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chiefpad.bsky.social
chiefpad
@chiefpad.bsky.social
630 followers 320 following 2.4K posts
“one day, when it’s safe, when there’s no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it’s too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this.”
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chiefpad.bsky.social
50 people?
yellow dots on the heads in the photograph indicate 50 people at a political rally.
October 30, 2025 at 11:41 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
I have to be embarrassed and say my case is not quite the same brand... but I love the aesthetic! Also this is a step up from a long line of laptops, so I feel like I'm in the future.
Picture of my home computer setup, with lots of glass and plenty of rgb lights in the fans.
October 18, 2025 at 3:09 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
20th century folk singer Woody Guthrie wrote the same message on his guitar to express his contempt for fascism, and to suggest that the act of creative expression is a way to resist those who would take it away. Just as Guthrie's guitar made music against authoritarians and capitalism, John uses his laptop to spread the written word in service of curiosity and compassion.
September 27, 2025 at 8:41 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
5 hours left, REPENT!
7:22 pm Wednesday, 24 September 2025 (GMT-12) Time in Baker Island Wikipedia says "Today, Baker Island is part of the Baker Island National Wildlife Refuge, an unincorporated and unorganized territory of the U.S. The island is managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and is visited annually for conservation purposes. Statistically, Baker Island is grouped with the United States Minor Outlying Islands and, along with Howland Island, is among the last places on Earth to experience the New Year, operating in the UTC−12:00 time zone, just east of the International Date Line.[5] It is one of the most remote U.S. possessions in the equatorial Pacific.[6]"
September 25, 2025 at 7:24 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
The spine separated in the 70s, the book is still held together with the remnants of the backing material
The spine separated in the 70s, the book is still held together with the remnants of the backing material Pages in between signatures have gaps
September 21, 2025 at 12:54 PM
chiefpad.bsky.social
I asked chatgpt for "a movie poster for a ripoff or sequel to the 1997 horror movie "the cube", but this time it is not set in a cube, but inside a cuboctic tetrahedron" and I think it did pretty well.
a movie poster for a ripoff or sequel to the 1997 horror movie "the cube", but this time it is not set in a cube, but inside a cuboctic tetrahedron. AI generated, but pretty good quality, and the guy has all his fingers. The enclosing polyhedron is not quite correct, but the sort of stylised graphic that a classically trained artist might reproduce, given a photo and drawing from memory.
September 16, 2025 at 4:32 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
The subgenius is to the left of the left and right of the right, picking the pockets of both sides.
September 13, 2025 at 4:41 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
The NewsmaxSpeak dictionary will be *this* thick.
'You haven't a real appreciation of Newspeak, Winston,' he said almost sadly. 'Even when you write it you're still thinking in Oldspeak. I've read some of those pieces that you write in "The Times" occasionally. They're good enough, but they're translations. In your heart you'd prefer to stick to Oldspeak, with all its vagueness and its useless shades of meaning. You don't grasp the beauty of the destruction of words. Do you know that Newspeak is the only language in the world whose vocabulary gets smaller every year?' Winston did know that, of course. He smiled, sympathetically he hoped, not trusting himself to speak. Syme bit off another fragment of the dark-coloured bread, chewed it briefly, and went on: 'Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed, will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten. Already, in the Eleventh Edition, we're not far from that point. But the process will still be continuing long after you and I are dead. Every year fewer and fewer words, and the range of consciousness always a little smaller. Even now, of course, there's no reason or excuse for committing thoughtcrime. It's merely a question of self-discipline, reality-control. But in the end there won't be any need even for that. The Revolution will be complete when the language is perfect. Newspeak is Ingsoc and Ingsoc is Newspeak,' he added with a sort of mystical satisfaction. 'Has it ever occurred to you, Winston, that by the year 2050, at the very latest, not a single human being will be alive who could understand such a conversation as we are having now?'
September 8, 2025 at 8:37 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Steam knows too much
Steam recommendation list says "Because you love... Crime"
August 1, 2025 at 9:19 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them. The Party intellectual knows in which direction his memories must be altered; he therefore knows that he is playing tricks with reality; but by the exercise of doublethink he also satisfies himself that reality is not violated. The process has to be conscious, or it would not be carried out with sufficient precision, but it also has to be unconscious, or it would bring with it a feeling of falsity and hence of guilt. Doublethink lies at the very heart of Ingsoc, since the essential act of the Party is to use conscious deception while retaining the firmness of purpose that goes with complete honesty. To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies -- all this is indispensably necessary. Even in using the word doublethink it is necessary to exercise doublethink. For by using the word one admits that one is tampering with reality; by a fresh act of doublethink one erases this knowledge; and so on indefinitely, with the lie always one leap ahead of the truth. Ultimately it is by means of doublethink that the Party has been able -- and may, for all we know, continue to be able for thousands of years -- to arrest the course of history.
August 1, 2025 at 6:53 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Hooray! Seven loads of food!

That should be enough food to give citizens of Gaza about... 46 grams of food each.

That's 2-3 spoonfuls of cooked rice per person.
Lets say we had seven trucks full of food delivered to the Gaza strip. How much food would that give to each person, if it was distributed evenly? Edit To calculate this, I need to make some estimates about truck capacity and Gaza's population. Truck capacity estimates: A standard food delivery truck typically carries 10-20 tons of food Let's use 15 tons as a reasonable average 7 trucks × 15 tons = 105 tons of food total Gaza population: Based on pre-October 2023 estimates, Gaza's population was approximately 2.3 million people. Calculation: 105 tons = 105,000 kg of food 105,000 kg ÷ 2.3 million people ≈ 0.046 kg per person This equals about 46 grams (1.6 ounces) of food per person. Context: This is roughly equivalent to a single slice of bread or a small apple per person. The WHO recommends about 2,100 calories per day for an average adult, which typically requires 1-2 kg of food depending on the type. So seven truckloads would provide less than a day's worth of food for the population. This illustrates why humanitarian organizations emphasize that food aid needs to be sustained and delivered at much larger scales to meaningfully address food insecurity in dense populations like Gaza. so that's about a quarter of a cup of rice? Edit Actually, that would be even less than a quarter cup of rice. Rice volume calculation: 46 grams of uncooked rice is roughly equivalent to about 3 tablespoons Since there are 16 tablespoons in a cup, this would be about 3/16 of a cup That's less than 1/4 cup (which would be 4 tablespoons) In more familiar terms: 46 grams of uncooked rice would cook up to about 1/3 cup of cooked rice That's roughly 2-3 spoonfuls of cooked rice per person So yes, you're right to put it in that perspective - it's a very small amount. Even something as calorie-dense as rice would only provide a few bites per person from seven trucks of food distributed across Gaza's entire population.
July 28, 2025 at 11:17 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
History has lessons, and sometimes predicts the future
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nero
In AD 67 Nero participated in the Olympics. He had bribed organizers to postpone the games for a year so he could participate,[133] and artistic competitions were added to the athletic events. Nero won every contest in which he was a competitor. During the games Nero sang and played his lyre on stage, acted in tragedies and raced chariots. He won a 10-horse chariot race, despite being thrown from the chariot and leaving the race. He was crowned on the basis that he would have won if he had completed the race. After he died a year later, his name was removed from the list of winners.[134] Champlin writes that though Nero's participation "effectively stifled true competition, [Nero] seems to have been oblivious of reality."[59]: 54–55 
July 28, 2025 at 2:30 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Matthew 20:1-16
The Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard is found in Matthew 20:1-16. It tells the story of a landowner who hires laborers at different hours of the day to work in his vineyard. While those hired early in the morning grumble when those hired later receive the same pay, the landowner reminds them that they agreed to the wage and that he is free to be generous. The parable illustrates that God's generosity extends to all who accept his invitation to work in his kingdom, regardless of when they come to faith.
July 27, 2025 at 5:03 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
MAGA character: "If you press this button, Donald Trump will get life in prison. BUT! Bill Clinton will get the same" Dem character: presses button {bip} MAGA character: {sweats} Dem character: presses button again {bip! bip! bip! bip!} MAGA character: no wait Dem character: presses button repeatedly {bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip! bip!}
July 23, 2025 at 11:00 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Sculpture at night. The theme is "It is the nature... of seeds to know... when to be still... and when to break open... and rise into action."
July 23, 2025 at 10:56 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
July 14, 2025 at 10:28 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Socrates didn't write anything.
July 12, 2025 at 1:42 PM
chiefpad.bsky.social
No, wait, what?
June 13, 2025 at 3:52 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Definitely need to own the label "Obstructionist" the way MAGA took on "Deplorables". Can I buy a t-shirt?
June 13, 2025 at 3:48 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
"In the Shadows"
Artist: Sam Bruere
Oil on board
AUD$150

Contact Victorian Artists Society

g.co/kgs/BpHC3X5
Oil painting in the Victorian Artists Society gallery in inner Melbourne.
June 10, 2025 at 1:19 PM
chiefpad.bsky.social
So close, NYT, so close and yet so far.
Highlighting the "like a Nazi" part of the NYT article on Elon taking drugs. The context: "It is unclear whether Mr. Musk, 53, was taking drugs when he became a fixture at the White House this year and was handed the power to slash the federal bureaucracy. But he has exhibited erratic behavior, insulting cabinet members, gesturing like a Nazi and garbling his answers in a staged interview."
May 31, 2025 at 4:37 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
May 28, 2025 at 9:33 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
Variables Level I BASIC allowed for three types of variables: 26 numeric variables, labeled A through Z 2 string variables, labeled A$ and B$ 1 array variable, labeled A(x) (with x used as the index) Error Messages Level I BASIC had three error messages: HOW?, WHAT?, and SORRY. User’s Manual for Level I described the error messages this way: In general, a HOW? message means, “I understand your instructions, but they’re asking me to do something that’s impossible.” The WHAT? error message, on the other hand, means, “I don’t understand your instructions — either the grammar is wrong or you’re using words that aren’t in my vocabulary.” The third and final error message is SORRY. It means “Sorry — you have run out of memory locations and must either cut down the program size or purchase additional memory.”
May 5, 2025 at 9:52 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
May 3, 2025 at 10:42 AM
chiefpad.bsky.social
May 3, 2025 at 10:41 AM