The woman in this video does everything she can to make sure she gets arrested. The level of entitlement she displays is monumental, which is amusing considering the level of ignorance she displays. I remain baffled at what aggressive idiots like this think they are going to achieve. Weird that the actual criminal in the tale is far more chill and reasonable.
So yesterday the former head of Roscosmos decided that the thing to do was hold a birthday party for himself in a city under occupation.
Dmitry Rogozin – who has called for the extermination of Ukraine – was in Russian-occupied Donetsk, but someone ratted him out to the Ukrainians who launched some artillery at him. They didn’t kill him, but they did get him with some shrapnel. If wholly unverified rumors are to be believed… wounded rather more than previously suggested:
Apologies, here is the proper link.https://t.co/M7bxF2vyFT
— Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) December 23, 2022
It should be pointed out that Rogozin got into “Twitter spat” with Musk back in May, threatening him for supplying Ukrainians with Starlink terminals. Determine for yourself it if would be “ironic” or “poetic justice” or “downright hilarious” if Starlink was used to transmit intelligence on Rogozin’s location or to aim ordnance.
A McDonalds in Texas is fully automated (except, of course, for the people maintaining the machines). Expect to see more of these… especially in places with legally mandated high minimum wages. So much for “entry level” jobs…
@foodiemunster @McDonald’s has a new test concept
Here’s something interesting…
If AI created art is ineligible for copyright protection, that’ll set up a roadblock to the forthcoming artpoclypse. It isn’t complete protection, of course… I’m sure there’s some spectrum between “eligible” and “ineligible.” How much manual tinkering a bit of AI-art needs is yet to be determined.
Also… it appears that the US Copyright Office believes that copyright protection is available only for art created by humans. Right now that’s fair… but in the future, probably not. AI might change from an unthinking tool to actual entities, with civil rights and all that. Someone twenty years from now might get bored and genetically tinker with Bonobos or Bottlenose and uplift them to full human sentience; at which point granting *their* personhood would mean that any art they create should merit their copyright.
I did not wake up this morning seeking or expecting to get another cat. Well, here we are:
Billy and his two siblings are strays who caught the attention of some friends who decided to rescue them. Given that the temperature will shortly be Damned Cold, the rescue effort was decided upon quickly. Unfortunately, one got away (hopes are that he/she will be picked up tomorrow), but two are now safely indoors. Above is “Billy” at the vet getting the first of several checkups and procedures. Fortunately he was found to be free of feline AIDS and leukemia, but he has an upper respiratory infection. Consequently he’s currently in quarantine. But all looks promising. He was a fur coated razorblade when first picked up (yes, there was blood), but he has calmed down a lot.
Yes, he looks a lot like Speedbump.
The video below shows part of the “celebration.” It’s sad (and yet hilarious) in the way that Kirk Cameron’s Subway birthday party was sad (and yet hilarious).
The great majority of the time when someone says “there aught to be a law,” there really aughtn’t. But a law I’d get behind: any new bill in Congress must be read, in it entirety, on the floor of the House and Senate by those who wrote and co-sponsored it before it is allowed to come up to vote. Only those who sat there and listened to at least 75% of the reading would be allowed to vote on the bill; those who weren’t there are automatically registered as “no” votes. This would have the effect of making bills *vastly* smaller than the bloated monstrosities they’ve become.
Take, for example, the latest budget. The R. Lee Ermey bit at the end wholly encapsulates things.
They *had* to know what they were doing…
At best they’ll *slightly* delay the development and deployment of AI that will render them utterly obsolete. Welcome to being just like everybody else.
So wouldn’t it make sense, rather than *not* producing art right now, to instead take this time to crank out as much art, and the best art, so that they can to try to maximize their income potential while they actually can? Artists are no more going to prevent the introduction of AI art than factory workers prevented automation.
Artwork circa 1983 depicting the Bell BAT (“Bell Advanced Tiltrotor”… so… ummm… the “Bell Bell Advanced Tiltrotor”) single-seat small military tiltrotor designed to compete in the LHX program. It is shown here in two modes. The nearest aircraft is in full forward flight; the aircraft in the background is hovering. Both are in the process of firing unknown anti-tank missiles at a column of Soviet armor.
