iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 10h

The big rig is coming together. Single-wheel bicycle trailer with a hub motor, to electrify my do-everything bike and carry shit. Tested to work but not yet mounted: solar panel over the trailer to charge the battery during daytime and extend autonomy (using a […] [Original post on social.coop]

Black bike with black bicycle trailer attached to the seatpost on green grass and brown dirt, white van partially visible behind, two chickens stand on pallets in lower right corner

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 07/10/2026

I pay too much rent to keep dealing with this shit

"is this a pigeon" meme with the person as "shitty landlord", the butterfly as "rain falling on my floor from the leaky roof" and the person saying "is this trickle-down economics"

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

Look at hom clearly we write ballot propositions in Missouri

Screenshot of ballot form:

"Constitutional Amendment No. 6
Shall the Missouri Constitution be amended to: • expand the initiative and referendum petition process by making it a fundamental right; • allow courts to revise ballot summaries through lawsuits; • prohibit the legislature from weakening initiative or referendum powers; • prohibit the legislature from changing or repealing laws enacted through the initiative process, or passing laws similar to those rejected by referendum, without approval from at least 80% of both chambers; and • preserve existing majority vote and signature requirements for initiative and referendum petitions? State and local governmental entities estimate no costs or savings."

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

Well, since I have presented it in a talk just now, I made as well "announce" it: my colleague Daniel and I started a company (small-business style, no investors) to commercialize open-source test and measurement hardware related to (flow) batteries. Been getting […] [Original post on social.coop]

Presentation slide titled "We started a company" with two male scientists with white labcoats standing in front of a lab bench with a laptop and experimental apparatus in between them. Image is crudely overlaid with WordArt-style vector images to make it show they have top hats, cigars, and briefcases full of cash.

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

Can anyone ID this bug? Found this massive insect in my room this morning, it is around 10 cm long (!) and probably almost 2 cm in diameter at its largest point. In southern France, for context we are in drought and it just rained. A locust? #insects #bugstodon #BackGarden

Big brown long slender bug on white wall with a crack in it

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 29/09/2026

Rich people when regular folk want walkable cities and functional public transit

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 24/09/2026

Vendredi 25 Septembre - Critical Mass Lyon 19h - Place Antonin Poncet, 69002 Lyon à tôt ? #CriticalMass #Lyon #BikeTooter #velo #velotaf

Affiche pour l'événement qui montre un vélo hand drawn in brown and orange tones with the relevant information cause I have the flemme of alt text in french

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 17/09/2026

[FYI: not trying to personally attack/dogpile, just disappointed] I like some of JA Westenberg's ideas and writing I've read, being exposed to them as they're pretty popular on the fediverse (@ Daojoan@mastodon.social, don't want to @ them here), picked up their […] [Original post on social.coop]

Screenshot that says:

How I AI (Disclosure)
Updated: 20 August 2026

I use Cursor for most coding tasks, and I’ve started experimenting with Grok Bot as the harness for my business. I use Codex and Grok to manage my knowledge base and wiki in Obsidian. I’ve started trialing VidIQ for YouTube as of this month. Cursor is also my go-to tool for formatting ebooks and maintaining versioning for knowledge work using Github and the new Cursor Origins codebase beta. I use Omarchy as my operating system, and increasingly an OS-level harness.

How I Write with AI
I write some posts with zero AI-assistance, and some with Spiral by Every and Codex. Either way, I start by developing the outlines and arguments by hand, deciding what I want to say and how the ideas should fit together. If I’m using AI, I’ll start with Spiral to turn those outlines and arguments into prose; an agent can write a chunk of the initial paragraphs, depending on the piece and the length of my initial input. I edit every paragraph by hand, revising the language, emphasis, and meaning. I then run the edited draft through Codex to identify structural weaknesses, gaps in the argument, and opportunities to improve the piece. I decide which suggestions to accept and make the final revisions myself. The ideas and overall direction are mine, while AI plays a substantial role in drafting the prose and helping me strengthen its structure and arguments.

YouTube thumbnail for video "The Secret to Success Isn't Genius; It's This One Trait" which appears to use generative AI

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 15/09/2026

biblically accurate experience of French administration #France

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 11/09/2026

Bandcamp: "pweeeaase spend money on any other day than Bandcamp Friday we missed out on $558,000 in fees fuck why did we start this unprofitable trend how can we stop this"

Email screenshot from Bandcamp:

"On September 4, fans spent over $3.1 million on Bandcamp in just 24 hours, directly supporting independent artists and labels.

That’s what Bandcamp Friday is all about.

But supporting the music you love doesn’t have to wait for a special date. On Bandcamp, artists and labels receive an average of 82% of each sale, and that’s true every day, not just on Bandcamp Friday.

Thanks for supporting independent music all year long"

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 10/09/2026

est-ce que quelqu'un peut expliquer a ce etranger ces secteurs de façon simple/ELI5 ou me diriger vers une ressource utile ? 🙏 #France

Checkbox filter with options:

Secteur de conventionnement

Secteur 1

Secteur 1 avec droit permanent à dépassement

Secteur 1 OPTAM

Secteur 1 OPTAM-CO

Secteur 2

Secteur 2 OPTAM

Secteur 2 OPTAM-CO

Conventionné

Conventionné avec dépassements d’honoraires

Secteur 3 (non conventionné)

Etablissement conventionné

Etablissement non conventionné

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 10/09/2026

Putain, the AI-generated ads on YouTube are getting out of control. Someone accidentally forced the US avatar to speak French 😅 I know I have a strong US accent when I speak french but this grates my ears 😭 good thing all that water and energy is going to cure […] [Original post on social.coop]

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 20/08/2026

Shrek but reborn as a dutch oven in Emmaüs (French Goodwill)

Shrek green dutch oven sitting on a shelf at a used goods charity shop over a tile floor. Handles look like little Shrek ears. Item marked as 5 EUR with a marker on the lid

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 18/08/2026

File under: good, solvable problems: too many bicycles on the regional train (TER, France, even with the summer-only bicycle reservation system). Thankfully I only had to go one stop. #BikeTooter

Several bikes and helmets/bags hanging vertically from hooks and leaning against the interior of a rail car, taken from perspective of a person holding their own bicycle with handlebars visible

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 30/07/2026

Does anyone know how to automatically hide/delete these crosshairs that appear in FreeCAD TechDraw workbench? #FreeCAD #TechDraw

B&W technical drawing showing exploded view of bullet connector and nut on either side of a metal plate with holes, there are crosshairs around the image

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 29/07/2026

#RealTimeCAD #FreeCAD writing the freaking docs takes FOREVER but is also satisfying. Trying to follow Julian Stirling's advice for OSHW docs: don't have any photos, they will be quickly out of date 😆 (am very guilty of this)

Tall vertical screenshot of exploded assembly view of a flow battery test cell from https://fbrc.dev

Many square components exploded vertically along a line with different part colors in isometric view

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 12/07/2026

If this isn't bureaucracy in France in a nutshell 😅 Sign outside of a relatively small wind farm giving chronology of the project, translated to English, it reads: 1998 - project starts 2002 - applied for a construction permit 🤞 🦗 ... 🦗 2018 - construction […] [Original post on social.coop]

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 23/06/2026

The temperature of my laboratory is approaching the boiling point of diethyl ether (34.6 C)

Glass thermometer on white background with blue liquid inside indicating around 33.5 C

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 16/06/2026

@owiecc @altbot Flex base Invinity GWh-scale AI datacenter project in Switzerland recently breaking ground

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 16/06/2026

Anyone have any questions for the flow battery industry players? At the world's biggest flow battery event at the moment! Vanadium, iron, organic systems, system integrators, electrode/membrane/pump manufacturers...

Pamphlet for the International Flow Battery Forum conference

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 13/06/2026

At least someone is benefiting from the race riots in Belfast. Wheelie Good Clean 😅

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 12/06/2026

For those (such as fleeing US researchers) looking to understand the French academic system, a handy diagram: All credit goes to @anne who made it for me when I moved to France for a postdoc a few years ago!

A handwritten diagram on a white background illustrates the connections between scientific organizations and academic roles. At the top, "CNRS" and "Universities" both "funds" "LABS" (specifically "UMR (unité mixte de recherche)"), while "CNRS" "employs" "Directeur de recherche" and "Universities" "employs" "Professeur des Universités (PU)". "Directeur de recherche" leads to "Chargé.e de Recherche with HDR" and then "Chargé de Recherche", while "Professeur des Universités (PU)" leads to "Maître de Conférence with HDR" and then "Maître de Conférence (MCF)". Blue text in the center says "can supervise Ph.D", this includes Directeur de recherche, PU, and roles with HDR. All these roles sit above a dashed yellow line, with the text "JOB FOR LIFE" in yellow (CDI roles). Below that line, in yellow is written "GO FUCK YOURSELVES LOL" (temporary job contact ie CDD) and the following positions: "ATER... PhD student... Post-Doc... Students...", "and now this new thing inspired by the US: 'Prof Junior' ie limited contract".

Text modified on that provided by @altbot, generated privately and locally using Gemma4:26b

🌱 Energy used: 0.678 Wh

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 03/06/2026

GUI view: all-Fe on the left, in the process of "forming" or whatever we want to call it (getting rid of initial ascorbic acid), on the right Cu/Mn first charge cycle done and starting discharge

Potentiostat user interface windows tiled next to each other showing battery charge/discharge curves and relevant operational parameters. Blue graphs on white UI elements, yellow traces

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 03/06/2026

#realTimeChem running two cells in parallel, Cu/Mn flooded/static cell and all-iron flow cell with a carbon steel negative current collector and nonconductive felt. Flow cell is all crooked cause I sent the wrong file for the steel collectors to the machine shop […] [Original post on social.coop]

White electrochemical cell with multicolor test leads attached filled with blue copper-containing electrolyte in the middle

Similar electrochemical cell connected to pumps as a flow battery inside of a plastic catering container

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 02/06/2026

well if i wasn't on the list(s) yet I am officially on them now all this for 250 mL of transition metal salt solution in sulfuric acid

CUSTOMER DECLARATION OF SPECIFIC USE(S)
of a restricted explosives precursor according to
Regulation (EU) 2019/1148 of the European Parliament and of the Council

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 20/05/2026

#RealTimeChem cycling an all-iron flow battery!! First few "cycles" are oxidizing sacrificial excess ascorbic acid added to reduce initial Fe (III) present and minimize ambient oxygen. Charged 2 mAh and discharged until discharge capacity approached 2 mAh as […] [Original post on social.coop]

Screenshot of potentiostat user interface software showing yellow traces on blue background and battery cycling parameters in the UI.

Glass beaker with pale green/yellowish solution inside and a stir bar. Beaker has "Fe" written on it in a black marker.

Flow battery experiment contained in an opaque plastic catering container on a workbench

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 30/04/2026

Okay it is a TEST (pardon the mess) but I can officially do charge/discharge tests on a much larger scale now! Should cover my needs for a while, can allegedly go up to 24 A/30 V/75 W (thought not with this wiring setup, lol). Testing out automated […] [Original post on social.coop]

Screenshot of Windows with two side-by-side windows of MightyWatt electronic load program on left and Gnuplot on right, showing a green voltage curve vs. time with voltage going up and down in the 12 V range

Rats nest of wires going between an electronic load, power supply, and 12 V lead-acid battery with parts strewn about

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026

[US state violence/torture] Just watched a documentary on the Attica prison riot made up primarily of interviews with former prisoners. It's free on YouTube here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG1f7FzgXY8… It's super horrific, of course, but […] [Original post on social.coop]

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026

Last random post. In a public park recently that had these motion-activated lamp posts. I guess light pollution and public safety aren't mutually exclusive?

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026

Friggin' Europe, back at it again with the micromobility. Bicycle lockers are a game changer. First time using one. Love not having to take off my lights, bags, pump, and other widgets. #BikeTooter

Black bicycle parked in a grey bicycle locker with a black pannier bag on the left side of the rear rack. Sliding door is partially open

Grey bicycle locker closed and locked with a folding lock

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026

The charging cable hanging out of the top floor window lol

Citroën Ami parked on a French street, a charging cable exits the second story window (zero-based housing) and connects to the car, hanging in the air

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 18/04/2026

New current collectors just dropped. Testing out LaserBoost in Spain. Pretty cool you can just upload a .step file from FreeCAD and be auto-quoted for sheet metal manufacturing.

10 identical brass sheet metal parts with holes wrapped in plastic on a stainless steel workbench

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 17/04/2026

#RealTimeChem well you can see oxygen reacting with (tri)iodide on the positive reservoir septum where I pulled the tubing out after bubbling argon... It's parafilm time Also normally the positive reservoir is quite yellow/brown so clearly inert gas purging is important

Photo of flow battery test cell with pumps, tubing, electrochemical cell, reservoirs, mostly 3d printed. Red jig holds it all together. Septa are folded over the white reservoirs and one on the left has some brown coloration near a pinhole in the center

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 25/03/2026

current results btw, test is still going - cycling tests are longgg

four matplotlib graphs of battery cycling data

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 25/03/2026

woohooo, got to lab and found the cell didn't go kaput overnight, finally a decent test is running (hope I don't jinx it) discharge capacity is increasing through first 5 cycles, cause of ~~weird zinc stuff~~ and the system *hopefully* trending towards a steady-ish state.

screenshot of electrochemical workstation software on the charge/discharge page with a graph showing multiple charge/discharge profiles of potential (V) vs. charge (mAh)

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 24/03/2026

I must inform you that batteries have been determined to speak Welsh, in fact.

PeerTube notification saying "Welsh transcription of your video Building a flow battery in less than 5 minutes has been generated" - video has no linguistic content

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 20/03/2026

finally back to doing an ACTUAL EXPERIMENT woo (a standard ZnI flow cell test but still)

screenshot of a program for a potentiostat/galvanostat, yellow line showing voltage vs. time on blue background, gray GUI elements on the edges allowing for setting various parameters related to charge/discharge of electrochemical systems

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 05/02/2026

Bike fit / used bike questions - looking for a used bike for my partner (162 cm). Found this used Gitane aluminum xc bike, size M, rockshox Judy 26", hydraulic brakes, 2x9, SRAM or Shimano (I forget). We tested it - rides smooth, shifts and brakes well. Owner […] [Original post on social.coop]

Person in colorful sweater on a golden hardtail mountain bike leaning against a wall. Side view

Person in colorful sweater on a golden hardtail mountain bike leaning against a wall. Front view

Person in colorful sweater on a golden hardtail mountain bike leaning against a wall. Angle view

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 05/02/2026

Cycling in the US Midwest rn, according to my hometown social ride chat. An icycle? #BikeTooter

Bicycle leaning against an apartment building fire escape, completely enveloped in ice. Ice on the ground and icicles on the fire escape. Brick and stone building, snowy ground.

Another angle of the previous photo, closer to the front wheel of the bike

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 30/01/2026

The stink bugs yearn for the 3D printer

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Kirk Smith, PhD @kirk.social.coop.ap.brid.gy · 25/01/2026

Winter bivouac camp on the bike to clear the head. Got to see a nice sunrise over the Vercors 🌄. More hike-a-bike than I'd like to admit but a good time nonetheless. Ça grimpe ! #bikepacking #bivouac #AdventureBiking #AdventureCycling #cycling #biking #mtb

Colorful cloudy sky just before sunrise with a foggy valley in foreground and mountainous background

Blue cloudy sky just after sunrise with a foggy valley in foreground and mountainous background

Forested hillside in winter looking into a foggy valley with some blue peeking through the clouds

Black mountain bike with yellow and black drybags strapped on a dirt path with snow and trees in the background

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