eclipsing the Dust Bowl's July 1936 by an eighth of a degree

What is the margin of error? Asking for a friend...

If only that was cheaper than hiring a human to do it..

I purchased a used Radeon Instinct MI50 with 32Gb VRAM on eBay for $360 — in December. it is quite usable with llama.cpp under FreeBSD inside an older (DDR3) workstation. I use it to filter incoming email (with a plugin to SpamAssassin).

That same model is now being sold for over $500. On the one hand, this is the first time in my life a witnessing a piece of computer hardware costing more seven month later.

But on the other limb, it is still cheaper than simply providing a Western developer with coffee for a few months — much less than actually hiring him...

The incident raises questions [emphasis mine] about supply chains, audits, and cybersecurity in the British armed forces

Raises questions? No, boys and girls — who slept through the journalist lecturer's implorations against cliches — it does not raise questions. It provides clear and obvious answers...

A mistake was still made

Yep, it happens. And it was not even a mistake by Flock, apparently — not that it matters. Mistakes will continue to be made — they don't mean, Flock is doing anything wrong, or that police has to be "defunded", or Capitalism overthrown. But Slashdot is running multiple anti-Flock articles every day, it seems — like they did against Walmart some 15-20 years ago.

Can't shake off the feeling, this is a part of a propaganda campaign...

The argument against it was in the summary.

The argument, that participants can influence the outcome — if financially motivated by the betting — is but a tertiary afterthought. That may have some merits, but it is not new — regular financial markets have learned to deal with insider trading, and we have criminal laws against such activity. It is not a reason to ban the betting outright.

But the original journalist, the submitter, and BeauHD obviously emphasise the "ghastly" aspect... And this appeal to emotion is, what I find contemptible.

I'm 99% sure somebody has already been killed because of Flock

But you don't have evidence, do you? Just like those January 6th "insurrectionists". Only they don't get any "Insightful" moderation for some reason...

Flock does not pull any triggers — it only informs police, that a suspect (or, more likely, the suspect license plate) has been spotted in a certain location. That's all. The actual reaction is than up to the officers.

If anything, it is only more certain, multiple murders — and other crimes — have been prevented by the timely(ier) detention of the criminals. And, additionally, by successful prosecution of them thanks to the video-evidence. But Grok could not find any comprehensive stats for me, so I'm not including any evidence either.

Fuck Trump Musk AOC Sanders far right n' left tech bros ICE Islamophobes antisemites mullahs pedopriests nationalists

Some libido you've got there!!

still fine ?

Fine? No, I'd be devastated by the death. But why would somebody else's making money — not "out of it", but by predicting it — affect me at all? They didn't kill the child. They didn't contribute to his dying.

Yeah, going home from a funeral — of anyone close to you — and watching people carelessly enjoying their lives unaware of your tragedy is annoying. But you don't get mad at them. Or, maybe, you do — because you're a fool controlled by emotions, rather than rational thought.

Bettors should not be rooting for an experimental medicine to fail just to earn a buck

Why not? If that is one's way to pursue happiness and it does not hurt anyone, what argument is there against it?

"It's quite ghastly."

That's not a reason...

Even so, law enforcement would also have access to the cellular records of countless individuals, the vast majority of whom were merely passing by a location at the 'wrong' time

What if, instead of asking: "Give us the list of everybody using this tower during this period", police asked for something narrower, like: "Give us the list of everybody using this tower during this period, and this other tower at this other period" (which is, what police would've done themselves)? What would make the request palatable to the Court — and Slashdot?

Enough AND-clauses until the resulting list is shorter than a certain number? 500? 50? 5? What if it becomes so short, the phone company employee(s) themselves can identify the suspect(s)?

I can't place a Polymarket bet on there being a hurricane and then go out and cause a hurricane.

Admitting your weakness is the first step towards growing strong!

Seriously, though, I do acknowledge this as a (potentially) valid concern in my next paragraph. But there are lots of other cases, where the bettor either has insider knowledge prior to betting, or can affect the outcome afterwards — both legally and otherwise. Lawmakers betting on financial markets' moves in response to their own legislation is still legal, for example. Other methods exist for the rest of us.

Yet, this proposal is limited sorely to setting wildfires and for the most bullshit reasons of all: "all so the rich and powerful can profit". Hence my contempt...

Offering bets on destructive wildfires threatens to minimize communities' suffering

Totally different from hurricanes, floods, and tsunamis, right?

There's also the heightened risk -- according to state and local fire officials -- that individuals could be tempted to commit arson in order to make sure their bets are successful

This is, actually, a valid concern. I don't think, freedoms — including the freedom to bet one's own money — should be curtailed by such concerns, but it is valid.

Funny, how the authors don't hate the would-be arsonists — nowhere close to their disdain for the "rich and powerful", who might (might not!) profit from the betting...

The act of surveilling someone is a form of search (Carpenter v. United States (2018)

You are incorrect. What the Carpenter determined, was not about generally "surveilling", but the particular act of requesting historical cell-site location records from wireless carriers.

The Court's majority did rule, that the 4th Amendment protects reasonable expectation of privacy, and the collection of the particular records violated this. But not in general case. What's between your cellphone and the cell-tower can be expected — reasonably to stay private. (Though personally I disagree even with that — anyone carrying an active radio should not expect it to be unnoticed.) But a visible presence in public — detectable by unaided human senses — definitely not. Police have tailed suspects for as long as law enforcement existed — and Bill of Rights' authors certainly knew about the practice existence — and there is nothing wrong about it.

Further, they didn't extend the "third-party doctrine" to the particular case of cell-site records, but they didn't repudiate it completely either.

While the average citizen is allowed to record anything they see in public [...] When the government does it, it is considered a breach of an individuals 4th amendment rights

Nope, it does not — not per Carpenter. Maybe, that's how things should be — though I'm not certain even of that. But it is not, how they are. And the list of earlier court-decisions (which I already posted twice) — the Knotts in particular — shows it.

Further, I was not talking about "the average citizen" — I was talking about a police officer. If one can watch you — without a warrant — he can also record you.

I suppose if one were to ignore 250 years of constitutional law

What "Constitutional Law"? Citation needed. Needed so badly, I'll do it for you:

Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967)

Established the “reasonable expectation of privacy” test. The Court held that what a person knowingly exposes to the public is not protected by the Fourth Amendment, laying the foundation for warrantless visual observation of people in public places.

United States v. Knotts, 460 U.S. 276 (1983)

Held that police may use a beeper (tracking device) to follow a vehicle on public roads without a warrant. A person traveling on public thoroughfares has no reasonable expectation of privacy in their movements from one place to another; visual surveillance (or technological aids that merely enhance it) is not a Fourth Amendment “search.”

United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400 (2012)

While ruling that prolonged GPS tracking of a vehicle constitutes a search requiring a warrant (because of the physical attachment of the device), the Court reaffirmed that short-term visual or technological monitoring of movements on public roads remains permissible without a warrant under the principles of Knotts.

Oh, wait...

people shouldn't have a government that follows their every step by using AI and networked devices

Maybe, we should not, but there is not law prohibiting government to do this.

AI may be new, but the problem is not, and courts have repeatedly reaffirmed government's right to surveil us in public without any warrants (list courtesy of Grok). The second item — known as Knotts — is particularly telling...

Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967)

Established the “reasonable expectation of privacy” test. The Court held that what a person knowingly exposes to the public is not protected by the Fourth Amendment, laying the foundation for warrantless visual observation of people in public places.

United States v. Knotts, 460 U.S. 276 (1983)

Held that police may use a beeper (tracking device) to follow a vehicle on public roads without a warrant. A person traveling on public thoroughfares has no reasonable expectation of privacy in their movements from one place to another; visual surveillance (or technological aids that merely enhance it) is not a Fourth Amendment “search.”

United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400 (2012)

While ruling that prolonged GPS tracking of a vehicle constitutes a search requiring a warrant (because of the physical attachment of the device), the Court reaffirmed that short-term visual or technological monitoring of movements on public roads remains permissible without a warrant under the principles of Knotts.

Besides, how can the 4th Amendment include cameras, which didn't exist in the 18th century, if the 2nd doesn't protect "assault rifles"? :-)