Mark
@maetl.bsky.social
Lecturer in Product Design at UCNZ. Tech industry dropout. Narrative systems and geoscience meddler. Old school web sectary. Frankenbike curator. Waste stream wrangler.
Pinned
Mark
@maetl.bsky.social
· Jun 25
I don’t want raytracing or photorealism, I want the lo-fi dwarfs in their fortress to be standing in grid cells backed by a fully simulated carbon cycle, atmospheric fluid flow, insolation, atmospheric chemistry, evapotranspiration, geological strata, ecological systems...
Beyond the methodological flaws and lack of evidence, the mental model of a large number of NZ adults is that mathematics is a synonym for arithmetic. Geometry and algebra are not useful for accountancy so they don’t count.
www.rnz.co.nz/news/nationa...
www.rnz.co.nz/news/nationa...
Maths professor says Education Minister's claims a school trial is 'groundbreaking' is problematic
Erica Stanford said the results showed the government's focus on fixing the basics is working.
www.rnz.co.nz
November 25, 2025 at 9:31 PM
Beyond the methodological flaws and lack of evidence, the mental model of a large number of NZ adults is that mathematics is a synonym for arithmetic. Geometry and algebra are not useful for accountancy so they don’t count.
www.rnz.co.nz/news/nationa...
www.rnz.co.nz/news/nationa...
If the history of single use waste products is a network graph, it feeds into a supernode nexus in the 1970s where Coca Cola manipulated mass culture with glass sustainability propaganda to nod to rising environmental awareness, while planning for a mass rollout of plastic bottles.
November 25, 2025 at 9:54 AM
If the history of single use waste products is a network graph, it feeds into a supernode nexus in the 1970s where Coca Cola manipulated mass culture with glass sustainability propaganda to nod to rising environmental awareness, while planning for a mass rollout of plastic bottles.
Reposted by Mark
Wellington people: want to try a larp? A larp about a weird, 1920's magic carnival? A friend of mine is running a little game in February: carnival-arcane.lilregie.com/booking/atte...
Carnival Arcane - Wellington Parlour LARP
carnival-arcane.lilregie.com
November 25, 2025 at 6:19 AM
Wellington people: want to try a larp? A larp about a weird, 1920's magic carnival? A friend of mine is running a little game in February: carnival-arcane.lilregie.com/booking/atte...
Regardless of kayfabe comms and Nat equivocation in media, ACT always says the thing to its red-faced griefer audience
November 25, 2025 at 6:08 AM
Regardless of kayfabe comms and Nat equivocation in media, ACT always says the thing to its red-faced griefer audience
In two years NZ govt intervention in regional councils has gone from planning co-governance with Mana Whenua to DOGE/Rogernomics scale austerity destruction.
November 25, 2025 at 4:48 AM
In two years NZ govt intervention in regional councils has gone from planning co-governance with Mana Whenua to DOGE/Rogernomics scale austerity destruction.
Reposted by Mark
Dark pattern UX to the extreme
One of the changes that OpenAI has made to make ChatGPT safer is a "take a break" nudge. There's something quite interesting about the design here. Which thing does it make you want to click?
November 25, 2025 at 2:02 AM
Dark pattern UX to the extreme
Standing on a berm with my arms folded complaining about being silenced while the newspaper photographer snaps a picture of me
the state should not stop me from building what I want to build but should stop other people from building what i don't want them to build and also the process should be faster with more consultation of me and not cost money
November 25, 2025 at 12:28 AM
Standing on a berm with my arms folded complaining about being silenced while the newspaper photographer snaps a picture of me
One thing that NZers need to understand is that going for 100% completion on the original Rogernomics agenda is not a reversible thing. We will need to transform all this wreckage into something new. We can't just "rebuild", as has been proven many times over.
November 24, 2025 at 11:44 PM
One thing that NZers need to understand is that going for 100% completion on the original Rogernomics agenda is not a reversible thing. We will need to transform all this wreckage into something new. We can't just "rebuild", as has been proven many times over.
Your household water bill brought to you by Veolia, GE Water, and minority shareholders Coca Cola Amatil.
Your local hospital brought to you by SERCO.
Your local primary school brought to you by Crimson Education, Google and OpenAI.
Your local hospital brought to you by SERCO.
Your local primary school brought to you by Crimson Education, Google and OpenAI.
November 24, 2025 at 11:35 PM
Your household water bill brought to you by Veolia, GE Water, and minority shareholders Coca Cola Amatil.
Your local hospital brought to you by SERCO.
Your local primary school brought to you by Crimson Education, Google and OpenAI.
Your local hospital brought to you by SERCO.
Your local primary school brought to you by Crimson Education, Google and OpenAI.
Reposted by Mark
We did something different with the credits for Demonschool. We used this format: name, title, lengthy description of what they did. Often you see credits in games where you don't know what the credited developer was actually responsible for. We wanted to give people proper, actual credit.
November 24, 2025 at 10:23 PM
We did something different with the credits for Demonschool. We used this format: name, title, lengthy description of what they did. Often you see credits in games where you don't know what the credited developer was actually responsible for. We wanted to give people proper, actual credit.
Reposted by Mark
Whenever I say this, people get Really Mad, but it's true. Same of any other art, too. You have to read the book, watch the film, see the painting, listen to the song, whatever.
I'm sorry, but watching a video about it on YouTube is not enough. You have not experience the art.
I'm sorry, but watching a video about it on YouTube is not enough. You have not experience the art.
"you have not played the game unless you've played the game" is one of my more annoying but unshakable opinions
the whole "don't play the game, just watch a video on youtube that will explain its story to you" is so disheartening because the issue of accessibility is genuinely really important but it's always just people who want to be spoon-fed nicely quantifiable information
November 23, 2025 at 3:58 AM
Whenever I say this, people get Really Mad, but it's true. Same of any other art, too. You have to read the book, watch the film, see the painting, listen to the song, whatever.
I'm sorry, but watching a video about it on YouTube is not enough. You have not experience the art.
I'm sorry, but watching a video about it on YouTube is not enough. You have not experience the art.
At first glance this seems similar to the old narrative of overarching metaphors of scientific reality:
18C: world as mechanical clock
19C: world as heat engine
20C: world as information processor
But the overlapping waves model of disciplines here is more epistemological than metaphorical.
18C: world as mechanical clock
19C: world as heat engine
20C: world as information processor
But the overlapping waves model of disciplines here is more epistemological than metaphorical.
We can chart the rise of modern government as a series of overlapping waves, each representing the rise and fall of an influential discipline: statistics in the 18th century, civil engineering in the 19th century, and economics in the 20th century medium.com/@jamestplunk...
The disciplines theory of government
Are legacy disciplines dragging the whole operation down?
medium.com
November 24, 2025 at 6:00 AM
At first glance this seems similar to the old narrative of overarching metaphors of scientific reality:
18C: world as mechanical clock
19C: world as heat engine
20C: world as information processor
But the overlapping waves model of disciplines here is more epistemological than metaphorical.
18C: world as mechanical clock
19C: world as heat engine
20C: world as information processor
But the overlapping waves model of disciplines here is more epistemological than metaphorical.
Reposted by Mark
if you're still writing using the hero's journey, your mind is closed to all the possibilities
November 24, 2025 at 2:06 AM
if you're still writing using the hero's journey, your mind is closed to all the possibilities
Reposted by Mark
One of my API keys got hacked. The only area I could see where they may have gotten access was through a private GitHub, I am not ruling out that it was vomited up by an LLM, they have been known to regurgitate API keys.
Pretty strong evidence of LLMs being trained on private GitHub pull request threads and other corporate project management tools.
I think Claude Code has achieved AGI
November 22, 2025 at 11:41 PM
One of my API keys got hacked. The only area I could see where they may have gotten access was through a private GitHub, I am not ruling out that it was vomited up by an LLM, they have been known to regurgitate API keys.
Pretty strong evidence of LLMs being trained on private GitHub pull request threads and other corporate project management tools.
November 22, 2025 at 11:19 PM
Pretty strong evidence of LLMs being trained on private GitHub pull request threads and other corporate project management tools.
Reposted by Mark
omfg. "wicked problem" are you fucking kidding me, jesus fucking christ
The real wicked problem here is Australia's mostly-white journalist class persistently stepping on the exact rakes the salivating white nationalists want them to step on. It is so nuts to me how none of this ever changes
The real wicked problem here is Australia's mostly-white journalist class persistently stepping on the exact rakes the salivating white nationalists want them to step on. It is so nuts to me how none of this ever changes
November 20, 2025 at 10:45 PM
omfg. "wicked problem" are you fucking kidding me, jesus fucking christ
The real wicked problem here is Australia's mostly-white journalist class persistently stepping on the exact rakes the salivating white nationalists want them to step on. It is so nuts to me how none of this ever changes
The real wicked problem here is Australia's mostly-white journalist class persistently stepping on the exact rakes the salivating white nationalists want them to step on. It is so nuts to me how none of this ever changes
Reposted by Mark
Rainbow orgs have released a statement: “The banning of puberty blockers is an example of government overreach and political attacks on healthcare… it is an unprecedented and inherently discriminatory use of the Medicines Act to deny healthcare to a particular population on the basis of their sex”
Government Overreach in Healthcare with Puberty Blockers Decision — Rainbow Support Collective
www.rainbowsupportcollective.nz
November 20, 2025 at 8:08 PM
Rainbow orgs have released a statement: “The banning of puberty blockers is an example of government overreach and political attacks on healthcare… it is an unprecedented and inherently discriminatory use of the Medicines Act to deny healthcare to a particular population on the basis of their sex”
This is for a game project which is currently under wraps, though analog switches give a strong hint as to what the experience might entail.
November 20, 2025 at 9:56 PM
This is for a game project which is currently under wraps, though analog switches give a strong hint as to what the experience might entail.
Reposted by Mark
“Trust us! Marginalising these communities more will absolutely bring down the cost of a KG of Mince and get your job back!”
November 20, 2025 at 4:47 AM
“Trust us! Marginalising these communities more will absolutely bring down the cost of a KG of Mince and get your job back!”
Reposted by Mark
We elect people who value numbers on a piece of paper over whether actual people eat or have a roof over their head or can get healthcare when they sick. We elect people who value numbers on a piece of a paper over children eating or being educated. I also note that the numbers are all fake.
November 19, 2025 at 8:51 PM
We elect people who value numbers on a piece of paper over whether actual people eat or have a roof over their head or can get healthcare when they sick. We elect people who value numbers on a piece of a paper over children eating or being educated. I also note that the numbers are all fake.
We invented a universal hypertext medium that is persistent and stable over decades-long time scales. Then, we made it unstable by continually shoving in all the features of modern operating systems and apps. Reinventing the medium over and over, using more memory and bandwidth each time round.
Man, do I ever feel this as an Old in the web development world. So many overengineered single-page dynamic framework "apps" being built for sites with extremely static content, when late-1990s tech (HTML, CSS, server-side rendering, aggessive caching) would be lightning quick & fit for purpose.
November 20, 2025 at 9:24 AM
We invented a universal hypertext medium that is persistent and stable over decades-long time scales. Then, we made it unstable by continually shoving in all the features of modern operating systems and apps. Reinventing the medium over and over, using more memory and bandwidth each time round.
lolsob at how this image is becoming a meme stacking up all the bullshit in much the same way as the computing culture it reflects.
Extremely upset that a throw-away XKCD joke somehow became the organizing principle for the Internet.
November 20, 2025 at 2:43 AM
lolsob at how this image is becoming a meme stacking up all the bullshit in much the same way as the computing culture it reflects.
Cruston
LYLE is here to solve the case and maybe perhaps steal ur heart??? 🔍💖
#datingsim #lgbt #indiegamedev #indiegame #gamedev #indiegames
#datingsim #lgbt #indiegamedev #indiegame #gamedev #indiegames
November 18, 2025 at 7:11 PM
Cruston
Many people, including the former mayor, repeatedly tried to warn you. This blatant infosec breach is a real ‘standard you walk past is the standard you accept’ moment for Mayor Andrew Little.
Mayor Andrew Little says he and chief executive Matt Prosser have had assurances from Chung the situation was unintentional and that Chung has apologised.
Private council briefing blogged online after ‘hot mic’ moment
Wellington City councillor Ray Chung left an open phone line to a controversial social media figure for 40 minutes during a closed training session, the mayor has confirmed – the contents of which wer...
www.thepost.co.nz
November 18, 2025 at 7:49 AM
Many people, including the former mayor, repeatedly tried to warn you. This blatant infosec breach is a real ‘standard you walk past is the standard you accept’ moment for Mayor Andrew Little.
So we’re back on this NZ managerialist cultural tic of ‘I’m comfortable managing my own conflicts of interest’.
Councils around the country who lost walking and cycling infrastructure because they don’t have access to a minister who can override the process should be apoplectic.
Councils around the country who lost walking and cycling infrastructure because they don’t have access to a minister who can override the process should be apoplectic.
NEW: Chris Bishop used housing money to fund a bridge in his electorate his own Govt had killed off.
Officials were against the move and Labour say he shouldn’t have been anywhere near the decision.
www.thepost.co.nz/politics/360...
Officials were against the move and Labour say he shouldn’t have been anywhere near the decision.
www.thepost.co.nz/politics/360...
Chris Bishop diverts Kāinga Ora money to fund a bridge in his electorate
Officials warned against the use of housing funds for bridge building but Bishop says it was a “pragmatic choice”.
www.thepost.co.nz
November 17, 2025 at 8:12 PM
So we’re back on this NZ managerialist cultural tic of ‘I’m comfortable managing my own conflicts of interest’.
Councils around the country who lost walking and cycling infrastructure because they don’t have access to a minister who can override the process should be apoplectic.
Councils around the country who lost walking and cycling infrastructure because they don’t have access to a minister who can override the process should be apoplectic.