Gio :⁾
@im.giovanh.com
cryptid • writer • universal constant • edge case • cyber artisan • saved Homestuck
https://im.giovanh.com
let's be fans of each other
https://im.giovanh.com
let's be fans of each other
Reposted by Gio :⁾
Severance was so real when they said some of the numbers on the screen feel happy or scary
as i stare at the hex editor, trying to derive meaning from screens full of numbers, i realize that reverse engineering is basically just numerology for hackers
January 17, 2026 at 10:52 PM
Severance was so real when they said some of the numbers on the screen feel happy or scary
Years and years ago I wrote up a design on how to do perfect age verification online, and in the intervening time Chrome has written almost the entire stack required to do it as part of their “managed browser” project they made for school chromebooks. Every age system visible to adults is theater.
February 10, 2026 at 3:58 AM
Years and years ago I wrote up a design on how to do perfect age verification online, and in the intervening time Chrome has written almost the entire stack required to do it as part of their “managed browser” project they made for school chromebooks. Every age system visible to adults is theater.
As a user-agent guy I look at “client-only verification system” and sort of die inside.
Actually though this is impossible to make without it being easy to bypass and therefore they won’t do it that way. So, lying.
Actually though this is impossible to make without it being easy to bypass and therefore they won’t do it that way. So, lying.
Discord is already starting to walk things back a little, so people should keep doing what they're doing (cancel Nitro, leave feedback/criticism, direct contact through support tickets/phone/email/etc)
February 10, 2026 at 3:52 AM
As a user-agent guy I look at “client-only verification system” and sort of die inside.
Actually though this is impossible to make without it being easy to bypass and therefore they won’t do it that way. So, lying.
Actually though this is impossible to make without it being easy to bypass and therefore they won’t do it that way. So, lying.
Reposted by Gio :⁾
It's so cool how a bunch of kids realized there was a genocide in the middle east in 2023 and now suddenly every major company and government is tripping over their own dicks to turn the world into an Orwllian surveillance state so that never happens again.
Discord leadership only people on planet who think adding age verification to Discord a good idea:
aftermath.site/discord-age-ve...
aftermath.site/discord-age-ve...
February 9, 2026 at 10:13 PM
It's so cool how a bunch of kids realized there was a genocide in the middle east in 2023 and now suddenly every major company and government is tripping over their own dicks to turn the world into an Orwllian surveillance state so that never happens again.
I think any centralized product that’s designed to be voice chat for preteens can’t also be the backbone of the entire creative industry. I think that’s two things
February 10, 2026 at 2:11 AM
I think any centralized product that’s designed to be voice chat for preteens can’t also be the backbone of the entire creative industry. I think that’s two things
Reposted by Gio :⁾
a nice thing about when the internet was a bunch of little sites and servers was that it was a lot harder for governments to pressure "the chat provider everyone uses" to implement age verification.
you wanna pressure 300 separate IRC servers? good luck with that. but one company? easy
you wanna pressure 300 separate IRC servers? good luck with that. but one company? easy
February 9, 2026 at 8:00 PM
a nice thing about when the internet was a bunch of little sites and servers was that it was a lot harder for governments to pressure "the chat provider everyone uses" to implement age verification.
you wanna pressure 300 separate IRC servers? good luck with that. but one company? easy
you wanna pressure 300 separate IRC servers? good luck with that. but one company? easy
Reposted by Gio :⁾
if you have a ring camera you are a child, terrified of the silhouette of a jacket hanging on a chair. you are lower than a worm to me. you have sold your soul to a devil that has offered you nothing in return
February 9, 2026 at 2:43 PM
if you have a ring camera you are a child, terrified of the silhouette of a jacket hanging on a chair. you are lower than a worm to me. you have sold your soul to a devil that has offered you nothing in return
Reposted by Gio :⁾
the death of third spaces offline (and online, really) has deteriorated society and safety as a whole for everyone. it's dire but that also just means we need to protect and build the third spaces we can
February 9, 2026 at 4:37 PM
the death of third spaces offline (and online, really) has deteriorated society and safety as a whole for everyone. it's dire but that also just means we need to protect and build the third spaces we can
Reposted by Gio :⁾
I'm convinced AI is our generation's radium - a discovery with genuinely useful applications in specific, controlled circumstances that we stupidly put in everything from kid's toys to toothpaste until we realised the harm far too late where future generations will ask if we were out of our minds.
February 8, 2026 at 10:23 PM
I'm convinced AI is our generation's radium - a discovery with genuinely useful applications in specific, controlled circumstances that we stupidly put in everything from kid's toys to toothpaste until we realised the harm far too late where future generations will ask if we were out of our minds.
Reposted by Gio :⁾
i’ve heard you could nearly mistake male_07 for a real person…
anyway, discord isn’t getting my fucking ID or biometric info. yall JUST had a massive breach of EXACTLY that info some months back, the fuck is wrong with you. if i gotta move over all of my community shit to something else then i will
anyway, discord isn’t getting my fucking ID or biometric info. yall JUST had a massive breach of EXACTLY that info some months back, the fuck is wrong with you. if i gotta move over all of my community shit to something else then i will
Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month - all accounts set to "teen-appropriate experience" by default www.theverge.com/tech/875309/...
discord.com/press-releas...
discord.com/press-releas...
February 9, 2026 at 3:13 PM
i’ve heard you could nearly mistake male_07 for a real person…
anyway, discord isn’t getting my fucking ID or biometric info. yall JUST had a massive breach of EXACTLY that info some months back, the fuck is wrong with you. if i gotta move over all of my community shit to something else then i will
anyway, discord isn’t getting my fucking ID or biometric info. yall JUST had a massive breach of EXACTLY that info some months back, the fuck is wrong with you. if i gotta move over all of my community shit to something else then i will
Reposted by Gio :⁾
This. This is why you should never EVER trust a website or service with your government ID, whether your from the UK or elsewhere. It's an invasion of citizen privary and can easily be nabbed by those who know what they're doing.
Posted in October - "Discord says hackers stole government IDs of 70,000 users" arstechnica.com/security/202...
Discord says hackers stole government IDs of 70,000 users
As more sites require IDs for user age verification, expect more such breaches to come.
arstechnica.com
February 9, 2026 at 3:01 PM
This. This is why you should never EVER trust a website or service with your government ID, whether your from the UK or elsewhere. It's an invasion of citizen privary and can easily be nabbed by those who know what they're doing.
Package theft is wild because it’s a problem that’s been completely solved by “mailboxes”, except Amazon can’t leverage any of that existing infrastructure for what they do
Uh package theft is a very serious issue, with a staggering ~0.0026% of packages falling victim to porch pirates in 2024 alone!
It's important to create a nationwide panopticon to save Americans ~$50-200 per package.
(1) www.sellerscommerce.com/blog/package... (2) www.uspsoig.gov/reports/whit...
It's important to create a nationwide panopticon to save Americans ~$50-200 per package.
(1) www.sellerscommerce.com/blog/package... (2) www.uspsoig.gov/reports/whit...
i'm baffled by all the people in the replies to posts about the spy doorbells asking for alternatives. like... the alternative is a regualr fucking doorbell with no camera in it. or a door knocker. get you a weird gargoyle guy! you dont need a camera!
February 9, 2026 at 6:55 AM
Package theft is wild because it’s a problem that’s been completely solved by “mailboxes”, except Amazon can’t leverage any of that existing infrastructure for what they do
Reposted by Gio :⁾
I made a map of 3.4 million Bluesky users - see if you can find yourself!
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
Bluesky Map
Interactive map of 3.4 million Bluesky users, visualised by their follower pattern.
bluesky-map.theo.io
February 8, 2026 at 10:59 PM
I made a map of 3.4 million Bluesky users - see if you can find yourself!
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
bluesky-map.theo.io
I've seen some similar projects, but IMO this seems to better capture some of the fine-grained detail
Reposted by Gio :⁾
I'm hardly the first person to note this, but it's enormously instructive that our President and his followers saw the message "THE ONLY THING MORE POWERFUL THAN HATE IS LOVE" and understood it, correctly, as an attack on them
February 9, 2026 at 2:11 AM
I'm hardly the first person to note this, but it's enormously instructive that our President and his followers saw the message "THE ONLY THING MORE POWERFUL THAN HATE IS LOVE" and understood it, correctly, as an attack on them
Just realized we invented Milton from The Talos Principle. That fully went from science fiction to reality in one swoop.
February 9, 2026 at 6:28 AM
Just realized we invented Milton from The Talos Principle. That fully went from science fiction to reality in one swoop.
Reposted by Gio :⁾
So uh Ring just up and said they've got a huge centralized private surveillance network they can leverage all at once huh
February 9, 2026 at 2:10 AM
So uh Ring just up and said they've got a huge centralized private surveillance network they can leverage all at once huh
Reposted by Gio :⁾
Cops were frequently getting caught planting drugs in 2017 because body cameras were new and many of them didn't understand how the technology worked.
When cops hit "record" it saved the 30 seconds from *before* they hit the button. Eventually, they figured it out.
When cops hit "record" it saved the 30 seconds from *before* they hit the button. Eventually, they figured it out.
Why Cops Frequently Got Caught Planting Drugs in 2017
Look. All technology comes with a learning curve.
gizmodo.com
February 5, 2026 at 9:21 PM
Cops were frequently getting caught planting drugs in 2017 because body cameras were new and many of them didn't understand how the technology worked.
When cops hit "record" it saved the 30 seconds from *before* they hit the button. Eventually, they figured it out.
When cops hit "record" it saved the 30 seconds from *before* they hit the button. Eventually, they figured it out.
Reposted by Gio :⁾
While reporting this, I had something happen that's never happened. A comms rep for one of the co's disputed my reporting and said what I was telling them was untrue because it was not in Grok, xAI's chatbot.
I was looking directly at the files. And this person was using AI to challenge the truth.
I was looking directly at the files. And this person was using AI to challenge the truth.
Epstein had many known connections to Silicon Valley CEOs, but less known was how he made money from those relationships.
We did a deep dive into how he got dealflow in Silicon Valley, giving him shots to invest in Coinbase, Palantir, SpaceX and other companies.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/05/b...
We did a deep dive into how he got dealflow in Silicon Valley, giving him shots to invest in Coinbase, Palantir, SpaceX and other companies.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/05/b...
Jeffrey Epstein’s Money Mingled With Silicon Valley Start-Ups
www.nytimes.com
February 5, 2026 at 5:38 PM
While reporting this, I had something happen that's never happened. A comms rep for one of the co's disputed my reporting and said what I was telling them was untrue because it was not in Grok, xAI's chatbot.
I was looking directly at the files. And this person was using AI to challenge the truth.
I was looking directly at the files. And this person was using AI to challenge the truth.
Reposted by Gio :⁾
by age 38 you should have had experiences with Google, Adobe, Microsoft, etc rile you up so much when you meet anyone working there no matter what dept unless you knew them before that you're furious with them personally like someone from alderaan meeting a storm trooper who worked on the death star
February 2, 2026 at 11:09 PM
by age 38 you should have had experiences with Google, Adobe, Microsoft, etc rile you up so much when you meet anyone working there no matter what dept unless you knew them before that you're furious with them personally like someone from alderaan meeting a storm trooper who worked on the death star
Reposted by Gio :⁾
ive been trying to convert @im.giovanh.com to a fallout 76 player by any means necessary
#Fallout #Fallout76
#Fallout #Fallout76
February 1, 2026 at 10:33 PM
ive been trying to convert @im.giovanh.com to a fallout 76 player by any means necessary
#Fallout #Fallout76
#Fallout #Fallout76
Reposted by Gio :⁾
ICE is assaulting and at war with americans. we are all their enemy. no other way to look at it at this point
Just experienced the most intense tear gassing of my life by federal officers outside the ICE facility in Portland where marchers gathered. There was no fast exit as they indiscriminately threw loads of gas and flash bangs. Children were in the crowd screaming. @oregoncapitalchronicle.com
February 1, 2026 at 2:49 AM
ICE is assaulting and at war with americans. we are all their enemy. no other way to look at it at this point
Reposted by Gio :⁾
Wrote about a recent study that suggested calling it "social media addiction" can do more harm than social media itself, in that it takes agency away from people, and makes it more difficult to help people who actually have a problem with not being able to put down social media.
The ‘Social Media Addiction’ Narrative May Be More Harmful Than Social Media Itself
This week, a major trial kicked off in Los Angeles in which hundreds of families sued Meta, TikTok, Snap, and YouTube, accusing the companies of intentionally designing their products to be addictive (though Snap…
This week, a major trial kicked off in Los Angeles in which hundreds of families sued Meta, TikTok, Snap, and YouTube, accusing the companies of intentionally designing their products to be addictive (though Snap…
The ‘Social Media Addiction’ Narrative May Be More Harmful Than Social Media Itself
This week, a major trial kicked off in Los Angeles in which hundreds of families sued Meta, TikTok, Snap, and YouTube, accusing the companies of intentionally designing their products to be addictive (though Snap and TikTok both settled on the eve of the trial) . From the Guardian: For the first time, a huge group of parents, teens and school districts is taking on the world’s most powerful social media companies in open court, accusing the tech giants of intentionally designing their products to be addictive.
www.techdirt.com
January 29, 2026 at 7:26 PM
Wrote about a recent study that suggested calling it "social media addiction" can do more harm than social media itself, in that it takes agency away from people, and makes it more difficult to help people who actually have a problem with not being able to put down social media.
Reposted by Gio :⁾
Ossoff: "This is a seismic event. This should have people across the country absolutely shook. This is a huge deal. This is an FBI raid on the Fulton County Elections office ... This is a shot across the bow at the midterm elections. He tried to steal power when he lost it in 2020."
January 29, 2026 at 2:52 AM
Ossoff: "This is a seismic event. This should have people across the country absolutely shook. This is a huge deal. This is an FBI raid on the Fulton County Elections office ... This is a shot across the bow at the midterm elections. He tried to steal power when he lost it in 2020."
Reposted by Gio :⁾
grok is elon musk correctly noting that chatbots were a new and poorly understood ideological battleground, the same way social media was at its inception, and attempting to seize the field for nazism, as he has also done with twitter
Grok is the most antisemitic chatbot according to the ADL
Grok is the most antisemitic chatbot according to the ADL
Grok showed a “complete failure” for some prompts.
buff.ly
January 28, 2026 at 4:31 PM
grok is elon musk correctly noting that chatbots were a new and poorly understood ideological battleground, the same way social media was at its inception, and attempting to seize the field for nazism, as he has also done with twitter