iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Oh, and I fully agree about generic software being a bad fit for many cases - companies should just have sucked it up and realised having devs within the business was worthwhile, for many pieces of software. The friction of poorly-fitting software inflicts constant costs that are hard to measure.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

But please keep in mind that piecemeal solutions like this are a big part of why many companies are so dysfunctional and can't manage basic customer requests, why data breaches happen, why many software replacement projects fail, and so on.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

I'm not saying you - or anyone else trapped in enterprise software Samara - is at fault, by the way. Totally understand that the people who stay sane are the ones who just focus on getting their immediate job done. I don't think it's a fixable problem in the current environment.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Companies like MS and Oracle of course sweep in claiming they will fix the issue by selling you "off-the-shelf" solutions and automation tools, which generally only add to the problem.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

A lot of businesses are bogged down in an endless cycle of IT & devs being tied up supporting and rebuilding shadow IT efforts by people in the business, who build them because IT are too busy to build or implement things for them. The latest wave will not fix this, it will make it worse.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

I just see this as another wave of the same thing, but at higher scale, so the impact is likely to be higher. Sure, it's fine when it really is just a little time saving script for one person's individual process (much like the majority of Excel macros), but a lot don't stop there.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

This has happened more every time software development was made easier. A significant percentage of my nearly 20 year career has been spent dealing with the aftermath of subject matter experts creating software that has become business critical. It costs businesses huge amounts of money to support.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

The bit where it shows the project name damn near broke me

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

Maybe it'll end badly, but the last job already did that, so what's the difference?

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

In a world that frequently makes me feel like I don't have much agency, it's been a deeply weird experience to just go ahead and stop being a dev and start being an artist.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

This week, I will be submitting my first grant application. I guess I'm a professional artist now? It certainly is starting to feel more real.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Oh yeah. For me I know once I start making changes I'm going to be distracted making adjustments and changing things back & forth for days, maybe weeks. Long haul procrastination.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Many (most?) immunocompromised people are *not* eligible for free Covid vaccination in the UK, so if this actually works, it will be useful for a lot of people who won't even need to lie. It's ridiculous how much the free ones have been restricted.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I looked into it after clicking on the publisher name on Steam and seeing Angerfoot pop up. Incredible range for a small studio!

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

It's the same studio using a different name, and self-publishing under their usual name

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natemare before christmas @natescape.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Do you know how much has to have gone wrong for me to not like the internet

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

(I am a aficionado of early medieval insular art so you can imagine how salty I get about bits of the Book of Kells etc. being ripped off and sticky taped into brown pseudo-France circa 1400)

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Ugh, yeah. I could forgive a little mixing & matching in a fantasy setting if it was done with some intent - but that's not what happens. It's just brown France + the low countries + a few incongruous elements from the British Isles sometimes

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

This is a big part of why I tend to dislike games with a medieval Europe inspired fantasy setting, though you would expect I'd be interested. So much brown.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Well, yeah, because people normally need to know/use their home address for a lot more than navigating to it. Mainly I think his choice of example was just very revealing of the class disconnect. Most of us have to do our own life admin.

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Violet @aaadelnrrv.online · 26/09/2026

caves of qud

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Poorly Drawn Lines @poorlydrawnlines.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Coming to life

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I really appreciate you taking the time to filter through shedloads of games and then play a bunch of them enough to be able to form an opinion and make those recommendations. That's gotta be time consuming, and the threads are a distillation of that, which we all benefit from. Thanks! :)

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I try to remind myself that the things I *do* are much more visible to other people than the things I *don't* do. I think that's even more true for you, because you do so many things that other people benefit from! I don't get to catch your streams too often, but your posts here are excellent.

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Casey S. Pumpkins 🎃 @caseyexplosion.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Alrighty, everyone who's not an indie gamedevs? Go check out all those neat looking games in the replies! Share ones you think are cool, play demos, wishlist. Go have fun!

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

(And this probably isn't obvious for people outside the field, but the big vendors have struggled to get a lot of large enterprises to move everything to the cloud. The marketing has done a good job of making it look like everyone wanted to move immediately. It's much like AI marketing.)

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

On-Prem third party software has its downsides, but its availability offers a compromise with a different set of risks, at least. It's telling that so many of the big vendors are desperate to kill theirs off and go cloud-only.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Do you really want to hand over all of that to a profit seeking business who you ultimately know will offer you the bare minimum once you sign, and who will crank up costs as soon as you're moved in, and would struggle to move back out?

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

I think if you actually consider what IT & devs are replacing/augmenting, it's becomes obvious that it's part of the core of the business. Your processes, filing system, ability for workers to carry out their duties, communication with customers and suppliers, analysis & oversight.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Even if you find a good MSP who take industry compliance rules seriously, you're now dependent on them. IT are often the only people who really understand those parts of the regulations, compliance professionals often aren't technical enough. Many audits lack rigour and don't catch problems.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

The best way to get IT people like that is to hire them, get them to work with compliance so they're trained up, and then retain them. The chances you find an MSP or even a job hunter who knows your industry's specifics is low. In my experience, many MSPs will simply lie about compliance.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

And the wider scope of IT is often more tied to the nature of the business than people realise. Certain industries have regulatory overhead where having IT people who actually understand and respect the added work needed could save you from serious legal issues down the line.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Sometimes the answer is yes (accounting & HR are good examples), but it should really be discussed and thought through far more carefully than tends to happen. And when the answer is yes, then the model of outsourcing should be carefully considered to avoid unpleasant dependencies.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Software and data products are intimately tied to the specific business in many cases. You should want your devs & data specialists to be subject matter experts. If you wouldn't outsource a business area, are you sure you should be outsourcing the software for that business area?

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

When it comes to enterprise software and IT, it bothers me how often this is ignored. There's this saying in business about not outsourcing your core competency, and IT & software often are seen as falling outside of that, when they shouldn't.

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TekknoNerd - Commissions open @tekknonerd.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Voyager, walking on those tiny legs.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Have you played Judero? I think what any one of us would find matches your criteria will be very subjective, but for me it hits a number of the aspects you mentioned. Caves of Qud also, but that's better known.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

The Irish collaborated with the Allies, including providing advance weather reports which helped ensure D Day went ahead. They maintained neutrality on the surface for political reasons, but ultimately helped the Allies succeed.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Everyone should experience Judero. Many of my forebearers are from the Scottish borders and it's so damned cool seeing a game inspired by the area and its folklore. The soundtrack is top tier, also.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Pretty stunned by the sheer size of the abbey. It's very impressive and there are enough remaining tiles to imagine how it must have looked. Rievaulx is still my favourite though, sorry Byland.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Went to Byland Abbey to look at the tiles, and saw this semi-circle in the ground with thicker grass and mushrooms growing from it. I wonder what used to be there.

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George Outhwaite @georgeouthwaite.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

I've been looking at this painting and I think that maybe I love it and I think that you should too

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

I specifically remember reading an article from some industry publication (not sure if it was internal or public) talking about how clean burning coal would work with this imagined technology. I would never have known about the concept if I hadn't worked in the sector.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

This was all very out in the open - I remember an industry funded prize fund at one point for the best carbon capture solution. Industry publications from at least as far back as ~20 years ago will have evidence, I would think.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

As someone who used to work in the energy industry, carbon capture was pushed hard by the industry. It was industry's preferred solution because it would have meant being able to carry on as usual, or even go back to opening more coal plants.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Once your brain accepts an example it's easier to write off any gut feelings that surely this can't just be statistically likely words/code/tokens. And from there you can also see the potential uses & limitations of this technology much more clearly.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

The best way not to fall into this mental trap is to actually learn how these tools work. If you find an explanation of how a much smaller model works, it's easier to comprehend - and then you can start to think about the increase in scale and what such a model might reasonably be capable of.

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WhatACunningHat @whatacunninghat.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

These tools have a huge advantage over natural systems in that they don't actually do anything without input. The coding tools are heavily reliant on repeat human input - even if the user isn't interacting, it's looping, and taking in the instructions a set up previously in files.

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