GreyDuck

Co.
Fucking.
Signed.

Best of sleep to you, good sir, and may the morrow be bright.

It's partly "I do NOT photograph well" and partly "new toys shiny" for me.

The fact that James May's career as a presenter is varied enough for TG to almost be a footnote is a testament to *something*, that's for sure.

Definitely going to be looking into a "Sanctuary Moon" analogue, indeed.

I'm glad it's finally Friday afternoon, not because my work week has been awful (it hasn't!) but because it's been *frelling weird* and my mind's tired of being boggled multiple times per day, every day.

I need the downtime.

The Melancholy of OpenAI I’m struggling to find articles about it, but I swear, for the last few years, people have been acting like GPT-5 would be some sort of industry-changing event, tantamount to the original iPhone. Instead, GPT-5 feels like the last Valentine’s Day before a breakup. I’m serious, there’s a genuine sadness to everything going on in AI — a kind of pained, feigned excitement for a new model that doesn’t really sound like a new model, and even Simon Willison, a well-intentioned, well-versed LLM-knower, can only muster the limp praise of “verdict: it’s just good at stuff.” How utterly melancholy! How deeply sad! We sit at what amounts to the end of, at the very least, the end of the GPT era, of the period of S development in generative AI when there were things to look forward to and when there was hope that OpenAI would create something impressive. This was, in many ways, the last real reason for anyone to take OpenAI seriously. After this, what exactly is there to wait for from this company? Its next model that becomes the top of some sort of obscure LLM benchmark for a week or two before Google or Anthropic does nearly the exact same thing? What, exactly, are we building all these data centers for? Why are we doing this? To what end? What necessitates the environmentally and societally destructive sprawl of generative AI?

Not that I ever believed that OpenAI would actually impress me, but is this really the best that Sam Altman has to offer? Is this why OpenAI has incinerated ten billion dollars since June? Is this what necessitated raising another $8.3 billion, with plans to raise another $22.5 billion to follow? Why are we acting as if there is not, on some level, a cashout happening at OpenAI right now? It’s trying to set up an employee share sale at a valuation that would make it worth more than Netflix at $500 billion. What, exactly, is it about OpenAI that makes this company worth $300 billion (Salesforce, as of writing this sentence, has a market capitalization of $243 billion), let alone $500 billion? What about GPT-5 justifies this company’s existence? Are these tools truly innovative? Are they truly useful? How is this company making a billion dollars a month, and what is it about its product that makes 20 million people pay $20-a-month for it? Are any of the 5 million business customers the ones that OpenAI has offered a month of ChatGPT Team to for a dollar? What’s it’s churn? How much money does OpenAI actually make? Investors plowing more money into OpenAI are not simply wasting their money, but enabling the reckless and erratic sprawl of Sam Altman. Nothing about this company is innovative, there is nothing impressive happening, and it is shameful that this has been allowed to go this far. This company is set to burn at least $8 billion this year according to The Information — but I think it’s going to burn far more, based on the fact it raised $10 billion in June, then $8.3 billion in August, and plans to raise another $20 billion or more by the end of the year.

What’s next? Will Anthropic end up doing exactly the same thing, then also raise a lot of money, then also have an employee share sale, then also release the newest, most powerful model of all time? I can’t wait! Really though, does anybody feel excited about what’s happening? Is anybody having fun? Is anybody truly hopeful for the future based on the launch of GPT-5? Or are they just going through the motions until somebody finally cracks and admits that things aren’t going to work out?

GPT-5 was meant to be OpenAI's iPhone moment. Instead, it felt like the last Valentine's Day before a breakup. This underwhelming launch feels like the end of the GPT era, and the last trick in Clammy Sam Altman's arsenal.
www.wheresyoured.at/the-enshittification-of-generative-ai/

She is SO FLOOFY! Off the charts!

crypto's claim to be all about financial freedom is consistently undercut by the fact that it is populated almost entirely by sociopathic scam artists

One: Big damned mood.

Two: Making silly videos like that is the peak use of vtuber tech, full stop. Almost makes me want to play with that toybox.

Apropos of not much, I long for the day when most folks' main exposure to Jeremy Clarkson is the "Oh no! ... Anyway--" gif.

It's also quite a spectrum of users... like, one particular notable MST3K fan I follow posts A LOT, while some folks I follow basically never post.

Which is just another way in which the raw numbers *do not actually matter* here.

Agreed!

Which is more distinctive, the cup *size* or the cup *design*...?

Sold!

The most ridiculous and annoying consomme-tion ever.

If I say that this has made the light dawn upon me, can I refer to it as the Caprese Sun?

(... I'll show myself out.)

They're giving him the biggest shoes to fill of the main three male characters. You can't tell me Clancy Brown wasn't the dude having THE MOST fun making the original movie. Not knocking Lambert or Connery (much) but c'mon now.

For me it's always gonna be Sneakers. Redford as a guy who's wishcasting himself as the face but he's still actually just a total nerd, leading a pack of even bigger nerds (and Sidney Poitier). His comic reaction bits are absolute gold.

Do not want.

Ugh... today's the last "nice" day we're getting for a bit, and by Sunday it's going to be ugly amounts of heat out there. #pdxtst

Taking care of yourself is always Job One.

Those who matter don't mind, those who mind don't matter.

Anyone who actually *uses* Bluesky (and isn't getting themselves blocklisted right left and center) probably has a timeline they have to curate with muted words just to keep it manageable.

I figure everyone else is some kind of provocateur or otherwise looking for a negative spin angle to chase.

It's a rollercoaster of hope and sorrow, but without the "actual vertical movement change" you'd expect from, say, a rollercoaster.

ohfortheloveof

On the one hand: My kingdom for an modern Esca redo.

On the other hand: They'd try to cram everything into 12 episodes, so never mind...

There's no rule stating a boar can't run in this horse race, right?

[pressing finger to ear] Er, wait, I'm being updated on this... never mind!

Yikes.

Doctor's office pinged me a couple weeks ago to say "hey it's time for your wellness visit, hurry up and schedule" and the first availability? Thanksgiving week.

Quokka biting a stick

Quokka holding a stick and opening their mouth

Quokka holding a stick

Quokka holding a stick

Just in case you needed a #quokka today

If you pick up one thing from listening to Genesis' entire catalog (and that includes Pete's solo work) it's that every one of those men is an *absolute nerd* and sometimes that reveals itself in the most unlistenable ways.

(I say this as a solo-Tony enjoyer: WHAT A NERD.)