the Tool Man Taylor. Not a thought in your head beside "lol guns are cool" "lol firing squad is manly" "hur hur hur more power"

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Nome @nome.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Constant mood: I don't want *more* competent fascists. But I reserve the right to feel insulted by how allergic to competence they are.

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William Gibson @greatdismal.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Having long been aware of those tech bros who read my work as utopian porn, where they’ve taken that doesn’t exactly surprise me.

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Jesse and the Purple Crayon … of Death!! @misctakes.com · 08/10/2026

No I don't think it's "good" for Anthropic to ban users from being "cruel" to Claude. That doesn't mean I think it's "good" to be "cruel" to Claude. Those are two different things.

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Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

this is so bleak, actually imagine being called a slur for a group you don't even belong to and instead of going "wow holy shit, no one should have to put up with that, we need to hold people to account," you go "no guys it's okay I hate them too!!!" and just hand the bully your lunch money

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Feral T. Robot, Oil Swamp Utility Bot #7629 @feralrobots.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Sorry, I meant the 'other-other-other', sven was here first:

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