this post was submitted on 25 May 2025
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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.

This is not debate club. Unless it’s amusing debate.

For actually-good tech, you want our NotAwfulTech community

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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.

(Credit and/or blame to David Gerard for starting this.)

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[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 1 points 59 minutes ago

New Bluesky post from Baldur Bjarnason:

What’s missing from the now ubiquitous “LLMs are good for code” is that code is a liability. The purpose of software is to accomplish goals with the minimal amount of code that’s realistically possible

LLMs may be good for code, but they seem to be a genuine hazard for collaborative software dev

[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 10 points 20 hours ago (4 children)

Veering semi-OT: the guy behind the godawful Windows 11 GUI has revealed himself:

Looking at his Twitter profile, its clear he's a general dumpster fire of a human being - most of his feed's just him retweeting AI garbage or fash garbage.

[–] istewart@awful.systems 5 points 10 hours ago

Not advocating violence, but Achewood did demonstrate one possible set of reactions to discovering a Microsoft designer at large in public.

https://achewood.com/2007/07/05/title.html

[–] ebu@awful.systems 6 points 12 hours ago

this one is a joke, i think. he is definitely on the fashy bullshit though

[–] o7___o7@awful.systems 10 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

It's not healthy for me to have my biases confirmed like this.

[–] antifuchs@awful.systems 4 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

But it lets you adjust your priors so pleasantly!

It also means you can update your priors about your own ~~biases~~ predictive instincts being good, allowing you to be more confident in literally everything you've ever believed or thought about for half a second. Superpredictors unite!

[–] kgMadee2@mathstodon.xyz 8 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

@BlueMonday1984 lol @ "I try not to let [performance] considerations get in the way"
Also why do you even put a React Dev on that task 🤡

[–] mii@awful.systems 6 points 1 day ago

Pretty good summary of why Alex Karp is as much a horrible fucking shithead as Thiel.

https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/alex-karp-palantir-tech-republic/tnamp/

[–] froztbyte@awful.systems 8 points 1 day ago

time amplifying the nonsense around saltman’s orb grift

features a helluva lot of words while at multiple points remaining entirely incurious about the claims it amplifies

[–] saucerwizard@awful.systems 25 points 1 day ago (1 children)

OT: just got a job interview and wanted to pass the good vibes on!

[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 7 points 1 day ago
[–] diz@awful.systems 12 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I was trying out free github copilot to see what the buzz is all about:

It doesn't even know its own settings. This one little useful thing that isn't plagiarism, providing natural language interface to its own bloody settings, it couldn't do.

[–] mlen@awful.systems 11 points 1 day ago (3 children)
[–] nightsky@awful.systems 8 points 1 day ago

In the collection of links of what Ive has done in recent years, there's one to an article about a turntable redesign he worked on, and from that article:

The Sondek LP12 has always been entirely retrofittable and Linn has released 50 modular hardware upgrades to the machine, something that Ive said he appreciates. "I love the idea that after years of ownership you can enjoy a product that's actually better than the one you bought years before," said Ive.

I don't know, should I laugh, or should I scream, that it's Ive, of all people, saying that.

[–] FredFig@awful.systems 8 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I don't get it, how is every one of the most touted people in the AI space among the least credible people in the industry.

Like literally every time its a person whose name I recognize from something else they've done, that something else is something I hate.

[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 6 points 1 day ago

ED ZITRON

FROM THE TOP ROPE

[–] BlueMonday1984@awful.systems 14 points 2 days ago (4 children)

New piece from Iris Meredith: Keeping up appearances, about the cultural forces that gave us LLMs and how best to defeat them

[–] zbyte64@awful.systems 4 points 13 hours ago

In a world that chases status, be prestigious

I'll keep that in mind....

[–] dgerard@awful.systems 6 points 1 day ago

this is ridiculously good

[–] FredFig@awful.systems 11 points 1 day ago

Reminds me something F.D. Signifier said on a music podcast.

Progressives are losing the cultural war in a lot of ways, but they'll always need us because we're the ones pushing the boundaries on art, and it turns out, no matter how ghoulish people want to act, everyone has genuine love of fucking awesome art. The true loss condition is being captured by the tools of the master.

[–] zogwarg@awful.systems 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Rekindled a desire to maybe try my own blog ^^.

I think beyond "Keeping up appearances" it's also the stereotype of fascists—and by extension LLM lovers—having trouble (or pretending to) distinguishing signifying and signified.

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