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Said it before, not quite the same
I’ve said this before in a somewhat different context. It’s doubly true now. Cybersecurity is simply a continuation of pre-computer Deepstate evil. Immediately after FDR died, Deepstate overthrew the government and took over again. It immediately started prosecuting everyone who had helped FDR save the country from Wall Street, and everyone who didn’t want to…
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Fools are at it again
Fools are chanting NO BLOOD FOR OIL again. This is backwards. I wrote about it in 2014. At that time the neocons were channeling Wilson, claiming to serve “democracy”. In fact we didn’t want more oil, we just wanted to prevent other countries from using THEIR oil or minerals or food. We blew up Saddam’s…
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Insiderish?
At the moment this insiderish event in the “news” business strikes me as fairly significant. Detroit still has morning and evening papers. They started out independent, then semi-merged in 1989 with a Joint Operating Agreement. The upper levels of management and financing were together while the newsrooms were independent. In the 80s many papers formed…
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Book didn’t disappoint
Somebody on substack recommended ‘A Field Guide to American Houses’ by McAlester. Recommended books are often disappointing but this one turned out to be splendid, just right for repeated browsing. It’s packed with actual lived-in houses, not architectural dreams. The ‘field guide’ classifies all American houses, starting with the huts and tipis of the old…
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Today is Carver Day!
Rehashed and revised from this 2014 item on his 150th birthday. = = = = = START REHASH: By most calculations, George Carver was born in January 1864 near Joplin. He was born in the last year of official slavery to a mother owned by a German farmer named Moses Carver. Soon after George was…
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Constants and variables on libel
Quick take… A fairly obscure Canadian musician named Ashley MacIsaac lost money, and will likely lose a lot more, because Google’s explainer AI told people that he was a sex offender. Apparently there is a known sex offender with the same name. Constants and variables show that AI itself isn’t the main factor here. Constant:…
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Double significance
Today is Braille Day and also Dimpled Chad Day. Braille is interesting since I’m in the middle of adapting courseware for blind students. After I finish the required but dubious verbal descriptions, I’ll run up a far more useful braille version, making the images directly tactile. There is a (somewhat) standard coding method to feed…
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Suspicion?
Several of the writers I follow are suddenly saying the same thing about the Bush/Trump invasion of Venezuela. They’re implying that Trump had a good reason to invade and topple a foreign country. This makes me suspicious. It feels like these folks are receiving the same signal. The pattern reminds me of 2023 when stout…
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We could learn more
This rant was inspired by two sources: the Chavez version of oil MBS, and Mamdani’s brilliant phrase ‘the warmth of collectivism’. Progressives and wokies love to focus on the ‘spiritual’ side and the ‘suffering’ side of the old American tribes. We could learn a WHOLE HELL OF A LOT MORE from the commercial success of…
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Shock and awe? Not clear yet /// EDIT: Clear.
A brave science teacher in Caracas has been reporting via Substack for a few weeks. The only reliable news comes from locals who see and hear what’s happening. Around here, the only reliable news comes from the SpokaneNews facebook group. Mainstream “news” from every city and country is useless. The previous stage of our grotesque…
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When I was smarter
Lately everyone is noticing the proliferation of fake “people”, aided by AI. Fake people started considerably before AI. Wikileaks noticed it in 2016 and I wrote about it, then forgot about it. (Writing leads to forgetting, which can be useful if you’re trying to get rid of bad thoughts.) From May 2017: I was idly…
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More silliness
Continuing the Not New theme. Silly people constantly misunderstand the origin of the web. The origin was not mysterious or secret. It was started by Deepstate for its own purposes. It didn’t suddenly switch from a grand festival of freedom to a surveillance monster when Trump was elected. Like every data web, it was meant…
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Simple cure
The AI missionaries are doing a great job, drawing people in with respect and courtesy. Apparently the bot itself does an even better job, though I haven’t tried it and won’t try it. Predictably the anti-AI people are missing the bet again. The same thing happened 20 years ago with pornography, and the same thing…
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From examining to incorporating
I’m always aware of the long history of computing, algorithms and data webs. I’ve made dozens of tech history pieces exploring the history and emphasizing that our “new innovations” are permanent parts of all such systems. This blog could be titled No, it’s not new. Here’s a not new I hadn’t noticed before! This 1977…
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Happy (fake) WWV New Year!
Since the 1960s I’ve always tried to mark the new year by catching the actual time on WWV. Shortwave reception in Spokane is poor, so I’ve failed to hear WWV in recent years. Last year it came in loud and clear on 10 MC. This year was typical, so I had to rely on a…
Polistra's Mill
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Polistra's Mill 