Mozilla Launches AI Window for Firefox
Mozilla announced on Thursday that it is building an AI Window for Firefox, a new opt-in browsing mode that will let users interact with an AI assistant and chatbot. The feature will become one of three browsing experiences in Firefox alongside the existing classic and private windows. Users will be able to select which AI model they want to use in the AI Window, according to a post on the Mozilla … ⌘ Read more

Reddit Cofounder Had a Bad Feeling About Giving Data To Sam Altman
Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian said he had serious doubts a decade ago about sharing the platform’s data with Sam Altman. Ohanian recounted on the “Brew Markets” podcast that between 2015 and 2016, Altman asked Reddit to let him “aggressively scrape” the site’s content. Altman had recently helped Reddit raise $50 million in a Series B round … ⌘ Read more

Cagent Comes to Docker Desktop with Built-In IDE Support through ACP
Docker Desktop now includes cagent bundled out of the box. This means developers can start building AI agents without a separate installation step. For those unfamiliar with cagent: it’s Docker’s open-source tool that lets you build AI agents using YAML configuration files instead of writing code. You define the agent’s behavior and tools, and cagent… ⌘ Read more

@threatcat@tilde.club Let me guess, sl? 😏

Perkeep lets you permanently keep your stuff, for life
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Car Size
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Samsung Brings Generative AI-Powered Bixby To Its TVs
Samsung is rolling out new conversational AI across its 2025 TVs that lets users ask questions about what’s on the screen and beyond it. From a report: First announced in September, the generative AI update is rolling out now with support for several languages. Vision AI Companion is based on an upgraded, generative AI-based version of Samsung’s virtual assis … ⌘ Read more

New Project Brings Strong Linux Compatibility To More Classic Windows Games
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: For years now, Valve has been slowly improving the capabilities of the Proton compatibility layer that lets thousands of Windows games work seamlessly on the Linux-based SteamOS. But Valve’s Windows-to-Linux compatibility layer generally only extends back to games writt … ⌘ Read more

This cat appeared on my hotel balcony. So of course I let her in. ⌘ Read more

@bender@twtxt.net Of course, I didn’t do anything yet at all. Maybe I will find some time next weekend. Let’s see.

Doctor who joked about gassing Jews let off with warning ⌘ Read more

Ironclad 0.7.0 and 0.8.0 released, adds RISC-V support
We’ve talked about Ironclad a few times, but there’s been two new releases since the 0.6.0 release we covered last, so let’s see what the project’s been up to. As a refresher, Ironclad is a formally verified, hard real-time capable kernel written in SPARK and Ada. Versions 0.7.0 and 0.8.0 improved support for block device caching, added a basic NVMe driver, added support for x86’s SMAP, switched from KVM to NVMM for Ironcla … ⌘ Read more

Is it normal he lets me do weird and funny stuff but he doesn’t allowed anyone else? ⌘ Read more

Building a vector search engine that lets you choose precision at query time
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Facebook Dating Is a Surprise Hit For the Social Network
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: Facebook Dating, which debuted in 2019, has become a surprise hit for the company. It lets people create a dating profile free in the app, where they can swipe and match with other eligible singles. It has more than 21 million daily users, quietly making it one of the most popular online dating service … ⌘ Read more

Gemini Starts Rolling Out On Android Auto
Gemini is (finally) rolling out on Android Auto, replacing Google Assistant while keeping “Hey Google,” adding Gemini Live (“let’s talk live”), message auto-translation, and new privacy toggles. “One feature lost between Assistant and Gemini, though, is the ability to use nicknames for contacts,” notes 9to5Google. From the report: Over the past 24 hours, Google has quietly started the rollou … ⌘ Read more

@prologic@twtxt.net Let’s go through it one by one. Here’s a wall of text that took me over 1.5 hours to write.

This section says AI should not be treated as an authority. This is actually just what I said, except the AI phrased/framed it like it was a counter-argument.

The AI also said that users must develop “AI literacy”, again phrasing/framing it like a counter-argument. Well, that is also just what I said. I said you should treat AI output like a random blog and you should verify the sources, yadda yadda. That is “AI literacy”, isn’t it?

My text went one step further, though: I said that when you take this requirement of “AI literacy” into account, you basically end up with a fancy search engine, with extra overhead that costs time. The AI missed/ignored this in its reply.

Okay, so, the AI also said that you should use AI tools just for drafting and brainstorming. Granted, a very rough draft of something will probably be doable. But then you have to diligently verify every little detail of this draft – okay, fine, a draft is a draft, it’s fine if it contains errors. The thing is, though, that you really must do this verification. And I claim that many people will not do it, because AI outputs look sooooo convincing, they don’t feel like a draft that needs editing.

Can you, as an expert, still use an AI draft as a basis/foundation? Yeah, probably. But here’s the kicker: You did not create that draft. You were not involved in the “thought process” behind it. When you, a human being, make a draft, you often think something like: “Okay, I want to draw a picture of a landscape and there’s going to be a little house, but for now, I’ll just put in a rough sketch of the house and add the details later.” You are aware of what you left out. When the AI did the draft, you are not aware of what’s missing – even more so when every AI output already looks like a final product. For me, personally, this makes it much harder and slower to verify such a draft, and I mentioned this in my text.

You, @prologic@twtxt.net, also mentioned this in your car tyre example.

In my text, I gave two analogies: The gym analogy and the Google Translate analogy. Your car tyre example falls in the same category, but Gemini’s calculator example is different (and, again, gaslight-y, see below).

What I meant in my text: A person wants to be a programmer. To me, a programmer is a person who writes code, understands code, maintains code, writes documentation, and so on. In your example, a person who changes a car tyre would be a mechanic. Now, if you use AI to write the code and documentation for you, are you still a programmer? If you have no understanding of said code, are you a programmer? A person who does not know how to change a car tyre, is that still a mechanic?

No, you’re something else. You should not be hired as a programmer or a mechanic.

Yes, that is “skill evolution” – which is pretty much my point! But the AI framed it like a counter-argument. It didn’t understand my text.

(But what if that’s our future? What if all programming will look like that in some years? I claim: It’s not possible. If you don’t know how to program, then you don’t know how to read/understand code written by an AI. You are something else, but you’re not a programmer. It might be valid to be something else – but that wasn’t my point, my point was that you’re not a bloody programmer.)

Gemini’s calculator example is garbage, I think. Crunching numbers and doing mathematics (i.e., “complex problem-solving”) are two different things. Just because you now have a calculator, doesn’t mean it’ll free you up to do mathematical proofs or whatever.

What would have worked is this: Let’s say you’re an accountant and you sum up spendings. Without a calculator, this takes a lot of time and is error prone. But when you have one, you can work faster. But once again, there’s a little gaslight-y detail: A calculator is correct. Yes, it could have “bugs” (hello Intel FDIV), but its design actually properly calculates numbers. AI, on the other hand, does not understand a thing (our current AI, that is), it’s just a statistical model. So, this modified example (“accountant with a calculator”) would actually have to be phrased like this: Suppose there’s an accountant and you give her a magic box that spits out the correct result in, what, I don’t know, 70-90% of the time. The accountant couldn’t rely on this box now, could she? She’d either have to double-check everything or accept possibly wrong results. And that is how I feel like when I work with AI tools.

Gemini has no idea that its calculator example doesn’t make sense. It just spits out some generic “argument” that it picked up on some website.

The AI makes two points here. The first one, I might actually agree with (“bad bot behavior is not the fault of AI itself”).

The second point is, once again, gaslighting, because it is phrased/framed like a counter-argument. It implies that I said something which I didn’t. Like the AI, I said that you would have to adjust the copyright law! At the same time, the AI answer didn’t even question whether it’s okay to break the current law or not. It just said “lol yeah, change the laws”. (I wonder in what way the laws would have to be changed in the AI’s “opinion”, because some of these changes could kill some business opportunities – or the laws would have to have special AI clauses that only benefit the AI techbros. But I digress, that wasn’t part of Gemini’s answer.)

Except for one point, I don’t accept any of Gemini’s “criticism”. It didn’t pick up on lots of details, ignored arguments, and I can just instinctively tell that this thing does not understand anything it wrote (which is correct, it’s just a statistical model).

And it framed everything like a counter-argument, while actually repeating what I said. That’s gaslighting: When Alice says “the sky is blue” and Bob replies with “why do you say the sky is purple?!”

But it sure looks convincing, doesn’t it?

This took so much of my time. I won’t do this again. 😂

Digital map lets you explore the Roman Empire’s vast road network
Archaeologists have compiled the most detailed map yet of roads throughout the Roman Empire in AD 150, totalling almost 300,000 kilometres in length ⌘ Read more

The EPA Let Companies Estimate Their Own Pollution Levels. We Discovered Real Emissions Are Far Worse.
Lisa Song,  Environment and Climate Reporter  -  ProPublica

_Stephan: ”king” Trump, his unethical vassals, and his Republican Congressional servants,  are not only doing everything they can to keep America trapped in carbon energy to serve the billionaires who rent the Republican Party, they are also either ending accurate … ⌘ Read more

Grafting trick could let us gene-edit a huge variety of plants
Many plants including cocoa, coffee and avocado cannot be gene-edited but a technique involving grafting could change that, opening the door to more productive and nutritious varieties ⌘ Read more

@bender@twtxt.net Not sure, if we actually have a law like that. But I wish it was the case. The clamp doesn’t say anything like that, just that it is now cactus.

The glue takes three days to reach its final strength. Let’s see. I’m sceptical.

@movq@www.uninformativ.de Oh shit! :-( Time to switch companies. If you found something, please let me know. This hype train is derailing here as well.

I’m building a service that lets you:

create and manage disposable, brandable email aliases so you can track leaks, forward important messages, and keep your real inbox clean.

I’ve just finishing building it for the most part, and have cut a v0.1.0 release. It’s currently closed source (to be decided later) and now open to beta testers. cc @bender@twtxt.net 🙏 I fully intend to monetize and offer this as a paid service in teh coming weeks/months, but beta/invite-only testers and early adopters/users first 🤟

Fuck me! I made a giant mess by knocking over the fresh cup of hot chocolate. I completely soaked my desk, t-shirt, pants, socks, house shoes, seat pad, chair, footstool, chair mat and floor. Showering beforehand was well worth it. :-D Let’s see where I will locate the smell of spoiled milk in the next days. Maybe underneath the baseboard? I’ll take bets.

At least my aiming skills are pretty good. I missed keyboard, mouse and other electronics.

We’ve done the science—let’s get on with climate action
For three decades now, I have watched Earth warm—not through headlines or politics, but in my own data. Every year, the evidence has become clearer. My colleagues have measured rising CO₂ levels in Antarctic ice cores. We have seen ice caps retreat, permafrost melt, ecosystems shift, and species vanish. Every single working day of my life has been a front-row seat to a planet in rapid transformation. ⌘ Read more

Microsoft breaks Task Manager in Windows 11, hard
Let’s take a look at how things are going at Microsoft, whose CEO claimed a few months ago that 30% of their code was generated by “AI”. After installing Windows Updates released on or after October 28, 2025 (KB5067036), you might encounter an issue where closing Task Manager using the Close (X) button does not fully terminate the process. When you reopen Task Manager, the previous instance continues running in the background even th … ⌘ Read more

Let’s do it! 🤟 https://meet.mills.io/call/Yarn.social

Linux Kernel Ported To WebAssembly - Demo Lets You Run It In Your Web Browser
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Trying to pack for a trip tomorrow…they won’t let me leave… ⌘ Read more

@bender@twtxt.net Kaboom! Hahaha, I did not think of that at all, thanks for pointing it out, mate! :‘-D

But let me clarify just in case: I honestly do not want to bash this project. In fact, it’s a great little invention. It’s just that I’m not conviced by the current user interface decisions. Anyway, web design isn’t right up my alley. I just wanted to add some fun. And luckily, at least someone liked it so far. :-)

@bender@twtxt.net @prologic@twtxt.net Let’s see on which day we’ll finally settle.

I reckon the white-space: nowrap is a bit evil on the gatherly notes, though.

@movq@www.uninformativ.de Hähähä, let’s feed the trolls! :->

Let the little guys in: A context sharing runtime for the personalised web
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Why zero is the most important number in all of mathematics
It took a long time for zero to be recognised as a number at all, let alone one of the most powerful ones – but now it’s clear that every number is made up of zeroes, says Jacob Aron ⌘ Read more

We’re supposed to see storm gusts up to 79 km/h. Let’s get the kites!

(I know, this is nothing for folks at the coasts.)

Stray at my work finally let me pet him ⌘ Read more

Let’s Help NetBSD Cross the Finish Line Before 2025 Ends
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Netanyahu’s wife pressed several ministers to sign a letter urging President Herzog to pardon Netanyahu, saying: “This is good timing - even Trump asked, it’s important for us. The cases are baseless and will lead nowhere anyway, let’s just finish with this.” ⌘ Read more

Fire Your Fetch Tool — Let your Agent Use a Browser
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Colour e-paper screen offers high-res video with low energy use
Future smartphones and other devices could have colour e-paper displays, thanks to a new technique that lets such screens display video while minimising energy usage ⌘ Read more

Obviously none of this requires an Internet connection, let alone a Network connection. All of it can be done over Bluetooth! Just like Carplay itself!

@movq@www.uninformativ.de Yeah, this is similar to my 2025 GWM Cannon Ute (truck) that we recently bought. It has this app called the “GWM App” that lets you view various health/stats of the vehicle, open/close the door, locks, control the A/C etc, all from your Mobile Phone. – But… Guess what?! :D It has a goddamn fucking SIM card in the head unit (dash) somewhere that once you “consent” and agree it signs up to some god knows what local cellular service and all that wonderul functionality is controlled by, guess what… A fucking goddamn CLOUD service! da actual flying fuck is wrong with these people?! – Are we some of the only people in the world that realize how fucking dumb all this Internet-connect shit™ really is?

Microsoft breaks USB input in Windows Recovery Environment
With official support for Windows 10 having officially ended a few days ago, let’s take a look and see how its successor, Windows 11, is doing. Microsoft released the first Patch Tuesday update (KB5066835) for Windows 11 25H2 this past week and it is probably fair to say that it has been a rough start for the new feature update. Despite the announcement of a wide rollout wherein the new version is now available for … ⌘ Read more

Let’s write a macro in Rust
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Metropolis 1998 lets you design every building in an isometric, pixel-art city
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Went to grab a bagel in Manhattan, store cat wouldn’t let me leave without paying pet tax. ⌘ Read more

Let’s Not Encrypt
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Hackers can steal 2FA codes and private messages from Android phones
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Environment variables are a legacy mess: Let’s dive deep into them
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The weirdest bug:When Reflected XSS Won’t Let a Page Breathe ⌘ Read more