waiting room drawing

quick while the government is shut down let’s all switch to metric

I swear using @cuelang.org is like having superpowers Just CUE-ified the lexicon for permissioned spaces, so much easier to have consistency and readability. The JSON form is generated into the expected directory. github.com/blebbit/atpr... #atdev #atprotodev @atproto.com

before and after hegseth's directive

tuesday

This only happens to you once

Last week I gave a talk at the IPTC’s “Photo Metadata Conference”. Here’s a blog-ified version, with lots of juicy digging into exactly what works and what’s broken in C2PA in 2025. Also strong opinions about provenance. And a link to the YouTube recording […] [Original post on cosocial.ca]

'Three Days of the Condor' hit theaters on this day in 1975. It was one of the all-time great conspiracy thrillers (and RIP Robert Redford obvi):

I saw someone say how frustrating it was that media outlets weren't interviewing people with autism. Well, @nellscovell.bsky.social was apparently thinking the same thing! Read and share! www.thedailybeast.com/my-brilliant...

She basically invented astrophysics. She proved the laws of chemistry, quantum mechanics, and statistical mechanics, not just gravity, applied universally. She determined the composition of the sun and primacy of hydrogen in the universe. She advised the PhDs of Frank Drake and Frank Kameny.

This article from 2012, discovered thanks to spiraling down a rathole that landed me on Wikipedia's article about him, is perhaps the best cultural analysis of Mark V. Shaney I have seen. observer.com/2012/07/mark...

someone should tell Trump there's a drug called "Paracetamol" that can be used instead of "Acetaminophen", big pharma doesn't want to sell it in the USA

Since this is going to be headline news tomorrow… The highest quality research has shown Tylenol use in pregnancy is NOT at all associated with autism risk. To suggest otherwise is to be an amateur that cherry-picks data points from decades ago. What we discussed 2 weeks ago remains true today ⬇️

My cartoon for this week’s @newscientist.com

sketchbook page

A visual reminder that aircraft move through a gaseous medium that must be compressed and displaced in order for them to fly.

Christ, what an asshole.

bub no. 34

Exploring how the kids I hung out with shaped who I ended up becoming. I drew this map of my old neighborhood as a kind of case study of my own childhood, with each house and name representing someone who crossed my path growing up.

One of these rich dudes invested in a food company with all proceeds going to kids in need. The other started Sundance Institute, boosting the lives of countless artists. Hey modern rich dudes, don't be a typical greedy AI crypto-prick, be like these two.

The Andy Goldsworthy exhibition at Edinburgh’s Royal Scottish Academy is great fun.

I had the privilege to work with Joseph H Condon at Bell Labs. (To us he was just "Joe"). His father was Edward U Condon, an important physicist who in time was head of the US's National Bureau of Standards, back when the US government cared about such things....

Oh to be a little Tardigrade scratching its back on a bubble. 🫧🐻🧪

These are the kinds of stories that seem wild, but are firmly based in science and medicine. They also show that science has a long way to go and we should be robustly funding science. Artificial cornea research is underfunded, like most of biomedical science in America. It's time to lead.

Here's the Blit movie (well, the ball excerpt) on a Tiny TV 2. This is the second smallest display it has ever been shown on.

The top line is we're never going to get rid of hallucinations as it's just the way LLMs are built: they're not understanding, they're guessing based on stats. But maybe LLMs can be better fine-tuned to sound less confident, so humans aren't so taken in by them & use them more appropriately?

A few quotes about Steve Jobs from "Valley of Genius" by Adam Fisher.

Here's a conundrum. We refuse to use Meta's products any more. As with any boycott, we feel that the gain (not letting a morally bankrupt company exploit us) far outweighs the loss (not being able to use their services). But the price _is_ high. And....

Best glory I’ve ever seen from a plane! It’s an optical phenomenon that occurs when light interacts in and around tiny droplets of water in the clouds, in the direction opposite the sun. More complex than a rainbow. Here’s a link to some more info: www.zmescience.com/science/phys... #optics #physics

Tonight’s movie selection is “High and Low” (1963). Dir. Akira Kurosawa. If you look up “influential” in the movie dictionary, I’m sure there’s a frame from this film. Wow!

The “problem” with vaccines? They so effective at preventing deaths that they create generations of people that question whether disease was a problem in the first place because they have never experienced the horrors of a world without vaccines.

What's going on with sound mixing? In the last few years, especially but not exclusively in British TV, the audio mix renders dialogue inaudible. The actors mumble; ambience and sometimes the music drowns them out. It wasn't always like this. /1

Uri Geller in Sydney (not).

that water

Senior software engineering position at CSIRO / SKAO / Data Central, based in Marsfield, NSW ...you will be instrumental in developing and supporting software components that enable seamless data access, processing, and analysis... jobs.csiro.au/job/Sydney%2...

Ban cars 😍😍😍 wapo.st/3VtXAM8

Gemini Observatory is looking for a new Deputy Director - looks this position will not be in Tucson but in La Serena in Chile aas.org/jobregister/... 🔭

Sad that of the word telephone, we dropped the tele- (still very true of modern devices) and kept the -phone (which we don't use).

It's 5 years since the best thing I've ever written and will ever write aired on Mad As Hell

Brain rot. This absolute confidence in the rightness of one's own thinking has led us to this nihilistic, tech bro libertarian dystopia that is going to make our lives less good. Less healthy. Less secure. Less comfortable. Less safe. Shorter.

Heading home from #GopherCon 2025 in NYC. As usual, many people asked how to get one of the amazing Go gopher Hawaiian shirts by Renee French. I've posted the details at github.com/rsc/gophersh.... (I know one person who has made pajama pants with the pattern. Socks might be nice too.) Enjoy!

Just a friendly reminder that your desire to have a bookshelf with a rolling ladder is valid. Don’t allow anyone to disrespect you by telling you otherwise.

The Australasian Dark Sky Alliance have created a petition to get the Aust. Govt to create legislation that limits light pollution and preserve Australia's Dark skies. Important for human health, wildlife and #Astronomy! Australians can sign here: www.aph.gov.au/e-petitions/... 🔭☄️

This is one of the most beautiful things I have witnessed, the craft here is impeccable.

in the park.

I look forward every week to the new Stephen Collins cartoon. This one is a standout, but then they all are.

Friends are now suggesting we can ban features or get features back by arguing they are woke (thanks Cracker Barrel). I'll go first: Jordan Peterson: the audio jack is like the female birth canal. Denying it to men is denying a future to our race

A central pillar of Chicago’s vibrant film culture, a reliably smart critic with a deep knowledge of & love for cinema (& theater, the beat he started out on), & a wonderful colleague & friend. If you care about art in your city, read & support your local critics, because our species is endangered.

Not just art. Talking. Writing. Editing. Designing. Coding. Thinking. Doing well at anything takes years of practice. Ceding that to a machine defeats the whole purpose of taking pleasure from one's chosen path in life.

a friday bub