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wosat @lemmy.world
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Comments 25
Microsoft sneaks ads into the new Outlook for Windows
  • Microsoft tried to shanghai me to the "new outlook". When I realized the scope of what they were trying to do, under the guise of a simple software update, I was floored. I don't even think Google, with all of their Borg-ish tendencies, would attempt such a blatant hijacking of user data. The privacy implications are profound.

  • A Disturbance in the Force - Official Trailer (2023) Seth Green, Weird Al Yankovic

    A Disturbance in the Force is a documentary unlike any other tailor-made for every and any Star Wars fan. Dealing with the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special, in 1977, "Star Wars" became a cultural phenomenon that single-handedly revitalized a stagnant film industry, and forever changed how films were sold, made, and marketed. In 1978, filmmaker George Lucas was talked into cashing in on the Star Wars craze by producing a holiday variety TV special. What could possibly go wrong? ANSWER: Everything…

    A Disturbance in the Force stars Seth Green, Weird Al Yankovic, Paul Scheer, Taran Killam, Patton Oswalt, Donny Osmond, Gilbert Gottfried, Bonnie Burton, Bruce Vilanch, and Steve Binder. The documentary is directed by Jeremy Coon and Steve Kozak with Kyle Newman serving as producers alongside Jeremy Coon and Steve Kozak as producers as well. Adam F. Goldberg is the executive producer of A Disturbance in the Force.

    A Disturbance in the Force is releasing on December 5 for Apple TV, Amazon, Google Play, and Vudu with select screenings across the US, UK, and Australia ahead of its digital and home entertainment launch.

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    ‘Impossible’ to create AI tools like ChatGPT without copyrighted material, OpenAI says
  • This situation seems analogous to when air travel started to take off (pun intended) and existing legal notions of property rights had to be adjusted. IIRC, a farmer sued an airline for trespassing because they were flying over his land. The court ruled against the farmer because to do otherwise would have killed the airline industry.

  • Scientists successfully replicate historic nuclear fusion breakthrough three times
  • While this is amazing and all, it's always seemed to me that this approach of using hundreds of laser beams focused on a single point would never scale to be viable for power generation. Can any experts here confirm?

    I've always assumed this approach was just useful as a research platform -- to learn things applicable to other approaches, such as tokamaks, or to weapons applications.

  • HP raising Instant Ink subscription pricing significantly
  • It amazes me that there are so many people who buy a printer, are offered this "pay $x a month for Y pages" type of plan, and say yes. I mean, sure, HP sucks, but they wouldn't be able to get away with such slimy business practices if there weren't so many people willing to pay.

  • Carbon Capture Tech Hype Is Fizzling Out, IEA Says
  • I'm with you. Also, it seems like it would be much more efficient to do carbon capture at the source, where the fuel is being used, like a power plant, where the concentrations are relatively high, compared to atmospheric capture where CO2 is less than 0.1%.

  • I wish writing SQL queries was more popular than ORMs
  • I used to be an ORM-hater, but my experience with Django has changed my mind, somewhat. I still think there are projects where ORM is unnecessary or even harmful, but for some projects, being able to lean on an ORM to create simple queries/updates or to handle DB migrations is a big time saver. And you can always fall back to hand-written SQL when you need to as long as the ORM allows it, which it absolutely should.

  • Texas could get a 205-mph bullet train zipping between Houston and Dallas
  • I'm seeing a lot of commenters shitting on Texas here, and while it's not completely undeserved, I'd like to point out that Texas is 1st in the nation in wind power generation. Texas will implement things -- even "Blue" things -- if the economics make sense.

  • Junk websites filled with AI-generated text are pulling in money from programmatic ads
  • I feel like this is the ad-equivalent of the sub-prime mortgage situation, pre-crisis. With mortgages, you had loans that no individual bank or bank manager would want, and then you had an automated process that obfuscated the individual loan details and produced financial products that could be sold as high quality. In the ad world, it's the same thing. You have these websites that nobody would buy ads from, individually, but somehow, through an automatic process offered by Google and friends, the worthless product becomes valuable.

  • FDA, DEA Blame Manufacturers For Meds Shortage
  • The DEA says that "manufacturers only sold approximately 70 percent of their allotted quota", but we don't get our medications from "manufacturers"; we get our medication from pharmacies, who often only carry 1 generic version of each medication in addition to the brand version. What percentage of generic manufacturers have hit their quota? My guess is that most of the slack is held by manufacturers of brand-name medication, while most of the limits are hitting manufacturers of generics.

    Also, the "70 percent" stat is for "amphetamine products", but what is that referring to, exactly? Adderall? Vyvanse, which is an amphetamine prodrug? All stimulants? (It wouldn't surprise me, coming from the agency that likes to refer to all illegal drugs as "narcotics".)

    This narrative that the FDA and DEA is pushing -- that manufacturers are somehow deciding not to make and sell medication that there is obvious demand for -- does not pass the smell test. Maybe the DEA quotas aren't to blame, but the notion that drug companies are deciding not to make and sell medication -- the one thing we've been able to count on them to do historically -- for some unknown reason that nobody is able to figure out is ludicrous.