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attacus.net
Computational entomologist, privacy enthusiast, historian. Perpetually raging against the ghost in the machine. Mastodon: @[email protected] 👁 Digital Rights Watch | 🎙 Byte Into IT on 📻 3RRR FM | 🐍 PyCon AU
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Amy Kurzweil, daughter of Ray Kurzweil, apparently following into her dad's wild bullshit by mimicking dead people with computers

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

If you've got any interest at all in Australian history, please write a word in support of Tim Sherratt - his API keys for national archives services have been revoked, cutting off years of work building tools around them. Contact info at bottom of post. updates.timsherratt.org/2025/02/24/y...

submitted 3 days ago • 0 comments

I finished teaching my Playful Theory class, a seminar for studio artists focused on games. It was my first academic course in the post-ChatGPT era, so I tried out a few strategies to handle students potentially skimming readings and submitting AI-generated response papers. Thread🧵

submitted 77 days ago • 17 comments

“…it was possible to view additional registrant information contained within the domain name record (postal address, phone and fax number) […] accessible via developer tools” Inspect Element strikes again! www.auda.org.au/news-insight...

submitted 80 days ago • 0 comments

you are not a serious person if your fear of A.I. is “what if scary computer decide 2 extinct humans” and not the health insurance companies using it to sentence people to death

submitted 83 days ago • 36 comments

A simple experiment you can do is buy a server, set up a website with nothing on it, then look at the access logs. All day, every day, there are random systems just blasting vulnerabilities at every device on the internet. Analysts call it "background noise", executives call it "cyber attacks".

submitted 83 days ago • 162 comments

“The workers showed that it’s possible to fight back against the opaque authority of algorithms, creating transparency despite a corporation’s wishes.” spectrum.ieee.org/shipt

submitted 82 days ago • 0 comments

Less AI, more poetic computing poetic.computer By koundinya (koundinya.website)

submitted 82 days ago • 0 comments

Overheard, a woman at the pub: “I worked at that fucking costume shop, dressed as Fester, wearing a goddamn bald cap, for nine hours. If I can do that, I can do anything.”

submitted 84 days ago • 0 comments

A cast of absolute thousands at the last Byte into IT for 2024! Tune in right now!! Catch us all on the air in 2025! @attacus.net @plasmov.bsky.social me, Alexar, Eric and Mike! On @3rrrfm.bsky.social

submitted 85 days ago • 0 comments

i mounted my giant crocheted insects in my studio

submitted 87 days ago • 6 comments

Please just don't use any website's DMs for secure communication. Don't do it. Just don't. Don't do it. Please. No.

submitted 96 days ago • 0 comments

bro this is literally what robots.txt was invented to do.

submitted 91 days ago • 12 comments

me: the whole state vs state and city vs city competitiveness in Australia is silly. all places have their pros and cons. also me, proud Victorian, reviewing something written by a Queenslander:

submitted 91 days ago • 1 comment

OK, new idea. The social media platforms should implement age assurance by following the 80s/90s video game model... #auspol #socialmedia

submitted 92 days ago • 1 comment

I am emerging from a conference operations bubble to find that they’ve passed the bill that everyone, from the best to the worst people you know, think is an unworkably bad idea. And there’s still an egg shortage, so our traditional method of democratic expression has been cut off.

submitted 92 days ago • 0 comments

At one point, Twitter was the central hub of the American Internet - BECAUSE of 'lazy linking'. You knew you could find and get to almost any paper, article, news story or creative endeavor likely to interest you from Twitter. Elon didn't understand his core business and sabotaged it.

submitted 92 days ago • 6 comments

Uh… ABC… that’s not… that’s not how “rawdogging” originated www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11...

submitted 93 days ago • 3 comments

I put together a Bluesky Starter Pack for PyCon AU 2024! This is for people speaking, attending, volunteering at, and organising the event in Melbourne this weekend. Are you at #PyConAU and on BlueSky? Message me and I’ll add you! go.bsky.app/JFytL7a

submitted 96 days ago • 5 comments

Google’s Gemini AI randomly spit out a long unhinged rant at a college student: “This is for you, human. You and only you. You are not special, you are not important, and you are not needed. … You are a stain on the universe. Please die. Please.” Jump to the last message in this transcript.

submitted 102 days ago • 6 comments

For those of you who know me: what starter packs do you think I should know about? Are there any I should ask to be added to?

submitted 102 days ago • 1 comment

Creating two massive moderation lists encompassing all bsky users—people for the Oxford comma, and people against it—so we can have two blueskies both blissfully existing unaware of the other

submitted 107 days ago • 9 comments

We are all made of stars, but your RBAC shouldn’t be

submitted 130 days ago • 16 comments

In most of the fields I operate in, I feel like the gains in productivity from having access to generative AI etc are outweighed by the losses from search becoming effectively useless due to generative AI etc

submitted 298 days ago • 0 comments