• 9 Posts
  • 95 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 16th, 2023

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  • I have used Linux in some form or fashion since 2001ish.

    I’m saying that to provide perspective for what I am about to say next: linux has made more “regular user” progress in the last 2-3 years than I’ve ever seen. This past year since the steam deck came out has been great for linux gamers.

    I personally use PopOS since it’s the best mix of all the things I care about and it’s rock solid.

    Mint is also a great choice. Feel free to ask questions as they pop up!

    As with anything, back up your important stuff so if you end up doing something stupid, you will just kick yourself and not cry.






  • undefined> Both are concerning, but as a former academic to me neither of them are as insidious as the harm that LLMs are already doing to training data. A lot of corpora depend on collecting public online data to construct data sets for research, and the assumption is that it’s largely human-generated. This balance is about to shift, and it’s going to cause significant damage to future research. Even if everyone agreed to make a change right now, the well is already poisoned. We’re talking the equivalent of the burning of Alexandria for linguistics research.

    It reminds me of the situation with steel where post atomic weapons its tainted. It can’t be used for scientific tools or equipment. You have to find and use it from pre-atomic bombs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-background_steel

    There is going to be “low background data” in the future.



  • A couple of things: It sounds like you are assuming I am white.

    This response doesn’t seem all that nice or inclusive. Calling someone with an, ironically, slightly different opinion than you (read: diverse), fragile and sensitive seems to be counter to the community you are trying to build here. Right? Am I crazy?

    I think we need to strive to have an environment where we can have open, honest, and sometimes uncomfortable conversations about all of this stuff. Being dismissive of it as “white fragility” isn’t productive or helpful.

    As I said in my initial comment, I understand the intent of that section of the report, and I think more diversity is better than homogeneity, but the way that information was conveyed, and almost specifically that information, seems unwelcoming. For what its worth, I very intentionally joined Beehaw vs any other instance because I truly appreciate what you are trying to do here. So hopefully you take this in the manner it is intended: (hopefully) constructive criticism and food for thought.




  • I understood the intent, but words mean things and phrasing matters. As written, it doesn’t seem welcoming or inclusive. They phrased the other sections much better–(which almost makes it seem more targeted even though I sincerely doubt it is)

    “We don’t have as much diversity as we would like in this area, so in an effort to cultivate a richer community, we’ll need to do more analysis and outreach. We are open to ideas!”.

    The reality is: you can’t force diversity. You can only make an environment where its welcome and encouraged–and you should be welcoming to everyone. Obviously this rubbed some folks the wrong way.

    As an aside: it’s also a little short sighted to assume that bucketing people in a “white” group means they aren’t diverse in their own right. I’d imagine there is quite a diverse makeup of “white people” on here-- people from Western Europe, Eastern Europe, the US, Canada, Australia, and elsewhere who all have very different perspectives, cultures, and norms that they bring to the table.