Writer, teacher, data driven humanist. Tech geek, model builder, mini-painter, reader. He/Him.

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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 11th, 2023

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  • Fair point, and thank you. Let me clarify a bit.

    It wasn’t my intention to say ChatGPT isn’t helpful. I’ve heard stories of people using it to great effect, but I’ve also heard stories of people who had it return the same non-solutions they had already found and dismissed. Just like any tool, actually…

    I was just pointing out that it is functionally similar to scanning SO, tech docs, Slashdot, Reddit, and other sources looking for an answer to our question. ChatGPT doesn’t have a magical source of knowledge that we collectively also do not have – it just has speed and a lot processing power. We all still have to verify the answers it gives, just like we would anything from SO.

    My last sentence was rushed, not 100% accurate, and shows some of my prejudices about ChatGPT. I think ChatGPT works best when it is treated like a rubber duck – give it your problem, ask it for input, but then use that as a prompt to spur your own learning and further discovery. Don’t use it to replace your own thinking and learning.


  • There was a story once that said if you put an infinite number of monkeys in front of an infinite number of typewriters, they would eventually produce the works of William Shakespeare.

    So far, the Internet has not shown that to be true. Example: Twitter.

    Now we have an artificial monkey remixing all of that, at our request, and we’re trying to find something resembling Hamlet’s Soliloquy in what it tells us. What it gives you is meaningless unless you interpret it in a way that works for you – how do you know the answer is correct if you don’t test it? In other words, you have to ensure the answers it gives are what you are looking for.

    In that scenario, it’s just a big expensive rubber duck you are using to debug your work.





  • If you want to use gimp as an ALTERNATIVE and go in without the bias, you’ll likely learn your way around a LOT faster.

    I think this is the key phrase – do you want an alternative (where you might have to learn new ways of doing things), or do you want a clone? GIMP is not a clone, but an alternative.

    I also think this gets to something I was told loooooooooong ago, when I was a young lad asking what was the best computer to buy. Someone told me, “Find all the software you want/need to run, and get the computer that will run it all.”

    In other words, if you need to use Photoshop, then maybe you don’t use Linux – maybe stick with Mac or (shudder) Windows.


  • Sadly, I think this is the result of big content companies seeing the success of the subscription model over the advertising model – if I can get Joe Public to pay me US$5-10 a month for my stuff, I can lock them in. Converting from advertising to subscription is trivial, and there is money to be made there.

    Sadly, no one can create good content just for the sake of the creation – you cannot live in modern society on your creations or reputation alone. You have to monetize them somehow, and big corporations can be a great source of that money. The alternative is to pay the creators directly, but there are only so many Patreon and other individual subscriptions I can manage at US$5+/month, on top of other bills.

    For the record, I’ve never used Stitcher nor SiriusXM, so I’ve no dog in this fight.