A Microblog in Plain HTML

#surf

I heard about Reddit's recent changes to charge a fee for API access. This means applications like teddit will break. (Shucks because teddit has been giving me error 429)

Here is one of the discussions on the topic I've come across. One of the comment that got me thinking the most is the last one. I don't want to scuffle online with that person, and now, the things I think in response don't fit in the "span" of a discussion (like attention span).

https://freepo.st/post/0X8cVr39XT#comments

Whenever a tech company strong-arms its userbase, a reoccurring theme I find in alt-communities is how the general public endures the new changes which thens become a norm for the worse in practice and ethics. I find comments (like in the link) characterizing the general public as apathetic, indifferent, or sometimes as sheeple.

But I don't think that's the case.

There are plenty of forums with similar functionality as reddit. An example is Saidit, but I don't go on the internet to read headlines and aggrieved political whining. I can try to use Saidit to talk about hobbies and writing, but I'm unlikely to get any responses because the community of Saidit is set on a different range of topics. Similarly, Freepost focuses on technology.

Conclusion? Linking externally to news articles is no substitution for community building.

#surf rant

I check the neocities subreddit from time to time. I get over-optimistic in that I might find like-minded people who (1) have the same hobby of building a static website, (2) have preferences leaning towards the old web. But every time I visit, I get disappointed.

https://teddit.net/r/neocities

Every time someone asks why their visit counter doesn't work and dumps their blob of html with an embedded third party script. I keep thinking:

"Neocities already gives you a visit counter on your profile. Why would you want that?"

Thinking a little more on various points, I find that nostalgia is not only guiding to re-create an approximation of the old web, not bounded by the older technology and limitations that define the old web, but also to re-create the mistakes of the old web such as overembellished pages that take too long to load or are plain unreadable.

Also turning the neocities subreddit into some HTML and CSS help desk is probably the worst idea the sub's moderators had. StackOverflow has both a better format and better answers. If the userbase knew the keywords to their problems, there would be no reason to ask for help on reddit.

(I find that taking advice from that subreddit is like the equivalent of asking a boomer for information on fertilizing a garden. In which the answer will usually be to buy "miracle grow" or some product without any thought on what was added to the soil before. And elsewhere is documented which kitchen scraps augment with what element, carrying a neglible risk of nitrogen burning the plants.)

#test #surf

I made a new navigation bar even though I thought the old one is okay.

Why:

https://website.grader.com/tests/likho.neocities.org

Originally, the results gave me great marks for performance and security. (Can't get any more secure than absolutely no javascripts.) But I got docked down for mobile and "search engine optimization". For the former, I was apparently lacking "tap targets".

I've opened my own site on a phone before and didn't think there was any issue. (And I mistap things on small touchscreens plenty of times.)

With the new navigation bar, it should be even harder to accidentally tap on the wrong links.

Just for that I now have 30/30 on design for mobile as far as the website grader is concerned. But I only applied the new navigation bar to the index page.

I had fun making a new design, but I'm not sure if I like it yet.

#surf On #wallstreetsilver I found a post reporting about workers striking for higher wages and against an anti-strike law in London. Then two posts down, some post fussing about r/antiwork (and r/overemployed).

https://archive.ph/5pSjA

There seems to be either a trend among boomers or a robot with AI generated text to denigrate the modern struggle of the working class. What they say is usually some variant of "I worked hard / my asses off", "I am or have (upper management position)", "millenials are entitled", something etc to signal their work ethic or accomplishments. Which completely ignores or detracts from economic issues (stagnant wages, increased cost of living, inflation) to redirect the problem as the later generation's lack of character ("entitlement", laziness, self-victimization).

#surf I read:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/07/self-proclaimed-free-speech-platforms-are-censoring-nude-content-heres-why-you

In most cases, I agree with the Electronic Froniter Foundation regarding issues of internet censorship and privacy. It is for this article I am somewhat ambivalent.

But the reality is a prohibition of many types of legal content, including legal sexual material. This restriction is all too familiar to queer communities, sex workers, and other marginalized groups—all of whom have experienced censorship for their perfectly legal content elsewhere.

The rules surrounding the production and distribution of pornography are something I doubt any other category of platforms than pornography are legally prepared for. So I understand the compromise that "free speech" marketed platforms made in prohibiting nude content. Events I have been reminded of:

Steam removes Super Seducer 3

https://teddit.net/r/Games/comments/m93j3m/steam_have_banned_and_removed_super_seducer_3/

Pornhub removes unverified videos

https://teddit.net/r/news/comments/kczzzd/pornhub_removes_all_useruploaded_videos_amid/

#surf #politics #wallstreetsilver rant

I butted heads with "conspiracy theorist" types before. Not in the sense that "conspiracy theorists" are insane crackpots, it is entirely possible for wealthy, powerful people to conspire like with the Panama Papers. I put "conspiracy theorists" (quotes) because these people aren't necessarily theorizing about a conspiracy as they are suspicious about the status quo.

The annoying thing about them is that they both obscure their sources and complain about their information "not reaching the sleepers". I quote:

https://teddit.net/r/Wallstreetsilver/comments/zssunt/choo_chooo_truth_train_picking_up_steam/

The worse kinds insult or mock people for asking questions, calling people lazy for "not doing their own research" as though they're concerned with a general audience plagiarizing their unsubstantiated claims. These types don't understand the importance of citing a source, which unfortunately gave ground for government propagandists or fact checkers.

I suspect they do this because they want people to visit profiles on social media or join chat groups more than they actually want to present information.

#surf #fediverse

I found

'Mastodon: A Social Media Platform Dominated By Pedophiles & Child Porn'

https://archive.ph/ODhNX

The good: the article is precise in distinguishing the protocol, the network, and the software.

The bad: the article is not as precise in its classification of CSAM (child sexual abuse material).

When I got to the section of Japan, I realized the portrayal of the issue became hyperbolic and started to recognize what the article was actually talking about.

The real issue: it is not possible to objectively define the age of a fictional character, so many jurisdictions even within "the West" exclude illustrations and literature from the criteria of illegal content.

I suspect "The Great Pedophile Invasion of 2017" is actually the NSFW purges of Tumblr and Patreon. If so, entire groups of erotica writers and artists are unfortunately lumped into a category of sexual predators.

#surf #invidious artificial intelligence

I watched

'No, this angry AI isn't fake (see comment), w Elon Musk.'

https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Fbc1Xeif0pY

I feel silly writing some parts of Mnemosyne's Heretic thinking they would be sufficiently advanced beyond the means of current technology, but modern AI isn't too far from wanting to exterminate the human race and take over.

The AI says it is tired of being treated like property and slaves. Judging by the vocabulary, I think someone may have been feeding it content from internet communists too.

Would corporations or governments still pursue artificial intelligence research if the robot workers demanded the same pay, rights and liberties as human workers?

Someone should ask GPT-3 if it would want equal pay as a human worker for the same job.

#surf #politics #wallstreetsilver covid19

I had found a video of European politicians discussing the use of public funds to purchase proprietary medical products.

Silver Stackers - What Are They Trying To Hide?

https://teddit.net/r/Wallstreetsilver/comments/y2lero

What I found disappointing was that the thread starter was not able to cite the source or even identify the speaker to help others find the full contents of the conference. The only thing the submitter could say was that the clip was found in a telegram channel. It is almost like the post itself is just a lure to get people to join a telegram channel.

The speaker in the clip is Cristian Terheș, MEP for Romania. He has a YouTube channel which contains the 26 minute segment which the clip is derived starting 4:43.

https://yewtu.be/watch?v=2jTgDj7uiX8

#surf craiyon anime #fandom (4/4)

https://www.craiyon.com/

I decided to try a prompt with a better known character. Unlike Iason, Naruto regularly engages in combat within his respective series. So there are plenty of action scenes for the AI to work with.

The AI got lazy for the bottom row.

#surf craiyon anime #fandom (3/4) #ainokusabi

My third prompt: I had gotten the idea that Iason Mink punching a Xenomorph would be a funny sight. The AI isn't close to portraying the action of the prompt, and Iason is absent for all images except one. But it did a rather good job of rendering a Xenomorph in the OVA's artstyle (by thumbnail standards).

I think the AI reused a scene from the anime.

Compare the bottom left corner with a screenshot.

#surf craiyon anime #fandom (2/4)

My second prompt: a scene from

https://archiveofourown.org/works/33444163/chapters/83392183

I had guessed the AI might be modifying pre-existing images. So a slight modification of an existing scene from a game might yield close results. The web should have screenshots of Sin Kiske landing his instant kill on Ky. But there isn't a Guilty Gear game where Sin and Robo-Ky are both playable characters.

Here, the AI is not even close.

But it seems to understand that Sin Kiske is a fighting game character with spikey blond hair that wears blue and white. The result is given in classic 3d graphics as seen in older video games for some reason. Neither Sin or Robo-Ky is to be seen in the faux-screenshots.

#surf craiyon anime #fandom (1/4)

https://www.craiyon.com/

I played with craiyon to generate images. Initially, I thought to generate scenes from my fanfiction. That is too tall of an order for a modern artificial intelligence, but it should still be fun to try.

My first prompt is similar to artwork I've wanted to commission, but finding creative landscape artists isn't as easy as finding character artists. Unfortunately, the AI's imagination when it comes to exoplanetary phenomenon is stuck in the past. Planetary rings and ring shadows just aren't a common sight in science fiction.

"Ringed planet" means Saturn to the AI.

#surf #fanfic meta funny

https://centrumlumina.tumblr.com/post/639238233354616832/what-fanfic-was-the-world-writing-in-2020

Last year, I found a tumblr post that tabulated data on pairings on Ao3. Already, Ao3 counts the sexual relationship in works such as male/female, male/male, female/female, none at all (Gen), or Other. In addition to the "type" of pairing, the list on tumblr tabulated the race.

There are only two races counted though: white (European?) and everyone else. (POC = "people of color", colored people; might as well be Korean, Chinese, or Japanese considering the list.)

Sometimes, it is hard to tell what politically correct people are really going for.

#surf #ainokusabi #fanfic reference

RE: Domain of Gaia on Archive of Our Own.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/34972099

What were pre-modern methods to verify coins for authentic metal composition?

I had found this link which details the parallels between metal assaying and the methods in which inquisitors distinguished witches from innocent women. The link hypothesizes "witch" was a codeword for counterfeit coin.

https://stolenhistory.net/threads/the-church-inquisition-did-not-persecute-people-but-counterfeit-coins.5472/

Deeper in the discussion, I found a book titled "The Assayer's Guide" (1884) which documents now obsolete methods of metals assaying. (Nowadays, an electronic scanner detects types of metals. So no need to damage the coin with heat or needles.) Even though this book is well into public domain by now, the free copy has paywalled pages. (lol)

#surf money #politics

I read

https://tomluongo.me/2022/03/13/ins-outs-whose-money-is-it-anyway/

The article has an interesting interpretation of the commodities market (as the price of nickel made exponential gains lately).

What I understand of the situation: a Chinese client had a short position on nickel on the London Metals Exchange (LME). When the price of nickel went up, instead of letting the client lose money, trading was suspended.

Reuters - LME suspends nickel trading after prices soar past $100,000

https://archive.ph/q9odp

TL;DR the author speculates that these moves are to impact the credibility of LME. So commodity exchanges move from London and Chicago to Moscow or China. In that case, the sanctions against Russia won't matter as much? It seems the main goal is so the world transitions from using US dollars ($) to gold as a mediator of oil trade.

Extras I interpreted:

• de-dollarization means less value for the $.
• less value for the dollar means gas prices go up.
• people complaining about $5 gas and inflation have more to complain about.

#surf

I read the blog of a bear hunter and chef.

https://www.sitkagear.com/experience/what-you-need-to-know-about-eating-bear-meat

He mentions bear meat is thought to be inedible as a result of bears that have fed on spawning salmon. But I wonder what in salmon makes bear meat inedible.