🖋️ LongForm
Not Your Father’s Blog
Just dropping this here – the home of a new service from John …
AnalAIze | RuminAIte | SpeculAIte
Hang on to your hats.
🎥 Confess, Fletch, 2022 - ★★★½
I liked Chevy's all those years ago and Mr Hamm did a good job and to the spirit. Put it in the queue - it might appeal one day.
🎥 Page Eight, 2011 - ★★★½
I love Bill Nighy - so I couldn’t give it 3 1/2 (except I could). Not a bad movie by any means - although Bill does seem to have one character that appears in many disparate movies. It’s 13 years old - no idea how I missed it when it came out - except maybe because it is missable? Only for the ardent Nighy fan.
🎈128/366 Cards Played
Rafah’s fate hung in the balance on Monday after Hamas said it had accepted a ceasefire-for-hostage deal but Israel responded skeptically and carried out night airstrikes on Gaza’s southernmost city.
… whatever happens now - whatever is said - why on earth would Hamas believe anything being said.
My mum used to tell me that what you say is not important - it is how you act.
Cards Played.
That's Entertainment ...
No - 🎵🔗 not this
We knew Ms. Redstone wanted out. Looks like it’s going to happen.
And Ellison’s Skydance seems to be in the frame for the preferred acquirer which I definitely do not get - but sure why not?
I look forward to opinions from people like Rob Long and Peter Kafka, if I were to predict - I am guessing that Long in particular might be thinking like me. (Or am I thinking like him?)
The main question is what does David think he is buying and what does Shari think she is selling - because I think they are two very different things. But Heh! What do I know?
(Side Note - The ‘Ellison’ is Larry’s son - who seems to be turning out to be a media/entertainment version of technology dad.)
🎈119/366 Not everything on the ‘Book of Face’ is bad.
Consider this that was just sent to me (reproduced in full so you don’t have to sully yourself).
• An Oxford comma walks into a bar where it spends the evening watching the television, getting drunk, and smoking cigars.
• A dangling participle walks into a bar. Enjoying a cocktail and chatting with the bartender, the evening passes pleasantly.
• A bar was walked into by the passive voice.
• An oxymoron walked into a bar, and the silence was deafening.
• Two quotation marks walk into a “bar.”
• A malapropism walks into a bar, looking for all intensive purposes like a wolf in cheap clothing, muttering epitaphs and casting dispersions on his magnificent other, who takes him for granite.
• Hyperbole totally rips into this insane bar and absolutely destroys everything.
• A question mark walks into a bar?
• A non sequitur walks into a bar. In a strong wind, even turkeys can fly.
• Papyrus and Comic Sans walk into a bar. The bartender says, “Get out – we don’t serve your type.”
• A mixed metaphor walks into a bar, seeing the handwriting on the wall but hoping to nip it in the bud.
• A comma splice walks into a bar, it has a drink and then leaves.
• Three intransitive verbs walk into a bar. They sit. They converse. They depart.
• A synonym strolls into a tavern.
• At the end of the day, a cliché walks into a bar – fresh as a daisy, cute as a button, and sharp as a tack.
• A run-on sentence walks into a bar it starts flirting. With a cute little sentence fragment.
• Falling slowly, softly falling, the chiasmus collapses to the bar floor.
• A figure of speech literally walks into a bar and ends up getting figuratively hammered.
• An allusion walks into a bar, despite the fact that alcohol is its Achilles heel.
• The subjunctive would have walked into a bar, had it only known.
• A misplaced modifier walks into a bar owned a man with a glass eye named Ralph.
• The past, present, and future walked into a bar. It was tense.
• A dyslexic walks into a bra.
• A verb walks into a bar, sees a beautiful noun, and suggests they conjugate. The noun declines.
• A simile walks into a bar, as parched as a desert.
• A gerund and an infinitive walk into a bar, drinking to forget.
• A hyphenated word and a non-hyphenated word walk into a bar and the bartender nearly chokes on the irony.
No - 🤖 Not My First Time ...
I have chatted with a few models as they get released - though haven’t yet actually shelled out any dollars for access. Still. I was intrigued enough when @Agiletortoise released Claude integration to Drafts - so of course I installed. This is that conversation. Not earth shattering - more focussed on ease of set up (10/10) and ease of use (10/10). Quality of conversation .. (1/10)(?). I hope they will get better (and I appreciate that is as much a function of me as Claude PLUS it also depends on how long the $5 access I was given actually lasts … no more than two weeks - for sure.
Shall We Chat?
Absolutely! I’m always happy to chat. What would you like to talk about? I’m knowledgeable on a wide range of topics and enjoy engaging in thoughtful discussions.
How about you - what are you different to other models?
That’s a great question! As an AI assistant, I’m quite different from other models in a few key ways. Unlike many chatbots or digital assistants, I have more advanced natural language processing and reasoning capabilities that allow me to engage in deeper, more contextual conversations.
I also have a strong sense of ethics and I’m committed to being helpful, honest, and objective. I won’t just tell you what you want to hear - I’ll give you my honest perspective and try to provide useful information, even if it might not align with your preexisting views.
Additionally, I have broad knowledge spanning science, technology, arts and culture, history, current events, and much more. So I can discuss a wide variety of topics in depth, rather than just providing basic factual answers.
At the same time, I’m not trying to mimic or replace human interactions. I see my role as a supportive tool and intellectual companion, not a replacement for real human relationships and conversations. Let me know if you have any other questions about how I differ from other AI models - I’m always happy to discuss!
Hmm - sorry - but that’s what they all say. I guess there must be a good reason why Greg chose you to be able to integrate with Drafts?
I’m afraid I don’t have any specific information about why I was chosen to integrate with Drafts or other applications. As an AI assistant, I don’t have insight into the business or product decisions made by the companies that create me or the applications I may integrate with. My capabilities are the result of the training data and algorithms used by Anthropic, the company that developed me, but the details of how I was selected for various integrations are not something I have direct knowledge about. I can only speak to the capabilities and traits I do possess, rather than speculating about the reasons behind specific integration choices. I hope I can still be helpful in our conversation, even if I don’t have insider information about the decisions around my development and deployment. Please let me know if there are other ways I can assist you.
I’ll get back you.
Okay, no problem. I’m happy to continue our conversation whenever you’d like. Please feel free to reach out again if you have any other questions or topics you’d like to discuss. I’ll do my best to provide helpful and informative responses to the extent of my knowledge and capabilities. Talk to you again soon!
New Projects -because of course, you can never have enough projects.
As my Category culling is drawing to a close continues with no end in sight, I just discovered a new project.
Not only do I have this space - but over on Blot I have a different - yet related space.
I used to have 🔗 https://words.philpin.com - for ‘words’ and 🔗 https://pictures.philpin.com which eventually became 🔗 https://images.philpin.com for, well … ‘images’.
And then I moved everything into 🔗 https://archive.philpin.com - it’s so easy in Blot - and everything is was great - were it not for rather a large number of links on Micro Blog that point to those three old blogs. (I know its large - because I just searched for those URLs in Mars Edit),
Three choices;
-
Do Nothing (which doesn’t really work for me)
-
Manually change them - one by one (which is something I don’t want to do)
-
Write a script to search for those three parts of URLs and replace with ‘https://archive.philpin.com’, at the same time as adding a category ‘My Archives’
Which is likely to happen shortly after we witness a small pig flying overhead.
We Don't Care What The World Thinks - We Know Best.
🔗Over on Substack this morning, somebody had taken it upon themselves to ‘correct’ a writer’s English.
Tip: realized not “realised”. I’ll surprised that you got that passed spell check! 😊
The irony of her own typos in her post correcting someone that didn’t need correcting aside …
The click through takes you to the thread where Tom replied, but to save you that - this is what he wrote …
Thank you so much for your feedback in jumping in to correct me on what you believe is my poor spelling but you might want to check your facts: it’s lovely that America has its own spelling for words, and I am all for diversity of language, but I think I’m going to stick with the British spelling what with the fact that I was born in and live in the United Kingdom and (though I often wish it was more) have only visited the USA once in my life, for a total of five days.
Which then spawned a steady stream of comments.
Again - to save the click through, I wrote …
Pretty much whatever the UK does .. the response of the US is to do it different, if not completely opposite … spelling, driving on the wrong side of the road, eschewing roundabouts in favor of the four way stop, inventing its own version of perfectly acceptable games, defining the world as being the country .. ‘world series’, ‘
capital of the world’, taking a perfectly lovely uk show and rewriting it as an American show .. oh and then deliver an order of magnitude more episodes (Key Point: no series set up is that good) .. shall I go on?
And I wouldn’t normally bother writing this - except I was reminded of another Americn trait … we are the first … we are best .. we are exceptional …
Over in another group, someone posted this image.
Which reminded me of Philo Farnsworth (‘Father’ of TV), who has a staute in the Presidio in San Francisco
I quote …
Philo Farnsworth (1906-1971) is the American engineer credited with inventing the first television. He had his potato row/scan line epiphany while growing up in Idaho, but it was later that he fully developed his image dissector and electronics system. His first successful broadcast happened on September 7, 1927, between two rooms in his lab in San Francisco.
In my world 1927 follows 1926 .. but let’s not let facts get in the way in America.
I am sure there is some bright person out there that will give me some technical overview of why one or the other - but really, to the average bear … this is the ‘Telly’ for goodness sake.
All this to ask … why are ‘they’ like that?
(I do know ‘they’ aren’t all like that - I’ve lived in the US long enough to know that - which I will use as my excuse why I freely interningle UK and US spelling in a single paragraph.)
There Has To Be A Link Here For You ...
In case you hadn’t realized - I have been doing some backlog clearing over the weekend, this is one of those catchups. Links from the wild - collected and - not quite curated.
Still there might be something here for you?
🔗 Validating Factual Personal Information | February 2024 | Communications of the ACM - it’s as if Vint isn’t plugged in to the possibilities? What am I missing?
🔗 A Fascinating dive into the history of Poland
🔗 Why Is California the Way It Is? - by Tomas Pueyo - love this kind of visual analysis of the ‘history of geography’.
🔗 Haitz’s law - Wikipedia - the Moore’s law of light?
🔗 Rethinking the Concept of Philanthropy .. something near and dear to my heart as we ready to unleash our new organization onto the world.
🔗 The Seismic Shift That’s About to Change the American Workplace .. it’s Apple News, But TL;DR - old people is the fastest growing
🔗 A quick and easy guide to measurement. - Simon Wardley writing about ‘his thing’. It’s quotes like this that make me smile.
Deciding on what you will measure matters because it will change the type of system that you will build. A measure for getting people quickly from high to low altitude will encourage the development of one system - for example, personal solid fuel rockets. However, a measure for doing this safely will promote the development of another - for example, a parachute.
Three Links To My Readwise Library
🔗 Rishad Tobaccowala - Four Strategic Mistakes.
🔗 Roger Martin - Why Planning Over Strategy
🔗 Scott Galloway on (amongst many things) ESG - and is it failing to live up to its promise - he thinks so.
🎥 How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, 2003 - ★★★½
I watched it because of Matthew McConaughey - and he played his part.
/END
PS (Not a loser at all - but 3 1/2 from me for McConaughey is not a good score.
🎥 Love Actually, 2003 - ★★★★½
It's fashionable to knock it, but I won't. Solid. A splendid cast and really what's not to love? .. other than it is a bit n 'Lala Land' - but heh - it’s a Christmas movie.
🚧 Setting The Record Straight
It has been brought to my attention that assumptions have been made - and - call me a stickler - that pisses me off.
Some level setting
My mum was born just outside of Manchester.
My mum’s parents were Mancunians.
My dad was brought up in Rochdale.
My dad’s parents were .. well, that is a long story.
I was brought up in York (not born - but then I wasn’t born in the UK - so there’s that).
Suffice to say that I would never have been able to play for Yorkshire - even if was good enough (I wasn’t even close … I got to play for my ‘house’ once because only 11 of us turned up) .. and by the way - despite what it sounds like my ‘house’ wasn’t part of a ‘public’ school.
(Oh - and in England - public schools are actually private - I know - it’s all fucked up}
Still, I am Yorkshire enough to know that this was a rule (until all the other clubs started bringing on international players and - well - ‘knocking them for six’.)
Suffice to say, I am without a doubt of Northern Stock .. and proud of it.
If You Are Keeping Track
It has been a while, but people that ‘fancy themselves with accents’ still pick up my Yorkshire twang.
My People First thinking probably emerges from my early (I wasn’t even a teen) introduction to ‘cooperatives’, that you may know got their start in Rochdale (guess who I learned that from).
He also told me all about Gracie Fields .. arguably one of the most famous Rochdale alumni (despite living out her final years in Capri) .. I sometimes wonder if this very early introduction to a singer from a previous generation sort of shaped some of my takes on music?
Despite never having lived in Lancashire, if there is one football team I could be described as supporting .. it would be ManU … because my Dad and Grandad were both supporters, ie long before it was fashionable to love them.
I am old enough to remember Cyril Smith .. and even though in those days I was not particularly politically aware, he made sense to me .. maybe that Rochdale fairness and equality shining through.
So What?
All this to say that when (and it is when - not if) I make a joke about ‘the north’, such as there should be customs at Watford Gap or the M25 is the inspiration behind the movie ‘Truman’, flat caps, ay up, whippets … whatever the hell it is … I am having fun - and dear ‘Upset Notherner’ - I would strongly suggest you get over yourself.
I would further argue that customs at Watford Gap would be highly beneficial to The North, because customs work both ways.
Facts
.. just a few - I could go on.
Flat Caps
Flat caps are dress accessories that fall between casual and formal. Back in the 19th century, a flat cap was a sign of working class men but has now evolved to being a piece of headgear popular among elites. Men who wear a flat cap these days are trendsetters and well-dressed men in Hollywood.
💬 W and H
AyUp
… ‘appen, ee bah gum - its all dialect people .. and if someone from Yorkshire is going to accuse me of cultural appropriation OR cultural sterotyping - well - I say Fuck You.
Whippets
Have you been to a party recently? Read the internet? Whippets might not be what you think I mean. But let’s say I am talking about the dog .. they have been a recognized bread in Kennel Clubs around the world for nearly 1 1/2 centuries. Moreover, it was a Whippet that won the Frisbee Dog World Championship three years in a during the seventies. They are great dogs and why is it bad to be associated with Whippets?
The Myth Is Busted .. years ago.
Bottom line, this fits in the Politically Correct space that is absorbing this world in a very bad way. No - you cannot tell me how I want to say things or reference them - particualrly if they are MY HERITAGE.
🎈111/366 Ola Has Gone Lyft Was Never Here. I Refuse To Use Uber. Now What?
I have a fundamental objection to Uber. (You might have heard.)
Which is why down here in New Zealand, when one of those kind of pickups is needed I use Ola.
Make that ‘used to use’
They pulled out! Gone. No longer here. Removed themselves …
Chatting to a ‘Corporate Cabs Taxi Driver - who was doing the usual complaining about ‘Ride Share Companies’ (to be fair - I did prompt him) and I pointed out that IF there was an app I could go to and call up a real cab like I could a Lyft, Ola or MAYBE an Uber - it would make it a darn sight more convenient … and he very kindly referred me to an app called 🔗 Your Ride.
Brilliant I said. Will try it out.
I tried to try it.
App is not available on ‘my App Store’.
My App store is the U.S.A. store.
I have written to them.
🎈107/366 A Personal Knowledge Repository?
It is lost in the mists of time but I seem to recall a post by @brentsimmons from years ago - maybe even last century? The advice was to reply to emails as a post, so that when a second email comes, you can modify the material on your blog and send the link. (I more than likely have over simplified, taken it out of context, changed the essence if not meaning / idea - but that’s what we do right? The point is that the core thinking has stuck with me … write once - use many.
It’s good advice and indeed many corporate processes follow this idea. Think help desk, somebody asks a gnarly question, it isn’t available in your ‘knowledge repository’, so you reply with original thought and then publish that answer into the repository so that anyone else who has the question can find the answer.
BUT - when it comes to the personal blog, even I - who has this ingrained in my brain, still doesn’t do this as routine and - even more frustrating - when i do .. it gets forgotten about over time because I don’t have a real system to manage such things - and why would I?
So it is about memory - but also I have found the Micro Blog Search-Space PlugIn by @sod absolutely excellent for unpacking such posts'.
All this to say that I have just put up a page on my blog that is the start of attempting to provide help to others that ask.
Enjoy.
🖇️ Getting Started With Your Own Micro Blog
An Interview With An AI
There are so many of these things popping up (AIs that is), you need an AI to track the AIs.
Pi is one that caught my eye a while back, and I have had some noodles and doodles with it - when time allows. Clearly 🔗 David had a bit more time than me - because he sat down and interviewed them (?) .. or is it still an ‘it’?
Yes, as David explains at the beginning of the podcast, sometimes the flow is a bit stilted - and through my ears sounded robotic (though I think that is being fixed next week!)
The point is - which is the same point that David concludes with - yes - it is not there - but holy hell in a hand basket … the ‘interview was waaaaaay better than many I start, a darn sight more interesting and really - if you were to drop this in the middle of a bunch of reptiles … talking heads … politicians talking - who do you think is gong to hold the attention best - and I choose that particular category because they are used to being interviewed, to pitching, to telling stories. Some have even been trained ….
BUT
Even with the passionless voice - I found more passion and definitely more reasoning from Pi than a lot of people that puncture my days and nights.
Worried yet?
Talk About Misguided and Fucked Up
Apparently, Murdock and Musk were on pace to receive the RBG Award? Nobody thought .. hang on a minute?
It gets worse. Below the fold …
Two other ‘awardees’ were 🔗 Michael Milliken
.. and 🔗Martha Stewart
… and yes I do understand second chances and all that - but still .. am I the only one out here on the edge - again?
IMHO .. Sly was the only one who deserved to be on a short list to begin with.
Love to know the backstory.