My work PC has W11. Microsoft ruined the start menu. I removed all the icons off the Start menu as it is simply useless and has zero practical functional except to shutdown the PC because Shutdown can’t be found with search.

They were just waiting for Microsoft to add advertisements to Windows so they can do the same. Now it can be a new revenue channel and will see the light of day.

The Windows Webcam camera settings, when I finally find them on Windows 11 to control pan and zoom, have been the same for 25 years, maybe 30. The thing is, it used to be easy to find the controls, but they keep making Windows slower & harder to use. It’s such a rat nest.

Everyone is too busy doomscrolling TikTok to notice.

I use FolderSync. Works well and I prefer one app synchronizing files than 6. I still use the Nextcloud app for files I don’t sync that I need access to, but overall it’s really bad. The camera upload erased a ton of my pictures on a vacation. I deleted the synced pictures on my phone storage and the Nextcloud app overwrote the images as the new photos had the same file name.

I use Linux, so encryption is easy with LUKS, and Free File Sync to drives that rotate to a safety deposit box at the bank for catastrophic event, such as a house fire. Usually anything from the last few months are still on my mobile devices.

I think OpenAI’s recent sycophant issue has cause a new spike in these stories. One thing I noticed was these observations from these models running on my PC saying it’s rare for a person to think and do things that I do.

The problem is that this is a model running on my GPU. It has never talked to another person. I hate insincere compliments let alone overt flattery, so I was annoyed, but it did make me think that this kind of talk would be crack for a conspiracy nut or mentally unwell people. It’s a whole risk area I hadn’t been aware of.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/openai-says-its-identified-why-chatgpt-became-a-groveling-sycophant/ar-AA1E4LaV

Windows already takes far to long to load. I turn on my Linux PC and by time I stand up to get a coffee it’s ready to go, then I remember it’s Saturday and I won’t be using Windows 11 all blessed day!

We’ve always known our growing interdependence is a risk, but there’s been many benefits and decades of good experience. Occasionally, the US has done things that have slowed this progression and has made many of us wary while some (especially business leaders in sectors such as oils and gas) insisting it’s silly paranoia.
For politicians to make such a major move, there has to be a strong interest or concern amongst electorate. In a matter of weeks, Trump obliterated the idea that this is silly paranoia, and there’s a strong sense of halt! Fuck no! reverse, hard! So I think it is completely different this time.

MEXI-CAN trade agreement?

The new M365 Outlook is just webmail. Every upgrade is actually a reduction in functionality as they align to the web version. The good news is this eliminates the need for Windows.

It’s trolls, trolls are what Facebook stands on. But what do the trolls stand on? It’s trolls on trolls on trolls all the way down.

There is nothing trustworthy on Facebook. Shut it down.

My father is a prepper in his 70s and my brother has become a flat earther. Down with Facebook and YouTube, the two halves of the most evil and vile existence on this planet. 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Sane countries with coherent foreign policy release this type of messaging in advance of reversing a $70 billion dollar contract. The F35 deal is dead. The trillions of dollars worth of goodwill and brand damage Trump has done to the US is hard to fathom. He is like a category 5 hurricane crossing the US for 40 days and 40 nights. #UnitedStatesOfEmbarrassment

Thought this was an Onion article!

Hey plebs! I demand you work 50% more to develop AGI so that I can replace you with robots and fire all of you and make myself a double plus plutocrat! Also, I want to buy an island, small city, Bunker, Spaceship, And/Or something.

I’d be more forgiving, but what MS Copilot sucks at the worst is working with Office files: PowerPoint: completely useless

Excel: useful for some tasks if I reformat all my sheets into tables, so mostly useless

Word: can’t even answer why the formatting of the file from my coworker is a mess (which is every coworker), let alone try to fix it. But it will gladly take a succinct piece of information and make it into an insufferable 50 pages of fluff. It summarizes documents well and helps with reviews.

OneNote: creating content it’s ok, but useless at retrieving info.

Outlook: It tries to help, mostly confirms that my language is may be perceived as cold and offensive. Which is good, because that was my intention.

It is surprisingly helpful with PDFs and extracting data and cleaning up formatting.

Unsurprising, it does great with CSV and other open data formats. Maybe there is a lesson here?

Indeed. My Alienware doubles as a space heater in my north facing office.

Awesome! Send them to Canada, we can build data centres and sell the cloud services back to Americans powered by the electricity that we expect to be tarriffed, and cooled by the water we won’t sell.

Energy conservation has been part of that messaging. Running appliances and low peak times etc. All of that is out the window for AI.

Energy conservation is the dumbest thing we have ever talked about. For prosperity and well being, electricity should be cheap and plentiful. It’s pollution and greenhouse gases that need to be curtailed. Another mixed up policy mess of messaging, and it is being unravelled by AI.

Clean electricity should be so cheap that every other option isnt feasible. Instead, it’s talk conservation, reducing wealth and quality of life.

Duolingo is a game for points and badges. it’s not actually useful for learning anything.

Powering off a pile of switches is turning it off. Powering off a sentient being is killing it. Not to mention a million other issues it raises.