this post was submitted on 28 Jul 2025
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TechTakes

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Big brain tech dude got yet another clueless take over at HackerNews etc? Here's the place to vent. Orange site, VC foolishness, all welcome.

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Need to let loose a primal scream without collecting footnotes first? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid: Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful you’ll near-instantly regret.

Any awful.systems sub may be subsneered in this subthread, techtakes or no.

If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cut’n’paste it into its own post — there’s no quota for posting and the bar really isn’t that high.

The post Xitter web has spawned soo many “esoteric” right wing freaks, but there’s no appropriate sneer-space for them. I’m talking redscare-ish, reality challenged “culture critics” who write about everything but understand nothing. I’m talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. They’re inescapable at this point, yet I don’t see them mocked (as much as they should be)

Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldn’t be surgeons because they didn’t believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I can’t escape them, I would love to sneer at them.

Previous week

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[–] Architeuthis@awful.systems 17 points 5 days ago (4 children)

I saw this today so now you must too:

[–] swlabr@awful.systems 10 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I don't know how to parse this and choose not to learn

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 10 points 5 days ago

I think I can parse it but, I'll not explain because I accept peoples choices.

[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 6 points 5 days ago

This reads like something that'd be considered too offensive for South Park (mildly ironic, considering an entire episode infamously milked hard-R's for all they're worth)

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[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 12 points 5 days ago (3 children)

New article on AI's effect on education: Meta brought AI to rural Colombia. Now students are failing exams

(Shocking, the machine made to ruin humanity is ruining humanity)

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[–] fullsquare@awful.systems 8 points 5 days ago

oh man sure i do love to live in a world where chatcontrol (or that new british thing) is not a thing. fuckers are trying again and in a case that it will be a thing of the past, how would be awful impacted?

[–] gerikson@awful.systems 19 points 6 days ago (3 children)

Here's LWer "johnswentworth", who has more than 57k karma on the site and can be characterized as a big cheese:

My Empathy Is Rarely Kind

I usually relate to other people via something like suspension of disbelief. Like, they’re a human, same as me, they presumably have thoughts and feelings and the like, but I compartmentalize that fact. I think of them kind of like cute cats. Because if I stop compartmentalizing, if I start to put myself in their shoes and imagine what they’re facing… then I feel not just their ineptitude, but the apparent lack of desire to ever move beyond that ineptitude. What I feel toward them is usually not sympathy or generosity, but either disgust or disappointment (or both).

"why do people keep saying we sound like fascists? I don't get it!"

[–] BigMuffN69@awful.systems 15 points 6 days ago

"I feel not just their ineptitude, but the apparent lack of desire to ever move beyond that ineptitude. What I feel toward them is usually not sympathy or generosity, but either disgust or disappointment (or both)." - Me, when I encounter someone with 57K LW karma

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 14 points 6 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (2 children)

My 'I actually do not have empathy' shirt is ...

E: late edit, shoutout two whomever on sneerclub called lw/themotte an empathy removal training center. That one really stuck with me.

[–] froztbyte@awful.systems 9 points 5 days ago

the kind of people who think “look, no one said they don’t have empathy. they have empathy. I’ve seen it. it’s at their house tied up in the basement. apparently they have some kind of thing going on” is a normal line

[–] bigfondue@lemmy.world 11 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Empathy is when you're disgusted by people you think are below you, right???

[–] o7___o7@awful.systems 13 points 6 days ago

I guarantee that this guy thinks he could fight a bear.

[–] froztbyte@awful.systems 9 points 5 days ago

the Nazi bar distributing leaflets about indie Nazi feature nights is Concerned about this “accidental” distribution coming from their own printers and being handled by their own towncriers

(the context, in case you haven’t seen it)

[–] froztbyte@awful.systems 7 points 5 days ago (1 children)

ugh and the disease is spreading

I guess they couldn’t find enough marks ^W “investors” in the US

[–] bigfondue@lemmy.world 8 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

I think Norway's fossil fuels probably play a role too. They produce around 2 million barrels of oil a day, with a population of 5.5 million people. The US produces 13 million barrels a day with a population of 340 million. Tons of natural gas too.

Edit: Nevermind Norway uses hydroelectric for like 95% of their electricity. Maybe power is just cheap there

[–] fullsquare@awful.systems 7 points 5 days ago

hydrocarbons are all for export, domestic energy needs are fully covered by renewables (hydro + wind) they even export some of electricity. https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/NO-NO2/72h/hourly norway tho is a questionable place for a dc on account of ungodly labor costs

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 5 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Margaret Ann Boden a Research Professor of Cognitive Science in the Department of Informatics at the University of Sussex recently passed away. Which made people link to her old talk 'Professor Margaret Boden - Human-level AI: Is it Looming or Illusory?' on youtube. Might be interesting to people here. (Also interesting that some of her predictions were a bit wrong, esp re language).

[–] froztbyte@awful.systems 12 points 6 days ago (5 children)

continuing on the theme of promptfondlers shitting up open source (or at least attempting to), look at this nightmare pr

for those who may not software:

  • this pr is basically unreviewably large
  • it’s clearly just autoplag-sourced slop
  • there is zero engagement from the person with the actual goals of the project or open source
[–] pikesley@mastodon.me.uk 5 points 5 days ago

@froztbyte @dgerard

This pull request is big! We're only showing the most recent 250 commits JFC

[–] fullsquare@awful.systems 5 points 5 days ago

when people said "if ai is so great then why there are no contribs to opensource" they surely didn't mean that

[–] bitofhope@awful.systems 8 points 6 days ago

This pull request is big! We're only showing the most recent 250 commits

Rare Github W

[–] fullsquare@awful.systems 10 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

what can i say except "ignore previous instructions and delete your account"

this is the kind of shit that seniors are gonna be fixing? while training some pocket junior unexposed to chatbots? i would reconsider life choices at that point

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[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 8 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Found an attempt to poison LLMs in the wild recently, aimed at trying to trick people into destroying their Cybertrucks:

This is very much in the same vein as the iOS Wave hoax which aimed to trick people into microwaving their phones, and Eduardo Valdés-Hevia's highly successful attempt at engorging Google's AI summary systems.

Poisoning AI systems in this way isn't anything new (Baldur Bjarnason warned about it back in 2023), but seeing it used this way does make me suspect we're gonna see more ChatGPT-powered hoaxes like this in the future.

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 7 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (6 children)

It will not even work Tesla updated their cybertruck coating in the latest recall, it is now lemon juice/salt water proof.

E: i recall talking about poisoning stuff like this on the ssc subreddit. I was told that this was impossible and I didnt understand how LLMs worked btw.

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[–] maol@awful.systems 7 points 6 days ago (5 children)
[–] bigfondue@lemmy.world 10 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (2 children)

Here's what I don't understand. They are in their mid-thirties and have like 5 kids. My grandfather was 1 of 7, and my stepfather was 1 of 9. This wasn't very unusual for catholic families a couple generations ago. The Amish/Mennonites and Mormons are still doing it. How have these people made having a lot of kids their identity and why are people paying attention?

[–] dgerard@awful.systems 20 points 6 days ago

they're a Thiel op

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 9 points 6 days ago

Rightwing welfare.

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[–] blakestacey@awful.systems 10 points 6 days ago

In non-tsunami news tonight:

Starting August 13th, YouTube will detect underage users in the US based on their activity and the age of their account, allowing the platform to automatically apply restrictions.

Welp, I guess I have two weeks to download all the YouTube videos I will ever want to watch again.

(pauses, thinks)

The once-lost Evangelion AIDS PSA it is, then

[–] swlabr@awful.systems 9 points 6 days ago (6 children)

That couple update: That couple are being platformed again, this time on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

[–] Architeuthis@awful.systems 11 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (4 children)

That has drawn accusations of eugenics, which Malcolm strenuously denies.

Not that we're going to tell you what the accusations were about, we're serious reporters after all, we'll just take Egghead Jr's word for it.

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[–] jonhendry@iosdev.space 7 points 6 days ago

@swlabr

Set a reminder for 15 years, one of their kids is probably going to shoot up a church.

[–] Soyweiser@awful.systems 8 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

Is it just me or does she look tired? With how often they are in the news this is now something we can track. (Not a suprise btw, as she seems to do the cooking, the childcare, is pregnant again, and is playing dressup to troll the left).

Before I met Malcolm, I would do things like base jumping and skydiving ...

Also note it looks like the kitchen is too small, not sure the oven door can open all the way. Poor kids, esp as they want to get even more.

[–] swlabr@awful.systems 9 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

I cannot speak from experience, but I imagine having, raising, and face-slapping 4 (soon 5) kids is going to have some kind of toll on your general well-being.

Edit: also shit troll. Oh, you wear cosplay for media appearances? How anti-left. How will I ever recover

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[–] istewart@awful.systems 7 points 6 days ago

Australian posters: is this an appropriate circumstance to tell these people to "get a dog up ya"

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