General Exception
The oddly bee-obsessed Neuromancer movie posters
Quiet Earth has some posters for the maybe kinda possibly Neuromancer movie that may or may not manifest itself in 2011, depending on how the greed probability waveforms collapse. Anyhow, one of them seems oddly bee obsessed (well, OK, wasp obsessed, which I vaguely recall has some relevance to the book someplace…). But it just reminded me of another oddly-bee obsessed novel.
Design Contest Yeilds Adorable Machine of Loving Grace
Electroluxe is sponsoring a design contest for products that we will see in the next 90 years. One of the entries is a little robot whose sole purpose in life is to take care of a single plant on Mars or similar hostile environment. I think there’s something Wall-Eesque about the little fella diligently going about his work. And, of course, it brought to mind Brautigan’s poem. Of course, in practice, I suspect the little robot would be stressing out as his plant’s health fluctuates, much like I’ve been distressed over the sudden die-off of shrimp in my fish tank, probably due to some unknown water issue, which I hope I’ve worked out.
Plot point for the next Sundman novel: Mystery Laptops Sent to State Governors
Some evil mastermind’s plan to take over the governorships of the strategically vital states of err… Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming, has been foiled. Seems that laptops showing up unbidden tends to alarm people. So, it’s likely that the hypnotizing software/belligerent AI/super-stealth hackzors warez won’t be fired up by an unsuspecting governor any time soon. Or maybe it was just a prepaid World of Warcraft account that would suck the state officials into spend all of their time on raids. Whichever. (via Slashdot).
Fox News: Now With Incisive Commentary by “Stud u like”
Other news stations might just run a “aw… look… cute video” segment. Nope, not Fox News of Dallas… they have to turn it into a controversy!
This cute video of someone playing “whack a kitty” (really, just gently pressing a kitty’s head down in a box they are playing in, with sound effects) raised the ire of the MSPCA… err… no, not them. Uhhh… PETA? Nope, not them either. It really seemed to mildly upset noted animal rights advocates such as “supersmithy on I-Love-Cats.com’s forum” and “Stud u like” on Digital Spy.
Well, there you go! If some guy(?) named “Stud u like” on some forum somewhere doesn’t like it, it must be controversial!
That’s some darn fine reporting work there, Lou.
Will the Internets Become Sentient?
New Scientist has an article that speculates that the Internet could someday become (or perhaps already is) sentient. Although their speculation is that it won’t be in the “launch all the nukes and start building killer bots that look like Arnie” sort of way.
Toe-tappingly depressing
So, how can you spice up really bleak statistics like recent stock market performances of major companies and the death toll of soldiers in Iraq? Make them into music, using that new darling of blog posts, Microsoft Songsmith (obligatory holy crap moment as I realize I’m linking to a Microsoft product I’m not hating on). See and listen to the results at WFMU’s Beware of the Blog.
R/C Bugs!
Let’s say you want a radio-controlled flying insect (and really, who doesn’t?) Sure, you could go out and get a Wowee Dragonfly. But that’s made of plastic, and is really just a radio-controlled plane with flapping wings. Booooring! Instead, you could get yourself a rhinoceros beetle, stick electrodes in its brain and presto! Radio controlled flying insects real enough to frighten any annoying little sister.
Hey, Dan Grabauskas
I spent a charming 40 extra minutes on this evening commute, mulling over the steaming big pile of FAIL that is the MBTA (officially, the Mass Bay Transport Authority, for those of you outside the Boston area). Because, you know, the day before Thanksgiving is the perfect time to have trains break down and buses not show up. Everyone is slacking off and leaving work early… why not the MBTA?
Anyhow, I decided after hearing for the millionth time the every 2-minute reminders to be paranoid and report anything suspicious from MBTA head Daniel Grabauskas, that I realized how I could pitch in and help make the T better. I could rewrite Mr. Grabauskas’s announcement to inject a little truth…
Tell Me About The Rabbits, George
Tell me again about how we’re going to have place of our own some day, and be happy keeping rabbits. And we’ll chase these cats terrists away!
(photo courtesy of The Christian Science Monitor
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But while the uproar has swayed much of the public to Johansson's defense at a time when #genAI is increasingly under scrutiny, this may not quite be an open-and-shut case should she decide to sue . Read the breakdown from @M_F_Rose in her latest article:
The release of @OpenAI's new digital assistant "Sky" stirred controversy after actress Scarlett Johansson alleged that the company had infringed on her rights by using a soundalike voice of hers after she'd declined to voice it herself.
Just saw @MargotSusca fantastic interview with @adamconover about the death of local news at the hands of hedge funds. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N21YfWy0-bA A theme I have written about *a lot*. Like this blog post from 2018: https://wetmachine.com/tales-of-the-sausage-factory/we-need-to-fix-the-news-media-not-just-social-media-part-i/ This has been a long time in the making.
I wrote yesterday on the terrifying escalation of antisemitism in Canada, citing events just over past week. Now there is more: last night a firebomb attempt at a Vancouver synagogue. Daily antisemitic incidents is who we are now.
https://www.jewishvancouver.com/important-community-updates-may-20-2024
https://x.com/mgeist/status/1796233336203194446
Load More
The oddly bee-obsessed Neuromancer movie posters
Quiet Earth has some posters for the maybe kinda possibly Neuromancer movie that may or may not manifest itself in 2011, depending on how the greed probability waveforms collapse. Anyhow, one of them seems oddly bee obsessed (well, OK, wasp obsessed, which I vaguely recall has some relevance to the book someplace…). But it just reminded me of another oddly-bee obsessed novel.
Design Contest Yeilds Adorable Machine of Loving Grace
Electroluxe is sponsoring a design contest for products that we will see in the next 90 years. One of the entries is a little robot whose sole purpose in life is to take care of a single plant on Mars or similar hostile environment. I think there’s something Wall-Eesque about the little fella diligently going about his work. And, of course, it brought to mind Brautigan’s poem. Of course, in practice, I suspect the little robot would be stressing out as his plant’s health fluctuates, much like I’ve been distressed over the sudden die-off of shrimp in my fish tank, probably due to some unknown water issue, which I hope I’ve worked out.
Plot point for the next Sundman novel: Mystery Laptops Sent to State Governors
Some evil mastermind’s plan to take over the governorships of the strategically vital states of err… Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming, has been foiled. Seems that laptops showing up unbidden tends to alarm people. So, it’s likely that the hypnotizing software/belligerent AI/super-stealth hackzors warez won’t be fired up by an unsuspecting governor any time soon. Or maybe it was just a prepaid World of Warcraft account that would suck the state officials into spend all of their time on raids. Whichever. (via Slashdot).
Fox News: Now With Incisive Commentary by “Stud u like”
Other news stations might just run a “aw… look… cute video” segment. Nope, not Fox News of Dallas… they have to turn it into a controversy!
This cute video of someone playing “whack a kitty” (really, just gently pressing a kitty’s head down in a box they are playing in, with sound effects) raised the ire of the MSPCA… err… no, not them. Uhhh… PETA? Nope, not them either. It really seemed to mildly upset noted animal rights advocates such as “supersmithy on I-Love-Cats.com’s forum” and “Stud u like” on Digital Spy.
Well, there you go! If some guy(?) named “Stud u like” on some forum somewhere doesn’t like it, it must be controversial!
That’s some darn fine reporting work there, Lou.
Will the Internets Become Sentient?
New Scientist has an article that speculates that the Internet could someday become (or perhaps already is) sentient. Although their speculation is that it won’t be in the “launch all the nukes and start building killer bots that look like Arnie” sort of way.
Toe-tappingly depressing
So, how can you spice up really bleak statistics like recent stock market performances of major companies and the death toll of soldiers in Iraq? Make them into music, using that new darling of blog posts, Microsoft Songsmith (obligatory holy crap moment as I realize I’m linking to a Microsoft product I’m not hating on). See and listen to the results at WFMU’s Beware of the Blog.
R/C Bugs!
Let’s say you want a radio-controlled flying insect (and really, who doesn’t?) Sure, you could go out and get a Wowee Dragonfly. But that’s made of plastic, and is really just a radio-controlled plane with flapping wings. Booooring! Instead, you could get yourself a rhinoceros beetle, stick electrodes in its brain and presto! Radio controlled flying insects real enough to frighten any annoying little sister.
Hey, Dan Grabauskas
I spent a charming 40 extra minutes on this evening commute, mulling over the steaming big pile of FAIL that is the MBTA (officially, the Mass Bay Transport Authority, for those of you outside the Boston area). Because, you know, the day before Thanksgiving is the perfect time to have trains break down and buses not show up. Everyone is slacking off and leaving work early… why not the MBTA?
Anyhow, I decided after hearing for the millionth time the every 2-minute reminders to be paranoid and report anything suspicious from MBTA head Daniel Grabauskas, that I realized how I could pitch in and help make the T better. I could rewrite Mr. Grabauskas’s announcement to inject a little truth…
Tell Me About The Rabbits, George
Tell me again about how we’re going to have place of our own some day, and be happy keeping rabbits. And we’ll chase these cats terrists away!
(photo courtesy of The Christian Science Monitor
-
- Load More
But while the uproar has swayed much of the public to Johansson's defense at a time when #genAI is increasingly under scrutiny, this may not quite be an open-and-shut case should she decide to sue . Read the breakdown from @M_F_Rose in her latest article:
The release of @OpenAI's new digital assistant "Sky" stirred controversy after actress Scarlett Johansson alleged that the company had infringed on her rights by using a soundalike voice of hers after she'd declined to voice it herself.
Just saw @MargotSusca fantastic interview with @adamconover about the death of local news at the hands of hedge funds. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N21YfWy0-bA A theme I have written about *a lot*. Like this blog post from 2018: https://wetmachine.com/tales-of-the-sausage-factory/we-need-to-fix-the-news-media-not-just-social-media-part-i/ This has been a long time in the making.
I wrote yesterday on the terrifying escalation of antisemitism in Canada, citing events just over past week. Now there is more: last night a firebomb attempt at a Vancouver synagogue. Daily antisemitic incidents is who we are now.
https://www.jewishvancouver.com/important-community-updates-may-20-2024
https://x.com/mgeist/status/1796233336203194446
