Footpad
footpad.bsky.social
Footpad
@footpad.bsky.social
Wittercism and crittercism.
Every Brit should fill this out.
This is the Gov looking for your input on the BBC. It takes a while to complete (15/20 mins) but it’s pretty comprehensive and covers most aspects.

Please share. I’m surprised many people haven’t seen it yet.

www.gov.uk/government/c...
Britain’s Story: The Next Chapter - BBC Royal Charter Review, Green Paper and public consultation
www.gov.uk
February 16, 2026 at 12:53 AM
The price of aircraft bits is staggering. I just watched a guy measure a one-inch bit of metal with a nut on one end and a ball on the other. "How much does that cost if it wears out?" I asked, privately making a ludicrous estimate of €50. "About €300."
February 14, 2026 at 10:19 AM
Bricking it about the upcoming exam, not just because it's an exam or even on a big subject in a foreign language but because the real test is liable to come months later as a pop-quiz with no warning, no retakes, and failure penalties ranging from cold embarrassment to a brief and terminal crunch.
February 14, 2026 at 7:03 AM
Man, just when you think you know what "fuck cancer" means, cancer opens up a whole new arena of ways in which it ought to go get fucked. It's weird that unconscious flesh can be so diversely and seemingly creatively malicious. #notme #oranyoneIlivewith #family
February 13, 2026 at 12:10 PM
At the age of ■■■ and a few months, I have finally developed the grownup habit of making my bed in the morning after getting up. It's extraordinary how much less out of control this makes my life feel.
February 12, 2026 at 3:51 PM
I'm going to die. #aviation #studentpilot
February 10, 2026 at 7:51 PM
THE DOG is patient and can wait as long as it takes. He can and will outwait you.
February 8, 2026 at 9:30 PM
Finished reading "The Analog Cat" by @huskyteer.co.uk. What a tour de force of imagination, humour, pathos and insight. Sixteen stories ranging from the insouciant (it takes a lot to make me belly-laugh while reading) to the... really quite deep. And I demand my turn in the sidecar!
February 8, 2026 at 2:48 PM
THE DOG approves of renewable energy and thinks you should too.

Or else there's another dog over there.
February 7, 2026 at 6:18 PM
Reposted by Footpad
one of the greatest human triumphs of my lifetime is the relentless, unceasing, heroic effort by DECADES' worth of doctors and scientists to find a cure for a disease much of the world didn't take seriously for years because it predominantly affected a community they thought kinda deserved it
Just because good news is worth celebrating:

There is now a Prep medication that is an *every six month* injection.

HIV has, effectively, a vaccination.
February 7, 2026 at 1:37 AM
This must have majorly done the furry rounds when it came out but how the hell did I miss it www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vTL...

esp. f.a.o. @scruff.bsky.social fnpr
Blaidd Reacts to Thirsty Comments
YouTube video by Only Jerry
www.youtube.com
February 4, 2026 at 9:10 AM
trapped in an endless repeating time loop of people showing you their hogs
February 2, 2026 at 6:38 PM
Reposted by Footpad
*sigh* here we go again. Your phone is not listening to everything around you 24/7 for advertising purposes. *If* you have voice activation on for the assistant, the mic is listening for the activation phrase: the processing power for listening for a single specific phrase is much lower.
Do you remember when people were saying "I think my phone is listening to me, i'm getting ads for stuff I spoke about" and people said "They arent listening to you, they're just this good at predicting your interests"?

Well, it happens they were doing exactly that.
www.cbsnews.com/news/google-...
Google to pay $68 million over allegations its voice assistant eavesdropped on users
Class-action lawsuit alleged that Google's voice assistant illegally recorded and shared private conversations with advertisers.
www.cbsnews.com
February 2, 2026 at 1:07 AM
FUCKING FANTASTI— oh, damn, different Miller.
February 1, 2026 at 12:16 PM
crazy insomnia please release me and let me dream of making love to werewolves on the heath, tearing out tufts with my teeth
January 31, 2026 at 11:24 PM
Awoo, just sayin'.
January 31, 2026 at 8:04 PM
The video @techconnectify.bsky.social is referring to is here and I emphatically recommend it either if you're interested in the compelling economics of renewable energy, or if you want to avoid the grinding horror of an emergent neofeudal dictatorship. Maybe even both!

bsky.app/profile/tech...
I managed to piss off way fewer people by directly saying "stop voting for republicans" than I did by making a video on the PlayStation's clever copy protection system.

94.9% likes now.

91.5% on the PS1 video.
January 31, 2026 at 5:41 PM
blog post for the small set of people who're interested in both aviation and mental illness: a dry account of how my history of depression affected the process of getting a flight medical certificate: footpad.dreamwidth.org/600170.html
January 28, 2026 at 9:13 PM
Plug for people who like audiobooks: @libro.fm are knocking two euros off their monthly subscription price. Same price as Audible, but no lock-in, no DRM, your credits don't expire, and your purchases support indie bookshops instead of swivel-eyed billionaires. It's a win all round. Go switch.
January 26, 2026 at 9:17 PM
HOLY CRAP @coelliptic.bsky.social @nachtfuchs.bsky.social the crazy bastards signed off on me!

Not easily, and with qualifications: yearly psych eval, some slightly worrying mumbling about "single seat aircraft? well that's okay then". But fuck it, I'll take it!
January 26, 2026 at 10:49 AM
The act of having done something concrete in support of Minnesota is a partial but effective armour against the emotional damage of seeing atrocities committed in Minnesota.

If you're feeling crap about it, do something about it.
There's a video out there of ice lynching a man. Don't watch it. It will not help you or others to traumatize yourself.

Spend the time you would have spent watching it/wanting to vomit and scream making a donation to somewhere in Minnesota, or if you can't, researching where you can help locally.
Stand With Minnesota Donation Directory
Stand With Minnesota is a hub for supporting, learning, and taking action to support Minnesotans impacted by ICE and federal enforcement.
www.standwithminnesota.com
January 25, 2026 at 11:36 AM
Finnish reindeer kills suggest that wolf population has increased in Russia as Russian hunters are sent to Ukraine.

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

That sure is a complex mess of consequences.
January 24, 2026 at 11:13 AM
Feeling awkward talking to an American about German high-speed trains. #ICE And I guess "bullet train" isn't an improvement.

On the plus side, if any Americans visit, let's take a train trip to an ancient cultural city just so you can say, "Get in, losers, we're taking the ICE to Nuremberg!"
January 17, 2026 at 9:25 PM
I was an Obama fanboy for a while, in the sense that I idolised him a bit. Later on... more nuanced, although obviously nowadays it's only rational to miss him like hell.

I'm making a point of not being a Mamdani fanboy, but man, I am *aching* with hope for him to succeed.

#politics
January 17, 2026 at 8:58 PM
What IS a good term to explain what AIs do when they macerate human knowledge and then barf it up again? Seriously: inventing the right descriptive term for the data emitted by AIs, as opposed to actual knowledge, would be kinda a big deal for our civilisation's collective intellectual health.
While you're technically correct, humans have talked about machines "knowing" things for as long as we've had automata with an internal representational state. The problem here isn't @ericschmeltzer.com, it's that we as a culture desperately need a new idiom to describe what LLMs actually do.
January 15, 2026 at 6:24 PM