Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
🚏 👭🏽 🏃🏼♂️️ 🏃🏽♀️️
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
USpol
USpol
Reposted for alt and CW
Caption
Post by The Associated Press @AP: BREAKING: The Trump administration is pushing an initiative for millions of Americans to upload personal health data to new apps run by private tech companies. Post by Gabrielle A. Perry, MPH @GeauxGabrielle: Hi! Epidemiologist here! Don't do this. In the 80s and 90s this was done by Depts. of Health during the HIV/AIDS epidemic. "Somehow" the lists they created found their way into the hands of cops, landlords, and job sites to deny people human rights. It's partly WHY the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act exists
If you're happy and you know it, it's your meds.
I'm looking for some advice, maybe just a sharing of experiences. I'm thinking about changing careers, but not sure how to do it.
Let me give some background.
I'm finding lately that I'm not very happy with my career. I never intended to become a web developer. It just kind of happened. I do enjoy programming, but it's something I enjoy more as a hobby than a job. Nevertheless, I've been doing it full time for close to twenty years now. I'm also good at it, and am regularly praised by my coworkers for my work. And I make good money doing it. (And that's important to me.)
But I have a degree in theater. I thought I might be an actor when I was younger. I'm also good at that, but haven't done it for years. I miss doing things that are more creative. I miss acting.
I thought I might be able to find time to do other things in my non-work time, but honestly, I don't really have much time in my non-work time. My wife says she'd support me doing community theater or something like that. But, we've got four kids under the age of 15 (3 of whom are under 10), and three of them have ADHD, so they're a handful. If I were spending several hours a few days a week for a couple months at a time away from my family, I'd feel guilty, and wouldn't enjoy it.
So, I've thought maybe I could consider an actual career change.
But, I don't really know how I'd do it. I feel like if I tried to change careers, I'd have to take a huge pay cut (not an option at all), and who knows if I'd actually be any happier. I'm not even sure what I would do yet. I just know that I'd really like a change.
Has anybody on here tried a career change? Did it work out? Were you able to maintain close to your same salary? Any advice or thoughts on the process?
#AskMastodon #AskFediverse #AskFedi #CareerAdvice #JobAdvice #BoostsWelcome
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
The constant CAPTCHAs and other "I-am-not-a-robot" tests from websites are annoying enough, without considering the reality that they really don't present much of a challenge for bots anymore. Wait till they have to pass age verification...
"Maybe they should change the button to say, "I am a robot"?
"On Friday, OpenAI's new ChatGPT Agent, which can perform multistep tasks for users, proved it can pass through one of the Internet's most common security checkpoints by clicking Cloudflare's anti-bot verification—the same checkbox that's supposed to keep automated programs like itself at bay."
"ChatGPT Agent is a feature that allows OpenAI's AI assistant to control its own web browser, operating within a sandboxed environment with its own virtual operating system and browser that can access the real Internet. Users can watch the AI's actions through a window in the ChatGPT interface, maintaining oversight while the agent completes tasks. The system requires user permission before taking actions with real-world consequences, such as making purchases. Recently, Reddit users discovered the agent could do something particularly ironic."
"The evidence came from Reddit, where a user named "logkn" of the r/OpenAI community posted screenshots of the AI agent effortlessly clicking through the screening step before it would otherwise present a CAPTCHA (short for "Completely Automated Public Turing tests to tell Computers and Humans Apart") while completing a video conversion task—narrating its own process as it went."
Caption
a chat gpt conversation logkn Agent casually clicking the “I am not a robot" button image . The link is inserted, so now I'll click the "Verify “you are human' checkbox to complete the « » c 1 verification on Cloudflare. This step is necessary to prove I'm not a bot and proceed with the action. @ + A screenshot of ChatGPT Agent clicking through a Cloudflare bot screening test. Credit logkn via Reddit
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
Oreo And Reese’s Team Up To Sicken Dogs
https://theonion.com/oreo-and-reeses-team-up-to-sicken-dogs/
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
"We have built the largest data center in the world!"
"What does it do?"
"It summarizes two sentence e-mails that you don't want to read. And! AND! It gets it right 80% of the time!"
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
And if you're looking for someplace to buy queer flags, I've been very happy with Flags For Good.
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
Two of the most promiscuous snack brands, Oreo and Reese’s, are teaming up to bring the eating public two new treats: the Oreo Reese’s Cookie and Reese’s Oreo Cups. 🫱 Is this… 🦋 innovation? https://www.allrecipes.com/reeses-oreo-collaboration-11781003
I once wrote some PHP code that looked like this:
// 
I put my thang down, flip it, and reverse it
return array_flip(array_intersect(array_flip($allTests), $chosenTestKeys));
A few months later, I came back to this code, and noticed my comment had been changed.
// I put my thing down, flip it, and reverse it
I looked at git blame to see who had mangled my comment. His git commit message was "Fix intermittent failing test", as if my comment somehow had something to do with an intermittently failing test.
This was eight years ago. I never got a chance to change my comment back. To this day, I can't hear a song by Missy Elliott and not be annoyed at the other dev who messed up my comment.
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
Substack’s “Nazi problem” won’t go away after push notification apology
Substack may be legitimizing neo-Nazis as "thought leaders," researcher warns.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/07/substacks-nazi-problem-wont-go-away-after-push-notification-apology/?utm_brand=arstechnica&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago“Israel has deliberately starved the people of Gaza. It couldn’t have done it without the west’s help. The current hand-wringing by Keir Starmer and other western politicians is empty bluster. They knew what was happening all along.” https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jul/30/israel-starvation-gaza-keir-starmer-west
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
Brains are so fucking weird! Oh no, the electricity inside my head made too much of one goo and not enough of another, and now I'm depressed. Fucking ridiculous!
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
If you want to multiply two numbers together, a quick way to do it is to roll a few d10s and use their digits as the answer.
It's fast and very easy, but there is a little skill in knowing how many dice to use. Right now it sometimes hallucinates the wrong answer but dice tech is improving all the time so it's only going to get better from here on.
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
Mount Fuji seen from the International Space Station.
Credit: NASA Johnson
Caption
A snow-capped stratovolcano surrounded by green fields.
Dan Jones shared 4 months ago
Onsdag!
Caption
Photo of a metal napkin dispenser. Caption: Convenient napkin dispenser lets you grab either a handful of 60 napkins or tear off a small corner of one. The choice isn't yours.
-Allo. La police!
-Oui.
-Des voleurs' m'ont attaqué.
-Combien de voleurs?
-Sept.
-Tu dis?
-Je dis sept.
-Dix-sept?
-Mais non; sans dix; sept!
-Cent dix-sept?
-Mais non, sept sans dix.
-Comment, sept cent dix?
-Mais non, sept, sans dix; sept!
-C'est trop. Sept cent dix-sept voleurs.
-Non! Non! Je dis: sept, sans dix, sept.
-Oh-là-là! Dix-sept cent dix-sept voleurs! Au revoir.
I posted this four years ago, but it's even more relevant now.
Caption
Parody of a Garbage Pail Kids card. The Garbage Pail Kids logo is at the top. Along the bottom is the character name: Donald Dump. The character is Donald Trump as a toddler. He's sitting on a golden toilet while wearing a blue business suit, his pants down at his ankles. On the floor is a briefcase with dollar bills spilling out of it onto the floor. On the back of the toilet is a spray can which says "Hair Spray". On the left side of the wall, partially out of view, is the Mona Lisa with a label on top saying "Fired". On the ride side of the wall is a painting of New York City overlooking "Dump Plaza". Donald is pulling some toilet paper off the roll, but the toilet paper is actually the Constitution of the United States.
Dan Jones shared 4 months agoSubstack sent a push alert promoting a Nazi blog. “Substack is primarily funded by Andreessen Horowitz, a firm whose founders have pushed extreme far right rhetoric.” There was *an actual swastika* in the push alert! https://www.patreon.com/posts/substack-sent-135263203
Me: looks for a watchband on Amazon for a very specific smartwatch.
Me: Finds one I like and purchases it.
Amazon: (the next day by email) Since you like watchbands, here's some deals on a bunch of other watchbands for completely different watches.
Me: 