Every now and then a photo appears in my notifications as someone spots the potential for Something Silly.

Sometimes the photographers are very kind and say "go for it". Thanks to @cheriecreationstruck for this one.

#sillyScribbles #googlyEyes

I saw a post recently wherein someone used LLM tools to analyze someone else’s software, which eventually led them to a conclusion that was essentially completely wrong. Not only that, the LLM drew conclusions about the *authors* behind the code that were borderline character assassination. Nevertheless, this person posted this output as though it were some kind of deep insight.

These LLM outputs are not independent thoughts. The LLM probably ingested hints of (maybe unconscious) biases in the user’s prompts within its context window, and regurgitated something that confirmed those biases. The user was pleased that their biases were confirmed (Independently! By an impartial LLM!), and they posted the output, maybe as vindication of their insight.

These models’ sycophancy can be subtle. They don’t have to state “You’re absolutely right!” to blow smoke up your ass. Sometimes they seem to confirm your preconceived notion after they supposedly “evaluate” information “independently”.

#ai

My partner and I have a really big problem with bookstores

We go in and stay there searching through the shelves for hours and leaves with bundles of books.

The problem of course is we are running out of room for books.

Instead of taking any part in the monthly wayland bashing bullshit, you could just read about how electron, one of the last X11 bastions, has adjusted to wayland. Super important work!

https://www.electronjs.org/blog/tech-talk-wayland

There's a "Wayland set the Linux desktop back" blog going around now and ... it just makes me so tired.

That take is so amazingly wrong, but so persistent and popular. It is the "immigrants took mah job!" of takes for software. It is so flawed in so many different ways, and utterly ignores the host of actual reasons that Linux has stalled on the desktop.

It is apparently seductive, too, because it offloads the blame entirely on the crew developing Wayland without the person casting the blame considering for even a second the actual complexity of the problems. I could literally write a book on the reasons that the Linux desktop hasn't caught on; and I would, too, if I thought people would actually buy it and read it (a lot of people, I mean - enough to justify writing a book...)

But it boils down to this: Linux desktop development doesn't have more than a tiny, tiny fraction of the funding per year that Microsoft or Apple spend on marketing a single product line. Much less the kind of funds that go into R&D.

Vendors, mostly, are disinterested in supporting an OS that has less than 10% market share. At times they have even been actively dissuaded from doing so by certain other companies...

Users are, by and large, not willing to deal with inconvenience or having to learn new things in order to adopt the Linux desktop, even though the two main vendors are constantly making the user experience worse and continually taking away control of our own devices.

Wayland? It's a convenient scapegoat.

I'm not, by the way, arguing that Wayland is perfect, or that the community behind it has executed everything perfectly. And I'm certainly not arguing that people haven't had bad experiences with Wayland; that hasn't been _my_ experience, but I also have been using Linux for 30 years now -- and I choose hardware based on its Linux compatibility. I also have different expectations from a desktop than someone who has used Windows or macOS most of their life.

OK. Rant over. Be nicer to the Wayland folks. Stop blaming them for everything. In fact, let's maybe consider that what would really be useful is constructive takes on how we can succeed from here.