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calcifer

@calcifer@masto.hackers.town

mastodon 4.6.6

Friendly local fire demon. Arduino and LED fiddler. Microcomputing enthusiast. Tech should enhance and enable humans, not control or degrade them. Old, but not stagnant.

*sic non rumpitur, erit*
(if it ain’t broke, it will be)
*cornu omnem aream*
(de-ass the area)

Migrated from @calcifer@hackers.town on 2025-04-14; original hackers.town join date is 2020-05-11

1211 Followers

96 Following

50 Posts

Joined April 12, 2025

Pronouns:

he/they (or whatever feels right)

git:

https://codeberg.org/calcifer/

ls:

https://calcifer.codeberg.page

Posts

@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · 4d ago

Replying to @pwassonchat@eldritch.cafe

@pwassonchat@eldritch.cafe @NanoRaptor@bitbang.social these agents are not as well-guided as that. Some researcher “testing” prompts to enable that kind of outcome would probably be successful until news of it broke. These things are designed with a “they are allowed to do anything unless a guardrail says no” philosophy (because capitalism: that’s cheaper and easier), and the guardrails fail all the time.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Aug 06, 2026

My headcanon for Pinky and The Brain is that “one is a genius, the other’s insane” doesn’t fall the way most people think. Brain is _insane_. Pinky is a genius who understands how to foil Brain’s insane plots by feigning being an idiot.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Aug 05, 2026

Boosted by

Trending Bot @trending@homestead.social

Got a call from the library where my kids are volunteering this summer. Apparently someone used a cheap combination lock to lock shut a bin of materials for a young readers program, as a prank. My kids shimmed the lock open for the librarian. And the librarian called basically to say ‘this was super helpful but also it seems like you should know they had it open in 5 minutes’ I don’t think she expected my response to be “that long?! I guess we need to practice”

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Aug 04, 2026

I continue to point out that different people and teams have different needs, and orgs should align to what makes their employees happy and productive. For some (like me), that’s fully remote. For others it’s hybrid or even going to the office every day. People’s life situations and needs are different, and it’s easy enough to supply office space for people who benefit from it. Only a few types prof roles really strongly require a particular work location; for everything else, give options.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Jul 29, 2026

Kid1: I kind of want to join the Fae Kid2: you’ll have to pick a court to serve… Kid1: revision. I want to unionize the Fae

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Jul 15, 2026

We built these titties We built these titties On HRT ( to the tune of We Built This City )

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Jul 01, 2026

The tension between

your media is better when you respect and trust your audience

and

a large portion of your audience actually need their hand held

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Jun 07, 2026

I’m winding up almost all my fiction reading at the same time. And I want to read some really good sci-fi or science-fantasy, preferably set in a high-tech world. But I am absolutely spoiled for choice.

Recommend me something?

Preferences in reply:

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Jun 07, 2026

I feel like the under appreciated companion to “touch grass” is “spend time face to face with people”. It’s definitely less pithy.

But spending time in the same physical space with people is important for our brains. It’s literally a physiological need, even if you’re a huge introvert.

It is best if you have some kind of bond with them (even if it’s just community or acquaintance).

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Jun 05, 2026

My employer makes AI optional for devs (“we’ll pay for Claude Code if you want it, but you have to ask and we’ll expect return on it”). Adoption is around 40%; which means I’ve now been asked to spend some time building guidelines and job aids for use.

🧵1/4

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Jun 03, 2026

Interviewed a therapist today whose immediate response to me mentioning I’m not religious was “do you think you might be a sociopath?”

Welp, at least I know right away I guess. Scratch that one off the list.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 19, 2026

Replying to @cascheranno@hachyderm.io

@cascheranno@hachyderm.io I generally haven’t had pay increases to be management; most places I’ve worked it was a lateral move. I quite enjoy leading teams, but I get itchy to be hands-on after a bit. And a little exhausted from the “managing up” part. And I never want to be a VP again because it’s all trash fire all the time.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 19, 2026

I had described a behavior from my spouse as “bullying”. My therapist said they weren’t sure about that, and asked if there were other behaviors I feel that way about. Sure.

So they asked me to make a list of bullying behaviors. Shared ahead and we talked about it in session today.

“Ok that’s mostly not bullying, but it does seem an awful lot like abuse”. Huh. I may have needed to hear that.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 19, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

Honestly I took this job because I was getting a bit burned out being a manager and wanted to be more hands-on again. But apparently I’m drifting into management anyway, maybe it’s time to move on again.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 19, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

I got a lecture from HR about “staying in my lane”, which I anticipated. I asked the head of HR to put it in writing that I should not flag mistreatment of colleagues nor potential legal risks to the company, and please cc my VP and the CEO. We’ll see if she has the guts to do it.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 19, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

Update: Subject will get a written warning about the specific behavior (makes sense; while understandable, it still was inappropriate). Harasser will be reassigned and placed on a temporary leave pending investigation. Her VP seems to want to do the right thing. Head of HR, less so; but she has been made to understand the liability that would come with firing a target of harassment.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 18, 2026

Replying to @Linza@kamu.social

@Linza@kamu.social it used to be. Entry level roles used to include meaningful mentorship in most places. Imperfect education to be sure, but it still was taught. Any kind of considered mentorship seems to have nearly died out though. I’ve only seen a few places hang on to it.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 18, 2026

Replying to @Linza@kamu.social

@Linza@kamu.social it’s more experience than autism. I’m autistic, but I have the experience to navigate HR. Knowing the laws that protect you and what terminology will get HR to pay attention is a work skill.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 18, 2026

Great genre of internet comment: people genuinely unaware that a great many Pokémon are modeled at least a little after real animals, who have seen a posted photo of said real animal, and are very excited that the real animal “looks like a Pokémon”

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 18, 2026

I don’t usually take work calls outside work hours, but I do trust a few people enough to give them a path to get hold of me in an emergency.

Happened tonight because a co-worker I supported for promotion had some Not Ok Words with someone, which is way out of character; and the person that reached out is like “they’re gonna fire her and it’s giving bad vibes”.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 18, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

Turns out the guy she lost her temper at has been bullying while staying technically within policy bounds, and she’s not experienced enough to know how to handle that, so HR nor her manager did anything to protect her. Which is beyond fucked. I managed to get enough information to go to HR and convince them that firing is, for now, a legal exposure. But I’m absolutely LIVID. HR gonna HR, but I t’s really been getting worse the past 3 months or so (leadership changes, of course).

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 17, 2026

Well heck this could be a grindr alternative

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 17, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

It’s been a point of conflict for my coparenting partner and I, though, so it’s honestly tinged with a little anxiety My partner insists that I “don’t do anything” when she’s gone, so this time I decided to carefully document the state of the house as it is when she left; and then again right before she returns. But I can’t use it for anything except having an objective reference for myself.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 17, 2026

Co-parent is out of town, so I’ve been able to get the house clean and put banana bread in the oven and get the kids’ rooms tidied and vacuumed so they can do their Weekly Remote D&D

Kids have been excellent helpers! Definitely starting to be more attentive to what needs to be done and just doing it.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 16, 2026

Replying to @computer@facts.computer

@computer@facts.computer @svandendragon@mastodon.art this. It was good to understand the concept of “machine time is cheaper than dev time” as a way to avoid premature optimization But we’ve kind of extremely gone too far on it.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 15, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

@feld@friedcheese.us @Em0nM4stodon@infosec.exchange ALSO, 2-party consent for audio recordings is by far not the strongest law or regulation that could apply, depending on jurisdictions Our lawyers strongly recommended getting explicit, documented consent for every recording as a best practice to ensure compliance

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 15, 2026

Replying to @feld@friedcheese.us

@feld@friedcheese.us @Em0nM4stodon@infosec.exchange I just went through this with lawyers like a month ago. My understanding: YES, you must get clear consent for a recording in 2-party states, or it’s illegal. That consent can come from a contract, but it is not implied. YES, if you’re using another tool to record people, you / the tool are required to actively seek consent, and in some cases destroy a recording if you don’t get it. YES, this also applies to AI tools; they don’t magically get a pass on this rule.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 11, 2026

Replying to @opossum@therian.zone

@opossum@therian.zone @X00001@masto.hackers.town propaskanda was RIGHT THERE

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 08, 2026

Replying to @ariarhythmic@ohai.social

@ariarhythmic@ohai.social @billgoats@bitbang.social without a jailbreak, it’ll read MOBI files. MOBI is an open standard, and there are many quality ways to convey other open formats to it. WITH the jailbreak, if you can manage it, you can very easily add support for ePUB, HTML, and PDF; other formats possible too but depend a bit what choices you make.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 06, 2026

Replying to @lerg@infosec.exchange

@lerg @crazypedia my issue is that I’m generally in favor of technology that enables more people to get their computers to do more things. More people writing code is good. But code for you to use and share is very different from code that will act as a custodian for other people’s data, or such like. That should require professional care and expertise. And also this move is “lay off people and assign their work to remaining staff”, which should be a union-forming event

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 06, 2026

Replying to @Tattooed_Mummy@beige.party

@Tattooed_Mummy@beige.party

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 05, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

Meanwhile the alternatives is “can’t say kill, use ‘unalive’ to avoid the algorithm quietly silencing you to please advertisers”

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 05, 2026

Replying to @calcifer@masto.hackers.town

Which, honestly is pleasingly ironic. There has been so much pearl-clutching over there being a *culture* of using CWs for topics that a decent number of people might want to make decisions about seeing. So many bits pushed to wring hands over whether it’s ethical or whatever. But no one on Fedi forces it. Sure, some communities or individuals might choose to not associate with you, and a few people might say something to you. That’s it.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 05, 2026

You know one of my favorite things about Fedi is that it’s much easier to speak your mind vs corporate social media.

Any of those Corpo sites will gleefully censor you for saying anything that might be distasteful to The Advertisers, while hiding behind “free speech” to avoid doling out any consequences for people just being pricks.

Here, I don’t have to worry that any topic or word is out of bounds; no corpo newspeak required

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 04, 2026

Replying to @flippac@types.pl

@flippac@types.pl you can totally scavenge! Your enemies just mostly don’t have Big Firepower. This could be done Doom style where enemies are using (super)natural abilities, or more practically where the difficulty is mostly enemy placement, number, skill, and fortitude/armor rather than Crazy Big Guns

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 04, 2026

Most FPS games follow a path of “get more extreme weapons so you can fight ever harder enemies”.

I want the reverse. You start well-armed. Your shit breaks; you run out of specialized ammo with no more to be had. You’re thinning the enemy ranks as you go but your job get harder and you constantly have to worry that if you pull out a bigger gun, you’ll not have it when you really need it.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · May 01, 2026

Replying to @sillyCoelophysis@hachyderm.io

@sillyCoelophysis @fedivergent there is a large cohort of people that think tech literacy means adopting the “newest” of everything. And therefore that anyone who doesn’t adopt a new shiny of some kind must just be struggling to do so Their worldview doesn’t really admit the possibility that someone could reject a technology or tool on the basis that it just isn’t suitable for purpose

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 30, 2026

Replying to @Gurnitath@meow.social

@Gurnitath@meow.social they call it the “minute” hand but it’s the largest hand on the clock.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 26, 2026

Replying to @sargoth@mastodon.social

@sargoth@mastodon.social @mark@mastodon.ocert.at

When events are unfolding, especially if they are complex, a lot of propaganda enters the stream. You are not well-positioned to separate the propaganda from the genuine, in most cases, in the moment. It is not a failure to be patient and wait for reliable information

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 24, 2026

Replying to @chiffchaff@tech.lgbt

@chiffchaff @lothcat very rich people don’t think about money all the time; that’s a thing that happens to people who are rich but desperately want to become very rich. The very rich literally hire people to worry about money for them. It’s very strange to watch.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 24, 2026

Replying to @fennek@bark.lgbt

@fennek @lothcat no one should have to ever worry about affording healthcare. That’s a deep failure of a society, to create any place where the chief worry of being sick or injured is financial.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 22, 2026

Replying to @zillion@freeradical.zone

@zillion@freeradical.zone I picked it up from somewhere a bit back, and it’s kind of perfect isn’t it??

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 21, 2026

Replying to @crystallord@pony.social

@crystallord@pony.social something doesn’t have to be a pinup or the like to be “sexy” in a way that’s unpleasant for some folks. Theres a lot of fantasy art out there where the artist’s body of work centers romance or sexuality, even if its very tame. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but enough that my kid has been complaining of the difficulty in finding fantasy artists where that subject matter is uncommon in their body of work.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 21, 2026

Replying to @neauoire@merveilles.town

@neauoire@merveilles.town @melvian@dragonchat.org indeed!

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 21, 2026

Hey pocket friends! I want your indie artist recommendations for people who draw dragon and fantasy art of all kinds, but don’t do a lot of highly-sexy content: my teen is aro-ace and so has strong 👎 feelings about how much of this stuff is very sexual, and I’d like to help them find stuff more to their taste

It’s cool if there are occasional “sexy art” in the body of work, we’re just looking for mostly not.

If you know someone, name and link them if possible! If not, please give us a boost.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @ireneista@adhd.irenes.space

@ireneista@adhd.irenes.space @lordkhan@social.cologne it’s sad that you’re only barely engaging in hyperbole. I’ve had conversations with people arguing we don’t need farms anymore because you can just buy frozen produce…

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @lordkhan@social.cologne

@lordkhan@social.cologne conversely, I lived rurally for quite a while and I’d have certain city folk scoff at me like “oh, sure clean water just comes out of the ground” and like… yes, that is exactly how my well functions. Just basic lack of understanding how things work (forgivable) combined with unearned certainty

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 14, 2026

It’s early, but I’m still calling it: the dumbest thing said to me today.

“Why do we need the national weather service? Everyone just gets weather from an app”

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 07, 2026

Replying to @ketumbra@infosec.exchange

@ketumbra@infosec.exchange @krejgo@mojos.eco @randahl@mastodon.social depends if you mean population or land area, I suppose.

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@calcifer@masto.hackers.town · Apr 03, 2026

Replying to @c0debabe@masto.hackers.town

@c0debabe nice! I hope you find some clients! You could consider widening your audience a bit by also offering a small group “class” (say 4 people per session) at like $50/person. I had good luck with doing that sort of thing a bit back.

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