Andrew @generalising@mastodon.flooey.org

When you are a Wikipedia editor, sometimes you have to help out your fellow contributors who struggle to maintain an encyclopedic tone

The moon appeared inside the Olympic rings on the Eiffel Tower, in breach of the Olympic Brand Guide.

This #Politico piece critical of Kamala #Harris at a recent #tech summit in #London actually put her up in my estimation. Rishi #Sunak and the tech bros wanted to talk about the fantasy "future #risks" of #AI. She pointed out that tech risks have already arrived: “When a senior is kicked off their #healthcare plan because of a faulty #algorithm, is that not existential for him?”
https://www.politico.eu/article/kamala-harris-brits-uk-vp-usa-elections-2024-joe-biden-president-downing-street/

This is fitting. The top topic on Xitter right now is of course the global Crowdstrike/Windows clusterfuck. But the AI summary of the discussion is hilarious, b/c it summarizes a bunch of sarcastic posts and makes it sound like a positive (or at least can-do) story.

For those of a psephology bent, the House of Commons Library have just published their briefing on the full results of the 2024 general election:
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-10009/

Also available in deferenceable URI format on our election results website:
https://electionresults.parliament.uk/general-elections/6/political-parties

And as a datasette for those who prefer SQL over point and click:
https://psephology-datasette-f3e7b1b7eb77.herokuapp.com/

Today is #WorldSnakeDay – here’s Edwin Morgan’s “Siesta of a Hungarian Snake” (Collected Poems, Carcanet 2012) 🐍

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #snake

In which I get mad about sloppy use of AI in a way that can actively endanger people!!!
https://thisisimportant.net/threads/ai-duty-of-care/

(thx to the American Alpine Club for their amazing work publicizing climbing and mountaineering accidents and identifying patterns in the causes)

New feature! We've added another lookup to WhoCanIVoteFor.co.uk that tells you about the various elected people that represent you and your area.

Give it a go here: https://whocanivotefor.co.uk/your_area/

Read the blog: https://democracyclub.org.uk/blog/2024/07/09/the-rest-of-the-state/

#civictech

Someone complained that the xkcd Dependency comic is unrealistic because it only shows one critical dependency you've never heard of.

However, it all makes sense once you realize it's actually a fractal:

Britain’s last coal fired power station has received its last delivery of coal in anticipation of closure at the end of September. As we look ahead to that historic milestone it is fascinating to look back at how quickly coal has departed the scene. Ten years ago it was still the dominant source of electrical power. More efficient gas burning power squeezed it out, with just over half the greenhouse gas emissions. Now, already, gas burning is being squeezed out too.

Do/Have you used a CD/DVD/Bluray in a while?

What about burning a disk?

I'm surveying modern day awareness/usage of optical media, mostly to confirm some demographic theories, so if you know what a CD/DVD is, please help me (and maybe others) out by answering some ~10 questions here:

https://optical-media-survey.benjojo.co.uk/

And then please boost for better visibility! Thank you!

When asked where the dynamite was found in the house, such as the basement, garage or shed, Barker said, “Yes. All of it, correct.”

https://ksltv.com/639565/crews-detonate-ancient-dynamite-sticks-found-in-holladay-home/