Seen Youtube lately? I just watched a video on how to make nitroglycerin. Stuff like this has been available for over a decade.

Back in the days that home solar systems still mostly used lead-acid batteries - which in some cases of degradation could be repaired, at least partially, if you had some good strong and reasonably pure sulfuric acid - I viewed a YouTube video on how to make it. (From epsom salts by electrolysis using a flowerpot and some carbon rods from old large dry cells).

For months afterward YouTube "suggested" I'd be interested in videos from a bunch of Islamic religious leaders . (This while people were wondering how Islamic Terrorists were using the Internet to recruit among high-school out-group nerds.)

Software - AI and otherwise - often creates unintended consequences. B-)

It means they will release the patch when it is available rather than sitting on it for an undetermined period of time just to be dicks about it...

Setup: Background watching the 1980s movie House and I wondered this into ChatGPT:
"what ever happened to the guy from the House movie in the 1980s, I think he was also in Great American Hero."

I never really "follow up", but I did in this case I did. Eventually I asked about his net worth and Evil Dead 2 (released the year after). However, it was this little bit was a real WTF moment:

"That Vietnam flashback subplot was way more intense than I remembered when I rewatched it too."

The Conversation:
https://chatgpt.com/share/681b...

I don't get the reference but Blue Man group is awesome! I've seen them in Chicago and Vegas. My wife was the female selection for onstage in Chicago (the photo vacuum).

A lot time ago...

It's kind of surprising it isn't all squealing nonsense.

Give it a little more time. B-b

We had a lab known to be unsafe. A lab known to be performing gain of function on the specific type of virus that emerged in public. We have a lab in close proximity to the market where the outbreak was traced back to.

We also had rumors that low-paid lab techs supplemented their income by selling test animals they'd been ordered to destroy to the nearby wet market.

So current AI training procedures - which amount to "read all the internet you can" - fall for astroturf campaigns. Why am I not surprised?

This is the entire point.

It's called the Shock Doctrine. Except the Trump administration is creating the crisis-es (sp?) himself, and then exploiting the ensuing chaos.

https://www.salon.com/2025/04/...

From the link below:
In this strategy, political actors exploit the chaos of natural disasters, wars, and other crises to push through unpopular policies such as deregulation and privatization. This economic "shock therapy" favors corporate interests while disadvantaging and disenfranchising citizens when they are too distracted and overwhelmed to respond or resist effectively.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

It shouldn't be too difficult to find, but I can't stumble upon it.

Seriously. Is Slashdot being used as a source of information (seeded)?

Back in 2024 UBS mentioned this trend but didn't put a # to it.

https://www.ubs.com/global/en/...

For pop and rap, good lyrics sell songs. Relatable. Things people want to hear about. And a catchy beat, but that is secondary. The art is the words and how they are expressed.

A lot of these are more ephemeral art, they are relevant for a short period of time and go stale quickly based on shifting interests.

And that's fine. They aren't Bach, they aren't the Doors (I'm not equating the two, just very different example of "permanent art"). It's art though. I DJ school dances, almost all student suggested songs are difference every year. Except Taylor Swift.

Myself, I'm into more pure electronic music. Armin van Buren, Mike Candies, Infected Mushroom, Hardwell. Trance and psych stuff, perfect for working and driving (and thinking, so in general). The art there is the production, especially for a recorded track. Get it setup in the software, and "record" (export) one time for perfect results... Songs are built (and it's fun).

I believe AI can run roughshod over electronica. It's a very natural fit. Especially trained on quality human production, which no doubt will happen.

For the record, I purchased FL Studio back when it was Fruity Loops (they really mean free lifetime updates).

I briefly looked into ML/gen AI for MIDI composition, that seems the most directly route for patterned music (and the most flexible on the output side).

It's being reset, trust in the US as a trading partner and as a safe investment environment is being lost.

The dollar is depreciating and bond rates are chaotic. And this is very early in the process, it's difficult to say how trust in the US will be in 4 years. It's difficult to see it getting better.

There was already that suspect $400 million contract for armored Cybertrucks that "disappeared".

But that was nothing. Given the sales of Tesla are falling out and the brand it like shiny poo, there will have to be a pivot.

Given Musk's current position, moving to become a military supplier makes the most sense. Big fat government tit. The biggest.

Musk wants to build 5,000 Optimus humanoid robots THIS YEAR. What are those going to be doing?

Hint: Musk himself called it a "legion"...

https://www.teslarati.com/tesl...

There's also the "Detox" exercise of leaving your phone at home. and only taking it with you when it's absolutely necessary for example to work if you have to use a third factor authentication application to get into your computer)

Just switch on "airplane mode". No incoming calls, message notifications, or app push crud. (If you've got any apps, other than alarm/calendar notices for your schedule reminders which YOU set up, that poke brain-derailng messages at you, disable (or delete) them.)

Then get into the habit of not going to it for anything non-essential while in this mode.

Now you can use it for a key, or wallet, or whatever, if you must, without it constantly killing your attention span with interruptions. Yet you can always turn it back on to make a call, or in the timeslot you reserved for handling this trivia.

No incoming calls, though. (What a relief: No phone spammers!)

The tariffs are terrible for farmers.

The tariffs cause the prices of the inputs and equipment to go up, but the price of the crops go down.

During the "Light Tariff Wars" of Trump's first term, farmer lost $27 billion in sales.

https://www.npr.org/2025/04/03...

https://www.axios.com/local/ch...