I recently came across a Swedish blog post exploring generative AI, visual culture, aesthetics, and the relationship between AI-generated imagery and authoritarian political tendencies. It's well worth reading in full, not least because it also explains in accessible terms how generative image systems actually function and why certain visual patterns emerge so consistently from them. The discussion around aesthetics stayed with me, but the larger question was harder to shake: what kinds of…

If you’re craving something light, fresh, and full of flavour, this Crispy Chicken Salad is the perfect summer supper. It starts with tender chicken breasts sliced in half to keep them juicy and quick‑cooking then coated in a golden Parmesan‑panko crust that adds the most irresistible crunch.The salad itself is simple and vibrant — crisp greens, shaved carrot ribbons (a vegetable peeler works beautifully), cool cucumber, and de-seeded tomatoes so the dressing stays bright and punchy instead of…

There Are Some Highly Contested Primaries Tomorrow Voters in New York, Maryland and Utah go to the polls tomorrow for primary elections. South Carolina voters are voting in runoffs. Some of the races are bitterly contested. Let's start with New York since it has many very competitive races. The heated primaries there, mostly in deep blue districts, are riven by everything that divides Democrats: generational change, Israel, outside spending by AI and crypto groups, socialism and more: Click…

The younger man looked nervous, and his supervisor was only marginally less so. Their visitor passes read ESA, and bore a small holographic mark which they had both assumed was standard, but it had drawn expressions of quickly-concealed surprise from more than one person they’d passed on their way from the building’s grand entrance to the office on the sixth floor. There was no plaque on the door, but there had been two secretaries and three armed guards in the outer chamber. The office was…

I am increasingly convinced that the first question pastors should ask about AI is not, “Can it write this sermon?” A better question is: “Can it help me work with the notes I already have?” That difference matters. A blank AI prompt invites the tool to lead. It asks the machine to decide the angle, structure, emphasis, and application before the pastor has done the slower work of observation, prayer, and judgment. Sometimes the output sounds impressive. That is part of the danger. A polished…

I used to love the Cluetrain Manifesto. What was not to love? I was young and rather clueless, and with a rebellious streak. Here come The Beatles, and they tell you that the ways of the world are wrong, which was true, and that everything will change. Which was false. Quite naturally, I hopped on the Cluetrain. It served me well for some time, so no hard feelings. And yet, it’s incredible how different things turned out to be! We went from… #62 Markets do not want to talk to flacks and…

The thing I notice after one month1 post-surgery is that I am going longer without thinking about my new scars, the still-lingering sensitivity of the surgery area or other stuff related to the surgery. I just do my usual, everyday routines. This is good. I even have 293 Intensity Minutes for the week. Intensity Minutes sounds very macho, but in my case, it’s just brisk walking. I want to run tomorrow, but it’s supposed to get up to 30°C, which is pretty stupid hot, but we’ll see. (Please see…

Frontier spaces

Jack isn’t quite old enough to sit through the Star Wars movies but that day is coming —presuming I can get him out of the Marvel universe long enough, Spidey and his Amazing Friends is pretty good though!— and I do wonder what he’ll make of it. Just another old movie that Dad wants him to watch? Which makes me wonder what his ‘Star Wars’ movie will be? Do movie releases still have that big an impact? I think so, but in 10 years time, when he’s 14, will it still be the same? Probably not.…

Actually another slow week! My partner and I have picked up running again, and hopefully are making it a recurring thing again. I did 3km @ 6:55 pace - I'm soooo washed, but it did feel good to get out of the house and get moving again. My shoulders and calves are all fucked up, but otherwise it felt great! Nothing a few stretches can't fix! Otherwise, super low-key. I bought a puzzle and started working on it with my partner, and we played our first game of MTG together. Both are super low…

Talked to **** about different types of friendships and emotional baggage and obsession and gossip and bullying and we both shared anecdotes re: bullying before concluding that neither of us knew how to talk to people back then/acknowledged our part of The Problem but I'm angry and resentful thinking about it now because,,, 1.) are bullies introspective are they having these conversations with their bully friends 2.) could I be a bully in denial? I think there should be bully support groups,…

Found this image on Instagram, it describes exactly how I feel at 51.

We're no strangers to the glory of the Icelandic black scene, which has always aimed for production of music with ever-present ferocity, and continental significance. Most of the bands active during the previous decade dominated my playlists of favorites, some of which I still consider recordings or such magnitude that elevates the whole genre. One could argue that one of the perpetrators of the movement was Svartidauði with their earliest demos in the mid 00s, then continued by numerous…

Everyone knows they should invest more in themselves. Exercise. Learning. Meditation. The creative project that has nothing to do with work and everything to do with who they actually are.Everyone also knows exactly what happened to those things. They slid off the calendar one week at a time, replaced by things that felt more urgent and less personal. Not dramatically. Gradually. Until you struggle to answer the question "what do you do for fun?" The cost is a gradual flattening. A narrowing of…

Hope you had blessed Sunday! ✝️🙏 Time for another Catholic Meme Monday. That’s all I have this week. Stay tuned for next week’s Catholic Meme Monday. Receive updates straight to your email inbox by subscribing to The Simple Catholic blog. P.S. If you prefer receiving quality Catholic humor in daily doses follow me on Instagram @thesimplecatholic. The post Catholic Meme Monday— Issue 232 first appeared on The Simple Catholic. The post Catholic Meme Monday— Issue 232 appeared first on The Simple…

Nearly forty years ago I drove to Beaversprite, a nature reserve near Dolgeville in upstate New York, in the foothills of the Adirondacks, to interview the caretaker. The founder, known for taming beavers and permitting some to live in her house, had recently died and the fate of the sanctuary was uncertain. I spent much of the day speaking with the caretaker and tramping around the grounds, and late in the afternoon started the drive back to Albany. On the way, at a deep dip in the road, I…

I run a website for my local town called Discover Dursley. One of the platform sections is the local What’s On, and I’m always on the hunt for local events to add into the weekly roundup. So I follow hundred’s of local facebook pages which produces a handy stream I can quickly scan for event posters. Of course, over the last year or so, the rise of the AI poster has been relentless. You know the ones I mean. They’re kinda hard to define, but a bit like life itself, you know it when you see it.…

Nebraska, 2013: Scottsbluff was the starting point for a nice drive across Nebraska, not the interstate but as an entry to Nebraska 2, which took us east to Farwell, which was also interesting.

Leonora Carrington. CONNECTED: i left my soul in bed: 10feb26 morning computer pluriverse 27jan24 Yuji Agematsu. Love the little SCHWA alien. morning computer: some useful things first thing in the day. My free weekly newsletter is at https://orbitaloperations.beehiiv.com/

Deeper understanding of the code and software systems we work on, is not only pragmatic and practical but highly enjoyable as well ... But, if it is both joyful and powerful, why are we so often prone to skip the struggle to understand and take shortcuts, accepting copy-pasted/generated solutions and generic answers, not analyzed?

Caltrain is working on their level boarding roadmap. If their recent work on grade separations is anything to go by, the capture of the agency by the layers of consultants belonging to the transit industrial complex is likely to result in a gold-plated mega-project approach to delivering level boarding in the late 2030s, where each station platform must be reconstructed from the ground up at a system-wide cost easily topping $2 billion.We don’t need to let them turn level boarding into another…

Nau mai,Yesterday we played at Green River Festival, in Greenfields, Massachusetts. In today’s blog I hit the correct spelling of Massachusetts on the second attempt, I’m proud to announce. We had another day in paradise. Snowpiercer was parked behind our festival stage when we woke up, and she was looking decidedly more handsome than the other two coaches she was parked next to. It was another compact festival and we were only a stone’s throw from all the important facilities that would get us…

First thing firstly: I went to OB this morning. It was uneventful. Chilly. Wonderful after several days of not being in the ocean. I was in Northern Virginia / Washington D.C. Instagram used to be where I’d post trip photos. As the platform has worsened, I do it less. That obliges me to post here more. Or somewhere at least. It was a family trip. It was great. I’ll post more later. In the meantime, have a great week. Sign my Guestbook | Contact Me | Book office hours | Share

Since it was created 9 years ago, this blog has been reporting on the way the City of London council leadership weaponises standards. For the entire time we’ve been covering our local authority’s standards regime establishment supporters have been free to flout the rules, and those who oppose that establishment have been persecuted for alleged standards violations despite adhering to the rules. Indeed the vigilantism of the City council’s old Standards Committee was so extreme that it had to be…

Review Originally Published March 13th, 2002 Most of the buzz around Mystic Eye Games which has come my way has focused on their Nightmares & books or the The Hunt: Rise of Evil campaign setting. Not very much attention, it seems, has turned to their modules – such as The Pit of Loch-Durnan, an adventure for characters of 2nd to 4th level. And maybe there’s a good reason for: The Pit of Loch-Durnan has a lot of problems. But we’ll come back to that. First, let’s take a quick peek at the plot.…

So, awhile back, I decided to start self hosting my music collection. I’m sure I’ve at least mentioned it somewhere here on the blog. I re-downloaded my entire collection and more beyond that. Nearly 5TB of new music was stored on my various hard drives. It took months. And by the end, I was pretty damn proud of it. I’ve been using that system now for months, and I’ve realized that I miss streaming services like Tidal and Spotify. It makes me feel a little dirty writing it, but it’s true. Why?…

Two quotes, apropos of nothing: A lot of software developers are seduced by the old “80/20” rule. It seems to make a lot of sense: 80% of the people use 20% of the features. So you convince yourself that you only need to implement 20% of the features, and you can still sell 80% as many copies. Unfortunately, it’s never the same 20%. Everybody uses a different set of features. — Joel Spolsky, Strategy Letter IV: Bloatware and the 80/20 Myth Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the…