Monkeytime

@tmorman

queer, easily distracted Baltimore, MD, earth the anti-trans folks are coming for you next

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Monkeytime@tmorman· Jul 7

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jul 6

Detailed WSJ gift link about European leaders' growing skepticism of Trump, and the complexities of trying to manage a childish man who, for one example, throws electronic equipment to the floor during meetings.

Text screenshot: American allies have begun pushing the gas pedal on an unprecedented experiment in de-Americanization. Authorities from France to the Netherlands are quietly removing American tech from their systems, adopting European open-source software and urging civil servants to no longer use Microsoft Teams or Office. Belatedly, they are spending hundreds of billions of dollars to try to boost Europe’s own private space firms, AI companies, and data centers, to avoid leaning on U.S. juggernauts.

Europeans are running studies on where they would store their data or process their payments should friction with the U.S. escalate,

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jul 4

The aftermath:

Four firefighters with hoses spray water on a large grass hill on a city corner. 90% of the hill is charred black instead of the green it was before the fire.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jul 4

This part about KPMG itself not following its own AI guidelines and publishing unverified slop citations in a report actually called "Redefining Excellence in the Age of Agentic AI" is pure comedy gold.

Text screenshot: Perhaps the tech consultancy and services giant speaks from experience. Last month, research outfit GPTZero claimed a forensic review of KPMG's October 2025 report, "Total Experience: Redefining Excellence in the Age of Agentic AI," found that only five of its 45 citations pointed accurately to the cited source. The rest contained errors ranging from misleading or invented details to references that were too vague to verify.

KPMG later removed the report from some of its websites and issued a statement.

"KPMG International takes the accuracy and integrity of its published content seriously. The report has been removed and we are reviewing the circumstances surrounding its publication. We expect all our people to follow our guidelines on the responsible use of AI, including human oversight to validate content and verify independent sources," a spokesperson said.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jul 3

TIL: the difference between SPF 30 and SPF 100 is negligible at best. WSJ gift link: www.wsj.com/health/welln...

Text screenshot: What SPF should I use?
The numbers on a sunscreen’s SPF label can be a bit misleading. At SPF 30, a sunscreen already blocks 97% of UVB rays. Going up from there, the difference becomes very slight—SPF 50 is just 1 percentage point more protection at 98%. SPF 100, despite the name, protects against 99% of rays. No sunscreen truly protects the skin at 100%.

Some studies suggest that SPF 100 does provide a meaningful leg up on SPF 50 sunscreens. Other health advocates have argued that the label creates a false sense of security for consumers, who might not reapply frequently enough as a result.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jun 29

Baltimore folks: there's a fantastic group show up right now at the Eubie Blake Cultural Center on Howard St: "5X5 Baltimore - The Art of Black Men." The center's curation is always on point and this show is amazing. Up thru 8/22.

Ernest Shaw painting of 2 squeegee boys holding sponge tools, with outlines of traditional African masks over their faces and a floating stoplight behind them.

Horizontal painting with black figures and shapes on a busy colorful background

Poster for the "5X5 - The Art of Black Men" exhibit, with 9 squares showing pieces from the show, the address at 847 N. Howard St and the dates from June 20 to August 22.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jun 27

More from this great exhibit.

An abstract Miró painting with black circle, lines, sun and washes of color

Back of a woman in a colorful flowered top standing between an abstract metal sculpture hung on a wall like a painting and a colorful abstract Miró painting.

3 tall thin colorful standing sculptures next to an abstract painting with lines shapes and colors on a somewhat empty background

Brown organic shapes and black lines on a white background in am abstract painting by Alice Sobel.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jun 27

Heads up, Bmore/DC art lovers: the fabulous "Miró and the United States" exhibit at the Phillips Collection closes next weekend, July 5th. It's full of his wonderful work *and* neat info about, and art by, U.S. abstract artists Miró influenced, many of them women I'd never known before. Must-see.

One of 23 "Constellations" painted by Miró, colorful circles, stars, eyes and other shapes fill the canvas, connected by black lines.

3 abstract paintings with large organic black shapes and colorful drips over a display case with paper ephemera.

People stand in a gallery in front of a long horizontal painting with other paintings and sculptures in the room.

Intro wall text for the exhibit: "MIRO AND THE UNITED STATES
At the end of his life, Joan Miró maintained, "It was really American painting that inspired me.
This exhibition traces the rich networks of exchange between the Catalan artist (1893-1983) and more than 30 American artists during the period between the 1940s and the 1960s, coinciding with the artist's seven visits from Spain to the United States. By placing Miro's art in dialogue with that of American artists, the exhibition seeks to explore the generative impact of their artistic conversations and how they each found in the other inspiring examples to fuel their own personal growth and development.
In the 1920s, as Miró was establishing himself as a leading abstract artist in Spain and France, he was introduced to American audiences through pioneering collectors Katherine S. Dreier and A. E. Gallatin. In 1926, Dreier included Miró in the landmark International Exhibition of Modern Art at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. At this show, visitors got their first glimpse of Miró's dream-like pictures, including Somersault, on view in this gallery. Dreier captured the controversial nature of Miro's early reception: "Miró is a remarkably gifted young Spaniard. Though one may not like his pictures, one cannot forget them."
By the mid-1940s, Miró's reputation in the US grew as his work became more widely seen in annual exhibitions at Pierre Matisse Gallery and critically examined in articles and interviews. In 1947, Miró arrived in New York for the first time. His eight-month stay to paint a large mural for the Terrace Plaza Hotel in Cincinnati included seeing exhibitions, engaging in artistic collaborations, and visiting with his American contemporaries-among them two generations of Abstract Expressionists who were gaining international recognition for their bold experiments with color, gesture and form. This exhibition explores how their fruitful interactions stimulated a breadth of innovative artistic expressions...

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jun 24

Read the statement from the union organizers at the just-sold Scientific American:

Text screenshot: "Earlier today in an all-staff meeting we were informed that Scientific American was being sold to LabX Media Group. We are shocked by this news, which comes just three days before the NLRB will count our votes on unionizing—a vote we know we won by an overwhelming majority. We are also deeply saddened by the news that LabX Media Group wants to say goodbye to 15 of our hard-working colleagues, including 12 unit members—nearly one-third of our unit and 60% of our organizing committee. Everyone played a role in the success of the publication.

We should call this action what it is – blatant union-busting. But there’s worse: we also have reason to believe that the sale was motivated by fear within Springer Nature that our attempts to doggedly report on the crisis facing science in America today would lead to repercussions from the Trump administration. On multiple occasions the company has sought to quash or tone down political or sensitive stories that were journalistically sound."

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jun 22

lol at this part: "Clott and Garcia said they didn’t believe U.S. companies would do any better at protecting user privacy than Chinese companies." Also:

Text screenshot: On OpenRouter, a platform that helps developers direct tasks to different AI models, those from DeepSeek, Tencent, Minimax, and Xiaomi are now the four most popular. Vercel, another AI service provider, said DeepSeek’s share of token usage jumped from under 1% to 17% in May, although its share of revenue stayed near 1%. Tokens are the units of text or data that AI models process.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jun 19

House music and a live percussionist: one of my fave party combos. Folks already setting up in the little park at the corner of Schroeder and W. Lexington. Occurs to me these small neighborhood parties are happening all over Bmore today. #Juneteenth

A man plays small hand drums on a stand in front of a DJ under a tent on a stage

Monkeytime@tmorman· Jun 11

"Doctors have also seen the drugs dial down appetite so extremely that some patients develop nutritional deficiencies."

Text screenshot: Some of the issues that have emerged are more serious. A few studies have tied the use of these medications with a slightly increased risk of developing a very rare eye condition, though it isn’t clear yet whether GLP-1s directly cause that condition. Doctors have also seen the drugs dial down appetite so extremely that some patients develop nutritional deficiencies. And the drugs have also been linked with a slight increase in risk for pancreatitis, though that remains extremely rare.

Patients also frequently lose muscle mass on the medications. Many young, healthy patients have been able to recover muscle, or preserve it in the first place, by strength training and eating plenty of protein, doctors said. But they have seen older adults become more frail on these medications, making them more prone to falls.

Monkeytime@tmorman· May 30

Fabulous crowd at the Baltimore Bike Party last night. Loved all the neighbors and kids who come out to cheer us on, too. What a delightful evening ride!

Smiling woman in a green jumpsuit and green helmet with a whistle in her mouth points to the adorable little terrier enjoying the ride in a caged basket on the back of her bike, with smiling bikers watching behind her.

Beautiful people on bikes ride up a hillybcity street, you can see a huge line of bikes going for blocks and blocks behind them.

A man in an orange spotted tentacled monster head mask on an electric bike flashes peace signs at the camera

Monkeytime@tmorman· May 27

Fantastic piece written by Sonny Rollins for a photo book that also looks fantastic.

Black-and-white photo of a sign next to the dressing room door of a jazz club. Text says, "PLEASE DON'T ASK FOR PASSES FOR YOUR FRIENDS...IF THEY WON'T PAY TO SEE YOU WHO THE HELL WILL"

Monkeytime@tmorman· May 24

POLITICO will shut down Capitol AI Report-Builder, a tool that produced branded policy reports for POLITICO Pro subscribers without any editorial review, despite generating glaring factual errors. It also will not revive the “Live Summaries” AI feature, which generated error-riddled unedited coverage of major political events, including the 2024 Democratic National Convention and Vice Presidential Debate. Both uses were found by an arbitrator in November 2025 to have violated PEN Guild’s collective bargaining agreement.

Monkeytime@tmorman· May 6

The reinclusion of Russia in events like the Vienna Biennale art show, like FIFA's almost certain upcoming decision to let them back into World Cup competition, is completely driven by amoral, unconvincing arguments (and sleazy connections) like this: www.nytimes.com/2026/05/05/a... [gift link]

Text screenshot: Anastasia Karneeva, the pavilion’s commissioner, published a video on Instagram on Monday saying that she would “very much like art to be the only voice” in Venice. Closing pavilions shuts off dialogue and means “nothing can grow,” added Karneeva, who runs the exhibitions company Smart Art, which she founded with Ekaterina Vinokurova, a daughter of Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov.

Monkeytime@tmorman· May 1

This is the part from an article last month where I said "close this camp forever and never let these people open it again." They *still* hadn't reported the girls' summer deaths to the state as of April, while asking to renew their license. Yeah, no.

Text screenshot: Yarnell asked whether Eastland had reported the deaths of the children to state health regulators within 24 hours, as required by state health code. Eastland said she still had not reported them.

“So you’re applying for a new license because you want to reopen camp next summer, right? But you still haven’t reported the deaths that occurred the last time you had a license” to the Department of State Health Services (DSHS)? Yarnell said. “Don’t you think you should update your DSHS application?”

“I guess so,” Eastland testified. “I don’t know, I’m not the one that’s been doing the application.”

Monkeytime@tmorman· May 1

Banksy's new statue: a man in a suit confidently marches over the edge of the platform he's on while confidently holding the pole of a huge flag that is blowing back to completely cover his face, blinding him as he marches forward to a big fall.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 30

Steny Hoyer, the Democratic U.S. House Rep. from #Maryland who just voted for Trump's warrantless surveillance law, is 86 years old and has held that Congressional seat since.......wait for it.........1981.

Steny Hoyer, a very old man in a gray suitjacket and tie wearing an American flag lapel pin, talks out of a very crooked mouth.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 29

Current fave black and white movie? Basil Dearden's fun 1962 noir All Night Long, a retelling of Othello set at a swinging London jazz party, with Patrick McGoohan as a conniving drummer in the Iago role breaking up the interracial couple. Both Mingus and Brubeck show up, too. Great little film.

Marti Stevens and Paul Harris in formal wear sit on stairs and talk behind metal bars that look like a jail in the black and white film All Night Long. They're in the Desdemona and Othello roles in the film's retelling of the Shakespeare play.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 28

Outdoors lovers: tick bite ER visits are way up this season. Graph is from @ylepidemiologist.bsky.social, whose account is well worth a follow if you're not already. Their emails always include fabulously useful and reliable health info.

Graph showing a much larger and earlier number of visits to Emergency Rooms for tick bites this year compared to the previous four years.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 28

The welfare billionaires are trying a new tactic to get you to pay for their stadiums but the same old facts still apply, even when they claim "but mixed use will make it work out fine!"

Text screenshot: But 50 years of consistent research findings show that sports venues don’t generate a financial windfall for host cities. The overwhelming evidence regarding the limited economic benefits of stadiums has produced a strong consensus among economists that sports venues are not worthwhile public investments.

It may seem counterintuitive that stadium events fail to boost local economies, because fans clearly do spend vast sums of money attending games. But most of the spectators in the crowd are locals, who reallocate their spending from other area merchants, rather than generating new commercial activity.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 26

In that copy Milton scribbled "The prologue to Juliet and Romeo" (you know, "Two households, both alike in dignity...") which for some reason had been left out of the First Folio, at the bottom of the preceding play's final page. Very neat to see!

John Milton's handwritten note on a page of the First Folio, recreating the prologue to Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, at the bottom of the previous plays ending, with an intricate abstract illustration.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 26

Ah, just saw the link to this previous Banner article from February, which does exactly what I want from grocery store reporting: www.thebanner.com/economy/balt.... My apologies to the Banner folks for missing that great example of news we can use. And it includes Save A Lot.

Bar chart showing total prices for grocery store staples from 20 Baltimore-area grocery stores, with Aldi the cheapest and Sprouts the most expensive.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 24

Hey, #Baltimore folks: the migrating night herons that for some wonderful reason come annually to tiny Thames Street Park near the harbor are back, building nests and hooking up. Baby herons coming soon. Check @thamesstreetnightherons on IG for amazing pics and info about these awesome birds.

Screenshot showing an image from the ThamesStreetNightHerons Instagram account. Photo shows a white bird with black markings on its head flying with outstretched wings, with a small tree branch in its beak.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 24

For perhaps obvious reasons I like this one's simplicity better.

Antique illustration of a skeleton seen from the chest up; the skeleton is pressing its right hand against the side of its skull in a gesture that says "good lord what is happening?" There are yellow stars surrounding the skull.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 21

The cynic in me wonders if the proposed legislation about use of AI in police reports (which had smart, sharp guardrails - see below) is what led to the "oh no let's have a moratorium so those rules won't pass yet" move. We'll see what rules for AI use in cop reports Connecticut eventually passes.

Text screenshot: The public defenders proposed legislation earlier this year — it was made moot by the moratorium — that would have closely regulated the use of AI report writing technology. Among other things, it would have required police to clearly label AI generated reports and required officers responsible for the reports to review, sign and attest to the accuracy of every page.

The proposed legislation also would have required police agencies to retain all drafts of AI generated reports, a procedure that would allow examiners to track the correction of computer-generated errors.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 19

In a move to increase transparency, the commission updated its energy efficiency directive in 2023 to oblige datacentre operators to report data on key performance indicators. In further guidance, it proposed publishing “aggregated” environmental metrics.

But during public consultations in January 2024, tech companies pushed to classify all individual information on datacentres as confidential, citing commercial interests. The demand means the data cannot even be accessed through freedom of information requests.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Apr 8

With alt text:

Twitter screenshot: In the best case scenario, Trump struck a deal to reopen a Strait that was open before the pointless war he started, with the IRGC demonstrating its control over the Strait and potentially extracting fees plus sanctions relief. Thousands of innocents - including hundreds of children - dead in Lebanon and Iran for no reason. U.S. troops killed and wounded. U.S. embassies and bases in the Middle East badly damaged. U.S. standing in the world obliterated. U.S. munitions badly depleted. Hundreds of billions spent. Prices up everywhere. More global economic fallout to come. Putin strengthened and enriched. Just a catastrophic situation even in the best of circumstances. A profoundly shameful episode in American history no matter what happens next.

Monkeytime@tmorman· Mar 11

Gorgeous daytime footage now: