It's very interesting how big of a revolution will LLMs cause (and are already causing) in genetics and bioengineering since DNA and proteins are, for all intent and purposes, really really long words
It's so funny that people have such strong opinions on AI but every geneticist I meet is like "oh god finally. This thing does all the work for me. We will find the catgirl gene soon"
And no this isn't just the specialized models like alphafold. You can ask Claude or Deepseek to make pipelines and bioinformatics stuff for you and they work.
The transformer architecture, and LLM’s have very valid and very benefical advantages for humanity. At the same time, however, the raging psychopats who control these companies have indeed completely abandoned their humanity, and removed themselves from the human condition completely.
To let these people decide the fate of the world and its future is utter and sheer madness and self destruction for mankind.
I don't think they're raging pyschopaths or that they are deciding the fate of the world, let alone the destruction of humankind. I just think they want a lot of money and this stupid unequal (read, capitalist oligarch) economy is letting them get away with stupid things. LLMs are a great technology for research and yes, even entertainment. I just don't need them in every single thing I use and I don't need them to replace jobs that need a human touch.
They were using this tech to generate potential cancer-fighting proteins when I was in uni about a decade ago. I assume they can do it better now with modern models but I've been out of the field for a while. They'd use what we now call "generative AI" to come up with potential proteins, they'd be screened for the most viable (and actually makeable/refinable) candidates, and they'd be tested on cell culture assays to investigate their effect on cell growth.
When I was in my geology undergrad course about 13 years ago, one of my colleague's undergrad thesis involved the use of neural networks for studying drill cores, and I very briefly was the intern of a professor where one project I started involved developing predictive code to automatically interpret gamma profiles (what was sandstone, what was limestone, etc). Another professor of mine did her post-phd about seven or so years ago with using neural networks for generating possible seismic profiles in a simulated block diagram created from a small number of drill cores, and they were generally accurate to the regional geology.
It's only when this stuff could get somewhat passable at making entertainment that it really exploded into the mainstream, but the technology has been in the works and evolving for a very long time.
I just lost my job and I need help with medical funds NOW!!
I still have my car debts to deal with but right now, immediate problems before long term problems. I need to pay this off ASAP if I want to get my meds refilled. I am very close close to out or totally out of my meds and I need this fixed immediately. The problem is, I just got laid off last week, meaning the paltry income i had is about to dry up while i navigate unemployment.
I write to you with tears welling in my eyes, my body wracked with pain every second. I write to you because the ignore me and neglect I've endured hurts me more than my injuries. So remember, even if I die, I will never f0rgive anyone who ignored me and my suffering. I implore everyone to look at me and h@lp me by d0nating and sharing whatever they can.
This week, I've been battling severe pain and frequent fainting spells due to severe anemia, and I'm completely unable to afford essential medications because of their high cost. All I wish for is for these fainting spells to stop, and for me to find compassionate hearts to stand by me so I can bu.y my medication and recover quickly.
Shrapnel still lodges in my body, and the pain keeps me awake at night. What makes my suffering even worse is that I was injured when our house was bombed while we were inside. I need urgent surgery but the cost of the operation is exorbitant, and I can't afford it. Now, I can't even afford painkillers to the constant pain tearing at my body.
Please I don't want to diie, I just want to live without pain. I need your sincere sup.port to save my life and end this suffering as soon as possible. Please, I would be extremely grateful to anyone who can d0nate to me. and if you can't, I hope you will shar.e this pOst.
I am very worried about Fadel. He is suffering unendurable pain and desperately needs relief as soon as possible. Please donate to him if you have anything to spare.
Hey, UK folks! Waterstones is having a 3-day pre-order sale that includes the UK paperback of Enshittification (which drops on Sept 1). Use SUMMER26 to get 25% off.
Data brokers are a cancer. There's a direct line from the unrestricted collection, retention and processing of our data to a host of evils, from deepfake porn to phishing scams; from racial discrimination in hiring to ICE roundups of migrants; from targeted election interference to identity theft:
Why do data brokers exist? Because we let them. Congress hasn't passed a new federal consumer privacy law since 1988, when they made it illegal for video stores to disclose your VHS rentals. All other acts of consumer surveillance are legal. Data brokers spy on us for the same reason your dog licks its balls: because they can, and we don't stop them:
Getting rid of data brokers wouldn't solve all our problems, but it sure would go a long way to solving many of them. Rather than legally requiring platforms to spy on kids (to exclude them from being targeted by platforms' algorithms), we could prohibit platforms from spying on anyone, including kids, meaning kids couldn't be identified (much less targeted) by algorithms or ads:
Data brokers produce mountains of raw material used for every form of scam and torture. It's data brokers who power the gig economy's "algorithmic wage discrimination" system, where nurses and other workers are offered less pay based on how much credit card debt they're carrying:
So the feds (both Congress and the executive branch) have surrendered, and that leaves states alone on the battlefield fighting the privacy wars alone. State legislatures have taken some big steps, but – crucially – they've stopped short of banning data brokers from operating within their borders. Having taken a ban on data brokers off the table, states are left with complex, often unworkable "compromises" that go nowhere.
This is where DROP comes in. DROP stands for "Delete Request and Opt-out Platform," and it's a new phase of California's privacy regime that kicks off next month. Under DROP, you fill in some paperwork and then the state requires every data brokerage operating in California to delete your data, as well as any inferences they've made about you based on that data:
Implementing DROP is nowhere near as good as banning data brokers. The idea that data brokers should be able to collect, retain and process your data unless you tell them not to implies that everyone starts off wanting to be spied on, and therefore data brokers should assume that unless they hear otherwise, we're delighted to be the subject of commercial surveillance. This is an incredibly stupid supposition, contradicted by all available evidence. For example, when Apple offered iPhone owners a one-click option to block Facebook from spying on them, 96% of iPhone owners clicked the button:
Indeed, given this fact, one wonders why Apple bothers with the "don't spy on me" button at all. Why not have a "do spy on me" button that is unchecked by default, and leave users to dig through their settings to find the option to opt in to being surveilled? Of course, then it would make the fact that Apple spies on its customers and uses the data to target ads (with no way to opt out) a little awkward:
In the absence of a ban on surveillance without explicit, opt-in consent, we are left with the bizarre fiction that most of us want to be spied on, a fiction that pervades the DROP process, making the entire procedure nearly impossible to complete.
To start the DROP process, you must first create a Login.gov ID. This is an incredibly invasive process that involves photographing multiple pieces of ID and taking several selfies using special apps and webpages that hijack your device's camera and processor in a bid to prevent bad actors from spoofing the process. There's a plausible reason for this rigmarole: Login.gov is the authentication system for multiple federal, state and local IT systems in the US, so a fake or stolen Login.gov ID could be used to access your IRS, Social Security, and other very sensitive accounts.
The corollary of this is the promise of Login.gov: once you create your ID (a lengthy, multi-stage process) you won't have to jump through lots of painful bureaucratic hoops to access a wide variety of government services.
DROP didn't get the memo.
After you log in to DROP via Login.gov, you are sent a text message – to the phone number in your Login.gov profile – with a link to access a "secure" website that takes over your camera to let you take a "secure" photo of the front and back of your California driver's license or your US passport. What if you don't have either of those? I guess that means you want to be spied on by data brokers.
Note that these are the same credentials you have to supply to get the Login.gov ID that you've just used to get to this step in the process. In other words, in order to get to the stage where they ask you to photograph your driver's license, you have to have already photographed and validated your driver's license.
Once you complete this (pointless, redundant) step, you're directed back to your computer, where the process continues. Here, you must fill in all kinds of biographical detail, as well as specialized pieces of information, including your car's VIN. This is a piece of information that most people don't have – but which the California DMV does have and could auto-feed into the system, given that you've repeatedly affirmatively identified yourself to the service.
You also have to provide your mobile advertising identifier, a long, unique number that you may or may not be able to extract from your phone, depending on the model and the OS version. If you can't get it that way, you can install an app like AAID, which comes with a long list of – you guessed it – permissions to extract, store and process your private information.
Here's the thing: the whole point of a mobile ad identifier is that apps can access it (this is how they identify and track you). That step, where the system made you switch to your phone and use your camera to photograph your driver's license? That step could have automatically pulled this data off your device. That's the whole fucking point of this exercise: that web-pages and apps can request your mobile ad identifier.
Instead, DROP wants users to dig through their phone's deepest settings and/or install an app to retrieve a 32-digit number, which they then must key into a webform on their computer or in a different app on their phone.
Once you've done this, you must fill in another page of biographical information, including information that you've already provided to Login.gov and information you've already filled in on previous screens.
On this screen, you must also verify your phone number by sending yourself a text and then pasting in a unique number the system sends to you. But remember how this whole thing started? The first step is that you authenticate with Login.gov, which sends a text to your phone so you can take a (redundant) picture of your driver's license. There is no way you could get this far in the process unless you controlled the phone number you've just "verified" with the system.
Next, you must verify your email address, by receiving an email with a unique code in it and keying or pasting that into the webform, too. Again, remember how this process started: with you logging in with Login.gov, using your email address, which the system has already treated as verified since the very start of this (very) long and (very) complicated process.
This whole thing is terrible, and it is predicated on the absurd premise that Californians have to be defended from the threat of strangers who pretend to be them in order to sneakily opt them out of surveillance. DROP requires stronger authentication than any other US government system I've ever interacted with. I file my tax returns with fewer authentication steps. I renew my car's DMV registration with fewer authentication steps. I became a US citizen with fewer authentication steps.
This is either a system with no coherent threat model, or (far more probably), its threat model is that people will use it. This is California's answer to "a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'":
It's especially instructive to compare this process to the steps you have to take in order to "opt in" to having a data broker open a file on you and stuff it full of your sensitive, personal information, which is then sold to all comers:
Step one: Exist.
Step two: There is no step two.
It's also instructive to compare this process to the steps a data broker has to take to spy on you and sell your data:
Step one: Exist.
Step two: There is no step two.
Though there are many obvious ways this could be made better, I want to stress here that you shouldn't have to do this at all. It's entirely backwards. The process for not being spied on should look like this:
Step one: Exist.
Step two: There is no step two.
If anyone is going to be forced to jump through hoops to participate in the mass collection and catastrophic mishandling of private data, it should be the data brokers, not the people they spy on.
This kind of malicious compliance is the inevitable outcome of a process that starts by taking the obvious best measure off the table. The answer to the problem of data brokers is banning data brokers, not creating a demented hairball of form-filling that maintains the fiction that data broker surveillance is consensual.
In its own way, this process reminds me of the whole "carbon credit" fiasco. The answer to too many carbon emissions is to democratically decide to ban certain kinds of carbon emissions. But that would require states to do things, rather than simply "nudging" a process that is guided by "the market." So we end up with these junk "credits" that companies manufacture by promising not to log forests, many of which are already wildlife preserves and/or subsequently burn down:
The best critique of this whole thing came in 2021 from the Climate Ad Project, who produced a short video in which people were allowed to kill one another provided they purchased "murder offsets":
In a state of nature, murder exists. We, as a society, have decided this is bad. Rather than creating "incentives" not to murder, we just banned murder. Admittedly, we still get some murders, but when these happen, we don't treat it as "a mispricing of the anti-murder incentive" – we treat it as a crime.
The commercial surveillance industry may not be a criminal enterprise (yet), but it is the source of a torrent of crime, a flood of crime, a tsunami of crime. Every piece of your information that a data broker possesses exposes you to the risk of being victimized by a criminal. For this reason, I strongly believe that you should go through the tedious, performatively difficult DROP process:
https://consumer.drop.privacy.ca.gov/
But let's not pretend that this is good – or even adequate. There is no demand for being spied on. There is no basis for taking such enormous care in making sure people aren't maliciously removed from surveillance databases. If these databases exist at all (they should not), then we should make spies go through all this paperwork, to prove that you do want to be spied on, and unless they manage it, then spying on us should be treated as the crime it is.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
Most cop thing I've ever read. what the fuck are you talking about. The posts you're looking for might be on this website but we won't show them to you???
just so you know, if you completely ignore the search feature on the website and just type "tumblr.com/search/term" into the address bar, it bypasses all of this. broken-ass website
where do i go to learn how to use your daughter, i'm still using nano but vim seems like what the cool kids use
okay so i personally just threw myself into the deep end and made myself adjust. to be quite honest i think i still don't have it down very well but I know a lot more than i did.
vimtutor is a decent place to start, and it comes with vim. Just run `:Tutor' from within vim (type `:Tutor' and hit enter) or run `vimtutor' in the command line. The former will also tell you if you've followed the instructions correctly.
cheatsheets are good for when you're learning. take your pick of the online ones or make your own. liuchengxu/vim-which-key is fun for exploring keymaps or good for when you only remember the start of a certain mapping.
if a more handheld interactive tutorial is your style, openvim.com is short and sweet, but only touches on basic motions and navigation. I don't know much about what's out there or works for learning.
That said, I feel plenty justified only knowing really, really basic motions. daw, ciw, ci", daP, and other Really Simple motions feel much better than. using a cursor to select text and replace it. I could say more, but it's nothing you won't find in vimtutor.
I can't believe i forgot. Just the default help screen (:h) gives a decent overview iirc. if I used anything while learning, it was that and a cheatsheet
I second this. vimtutor to learn the first 80% (which, if you have only that, will give you a long happy life with vim as your editor) then vimwiki, vimgolf, certain YouTube videos and some extensions to learn some neat tricks for your tool belt. like this video about `g` https://youtu.be/3sUDa5GdCTI?si=m9iIdc4q0GR8wlT0 .
otherwise , just learn from vimtutor, edit your code or text normally, find some task that you think "well gee golly, this one task is kinda repetitive and I wish that there was a nice solution" and then find out that there's a :command or a shortcut, and then that becomes part of your muscle memory, and you find yourself accidentally putting :wq in word documents or hitting gcc to comment a line while using notepad on your work computer. at that point, it's full blown.
I desperately want to make out with @emacs-evil-mode . it'd be confusing, it might even be illegal or at the very least improper, she is either my rival or my stepsister or something. maybe more
where do i go to learn how to use your daughter, i'm still using nano but vim seems like what the cool kids use
okay so i personally just threw myself into the deep end and made myself adjust. to be quite honest i think i still don't have it down very well but I know a lot more than i did.
vimtutor is a decent place to start, and it comes with vim. Just run `:Tutor' from within vim (type `:Tutor' and hit enter) or run `vimtutor' in the command line. The former will also tell you if you've followed the instructions correctly.
cheatsheets are good for when you're learning. take your pick of the online ones or make your own. liuchengxu/vim-which-key is fun for exploring keymaps or good for when you only remember the start of a certain mapping.
if a more handheld interactive tutorial is your style, openvim.com is short and sweet, but only touches on basic motions and navigation. I don't know much about what's out there or works for learning.
That said, I feel plenty justified only knowing really, really basic motions. daw, ciw, ci", daP, and other Really Simple motions feel much better than. using a cursor to select text and replace it. I could say more, but it's nothing you won't find in vimtutor.
I can't believe i forgot. Just the default help screen (:h) gives a decent overview iirc. if I used anything while learning, it was that and a cheatsheet
I second this. vimtutor to learn the first 80% (which, if you have only that, will give you a long happy life with vim as your editor) then vimwiki, vimgolf, certain YouTube videos and some extensions to learn some neat tricks for your tool belt. like this video about `g` https://youtu.be/3sUDa5GdCTI?si=m9iIdc4q0GR8wlT0 .
otherwise , just learn from vimtutor, edit your code or text normally, find some task that you think "well gee golly, this one task is kinda repetitive and I wish that there was a nice solution" and then find out that there's a :command or a shortcut, and then that becomes part of your muscle memory, and you find yourself accidentally putting :wq in word documents or hitting gcc to comment a line while using notepad on your work computer. at that point, it's full blown.
Please save and share this info where possible. This report has since been removed by Amnesty International due to legal threats of libel from JK Rowling. This information is no longer easily accessible.
My gf's household received an eviction warning for 2,200$ and they need help to cover it! Please give her whatever you can so she doesn't get evicted, it would really mean the world to me. If you can't donate, at least please reblog okay?
Her ko-fi
(my ko-fi as backup if the above link doesn't work)
hi tumbleweed, what text editor do you use? <- definitely not hoping for a specific answer
editing text is a dirty fight for survival with blunt and barely functioning tools. maybe some day something will pick up helpless little me and push me into using something that does work for me.
you have found my only weakness (autism, object personification, need for harmony, being super easy provoked into a challenge, nostalgia and longing for computer tech i never used, ...) so i now have:
"get the build of traditional vi to work on my machine (hopefully just configure the Makefile, but i don't know how to do that right)"
Several AI services (chatbots ) are purposely addictive, the same way people can become addicted to gambling or shopping. We’ve literally seen in real time how ChatGPT has caused psychosis and delusions in people; it can have a huge affect on someones’s mental stability. Just because it isn’t substance-based doesn’t mean that doesn’t count as an addiction, and shaming people who are trying to move on and improve themselves is counterproductive. Im proud of that dude and his 4 month mark!
Then I'll mention the predatory chatbots who do it on purpose! Character.ai is one of many AI chatbot websites that're designed to be addictive.
None of the signup methods require a password. It only takes email and birthday. Minimizing time on the signin or signup screen makes it harder for people quitting to avoid relapse.
"Characters" on the website will send messages "on their own" (prompted by the site) to try to invite inactive users back after as soon as 1 day of inactivity. This is likely to force FOMO, or make users feel more like they owe the bots a response. Unhealthy attachment stuff.
Account deletion is an essential part of every service that should go smoothly, right? Right? Wrong. It takes 1-2 weeks for a Character AI account deletion to be finalized, and account deletion requests have a high chance to not go through if you're not using the app.
Rephrasing: People leaving Character.AI are pushed to download the app in order to delete their accounts, if they haven't already. This makes it harder for people to quit and stay gone. Failing to quit an addiction makes it harder to quit successfully in the future, so this feels like a feature, not a bug.
On top of that, the delete account menu reads like this:
Tell me THAT doesn't sound like a bad ex. It's a carefully crafted yet hostile environment to those who are already addicted to the technology. I am so so SO happy, downright delighted that they've managed to quit, and I wish the best for others in recovery spaces or considering quitting as well!! While AI addiction is an emerging condition, there are already therapists and other mental health professionals trained to help people plan to quit and do so a bit easier.
(If anyone seeing this is in need of them, there are several tumblr Communities here devoted to quitting, too. They provide a mix of advice, venting spaces, and proof that you aren't alone.)
Total stranger on the phone who we’ve never spoken to before: I have power of attorney over the CEO of this corporation and we are a customer of yours. Please change the administrator password on the server to XXXXX
My boss, putting on white grease paint and a red wig: Oh, of course! Let’s do it quickly so that you’ll want to keep working with us since you’re going to be making business decisions!
Me: I would sell you to satan for one corn chip and I’m allergic to corn but before you do this maybe you should call someone who is actually on our contact list for our customer and see if they’ve ever heard of this stranger.
My boss, looking through a selection of shoes that honk when you walk: Oh, but she said that it was very important that none of the employees know what was happening because they’re making staffing changes.
Me: As your lawyer I recommend that you just call a single one of our contacts and see if they’ve ever heard of her name.
My boss, shoving all of our technicians into a VW beetle: You’re not my lawyer.
Me: HOW THE FUCK WOULD YOU KNOW? I COULD BE! YOU SHOULD MAYBE CHECK ON THAT.
Security firms that are hired to check the security of banks will often use the following tactic: They will walk up to the teller in a suit with their ID badge and a clipboard and go:
“Hello I am [name] from [security firm] we’ve been hired to verify the security of the facility I need to see your computers.”
“Erm…I’ll have to verify that with my managers.”
“Congratulations, you have just passed the security verification.” [Scribbles on clipboard] “But in all seriousness I do need to verify your security so I need to see your computers.”
“Social engineering” is a way too fancy word for what it is. I know a guy (not personally) who broke several people out of prison by essentially writing “Greetings, please release this person, signed, whoever the judge is” on a piece of paper and faxing it there. Because no one would have a fax machine in their own house I guess.
