#cog rants

[cognitiveinequality]

Sizzling Boomer take but I think we genuinely should fire every Twitch streamer into the heart of a supernova. Goddamned Ethan Klein, Hasan, Asmongold, Destiny... and really every other clown you can name in the seemingly-endless honking, cartwheeling parade of discourse-addled, hair-splitting, gotcha-gooning mic jockeys out there... Every single one.

I simply am exhausted to my deepest mitochondria by the venomous, meme-parroting, bot-riddled audiences they breed; the inescapable hollow tribalism they cultivate that now infects any corner of online life that these vacuous mouthpieces focus on for their oversized, outrage click-driven paychecks.

I hope they all get handcuffed to one another and thrown into a mile-deep pit filled with stagnant water and broken glass where they have to gnaw each other's dicks off to survive.

[cognitiveinequality]

.

Ok...[*sigh*] So I need to preface this by saying... as I see more of life, I have come to learn that, in general, not only is "the public" largely incurious about anything that isn't making them either hungry or horny at any given moment, but also that many average, "center-of-the-Bell-Curve" folks almost don't even have the ability to forsee predictable consequences beyond the most basic shit like "don't touch a hot stove".

And yet...

As patient as I try to be about people's lack of savvy — we can't all be experts in everything or all care about same stuff! I get it! — it *still* drives me nuts that otherwise reasonable people can't see what kind of Pandora's Box unregulated AI use is unleashing. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills at the rapid and unquestioning widespread acceptance of this bullshit piss-glaze borderline Ponzi scheme that is actively making huge segments of people's lives substantially worse - customer service, ads and marketing, music, news, law and government, movies and TV, therapy and mental health services... not to mention the enshittification of the Internet at large.

Every. single. time I encounter someone who “asked ChatGPT” for an answer or “got AI to summarize [detailed and nuanced written document] for me" I immediately think significantly less of them. Unfortunately, it's happening more and more as it all gets more normalized. And I think it may actually be driving me crazy.

[cognitiveinequality]

nothing gives me an unpleasant mindlurch like diving deep into reading someone's passionate rant paragraph and running into the misspelling "ya'll"

[cognitiveinequality]

I'm so tired of AI images with that telltale yellow-beige glaze over everything. It's bad enough I have to see that shit, does it really need to put the "piss filter" over everything it fucking generates?

[cognitiveinequality]

If nothing else good comes from this upcoming US election, at least it's brought to light for a lot of people is how much of our lives and the direction of the country (and frankly the entire world!) is controlled by a handful of men with just an insane amount of money.

Thiel, Bezos, Musk, Adelson, Mellon... These aren't your grandpa's "great statesmen". They're not even simply glib executives with political ambition. This is a handful of shadowy men who are obsessed with controlling other human beings in order to accumulate more wealth and comfort for themselves.

Unless the U.S. puts a hard stop to 💰influence politics💰, the entire world is going to suffer at the hands of these cowardly lunatics.

[cognitiveinequality]

ah yes I love when desktop websites that I visit 30+ pages a day on break my browser's back button.

(note: I do not actually love it.)

tell me, @tumblr engineers... what is the point of changing the dashboard address in the URL bar every time I hit 'Next" if YOU ARE GOING TO PREVENT ME FROM GOING TO A PREVIOUS PAGE USING THE STANDARD METHOD BROWSERS HAVE BEEN USING FOR A QUARTER-CENTURY?!

[cognitiveinequality]

how come seemingly every goddamn bathroom product that i use comes in some kind of teetery top-heavy spray bottle or dispenser that has a center of gravity that shifts based on vibes i swear to christ beauty companies have perfected the world's most clankable metal and lids that pop off if you breathe wrong and play a goddamn xylophone solo across the tile floor like christ alive i'm just reaching for my toothbrush and it sounds like I'm walking through a fucking wind chime store

[cognitiveinequality]

ah tumblr...

the website where there are users who can’t seem to help themselves by commenting their ‘fine-but-not-necessary-and-not-nearly-as-clever-as-they-obviously-think-they’re-being’ thoughts on

every.

single.

post.

they reblog.

sometimes those users are moderately-notable writers.

and sometimes adding those users’ handles to your XKit blacklist dials down your irritation level just enough to keep you from rage-unfollowing treasured mutuals who apparently adore reblogging their stuff.

(one day I’m going to have to buy April & the Xkit team a pony, I swear...)