Over here checking sources

@janis

Vancouver librarian, writer, music and radio type (etc.), often worrying about mis/disinformation and AI. I block profiles that give a weird vibe -- sorry if this leads to some errors. (Opinions are my own.)

490 Folgt508 Follower1.194 Posts

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Ist das dein Profil?Übernimm es — dann gehört dir janis.dirty.social.Profil übernehmen

Over here checking sources@janis· 17d

Hey, I have an idea. Maybe people could stop saying that the humanities are useless?

New York Times: What to Know Before Seeing ‘The Odyssey’
Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of Homer’s epic poem has monster battles, a sorceress and dozens of thirsty suitors. Here’s a primer.

Over here checking sources@janis· 21d

Working from home, listening to CBC Ideas in the background, and damn it, this is chilling.

Ideas with Nahlah Ayed: In his book On Oil, Don Gillmor traces the transformative grip that petroleum has exercised over humanity. He argues that oil is not just a substance — but an idea … one that has come to constitute its own potent system of belief. He joins Nahlah Ayed to discuss how oil became the one true global religion.

Over here checking sources@janis· 24d

In somewhat happier news, getting news headlines from Radio Canada is a great way to build my French vocabulary. (Even if most of the headlines are just as depressing.) Prétendre: to claim Bilan: balance sheet Marge: margin, fringe Peine: sentence / punishment

Fragments of French language news headlines, on forest fires, etc.

Over here checking sources@janis· 28d

Uhh, can the billionaires slow down just a little bit on this whole comic-book villain schtick? www.thenerve.news/p/uki-goni-a...

Uki Goñi on Argentina’s anarcho-capitalist future
“South America has long been a honey-trap for world-class charlatans with out-of-the-box ideas,” writes the author and journalist Uki Goñi. Now, President Javier Milei has announced he will be “transforming Argentina, the planet's eighth-largest country, into a tax haven for ‘non-human corporations’.” Peter Thiel has moved to Buenos Aires, and if Milei has his way, totally autonomous AI-run companies will be following on his heels (as well as a fleet of data centres consuming clear glacier water across Patagonia). It seems almost impossible to believe it could happen – but that’s the plan. Read Uki’s compelling feature here.

Over here checking sources@janis· Jun 30

Update: So it turns out that one of the benefits of alt-text is that sometimes an extremely specific account will repost you because you mentioned an extremely specific word.

A pinned post from the "I'm a lectern" Bluesky account:

"Wow, this account only skeets about lecterns!" Smile emoji, follows.

"Wow, this account only skeets about lecterns!" Expressionless face emoji, unfollows.

Over here checking sources@janis· Jun 30

Sometimes my friends will ask why I even let FB show me ads. Well, here you go.

"The Farewell Kiss Ring: Oxidized 925 Sterling Silver or Stainless Steel." A close-up of a wide-band ring with an image of a man throwing a show at another man at a lectern, standing beside an American flag.

Over here checking sources@janis· Jun 27

My fave quote of the day so far, about people who justify using AI to create “art”: “AI is the ultimate participation trophy.”

Conservatives like to gripe about participation trophies, but AI is the ultimate participation trophy

Over here checking sources@janis· Jun 21

However, these guys were...

Over here checking sources@janis· Jun 19

It honestly makes me laugh. So often we see trolls accusing informed and educated people (aka "leftists") of having mysterious paid protesting jobs, if they have jobs at all. Anyhow, great comeback.

Over here checking sources@janis· May 24

Also, I'm not a big fan of pink. On the other hand, if I look at so-called men's watches, I get the option of hand-wound or automatic (in addition to quartz). There are also some great colour options, with lots of silvers, blues, greens, etc.

A screencapture showing the watch movement filters available for watches that are not "women's" or "ladies'" models: In addition to quartz options you can select Automatic or Hand Wound.

Over here checking sources@janis· May 24

This is such a dumb small thing, but if anyone wonders why I wear a "men's" watch this is why: the "women's" versions are pink and don't include the features I'm looking for. (Wild to imagine, but I, a woman, absolutely love automatic watches. Not just to avoid batteries, but because they're cool.)

Screen capture showing two Timex watches, featuring Snoopy. Both have pink straps and emphasise "cuteness." One shows Snoopy hugging Woodstock, the bird. The other shows Snoopy with three pink hearts, and a dial view above him shows further Peanuts characters with additional pink hearts.

Screencapture showing Timex's filters for women's watches. For watch movement, there are only two options available, Quartz Analog and Quarts Digital.

Over here checking sources@janis· May 23

Fun!

A Star Trek title image, with the Enterprise in orbit around an earth-like planet. The lettering says, "Just say no to AI slop."

Over here checking sources@janis· May 22

So I took the increasingly rare step of going to Google so I could have a look at this.

A Google result screen where the user has typed the word "Stop" into the search bar.

The AI Overview replies: "Understood! All activity has been halted. Let me know whenever you're ready to start again, and feel free to point me in a new direction." A red image of a stop sign appears next to this message. (I am not sure why?)

Below this is a definition of the word "Stop" from the Collins English Dictionary.

Over here checking sources@janis· May 12

I’m starting to think these aren’t very accurate.

A fortune cookie fortune that says: “you will be travelling and coming into money.”

Over here checking sources@janis· Mar 31

File under weird little things that make me happy.

A lavender coloured Dan Echo (Danelectro) guitar pedal with a glowing power light and two cables plugged in. The pedal has curving lines we reminiscent of a late 1950s car.

Over here checking sources@janis· Mar 18

My first one!

Queen Bee graphic from the New York Times Spelling Bee game

Over here checking sources@janis· Feb 7

Got this by email. Interesting that the WaPo knows what might convince me to subscribe again, while also making it extremely unlikely that they will be doing more of this.

A sickening moral slum of an administration:

 Regarding Venezuela, Ukraine and much more, Trump and his acolytes are worse than simply incompetent.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth seems to be a war criminal. Without a war. An interesting achievement.

Over here checking sources@janis· Feb 4

Not a Bluesky expert so don't know if this is strange / bot behaviour, but it the follower count is currently jumping up and down by about 30.

A graph showing very extreme and squared-off peaks and valleys rather than curves.

Over here checking sources@janis· Jan 5

A very tough call, but it's still Totoro for me.

A scene from "My Neighbour Totoro" where Satsuki and Totoro are standing at a bus stop in the rain, Satsuki with an umbrella and Totoro with a leaf on top of their head.

Over here checking sources@janis· Jan 3

Honestly, signs point to yes.

Growling Riflebird. A photo of the body of a glossy black bird with a gleaming green-black breast, marked with tags, a specimen in a museum.

Over here checking sources@janis· Dec 18

Usually a notice about updated privacy policies is not good news -- what a nice surprise to see this one from Mauril. (Mauril is a French-learning app from CBC / Radio-Canada)

"We are writing to inform you that we will be updating the Mauril Privacy Notice on December 24th, 2025. Your continued use of Mauril after this date will be subject to the updated Privacy Notice.

Here is a summary of the changes:

In order to minimize data collection, your name will no longer be collected. Your email address, and your pseudonym (optional) will be the only account identifiers.
Mauril will introduce a pronunciation feature that will process users’ voice in real time, but this voice data will not be retained.

We remain dedicated to protecting your data and ensuring a quality experience on Mauril."

Over here checking sources@janis· Nov 21

Count on mums to get it done!

Poster with photos of babies in diapers. The wording says: This budget stinks! We demand a change. Join the WTC & Friends Diaper Change-In at City Hall, November 25th, 9-10:30 am.

Over here checking sources@janis· Nov 17

Library Journal also created a graphic a few years ago: "Libraries are engines for book sales." www.libraryjournal.com/story/Embarg...

42% of all US adults surveyed had purhcased the same book they borrowed from the library. 70% bought another book by the same author as one they borrowed from the library. Those numbers also increase with younger generations. That percentage increases to half or more of younger generations buy books they first tried at the library.

Over here checking sources@janis· Nov 6

[sighs]

A cartoon: A woman at a computer says to herself: "There's no way I can finish this 20-page report tonight. ChatGPT, please generate a report from these 10 bullet points." Then we see a man at a computer: "Has Anna just sent me a 20-pager? I don't have the time to read that. CoPilot, summarize the report Anna just sent me into 10 bullet points."

Over here checking sources@janis· Nov 6

wtaf nyt

A New York Times headline: “Did Women Ruin the Workplace?”

Over here checking sources@janis· Oct 27

I'm not sure a workshop is really "free" if the sign-up form has 11 required fields.

An online registration form with 11 required fields for name, email, library/company name, job title, job function, institution type and address, and phone number.

Over here checking sources@janis· Oct 17

I’ve been a librarian for a long time and seen some bad things come around. But this moment is so demoralizing. Maybe for the first time in my career I can see the perspective of the librarians who retired when we got rid of card catalogues and went online.

Questions: we may not have answers but we will certainly commiserate. With meme: “My buddy lost his job to AI. It was his job to chug thousands of gallons of water at a data centre.”

Over here checking sources@janis· Oct 14

Now this is a fun Thanksgiving night TV lineup.

Four movie titles from TCM on tonight’s schedule: That Thing You Do, This is Spinal Tap, Eddie and the Cruisers, and A Hard Day’s Night. (None of this is about the harvest or family dinners but then again TCM is an American channel and they’re not celebrating Thanksgiving in the US today.)

Over here checking sources@janis· Oct 2

Just me going on about this again.

From Reddit's technology sub:

3mo ago
I recently heard about a teacher who instead of trying to circumvent students using ai, which is impossible, she made assignments by going "ask ChatGPT to write a report on this subject, and then research how and why it's wrong".

Not only did the students discover that chatGPT is extremely wrong a lot of the time, it also lead them to realize that they should not use it as a primary source.

Over here checking sources@janis· Sep 15

Uh, no.