https://www.mdia.org/articles/tarantulas-on-mount-diablo for the past few days the phrase "autumnal wanderers" has been sitting in my head purring softly

This whole Russian Bots narrative is really tiring. It has been ten fucking years of this shit. It is a pervasive story because it is an incredibly useful propaganda tactic in deflecting blame from anybody in power who can actually be held accountable.

As Liberalism deteriorates under the weight of its contradictions (namely, trying to reconcile Capitalism with Democracy), all of our sins can be conveniently shunted to an external enemy. We can keep telling ourselves the lie that our system is fundamentally just, only we keep getting bamboozled by a foreign enemy.

Rather than confront the antisocial unity of the Republicans, Democrats, corporate media, finance capitalism, and rent-seeking monopolies, we are conditioned instead to circle our wagons around them. We are supposed to believe that this unholy alliance is actually democracy manifest, and that it is actually very fragile. That it is dangling by a thread, and how sorely we'll miss it when it's gone.

This facile mode of media analysis completely lacks any power analysis. We are to believe that the world's most valuable social media properties are powerless in the face of common cyber-criminals. As a countermeasure, we not only accept, but welcome increased surveillance and censorship, to the most privacy invading companies in the world, to make sure the people spreading the wrong politics can be swiftly eliminated from the body politic.

This is awfully convenient for the powers-that-be. Also, pay no mind to the fact that these platforms are an overflowing dumpster of reactionary sludge, despite all of this increased surveillance. It has literally never been worse.

This isn't the work of a foreign bot farm. This is the deliberate design of capitalist social media platforms. Bots - to the extent they factor into the equation - are only a drop in the bucket. A bug's corpse on the windshield of a home-grown propaganda machine which is driving straight towards fascism.

They're going to kill us all to build a beach resort.

update: character.ai has filed for bankruptcy. some of its assets may be sold off to disney, none of its executives appear to be going to prison. much higher-valuation chatbot companies have caused the deaths of many people, with no real repercussions for their executive leadership. https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/characterai-files-bankruptcy-agrees-sell-some-assets-disney-20-million-2026-10-13/

definitely doesn't seem like a microcosm for a certain definition of masculinity, nosiree!

The archetypal driver in these cases is a wealthy BMW owner who considers himself a professional-racing-level driver, and for whom "being behind someone in traffic" is a kind of humiliation, a psychological domination that drives him into a berserker rage. In his mind he is not free unless he is on the open road, speeding, with no one ahead of him. He subscribes to a sort of hierarchy that does not help anyone, does not actually exist.

Drove yesterday on various narrow, twisty California roads (forests, mountains, coasts) with absolutely gorgeous scenery and was reminded how sometimes there are people on those roads with you that are furious that you aren't going as fast as they want to go, taking blind corners at 45+ mph, way over the speed limit. What is your problem my guy? This is the scenic route! Why are you dead set on traveling at unsafe (possibly lethal) speeds?

RE: https://masto.ai/@Miro_Collas/117431722219558524

Between this and Robert Scoble posting video of his putting his (and possibly also his child's) life on the line with Tesla "FSD" at the same highway intersection where someone was killed, it's important to point out that there is essentially a suicidal cult impulse at work here, not unlike pentecostal snake handlers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_handling_in_Christianity

Sierra Marketing Department Employee 1: So here's a rough draft of the box art... what do you think?
Sierra Marketing Department Employee 2: Wow, looks great! I like that the "3D" is in 3D. But it feels like... it needs something extra.
Sierra Marketing Department Employee 3: Hmm yeah, there's that blank space on the left...
Sierra Marketing Department Employee 2: Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
Sierra Marketing Department Employees (in unison): Screaming Guy!

to think this stuff is useful you have to have an ontologically fucked idea of what the work actually is. this applies to almost all applications of this technology

RE: https://mas.to/@gleick/117417047354666899

This is the same discussion as autonomous vehicles - "oh no we have no way to ever charge a computer with murder for running down pedestrians, so I guess we better give up". This is not complicated.

glider pro, title screen, macintosh (1994) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4QP76Om7sQ

"lyre, a new narrative scripting language designed specifically for building storylet narratives in the vein of games like Sunless Sea, Voyageur, Fallen London" https://azhdarchid.com/lyre_preview

shaved head and eyebrows, eyes dilated, skulljack dripping for that "fresh from the pod" look

readin about the Ghost Blimp that floated in from the coast and landed on a random street in Daly City one day in 1942: https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Ghost-blimp-s-enduring-mystery-How-did-crew-13267309.php

Prison quilt stories just gut me

The incarcerated men couldn't be interviewed about the quilt they made, but they did provide write ups that accompany photos in the article. The man who didn't like participating until his brother died... goddamn

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2026/10/09/quilt-prison-vermont-restorative-justice

Edit: added a photo because the article didn't preview

#Quilting #QuiltingNews

let's be Hopeless Situation Warriors together
https://breezewiki.com/backstrokeofthewest/wiki/Hopeless_Situation_Warriors

"Programming isn’t special. It’s just Art, and Art is the most human — and thus, the most universal — thing that there is."

(Article title: Programming Isn’t Special)

https://blog.glyph.im/2026/10/programming-isnt-special.html

https://www.reddit.com/r/NoMansSkyTheGame/comments/1x0tzgq/fellow_crabellers_i_collected_all_helmet_crabs_in/ find someone who loves you as much as this person loves Helmet Crabs