Thommy

People on bluesky - follow @ap.brid.gy if you want me to be able to follow you back.

Ⓐ🏴 software engineer and occasional street food vendor. Sincereposter in a shitposter's world. If you want to PM me use Matrix ([@tjw](https://mastodon.social/@tjw ):untamedwilds.com).

All opinions here are my own.

Music - 𖤐 𝔗𝔞𝔯𝔭𝔞𝔫 𖤐 (npub1nt9…3h6s)
Dev - tjw (npub1m7j…ltdp)
Photography - [@nonbinaryanalog](https://social.nonbinaryanalog.com/nonbinaryanalog ) and Non-Binary Analog (npub1ytf…qtjx)
Food - Shallot Sanctuary 🌱 (npub1pct…8vhm), [@yummy](https://shallotsanctuary.com )

pronoun: they or he/she/it
openpgp: https://keyoxide.org/BF9C932A8F344C180A41F43C10FAE5DECF03A1C7
ham: KE6VEA
blag: https://thomaswebb.net

Public Key

npub1mzu7r2yxfflxv46rpwuxuyc35t5px9azy8npx864mjrum2k5rzasd2yccg

NIP-05 Address

thomasjwebb_at_mastodon.social@momostr.pink

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsd3w0p4zry5lnx2apshwrwzvg696qnz73zresnra2aep7d4t2p3wcpz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dstw7ng5

Publishing to

relay.damus.io

nos.lol

Author Public Key

npub1mzu7r2yxfflxv46rpwuxuyc35t5px9azy8npx864mjrum2k5rzasd2yccg

Show more details

Last Notes

2026-05-01 00:30:47 UTC

- reply

only you can know if you can sauté them and if so, you'll never be able to tell a soul how delicious the forbidden ancient giant garlic mushrooms were.

2026-04-20 22:49:38 UTC

lgbt domains are expensive. So I'm going to get rid of these:
genderqueer.lgbt
genderfluid.lgbt
If anyone on the fediverse who seems reputable to me, I'll sell it at huge discount or even free, depending on what you will doing with it. The only catch is your registrar will probably charge you a lot to renew it. I'm trying to save up money for laser hair removal and part of that is cutting needless expenses like this.

2026-04-13 21:52:38 UTC

Just strategically speaking, saying "God does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war" is a pretty good idea if you're the head of a religion. It's obvious that Trump's actions are going to bite him and the US in the ass. I want people to turn to the more obvious, non-supernatural explanations but that's just me.

2026-03-21 01:30:35 UTC

- reply

interesting. I didn't know the brand is back. Seems like they're publishing indie games now? That's pretty cool.

2026-03-08 16:22:02 UTC

Warmongers always want us to believe these two things simultaneously somehow:
1) The enemy is fanatical and irrational
2) The enemy will surrender and the war will be over swiftly when they clearly see what they're up against

2026-01-27 22:48:20 UTC

I went to NAMM and the subsequent Friends of Buchla event last week/weekend and one thing that I think does deserve more representation there is open source tools. It would be nice if there was one booth, even a small one, that just represented the whole ecosystem. Music students and educators attend at a great discount or paid for by an institution. They're not programmers who necessarily know what's out there.

2025-12-15 18:27:55 UTC

- reply

oh yeah I'm not camp espresso here. I even like the fruitier light roast Arabicas.

2025-12-15 17:59:34 UTC

- reply

I’ve always done this with pour-over. We have a tea kettle that makes a click sound when it’s cooled down enough for tea. Boiling water isn’t ideal for most teas. Ofc cold brew takes this to an extreme that I like but not everyone is a fan.

2025-12-11 16:49:14 UTC

- reply

I think it really muddied the waters when writers started using other terms as euphemisms like "hipster" (though I think that term has its own sinister connotations) and brogrammer/tech bro, as though the problem is confined to one industry.

2025-12-05 18:41:07 UTC

- reply

yeah I totally agree with this. I liked the old school philosophy of making sure that your oss package can `./configure && make` on any OS ever, but the dockerization of everything has resulted in devs getting lazy about this. It's even reduced the amount of help I'm able to find when googling when something doesn't work. What really sucks is when a server project's official recommendation is to just run their official docker (especially when I'm trying to run in a freebsd jail).

2025-09-20 19:03:22 UTC

- reply

that's pretty awesome though. You should get her autograph, it could be something really funny. From one Chris Trottier to another.

2025-09-06 21:31:09 UTC

FYI if you're in the US - you can probably get an updated vaccine. I'm waiting on the updated version of the vaccine and apparently so is Nevada (this map makes it look worse than the reality; the situation should be rectified by next month).
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/159/477/057/524/134/original/f7d7f465f495e24f.jpg

2025-08-23 02:08:29 UTC

- reply

the first track in a compilation I made for my brother was her cover of Warm Leatherette. I love what she does to these tracks. Definitely one of my inspirations.

2025-08-10 20:51:59 UTC

- reply

"I'm a villain from a dystopian sci-fi. Gimme money!" is a weird angle and weirder that it sells to a certain audience who we're led to believe are experts at putting money in all the right places.

2025-08-10 19:49:43 UTC

It's wild that some people in the tech industry *want* us to believe that they have sapient beings running on their computers which, if true, would make them guilty of slavery.

2025-07-30 16:28:39 UTC

- reply

I'm having to remind myself that after talking to someone who's still using software I wrote ages ago and am in the process of updating. This isn't time to change every last thing about it but fix just the things that had issues.

2025-07-08 07:00:24 UTC

- reply

I totally forgot about how they used to be backwards compatible. Even at the time it seemed like I was a weirdo for wanting a vcd at a time when dvds already existed.

2025-07-08 06:55:06 UTC

- reply

I have exactly one movie in that format (Ninja Scroll). It appealed to my then lack of DVD player and that I could hope to keep a copy of the contents on my hd. I like that digital lofi is getting some love now. Mavica jankiness.

2025-06-21 23:12:41 UTC

I love the plot twist that we had a Denisovan skull all along, just it was hiding in someone's house (because WWII), then not yet identified as such for a few years.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/first-near-complete-denisovan-skull-reveals-what-this-ancient-human-cousin/

2025-06-21 17:41:50 UTC

- reply

oh yeah and I relate to not wanting to be defined by it, but she also comes from an older culture (that was pushed by medical professionals and even the law) of seeing stealth as the ultimate goal, not continuing to publicly be out and part of a trans community.

2025-06-21 16:34:36 UTC

- reply

Brianna Wu has become notorious in recent years for being somewhat anti-trans, despite being trans herself so I'm using her as an extreme example and because people often have this idea that criticizing people tends to push them away and towards the bad side.

2025-06-21 15:02:03 UTC

- reply

some people might have worried about us "pushing" her into being Brianna Wu, but that's not how it works. If she really cares, she'll listen to criticism.

2025-05-20 20:11:58 UTC

- reply

the alt-right moment during Trump's first term really gave me the feeling that atheist nerds (such as I) really fucked up and created a monster. Or failed to prevent its mutation from the blogosphere and debate bro thought terminating cliches.

2025-05-11 14:56:52 UTC

- reply

does this tend to happen with vaccines though? I know it does with recreational drugs and medications needed to treat illness, but I wonder if the same dynamic applies to preventative things like vaccines. The cost/benefit analysis might not work when there isn't instant verification that it really is a vaccine like there is with drugs.

2025-05-11 14:37:26 UTC

- reply

I hope Canada has it and I can slip into Canada next time I'm in Seattle to get it. But this is the sort of thing we benefit from everyone getting.

2025-03-09 01:35:33 UTC

- reply

this is not something that can simply be understood by looking at specs. You have to think about the game theory of it. There's nothing *technologically* stopping every last user on Facebook from leaving yet they don't. If one server gets large enough market share, they could simply turn off federation if that suits them. Insert concerns people had about how Threads might have harmed the fediverse (which I personally thought were overblown, but not preposterous).

2025-03-09 01:33:46 UTC

- reply

The main point of my OP was that bsky is more vulnerable to a takeover, contrary to the ads they're putting out bragging that they're "billionaire-proof."
The problem that's referring to is the phenomenon of a communication tool attaining enough network effect, then getting hijacked. That could still be a problem on fedi if the market is concentrated in too few servers.
And let's not forget when W3C's specs didn't magically force Microsoft to behave.

2025-03-08 18:38:51 UTC

- reply

yeah I see it as more resiliant to being hijacked than bluesky but by no means invincible. It's promising that more and more small businesses are adopting fediverse. I'm less worried that Meta could control the whole thing now than I was a year ago.

2025-03-08 17:36:11 UTC

Not only is #BlueSky extremely not billionaire-proof, neither is #Fediverse. Nothing is safe from billionaires. But bsky is as vulnerable to hostile takeover as Twitter was, more than fedi.

2025-01-18 02:22:19 UTC

- reply

maybe part of the issue is even Twitter was always a niche anyway, compared to Facebook and Instagram. And Mastodon reminds people a lot of Twitter.

2025-01-17 05:43:08 UTC

- reply

yeah a Sharkey (misskey fork) server I set up to be goth themed and maybe lure friends on facebook to. I like it for doing meme pages and such because I can easily switch between accounts in the web interface.

2025-01-17 05:33:12 UTC

I'm deleting the most popular fb meme page I ever made and reviving it on Fediverse at @npub1zwc…3lvs. It's a performance art in which I make fun of boomer Italian-American culture.

2025-01-16 19:58:51 UTC

- reply

I do miss early ig and that’s a big part of why I like pixelfed. But one thing I really missed was the borders!

2025-01-05 18:10:23 UTC

I admit that American conceptions of what counts as breakfast food can be very arbitrary:
"I had potatoes for breakfast"
"Well of course, that makes perfect sense"
"They were mashed"
"Stay away from me, serial killer. That's dinner food"

2024-12-19 01:15:51 UTC

- reply

thanks! Yes I hear a lot of comparisons to The Cramps. We were immersed in old school deathrock like 45 Grave and Christian Death when writing this.

2024-12-19 01:01:24 UTC

- reply

me with my music releases. But more people than just me have my vinyl in their record collections and I'm sure the same will be true of your book.

2024-12-15 02:56:57 UTC

- reply

oh he’s a joke account. Doing a parody of how weirdos on LinkedIn sound

2024-12-11 20:40:25 UTC

- reply

doing actual activism on the ground is also not always pretty. Sometimes it means you're feeding homeless people alongside a Maoist and a religious conservative because no one else showed up in the cold weather. It's also hard to know how to improve the Fediverse if you never even try other social media. I literally worked for Meta at one point and that experience is what got me enthusiastic about decentralized.

2024-11-26 16:26:10 UTC

- reply

especially when you think of x's version of the clipboard being client-server based. I guess it can be remote if you're doing remote x but seems like it could be distributed?

2024-11-10 17:31:10 UTC

- reply

I hope more people understand that instead of listening to people like Bari Weiss.

2024-11-10 16:22:40 UTC

"I don’t really know why Kamala Harris lost. The best explanation I’ve seen is that Harris ran into a buzzsaw of anti-incumbent post-pandemic disillusionment that has played out across the developed world.
[...]
And it turns out that the explanations for Harris losing correlate pretty well with the pundits’ pet peeves. And so, if you have been complaining about wokeness, or campus politics, for the past few years, it is obvious that this is at the heart of Trump’s win"
https://donmoynihan.substack.com/p/who-is-allowed-to-practice-identity?r=zrc2o&triedRedirect=true

2024-11-09 18:21:11 UTC

- reply

as long as people really research what they're getting into because there's nowhere that's safe from fascism
https://mastodon.social/@lzg/113443719873037703

2024-09-03 16:45:51 UTC

- reply

I'm an admin of a few small instances myself but I think small instances have their issues too. The ratio isn't necessarily better and sometimes the mods have more blind spots just by virtue of being a smaller number of people.
One issue though is if normies want to try Fediverse and ask me, I'll tell them all the good and the bad. But Meta is just going to tell them the good about Threads and they have to find out the bad themselves.

2024-09-03 14:40:14 UTC

I know it's corny to be pro-Fediverse on the #Fediverse but I don't care. It drives me nuts seeing people complain that the moderation on threads is bad, and so is the community on Bluesky and not even *mention* Fediverse. Like people here are too militant about it and will berate you for joining just now or having even the mildest of criticisms. That's bad, but it's still maddening to see people act helpless when there is another solution they should at least consider.

2024-08-17 18:25:53 UTC

- reply

yeah I was thinking that too or if they even decided to block all Akkoma servers. It used to work though. They might have noticed that a disproportionate amount of bad servers were Akkoma (which yes, fair) and applied a blanket temporary ban or something. Hmmm...

2024-08-17 18:22:10 UTC

- reply

thanks! It's not on that list though. I wonder if it's soft blocked in an internal list as a server that didn't respond at one point.

2024-08-17 14:30:04 UTC

It appears threads.net has my Akkoma instance blocked. I need to investigate if I'm doing something wrong (did someone sign up and start spamming a threads.net account?) or some forms I need to fill out... #fediverse #threads

2024-08-16 14:37:36 UTC

- reply

lmfao their "debunking" of his joke is even funnier "he likes spicy food! I saw him put medium hot sauce in something!"

2024-08-15 17:40:05 UTC

- reply

yeah exactly. They don't represent US Jews very well and that's not even their aim. It's also as a practical political matter, not expedient to care much what Jewish voters think. Jews are a small minority in the US, mostly concentrated in non-swing states. The minority within Evangelicals who are swing voters instead of solid Republicans end up mattering more to Democrats.

2024-08-15 17:19:52 UTC

- reply

yeah I didn't catch that aspect of the wording but very suspect to characterize the pro-Israel lobby as the "Jewish lobby" And Jews in the US tend to be highly critical of Israel's actions right now (including many of the ones who call themselves pro-Israel).

2024-08-15 16:55:02 UTC

- reply

what does that have to do with what I'm saying. A dinky country influencing US decisions doesn't constitute it being a "puppet" if it did, then the US would also be a Turkish nationalist puppet, a French nationalist puppet and so on. You know what's going on when someone utters the deranged phrase "Zionist puppet" in a world of Jewish puppetmaster canards. Pro-Israel bias in US politics is driven more by Evangelicals than Jews.

2024-08-15 16:44:44 UTC

- reply

there's no way to think a tiny country in the Middle-East is controlling the state with the most powerful military in the world without believing antisemitic conspiracy theories, possibly involving the Rothschilds.

2024-08-15 15:33:50 UTC

- reply

not a perfect assay, but a common feature of antisemitic takes on Israel is to invert the relationship and treat the US as a "Zionist puppet"

2024-08-15 00:48:14 UTC

The death toll in the Gaza strip is unprecedented if you look in terms of the percentage of the population and the speed. There are issues with just measuring by ratio but it matters when there's clear genocidal intent from some in the Israeli government.
un-paywalled Haaretz:
https://archive.ph/FHgXE#selection-1375.181-1375.903
Lancet study:
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)01169-3/fulltext
IDF using Gazans as human shields again:
https://www.timesofisrael.com/report-idf-using-gazans-to-check-areas-that-may-be-booby-trapped-before-troops-enter/