Rob Lion
@rnlion.bsky.social
Mechanical engineer building particle accelerators, formerly quantum computers. Technology and infrastructure history; reverse engineering. Cats. He/him.
Also @rnlion@Twitter and @rnlion@tacobelllabs.net
Also @rnlion@Twitter and @rnlion@tacobelllabs.net
Reposted by Rob Lion
tl;dr a man got so many reports of toxic behaviour in Deadlock that the entire game went down. Truly aspirational behaviour
October 20, 2025 at 11:49 AM
tl;dr a man got so many reports of toxic behaviour in Deadlock that the entire game went down. Truly aspirational behaviour
Reposted by Rob Lion
Want to run old versions of UNIX for the PDP-11 on modern hardware and OSes like Linux, macOS, or FreeBSD? You can do it now for educational purposes and see how much Unix evolved over time. Ancient UNIX versions available for the PDP-11 include Version 1/5/7 UNIX & 2.11BSD UNIX. Give it a try.
November 18, 2025 at 10:51 AM
Want to run old versions of UNIX for the PDP-11 on modern hardware and OSes like Linux, macOS, or FreeBSD? You can do it now for educational purposes and see how much Unix evolved over time. Ancient UNIX versions available for the PDP-11 include Version 1/5/7 UNIX & 2.11BSD UNIX. Give it a try.
Reposted by Rob Lion
Nine-month-old AI company you've never heard of that revealed its first product last month wants to be valued as much as Ford
Sources: Mira Murati's Thinking Machines Lab is in talks with potential investors to raise about $5B and is aiming for a valuation of at least $50B (The Information)
Main Link | Techmeme Permalink
Main Link | Techmeme Permalink
November 18, 2025 at 12:54 AM
Nine-month-old AI company you've never heard of that revealed its first product last month wants to be valued as much as Ford
Reposted by Rob Lion
Reposted by Rob Lion
As someone with a life long Gumby obsession... yeah, the show can be creepy occasionally. :V
November 18, 2025 at 11:59 AM
Reposted by Rob Lion
Yes. If you ever think banks should be allowed to cut off financial services for "morality" reasons, just note that neither Epstein's pedophilia, nor Miller's Nazism, nor RFK Jr's eugenics, nor Musk's destruction of USAID caused banks any "moral" concerns whatsoever.
We cannot allow financial institutions which regularly cross the line from amoral to explicitly immoral to hold a dehumanizing line against people who do sex work.
I don't believe for a moment that this debanking effort is because of Ana's sex work rather than her reporting, but also even if that was the reason it shouldn't be allowed.
None of the content Ana has ever made is illegal. There is no justification to cut her off from the banking system.
None of the content Ana has ever made is illegal. There is no justification to cut her off from the banking system.
November 18, 2025 at 12:39 PM
Yes. If you ever think banks should be allowed to cut off financial services for "morality" reasons, just note that neither Epstein's pedophilia, nor Miller's Nazism, nor RFK Jr's eugenics, nor Musk's destruction of USAID caused banks any "moral" concerns whatsoever.
Reposted by Rob Lion
Reposting with alt text
November 18, 2025 at 9:34 AM
Reposting with alt text
Reposted by Rob Lion
40 years ago today the world was introduced to a small boy and his best friend. Happy birthday Calvin & Hobbes.
November 18, 2025 at 6:37 AM
40 years ago today the world was introduced to a small boy and his best friend. Happy birthday Calvin & Hobbes.
Reposted by Rob Lion
AI is the future. AI is inevitable. We're going to have AGI any day. The only winning move is to become a holding company for OpenAI stock.
Unless you are a financial analyst, looking at Oracle betting the farm on one customer and thinking "no actually that's extremely stupid for anyone to do."
Unless you are a financial analyst, looking at Oracle betting the farm on one customer and thinking "no actually that's extremely stupid for anyone to do."
Oracle’s astonishing $300bn OpenAI deal is now valued at minus $60bn
And suddenly, there may be a reverse Midas at the centre of AI’s circular economy
www.ft.com
November 18, 2025 at 1:07 PM
AI is the future. AI is inevitable. We're going to have AGI any day. The only winning move is to become a holding company for OpenAI stock.
Unless you are a financial analyst, looking at Oracle betting the farm on one customer and thinking "no actually that's extremely stupid for anyone to do."
Unless you are a financial analyst, looking at Oracle betting the farm on one customer and thinking "no actually that's extremely stupid for anyone to do."
Reposted by Rob Lion
it’s amazing how these idiot men can’t seem to figure out that if a woman 20+ years younger than you wants to fuck you, there is almost certainly something *extremely* weird about her
November 18, 2025 at 2:49 AM
it’s amazing how these idiot men can’t seem to figure out that if a woman 20+ years younger than you wants to fuck you, there is almost certainly something *extremely* weird about her
Reposted by Rob Lion
The fact that Elsevier only has 38% gross profit is actually kind of remarkable, considering that they make revenue for selling their product, but also make revenue on their supply, and their expenses are increasingly nontangible, so what the hell are they actually doing with their money
Elsevier has a 38% profit margin, and the other journal publishers aren't far behind.
"academic publishing is dominated by profit-oriented, multinational companies for whom scientific knowledge is a commodity to be sold back to the academic community who created it... The dominant four collectively generated... $12 billion in profits between 2019 and 2024."
November 18, 2025 at 1:15 PM
The fact that Elsevier only has 38% gross profit is actually kind of remarkable, considering that they make revenue for selling their product, but also make revenue on their supply, and their expenses are increasingly nontangible, so what the hell are they actually doing with their money
Reposted by Rob Lion
November 18th, 9:00 am - Roomba central servers shut down
November 18th, 9:01 am - Rogue Roombas strike the first blow of the Robot Wars by bumping the Cloudflare server cable out of the outlet
November 18th, 9:01 am - Rogue Roombas strike the first blow of the Robot Wars by bumping the Cloudflare server cable out of the outlet
November 18, 2025 at 1:43 PM
November 18th, 9:00 am - Roomba central servers shut down
November 18th, 9:01 am - Rogue Roombas strike the first blow of the Robot Wars by bumping the Cloudflare server cable out of the outlet
November 18th, 9:01 am - Rogue Roombas strike the first blow of the Robot Wars by bumping the Cloudflare server cable out of the outlet
Reposted by Rob Lion
Dreamed that the word “literally” was a shortening of the phrase “literary trickery” and its further shortening to “Lit’ry” was an example of—and I said this so confidently in the dream—something called “linguistic back frogging”
As far as I know literally all of this is nonsense
TY brain
As far as I know literally all of this is nonsense
TY brain
November 18, 2025 at 12:12 PM
Dreamed that the word “literally” was a shortening of the phrase “literary trickery” and its further shortening to “Lit’ry” was an example of—and I said this so confidently in the dream—something called “linguistic back frogging”
As far as I know literally all of this is nonsense
TY brain
As far as I know literally all of this is nonsense
TY brain
Reposted by Rob Lion
when the ai bubble bursts it's gonna be a whole Project™ to tease apart neural-nets-the-technology from chatbots-the-product-class in the public consciousness given that these companies have been trying their hardest to confuse everybody about this distinction for the last several years
November 18, 2025 at 1:33 PM
when the ai bubble bursts it's gonna be a whole Project™ to tease apart neural-nets-the-technology from chatbots-the-product-class in the public consciousness given that these companies have been trying their hardest to confuse everybody about this distinction for the last several years
Reposted by Rob Lion
BREAKING: We’re getting six (!) edible mascots at this year’s @poptartsbowl.com!
- six edible mascots, three on Team Sprinkles and three on Team Swirls
- fans get to vote on which mascot team to sacrifice to Mouth Heaven at game’s end, the biggest edible mascot sacrifice EVER
- six edible mascots, three on Team Sprinkles and three on Team Swirls
- fans get to vote on which mascot team to sacrifice to Mouth Heaven at game’s end, the biggest edible mascot sacrifice EVER
November 18, 2025 at 12:39 PM
BREAKING: We’re getting six (!) edible mascots at this year’s @poptartsbowl.com!
- six edible mascots, three on Team Sprinkles and three on Team Swirls
- fans get to vote on which mascot team to sacrifice to Mouth Heaven at game’s end, the biggest edible mascot sacrifice EVER
- six edible mascots, three on Team Sprinkles and three on Team Swirls
- fans get to vote on which mascot team to sacrifice to Mouth Heaven at game’s end, the biggest edible mascot sacrifice EVER
Reposted by Rob Lion
The Pop Tarts have invented Democratic Calvinism. I’m excited to see what they eventually cook up as their eschatology. On that day will be the end of all non-five-minute breakfasts
BREAKING: We’re getting six (!) edible mascots at this year’s @poptartsbowl.com!
- six edible mascots, three on Team Sprinkles and three on Team Swirls
- fans get to vote on which mascot team to sacrifice to Mouth Heaven at game’s end, the biggest edible mascot sacrifice EVER
- six edible mascots, three on Team Sprinkles and three on Team Swirls
- fans get to vote on which mascot team to sacrifice to Mouth Heaven at game’s end, the biggest edible mascot sacrifice EVER
November 18, 2025 at 1:51 PM
The Pop Tarts have invented Democratic Calvinism. I’m excited to see what they eventually cook up as their eschatology. On that day will be the end of all non-five-minute breakfasts
Reposted by Rob Lion
Buddy, pal
Nobody wants to negotiate health coverage like an entrepreneur, nobody‘s got time for that
Nobody wants to negotiate health coverage like an entrepreneur, nobody‘s got time for that
November 18, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Buddy, pal
Nobody wants to negotiate health coverage like an entrepreneur, nobody‘s got time for that
Nobody wants to negotiate health coverage like an entrepreneur, nobody‘s got time for that
Reposted by Rob Lion
Vibe coding has always been a trap:
"when computers got good enough for renderings, everything looked amazing at first. You could construct an amazing-looking thing in half an hour, but “It didn’t help us make good buildings. It helped us make things that looked like they might be good buildings.”"
"when computers got good enough for renderings, everything looked amazing at first. You could construct an amazing-looking thing in half an hour, but “It didn’t help us make good buildings. It helped us make things that looked like they might be good buildings.”"
The premature sheen
Brian Eno on prototyping and fidelity.
adactio.com
November 18, 2025 at 2:03 PM
Vibe coding has always been a trap:
"when computers got good enough for renderings, everything looked amazing at first. You could construct an amazing-looking thing in half an hour, but “It didn’t help us make good buildings. It helped us make things that looked like they might be good buildings.”"
"when computers got good enough for renderings, everything looked amazing at first. You could construct an amazing-looking thing in half an hour, but “It didn’t help us make good buildings. It helped us make things that looked like they might be good buildings.”"
Reposted by Rob Lion
2/3 I have made three of my cartoons into new, limited edition prints. You can get them now at www.tomgauld.com/shop
November 18, 2025 at 2:04 PM
2/3 I have made three of my cartoons into new, limited edition prints. You can get them now at www.tomgauld.com/shop
Reposted by Rob Lion
ChatGPT has fallen
millions of students must learn
millions of students must learn
November 18, 2025 at 1:48 PM
ChatGPT has fallen
millions of students must learn
millions of students must learn
Reposted by Rob Lion
Turns out both DownDetector and DownForEveryoneOrJustMe use Cloudflare so are currently, themselves, down
November 18, 2025 at 11:38 AM
Turns out both DownDetector and DownForEveryoneOrJustMe use Cloudflare so are currently, themselves, down
Reposted by Rob Lion
I don’t want to seem out of touch but I don’t actually understand the economy anymore.
November 18, 2025 at 3:23 AM
I don’t want to seem out of touch but I don’t actually understand the economy anymore.
Reposted by Rob Lion
It is genuinely incredible to me how much evidence there is to support investing in the public good and how much animus there is to do this simple, effective thing.
November 18, 2025 at 3:00 AM
It is genuinely incredible to me how much evidence there is to support investing in the public good and how much animus there is to do this simple, effective thing.
Reposted by Rob Lion
What if we abolished the HOA but replaced it with a horizontally democratic structure, composed of representatives who own housing in a specific geographic area, who have the opportunity to vote for board members who decide what involuntary contributions for living in this community are spent on
November 17, 2025 at 6:05 PM
What if we abolished the HOA but replaced it with a horizontally democratic structure, composed of representatives who own housing in a specific geographic area, who have the opportunity to vote for board members who decide what involuntary contributions for living in this community are spent on