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XauriEL

@[email protected]

Xennial Canuck/Kiwi Lunarpunk Satanist Cyberqueer, Feral Goth Trash Goblin, Speculative Fiction Author, Capitalism Disliker. Be warned, I'm a sarcastic bitch with a dark sense of humour. Ze/zer/zir

Peculiar enthusiasms:
The #Humanities #History #Philosophy
#Sociology #GameStudies
#Economics #VirtualEconomy
#Linguistics #Conlang
#UrbanPlanning #RegionalPlanning
#Geography #Maps #Cartography #GIS
#OpenEducation #CreativeCommons
#Metafiction
SF Detective Stories
#SocialistRealist art

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@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

Got pocket checked at the new venue for goth night & had to leave my swiss army knife in the car. $10 a pint and nearly $20 a ticket. Things sure have changed since the Underground days with people openly doing lines of coke off the bathroom sink

XauriEL OP ,
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They gentrified goth

XauriEL OP ,
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Mind you, one pint is enough for me these days

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

Kings are wild. You get people calling themselves things like "The King of the Entire Universe" when they rule, like, three cities in Mesopotamia. That takes some fucking brass balls

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

Do you need gen AI to do literally anything? No.

But is it going to save you time and money? When you factor in the resources needed to fix its mistakes, also no.

But at least the end product will be better and make you more money, right? Buster, you're not gonna believe this,

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

You can say what you will about the quality of the new Jurassic Park movies but the core plot conceit that capitalists would completely ignore past experiences and keep opening new dinosaur parks even when the last one led to mass death is spot-on

XauriEL OP ,
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The Lost World and JPIII: Nobody would be enough of an idiot to open another dinosaur park after what happened to the last one so here are some increasingly far-reaching scenarios for how to get humans back in contact with dinosaurs

Jurassic World: No, no, someone would definitely be that much of an idiot

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

The three remaining software business models:

  1. Subscription, plus selling your personal data

  2. Ads, with a subscription to make the software feature-complete and remove (some of) the ads, plus selling your personal data

  3. We're anarchists, so we straight up give out our software for free. You can pay us if you want, that's cool too. The interface is crunky as heck and we're constantly starting internecine fights with users, other FLOSS groups, and within our own team, but hey, we don't sell your personal data so there's that

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

My short ebook Tea for Two is available for sale as of now! For over two centuries, Anna Kerroway has refused to upload her consciousness to the Matrioshka Brain. But with the Earth scheduled for demolition, it seems that now she has to... or does she?

https://books2read.com/u/boJkEL

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

My brand-new phone has no fucking headphone jack

This is infuriating. I hate technology

@mcc@mastodon.social avatar mcc , to random

I love how the public library is a space with power outlets and wifi where you are allowed to simply exist for a period of several hours without spending money

XauriEL ,
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@mcc we need to bring back going to the library and just sitting and reading for a while as a casual activity

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

So I'm assuming all this sliver stuff in the Through the Omenpaths mastery is teasing that slivers are going to be the next big bad of the MTG story

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

So they finally, finally gave us enough concessions on scheduling that we were able to agree to it. That means only like 3 or 4 language items outstanding.

Which means we got to drop our monetary package! Cue another fucking 6 months of fighting about wages and benefits

XauriEL OP ,
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My partner on the bargaining committee did the math and there are only like 8 people still in the bargaining unit that were on the original certification order. Half the kids who work here now probably don't even know they're in a union. I am so tired of this shit, i just want to get this DONE. I would almost welcome having to go to arbitration at this point, just to get it over with. But we need to keep fighting. The guys need to get something material out of this. We've already come so far from what was being offered us, from what's in the Manitoba agreement, but we need raises desperately and I can't stop now

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

Toxic masculinity has nothing to do with being strong or stoic, either physically or emotionally

It has nothing to do with being a protector, a provider, or a role model

It has nothing to do with drinking beer, watching football, or rocking a sick beard

It has nothing to do with changing tires, moving sofas, or opening pickle jars

Toxic masculinity is about one thing and one thing only: CONTROL

Control over women, control over children, and control over other men

Everything else they bring up when we talk about toxic masculinity is a smokescreen

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

I wish I had known in my 20s that selling science fiction to venture capitalists was way more profitable than selling it to publishers of science fiction

@nixCraft@mastodon.social avatar nixCraft , to random

The unsung heroes are often the ones who stopped the train wreck before anyone even knew the tracks were faulty. That is why it's a thankless job, keeping the sky from falling. Mostly because when it doesn't fall, everyone just assumes it was never going to.

XauriEL ,
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@nixCraft

Y2K.jpg

@gerrymcgovern@mastodon.green avatar gerrymcgovern , to random

I'm writing a story about hidden e-waste. Chips and electronics in products such as children's toys, shoes, clothes, etc.

Anyone has some funny / weird examples of products you don't expect to have chips / or that have no useful reason to have chips--but still do? Or examples of really throwaway electronics such as vapes?

XauriEL ,
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@gerrymcgovern I watched a video of someone disassembling a dead nic vape and there was a literal microphone in it. The sensor that triggered the autodraw was an actual microphone. Bizarre

@itspomf@chitter.xyz avatar itspomf , to random

The fact your average MBA can be replaced by an untested and unvetted tool which gets it wrong up to 60% of the time should really be a sign that modern corporate management is a farce.

XauriEL ,
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@itspomf when you said "untested tool that gets it wrong 60% of the time", I know you were talking about AI, but at first I thougt yoi were just talking about another manager

@XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

Never mind punching fascists, we can't even be mean to fascists now without libs calling us the "dirtbag left". They're going to high-road us all into the fucking showers

@JessTheUnstill@infosec.exchange avatar JessTheUnstill , to random

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    XauriEL ,
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    @JessTheUnstill brb, just changing my gender to "1 pound of small red potatoes"

    @khleedril@cyberplace.social avatar khleedril , to bookstodon group

    Gosh, The Sirens of Titan, Kurt Vonnegut, is not the MasterWork I was expecting! Very outdated (book came out 1959) ideas about travellling around the Solar system and living on planets.

    SPOILERS: https://rdmp.org/dale-mellor/bookblog/?review=the-sirens-of-titan

    bookstodon@a.gup.pe icon bookstodon group

    XauriEL ,
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    @khleedril bookstodon@a.gup.pe icon bookstodon group I mean, I feel like if you're going to Vonnegut for nails-hard sci fi, you're in the wrong place

    @XauriEL@mastodon.nz avatar XauriEL , to random

    People who wear glasses are disabled, BTW. We need disability aids to function as an active part of society. If you wear glasses, you are disabled; your disability is just one that happens to be highly (if not totally) accommodated. It is generally considered reasonable to insist that you need your glasses and cannot cope well without them, and glasses are readily available and prescriptions for them not heavily gated. Touching or taking them without your permission is considered rude and cruel.

    @AnarchoNinaWrites@jorts.horse avatar AnarchoNinaWrites , to random

    So, you know how a couple of days ago I was mocking fascists for buying overpriced "anti-woke freedom water?"

    Whelp...

    https://shop.joebiden.com/dark-brandons-secret-sauce/

    Gonna go jump into a volcano or something...

    XauriEL ,
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    @AnarchoNinaWrites something something performative political debate as capitalist commodity