Which brings us around to my ultimate thesis, which is that the Roman Republic conquered the entire world it knew...because of woke.

100% this! 🙌

“There is a certain intellectual laziness that settles at either extreme of the hype/skepticism spectrum. By failing to acknowledge both the utility and the dangers, we allow some to run untethered into mayhem while others wear blinders, convincing themselves it isn't happening.”

If 2026 brings us a lengthy Eric Lang deep dive on the design of Munchkin, it’s off to a good start.

I think it’d be neat to dig into the scientific discoveries that made transistors viable. How doping silicon with different elements gives it the properties to execute boolean logic, etc.

I find stuff like this helpful when I feel that way: bsky.app/profile/luke...

There are still people developing new tech with empathy.

It could be read as two separate questions:

1. Is this you?
2. Is this an authorized representative?

In which case it would be unclear which you’re saying yes or no to.

*sigh* Somehow I’m not surprised that Fetterman’s in that list.

This will always be the sound of computer to me: upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co...

How do we feel about the potential for something like the Slate or the Telo to fill the gap?

Google+ probably came the closest to having a compelling sales pitch, but that died on the vine (and I think Google was already sliding into evil at that point). Mastodon’s probably the least evil currently but lacks the sales pitch.

It’s been tried (Diaspora comes to mind). The big problem is that they need to a selling point more compelling than “all of your friends and family are already here,” and things like “we respect your privacy” simply aren’t that for your average Internet user.

I propose that this hypothesis requires more testing.

Chilling, isn’t it? I get what they were going for with it, but in the current political climate it has a very particular read.

Are we entirely certain it’s not?

I’m happy any time it’s not Yet Another Shade of Blue.

That’s just the same sleight of hand, isn’t it? I’m pretty sure it remains illegal to shoot civilians even with Congressional authorization.

Probably, but I’d prefer to avoid that altogether. Although I should also note the hypothetical civilians aren’t necessarily US; continuing to murder Venezuelan fishermen is also illegal.

Correct but also kind of pulling some sleight-of-hand. It’s not really capital-W War that people are anticipating here, is it? It’s, “hey, soldier, would you kindly shoot that civilian for me?”