Trying very hard to avoid computers, and failing miserably.
Public Key
npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw Profile Code
nprofile1qqsdc6utdrv5ag84jwrql3kptut6h09gmzj3x745swsrefk4pw0qncspz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumt0wd68ytnsw43q4jjsuy
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Published at
2025-08-24T13:27:07Z Event JSON
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"content": "{\"name\":\"samir, lost and found\",\"about\":\"Trying very hard to avoid computers, and failing miserably.\\n\\nA 30-something British-born coconut Indian living in Zürich, Switzerland. I speak English, and enough Hochdeutsch to order a pizza.\\n\\nOccasional, inadvertent arsehole. If observed, please call me out.\\n\\nFascists, racists, Zionists, TERFs, homophobes, and other bigots can fuck right off.\\n\\nAdmin and sole user of this self-hosted instance.\\n\\nThis profile is searchable.\",\"picture\":\"https://cats.functional.computer/accounts/avatars/109/406/446/306/238/923/original/fcfc61cafa7ffc2c.jpeg\",\"banner\":\"https://cats.functional.computer/accounts/headers/109/406/446/306/238/923/original/176d65b934bb10bd.jpeg\",\"nip05\":\"[email protected] \",\"fields\":[[\"pronouns\",\"he/him; they/them\"],[\"location\",\"Zürich, Switzerland\"],[\"blog\",\"https://functional.computer/\"]]}" ,
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Last Notes npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…x759 Look Mum, No Hands! and Timberyard on Old Street both used to check most of these boxes (I used to run meetups in the former), but they have sadly shut down. Timberyard’s central London branch isn’t as good. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Hey friends, my partner has put together a course to help people with the mental side of landing a tech job. Confidence in interviews, finding stuff that aligns with your values, salary negotiation; that sort of thing. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…sr9k I want that on my wall for video calls. With a big arrow pointing to my head. 😜 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…sr9k In software, we say “legacy”. 😄 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I think we need to start using zombie film logic to refer to the LLM-pilled. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found When an LLM outputs, “I panicked”, it does not mean it panicked. It means that based on the preceding sentences, “I panicked” was a likely thing to come next. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…vdjy Yes, so much yes. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I decided I was missing something on Unix. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…kvnh I was slightly left of centre (in the UK) 20 years ago. I didn’t really change, everyone else did. Now I’m far left. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Time to start making cold brew coffee. 😋 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Northern/Western-European 30-somethings, see also: why your memory of winter is lots of snow, but your memory of last winter is lots of fog and some weirdly hot days. https://mastodon.world/@davidho/114658567143184052 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…x759 What are the odds it simply contains a staircase down into a vast, cavernous bunker? npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found You can replace sleep with food, right? npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I have officially abandoned NewsBlur in favour of my personal FreshRSS instance. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I took a look at my server logs and they are mostly 404s. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…fv4z @nprofile…psrp Right, instead we’ll be writing JavaScript with React for the next hundred years because SO disappearing (and nothing replacing it) will mean there’s nowhere to ask questions about newer languages/frameworks/concepts. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found The responses to this make me happy, because it’s evidence that Fedi is truly federated. There are lots of cool suggestions (including running your own), and I learned about a couple of Fedi instances I wasn’t aware of! https://fosstodon.org/@bert_hubert/114420946255456278 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…zwgs Pasta sauce. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I started a simple key-value store a few weeks back, for storing version numbers and pushing them to a webhook on change. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…t4qe I was lucky and only got two messages from Nicole (and I blocked both servers). If I had to guess, it’s probably because I imported Oliphant’s blocklist a while back. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…vdjy I struggle with this too (in a totally different space, mostly on software modelling and testing): I have blogged extensively about stuff that irks me and how to solve it, but replying to a conversation with a link to a 10-year-old article by me comes across as egoistic and somewhat thoughtless. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Do chemists feel the same way about people using “hydro” for water as computer scientists feel about the appropriation of “crypto”? npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…sr9k I hope you have some fun podcasts or audiobooks to listen to. 😄 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Prompts already won. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…nz6l Occasionally, a human will do something not to benefit themselves, their children, or even their neighbours, but people (and perhaps animals or the natural world) who haven’t even been born yet. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found The Web Design Museum is wonderful. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…5lc3 The vapid, pointless suggestions at the bottom of the screen there are the icing on the cake. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…cl5w Well, if you’re going to be ill, do it in style. Sounds like you’re making the most out of it, at least! npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…0e9j Your response is delicious, though. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @nprofile…m2eu I was once on a team where an absolute champion decided he would be the face of the team. He volunteered for every meeting (and there were so many meetings) so that everyone else could get things done. He was a leader. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub19lt…qfjk I think this is your best one yet. I found it absolutely believable. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I am seeing so many Americans post about upsetting the cat/dog/catdog by feeding them an hour later (because of DST). npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub198t…hasj I read it! I sometimes skip the entries highly focused on legal stuff, but often I find those interesting too. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Did you know that cats walk in “direct register”, which means that the back paws always land exactly where the front paws were? This is apparently extremely useful for stealthy hunting. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Mozilla: What do you want? npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Remember, friends, never refer to a Large Language Model as “AI”. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1gnx…d5kh Rustup is a program that automatically downloads the correct version of Rust for a given project. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1hpc…hjn3 I did, and I think it makes sense, but I wanted a vibe check too. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I got my postal vote. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1psd…9sr7 I think one could argue that it was a combination of COVID and disastrous health policy (and the blatant corruption), but it’s hard to find control values. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1psd…9sr7 Perhaps, if the Tories had not driven down life expectancy so much, they’d be coping pretty well right now… npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I consider myself left-wing. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub16u7…uend It took me a few seconds to realise that “chocolate and vodka” was not the answer to the question. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub129g…4kwg Agreed, I thought we’d learned this lesson with proprietary JavaScript “transpilers” that make your stack traces completely unusable. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found A couple years ago, all the blockchain dudes were yelling from the rooftops about provenance and a single source of verifiable truth. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Hot take: it is normal and rational to accept a job at a company you dislike, or in a field you are morally against, when the alternative is not having a job. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub16u7…uend I am very interested in whether the data dives into differences where one of the couple is working and the other is taking care of the home and family. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1vs8…54zy Honestly, I thought it would have happened faster. I was predicting that we’d start to see consultants raking it in for fixing AI-generated messed even this year. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub13uu…pvgs I think you’d be replacing large chunks with \xAB, so you might find the opposite. 😄 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Software isn’t going to improve until we, the people who care about it, stop taking large salaries for a little while. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found I DID NOT ASK FOR THIS, MICROSOFT. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1lwu…6w4j @npub1ngr…rc8q I realise you’re not asking for advice, but if you would like some on shrinking this down, let me know. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1mdk…aptk There’s a film? A TV show!? npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1sat…8vnx I'm impressed with anyone who can do this kind of work. My kid keeps asking me to draw things and I think they're getting bored of the same penguin over and over… npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Does anyone on this here sleepyweb do calligraphy + drawing/painting on commission? npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found Thanks to modern medicine and diets, some animals, such as humans, live far longer in captivity. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1hpc…hjn3 So long, though. “AfD” and “SVP” are much easier to pronounce. npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1hpc…hjn3 Also, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed reading the replies to your post. Thank you for making it. 😄 npub1m34ck6xef6s0tyuxplrvzhch4w723k99zdatfqaq8jnd2zu7p83qjra9uw samir, lost and found @npub1hpc…hjn3 I remember visiting relatives in India when I was a teenager and they inevitably commented to my mum, “lamba hai!” (“Gosh, he’s tall!”)
