Mastodawn

The world’s solar capacity reached 1,419 gigawatts in 2023, way beyond any predictions. 1 gigawatt = power for a medium sized city

Kim Dec 31

Șero 🕊Dec 31

#Aachen

Kim Dec 14

Zentrum für Politische Schönheit Dec 14

Falls verpasst: Greenpeace wurde zu einer Strafe von 330 Millionen $ verurteilt. Der Organisation droht in den USA die Abwicklung. In Louisiana gelten bestimmte Formen des zivilen Widerstands seit 2024 als „organisierte Kriminalität“. Auf Bundesebene drohen 20 Jahre Haft und Zwangsarbeit f. Protest.

Kim Nov 4

Nick Rogers Nov 3

The Australian Federal Government has announced a program to equitably distribute electricity from excess solar electricity capacity, in New South Wales, Queensland and South Australia. @asymco

The peak 3 hours of production, in the middle of the day, will be unmetered for all households, including the mostly rental properties that don’t have Solar panels.

A great time to charge a car & run a washing machine while the swimming pool filter goes at full tilt!

‘straya!

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/nov/03/australians-to-get-at-least-three-hours-a-day-of-free-solar-power-even-if-they-dont-have-solar-panels

Australians to get at least three hours a day of free solar power – even if they don’t have solar panels

Labor announces ‘solar sharer’ program for households in NSW, south-east Queensland and South Australia

The Guardian

Kim Nov 3

Show thread

Eva Wolfangel Nov 3

2. Ich rufe meinen Orthopöden an. Dran geht eine KI von Doctolib und sagt, dass der Anruf aufgezeichnet würde.
Ich sage: Ich will nicht, dass der Anriuf aufgezeichnet wird.
Die KI: "Ich verstehe Ihre Bedenken."
Und fragt nach meinem Geburtstag. Ich sage: "Den verrate ich nur, wenn das hier nicht aufgezeichnet wird und auf Doctolibs Servern landet." (denn: von dem habe ich schon ungelogen tausende geleakte Datensätze gesehen)
Die KI sagt, dann könne ich keinen Termin vereinbaren und legt auf.

Kim Oct 28

Martin Seeger Oct 28

This is a valuable lesson for any manufacturer: never awaken the nerd sleeping inside your customer, because his wrath shall be terrible.

In this case the warning was quite literal.

The company annoyed a buyer enough to push him into full blown nerd mode. He tore the product apart, reverse engineered every part, and then published a step by step guide showing exactly how to disable "kill switch" that prevented the use of the product without the vendor spying on the user.

What started as a minor grievance became a public, technical exposé that left the maker exposed and embarrassed.

Moral of the story: underestimate your users at your own peril.

The Day My Smart Vacuum Turned Against Me

Update: This post seems to have struck a nerve and went very wide. As I will not be able to answer every comment, I want to add a few points:

The linked article was not written by me. It came to me on a different channel (Discord). I only wrote the post on Mastodon.
The top image in the article looks AI generated. It is no a good image, but in my view less irritating than an advertisement (which is far more common).
Some people suggest the article itself is AI generated. I don't think this is the case. I wouldn't rule out he author wrote the text in a different language and used AI for translation assistance.
The claims in the article are not fully backed by the linked repo, but the general statement is correct and IMHO important.

The Day My Smart Vacuum Turned Against Me

Would you allow a stranger to drive a camera-equipped computer around your living room? You might have already done so without even realizing it. The Beginning: A Curious Experiment It all started innocently enough. I had recently bought an iLife A11 smart vacuum—a sleek, affordable, and technologically advanced robot

Small World

Kim Oct 26