Want to wade into the sandy surf of the abyss? 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.)

  • blakestacey@awful.systemsEnglish
    8·
    13 hours ago

    Bloomberg covers the disastrous impact of AI upon food recipes, while still putting an “AI overview” on the top of the page…

    In interviews, 22 independent food creators said that AI-generated “recipe slop” is distorting nearly every way people find cooking advice online, damaging their businesses while causing consumers to waste time and money.

    Across the internet, writers say their vetted recipes are hidden by the flood. Pinterest feeds are stuffed with AI-generated images of food that the attached instructions won’t achieve; Google’s AI Overviews surface error-filled cooking steps that siphon away clicks from professionals. Meanwhile, Facebook content farms use AI-generated images of supposedly delicious but impossible dishes to the top of people’s feeds, in an attempt to turn any clicks into ad revenue.

    All of this, food bloggers say, erodes the simple promise of a recipe: that someone has actually cooked it before you have. To Gargano, this is the core issue. “No matter how clever the AI is,” she said in a recent interview, “it can never actually test a recipe in a real kitchen and see how it works.”

    […]

    For Carrie Forrest, who runs Clean Eating Kitchen, AI has been devastating: 80% of her traffic — and her revenue — has disappeared in two years. Although the views started dropping when OpenAI’s ChatGPT was released, it wasn’t until Google launched AI Mode in search that her traffic collapsed, she said. Since then, she’s gone from employing about ten people to letting everyone go. “I’m going to have to find something else to do.”

    This holiday season is on track to be Forrest’s slowest in years. She fears that if more content creators give up, the AI won’t have new content to draw from — except content generated by AI. It may get to a point where “AI is just talking to itself,” and home cooks are gambling with the results, she said.

    • Sailor Sega Saturn@awful.systemsEnglish
      5·
      9 hours ago

      Based Linux is another non-Woke option if you want a Debian based system that supports systemd, Wayland, XLibre and the GNU tools.

      Do… do you think he realizes that Debian is “woke”?

      Also I wonder what his beef with Rust is? Is Rust woke?

      • nightsky@awful.systemsEnglish
        3·
        7 hours ago

        Also I wonder what his beef with Rust is? Is Rust woke?

        I’ve seen this before. There is a special type of person out there who feels emasculated (yeah it’s always men, isn’t it) by the idea of a language statically enforcing memory-safety. Because, you know, real men write C or C++ with no safety rope and no seatbelt, juggling with raw pointers and chainsaws with their bare hands. They think that the only reason why C/C++ has produced an infinite abundance of bugs and security holes is because other programmers just suck. But they are different, they can handle it, they are very clever after all. And they won’t let some wusses take away their powers with all these ideas of memory safety by design.

        • Sailor Sega Saturn@awful.systemsEnglish
          4·
          4 hours ago

          As a C++ programmer some Rust people can come on a little strong, as if I’ve never thought about the importance of memory safety before and don’t know how to write secure code (well excuse me for building on top of decades of libraries that no one thought to write in rust in the '80s).

          But that’s normal programmer flame war stuff. Rust people tend to be young and enthusiastic about security which is all good.

          • swlabr@awful.systemsEnglish
            3·
            3 hours ago

            pretty much every programming language discussion I’ve ever been in has at least one person come in with a chip on their shoulder, ready to burn down civilisation in the name of readability or ease of use or memory safety or what have you.

            IMO it’s an abyss staring thing; you spend enough time in the code mines and you’ll discover some gleaming orb of fascination. Hypothetically this is cured by grass touching. I have been both places.

            That is why I’m proud to announce my new, everything safe programming language: C’thlaglthorp, or Ctt for short.

            ⠀̸͓͑̌͆͜

            T̷̡̬͖͓̲͒ĥ̴̼͑͗̏͗̐e̴̡̧̦̘̘͉̮̠͍͕̩̫̐̎̎̃͆̄͗̇̂̋́̕͠͝ͅ ̴̧̭͎̮̯̥̣̻͍̫͇̼̪̅̋̈́̃̈̾̆̀̓̓͊͂͝ă̵̧̨͎͓͇̦̝͖͎̓̿͠b̸̨̮͚̣̪̪̪͉̮̙͇͎̍͗̕ý̸̘̘ş̷̣̲͙͓̫̎̿̍̈́͛͗́́͝s̶̞̣͖̼̓̅̀̀̉́̃̈́̾̋̄̎͐̀͘͠ ̸͓̈̔͒̽͝w̵̨͚͖̟͚͇̠̘̻͍͕̲̯͍̑́̀͗́̋̀́͛͜͜͠ĭ̸̳̜̰̥̘̟̠̈́͜l̴̡̧̝̣̂͌̿̍̍̿̋l̶̳̙̰̱̫͉̥̃̇̌̂́̈́́͜ ̵̧̤̻̗͈͓̫̮̳͐͊̀̔̍̈̈́̋͂̚͝k̴̨̛͕̠͇͓̝̝̻̘̱͔̫̰̆͂̌̂̀̂̑̈̋͝͠ĕ̷̯̥̝̟̓̓͑̀ę̵̡̨̨͕͍͔̮͂͋̈̍͒̿͛p̸͇̥̺̅͋͐̿͑̿̎͐̈́͛͝͠ ̶̡̟̫͍̲̗͖̓́̽̐̀̀̇̿͝ÿ̴̢̨͚̟̘̼̭͓̘̲̫̮̩̠̺͉̀͜ớ̶̢̪̤͉͎̟̻̩̣̹̬̈́̅̉̈́͂̓̎͌̾͗̓̕͠u̶̗̥͔̹̝̦͕͎͎͍̹͓͕̾̑́ ̷͍̓̃̏̐̄̒̿̅͂̎̉̈́̚s̵̠̭̠͈̖̺͕̬̞͖̫̿̊́̾̾̕̕ͅá̵̯͓͙͕̉͛͌͛̋̕͘f̶̢̛͈͎̥̗̫͇͕̘̦̙̋̇̓̍̊̋͆̓̈͐̚̚͘͜ͅȩ̷͙̝̳̲̈́̽̈́̍̐͝͠

      • gerikson@awful.systemsEnglish
        4·
        8 hours ago

        Linux puritans are as fissile as the OG Puritans. There’s already Devuan which is Debian minus systemd, and now with XLibre. Not sure why this nerd thinks his particular non-denominational chapel will bring in the crowds to hear him sermonize.

        Edit BTW Devuan for me is the epitome of FLOSS techfash.

    • BlueMonday1984@awful.systemsOPEnglish
      51·
      13 hours ago

      Well, at least the website isn’t vibe-coded. Considering the creator’s an out-and-proud promptfondler (as seen on his Twitter), that’s genuinely shocking.

      • Soyweiser@awful.systemsEnglish
        1·
        26 minutes ago

        And all of this over a local 1% speed increase. Which he imagines just works just as well for everyone else. (I noted the Rationalism style, calculate this minor increase over all potential (imagined) users to make it into a big thing bit as well).

        And his source for the increase? He played two games. (One of which was cyberpunk, which iirc can be weird re gpu optimizations, so it isn’t even a reliable indication).

    • ebu@awful.systemsEnglish
      6·
      15 hours ago

      the obnoxious self-aggrandizement is dripping all over the text, not the least of which when he conceptualizes himself as a part of a “new and potentially valuable class of contributors”, as if the addition of a slop-generator can transform the layperson into someone capable of contributing to a complex software project. but that’s old news. here’s what’s getting me now:

      For a project like Mesa, which uses the permissive MIT license, accidentally incorporating a snippet of code that carries the “viral” obligations of the GPL could potentially trigger a legal catastrophe. Faith Ekstrand drove this point home with a chillingly practical example: “If we piss off Nvidia and they sue us, the project is over. It doesn’t matter whether or not we can theoretically win.”

      this is a legal issue – this should be Seyfarth’s home turf! obviously he can’t code and has a sneering contempt for anyone who learns to do so, but in this micro-instance, giving an informed legal opinion on how this issue could be handled would actually be in the Mesa project’s best interests! let’s see how he

      However this is a hypothetical scenario and there are several ways to mitigate such legal risks. Most projects already shift the legal burden to the contributor. The project still has to reject any code that openly violates the licensing terms, but if such violations are not obvious, there is little legal risk to the project itself.

      “it wouldn’t happen, and even if it did, you could just try to sacrifice your individual developers to NVIDIA one at a time and hope that makes them go away.” great cool thank you. this is the best you’ve got with your legal background. fantastic. what an utter tool

    • swlabr@awful.systemsEnglish
      12·
      18 hours ago

      JFC, man. Fuck this snivelling weasel. I read the whole thing. How dare he even suggest he has a fleck of humility in his being. He goes in saying he submitted his changes as an RFC instead of a pull request, but goes balls deep on trying to defend his work as worthy of submitting. Utter bullshit.

      Some quotes:

      My explicit statement of having “no desire to actually learn about the Mesa code-base” was not seen as a gesture of honest humility,

      “I have no intent on understanding this codebase that I’m 100% sure I’ve created a good change for, be grateful, peasants.”

      also, him, explicitly not a developer, spake thusly:

      This sentiment exposes the raw nerve of the open-source world: developer burnout.

      vibe codes once I am become jeff, coder at google

      Finally, this massive turd:

      The Mesa project’s updated contributor guidelines, which now demand that any submitter of AI-assisted code must understand it as if they wrote it themselves, has been lauded by some as a pragmatic solution. I contend it is a policy of convenience, a blunt instrument designed not to solve a complex problem, but to legislate it out of existence. It is a fortress wall built to protect the status quo, and while it may offer the illusion of security, it does so at the cost of innovation and by silencing a new and potentially valuable class of contributors. The discussion should not end here, with a policy that prioritizes procedural purity over measurable progress. The true challenge has been misdiagnosed; the pathology is not the “user with an AI,” but a rigid, legacy process that lacks the antibodies to handle a new form of discovery.

      Honestly this guy should just start his own fucking codebase where him and his promptfondling circlejerk buddies can vibecode bricks together.

      • Soyweiser@awful.systemsEnglish
        5·
        17 hours ago

        Yeah I was reminded of this guy by some posts on bsky, and mentioned there I didn’t want to link to him directly because I don’t think that kind of stuff is nice and just leads to harassment, but reading those two new blog posts really made me doubt that for a moment. (Of course only posting it here is a good alternative, looking back at the old posts I had also forgotten that he just was a weird conservative).

        I also found the part where he said ‘I even labeled it as an experiment’ quite annoying, that he doesn’t realize that this doesn’t matter at all. The developers still need to evaluate it like any normal post, and he didn’t even ask them permission to do the experiment.

        • swlabr@awful.systemsEnglish
          5·
          17 hours ago

          “I even labeled it as an experiment. A social experiment, some might say. I’m saying it was just a prank, bro. But really you’re the bad person because you were mean to me.” This is DARVO, right?

          You’re right that sharing this stuff leads to harassment, at least a lot of the time. I have no interest in personally engaging with this fuck.

          • Soyweiser@awful.systemsEnglish
            6·
            17 hours ago

            I’m esp weary of sharing stuff like this on a place like bsky, esp when I was just replying to others being a bit annoyed at people doing LLM based PRs. Hope people here have better self control at not actually going after people.

            • swlabr@awful.systemsEnglish
              6·
              16 hours ago

              One would hope! Don’t piss in the popcorn, as they say. Also, don’t do any stupid shit that might cause more work for our glorious admins, i.e. leave a trail of breadcrumbs back to awful.systems.

  • swlabr@awful.systemsEnglish
    9·
    2 days ago

    So I got jumpscared recently by that couple. I was listening to one of my many favourite podcasts, Threedom, when on the most recent episode, “I Definitely Tuned Out and I Agree With You”, this exchange happened, starting around 44 minutes, give or take 10 for ads.

    spoiler tagged exchange, in case you are a pisspig* and don't want spoilers.

    Context: the hosts are talking about how they value fostering their children’s expressive abilities, even if that means their children do things like scream in inappropriate situations.

    Scott: I guess what I’m trying to say is that some parents would look at us, and say, like, “oh, you’re not teaching them how to act in social situations or whatever,”

    Paul: Yes, you should slap them across the face, in the store.

    <laughter>

    Scott: Who was that… that… that, like, person who… there’s some parent out there that thinks that you need to like have a million kids or whatever and uh, and a paper writer followed them around and he just smacked his kid right in front of the paper writ-, er… the journalist? Uh, anyway…

    Lauren: Paper writer?

    Scott: Yeah, sorry, sorry, Journalist.

    Paul: Couldn’t sound more specific, and yet I don’t know.

    <end of reference>

    Tried too hard transcribing this and still feel like I did a bad job.

    Anyway, gosh, congrats to them on their extreme success in being platformed. Couldn’t have been a more deserving couple. /s

    *pisspig is the name given to a fan of the podcast Threedom. The fans picked the name, the hosts aren’t really sure why.

  • gerikson@awful.systemsEnglish
    13·
    2 days ago

    Semi-relevant, Matthew Garrett has won a court case against the kooks running Techrights:

    https://nondeterministic.computer/@mjg59/115581959497817474

    About the only positive thing you can say about Schestowitz (and probably his wife) is that they are rabidly anti-AI, but that is only because they are also rabidly against anyone who does not subscribe to their personal purity-test vision of Free Software (basically it’s them, RMS, and maybe his parrot).

    I have an unhealthy interest in them, because during the Andrew Lee putsch they were basically on his side, until he fucked even them, and I kinda drifted into their IRC server to see what was up. It was my unwelcome introduction to the toxic underbelly of FLOSS, with rampant RMS-worship, misogyny, racism and incipient techno-fascism. I ducked out quite quickly.

    Tellingly, Techrights is all in on the Gemini protocol.

  • Architeuthis@awful.systemsEnglish
    8·
    2 days ago

    No idea if it was intentional given how long a series’ production cycle can be before it ends up on tv/streaming, but it’s hard not to see Vince Gilligan’s Pluribus as a weird extended impact-of-chatbots metaphor.

    It’s also somewhat tedious and seems to be working under the assumption that cool cinematography is a sufficient substitute for character development.

    • swlabr@awful.systemsEnglish
      3·
      18 hours ago

      BB and BCS were both kinda slow burns IMO. That’s not to say the new show is worth holding onto (haven’t seen it), just commenting on the trend.