John Q Public
@conjurial.bsky.social
I work in AI research, I used to work in politics, and I poast about both
Lots of things become very cheap if you can just say “nah bro, just take my word for it” in response to most concerns
November 14, 2025 at 10:28 PM
Lots of things become very cheap if you can just say “nah bro, just take my word for it” in response to most concerns
And your random fly by night crypto rugpull mainly tells you how desperate certain people are to be scammed, which I’ll concede is valuable information if you’re a scammer
November 14, 2025 at 10:22 PM
And your random fly by night crypto rugpull mainly tells you how desperate certain people are to be scammed, which I’ll concede is valuable information if you’re a scammer
Novel information about what, anyway? The price of Bitcoin I’ll admit says something, though hard to say exactly what. The price of ether is an expression of confidence or lack thereof in the Ethereum project
Meanwhile Dogecoin is explicitly a joke
Meanwhile Dogecoin is explicitly a joke
November 14, 2025 at 10:21 PM
Novel information about what, anyway? The price of Bitcoin I’ll admit says something, though hard to say exactly what. The price of ether is an expression of confidence or lack thereof in the Ethereum project
Meanwhile Dogecoin is explicitly a joke
Meanwhile Dogecoin is explicitly a joke
Just generalized misanthropy that’s not quite self-aware enough to identify as such
November 14, 2025 at 9:31 PM
Just generalized misanthropy that’s not quite self-aware enough to identify as such
This is the same sort of fundamentally anti-human belief system that gave us “the population bomb” and those people you see on NYT comment threads complaining about how what we *really* need is for there to be fewer people
College students are CEQA pollution, etc etc
College students are CEQA pollution, etc etc
November 14, 2025 at 9:30 PM
This is the same sort of fundamentally anti-human belief system that gave us “the population bomb” and those people you see on NYT comment threads complaining about how what we *really* need is for there to be fewer people
College students are CEQA pollution, etc etc
College students are CEQA pollution, etc etc
suicide and murder also may not be clearly separate categories here
it doesn't even necessarily have to be murder as such.
if you're in charge of the prison system and you know Epstein is suicidal because he's staring down the rest of his life in jail, just, y'know, make it known to the guards he's not *really* on suicide watch
if you're in charge of the prison system and you know Epstein is suicidal because he's staring down the rest of his life in jail, just, y'know, make it known to the guards he's not *really* on suicide watch
November 14, 2025 at 9:26 PM
suicide and murder also may not be clearly separate categories here
apropos of nothing
November 14, 2025 at 8:54 AM
apropos of nothing
imagine a world where Peter Thiel is best known politically as a sharp-elbowed funder of municipal deregulation campaigns
sigh
sigh
November 14, 2025 at 7:01 AM
imagine a world where Peter Thiel is best known politically as a sharp-elbowed funder of municipal deregulation campaigns
sigh
sigh
they needed yimby and instead they found ayahuasca and Carl Schmitt
November 14, 2025 at 6:59 AM
they needed yimby and instead they found ayahuasca and Carl Schmitt
has he ever said the additional users were, uh, human
[reposting without the confusion about which definition of user we're comparing between bluesky and twitter]
[reposting without the confusion about which definition of user we're comparing between bluesky and twitter]
November 14, 2025 at 6:57 AM
has he ever said the additional users were, uh, human
[reposting without the confusion about which definition of user we're comparing between bluesky and twitter]
[reposting without the confusion about which definition of user we're comparing between bluesky and twitter]
The fact that AG Sulzberger and his family own and manage the largest watchdog means you to have to ask, as they say, quis custodiet etc
All of this would be perfectly legible to a journalist in other circumstances
All of this would be perfectly legible to a journalist in other circumstances
November 14, 2025 at 4:45 AM
The fact that AG Sulzberger and his family own and manage the largest watchdog means you to have to ask, as they say, quis custodiet etc
All of this would be perfectly legible to a journalist in other circumstances
All of this would be perfectly legible to a journalist in other circumstances
The economic insecurity of journalism and journalists in a world where the internet has eaten the ad money means coming out and saying squarely that NYT management is up to its eyeballs in extremely shady things will cause you to have trouble paying your rent
November 14, 2025 at 4:44 AM
The economic insecurity of journalism and journalists in a world where the internet has eaten the ad money means coming out and saying squarely that NYT management is up to its eyeballs in extremely shady things will cause you to have trouble paying your rent
Yeah I don’t *think* you had to register then? If any Law Knowers would like to correct me about that though, please do
November 14, 2025 at 3:45 AM
Yeah I don’t *think* you had to register then? If any Law Knowers would like to correct me about that though, please do
In my ideal world you’d be able to hit an API endpoint from the Copyright Office with a work and get back a similarity-based “this is probably all or part of registry IDs X, Y and Z” or “unregistered”
And the return value while not dispositive would have persuasive value for courts
And the return value while not dispositive would have persuasive value for courts
November 14, 2025 at 3:37 AM
In my ideal world you’d be able to hit an API endpoint from the Copyright Office with a work and get back a similarity-based “this is probably all or part of registry IDs X, Y and Z” or “unregistered”
And the return value while not dispositive would have persuasive value for courts
And the return value while not dispositive would have persuasive value for courts
the more I learn about how the press handled the 2016 election the angrier I get
November 14, 2025 at 3:35 AM
the more I learn about how the press handled the 2016 election the angrier I get
Honestly feels like a lot of the answer is “the media decided not to make an issue out of it”
November 14, 2025 at 3:34 AM
Honestly feels like a lot of the answer is “the media decided not to make an issue out of it”
Yeah I guess, would you use benchmarks to decide whether to use the model? I’m sure they look at them when pre- and post-training and etc, but would we care?
I don’t think I would personally, maybe not unless I have a really specialized task in mind
I don’t think I would personally, maybe not unless I have a really specialized task in mind
November 14, 2025 at 3:33 AM
Yeah I guess, would you use benchmarks to decide whether to use the model? I’m sure they look at them when pre- and post-training and etc, but would we care?
I don’t think I would personally, maybe not unless I have a really specialized task in mind
I don’t think I would personally, maybe not unless I have a really specialized task in mind
This way they all say “our country” all the time about everything is an interesting tic, whether it’s revealing a fascist view of the organic nation or just copying Trump really hard
November 14, 2025 at 3:31 AM
This way they all say “our country” all the time about everything is an interesting tic, whether it’s revealing a fascist view of the organic nation or just copying Trump really hard
they don’t necessarily need it: one of the holdings of the authors / Anthropic case was that if Anthropic legally buys books the usual way it’s fair use to train on them. No additional license needed.
Anthropic was dumb and also pirated some books but could have not done so and been in the clear
Anthropic was dumb and also pirated some books but could have not done so and been in the clear
November 14, 2025 at 3:04 AM
they don’t necessarily need it: one of the holdings of the authors / Anthropic case was that if Anthropic legally buys books the usual way it’s fair use to train on them. No additional license needed.
Anthropic was dumb and also pirated some books but could have not done so and been in the clear
Anthropic was dumb and also pirated some books but could have not done so and been in the clear
Torrens title for copyright would be a good idea
November 14, 2025 at 2:52 AM
Torrens title for copyright would be a good idea
And for that matter even if you have one how do you know the entity making the dedication has clear ownership of the copyright?
November 14, 2025 at 2:51 AM
And for that matter even if you have one how do you know the entity making the dedication has clear ownership of the copyright?
Nor do you know what is and isn’t copyrighted because public domain dedications don’t have to be registered anywhere
November 14, 2025 at 2:50 AM
Nor do you know what is and isn’t copyrighted because public domain dedications don’t have to be registered anywhere
I’m now rooting for a newly discovered letter from Shakespeare saying he felt the same way about Macbeth
November 14, 2025 at 2:36 AM
I’m now rooting for a newly discovered letter from Shakespeare saying he felt the same way about Macbeth
The job is to savvily report on the direction of the currents while disdaining the people with oars in their boats as just Not Getting It
November 14, 2025 at 1:27 AM
The job is to savvily report on the direction of the currents while disdaining the people with oars in their boats as just Not Getting It