The Bard in Green @ thebardingreen @lemmy.starlightkel.xyz

* Technology Consultant.

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2 yr. ago

Uh... that's been me. With Special K, Red Berries no less. I'm not too proud to admit it.

I googled this and that's enough internet for today.

I always find these breakdowns to be a little bit disingenuous. Like, you could do this same analysis on the whole email system, or on the whole world wide banking system, including ATMs, or on the energy usage of all DNS queries or even on global ActivityPub activity, not to mention shopping on Amazon or browsing Facebook. People DO do these kinds of breakdowns on generative AI, for exactly the same reasons, and reach the same kinds of conclusions.

Having a global computer network is INCREDIBLY energy intensive, with a massive carbon footprint. It's not shocking that a given application of that network is energy intensive, with a massive carbon footprint. These kinds of analysis are put together by people who already don't like cryptocurrencies (for all kinds of reasons both valid and ridiculous) who then go cherry picking MORE reasons not to like them.

Thanks for the breakdown. When I read the headline, I guessed at a bunch of what the article said and you confirmed most of it.

As someone who does cybersecurity consulting for govt. contractors, companies invest in security when some external force forces them to, and then they spend the bare minimum to meet whatever that force requires (and they try to get away with less at every opportunity).

Right now in government contracting we're experiencing this paradigm shift where the NIST-800-171 standard (which everyone was required to follow, but kind of on the honor system) is going to be replaced in 21 months or so by something called CMMC (Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification). But, CMMC is basically just the same requirements as NIST-800-171, so why?

BECAUSE, everyone just SAYS they're NIST-800-171 compliant on all their contracts. Everyone self scores themselves on it and gets a WAY higher score than they do when being scored by a 3rd party, and then reports their self scores up the chain. The way this works in both DoD and NASA projects, which is what I'm familiar with, is the big players like Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, etc, have thousands of smaller suppliers and those suppliers have smaller suppliers, so the requirements flow down from the govt to the big contractors to the small subcontractors and each link in the chain is responsible for making sure the upstream links are compliant... which they NEVER are, but they all say they are!

Of course, the government KNOWS this is happening, but lacks the resources to do anything about it. So the solution is to make everyone get third party certified that they are compliant. Half that industry is setting themselves up for failure to meet that deadline (which, of course, has already been delayed and pushed back multiple times) and I have a feeling that when small companies start failing their CMMC certs, they're going to get stern warnings instead of losing their contracts because the government has to buy shit from someone.

When I talk to the money / business people at my clients, this goes in one ear and out the other.

There are wide spread (willful) misconceptions among those folks that cybersecurity is something IT people do and everyone else just does their jobs without having to think about it. I've had CEOs say things like "No, we're not doing that, we can't work that way." when I educate them about their requirements... and then look to me to provide the solution where they don't have to change anything about the way they work and when I can't, they get frustrated with me and my team. I've had them ask me "Well what do the big companies do?" and I say "Look, they actually TRY to do all these things they require you to do and they fail at it ALL the time, but I've heard you complain about how their bureaucracy and rules slow everything down and make working with them difficult. A bunch of that stuff IS what they do to deal with this." And they just don't believe me. I've had CFOs say "We don't have the budget to do all of this, so which parts are the most important?" and I've said "This is the LAW. You're supposed to do all of it!" But they know and I know that for the time being no one will hold them accountable.

Right now, tons of companies just say "We're NIST-800-171 compliant" or "We're working towards NIST-800-171 compliance" and their contracts go forward and they hire someone like me to tell them what to do and then they don't do 60% of it and delay doing 20% of it.

This is in an industry that is required by law to try extra hard on their security. In industries where there are no such requirements, or less requirements... good luck.

Nuke hurling trebuchets are an underexplored fantasy tech.

I've written more than enough words to win, while failing to finish my story. I've also played a lot with local LLMs. Can confirm on all counts.

"Harley!"

"Yes puddin?"

"I need you to dress up as that Sailor Moon character from that Japanese cartoon show."

"Oh, you'ah so kinky puddin! Ah...Why do you want me to do that?"

"Because I wish to place you on a throne of darkness surrounded by the skulls of our enemies and force Gotham to kneel before you and swear their allegiance to you."

"Oh puddin! The things you say get me all wobbly inside! But why the cahtoon costume?"

"Harley!"

"Yes puddin?"

"JUST DO IT!!!"

"Uhh... Ok puddin."

That's hot.

I mean... imagine being out in the sun like that, covered in all that fur.

Are you an old lady? That was his thing.

Humans starting with the Venerable trait is OP.

I have watched those exact guys eat an organization I worked for alive. At the end, they had like... 10 business consultants and 1 junior engineer. At an electronics engineering company.

https://i.natgeofe.com/n/4c509f20-8730-4cd1-a90b-6681394c92ca/NationalGeographic_1742512_3x2.jpg

All my machines are named after Autobots.

IKR? XD

I began using Linux as my daily driver in 2001. I was 21. I think my story is pretty unique.

I lived in a house with 5 roommates, of which I was the second oldest. The others were 17, 18, 19 and 43. Except for the 43 year old we were basically all friends from Waldorf School (which is a fucking cult disguised as a liberal arts school, don't let anyone tell you otherwise).

There were only two computers in the house. Mine was the only one with an ethernet card. I got a Cable Modem. No one else thought they needed fast internet.

It was a kind of disaster of a living situation... like the 17 year old was an emancipated minor who was stripping using a fake ID, the 18 year old was a stoner who worked at the local bagel shop and sold weed. The 19 year old was a kid who immigrated from Mexico City when his mom married a American and was into a BUNCH of sketchy shit. SUPER nice kid, but his friends were like, in retrospect, obviously a bunch of gangsters.

Before the 43 year old we had two other roommates. The first was a girl who was 20 who we knew from school, but then she left and went to college out of state. The second was a girl our stripper roommate knew who was ALSO a stripper and had an inoperable brain tumor. Poor girl was 19 years old and was told she had 18 months to live. She quit school, became a stripper and dedicated her life to sex, drugs and partying. She was a complete mess and her friends + the gangster guy's friends turned our house into an absurd party flat that got the cops called on us (for noise or trash or sketchy people hanging around) like once or twice a month.

(yes... this IS the story of how I became a Linux user, I'm getting there).

So terminally ill stripper girl just disappeared one day. Never came home, never showed up to work, we never heard from her again. We needed to pay rent and we were all poor young people. Gangster guy has a legit job as a dish washer at a Mexican restaurant and he's like "Hey, this dude who's a server there needs a place to live."

Enter the 43 year old who is a TOTAL creep ball (imagine that). Just to cut straight to the chase, one of the first things he does is start regularly fucking 17 year old stripper girl's 16 (or possibly even 15) year old best friend from middle school, who starts spending the night at our house almost every night (and also ditching school all the time). They don't just fuck in his room, they fuck all over the house and don't clean up. Like I had clean up their used condoms and cum tissues from all over the house.

The other thing 43 year old creep ball does is fucking use my computer to download a shit ton of porn while I'm not around. Here's how we caught him.

Some friends and I are messing with my computer and we notice that... for some goddamn reason... AOL has been installed. Why the FUCK would AOL be there? I have a goddamn cable modem! So my buddy, who's also a computer nerd and is starting to get into Linux himself and I uninstall AOL and it asks if we want to save local files. When we say yes, it dumps... a bunch of AVI files of the hairiest 90s porn you can imagine onto my desktop and all I can think about is this creep ball who's used condoms I'm cleaning up sitting in my chair in my room when I'm not there jerking off.

SO... my buddy and I nuke my OS and install Debian. I leave the house and leave the computer logged in leaving a virtual console running.

Creep ball comes in to watch porn on my computer and is faced with the linux terminal. He typed (I'm not kidding)

• dir
• win
• win.exe
• windows
• start windows
• motherfucker!

That's the 100% true story of how I became a Linux user.

I would not be surprised if the real target market is rich preppers who want this thing to patrol their bunker.

Hear someone powerful told Musk off for being arrogant. :D

Hear it's about government's right to censor content they don't like. D:

I got to play this character for several sessions, but he deserved more.

A lesser Devil modified bard chef. D&D Pirate Game with a drow captain of a haunted ship.

My bard powers were all based on cooking. In order to buff the crew I had to feed them. I had a constant supply of hors d'oeuvres, tiny deserts, etc. After combat, I would heal the party by cooking 5 star gourmet meals. I fought with a meat cleaver.

My back story: I was basically on the run. I was Gold Star Master of Sauces and Boilings, 3rd Degree Initiate of the Sulfur Ovens and Bonded Sous-chef of the School of Flesh and Broth in the City of Dis, 87 years into a 500 year Sous-chef contract that I was AWOL from. I got summoned to the Prime Material Plane in order to cater a wedding party for the daughter of a shady wizard and I managed to exploit a loop hole in the contract I signed with him to leave to get ingredients and never come back. He was pissed at me for ruining his daughter's wedding reception and my masters at the School of Flesh and Broth told him "Capture and return our Sous-chef, or else!" So he was my primary antagonist.

But I had a plan! I wrote up a contract for people to sign to try to get them to be my apprentices. By Prime Material Plane standards, I was a genuine gold star level chef. All those poor sods you see competing on Hell's Kitchen would kill to study under someone of my skill level. Basically, the contract was structured such that if they managed to complete an apprenticeship with me, they should be able to obtain employment with kings, popes and sultans. However, if they failed to complete their apprenticeship, I would own their soul. My goal was to be a complete dick to my apprentices to the point that they would give up and run away and fail to complete their training. Then, when I had a small collection of souls, I could return to the 9 Hells and buy out my contract and get them to stop chasing me.

Sadly, the campaign only lasted three sessions.

A few of my favourite clauses from the contract:

Apprentice certifies that, to the best of their knowledge, their Mortal Soul is in sound and original condition, not bound into their body through any enchantments, curses or blessings of undeath or deathlessness (or other mystical bindings), not owed to any other being of the Lower Planes or other Outer Planar Origin, not claimed by any deity or near-deity for any purpose and in no other ways is it’s transfer into Chef’s lawful possession in the event of a breach (5.0). impeded. Furthermore, that they will NOT promise, commit, sell, license or gift their soul to any third party during the terms of this contract.

Neither party shall be liable for any failure to perform their obligations under this agreement if prevented from doing so by a cause or causes reasonably beyond their control. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, such causes include Acts of deities or near-deities, disruptions to the structure of the planes of existence, infernal war operations (the Blood War), temporal disruptions, Wishes made by third parties or other similar cause or causes which could not with reasonable diligence be controlled or prevented by the party. This clause IN NO WAY waives the obligations of the Apprentice with respect to clause clause 1.1 i.

If Apprentice abandons the apprenticeship due to unanticipated death (2.5), a grace period of 3 days will be granted, during which time Apprentice may be resurrected or otherwise returned to life (including as an undead being), upon which event Apprentice agrees to immediately and without delay return to their Apprenticeship. Failure to do so shall be considered a breach of this contract.

Typed "rm -r" in "/home/myuser" instead of "/home/myuser/Documents/ThingINoLongerNeed"

We gave my son a smart phone at 8, because his mother and I lived in different states and he flew as an unaccompanied minor a LOT. I also lived in Oakland and I wanted to be able to reach him and to know where he was when he was with me.

We had strict rules about when he was allowed to have it on and when he was not allowed to NOT have it. We also didn't get him a data plan and made him use Wifi.

As a result of him actually being impressively responsible with that phone, we turned on the data and relaxed the rules probably years earlier than we would have under other circumstances.