Sign in

Charles Stearns

@pinballgeek.bsky.social
286 followers 545 following 299 posts

software engineer/manager • IoT • pinball • boardgames • bourbon • tiki drinks • introvert • PDX • he/him

PostsRepliesMedia
Reposted by Charles Stearns
By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 06/10/2026
Since the mid-1950s, we have changed the thing that "AI" refers to every 5-10 years. The current thing we're calling "AI" is about a decade old, and all this label-switching leads to a lack of clarity as to what (this) "AI" is.
The First Bank of Chicago, a Grecian temple to money. It is surrounded by flames. A skeleton in academic robes and mortarboards has been lynched from its roof. In the foreground are banded packages of US $100 bills.
322768
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Josh Gondelman @joshgondelman.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
The price of gas is now what used to be the amount you'd pay if you forgot to fill the rental car up before returning it.
141644
Reposted by Charles Stearns
FLEABttn @fleabttn.com · 03/10/2026
one of you is smart enough to make a bluesky cartridge for the commodore 64
174
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Gail Simone @gailsimone.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
NEWS: I don’t like transphobes and here is a short list of why. 1) They are full of shit.
403918734
Reposted by Charles Stearns
gamera obscura october edition @ohrobin.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
“I hope against hope that a better world is possible. Except everything keeps getting worse. The wars, the brutality, the racism, the authoritarianism, the planetary destruction. We are being pushed to the precipice. With no option but to jump and no one to watch us and remember.”
arunnews.substack.com
I Watched People Jump
On 9/11, memory, and crimes against history
3519
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
I have some work travel coming up next month as well as well as the Retro Gaming Expo (where I’ll mask up) so I went and got my COVID and flu shots. What’s just a little extra sauce on my already grumpy Friday demeanor tomorrow.
000
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
Leave it to media execs to not understand fundamentally what made a show successful.
000
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Anytime I hear AGI is just around the corner I think about how theses models are trained on the aggregate of human content, making them a statistical average. Then I think about the quote from the 1997 classic MiB “A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals…” We are not near AGI.
000
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
As I'm now a reading glasses wearer, the iPhone Duo is interesting just from the stand point of bigger fonts. But given all the context switching I do in my job I'm particularly interested in Siri Recap, depending more details about how privacy is handled.
000
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Christian Lipski @christianlipski.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Yes.
041
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Will “Available for Contracts” Smith @willsmith.fun · 05/09/2026
This is a fascinating thread.
3597
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
That Apple Cup weekend is so early and that there is also no UO OSU (Civil War) game this year, really punctuates for me how much I feel like I’m in the wrong timeline. Things change, many for necessary reasons, but when traditions are killed purely by capitalism I can only despair for our future.
000
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Grady Booch @booch.com · 03/09/2026
In my lifetime, I have been witness to the extraordinary growth of information coupled with the frightening decline of applied wisdom.
17515
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Mar Hicks @histoftech.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
“Steinem, a co-founder of Ms. Magazine, was a hugely recognizable presence wherever she went. And she went everywhere: Much of her life as an advocate was spent on the road, speaking at college campuses and community centers, at rallies and marches.” RIP apnews.com/article/glor...
apnews.com
Gloria Steinem, a potent voice of US feminism and co-founder of Ms. Magazine, dies at 92
Gloria Steinem, the most visible symbol and potent voice of the U.S. women's movement in the '60s and '70s and a fierce advocate for feminist causes for the rest of her life, has died at 92.
318456
Reposted by Charles Stearns
The Onion @theonion.com · 26/08/2026
Dolly Parton Troubled To Find God Illiterate theonion.com/dolly-parton-troubled-…
Dolly Parton Troubled To Find God Illiterate
715934703
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Ars Technica @arstechnica.com · 26/08/2026
arstechnica.com
RIP Tim Curry: Ars remembers his top 10 iconic performances
A dashing pirate, a butler, a killer clown, an alien mad scientist in drag—the man had range.
613632
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Garry @thegmcconnachie.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
This is why Dolly Parton will be remembered and loved ❤️📚
106143445750
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
💔😢 Dolly was the true meaning of greatness, leaving such an incredibly positive mark on society that will linger for generations.
000
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Pat Baer @patbaer.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
RED ALERT WE GOT A WEIRD AL TINY DESK www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4I-...
youtube.com
'Weird Al' Yankovic: Tiny Desk Concert
YouTube video by NPR Music
162
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Gregormortis (with Boo G's) @plusgreg.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
If I had a nickel for every time a weird little guy with the eyes of a malamute starred in a definitive fantasy franchise and then used their career-long blank check to make outsider indie movies, I'd have two nickels. But it's weird that it happened twice.
Screenshot of Elijah Wood in Come to Daddy, he wears a blue lightweight robe over a black turtleneck and talks into a black wired phone. He has a small mustache. Daniel Radcliffe in Swiss Army Man, where he plays a magical farting corpse. He wears a blue suit and blue checked shirt with navy tie. He lies on a forest floor with Paul Dano looking down on him, back to camera.
701909205
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Funranium (AKA Phil Broughton) @funranium.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Once upon a time, there was a poker tournament. This was in 2003 when the televised World Poker Tour tournaments were a kinda new thing. Among the things my friend put on the server we built for piracy before I left, so we winterovers could view things, was that.
1573
Reposted by Charles Stearns
John Scalzi @scalzi.com · 14/08/2026
You don't have to be racist shitballs to do a capitalism www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...
theguardian.com
US firms that kept DEI policies despite ‘go woke, go broke’ threats thrived
Exclusive: Companies that kept policies did just as well financially, even after Trump’s executive order, as those that didn’t
251295178
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Shepherd @neolithicsheep.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Good piece on why schizophrenia is the number two* predictor of death from extreme heat: www.wired.com/story/heat-w... *number one is poverty
wired.com
In a Heat Wave, One Medical Condition Is So Much Deadlier Than Any Other
People with schizophrenia face a perfect storm of dangers on a hotter planet.
212642
Reposted by Charles Stearns
James @retrojames.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
To all the 80s kids in America, I made this one for you. It took a long time but it was “Wilde” to edit. I hope you like the vibe…
2029242
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Ursula K. Le Guin Bot @leguinbot.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
I look at the world, at the forests and the mountains here, the sky, and it's all right, as it should be. But we aren't. People aren't. We're wrong. We do wrong. No animal does wrong. How could they? But we can, and we do. And we never stop.
010228
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Cabel Sasser @cabel.panic.com · 09/08/2026
it was lloyd center’s last day.
1616224
Reposted by Charles Stearns
OPB @opb.org · 08/08/2026
The Lloyd Center will close to the public today. On a recent Sunday afternoon, most of the restaurants are vacant on the top floor of Lloyd Center, but the food court is anything but quiet. About a hundred people crowd around tables, cheering loudly as metal spinning tops slam into each other.
opb.org
‘A safe space for weirdos’: Beyblade community hosts final tournament at Lloyd Center’s food court
The Portland Trail-Bladers host their final Beyblade tournament at Portland's Lloyd Center ahead of its closure on Aug 8, 2026. The mall transformed into a community living room over the past few years.
34715
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
for a junk drawer to legally qualify as a real junk drawer, what is the ONE absolute mandatory item it must include? A random battery that you only learn is already dead when you try to use it.
000
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Hillary Monahan @hillarymonahan.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Courtesy of my mother's FB feed.
RFK Jr's weird squash head.

If diarrhea lettuce was a person.
18213
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Effin' Birds @effinbirds.com · 03/08/2026
A woodcut of a bird beside the text "STOP BEING A DUMBFUCK"
353596
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Meade Krosby @meadekrosby.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
The emergency response to Spokane fires has been exemplary and heroic. We also need to remember this isn’t the limit of our ability to reduce wildfire risk. After 100 years of strict fire suppression, millions of acres of WA forest need fuel reduction treatments like prescribed fire & thinning.
214138
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Ali Trotta @alwayscoffee.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
Look up
A beautiful maple tree, blue sky, and a chonky white cloud
2354
Reposted by Charles Stearns
PBF Comics @pbfcomics.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
“What a beautiful universe, hon" says a telescope as gazes upon an aurora borealis. “It really is”, responds the telescope's partner, who it turns out is not a telescope, but a microscope. Hands full of algae, she wades waist deep in a disgusting swamp, amazed by the heavenly microscopic life all around them.
100211635270
Reposted by Charles Stearns
The Oatmeal @theoatmeal.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
I drew a police sketch of Jimothy in case the cops need it
171077190
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Either the US scores nexts after that disaster of goal keeping or the wheels will indeed have fully fallen off.
100
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Rich Burroughs @somewhattolerable.com · 02/07/2026
Oh damn. If you are ever in Portland or PDX now, Books With Pictures is a very fantastic, inclusive comic shop.
021
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
In that political quiz going around I got the current Pope. (Pope Leo XIV) I’m very conflicted about this.
000
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
Random reminder that the GOP's tax cuts for their billionaire donors ballooned the deficit, so they're blaming the problem on Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid — while making cuts to programs that millions of Americans rely on. It's socialism for the rich, harsh capitalism for everyone else.
401527575
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Shivam Bhatt @shivambhatt.bsky.social · 15/06/2026
4772167
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Pat Baer @patbaer.bsky.social · 13/06/2026
pro-tip:
281
Reposted by Charles Stearns
J. Anderson Coats (she/her) @jandersoncoats.bsky.social · 08/06/2026
My day job is at a rural branch of a public library, and we have a Pride display. Yesterday I was at the desk when a man came in. Fifties, maybe, or sixties. Plaid shirt, mesh trucker cap, suspenders. He went up to the display and just stood there for a long moment. Then he came up to the desk. 🧵 1/
8381202802
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Robert Kelchen @robertkelchen.com · 05/06/2026
This is a really cool piece on how Alan Alda has funded an initiative to help researchers better communicate their findings to the public through learning improv skills.
wsj.com
Alan Alda’s Solution to Eroding Trust in Science: More Improv
The “M*A*S*H” star’s program to help researchers overcome their communication challenges now draws thousands. We sat in on a class.
382719606
Reposted by Charles Stearns
SwiftOnSecurity @swiftonsecurity.com · 28/05/2026
Your boyfriend just spent $10k before your trip to Europe 1.) Engagement ring 2.) 64GB of RAM
1618324
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Trish Greenhalgh @trishgreenhalgh.bsky.social · 23/05/2026
Every summer I repost this article on how to spot drowning. Please read it and pass on. In the last few years I’ve had SIX messages from people who saved a kid’s life after clicking on the link from my feed. slate.com/technology/2...
slate.com
Drowning Doesn’t Look Like Drowning
Drowning is not the violent, splashing call for help that most people expect.
253133939735
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 23/05/2026
I started my vacation today, and as part of that I signed out of all my work accounts EOD yesterday. I’ve only reflexively opened Outlook twice today, which isn’t as bad as I expected, but I feel the withdrawal.
000
Reposted by Charles Stearns
don-brown.bsky.social @don-brown.bsky.social · 15/05/2026
126441
Charles Stearns @pinballgeek.bsky.social · 16/05/2026
I’m going to be trying so hard to not play Subnautica 2 until it leaves early access. This is going to be painful, but I’m also really tired of playing games that have massive QoL improvements in the middle of my play through. I’m dealing with that right now with Crimson Desert, a released game.
000
Reposted by Charles Stearns
John Scalzi @scalzi.com · 13/05/2026
"If she has her own house, what will she need me for?" I don't know, dude, maybe be cool and fun to be around and be happy for her success instead being whiny little sad-ass troll about it? www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...
theguardian.com
Single women are buying more houses. The men they are dating are not responding well
Female home owners report feeling stuck between men’s contradictory expectations – they are told to be independent, but not assume the breadwinner role
40196621549
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 08/05/2026
Giving billionaires and corporations the green light to buy our elections. Making it easier for polluters to destroy the planet. Stripping millions of reproductive freedom. Granting presidents immunity. Gutting the protections of the Voting Rights Act. The shame of the John Roberts court.
13033661163
Reposted by Charles Stearns
Graham Annable @grickle.bsky.social · 03/05/2026
Rainful thoughts. #grickledoodle #rain #cat #introspective #dog #spring #cartoon #art #drawing #funny #humor #sad
A cartoon illustration of a cat sitting outside on a blanket with an umbrella in very rainy weather. Caption reads "Some days she just needed to be outside, regardless of the weather."
023340