Random/Interesting/Weird

[Hurlshort]

16 minutes ago, Gromnir said:

somehow missed this until this past monday and our accountant didn't tell us 'bout the change.

IRS: May 15 tax deadline extended to Oct. 16 for disaster area taxpayers in California, Alabama and Georgia

is four CA counties not impacted by the deadline extension, so is worth double-checking.

HA! Good Fun!

Yeah, I haven't really figured out what to do with this. It is easy enough for me to file in April, but I owe a tidy sum and could use the extra time to pay it off. It still feels weird not doing it by April, though.

[Raithe]

https://www.jedinews.com/podcasts/articles/star-wars-celebration-europe-2023-one-galaxy-one-goal-raising-funds-for-make-a-wish-uk/

The Galactic Academy, The 501st Legion, The Rebel Legion, The Mando Mercs, The Droid Builders, Saber Guild and the Dark Empire, along with Social Media representatives Fantha Tracks and Jedi News, are proud to be fundraising for Make-A-Wish UK.

[Keyrock]

I started messing around with text to image AI image generation and, while it's far from perfect, it's both thoroughly impressive and more than a little terrifying. My input was "Neil Breen drawn in the style of Boris Vallejo" and this is what was generated:

Now that you've seen it you can't unsee it. You're welcome. 

Edit: I think I have a new profile picture.

Edited March 28, 2023 by Keyrock

[Malcador]

Basically how he sees himself in his films.

[Gfted1]

I just noticed...are his nipples pierced?

[Keyrock]

I didn't specify any piercings but I'm not going to judge what the AI is into. 

[Gfted1]

Speaking of which: I Gave ChatGPT an IQ Test. Here's What I Discovered - Scientific American

[Raithe]

https://www.eff.org/cases/hachette-v-internet-archive

http://blog.archive.org/2023/03/25/the-fight-continues/

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), with co-counsel Durie Tangri, is defending  the Internet Archive against a lawsuit that threatens its Controlled Digital Lending (CDL) program.

The Internet Archive is a nonprofit digital library, preserving and providing access to cultural artifacts of all kinds in electronic form. CDL allows people to check out digital copies of books for two weeks or less, and only permits patrons to check out as many copies as the Archive and its partner libraries physically own. That means that if the Archive and its partner libraries have only one copy of a book, then only one patron can borrow it at a time, just like any other library. Through CDL, the Internet Archive is helping to foster research and learning by helping its patrons access books and by keeping books in circulation when their publishers have lost interest in them.

Four publishers sued the Archive, alleging that CDL violates their copyrights. In their complaint, Hachette, HarperCollins, Wiley, and Penguin Random House claim CDL has cost their companies millions of dollars and is a threat to their businesses.

They are wrong. Libraries have paid publishers billions of dollars for the books in their print collections, and are investing enormous resources in digitization in order to preserve those texts. CDL helps ensure that the public can make full use of the books that libraries have bought and paid for. This activity is fundamentally the same as traditional library lending, and poses no new harm to authors or the publishing industry. Libraries have never been required to get permissions or pay extra fees to lend books.  And as a practical matter, the available data shows that CDL has not and will not harm the publishers' bottom line.

 

[Amentep]

An Australian punk band have released the world's first urine-filled vinyl album

[Gorth]

2 hours ago, Amentep said:

An Australian punk band have released the world's first urine-filled vinyl album

 Not surprised they’re Australian, but I thought punk bands had taken the piss on society for decades?

[Raithe]

 

[Sarex]

 

[ShadySands]

When a 9-year-old girl didn’t want her goat to be slaughtered, county fair officials sent deputies after it

I'm from rural nowhere and have seen a lot of kids back out of selling their animals for slaughter but I've never seen a reaction like this.

[Azdeus]

1 hour ago, ShadySands said:

When a 9-year-old girl didn’t want her goat to be slaughtered, county fair officials sent deputies after it

I'm from rural nowhere and have seen a lot of kids back out of selling their animals for slaughter but I've never seen a reaction like this.

I guess one should be grateful they didn't shoot the family, then again they look fair-skinned

Edited April 1, 2023 by Azdeus

[Bartimaeus]

2 hours ago, ShadySands said:

When a 9-year-old girl didn’t want her goat to be slaughtered, county fair officials sent deputies after it

I'm from rural nowhere and have seen a lot of kids back out of selling their animals for slaughter but I've never seen a reaction like this.

Would the world be a better place if:
A. Fair officials and the police bust down doors to shoot the goat to death, or...
B. The goat busts down fair officials' and the police's doors to shoot all of them to death?

I think we all know the right answer here, .

[Gorth]

Goats seems to be special to kids...

 

[Gromnir]

On 4/1/2023 at 3:15 PM, ShadySands said:

When a 9-year-old girl didn’t want her goat to be slaughtered, county fair officials sent deputies after it

I'm from rural nowhere and have seen a lot of kids back out of selling their animals for slaughter but I've never seen a reaction like this.

am a bit older so our recollections show a kinda evolution. when we were young am recalling at least a handful o' kids initial backing out of future farmers or 4-h sales, but those reluctant children were never allowed to win such conflicts as parents would step in and utilize increasing corrective pressure up to and including the application o' a beating just outta view o' fairgoers. is one example o' how am thinking some progress has been made in child rearing as we has seen a clear temporal trend in favour o' avoiding the use o' force or emotional blackmail to make children reach a correct choice. 

...

gonna admit that a few decades past we woulda' read the story and been nonplussed by the involvement o' law enforcement, but given the way we were raised and the time in which we grew to adulthood, our initial reaction woulda' been to blame parents for not teaching their child responsibility. 

"“Our daughter lost three grandparents within the last year, and our family has had so much heartbreak and sadness that I couldn’t bear the thought of the following weeks of sadness after the slaughter of her first livestock animal,” she wrote to Shasta District Fair Chief Executive Melanie Silva."

80's Gromnir: sorry but everybody has a hard luck story and it don't sound as if the grandparents all died within days before the sale o' the goat, so were the parent's responsibility to prepare their child for what was going to be nowhere near the hardest choice she would need eventual make.  suck it up buttercup 'cause life only gets harder from here. 

80's Gromnir were a bit less huggable.

is also worth noting how shasta county is kinda like a nightmare brigadoon with too many residents channeling an 1800s mentality... or maybe 1600s

 

'course the academic support for teaching children lessons through corporal punishment and/or emotional trauma is non-existent, so in spite o' our own experience, am now firm opposed to the shasta county, "teach this little girl a lesson," efforts. is more than a few studies which conclude that treating kids as if they is very short marines going through bootcamp is bad and while there is indeed a few studies which is ambivalent on the matter, we have yet to see support for the soul crushing approach save for the unconvincing anecdotal, "when i was a kid," kinda evidence. however, am not a parent, so am also recognizing how is far easier to be judgy w/o needing raise a child who is perhaps less amenable to kindness and gentle persuasion.

am only kinda kidding 'bout shasta btw. 

on the positive side, is doubtful @Hurlshotand his daughter need worry they could end up being part o' the next la times story 'bout goats on the lamb as is doubtful gilroy and santa clara county would take the shasta approach.

HA! Good Fun!

 

Edited April 3, 2023 by Gromnir

[Amentep]

On 4/1/2023 at 6:15 PM, ShadySands said:

When a 9-year-old girl didn’t want her goat to be slaughtered, county fair officials sent deputies after it

I'm from rural nowhere and have seen a lot of kids back out of selling their animals for slaughter but I've never seen a reaction like this.

I still don't get why they entered it into the fair in the first place if their kid (har-har) was attached to the other kid (har-de-har-har) in the first place.  I also don't get why the fair doesn't have a non-auction / slaughter showing category given that not all livestock is bred for slaughter.  That said, I've not been to a lot of fairs of this kind, so not really sure what the norm is either.  

[Gromnir]

4 minutes ago, Amentep said:

I still don't get why they entered it into the fair in the first place if their kid (har-har) was attached to the other kid (har-de-har-har) in the first place. 

obvious answer: people miscalculated.

would hardly be the first time in history that happened, yes? is much easier to sit at your kitchen table and discuss as a family how raising a goat for eventual slaughter is gonna be difficult than it is to live the moment where a young person needs sacrifice an animal with which they has emotional bonded. talk 'bout responsibility. discuss the emotional side. have everybody at the kitchen table reach an agreement based on clear-headed reflection. fantastic. unfortunate, talk, discuss and agree is all too often not gonna prepare people for reals. 

*shrug*

as shady noted, he had seen more than a few youngsters go through a last minute change o' heart. we saw a few fair day tear explosions our self. am suspecting in most such cases the individuals involved thought their day at the fair would go different. it happens. it happens often enough that it ain't a surprise save to those persons who predictable miscalculated. the la times didn't write a story about parental and young person error with the 4-h and ffa animal husbandry programs 'cause is not newsworthy. happens all the time. shasta's response were what were different.

HA! Good Fun!

[Raithe]

https://www.bangordailynews.com/2023/04/02/business/maine-libraries-telehealth-lifelines-joam40zk0w/?

After many doctors closed their offices to patient visits earlier in the COVID-19 pandemic, Maine libraries became critical health care hubs.

The Maine State Library launched a pilot telehealth program with 10 libraries across the state last year in communities with high instances of health issues or a lack of ready access to health care or technology at home. The goal, said Maine State Librarian Jamie Ritter, was to make access to health care more equitable.

[Lexx]

Funny, this kinda sounds like the Followers of the Apocalypse in Fallout. They pretty much did the same thing - starting with reading and studying in a library, to offering medical services.

[Gfted1]

"Telehealth"? FFS, use the $50K and buy everyone a phone.

[Malcador]

Product of being bored at work, came across this - the hero Thompson is in this.  One of the soldiers, Hodges, seems really out to lunch compared to rest interviewed, the others seems pretty torn up and he says "We carried out the orders in a moral fashion... we did not violate any moral standards".

Edited April 5, 2023 by Malcador

[Gromnir]

HA! Good Fun!

[majestic]

"Is the King Cobra the best pet snake for you?" "Well... no. It most certainly is not."