What do you mean? I follow a lot of hashtags on Mastodon. Won’t I be seeing a lot of Threads content if I’m on a server federated with them without explicitly opting into that?
This is more a question of tolerance. We know Facebook is NOT tolerant of competitors, of the open web, of free software, etc. They cannot survive as a megacorp without a level of assurance and control that they can’t have if they’re “just another fediserver”. They WILL try to wrangle control. They WILL try to eat us all up. Why let the fox in the henhouse when you already know it’s a fox?
That doesn’t actually fix the issue. If Facebook is trying to set itself up like Chrome with the webplatform, or GTalk with XMPP, then they will drive the feature set of ActivityPub, whether you’re federated with them or not.
Hypothetical example:
Want to see this picture/video from someone on Threads? You need Facebook’s proprietary picture format, which has DRM baked in it. Even if you don’t federate, Mastodon, Lemmy, etc now have to take energy away from their work to adopt the proprietary picture format. It depends on the proportion Threads takes on the network and how they can leverage that position to put pressure.
Threads currently has voice notes. Should all ActivityPub services support that? If so, do we adhere to Threads’ standard or not?
It was just an example. The same can happen at the Mastodon-level instead of the Fediverse-level. Since there is some desired interop (e.g. between Mastodon and Lemmy), services do influence each other in their feature set.
I’m not sure what you mean by “a lot of what people are worried about Threads doing has already been done by Mastodon”. Do you mean that the decisions that Mastodon make influence the rest of the Fediverse? If so, let’s make sure we understand the difference here: Threads has a much more hostile disposition. Mastodon seems to have incentives aligned with the rest of the Fediverse services, and probably deserves the benefit of the doubt; Facebook has abused that benefit time and time again.
People in New York City once again took to the streets to demand a permanent ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza and an end US aid to Israel. Protesters marched from Foley Square to NYC City Hall, Wall Street, and Washington Square Park to raise their demands. The protest took place as the United Nations Security Council was...
I was under the impression that there were resources in that area that the US currently has privileged access to because of their alliances there. So they have a stake in making their allies come out on top.
I’m not so sure that’s true. What if normalizing and removing friction from piracy gets to the point where the streaming services have to react by providing better services and better payouts?
How much should they be paid for it? In a situation where the streaming services have a stranglehold on the market and are extracting a big amount in rent-seeking price vs actually paying the people who labored to create it, should we continue to pay and give in to their morally dubious tactics? In this lens, can piracy be considered a form of civil disobedience?
Ah, that’s not my understanding of civil disobedience. I prefer this definition: “civil disobedience is a public, non-violent and conscientious breach of law undertaken with the aim of bringing about a change in laws or government policies” (plato.stanford.edu/entries/civil-disobedience/)
I suppose the piracy aspect might not be public enough to count as civil disobedience though, unless you count as public the noticeable cumulative effects of all piracy.
Agreed, and to me the solution is not “let’s hope the companies play nice”, but rather to bring in anti-monopoly regulations, like Canada’s Bill C-56.
We need to force companies to add interoperability, transparency and fairness imho. Like the ongoing fight to force Apple to allow competing browsers in iOS. Or alternate app stores for Android and iOS.
The headline says “you’re told that what you’re doing is buying by the people selling you the media, but that’s not what you’re actually doing. So, if they’re lying to you about what you’re buying, then pirating a different thing isn’t stealing the thing they are trying to sell you.”
It’s definitely tongue in cheek and has some hyperbole in it, but that is the gist of the statement.
What Spotify does affects the entire music market. Why should you worry about their income? Because Spotify’s strategy makes it harder and harder for musicians to have the income to keep on making music. If you care about having music to listen to, you should care about this. Also, Spotify and music is just one example of the overall exploitation of workers. If you don’t stand for artists when it’s their livelihood at stake, why should anyone stand up for your rights when it’s your livelihood at stake?
Cory Doctorow writes extensively about how it’s Spotify’s fault, as an extension of the common exploitation of musicians in the industry, in the excellent book Chokepoint Capitalism. Here’s a short summary of the Spotify argument by the author: www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ5z_KKeFqE
That’s the point, though. Spotify is rigged specifically so that they don’t have to pay small artists. Spotify splits the pot with the Big Three and everyone else can go fuck themselves. I would much rather my monthly payment go toward the artists I actually listen to. Instead, most of a monthly payment goes to the most played artists-- which Spotify rigs to be whoever nets them the most money (low royalty artists, high dividends for Spotify and the Big Three who are highly invested in it)
Yeah, agreed and every person can only do so much. I like to think that it’s all the same fight, it’s the fight against the stranglehold that the rich have on the rest of us.
A Quinnipiac University poll asked U.S. registered voters to select one of four options to blame for the divisions in the country. Overall, 35 percent blamed social media, 32 percent blamed political leaders, 28 percent blamed cable news channels and only 1 percent blamed other countries.
I agree that the technologies did pan out, but I don’t think it’s an ignorant opinion.
I also feel blasé about the new battery articles because they tend to promise orders of magnitude changes rather than incremental change. Batteries did get much better, but it doesn’t really feel that way I suppose. Our experience of battery power hasn’t changed much.
It’s really about getting excited about the article or the tech, it takes so long to see its mild effects that there’s no real cashing out on the excitement, so it’s not very satisfying.
This is an idea I’ve been toying with for a bit. There is a ton of media that includes unimportant information that doesn’t need to be stored pixel perfect. Storing large portions of the image data as text will save substantial amounts of storage, and as the reality of on-device image generation becoming commonplace sets in...
OP sounds like he’s making a data compression pitch, but I think you have the better idea. I think surrounding the picture with a lot of contextual data about when/why/how this picture was taken will absolutely help recall and connecting to related concepts.
I’ve been using LLMs pretty extensively in a professional capacity and with the proper grounding work it becomes very useful and reliable.
LLMs on their own is not the world changing tech, LLMs+grounding (what is now being called a Cognitive Architecture), that’s the world changing tech. So while LLMs can be vulnerable to bullshitting, there is a lot of work around them that can qualitatively change their performance.
Essentially, you don’t ask them to use their internal knowledge. In fact, you explicitly ask them not to. The technique is generally referred to as Retrieval Augmented Generation. You take the context/user input and you retrieve relevant information from the net/your DB/vector DB/whatever, and you give it to an LLM with how to transform this information (summarize, answer a question, etc).
So you try as much as you can to “ground” the LLM with knowledge that you trust, and to only use this information to perform the task.
So you get a system that can do a really good job at transforming the data you have into the right shape for the task(s) you need to perform, without requiring your LLM to act as a source of information, only a great data massager.
“It has already started to be a problem with the current LLMs that have exhausted most easily reached sources of content on the internet and are now feeding off LLM-generated content, which has resulted in a sharp drop in quality.”
Do you have any sources to back that claim? LLMs are rising in quality, not dropping, afaik.
And hopefully this will allow them to follow the 80/20 rule where the AI can do 80% of the grunt work and the human can concentrate on the 20% creative part.
I summarized the two readings of the bill. (Claude AI did, really)
The first speech from the Sponsor (February 8, 2022)
Senator Pate gave a speech introducing Bill S-233, which would create a national framework to implement a guaranteed livable basic income program in Canada. She argued that poverty is a major social issue that needs to be urgently addressed. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated income inequality and disproportionately affected marginalized groups. A guaranteed livable income could improve health, social, and economic outcomes for low-income Canadians.
The speech outlined how poverty puts people at greater risk of poor health, food insecurity, and homelessness. COVID-19 has spotlighted these vulnerabilities, as lower-income groups have suffered higher mortality rates. Senator Pate cited research showing guaranteed income pilots reduced hospital visits and improved participants’ health. She argued a national program is feasible, building on existing supports like the Canada Child Benefit. Costs could be offset by reducing other programs and realizing savings in areas like healthcare.
There is growing momentum for guaranteed income, with support across party lines. Public opinion also favors it. Senator Pate positioned the bill as responding to decades of calls to action on poverty reduction. She appealed to fellow Senators to stop perpetuating myths about poverty and act boldly to implement this long-overdue policy. The speech was a compelling case for guaranteed income as a powerful tool for promoting equity and dignity.
The Response (April 18, 2023)
Senator MacDonald responded to Senator Pate’s speech introducing Bill S-233, which would create a framework for a guaranteed basic income (GBI) program in Canada. He commended Senator Pate’s advocacy for the poor, but expressed concerns about the bill’s lack of detail and fiscal implications.
Senator MacDonald outlined analyses questioning the affordability and sustainability of a GBI program. He cited research suggesting it could cost hundreds of billions annually, require tax increases, and reduce work incentives. Senator MacDonald also noted provincial studies concluding GBI is too costly and ineffective for poverty reduction compared to targeted measures.
Given Canada’s debt and deficits, Senator MacDonald argued the country cannot realistically consider implementing GBI currently. He contended the solution is generating wealth through natural resource development, not expanding welfare states. Senator MacDonald suggested Conservatives could support GBI to replace current programs if fiscal conditions improve under a future Conservative government.
In conclusion, Senator MacDonald maintained Conservatives oppose Bill S-233. While GBI aims are laudable, he believes the bill’s lack of detail and Canada’s finances make it unrealistic presently. He advocated defeating the bill or sending it to committee for further scrutiny.
Discussion last Tuesday (Oct 17)
I’ll put up a summary of the transcript once it becomes available or if I can extract it from the video.
Agreed. It’s such a disingenuous argument. It’s the usual casting of poor people as lazy, and what they need is a good lashing to get them to work.
Like… No. People want dignity. People want to feel satisfied in their lives. UBI trials have shown that they use that money to get the life/jobs that they want. They’re just not gonna be forced into shitty jobs as you said. This last bit is the part not said out loud.
That’s always been the case, though, imo. People had to make time for art. They had to go to galleries, see plays and listen to music. To me it’s about the fair promotion of art, and the ability for the art enjoyer to find art that they themselves enjoy rather than what some business model requires of them, and the ability for art creators to find a niche and to be able to work on their art as much as they would want to.
I don’t think that Sarah Silverman and the others are saying that the tech shouldn’t exist. They’re saying that the input to train them needs to be negotiated as a society. And the businesses also care about the input to train them because it affects the performance of the LLMs. If we do allow licensing, watermarking, data cleanup, synthetic data, etc. in a way that is transparent, I think it’s good for the industry and it’s good for the people.
For one thing: when you do it, you’re the only one that can express that experience and knowledge. When the AI does it, everyone an express that experience and knowledge. It’s kind of like the difference between artisanal and industrial. There’s a big difference of scale that has a great impact on the livelihood of the creators.
I don’t see how one invalidates the other. Amazon’s predatory practices have killed off the competition and created a sizable price gap. Not everyone has the luxury of voting with their money.
Hey folks. Just wanted to put out a good word about Nostr. I’m finding it to be pleasantly easy to use and very akin to twitter but uses soft servers in the form of relays. Its not quite moving away from servers but where decentralization is happening frequently, its nice to give that liberty back to users....
All code on the blendermarket is GPL. Yet, it sold over 25 million dollars worth of software. No DRM on the assets, all free software. Free as in freedom, not as in beer. In spite of that, I have not seen once anyone in the blender community complain about piracy, let alone have I seen anyone distribute any software or assets...
Hi all, Is there a way for me to block a particular domain no matter in which community it finds itself in? There are some news outlets that I just don’t want to be polluted by....
For years I’ve taken screenshots of some of the dumbest most important news on the internet. Join me on !vital_news !vital_news and help me collect these important stories.
So if I look at a community’s page on the instance proper, like: lemmy.ml/c/artificial_intel . There are posts there that are not reflected when I look at it from lemmy.ca: lemmy.ca/c/[email protected] a post that I’ve posted from Lemmy.ca!...
When I click on the link you provided, I see my post.
When I go on the !AI page on lemmy.ca, I don’t see it. On any device of my devices (browser and app). I tried to sort by new and I still don’t see it. Does it need a moderator’s acceptance or something?
41% of fediverse instances have blocked threads so far!!! (tech.lgbt)
Threads testing mastodon integration (www.threads.net)
Threads accounts will be available on Mastodon and other services that use the ActivityPub protocol. (mander.xyz)
www.threads.net/
New Yorkers march on Wall St. to demand an end to US funding of Israel : Peoples Dispatch (peoplesdispatch.org)
People in New York City once again took to the streets to demand a permanent ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza and an end US aid to Israel. Protesters marched from Foley Square to NYC City Hall, Wall Street, and Washington Square Park to raise their demands. The protest took place as the United Nations Security Council was...
Pluralistic: “If buying isn’t owning, piracy isn’t stealing” (pluralistic.net)
Spotify made £56m profit, but has decided not to pay smaller artists like me. We need you to make some noise | Damon Krukowski (www.theguardian.com)
Is A.I.'s Easy Mode the Death of Creativity? (youtu.be)
young voters say social media to blame for divisions in the u.s (thehill.com)
A Quinnipiac University poll asked U.S. registered voters to select one of four options to blame for the divisions in the country. Overall, 35 percent blamed social media, 32 percent blamed political leaders, 28 percent blamed cable news channels and only 1 percent blamed other countries.
Sodium-ion battery breakthroughs may be key to our electric future (www.techspot.com)
Near-Future file type concept "Digital Memory" (lemmy.world)
This is an idea I’ve been toying with for a bit. There is a ton of media that includes unimportant information that doesn’t need to be stored pixel perfect. Storing large portions of the image data as text will save substantial amounts of storage, and as the reality of on-device image generation becoming commonplace sets in...
Oops! We Automated Bullshit. | Department of Computer Science and Technology (www.cst.cam.ac.uk)
Midjourney, Stability AI and DeviantArt win a victory in copyright case by artists — but the fight continues (venturebeat.com)
FIrefox can and should but refuses to implement browser level encryption to protect every browsing data generated by the browser.
Chrome does not do it either but are we supposed to be the ones that start a new trend or the ones that follow the trend?...
3D-GPT: converting text into 3D assets (venturebeat.com)
People get out of poverty faster with a guaranteed livable income says Ontario senator (www.aptnnews.ca)
Suing Writers Seethe at OpenAI's Excuses in Court (futurism.com)
Calls for boycott after alleged assault mars Lebanon film festival (www.aljazeera.com)
LIFF members deny the attack, and lawyer representing festival says a case will be filed against the accuser.
Internet developments have gone from exciting to dreadful.
Idk if this is the right community for this conversation, but it’s been on my mind and I want to share it with someone....
‘They Treat Us Worse Than Animals’: Working Without Water at Amazon (tribunemag.co.uk)
If you haven't heard of it - Nostr is a decentralized twitter alt - but uses relays as soft servers (www.youtube.com)
Hey folks. Just wanted to put out a good word about Nostr. I’m finding it to be pleasantly easy to use and very akin to twitter but uses soft servers in the form of relays. Its not quite moving away from servers but where decentralization is happening frequently, its nice to give that liberty back to users....
Academic Book About Emojis Can’t Include The Emojis It Talks About Because Of Copyright (www.techdirt.com)
cross-posted from: lemmy.zip/post/1076627...
The Blender market is kinda revolutionary and noone really talks about it
All code on the blendermarket is GPL. Yet, it sold over 25 million dollars worth of software. No DRM on the assets, all free software. Free as in freedom, not as in beer. In spite of that, I have not seen once anyone in the blender community complain about piracy, let alone have I seen anyone distribute any software or assets...
Can I block a particular domain?
Hi all, Is there a way for me to block a particular domain no matter in which community it finds itself in? There are some news outlets that I just don’t want to be polluted by....
Vital News where only the most "important" news is posted
For years I’ve taken screenshots of some of the dumbest most important news on the internet. Join me on !vital_news !vital_news and help me collect these important stories.
Not all posts being synced to Lemmy.ca?
So if I look at a community’s page on the instance proper, like: lemmy.ml/c/artificial_intel . There are posts there that are not reflected when I look at it from lemmy.ca: lemmy.ca/c/[email protected] a post that I’ve posted from Lemmy.ca!...