Was feeling bored yesterday and didn't want to start a new coding project and so decided to play "King's Quest" 🙂

Dusted off DOSBox-X (https://dosbox-x.com), which has a bunch of features which makes it easier to use than DOSBox, and I was off to the races!

I hadn't played the VGA version of the game before and so it was actually enjoyable.

Now maybe I should look into getting the AGDI version of the game (https://agdinteractive.com/games…) working? Trouble is, the macOS version of the game is 32-bit only and I’m too lazy to set up a VM and do all that. Same with the Windows version, which requires at least Windows ME …

#DOSBox #RetroGaming #DOSGames
A screenshot from King's Quest …

@SuperSideshow Mine too! But I see it being used more and more and it just drives me mad …

Honestly, I don't really understand the logic in “Star Wars” much of the time since they just rely on stupid decisions to move things along 😛

The latest in a long line appears to be to let Sabine do whatever she wants and trusting in her even though she keeps making one stupid decision after another in “Ahsoka” …

I do realize that the story would be very short if not for Sabine’s not-at-all-well-thought-out decisions, but honestly, this is very lazy story telling where you rely on characters to mess up and have other characters act as if they don’t see this sort of thing coming at all …

#TV #StarWars #Ahsoka

@xavierLowmiller LOL. Yeah, I loved that one too. I was furiously typing out quotes as I watched the movie and in the end, I think the movie won out and I stopped typing quotes 😛

"Barbie" (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1517268) is probably the best Hollywood movie I've seen in at least two years, maybe longer 🙂

It's brilliant, funny, subversive, thought-provoking and so full of quotes that I think I'm going to love (and use) for a while.

Oh, and the expressiveness of Margot Robbie’s face was just such a joy to watch!

Also, did anybody notice that the palm tree in the roundabout in front of Barbie's house works like a sundial? Or was that just my imagination?

Some quotes I loved (possibly paraphrased a little) were:

"I know I’m stereotypical barbie and therefore don’t form conjectures concerning casualty of adjacent unfolding events but some things have been happening that might be related.”

"You guys are clearly not doing patriarchy well.”

"I'm a man with no power, does that make me a woman?"

"I'm ready to be your long-term, long-distance, casual, low-commitment girlfriend.”

#Movies #English #Hollywood

@maxx To be quite honest, telling other people what they should or should not do is a bit rude, don’t you think?

Telling me that I *should* continue to use #AIArt presupposes that that’s a rule.

Also, saying “bland computer generate babes” is both a bit insulting and again presumption on your part since I do not generate images with people at all — except accdentally.

Sure, asking somebody to not do something politely is one thing. But saying “you should do this” or “you shouldn’t do this” is not OK.

If this was meant to be a request, you really should change your phrasing perhaps?

@morph The issue here probably is that “art” can mean different things to different people 🙂 When I say “art”, I mean it as in “an image”, I am not making a statement about the quality of the drawing/image.

But others seem to think that if something is called “art” then it has to be high-quality, fit to be hung in a gallery etc.

Also, even if we are talking about the quality of the work when we say “art”, what’s “art” to you might not be “art” to me 😛

So I’m not sure we’re going to please everybody no matter what term we use since somebody will have an objection in some form.

@boringold @WeavingWithAI

@auzzy I do agree about the better editing practices 🙂

I tend to be a little overly verbose on here when I post since I don’t have to worry about the post length. But as an experiment, I posted about the same movie yesterday on three different platforms, and I could see how I could’ve really cut down on my post on here and yet retained (most of) the spirit in a shorter post.

But I must admit that I do like the freedom of not having to think about the post length 😛

"Ustaad" (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27116302) is a beautiful, wonderful, and though-provoking movie.

Nothing extraordinary in terms of plot or hook — no mysteries, no capers, nothing earthshaking. Just the story of a guy's life.

But the moments are beautiful and some of the scenery in the movie was just breathtakingly beautiful!

I enjoyed every minute of it since stories about fate, destiny, coincidence — whatever you want to call it — and going for what you love are always close to my heart 🙂

If you like that kind of thing, highly recommended!

#Movies #Telugu #Indian #JustALifeLived #Tollywood

@boringold I'm curious, but how do you define images generated by code? As in, aren’t images generated using machine learning models, also generated via code, though perhaps not always code written by you?

Not trying to be argumentative, but genuinely curious 🙂 Is this like possibly generating SVG images? Or just putting together basic primitives (circles, rectangles etc.) to create an image?

Would you happen to have any links to samples of your work that you consider #GenerativeArt that I can take a look at?

I’m curious and fascinated …

In the past year, I've seen at least 3 - 4 Indian movies in different languages about foreign pharmaceutical corporations coming to India and doing dangerous drug trials on children (generally in orphanages) and/or poor people in a given area.

Is this just movie-makers following a trend? Or a political attempt to foster isolationism through (subtle) propaganda? Or based on a kernel of truth?

Anybody know?

#Movies #India #Tamil #Telugu #DrugTrials #PropagandaOrTruth

It's interesting how posting/editing on the various platforms varies due to text length for a single post ..

On Bluesky, I have to really pare it down to fit within the 300-char limit. On Threads, I can expand upon the thought a bit more since posts can be a bit longer, and on Fedi, (where I can have 8k char posts), I can go to town ... 😛

But are my posts here better for it?

I don’t know. I just write here and don’t worry about whether I’m repeating myself, or if my thoughts can be expressed better.

But especially on Bluesky, I find myself looking at each sentence and figuring out what can be cut and how things can be made shorter and yet retain the essence of the thought.

Does that make me a better editor/writer? Maybe?

#Thoughts #PostingOnSocialMedia #Writing #Editing

I used to use the #AIArt hashtag for the art I post on social media that was machine generated. But no longer ...

The current systems are not intelligent — they are just statistical predictive systems.

I now use the hashtag #GenerativeArt for my machine learning generated art. I think that might be a better description? I don't know that for sure, but it certainly feels better than continuing to use the #AIArt tag 😛

It's an interesting thing about Tamil — Indians (or at least some Indians) say that Sri Lankan Tamils speak the same language as us and so they are our brothers/sisters.

And yet, when they show Sri Lankan Tamils in Tamil/Indian movies, they always speak a variant of Tamil that sets them apart. Even weirder still, the Tamil they speak sounds weird to me since I’ve never heard that kind of Tamil from any of the Sri Lankan Tamil people I’ve talked to/associated with 😛

So why use this weird Tamil? Is that shorthand for “they are different than us”? And if yes, isn’t that lazy? And also possibly breaks the whole “they are our brethren” sentiment?

I don’t know … People are strange … And of course, movies are stranger still 😀

#Movies #Tamil #India #SriLanka

@gaveen Yeah, the huge number of episodes is daunting, but I’m hoping we like it based on what I’ve seen of the Netflix show and that means that we are set up for a long time in terms of content 😛

The Netflix show had so many laugh-out-loud moments that I’m really looking forward to watching the anime now. Only have season 1 at the moment but if we like that, then I guess it’s truly on 😛

@gaveen Haven’t finished watching it (well, barely started … since we’ve only watched the first episode) but loving it so far 🙂

Hadn’t seen the original either and so after watching the first adaptation, we’ve decided to give the anime version a try too …

*Ring* It's the telephone.

“Hello?” I say tentatively.

“We are calling from your bank. We are updating the security on all our debit cards. We need to verify some information.”

Alarm bells are going off all over in my head already.

“You called me. I don’t know who you are.” I say.

“Oh, we are sending you an SMS from Abu Dhabi police. That should verify us,” they say breezily.

"Why is the Abu Dhabi police sending messages for a bank?” I wonder. But the other person is rattling off stuff and not giving me time to think. I check the phone and sure enough, there’s an SMS from “ADPolice” (“That can be anyone, or even spoofed,” my mind counters …)

I decided to play along for a little while longer and see what happened.

“OK, I got the SMS,” I say.

“See? That verifies that I am who I said, I am,” the guy says enthusiastically. “Can you verify your card number? The first digits are … “ He reads out the first few digits, which I knew would be common and well-known.

So I should probably have hung up at this point. Or, better still in hindsight, given a fake set of numbers for the card to see if they accepted it. If they accepted the fake number, then they can’t be from the bank, right?

I didn’t think of that though. But I figured they already had my card number and so gave them the number. Then they ask for the expiration date and I provide that too.

“Thank you. I’m transferring you over to my supervisor now,” he says.

Another guy, more brusque and officious sounding comes on.

“We are upgrading the card security since you might have used the card at a mall or online,” he says. This makes no sense at all to me. Everybody uses cards online etc. Do they upgrade security each time.

“OK.” I say.

“Can you read me the number on the back of your card for verification purposes?” he asks.

I know that this is as far as I can go. I say, “No.”

He says, “Why not?”

“You might be a scammer. I get lots of fake calls”.

“Yes, there are fake calls, but this is real,” he counters. “I’ll send you an SMS from the government to prove it,” he continues.

I get an SMS from a government site asking me to verify a transaction for 1 AED. This is not a verification, just somebody trying to get me to pay them 1 AED. Again, not very bank-like.

I ask further questions, but the guy starts getting loud and obnoxious, repeating the same things he’d said before.

“Don’t yell at me!” I say. He gets quieter, but still demands information, saying that the bank has all my info and that they just need to verify it. I realize that this is not going any further and hang up.

They call again 6 - 7 times. I know a bank would never do that. They’d simply move on to the next customer, not that calling each customer individually to verify is what they’d do in a situation like this anyway …

So, the moral of the story, don’t give away any info at all. And provide fake info if you suspect it’s a fake/fraud call. If they don’t recognize that the info is fake, then they aren’t who they say they are …

#UAE #Scammers #FakeCalls #CreditCardPhishing #Fraudsters

He: “What's this second base and third base?”

She: “Ask one of your friends …”

He: “My father won’t know these things …”

“Satyaprem Ki Katha” (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt14914988)

#HindiMovieMoments #Bollywood #Hindi #WhatDoYouSay

@noracodes I do some writing about tech and a bit of Python stuff too (all about machine learning) and some other eclectic stuff on my blog. Haven’t updated in a while but probably will get around to it at some point?

https://write.farook.org/rss

Hi rectangle friends. I love RSS. I have lots of wonderful blogs in my RSS feedcatcher. But! I have audited my subscriptions and confirmed my feeling that a high percentage of the people whose blogs I regularly read are white. Since I mostly subscribe to new blogs via links from existing subscriptions, I think I'm stuck in a bit of a bubble, and I'd like some help discovering technical blogs and feeds run or authored by non-white people!

If you or someone you know a) is non-white b) has a blog about Rust, Python, web tech, Linux, systems programming, tech and society, or other, related topics that c) can be subscribed to via RSS, please reply and I will check it out and boost it!

Those are the only requirements. If you don't feel like you're an "expert", have only written one blog post, haven't posted in a year, etc please still let me know and I will check it out. Everyone's voice is valuable.

Thank you 💜 Boosts are appreciated!