froztbyte

I've been waiting for this. I wish it had happened sooner, before DOGE could do as much damage it did, but better late than never

as I said elsewhere (and have from early around the doge announcement): he was never going to last because orange was never going to felon lead, and felon was never going to settle. and everyone who brought him in did so knowing that, but that was fine for them because they were using him as a useful idiot, as a politically useful wrecking ball who they could dump all blame on later and wash their hands of

DOGE has shown you don't need congressional approval or actual legal authority to screw over people funded by the government

this tracks with historical fascist power seizures, although ofc updated in the detail of “let felon run wild, then just accept the outcome and use it as a new precedent”. he provided them with a test run of finding just how egregious they could go without pushback (and thus where they need to machinate more)

I am looking forward to Donald screwing over SpaceX or Starlink's government contracts. On the returning end... Elon doesn't have that many ways of properly screwing with Trump, even if he has stockpiled blackmail material I don't think it will be enough to turn MAGA against Trump. Still, I'm somewhat hopeful this will lead to larger infighting between the techbro alt-righters and the Christofascist alt-righters.

overall, same yeah. felon’s long appeared to be comfortable socking for outside influences, so maybe he might go knocking for some more russian/chinese/indian/emirati/whatever war funding, but maaaybe not find some soon enough to prop up his whole house of cards?

(besides, the entire ai craze is begging in the same corners, which maybe is a good thing in this light)

eugenics, saas edition

sigh

another good piece from 404, teachers being real unhappy with the tsunami of bullshit autoplag has loaded them with

new yorker profile on moldbug (archive)

(still reading)

(e: wtf, phone client posted to subthread despite top reply arrow icon. bug bug buuuuug. the jank is ever present)

“Pray tell mr Babbage..”

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

oh, no, to be clear: this isn't about the sex/sluttiness - I have no issue with that at all. in a more general sense (over the wider set of things aella), her positioning herself as a "sex researcher" but often using that to bash specific groups or put out a specific narrative, that is far more problematic

but regarding this specific thing, tho: the "forced a tattoo on me" bit specifically, and all the rationalists doing their weird quasi-intellectual arguing with everyone who asks questions. the "forced" wording feels ... intentionally bait&switch? presumably (..hopefully?) there's mutual consent here, so it's a fucking choice to go frame the event that way

I'm sure your keyboard has more input controls than just that, want to try some of them?

And didn’t Aella and also Grimes have a come to jesus moment when they realized they hung out with a lot of bad people

I would give this at least -9600 credibility points. neither of them are whoopsie-daisy'ing into these scenes and crowds, they both knew what and who

I regret to inform you that, once again, aella (via this)

fucked that this is at least moderately honest

absolutely worth it given your coming plans. sucks because yet more expenditure but your happiness and safety are more important