@HistoPol Thank you 🫶
@tsvenson Great way of seeing it. 🫶
@JackEric thank you jack 🫶
@CatherineFlick Thank you Catherine. 🫶
I'm in the process of preparing for open heart surgery. It's an elaborate procedure where I'll get a new mechanical heart valve and also replace about 6-7 centimeters of the aorta.
This is followed by sick leave and rehabilitation with, among other things, breathing techniques to make sure my lung capacity is restored. It takes about three months for my rib cage to just heal up.
Although I've been aware of my congenital heart defect for a long time, the news of needing an imminent operation came quite suddenly and surprisingly. So how did I end up here?
In this blog post I share my experience and the road ahead.
[This post was first written in Swedish. I've done my best to rewrite it in English in my own voice, not the voice of any AI tool.]
https://axbom.com/my-tender-heart-and-i/
Today is Earth Overshoot Day – The day when we have consumed as much of the Earth's resources as it can replenish in a year.
But it's only today because many countries use far less resources than an equal consumption would allow.
If all countries consumed as much as Sweden, for example, the overshoot day would fall as early as April 21.
https://overshoot.footprintnetwork.org/newsroom/country-overshoot-days/
@prehnra So very true...
Organisations when they hire consultancy services: “We need a company credit check and report to ensure your finances are stable and that this will be a sustainable relationship.”
Organisations when deciding on using OpenAI: “We understand you spend $700,000 per day and need $5 billion a year to survive as a company, which is way more than any company has ever raised in history. Please take our money. We will integrate your tool into all our tools now. The lottery is our favorite way of investing in our own future.”
“Questioning and resisting the worst excesses of technology isn't antithetical to progress.”
https://thenib.com/im-a-luddite/
The hidden costs of AI crawlers: https://front-end.social/@stefan/112863640599785389
RE: https://front-end.social/users/stefan/statuses/112863640599785389
If a billionaire says that pigs will fly within two years and that this holds potential for billions of dollars of financial growth, there will be no shortage of media outlets ready to repeat and debate this incessantly, no shortage of McKinsey consultants to confirm or inflate the numbers and publish whitepapers on the topic, and no shortage of Aeronautical Hog Experts on LinkedIn to advise you on this inevitable future that you must adapt to.
You may not be replaced by a flying pig but you will be replaced by someone else working with a flying pig.
@silviamaggi Good share, thank you. Had never heard about the vicious flower before.
I am also struggling with LinkedIn.
I so miss the blogosphere, where we grew alongside people we admired with healthy doses of content that people put their heart into.
@iamdavidobrien So much. And yes, it’s surprisingly short.
@iamdavidobrien Yes, this is definitely a coherent way of reading it. I’ve found that the more times I browse through it the more layered I find it. She asks a lot of questions about what we believe and what we find enjoyable… And it leaves so much open. Especially of course the end, and why people leave, rather than voice their objection.
@danne Thank you! I’ve just started following Joel on Nebula. I’m very fond of his articulate takes.
@biggestjoel
@datarama Exactly this is likely what I am afraid of. I’m afraid of the unmasking. Which of course makes it even more important for me to address.
This morning I re-read Ursula K. Le Guin’s short story ’The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas’ to find the bits I need to make a comparison to the AI hype of today.
It’s so very beautiful in it’s simplicity and also just tore my heart out. It was more detailed in the child’s suffering than I remembered.
I want to write an essay that brings attention to everyone suffering for the AI benefactors to gain their advantages.
- the exploited labeling workers
- the people mining minerals
- the people who suffer from the data centre pollution and drainage
But I am afraid it’s going to be tough writing and people just won’t get it… I have seen the children that the child in the story reflects.
Will rest on this a few more days.
If you have not read it, it’s available here:
https://archive.org/stream/the-ones-who-walk-away-from-omelas-ursula-k-leguin/The%20Ones%20Who%20Walk%20Away%20from%20Omelas%20-%20Ursula%20K%20LeGuin_djvu.txt
När du läser nyheten om en blind Barbie med vit käpp, notera att dockan är framtagen tillsammans med organisationer och personer som är experter på, och själva har, synnedsättningar.
Mattel anordnade också lekstunder för barn med synnedsättningar som en del i produktutvecklingen. Därför handlar nyheten även om hänsyn till detaljer ända ner till hur kartongen öppnas.
- Kläderna är gjorda i material med hög sensorisk och taktil upplevelse (en rosa satin-blus och veckad kjol).
- För att enkelt kunna byta kläder har blusen ett högkontrast-fäste med krok och kjolen ett elastiskt midjeband.
- Armbågslederna har utformats så att dockan ska kunna använda käppen på ett sätt som uppfattas som bekvämt.
- Barbie i Braille-skrift på kartongen är strategiskt placerat enligt råd från synskadade själva.
- För att personer med synnedsättning också lättare ska kunna öppna kartongen själva har den kompletterats med en ny dra-ut-flik.
Notera att högkontrast-detaljer handlar om att göra det lättare för personer med synnedsättningar att hantera dockan.
Och detaljerna på kartongen (hela vägen ner till blindskriften) kommer nu att implementeras på ALLA Barbie-lådor i Fashionista-serien. Det understryker hur ett fokus på tillgänglighet bidrar till design som hjälper alla.
Det finns självklart många saker rent generellt att anmärka på när det gäller Mattel och Barbie som fenomen, som det alltid gjort, men jag uppskattar det arbetssätt som de visar prov på i det här fallet och som många fler organisationer kan lära sig av.
Bildbeskrivning: En leende Lucy Edwards håller upp och visar den nya Barbie-dockan med vit käpp. Lucy Edwards är en brittisk journalist samt aktivist och influencer inom tillgänglighet. Hon förlorade själv sin syn vid 17 års ålder. Bilden är en PR-bild från Mattel i samband med lanseringen.
"An important characteristic of our society is that it has developed technologies that distribute responsibility in a way so that no one has it."
– Joseph Weizenbaum in 'Islands in the Cyberstream'.