- With the understanding that Apple is seldom the first at something (something the Android Crew is eager to point out pretty much always), I am very happy to see that Samsung has opened its mouth about a non-invasive blood sugar test on a wearable. This is a big deal for folks with diabetes, and if it’s on an ‘affordable piece of tech’, I promise you a ton of us would buy it regardless of cost. More than anything else, that’s a quality of life enhancement. Up to this point, a CGM is the only way to keep from pricking your fingers multiple times a day, but a CGM still breaks the skin and can be costly.
- Meta says All Your Toks Are Belong To Us, Plz Taek R Monee. But do go on about how TikTok is a national security threat and this had nothing to do with TikTok drinking every other platform’s milkshake. A reminder of the brilliance of Bill Hicks:
- “Go back to bed, America. Your government has figured out how it all transpired. Go back to bed, America. Your government is in control again. Here. Here’s American Gladiators. Watch this, shut up. Go back to bed, America. Here is American Gladiators. Here are 56 channels of it! Watch these pituitary retards bang their fucking skulls together and congratulate you on living in the land of freedom. Here you go, America! You are free to do what we tell you! You are free to do what we tell you!”
- “Go back to bed, America. Your government has figured out how it all transpired. Go back to bed, America. Your government is in control again. Here. Here’s American Gladiators. Watch this, shut up. Go back to bed, America. Here is American Gladiators. Here are 56 channels of it! Watch these pituitary retards bang their fucking skulls together and congratulate you on living in the land of freedom. Here you go, America! You are free to do what we tell you! You are free to do what we tell you!”
- Here is a link to the Posse Comitatus Act. The US Military being deployed to California would be leading every newscast and on the front page of every paper. It’s not.
- Jim Acosta leaving CNN reminded me of what a real anchorman looks like signing off, and before you say newsmen don’t roll like that anymore, I’d tell you, “I know. That’s the problem.”
Tag: TikTok
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Thursday, Jan 16th, 2025
- I’d have liked to have been a fly on the wall during the meeting that led to Biden and Co.’s attempt to reverse the TikTok ban. There are a lot of theories about why people wanted TikTok to go, but I’m pretty sure national security isn’t the real reason. The two I think are more likely is that A) The PTB doesn’t like the fact that TikTokers speak a lot of truth to bullshit, and have done very well at that. Look no further than the pandemic for examples of TikTok creators smacking that down on the quick. B) TikTok allows more people than ever to make a living from content creation instead of being in the office. RTO has been a priority for the status quo since the pandemic ‘ended’, and they’d like to take that option away. What wasn’t taken into account is how much the TikTok economy contributes to the overall economy, and they shit a brick when they crunched those numbers. So, no, barring SCOTUS upholding the ban, TikTok isn’t going away on Sunday. Once this is all over, I think we should focus on all social media, not just the ones ‘we don’t like’. It’s all been weaponized in one form or another, and while I’d really like to see it all thrown into the sun, we need to rethink social media. Period.
- On a related note, I’ve signed up for a micro.blog account. I’m watching a playlist made by Numeric Citizen on how to use micro.blog. One thing I might find useful. I can subscribe to the RSS feeds for my accounts elsewhere, cross-post them to my micro blog, and then they will post to the other accounts I select. So, I could subscribe to my YT feed, which will post to my micro.blog, and then post to my Bluesky. The same could be done for this post on WP. It looks like you have to be on the $5/ month plan, but that’s MUCH less than the services like Buffer that charge at least 15 a month to do the same thing. I haven’t seen if there’s a way to schedule native posts (ones that are made in micro.blog as opposed to another feed), but if most of what’s getting posted is from another source, it may be a feature where the post originated. Of course, this may not matter to you at all. Not sure it matters to me, honestly. Food for thought.
- Winter has come for the first time in five years or so around here. There’s a reason I tell people I’m FROM Maine. I was BORN there, that’s about it. Thanks to the US Navy, before the age of 13 I spent half of that in Hawaii and a good chunk of the other half in Gitmo. Winter was never on the dance card. The middle of next week the lows are going to be in the teens, and I am going to be miserable. They say we’ll have a pattern flip in February, and I am just counting the days. Hat Tip to Ryan Hall, who has become my go-to guy on the weather.
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Friday, January 10th, 2025
- If you accept that Trump was never going to jail under any circumstances, then let’s focus on what happened today. The verdict was upheld, a sentence was passed. I’m not sure if this is appealable to a higher court from here, I think he would have to show something happened to prevent him from getting a fair hearing? If it’s not appealable, then the bottom line is that Donald Trump is now and forever a convicted felon. Make all the jokes you want about ‘getting away with it’, he didn’t. In a (very) small way, there has been accountability. Trust me, he’s livid about this.
- If you want to know why you’re in a cult, part eleventy: MAGA has jumped to naming all the people who also have convictions, like MLK, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela… You could hear the sound of millions of goalposts moving. Like I said the other day. “STOP PERSECUTING ME!” said the guy in charge.
- I listened to the Supreme Court arguments for TikTok today. IANAL, but it appears to me that the government is dressing up a free-speech argument as a national security threat. What the government is accusing TikTok of doing is using an algorithm to show you content. It thinks China can manipulate that algorithm to show you what it wants you to see. The trouble with this argument is that an algorithm is an editorial slant. That’s ANY For You/Discover/We Think You’ll Like/Related Page at ANY content company. Facebook does the same thing, lest you forget. There are two questions to answer: Does a threat to national security trump the 1st Amendment? Second, if TikTok poses a national security threat, then show us the threat. I can think of a greater threat to national security than this, and it’s not hypothetical. It’s real, and it’s taking office in 10 days. That opinion has been and will be all over TikTok, and I think that’s the real reason the gov’t wants it gone. Speaking truth to bullshit? Well, we can’t have that, can we?
- I put together my new desk chair last night, and I realized upon sitting in it that it does not recline. It’s one of these ergonomic chairs that adjust in a few ways, but reclining is not one of them. It’s probably very good for my back if I can keep from slouching forward. This is just one of the ways I don’t human very well I suppose, but we’ll see if this chair helps my posture. I’m practically a hunchback on my best days.
- With any luck, a super-duper pod this weekend. Stay Tuned.
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Journal, April 23rd, 2024
- Today was the second day of testimony in the Trump ‘Hush Money’ case, and I a now certain of three things:
- David Pecker was called up first for a reason, and that reason is to back up what Cohen says in his testimony. It’s a ‘pre-buttal’, if you like. Cohen’s credibility will certainly be questioned, and this is meant to corroborate his testimony. Of course, IANAL and all that.
- I will be snickering to myself every time I hear ‘Pecker’ because I am 14 years old.
- I cannot help but hear Idris Elba as Stringer Bell in The Wire. “Is you taking notes on a criminal conspiracy?” Go look it up on YT if you want the explicit version.
- I’m a little hazy on which groups of people it’s ok to slaughter.
- Elvis, Weed, Heavy Metal, Explicit Lyrics, Hip Hop, Video Games, and TikTok. What a nice little herd of scapegoats. There might be one difference with that last one: they might be scared of TikTok. Not because of China, that’s bullshit. Many TikTok creators actively took on the misinformation and disinformation about COVID during the lockdown. Some creators were able to get some of those people thrown off the platform and shunned in society, and some were even arrested. I remember one person who was able to get their hands on blank immunization cards and for a fee, would sign off on an immunization that was never given. The TikTok ban is about one thing, and that’s payback. When they realized they didn’t have the votes to pass it as a standalone bill, they tucked it into a so-called ‘must pass’ bill. So, we’ll see. I’m watching the Senate debate of this bill on C-Span, and there are some No votes after all. This will be interesting.
- Looks like we might be getting new iPad/iPad Pros next month, Apple’s announced an event on 5/7. I’ve had an 11 inch iPad Pro since 2018, and it’s been a really great thing to take with me to work on writing on the go. That said, I think it’s time to accept that what I really want is a MacBook Pro. I bought the wife a 13 inch MBP in 2021, and I think it would be nice to be able to edit audio and video on the go. I’ve given up hope that Adobe will make a version of Audition or Premiere Pro for the iPad Pro, and I the iPad version of Final Cut Pro is not compatible with my machine. I think what I need is a MBP and an external hard drive to work from, so I can also edit from the iMac.
That’s all for now. Herself would like me to take a break and pay her some attention. You now how it is.
- Today was the second day of testimony in the Trump ‘Hush Money’ case, and I a now certain of three things:
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Thursday, October 12th, 2023
The last few weeks of the Podcast have been less than ten minutes long, because they’re TikTok friendly. Would you believe that the podcast gets more views and engagement on TikTok than anywhere else?
I said that I would do that as long as I had nothing else to do, but I’m feeling the urge to do more as we continue to move on. I realize that it doesn’t have to be a format, although my brain wants to continue to format it a certain way. If I take my own advice and make it a living diary that I invite you all to read, then that’s how we proceed.
So the podcast—as ever—will change, because I change.
When? I don’t know that quite yet. We’ll see.
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Monday, August 7th, 2023
The most recent episode of the Podcast (week ending 8/6/2023) really got some traction on TikTok, of all places. I seem to getting more engagement and views there than anywhere else, even the Podcast feed. Moreover, the total engagement over the original post and the video replies I made to the comment section, was between 1200 and 1300 views. That’s amazing, and I’m super happy about it. I will be continuing this format for the foreseeable future. I found a winning formula.
That only took decades…