RalfMaximus

49% Evil Is Not Half Bad

Atlanta, Georgia, USA
Multi-fandom nerd but lots of Star Trek.
Multiple careers, but centered around software & technology & public healthcare especially EH.

I write sometimes, mostly science fictiony things.

tumblr: https://ralfmaximus.tumblr.com
bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ralfmaximus.bsky.social
email: ralfmaximus@gmail.com

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Last Notes

2026-06-04 14:26:58 UTC

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Any chance google SMS is doing the same thing? I've been getting duplicate texts from certain accounts.

2026-05-19 21:37:45 UTC

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> saaaameeee
It's downloading but oh so slowly

2026-04-23 16:08:34 UTC

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Seriously don't know what to make of this. Rogue employees, sailing under the Microsoft flag? Fake employees?
The app itself is terrifying and stupid. I can easily imagine naïve users interested in AI installing this thing and forgetting about it.

2026-03-31 18:19:16 UTC

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^^This. Nobody should give a shit about crossdressing or having an open marriage or any number of other things that are nobody's business. That's the way it SHOULD work, anyway.
I really do hate their hypocrisy though. Lying & denying, prosecuting others for the exact same stuff... THAT is shitty behavior.

2026-03-27 18:38:09 UTC

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Streaming services now use paid services to track how often torrents are downloaded, effectively treating piracy as another viewer metric. Just by torrenting it you're helping boost JKR's numbers. And alas, using a VPN won't change that.
There are many services, but one such tool is Piracymeter.
https://piracymeter.com/

2026-03-20 23:26:54 UTC

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No! You can turn all AI features off in Kagi, and even if you do ask for an AI summary it must be a deliberate action.
Plus their AI responses are heavily referenced with links to sources so you can verify. It's a very different (and refreshing) experience from Google.

2025-12-28 06:02:09 UTC

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Exactly so. Movies could do this because there was zero financial connection with broadcast TV.
Also, Network was considered ridiculous parody. The darkest of dark comedy. Nobody thought it was talking about real issues. TV news was not entertainment when the film was made, and wouldn't be for another decade (Reagan).
Also also: an extramarital affair in 1976 was just a thing bored men did; to be expected. Ever watch Mad Men? The culture was just Like That.

2025-12-19 20:35:16 UTC

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I still think the surprise destruction of the East Wing was that Melania did something to piss him off and he wanted to hurt her. One of the few things Melania truly enjoyed was 'her' private offices located in the East Wing, where the First Lady's space has always been. Boom, gone. See what you made me do, Melania? I warned you.

2025-12-03 18:20:47 UTC

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"Better" training? How about any?
If Hegseth and his band of merry idiots received training of any kind, they're not acting like it.

2025-09-18 16:27:51 UTC

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Adopting ANYONE's planet-based calendar wouldn't work in a galactic civilization. That's why stardates were invented; they're universal, with the added bonus of accounting for the relativistic effects of FTL.
Any given civilization might use a local calendar for day-to-day events. But interplanetary subspace Zoom calls will be scheduled via stardate.

2025-09-18 15:37:57 UTC

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Stardate is just a *Federation* convention. Every planet/civilization has its own local timekeeping mechanism, and there's probably software that auto-converts. Wired into the Universal Translator no doubt.
Our silly 12-month calendar is studied by races all over the galaxy as an oddity practiced by one of the Federation's founding members.

2025-09-18 14:48:59 UTC

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CANON: Yes, there exist subspace beacons that emit a pulse that let everyone keep their clocks sync'd, regardless of where they are in the galaxy. That's Stardate.
META: Gene Roddenberry invented Stardate so he'd not have to specify when exactly Star Trek takes place. "Two or three hundred years from now" is the most he'd commit to in the 1960s.

2025-09-10 16:26:46 UTC

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This *feels* like Putin testing for NATO response. If NATO/USA does nothing (i.e. fails to invoke article 5) he'll be emboldened to push farther.

2025-07-25 19:48:58 UTC

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There are billions geography facts on the internet. This includes fictional data sets too from popular SF/fantasy.
There are millions of human<->human interactions where geography facts are discussed, some of them accurately, many of them not.
Train a LLM on all that. Ask it geography questions.
The results will be the most likely next chain of text based on all those weighted interactions. That's it. There's no lying, no truth. It's making predictions.

2025-06-18 13:16:48 UTC

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..particle beams?? Really.

2025-06-04 19:18:52 UTC

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Unless you're paying for business class, they'll start throttling you.

2025-05-16 00:25:58 UTC

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The article doesn't doesn't differentiate between the classic AI used in radiology and LLM slop.
It does do a decent job of describing how radiology AI works, but just leaves it there. Casual (non technical) readers are left with the impression that the people yelling about AI stealing jobs are wrong. Unpaywalled here.
https://archive.ph/GYvrD

2025-05-15 22:59:56 UTC

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Well that makes sense. Radiology AI is not generative LLM, it's neural networks trained to identify patterns. You still need humans in that particular loop to verify the findings.

2025-05-14 15:47:29 UTC

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Doesn't want to give medical advice, says the Health Secretary who bathed in raw sewage with his grandkids over the weekend. JFC

2025-04-17 21:46:04 UTC

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Oh this sucks. I've worked in state/county/municipal Environmental Health (food inspections) and those guys are perpetually underfunded. Seriously, they do heroic work for little pay & recognition, using outdated tools. If the FDA quits, we're in for some stupidly bad times.

2025-04-10 17:06:51 UTC

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> Artificial intelligence will also play a larger part in making Digg more accessible to users, Rose said.[11]
From their wikipedia page. Cough.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digg

2025-03-14 23:42:20 UTC

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Safe to assume a decent malware solution (e.g. Malware Bytes) would guard against this?
Not the WIN+R or Powershell command, but the moment that .exe payload hits the system it'd get detected, right?
For that matter, wouldn't UAC block installation?

2025-03-03 20:46:27 UTC

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Understood. I grew up in hurricane country and we'd go through the typical stages of panic every coupla years whenever a Big One approached. Please stay safe

2025-03-03 20:42:47 UTC

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Oh. OH. Good golly

2025-03-03 20:39:43 UTC

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..what are we not panicking over today?

2024-12-05 19:43:01 UTC

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Seriously. Laws are the civilized alternative to dragging the accused out into the street and beating them to death. When legal justice fails systematically, expect vigilantism to rise.
This feels like the beginning of something massive.

2024-10-23 14:32:32 UTC

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Unpaywalled here. https://archive.ph/eArUr
The article is very kind to the billionaires it reports upon. It casts them as thoughtful, strategic leaders concerned about what Democrats might do to the economy.
That's bullshit.
The reality is much simpler: these guys salivate over having direct, unrestricted control over the levers of government. Which Trump will gleefully give them, in exchange for kickbacks & payouts.

2024-10-09 17:53:42 UTC

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I'm sorry, I have absolutely nothing helpful to offer. I hope somebody presents a solution.
Just wanna meta-bitch about how COMPLICATED software development has gotten in 2024. Long gone are the days of (1) compiling a program, (2) copying the exe into a folder then (3) running the program. I miss not having to worry about dependencies or having the correct versions of something installed.

2024-10-03 17:22:26 UTC

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Right. And I went down multiple rabbit holes in both Nevada & Michigan looking for suitable Gragsons.

2024-10-03 17:06:45 UTC

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I can find only one reference to P41, on page 34. And it's in reference to Michigan, not Nevada. Very confusing.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/244/581/875/641/765/original/c69d16f6031b2a77.png

2024-09-27 17:56:37 UTC

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Huh. Is there a network rule that specifically excludes assigning yourself as your own therapist? If not, you have the opportunity to do the world's funniest thing.

2024-09-18 13:45:23 UTC

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Congratulations! Any decent alternatives out there?

2024-09-17 20:47:30 UTC

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Sweeeeet. I used to drive a MkIV Supra turbo & got challenged ALL the time, but thanks to the Fast & Furious franchise the Supra is basically a rolling "Arrest Me" sign so I rarely engaged.
Lambos & newer stock Mustang Cobras were the worst offenders.

2024-09-17 20:07:50 UTC

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I drive a lightly modded go-fast daily driver, and have been SO TEMPTED to max it out but realized how silly that would be. The urge is real. Good job resisting The Impulse™

2024-09-12 15:57:13 UTC

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So is that it? Or is this tedious appeal process headed for SCOTUS? *Can* it go to SCOTUS?

2024-09-12 13:57:40 UTC

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Historically wasteful.

2024-08-29 18:35:54 UTC

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Seconded.
It also bears mentioning that the primary reason he focuses on those specific soldiers dying due to the Afghanistan drawdown is because he likes blaming Biden for that. DESPITE THE FACT that it was Trump who initiated the Afghanistan withdrawal in 2020. https://www.factcheck.org/2021/08/timeline-of-u-s-withdrawal-from-afghanistan/

2024-08-15 16:34:23 UTC

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While there is zero doubt the reason he talks about insane asylums is because he is confused about the term 'asylum' as it pertains to immigration... how does that link up with Hannibal Lecter?
Trump talks fondly about Lecter. As if he's a real person and they are friends. Not a threat, and certainly not anyone trying to sneak into the united states.
Very confused about this particular association. Can you elaborate?

2024-08-07 19:36:29 UTC

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Conversely, at a recent Trump rally an attendee was shot to death, eight (nine?) others injured and Trump used it as a marketing stunt. The next day he went golfing. He has never contacted the victims.