Someone pointed out we (tech workers) had a lot of leverage in 2020 and 2021, but we squandered it. They were not wrong.

Perhaps now, while there is still time, we should make one last push for a union?

Looking at what is happening to software developers, I think if we aren't careful, that'll be the fate of many of us soon.

I am a senior pen tester. I've done one assessment in the last six months because the slop machine is doing them now.

While I've switched to threat modeling and other things, I'm taking a huge gamble hoping my company won't just decide to offload my position to the harness.

I've been in a union before, and I know they aren't perfect, but we've got nothing right now!

Thoughts and prayers? That does not feel like a winning strategy.

Unions could fight against slop machines, and give us the means of pushing back.

But do we have the will to do it?

Reading a thread on the dire state of software development, coupled with a report this morning about how "AI" is fucking up software.

Can we, as tech workers, get serious about unionizing yet?

RE: https://mastodon.social/@blogdiva/117383335991891306

This thread is so good

hot take

The United States of America has not won a war since 1945.

RE: https://caneandable.social/@WeirdWriter/117037643992094703

I think that Robert Kingett is one of the most underrated writers right now. Brilliant, funny, and charming only begin to describe this work. Brimming with heart would be another.

This is a great piece on fan fiction, but you can't go wrong with anything by Kingett. Anyway, if you haven't yet, do yourself a favor and give him a follow!

This isn't going to be my weekly post, but I have been thinking about Eve Online (like usual).

I made the mistake of being a fleet commander for four fleets in one week. That was just too much. It's been like two weeks since I flew a fleet. Going to try to fly two this weekend, but I think that's probably a more sustainable number for a week.

Anyway, that's all I wanted to share. If you are also an Eve player, I hope you are able to undock and have a little fun.

Cheers, internet friend!

#EveOnline

I went to a small state school and lucked into a great education.

I earned a philosophy degree while working towards a terminal graduate degree in history (meaning no doctor sauc3). I won a tuition waiver, so the two courses I needed to finish my philo degree only cost my time, the effort to think, read, attend lectures, write some papers, maybe give a talk and take a test. Plus the price of the books that were bought used from Amazon. Sorry, I know, but I was a broke grad student, forgive me or don't. That's not the point of the story. For what it's worth, I feel like I tried to check out what I could from the library, because lots of my fellow students didn't know about that trick. Anyway, I am getting sidetracked.

That philosophy degree was mostly earned under a feminist and noted scholar of queer theory, someone who literally wrote the book on it. We remain friends to this day, and spent a decent chunk of the morning having a discussion about gender and politics over text.

Do you think that someone who went to an Ivy could have that same exchange with a professor who taught them over a decade ago? Would they even be able to get in touch with their more famous professors?

I'm not trying to make an explicit argument about the quality of my education, but rather to suggest you get out of college what you put in.

It's sad that "AI" is destroying the American university, and we are worse as a society as a result. "AI" isn't just making tech worse, it is making society worse as well. I think there is an alternative, but we just have to persuade more people and start thinking about how to resist. Then making plans and following through.

I've read about Neo-luddite movements and clubs springing up around the country, including college campuses. This makes sense to me, and reminds me once again that the kids are alright.

For now, I am going to keep writing and holding out hope for the future. Thinking about ideas to share that will make the world a better place. I am not content with how things are, and the world is crying out for something better. Maybe I have the answer? Perhaps I will spark the right idea in someone else? Either way, I am going for it!

#NoAI #NoFateButWhatWeMake #higherEduation #philosophy

Dear #lazyweb

Looking to get a recommendation for a printer. Needs to be able to do double-sided, would be nice if it could do copies. Not a dealbreaker if it can't make copies. Black and white is preferable. Would prefer cheap but I don't mind investing in something that's good quality. Needs to be able to interact with my MacBook Pro.

My plan is to use it for making and distributing zines. So if there is anything in particular that is good for that purpose, please let me know!

I would appreciate any recommendations or if you don't have one, boosts are just as good.

Thanks and I hope you have a great day. Cheers, internet friend!

#zine #zines #lazyweb #printers

Someone please give me a job!

I've been working in IT for 14 years, and the last 9 have been in offensive security. There is a longer post pinned to my profile, but the TL:DR is that I need to break away from my current company.

I would really like to get into people management. I did a year of graduate study in communications, I've had an article published in 2600, and I think my biggest strength is my ability to effectively communicate. Translating from technical speak to corp speak is perhaps my biggest strength, outside being an empathetic leader.

So if you know about a fully remote people manager job, or one that will pay for relocation out of Southern California, or some hybrid where I fly in for one week a month or something - please let me know!

#GetFediHired

In tonight's episode of "never have any heroes"

Another person I thought was cool trashed their reputation and good will defending the slop machines.

Sad but not surprised. At this point, I am sad but not surprised.

Love coming online Monday morning to the bosses boss asking if I have heard of some new "AI red team tool"?

No bro, I have not. I don't waste my brainpower following the ebb and flow of the slopperators and their latest round of lies and grifts. I don't think I could care any less if I tried.

Further, I don't understand how we have all the money in the world for "AI" bullshit, but they cut the offensive security team in half.

I hate it here.

#NoAI

Listening to Outkast today and I think they are a criminally underrated band. I could write many more letters and words about this, but listen to a couple of their hits and tell me I'm wrong.

Oh brother! I am going to write about Eve early. No doubt this will appear in the Sunday update, but I can't wait. This, I have to get off my chest.

Tonight I did one of the most stupid things I've ever done in Eve online. Instead of waiting for my friend in the carrier to show up. Rather than doing this in a safer system, you know, the kind that doesn't have three other systems connected to it. In lieu of having scouts in the other places to have an early warning. While a smart person might have done those things, the dude writing this could easily be mistaken for a fool, or a goofball, or a doofus, or any number of insulting names.

No, I didn't do any of those smart things. Instead I had my Orca out mining boosting and compressing for ice while multi boxing three other mining characters on one screen. No scouts. Not paying attention to the intel channels. Just hanging out.

It is tempting to rant about how much I hate Deepwater Hooligans. Rage quitting was also an option, and to be sure, once I got my pod back to the station, I logged off. But I am probably not going to stay logged off for the night.

No, instead I learned a beautiful lesson. Actually, I learned several lessons, but one of the biggest is that I can lose a ship that costs over a billion ISK and it didn't ruin my night.

Instead, I can go out and cause problems for other people. Whether that be in faction war, or elsewhere. Maybe I will go find the home of Deepwater Hooligans and cause them some issues? Perhaps revenge is a dish best served cold.

My larger point is that one stupid mistake doesn't have to ruin my whole evening, or weekend, or week. And at the end of the day, if I learned something, it wasn't a mistake.

It was a billion plus ISK lesson in having the guts to do something stupid. I'm going to use this to endeavor to be less afraid. I am going to buy that redeemer, and a mach. I'm also going to get another Orca and get back out there again, eventually.

So don't be afraid to go out and learn something, internet friend. Maybe you can learn something from me and save yourself a billion and a half ISK? Or don't, but either way I hope you have a nice day and a great weekend. Cheers!

#EveOnline

I hate to say I’m desperate, but I haven’t had work in *months*. If anyone’s looking for a #freelance senior #wordpress #developer, please keep me in mind. I do full, custom theme builds, specialize in #accessibility and #semantic code, and am a great communicator about time estimates and budgets! My full portfolio is www.amberweinberg.com

If you don’t have any work, I would appreciate a boost 😊

#frontend #frontendDeveloper #development #WPJobs #needwork #hireme #hire #getfedihired

When the bubble bursts, do you think the people who grifted for generative "AI" are going to be given a scarlet letter and kicked out of the industry? Or do you think they will just move on to the next scam, like nothing happened?

I suspect it's the latter, but it sure would be nice if all those people who went super hard for the con suffered some kind of consequence for that decision.

It's been like six months, so I will post another casual reminder that I am looking for a new job.

At this point, I've been doing IT for over 14 years, and the last nine have been in offensive security. I would say the first half of my offsec career was primarily network pen testing, and the last half has been mostly application security. I feel I have a pretty strong mix of both, though my net pen skills have gotten rustier the last few years, if I am being totally honest. I did a wireless assessment recently as well, so that's another area I could help your org.

Over the last few months, I've transitions to doing more red team work, and not just the physical pen testing side of it, though I have experience doing that as well. There's also been a purple team component, and I've written before on the importance of not doing offsec in a vacuum.

Oh, and I've also done threat modeling. That's something else I could help your organization consider - where are all your threats? It's good to know where all your blinky lights are, but have you thought about all your potential threats, or tried to?

When I was a consultant, I messed with other stuff like Kubernetes clusters, legacy kit like the AS/400, secure code review, and mobile application testing.

I would be open to people leadership as well. I've professionally and personally mentored a few individuals, and it's an area where I feel I have strength and could grow quickly.

One thing I don't like is generative AI, I think it's a grift and I don't want to work at a company that is pushing for people to use it. Honestly it's a big part of the reason I've been looking for a new job for the last year. If I had an angel investor, I'd start a generative AI-free consultancy.

I should close with two tidbits. I live in California, and I prefer to work remotely. That being said (written), I am open to relocation, including out of the United States of America, to any country that would support migration. I prefer remote, as I've been doing that off and on for the better part of a decade, but for the right price I am open to sitting in an office a few days a week. For a lot more money, I'd sit in an office five days a week.

Boosts are appreciated!

#OffensiveSecurity #GetFediHired

RE: https://post.lurk.org/@fcr/116443635107473574

Scoop from Barrett Brown that didn't strike me as all that shocking, to be totally honest.

Whoops, forgot to do a weekly update on Sunday for Eve, so I suppose this is as good a time as any!

I think I mentioned that I decided to extract skills and change eight of my characters so they don't have a name I don't want to see when I am playing my escapist fantasy. If I didn't, that's the thing I am working on right now. I made a chip of progress into that (like smaller than a dent), and I think there are only three or four characters left to extract (and am leaning towards three).

My initial plan was to spread the SP out, but I quickly realized it was better to focus on getting my new main up to 50 million SP, and then working on the other characters. Since skill extractors give 400k from 20 to 50 million, and I needed to get to around 27 at least, and you will see why below.

First thing I did (after the magic 15) was making sure he could fly a dread. I keep telling myself I am going to crab, but if I am too cheap to drop two billion for a fitting Orca to mine ice, do I really think I think I will drop twice that on a dread?

My new main can fly a rev (or a rev navy, though he shouldn't), as well as a flycatcher and in a few days a Kiki. These are all with max skills for the plans recommend by my alliance. He could fly more ships, but better to not do it without completed skill plans. I think he's around 30 million SP, but I forgot to do explo skills, so that's next in line. He can also mine (ice and mercoxit) and fly a hulk.

Anyway, to that end, I spent a bunch of time on Sunday mining ice because I have corp mates who want to buy fuel blocks. Yet another reminder that I should be using an Orca for better boosts and compression, and then I won't have to keep flying back and forth. But on the other hand, it feels safer doing that in a porp, which would be SRP'd by my corp (that rhyme was not on purpose). But the hull is less than 100m, so even if it's not, that's fine. IDK, as of right now it isn't too annoying to fly back to the station every few minutes. It also means I am sure the loot is getting out safe.

Alright, that's enough waffling about spending ISK, and that's enough of an update for now. Thanks for reading internet friend, I hope you have fun out there, and fly dangerously!

#EveOnline

I just saw a LinkedIN post from some principal security doofus at Microsoft being loud and wrong about large language models.

Serious question - given that Microslop has been producing trash code, which has been getting worse and worse over the last 30 years. Why do people still listen to them, or take them seriously? They wrote code so bad, it broke their text editor, why does anyone give credence to the things they say and write?

I'm sure it has to do with some combo of money and market share, but these clowns have been loud and wrong for three decades. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that they are still doing it today. Maybe that's the one thing that has been consistent about them over the years? That and being run by monsters.

#NoAI #microslop

This recruiter that I am connected with on LinkedIN, and used to respect (I made an appearance on his podcast years ago) made a prediction for the future of offensive security. Spoiler alert, it's why all those descriptors are past tense.

He had a meal with some executive the other day who said their "AI" can do in an hour what it used to take his team a week to do. That naturally, the future would be "AI pentesters" overseeing an army of these slop machines. Pentesters as sloperators.

I was going to reply to his message that this vision of the future will solve the talent shortage, because it'll slash jobs and the people that don't quit out of disgust while have their brains addled by the slop machines.

Then I was going to message him directly and tell him that he described hell, and the money being triple my current salary wouldn't matter.

Ultimately, I just did nothing. I've written before that the bubble can't burst fast enough, but the damage it is doing to peoples brains today makes me wonder how industries will survive.

Offloading your thinking to a lying machine en mass - that is what society is doing with "AI" during a time when it feels like people aren't doing a ton of thinking to begin with.

Usually I try to be hopeful, but GDI, more and more I understand why people who work in tech leave and never come back. My computers will just be used for Eve Online and music in the future, and maybe that's for the best.

I am watching Terminator 3 and it is so eye opening. John Conner is in his early 20s, and his mom delayed Skynet so he's just kind of a drifter and a burnout. Imagine spending your whole life training for something that never happens? Only it does happen, because it was inevitable (as the machine says), but life often feels like John Conner must have felt. Like living through the first ten minutes of that movie.

We know that doing "AI" is dangerous, but we don't care because it hasn't killed us yet. I should clarify, business leaders with all the power don't care. Ask the average person, and 8/10 either don't like or strongly dislike "AI", yet people say that it's inevitable.

I don't buy that, and I am not giving up. Not today, not yesterday, and not tomorrow.

#noai #nofatebutwhatwemake