Phil Burg (he/him)

173 Followers
156 Following
1.3K Posts

Standard issue white, bald infosec guy.
Longtime supporter of the Carlton Football Club.

Advocate for CSA survivors, LGBTQIA+ ally. Trans rights are human rights.

Caution: I have strong opinions about a great many topics in IT and am inclined to share them when provoked.

Living and working on Wurundjeri land in Victoria Australia.

Meanwhile, 55 years ago

Right then gang, can y’all click this link and check out this website so it can get loads of visitors from all over the place as a favour to a friends kid? Yeah you can

Boosts and whatnot as well 💕

👉 https://myplasticpromise.co.uk/

My Plastic Promise

Apple: Our Apple Intelligence (AI) totally secure, trust us. It wiil change your life.

Apple: BTW, Apple Intelligence (AI) is not available in the EU because of safety concerns.

Me: Maybe Apple Intelligence (AI) is not secure and private, otherwise it would have been available in EU too 🤨

tl;dr: Avoid Apple Intelligence (AI) on your iPad or iPhone or Mac. It is powered by Google Gemini.

I for one am trying to stay on the right side of my feline friends.

Source: Hannah Hillam, Dec 11, 2020

#caturday #cats #catsofMastodon

"In the Seventies, when my family first moved to this country, we were the target of those comedians. I don’t see a lot of difference between the racist and hostile jokes directed at my family by comedians in the Seventies, and the targeting of the trans community now. If you come from any sort of minority, marginalised background, we’ve all got to have each others’ backs. Prejudice is a contagion.”
Nish Kumar

#Comedy #NishKumar
https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/comedy/features/nish-kumar-interview-ricky-gervais-jimmy-carr-b2987362.html

Nish Kumar: ‘The safety of minority groups is more important than whether or not Ricky Gervais likes me’

Ahead of a new standup tour, the peppery comedian speaks to Louis Chilton about anger, punching down, and the state of British comedy – and he doesn’t hold back

The Independent

🌈 URGENT CALL TO ACTION 🚨

If you’re part of the Australian LGBTIQA+ community, or a friend or ally, PLEASE sign & share this petition URGENTLY!

Hands Off Our Protections

Equality Australia #petition to MPs

✍️ Sign & share –> https://equalityaustralia.org.au/hands-off-our-protections/

Our #LGBTIQA+ community is facing some of the most serious attacks on our rights and protections in many years.

Right now, we are facing multiple bills that would strip protections from #trans people and erode Australia’s anti-discrimination laws more broadly.

Once again we need to fight for our rights and protections. If the shitshow that’s happening in the US right now is teaching us anything, it’s that legal protections are never completely settled and can be removed or reduced at any time if the people who hate us are able to mobilise and drag us back to the 1950s.

Please sign the Equality Australia petition calling on federal MPs to stand with us – and share it widely with your friends, family, and communities on every platform you can.

✍️ Sign & share –> https://equalityaustralia.org.au/hands-off-our-protections/

pls #boost4reach 🙏
 
 
#TransRights 🏳️‍⚧️
#WomensRights 💜🤍💚
#LGBTQIArights 🏳️‍🌈
#LGBTIQArights 🏳️‍🌈
#LGBTrights 🏳️‍🌈
#LGBT 🏳️‍🌈
#LGBTIQA 🏳️‍🌈

Hands off our protections

Hands off our Protections Our communities are facing some of the most serious attacks on our rights and protections in many years.  Right now, multiple Bills are being pushed that would strip protections from trans people and take a wrecking ball to Australia’s anti-discrimination laws more broadly.  No one should be singled out for exclusion because [...]Read More...

Equality Australia
In honor of June 6, International Antifa Day.
On this 82nd anniversary of D-Day, remember: The way we wonder why Germans didn’t stop Hitler is exactly how the rest of the world views Americans and Trump today.

Another great story about the impact of AI with no mention to it in the headline of the story:

In South Korea a Starbucks marketing campaign is created using AI and executives don't even bother to open the email attachments to check the proposals. The campaign was published on the date of a pro-democracy protesters massacre calling it Tank Day and using slogans clearly drawing from the deadly military attack, which felt deeply unrespectful to the victims. The AI most likely learned that from far-right forums like Ilbe where mocking the victims is common.

They cancelled the campaign hours after publishing it but it was too late, the CEO has been sacked, card payments went down a 26%, refunds haven been requested from prepaid cards, police is investigating and Starbucks asked costumers to refrain from directing their anger to staff.

#ai #aislop #starbucks

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jun/06/starbucks-south-korea-tank-day-promotion-blunder

How a Starbucks marketing stunt spiralled into mass boycotts in South Korea

A botched tumbler promotion on the anniversary of a pro-democracy massacre unleashed a boycott, police investigation and political firestorm

The Guardian

What do you say to that? I usually start by talking about whether there's any economic basis for keeping the AI servers running. AI is - by far - the money-losingest venture in human history, and it's practically impossible to overstate just how *bad* the AI business is. Not only does AI have terrible unit economics, those unit economics are getting *worse* over time:

https://pluralistic.net/2026/05/26/the-ai-will-continue/#until-morale-improves

8/

Pluralistic: The AI bubble isn’t like the internet bubble (26 May 2026) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow