[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 6 points 16 hours ago

I actually love my foldable Razr. I never could afford one as a kid, and the smaller form-factor is actually really nice.

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 14 points 16 hours ago

Basically yes, a chatbot and the ability to do simple actions (agents). So in their fantasy universe, instead of clicking on Firefox and typing a query in the search bar, you'd ask the desktop to search for something, and it would do those steps.

That's all just an excuse though, to explain why they need to collect all your local data. :P

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 6 points 21 hours ago

The secret I've found to a wonderful work life balance is to become indispensable in knowledge, but to not do much or any labor; just be a walking encyclopedia for your job role that enables others to do their's.

For managers who do not yet understand your new work dynamic, make sure to say 'yes' , very enthusiastically, to whatever they ask, but then just don't actually do it. They'll learn to stop asking, but they can't afford to lose you either.

Rejoice, you are now an "SME".

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 4 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I think you are looking for a unified solution to deal with very different and very nuanced problems.

The swastika was chosen by Hitler as a means to legitimize his movement. It's important to remember that the average 1920s German had little formal schooling in world history. Even compared to our shitty and revisionist US curriculum, they had next to nothing. He could co-opt it and people were legitimately like, "wow, that's crazy, I absolutely have never heard of Buddhism or Hinduism or anything. Maybe we really did used to rule all of them". The Nazi swastika was at no point a dogwhistle, it's a very explicit and bold statement of their false identity. It was an assertion of power and authority. If you cede the symbol to them, you are intrinsically acknowledging them as the "legitimate" owners of that symbol, which they are not. You can very easily distinguish between a swastika that is being flown as a white supremacist symbol, and one that is not. No Nazis are building Buddhist temples or weaving faux-Native American textiles just so they can have a "plausibly deniable" swastika, nor using pictures of those items to masquerade as non-Nazis with a nudge and a wink (because that would hurt their 'pride'). They just use Nazi imagery directly.

To attack this, you need to very actively de-legitimize its improper usage, and boost its proper usage. The message cannot be "yes, this thousands of years old symbol really is about the Nazis", because that is the stance of the Nazis themselves. It has to be, "fuck off Nazis, that's not your's, and we're going to actively weed out your bullshit".

On the other side are symbols like Pepe, where the purpose was never about legitimizing their ideology, but in fact to hide it and dogwhistle. The creator of Pepe is attempting valiantly to do exactly what I said above, but I think that while getting Nazis to stop using it (and everything else, air included) is great, there is no wider history or adoption that makes Pepe worth using elsewhere. It was just a cartoon frog. In this case, drawing a direct line between people who choose to represent themselves with Pepe, and with the shitty ideologies they're using it to dogwhistle about, is actually the best counter to them, because a dogwhistle isn't a dogwhistle if the relationship is explicit and universally understood.

Banning Pepe outright in Steam profiles makes complete sense to me, because it sends the message that "we know what you're using this to mean, and you're not fooling anyone, dumbass".

Whereas IMO Valve should make it very clear that swastikas will be reviewed, and any Nazi swastikas will result in an immediate ban, whereas use in the legitimate meanings will not be (and that they will take context into consideration, i.e. user location, other profile info, past handles, discussion comments, etc etc).

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 5 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I think its worth considering that the Native Americans whose version of the symbol was most directly copied elected to give it up, and that was in 1920. How could we ask Buddhists to give up their symbol of piece? If it isn’t fair to Buddhists, why did the Navajo, Hopi, Apache, and Tohono O’odham feel like they HAD to?

Are you asking me to speak to this? I can't speak to the personal motivations or viewpoints of either Native American tribes, nor of a myriad of Asian cultures. But I can say that I don't personally believe it is either fair, appropriate, or necessary for Buddhists to stop using a symbol they've used for thousands of years in order to distance themselves from a group they are not in fact associated with.

groups make incredible leaps of empathy like that

I think you may have fallen prey to a false narrative around this. From what I'm seeing, the "whirling log" (the native american symbol that resembles the swastika) was mostly dropped due to pressure from white people over their own white guilt and the politics around Nazism, not out of some collective spontaneous show of empathy, and never actually fell out of use completely, and is now being actively reclaimed by various native americans.

During World War II, Eskeets said the U.S. government asked the Navajo to “hold off” on using the symbol. So for an unknown amount of time, Eskeets said metalsmiths, weavers and other artists stopped incorporating it into their work. That helped create the misconception that items with a whirling log are no longer being made at all.

It's apparently still being actively used by the Navajo, as well, but they tend not to talk to white people about it since people can't have a normal one.

The sacredness of the “whirling log” makes it challenging to get some Native Americans to speak to non-Natives about the subject. That’s according to Edison Eskeets, a trader at The Hubbell Trading Post, a national historic site and the oldest operating trading post on the Navajo Nation and in the United States. Several Navajo artists were contacted and either didn’t respond to requests or hung up the phone when asked to speak about the symbol’s significance.

Eskeets said the whirling log represents humanity and life and is still used for healing in hundreds of Navajo ceremonies.

“It kind of has everything on it,” he said. “It represents the constellation, the moon, the sun, the equinox. It’s down to the earth, the four directions, the rotation of mother earth, all of that … it’s the rotation of life.”

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 8 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

But the old meanings are all dead.

I'm sorry, but this is completely false. The swastika is still used all across the world for its original meanings. If you'd said this about e.g. Norse symbols like the Valknut or Sonnenrad, I'd be 1000% on board with you, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say you've not been to anywhere that Buddhism is common if you think everyone associates the swastika with Nazism.

There are specific versions of the swastika that Nazi Germany created that are only associated with Nazism, such as the 45-degree rotated swastika, or obviously any swastika embedded within another German military symbol, but to assert that the basic symbol itself has been co-opted is very Euro-centric.

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 4 points 3 days ago

Probably none. Now I'll name one that is large and influential, and isn't trying to combat the problem: X

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 5 points 3 days ago

No, bots are not real people, so them masquerading as real people holding an opinion is, by definition, misinformation.

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 6 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

This isn’t misinformation.

Right, the other example is. The whole point is the difference between propaganda (the bots) and legitimate political sentiment (all real people). Given that Musk is actively choosing not to combat misinformation bots on his platform, it's fair to step in.

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 8 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

They're not just reading into it, if that's what you mean; the SA, and the rest of the crew's behavior towards Anya is all very much what they described. Jimmy seeing Anya as a disfigured womb with a foal (as in, a horse) is literally what happens, not a figure of speech.

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 13 points 4 days ago

I think it's important for groups of people to be able to choose to ban propaganda and misinformation, because propaganda is not simply information being imparted, it's an entire ecosystem of deceptive methods to disseminate information and to alter your perception without you realizing.

If it were calling for the EU banning X solely because they don't like Musk's shitty personal opinions, I'd agree with you, but they cite the disinformation, misinformation, and outright propaganda that the platform is being used to spread, and I think that's perfectly valid.

Take 2 scenarios:

5 million actual people telling you that 'x' political view is common and popular, causing you to doubt, or at least temper your own personal beliefs.

500 thousand actual people, plus 4.5 million bot accounts telling you that 'x' political view is common and popular, causing you to doubt, or at least temper your own personal beliefs.

In reality, you don't even need the bot accounts to outnumber the real users if you control the algorithms that determine what people see, which is exactly the situation that X is in right now.

tl;dr This isn't about banning the viewpoints themselves, it's about banning a platform that deceptively alters visibility of viewpoints to manipulate people.

Banning things you don’t like is not a solution

Tell that to Musk; X bans TONS of people over their viewpoints.

[-] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 5 points 4 days ago

I want to pay them for Bloodborne on PC, but Sony won't let me! Sounds like that's their choice/ problem.

81
submitted 2 weeks ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/politics@beehaw.org

Missouri voters on Tuesday resoundingly approved an amendment to overturn the state’s near-total abortion ban, making it the first state to do so in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which eliminated federal constitutional protection of abortion. The passage of Amendment 3, which enshrines reproductive rights in the state constitution, signals the potential to begin restoring access to health care in a swath of the country that has become an abortion desert.

“The people of Missouri — be they Democrat, Republican, or independent — have resoundingly declared that they don’t want politicians involved in their private medical decisions,” said Rachel Sweet, campaign manager for Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, the umbrella organization for the Yes on 3 campaign.

Taking the wins where I can, today...

42
submitted 1 month ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/news@beehaw.org

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/16537189

Selected the wrong WorldNews community (lemmy.ml) -_-

The Generals’ Plan was presented to the parliament last month by a group of retired generals and high-ranking officers, according to publicly available minutes. Since then, officials from the prime minister’s office called seeking more details, according to its chief architect, Giora Eiland, a former head of the National Security Council.

Israeli media reported that Netanyahu told a closed parliamentary defense committee session that he was considering the plan.

Eiland said the only way to stop Hamas and bring an end to the yearlong war is to prevent its access to aid.

“They will either have to surrender or to starve,” Eiland said. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that we’re going to kill every person,” he said. “It will not be necessary. People will not be able to live there (the north). The water will dry up.”

...

When asked if the evacuation orders in northern Gaza marked the first stages of the “Generals’ Plan,” Israeli military spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani said no.

“We have not received a plan like that,” he added.

But one official with knowledge of the matter said parts of the plan are already being implemented, without specifying which parts. A second official, who is Israeli, said Netanyahu “had read and studied” the plan, “like many plans that have reached him throughout the war,” but didn’t say whether any of it had been adopted. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity, because the plan isn’t supposed to be discussed publicly.

On Sunday, Israel launched an offensive against Hamas fighters in the Jabaliya refugee camp north of the city. No trucks of food, water or medicine have entered the north since Sept. 30, according to the U.N. and the website of the Israeli military agency overseeing humanitarian aid crossings.

36
submitted 1 month ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/worldnews@lemmy.ml

The Generals’ Plan was presented to the parliament last month by a group of retired generals and high-ranking officers, according to publicly available minutes. Since then, officials from the prime minister’s office called seeking more details, according to its chief architect, Giora Eiland, a former head of the National Security Council.

Israeli media reported that Netanyahu told a closed parliamentary defense committee session that he was considering the plan.

Eiland said the only way to stop Hamas and bring an end to the yearlong war is to prevent its access to aid.

“They will either have to surrender or to starve,” Eiland said. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that we’re going to kill every person,” he said. “It will not be necessary. People will not be able to live there (the north). The water will dry up.”

...

When asked if the evacuation orders in northern Gaza marked the first stages of the “Generals’ Plan,” Israeli military spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani said no.

“We have not received a plan like that,” he added.

But one official with knowledge of the matter said parts of the plan are already being implemented, without specifying which parts. A second official, who is Israeli, said Netanyahu “had read and studied” the plan, “like many plans that have reached him throughout the war,” but didn’t say whether any of it had been adopted. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity, because the plan isn’t supposed to be discussed publicly.

On Sunday, Israel launched an offensive against Hamas fighters in the Jabaliya refugee camp north of the city. No trucks of food, water or medicine have entered the north since Sept. 30, according to the U.N. and the website of the Israeli military agency overseeing humanitarian aid crossings.

24
submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org

Been working on a cyberdeck project for a few days, using it to learn woodworking and wiring. Currently have the front and rear panels cut and attach-able, and the PSU wired up to supply enough power for the rPi 5.

Still have to finish the handle and side panels, and wire up the second PSU for supplying the fans, screen, and temp sensor. Also have to plan, assemble, and install the keyboard. Lastly, I'll paint and lacquer the case panels.

I'm trying to hew more closely to a Shadowrun-esque deck design, rather than the clamshell designs that are more popular now.

Gallery

21
Workin' hard (beehaw.org)
submitted 2 months ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/humor@beehaw.org
21
submitted 3 months ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/climate@slrpnk.net

Some photos from during the California Camp Fire, taken in SF during the daytime

14
submitted 3 months ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org

Hello Bees!

I've got a couple of projects lined up that I want to use SBCs (single-board computers) for, and I admit that I have very little knowledge about how the different SBCs from different manufacturers compare to each other, so I figured I'd get y'all's help.

Project 1: Portable media server

This is something I've been wanting for a while in order to make long car trips that involve low or no internet access more enjoyable. The basic idea I have is an SBC with a 2-4 M.2 SSDs, wireless, and bluetooth, that I can load up with media and run Jellyfin on, and then connect to with whatever devices I have around (whether that's a tablet, a smart tv in a hotel, etc). I want to do this as an SBC versus on a laptop partially so I can power it off my car more easily, and potentially have the car play music from it while driving.

I'm leaning towards something like the CM3588 from FriendlyElec is where I'm leaning, so I could RAID 5 some 4TB M.2 SSDs and get ~11.5TB usable (which would match my current Jellyfin home server setup). I'd love to hear if thoughts on this for this kind of portable use case, and any recommendations on alternatives, or other routes to explore.

Project 2: Miniature AI Machine

I've enjoyed experimenting with LLMs and StableDiffusion, and I want to make something a little faster and more targeted towards AI without building a 5U GPU server (nor do I have a spare $14.5k for a barebones setup of one). I've seen SBCs targeting AI use via baked-in NPUs, or with NPU expansion slots, and I'm interested in what y'all think about this approach.

I've also seen people with rPi clusters ostensibly for ML applications, but never any real write-ups on how these perform compared to a regular (E-)ATX machine with a high-end GPU.

115
submitted 3 months ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/politics@beehaw.org

Talking about JD Vance, he said

And I gotta tell you, I can't wait to debate the guy.

That is, if he's willing to get off the couch and show up.

...See what I did there?

The rest of his speech is worth a watch, to see just how good of a pick he really was.

74
submitted 4 months ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/politics@beehaw.org

The highest 24-hour fundraising total, surpassing Trump's post-conviction and (likely, given that they refuse to disclose it) post-assassination totals.

888,000 small donors, 500,000 of whom were first-time donors for this campaign cycle.

That's the engagement and energy we should have been having this whole time. That's the kind of engagement and energy that landslides Trump.

30
submitted 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/politics@beehaw.org

The chorus of condemnation was predictable and not in itself a problem: There’s nothing wrong with desiring a world without stochastic assassination attempts, even against political opponents. But when you have Israel’s minister of foreign affairs, Israel Katz of the fascistic ruling Likud Party, tweeting, “Violence can never ever be part of politics,” the very concept of “political violence” is evacuated of meaning.

The problem is not so much one of hypocrisy or insincerity — vices so common in politics that they hardly merit mention. The issue, rather, is what picture of “political violence” this messaging serves: To say that “political violence” has “no place” in a society organized by political violence at home and abroad is to acquiesce to the normalization of that violence, so long as it is state and capitalist monopolized.

As author Ben Ehrenreich noted on X, “There is no place for political violence against rich, white men. It is antithetical to everything America stands for.”

167
submitted 4 months ago by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/politics@beehaw.org

Liberal Democratic U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has introduced articles of impeachment against conservative U.S. Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, her office said on Wednesday.

It won't pass, but at least it's nice to be reminded that The Squad is still out there trying to actively better our world just a bit.

77
submitted 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) by t3rmit3@beehaw.org to c/politics@beehaw.org

This sucks. This is leaning further into the Major Questions Doctrine that SCOTUS has been pushing, where agencies and their actually knowledgeable, employed scientists and technical experts, have no real control over regulatory policies, and instead are beholden to Congress and judges to decide e.g. how many ppm of a chemical is safe for people to drink.

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t3rmit3

joined 1 year ago