memfree
@memfree@beehaw.org
- Comment on The Future of Forums is Lies, I Guess 6 days ago:
These attacks do not have to be reliable to be successful. They only need to work often enough to be cost-effective, and the cost of LLM text generation is cheap and falling. Their sophistication will rise. Link-spam will be augmented by personal posts, images, video, and more subtle, influencer-style recommendations—“Oh my god, you guys, this new electro plug is incredible.” Networks of bots will positively interact with one another, throwing up chaff for moderators. I would not at all be surprised for LLM spambots to contest moderation decisions via email.
I don’t know how to run a community forum in this future. I do not have the time or emotional energy to screen out regular attacks by Large Language Models, with the knowledge that making the wrong decision costs a real human being their connection to a niche community.
Ouch. I’d never want to tell someone ‘Denied. I think you’re a bot.’ – but I really hate the number of bots already out there. I was fine with the occasional bots that would provide a wiki-link and even the ones who would reply to movie quotes with their own quotes. Those were obvious and you could easily opt to ignore/hide their accounts. As the article states, the particular bot here was also easy to spot once they got in the door, but the initial contact could easily have been human and we can expect bots to continuously seem human as AI improves.
Bots are already driving policy decisions in government by promoting/demoting particular posts and writing their own comments that can redirect conversations. They make it look like there is broad consensus for the views they’re paid to promote, and at least some people will take that as a sign that the view is a valid option (ad populum).
Sometimes it feels like the internet is a crowd of bots all shouting at one another and stifling the humans trying to get a word in. The tricky part is that I WANT actual unpaid humans to tell me what they actually: like/hate/do/avoid. I WANT to hear actual stories from real humans. I don’t want to find out the ‘Am I the A-hole?’ story getting everyone so worked up was an ‘AI-hole’ experiment in manipulating emotions.
I wish I could offer some means to successfully determine human vs. generated content, but the only solutions I’ve come up with require revealing real-world identities to sites, and that feels as awful as having bots. Otherwise, I imagine that identifying bots will be an ever escalating war akin to Search Engine Optimization wars.
- Comment on As Floods Hit, Key Roles Were Vacant at Weather Service Offices in Texas 1 week ago:
I heard several sound bites with officials saying, ‘No one could have predicted this’ and I keep thinking, “I betcha some groundwater geological engineer already predicted this exact disaster complete with amount of rain needed per each foot-level of river rise and with a precise measure of their margins of error.” I do NOT know that for a fact, but – having known geological engineers – it feels like the sort of thing they’d calculate out of idle curiosity (especially if they notice new development diverting groundwater in unmitigated ways).
- Comment on BREAKING NEWS 3 weeks ago:
ptarmigan
- Comment on ‘Adolescence’ Sets Netflix Record With 66.3 Million Views, Best Ever Two-Week Total for a Limited Series 3 months ago:
Wow, that is a perfect and concise expression of my main complaints.
- Comment on ‘Adolescence’ Sets Netflix Record With 66.3 Million Views, Best Ever Two-Week Total for a Limited Series 3 months ago:
Hrm. I was one of those viewers. I didn’t think it was awful, but it wasn’t so strong that I’d recommend it, either.
- Comment on Opinion: It's time for a proper Steam-type service for TV alongside streaming exists. 3 months ago:
From Steam founder Gabe Newell, 2011:
We think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy," Newell said. "Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem. For example, if a pirate offers a product anywhere in the world, 24/7, purchasable from the convenience of your personal computer, and the legal provider says the product is region-locked, will come to your country three months after the U.S. release and can only be purchased at a brick and mortar store, then the pirate’s service is more valuable.
The same can be said of movies/tv – except Steam saw the issue before EA and everyone made their own streaming stores, whereas all the video distributors have splintered into their own services.
I’m not sure where/why Hulu failed to gain the sort of share Steam attained. It existed early on and had … at least 3 big networks (iirc, not cbs? but abc, nbc and fox – then nbc dropped out to just do peacock, I think). Perhaps hulu didn’t pay enough for rights or perhaps Apple, Netflix and Amazon represented too many other players to make the equivalent arguments as Steam made.
- Comment on Elon Musk says X hit by 'massive cyber attack' as users unable to log in 4 months ago:
- Comment on Donors 9 months ago:
It sounds like the donor had requirements. From The Tribune:
The University of Chicago has received a $100 million gift from an anonymous donor to support free expression, marking what may be the largest-ever single donation to support such values in higher education, the university announced Thursday.
And:
Discussions surrounding the donation have been ongoing for over a year, according to a university spokesperson.
From …suntimes.com/…/university-chicago-donation-free-… :
The gift was ridiculed by advocates involved in the encampment that highlighted abuses against Palestinians in the Israel-Hamas War and torn down by the university in the spring.
“It’s truly a slap in the face,” said Yousseff Hasweh, a U of C grad who’s diploma was withheld by the university for two months, allegedly for his involvement in the protest.
- Comment on Audubon 9 months ago:
I’m fine with removing the Audubon name from any group – not because of John Audubon himself, but because the current Audubon Society seems to be an unscrupulous, anti-union, money-grubbing, greenwashing mess.
- Comment on A nightly Waymo robotaxi parking lot honkfest is waking San Francisco neighbors 11 months ago:
Reminds me of the incident in February where a waymo tried to get through a bunch of street revelers, and their response was to set it on fire. From the old pcmag story :
San Francisco Fire Chief Jeanine Nicholson noted that it had tallied 55 incidents where self-driving vehicles had interfered with rescue operations in the city.
In some cases, residents have put orange cones on the hoods of cars, which makes them temporarily immobile.
(see also the autopian story it references)
- Comment on Palantir partners with Microsoft to sell AI to the government 11 months ago:
Reminder that Palantir is the same company whose bosses are deep in bed with AmericaPAC – which got big write-ups (link is to one comment, but you can read more there and lots of places) because Elon Musk is gathering voter data seemingly for that PAC to target swing state voters with canvassing efforts.
- Comment on Booper 2 Pooper 11 months ago:
I’m also not an expert, but that was my thought, too.
More than that, even if a tail is undamaged, including it is not giving useful imformation because tail size can vary out of proportion to the main body and is pretty standard for other animals as well. For example, no one is measuring a horse to include the tail length, nor a dog, cat, and generally not a bird, either.
That said, I expect an news story about alligators on the golf course or catching invasive snakes to measure the whole body for the NEWS story and let the experts worry about the booper2pooper length in their own space.
- Comment on US senators claim car makers sold driver data for pennies 11 months ago:
I knew about the police getting access, but I missed that home insurance companies were checking properties with drones. I guess I don’t mind them spending their own money to send their own drones to verify properties they insure, but I agree that using MY camera that I bought to get info or sell MY data is at least unethical and ought to be illegal. It should be required that they get my explicit consent to that sort of thing for each instance of data collection or sale.
- Comment on US senators claim car makers sold driver data for pennies 11 months ago:
Who? The Senators? I think they’re genuinely interested in stopping the practice (obviously it also gets them good press, possibly even votes, but they coulda probably got cash if they did nothing).
I think the car companies are just trying to make money anywhere they can.
- Submitted 11 months ago to technology@beehaw.org | 18 comments
- Comment on [Request] Retro Recommendations 11 months ago:
Myst can be a bit esoteric, especially the older versions.
Did they rewrite it in later ports? Also curious as to where you stand on Zork.
- Comment on At the Olympics, AI is watching you 11 months ago:
I can’t argue with you on that.
- Submitted 11 months ago to technology@beehaw.org | 6 comments
- Google says it never collected users’ personal information / Asks for summary judgementwww.courthousenews.com ↗Submitted 11 months ago to technology@beehaw.org | 5 comments
- Comment on Pluralistic: Holy CRAP the UN Cybercrime Treaty is a nightmare 11 months ago:
I actually DO have some hope it will be rewritten, but I figure we know about it and maybe contact someone? usun.usmission.gov/mission/ ?
- Submitted 11 months ago to technology@beehaw.org | 3 comments
- Comment on Bethesda Game Studios has unionized! 11 months ago:
Yay!!!
I can’t get myself to click a twitter link, so in case others feel the same, here’s an alternate piece that basically says the same thing (I can’t yet find an article with detailed info): ign.com/…/bethesda-game-studios-microsoft-game-st…
- Comment on Caption this. 11 months ago:
- Comment on Weekly “What are you playing” Thread || Week of July 14th 11 months ago:
i’m chilling slo mo to Potion Craft: Alchemist Simulator. No adrenaline needed.
- Comment on First-known TikTok mob attack led by middle schoolers tormenting teachers 11 months ago:
I heard a strange take on this story. I know someone whose spouse worked at that very school and has heard the gossip about the incident. While the hen clutch has been gossiping in private conversations rather than internet posts for the world to see, their speculations about the Principal are almost as slanderous – and have been for years.
Long story short: the hens felt this wouldn’t have happened if the Principal didn’t let the kids run amok and instead provided consistent disciple.
- Comment on Long Dark dev criticises Manor Lords for lack of updates, Hooded Horse CEO replies that not every game needs to be "some live-service boom or bust" 1 year ago:
I misunderstood regarding those games, sorry.
- Comment on Long Dark dev criticises Manor Lords for lack of updates, Hooded Horse CEO replies that not every game needs to be "some live-service boom or bust" 1 year ago:
See? That’s the thing. I don’t want to support future in-app purchases that get tacked on after they got me to PAY THEM for the ‘privilege’ of doing their beta testing for them. That seems like a special kind of evil that must not be encouraged.
- Comment on Long Dark dev criticises Manor Lords for lack of updates, Hooded Horse CEO replies that not every game needs to be "some live-service boom or bust" 1 year ago:
I don’t understand how anyone buys Early Access games. Yes, I understand that the creators need to make a living before the game launches, but big companies should have the reserves and small companies may just take the money and run.
A couple days ago I looked at pcgamer’s summer steam deals list, and since Manor Lords topped the list I went over to Steam to check it out. Early Access. Nevermind.
I forgot about it entirely until looking at this article. Went to Steam and: Oh. Right. Early Access. Nevermind.
I do agree that it is too early to expect more updates. It only became available in April. I don’t expect it to have improvements worth integrating yet. That said, I’m not spending $30 (regular price $40) on something that may or may not end up being any good – that might always be too buggy to play, or too cringe-y to enjoy, or go so far from the initial demo that it isn’t the same game (I will never forgive you, Spore, and I will never buy you).
- Comment on Technical quality of life advice 1 year ago:
I agree! And I’m thankful that lots of games build that in.
- Comment on Technical quality of life advice 1 year ago:
I hate using AWSD as direction keys. I don’t understand why some games refuse to map the arrow keys to the same commands, but some don’t and it becomes up to me to manually set that right before playing anything.
It irritates me so much to me that if a game doesn’t let me change the key mappings, I’m probably going for a refund rather than play at all.
