RE: @arstechnica@mastodon.social
Godspeed Mr Windler.
Remote
drs1969 (David Smith) 🇬🇧
@drs1969@mstdn.social
mastodon 4.7.2Refugee from The Winchester. Amateur lot of things including astronomy, photography, and mucking about with classic cars (owner). Leccy car owner. Owned by two cats, slept on by a beagle, shed on by a Golden and tolerated by Mrs S. Head of Technology Strategy at The IET. If this takes off, it'll be the starry nights, Scholarly Publishing, bits of old MGA, a rant or two. Bit of F1, and probably a loathing of the Tories /GOP
185 Followers
365 Following
50 Posts
Joined November 05, 2022
Public Service Announcement
Redo the thermal paste on your laptop cpu and gpu.
Prepare to be slightly astonished.
My Dell XPS15 is, um, whisper quiet. Previously it would spin up the fans with furious abandon, to the extent that it was offputting to work on.
An hour spent removing the heat sink, cleaning it and applying new thermal paste was time VERY well spent.
Go on. Give yer lappy some love.
Replying to
@sundogplanets@mastodon.social I'm absolutely convinced it's a scam for getting investment funding. Thats all they have now. Look at the SpaceX IPO vs today. 1/2d in 'value' and the early investors don't care cos they made out when it listed on the stock market.
It's just a super fancy version of the Nigerian Prince scam.
(See also reflect @#£%ing Orbital)
Replying to
@dangoodin@infosec.exchange That's an insane take. The humans set the machine running, using code they built and infrastructure they deployed. Humans did this. Using computers and toolsets to do it, just like every hacker does.
Replying to
@BaronWalschap@mastodon.nl @AkaSci@fosstodon.org @sundogplanets@mastodon.social Oh it's not. None of those so called use cases withstand 5 mins with a calculator. Solar? Forget it, nowhere near enough energy reflected.
Lord knows how they'll do collision avoidance on a large reflective sheet.
These folk are all cult idiots at best, thinking they know more than actual experts. Somehow, this doesnt stop them being given lots of money.
Replying to
@AkaSci@fosstodon.org it's a proposal to scam VC money, just like the mega constellations are.
Replying to
@sundogplanets@mastodon.social oh HANG ON... this is about building speculative asset classes of orbital space, so it can be sold to people who DO actually want to put satelites up into ( or maybe just intersecting) those orbits.
Like the 'air rights' or whatever its called over New York, for sky scrapers.
Replying to
@ifixcoinops@retro.social Is that an old microsoft media PC? Must be a tv card decoder / input. Windows used to have a (very good) media centre setup in the XP / vista days.
Replying to
@dangoodin@infosec.exchange @wdormann@infosec.exchange @glyph@mastodon.social
Apologies Dan - I was not having a go at you at all.
That's clearly the aurhors take, not yours.
But unless you have specific laws out there that reference AI self determing agency... whatever a defence might try, this is 'humans used a computer to hack another company" their motivations are arguable. I don't think the outcome is though.
RE: @aclmeeting@sigmoid.social
I have zero sympathy for the authors here. They wasted everybody else’s time and their work cannot be trusted if they cannot be bothered to check/ faked the citations.
A million yrs ago when writing my thesis, I was told to make sure my references were all correct OR ELSE. Back then they were handcrafted… there’s NO excuse now.
Good on the ACL for their decision here.
Um....
https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-subprime-data-center-crisis/?ref=ed-zitrons-wheres-your-ed-at-newsletter
Not good. Not good at all.
Replying to
@briankrebs@infosec.exchange @campuscodi@mastodon.social The detail can be found here:
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=PI_COM:C(2023)4523
It's very clear that biometric identification is forbidden.
It's also clear that it can be turned off for each drive.
It's also quite detailed on the areas that will trigger it.
It's explicit that it's closed loop onboard processing only.
So there isn't really a privacy angle here.
There might be a security angle if the car can be hacked.
Personally I'd be interested to see if 'lifesaver' checks trigger it.
Replying to
@dangillmor Well they gonna have a great time with London’s traffic cameras and the even more feared traffic wardens. And then London’s cycling community will probably want to have a chew on them as well.
Idiots.
Replying to
@flowfx@chaos.social I reckon Trainline (website or app) is your best bet. https://support.thetrainline.com/hc/en-gb/articles/5183350424095-How-do-I-reserve-a-space-for-my-bike
Scotrail or northern rail are the two train companies I think. But Trainline will give you all the options.
Replying to
@astro_jcm@mastodon.online saw the picture… immediately heard the soundtrack in my head.
No. I don't have to spare a thought for the men in blue and white. They were an absolute disgrace. In any other game they are down to 9 or 8 men. And the scenes at the end werw utterly appalling.
Well done Spain for trying to play football. Deserved winners.
BBC football correspondents being idiots:
World Cup winners since 1966
Brazil 3x
West Germany/Germany 3x
Argentina 3x
Italy 2X
France 2X
Spain 1x
How our best ever finish since 66 can be described as a failure is beyond me. It’s insane.
Oh and the 2 best games of the tournament?
England Mexico and England France.
Replying to
@sstendahl@floss.social @eniko@mastodon.gamedev.place @pluralistic@mamot.fr According to Ed Zitron, it's 1 Trillion of investment next year. Or $125 for every living human on earth...
Replying to
@dangoodin@infosec.exchange Oh deffo my (british) opinion! But having said that, an AI is just a computer. Unless there's US laws that make some distinction?
Replying to
@sundogplanets@mastodon.social I don't even know how to imagine that. The sky would be infested with these wretched things. I wonder if anyone could simulate this in Stellarium? Might help to show how appalling it will be?
Oh Arse is on the pitch. 🤮🤮🤮
Come on #Spain 👍👍👍💪💪💪🤞🤞🤞
RE: @ludicity@mastodon.sprawl.club
This is an eyepopping write up. Do read it.
When the AI bubble bursts, and it will, it's going to be apocalyptic I think. It's 2007/8 subprime market all over again. Only its not banks, it's compute infrastructure.
Can AWS and Microsoft and Samsung survive this market imploding?
Sounds like a splendid idea. Nothing could possibly go wrong with this. No sir. /s
You Can Now Grant Claude Access To Your 1Password Credentials https://www.engadget.com/2216405/1password-anthropic-claude-integration/
Replying to
@mattburgess@infosec.exchange leaving aside the technical aspects for a moment... Is this a sign that Govts are getting to the conclusion that these guys ARENT neutral pipes, and that they ARE responsible for what flows through them. Because that would signal massive change in liability. And if it applies to such images, it can apply to other problematic content as well.
Replying to
@briankrebs@infosec.exchange @campuscodi@mastodon.social for Privacy - In the US, I'd agree with you. Not so in the EU. My primary concern with these systems is that they are rubbish - esp in rural areas with our narrow roads and hedges.
But yes, on the security front it would be good to pen test these vehicles systematically, to see what could be done.
This is about competing harms though. Driving without attention would benefit from sensors to alert the driver. Esp with all the touch screen interfaces now.
Replying to
@petergleick (Brit) I don't see Congress doing anything to remove him. His health may render him incapable i guess.
Thing is, he's not a huge aberation is he... Biden wasn't fit to hold office for 2 years of his term? Reagan wasn't either in his second term.
The guardrails and checks of your written constitution are in tatters, and have been for some time.
And on that cheery note...
Replying to
@JMMaok@mastodon.online I have a very zero tolerance view of this. And people publishing faked results. Should be blocklisted and handled like drug cheats in sport.
It is always worthwhile reading whatever Jamie Bartlett has to say. See below. Also he has a new book out which I will be getting.
If you care anything for the digital world we live in, go read Radicals - one of the best books about where we find ourselves - Jamie was there poking around at the seeds of what has grown.
Meet the AI jailbreakers: ‘I see the worst things humanity has produced’ | AI (artificial intelligence) | The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/apr/29/meet-the-ai-jailbreakers-i-see-the-worst-things-humanity-has-produced
Come on #Spain 👍👍👍💪💪💪🤞🤞🤞
Replying to
@emilymbender@dair-community.social According to others on Mastodon, it appears that this article may have been at least partially written using ChatGPT. The links in it have gpt modifiers attached to them it seems.
Might explain some of the things you've highlighted?
Just got to read some of 'Joe' the Open AI cybersecurity engineer's defense of the manifest failings of the Open AI agents and their hacking spree.
I gave up after about 10 paras of waffle and 'u dont unnerstand us we just an R&D lab that grew' bleating.
Mate... OWN IT. OpenAI fucked up incredibly badly. They've broken multiple cyber laws in any sensible reading of things. And it's just software mate. Dangerous shoddy software. The attitude on display just stinks of entitlement.
This
OMG! The Bank of England boss is an idiot.
Netscape was a browser company not a search company. They were bought by AOL when Google was just launching. They were done for by Microsoft abusing their position as an OS provider to bundle IE and have it the default. The EU fined them Billions for it, but the damage was done.
And his assessment of the AI bubble is 'not everybody will win'? Wow. Insightful commentary like that has me reassured that our central bank is in good hands. /s
Replying to
@womble@infosec.exchange @briankrebs@infosec.exchange @campuscodi@mastodon.social
People do all sorts of things other than look at the road ahead. It's not a surveilance device. It's a realtime sensor for guaging where the driver is looking in terms of zones of concern.
I'm sure it will be as annoying as the lane assist rubbish we have to deal with, and the speed alert stuff. But here I don't think you can argue for surveilance if you read the specification for compliance.
Whether it can be hacked however...
The very definition of objectifying a woman.
Sorry, the non-consensual objectification of a woman.
Reanimated AI Greta Garbo stars again … in a ball-bearing advert | Greta Garbo | The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/film/2026/sep/30/ai-greta-garbo-stars-again-ball-bearing-advert
‘No’
This is a pretty nonsense article tbh.
Claude doesn’t get distressed - it can’t. It. Doesn’t. Have. Agency. What it has is attention heads with weights that correspond to vectors associated with ‘distress’ responses in language, that can be triggered with a suitable prompt.
Etc etc
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jul/19/could-ai-be-conscious
I'm sorry but if an #AI can delete your entire company database in 9 seconds, then so could a threat actor. Or a human employee making a horrible mistake.
You didn't set up your environments properly. You had no proper access control set up and yohr permissions structure was not fit for purpose.
You gave the keys to the robot and didn't supervise it properly.
Claude didn't go rogue. It entered an untrapped error state with no safeguards in place.
I wonder if these academics took a step back for a moment at what they have written, & wondered whether it might come across as sociopathic and patronising. I guess not.
The UK deer argument is facile btw. We cull deer in this country because they have no real predators now, so their numbers have to be managed.
It's a bit different to killing a Lion or other endangered apex predator.
A ban on trophy hunting would harm, not help, conservation | Hunting | The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/apr/30/a-ban-on-trophy-hunting-would-harm-not-help-conservation
Replying to
@drsimevans@mastodon.energy Like for like you want to compare on the 7Kg vented dryer (bottom left) in terms of energy spent vs capacity. That one is only £20 cheaper.
"TEMU SKYNET"
Yeah, made me laugh.
Replying to
@donaldball@triangletoot.party @briankrebs@infosec.exchange @campuscodi@mastodon.social
Section 2.3.1
This is a regulation, not guidelines. You can't sell a car that breaks these rules in the EU.
RE: @EUCommission@ec.social-network.europa.eu
After they have paid for it.
Or have negotiated some appropriate usage conditions eg for research or non-commercial usage of content in a model.
This isn't difficult.
Some of us were dealing with issues like this back when we were building semantic knowledge graphs.
It's just software and databases.
Wow. If you want proof Laura is a Conservative, and thus abusing her position as a BBC journalist, this is the article for you.
Labour Party conference was at the Liverpool Experience Centre. Capacity 11,000.
Conservative Party Conference is a Birmingham Symphony Hall - capacity about 2000.
Then you can read the rest of the unsubstatiated statements abput Conservative poularity and indeed achievements.
Something something impartiality...
Replying to
@mttaggart@infosec.exchange if Ed Zitron is right, is there a process anywhere right now that still delivers a positive ROI when the cost is 8 to 10x what it is at the moment?
I'd love to know, even generally, what that might be.
Replying to
@hackbyte @briankrebs@infosec.exchange @campuscodi@mastodon.social
Ok - 'necessary purpose' is the key GDPR law here - and the penalty is 8% of annual turnover...
It's only neccesary to determine the drivers gaze direction, in order to trigger an alert if needed.
Nothing else is neccesary.
The closed loop specification is there to isolate that data.
The EU broke Volkswagon for cheating on engine emissions. So a manufacturer getting caught here would be in very very serious trouble.
This is shocking and completely unnacceptable.
Quick boost there of Laura ‘I’m impartial me ‘cos I work for the BBC’ Kuenssberg on Sunday, writing for the BBC news website…
Here’s John Crace describing the capacity of the main hall at the Conservative Party conference. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/oct/05/no-queues-empty-seats-and-the-worst-speech-ever-heard-welcome-to-the-tory-conference
Hmmm. Impartial eh…