Just released today a new Ladytron track and to think you can purchase this without pants on. flip it on to your computer. and on to your phone. ladytron.bandcamp.com/track/i-beli... BandcampFriday
Former Twitter user, but I left when it became a Nazi bar. Made the nytimes Twitter bot, worked for the NYT before moving into civic technology. Living in Takoma Park, MD and fighting for a hopeful and humane future. (He/him) More info at jacobharr.is
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Just released today a new Ladytron track and to think you can purchase this without pants on. flip it on to your computer. and on to your phone. ladytron.bandcamp.com/track/i-beli... BandcampFriday
Left: yesterday Right: today
So many dogs deserve the right to a jury
“Ethical concerns” is not just a euphemism here, it’s wrong. A concern is apprehension about something uncertain. There is nobody concerned about the ethics here, because there is nothing uncertain. It’s indisputably illegal and unethical; people either care or they don’t.
$1.5 billion sounds like a lot of money, but keep in mind that Anthropic just raised $13 billion in its latest fundraising round and is valued at $183 billion
It’s been the teams, people working together to figure things out and get things done. We build in sand. But we are building it together. How lucky we are!
Sorry for all the philosophizing. The job search has been tough, the DOGE-driven destruction of civic tech institutions has broken my heart. But it’s left me reflective about why I love programming and what’s given me joy. It’s never been the algorithms or hours staring alone at a screen,
Everybody should encounter an old mainframe system in their career. You might sneer at first but then you realize that nothing you build will last nearly so long. Your code might last 10 years if you’re lucky. We will leave no monuments. We build in sand. The meaning then is only what code does
I’ve started thinking of it in Discworld terms, many young programmers start their careers as precocious wizards, wielding abstractions to pull the world in and reshape the world out. But the truly wise and lucky ones eventually become Granny Weatherwax. Sometimes you need more headology than magic
Codecs shouldn’t be in that list. For all the relentless tweaking that went into the MP3 standard, the creator was still listening to a song he loved, one that he wanted to sound good to his ears. I frankly pity the cryptocurrency crowd and relentless optimization junkies for their sterile realms
But for most of us, the hard work is all about properly handling reality -> computer (and vice versa) with all its messiness and ambiguities. And I’d argue that is the most joyful aspect of the work. It’s certainly the most wonderfully human aspect of it
Let me expand on this: the situations where the technical is the main problem, where the choice of algorithm/language makes a huge difference are ones where the hard work of translating reality -> computer is already done/irrelevant: cryptography, search, sort, codecs, etc.
@danhon.com Not sure if you saw this, but it is up your alley too...
Stares in "No Silver Bullet" by Fred Brooks 99% of the time, the hard problems aren't technical but architectural, conceptual or procedural
A developer came up to me, big full-stack talent, really into scale and frameworks, tears in his eyes, and says, "I want to work in the office on computer, but remote is killing me." You hear that folks? Remote was literally killing him. So, I said to him we have to find a better way
if we've learned anything this year, it's that congress is pretty much powerless over decisions that have to do with the computer. does renaming DOD require an act of congress? yea. but uhhh, they'll just change it on the computer anyways.
Apparently we lost Vietnam because woke. bsky.app/profile/atru...
Press F to shake fist at an uncaring god
"Abundance deez nuts"
In 1988, it was illegal to sell a coffee mug without one of these cats on it
I know there's a lot going on, but it should be getting more attention that the governor of Illinois just credibly accused Texas of planning to literally invade his state. I unpack how profoundly alarming this is @theunpopulist.net:
More than 300k Black women being pushed out of the labor market while white men gained 365k more jobs is what we mean when we refer to racism as systemic.
Okay so that is (as far as we know): 3 Aegis-class destroyers, the cruiser the USS Lake Eerie, a fast-attack submarine, the 3-ship Iwo Jima amphibious ready group carrying a Marine Expeditionary Unit and now 10 F-35s (unclear which branch's F-35s) deployed to the Caribbean. All in the last month.
A major economic challenge we're not talking enough about: It's getting harder and harder for young people to find entry-level jobs. We are definitely feeling this in NYC. Nat’l unemployment rate for ages 16-24 just hit 10.5%, highest it's been since the pandemic. Rising steadily.
ME: I feel like I’m starting to spiral THERAPIST: well, we’ve talked about the five steps you should take to… ME: I know I know. Find one thing I can pet, one book I can buy, one dumpling I can eat, one leg I can shake, and one season of Murder She Wrote I can binge THERAPIST: what
I do think that LLM-assisted coding of open ends is one of the genuinely promising use cases for the technology, so I hope that continues to develop, but also lol www.langerresearch.com/wp-content/u...
It’s a proud Philadelphia tradition, it means “good luck”
Shout out @d3ol.dev
We are in the absolute wildest of times
Of course there is a positive spin on the dreadful jobs numbers through a nativist/anti-government lens
I mean, yeah, if i was an executive of a manufacturing company who just saw what happened to workers and other executives at my or another manufacturing company, i would be rethinking manufacturing my products in the United States 🤷🏾♂️
Me sowing: Haha fuck yeah!!! Yes!! Me reaping: Well this fucking sucks. What the fuck.
I know the focus today is on "the numbers." But lemme share a feeling: I'm worried. The economy was in a good place in late 2024. That's no longer true. And the trajectory is, at a minimum, concerning. That's millions of peoples lives, and millions of stories of pain.
It’s almost like you might need to do a sustained program of policy and calibrated incentives vs. just slapping down a tariff and declaring victory. Best option is probably a new and growing industry, like maybe environmental products, just spitballing here
The job market continues to slow, and it's pretty dramatic. Keeping our head above water (for now). August jobs growth was only +22k. July revised up +6k to +79k. June was revised down by -27k to -13k. Average jobs growth over the three months = +29k. Unemployment rose a tick to 4.3%
Trump v. United States
it’s a real “oops all nazis” situation with every random person in this administration
video of the exchange I was referring to: bsky.app/profile/atru...
I thought Lutnick's comments might signal the numbers were going to be bad. Guess that instinct was right U.S. economy added just 22,000 jobs in August. And post-revisions, we lost jobs in June for first time since the pandemic (Dec 2020)
I realize they didn’t say exactly how the previous owner wound up there and it’s been a tight housing market with not a lot of inventory, sometimes a realtor has to take matters into their own hands…
My aux? Fed My strength? Not grunted
Not as easy as it sounds tbh.
I just hear it in the voice of the bikers at the beginning of Furiosa
I’ve done this for 2 weeks now and it *absolutely rules*. Best class discussions I’ve ever had. Best engagement with readings. They write in this worksheet for 15 minutes, then talk about their responses in groups of 3-4, then groups share with the whole class, and *then* we talk about the readings
i am watching clips from the kennedy hearing and one thing that comes across is his petulance at being challenged. he is like an overgrown baby (if that baby were a hot dog you grilled too long)
My focus group reported feeling squeezed by Trump's tariffs, job layoffs, and Medicaid cuts. But they expressed strong support for his billionaire tax cuts since all of them had bought Powerball tickets and felt good about their chances.
In this Ohio diner, War is a strategic card game and Defense is the type of lawyer they make you hire after a Michigan fan got in your face. But they do know this: Donald Trump's landslide 49% of the vote gives him a mandate to rename every department in the federal government.
so Department of War is more like a nickname. like, DOD’s teacher wouldn’t be allowed to call it Department of War in Florida.
What’s funny is that legally can’t rename so he’s subtitling it to now be The Department of Defense: Department of War like it’s some shitty NCIS spinoff
Kavanaugh's statements make the problem worse, not better. If the reason SCOTUS is using cryptic shadow docket orders is because "five" of them can't "reach a consensus or a compromise on a particular issue that might be difficult," then that order should not be precedential —there's no majority.
Some proportion magically thought Trump would keep this. I think about the interview with a Trump supporter who thought he would boost the CFPB
“well I doubt this article could lower people’s already low expectations for the moral character of venture capitalists” — me, a naive person, 40 minutes ago 😯
1 Small Thing: Trump tried to change DoD’s name Reality check: Only Congress can do that Get Smart: Access journalism in the age of Trump has hidden risks. Why it matters: Authoritarian regimes lie, deny, & distract from corruption & failures. Honest journalists shouldn’t repeat claims unchecked.
Numerous members of right-wing think tanks like AEI and the Manhattan Institute at the Abundance Conference too. This is just straight up a right-wing “movement.”
One of the best Daves I know, honestly.
everything everywhere all at dunce
los angeles angels of anaheim ass department
Today's my birthday so I'd love it if you played this game my dad described as "unpleasant."
This is *literally* what some district court judges have said in opinions! The bad things the Supreme Court is doing through the shadow docket aren’t too difficult to figure out if you take apart each piece of the legal process and describe what it is supposed to accomplish.
I'm just sitting here seething with rage about having to see those bad corners, here in my timeline on god's own website. For shame!
Forgive a self-flack, but I have a story out about how cuts to US research funding will utterly bork the life cycle of scientific discoveries --> commercial products. The venture investors who often make that happen see it coming and are freaking out. www.inc.com/adam-rogers/...
After discussion with @soundingline.bsky.social and @keithpille.bsky.social I have come up with something important for dudes
Sigh, only website… It still doesn’t have search either
This is notably the only web page made by DOGE that has a backing database (how I know www.404media.co/anyone-can-p...) and dynamic data. All of the other 4 are single page signup forms basically.
Anyhow, some of these staff have now reportedly migrated to the National Design Studio, so looking forward to more failures in web design
Also, this kind of inclusion just fails basic government security rules. We don’t even use CDN-sourced JavaScript libraries because it’s just not a good idea to take random JavaScript from elsewhere and embed it on a page that is an official government site. I personally don’t even like Google Tags
The issue seems to be that their X integration that loaded up the tweets is not working. This is why you generally don’t source your page content from a third party, especially when you have a Postgres database like they do here (you could even cache locally)
A rare bit of candor from DOGE
You literally have to get a Public Trust clearance to get hired at most government jobs news.clearancejobs.com/2025/01/15/w...
And I would never want to get between Ted and a trip to Cancun when there’s an emergency in Texas
The Trump administration has canceled the Biden era rule where airlines would have to compensate passengers for flight disruptions.
Someone here has clearly read the classics, thank you!
Time for me to cite the “No Silver Bullet” essay by Fred Brooks again
And some of us are reading in public because it's how we make the signal to our counterpart that we are here to exchange the cash for the microfilm. It's just basic tradecraft, people!
I'm going to assume this is done by men who presumably don't read books in public or even at all. There is a weird terminal online thing where they want to feel like anything different from their exact shared experience is fake, virtue signaling, whatever that I don't really don't understand
(No, we won't tell you exactly where and put down that shovel)
Watching RFK Jr confidently spout dangerous bullshit to Congress is a real demonstration of what happens when you take a conspiratorial mindset and surround it with money and privilege and yes men for 71 years.
sure this is definitely how conversations go
Just got absolutely demolished by a coworker with a standing desk
When I was 7 years old, Cal Ripken broke Lou Gehrig’s record in the 2131 game — an iconic night for impressionable kids. Back then, I really thought the Iron Man was invincible. Now, 30 years later, I talked with my childhood hero about the truth of the Streak: www.thebanner.com/sports/oriol...
All this sudden anger/language on RFK pisses me off more than anything: ➡️ stop calling him a vaccine skeptic. He’s an anti-vaxxer. ➡️ he and MAHA have always made it clear on removing/side stepping scientific experts. ➡️ he has NEVER intelligently spoke about public health. Stop. Normalizing. Him
I'm not a communications professional, but it doesn't seem like the best idea to roll into a Senate oversight committee with the attitude of "fuck you, I'm smarter than everybody here"
In hindsight, it was a mistake to change my name to Scam Likely now that we're in the era of Caller ID
Notably, after this screed claiming vaccines cause autism, RFK closed with this threat, "We're being lied to by these agencies, and we're going to change that right now" by spouting conspiracy theories and using them to justify ending vaccines access for children.
In my view, Amy Coney Barrett kicking off her book tour by doing a sold-out event with Bari Weiss and publishing an exclusive excerpt in The Free Press should end the "Supreme Court justices are not motivated by ideology" discourse once and for all ballsandstrikes.org/legal-cultur...
Palm V or a Handspring model?
"You can't take it with you" is what they say. But how do they know? If my soul is able to transfer from the physical realm, who is to say there isn't a similar soul to my hoard that could transmute like lead into gold alongside me in death
Followed by rows and rows Of the finest unused headstones
Love the hoarding though. People say you get dragons, but that's just superstition. Those people don't know the pleasure of seeing gold piled high deep within your keep
I do think they'll appreciate me leaving the meeting by taking the elevator down
What? Who even says that? I was assuming he was asking something else that he was using as a proxy for "are you trustworthy?" but that is bonkers. Of course, she is trustworthy. As a public servant, she literally has a Public Trust background clearance
Me, looking at my treasury with rheumy eyes and realizing that if I hadn't been so in love with the hoarding, I could have avoided both problems!
Anyway Senator/Dr. Bill Cassidy could have kept RFK out of government entirely if he had actually cared
The RFK hearing is a remarkable example of someone in real-time being informed about where they are on the Dunning-Kruger curve.
Apparently it's okay to skimp on the masonry and pointing and instead spend on the regular lime washing package
Possibly, the end is near too
I'm not watching. Did he literally ask her "are you trustworthy?" or did he ask for something else that he is paraphrasing that way? That's just nuts
Wrong direction though!