Catching Fancy

HYPERBASS FLUTE

I present, THE OCTOBASS

It’s so big that it needs keys to hit the strings.

And in the reverse direction there exists the Pochette. Translated from French, it means pocket, as it was a pocket sized violin like instrument.

This past month, Parks & Rec has been doing a lot of work on the field adjacent to my school. They have trucks with flatbeds, mowing/tree-cutting/postholing machinery, etc. And when they arrived, I (campus monitor) was told I would need to herd the kids away from the trucks/machinery and basically prevent them from creating a dangerous situation.

So when recess came around and the kids stampeded out the door I held them up and I said (being funny but at the same time serious, you know how it is, kids listen better if you're funny)

"Okay, I know that you're all smart AND mature, right? And talented and good looking? Definitely the smartest and most talented class in this school? (I say this to every class, they're all 'my favorites'.) And because you're SO intelligent and mature, I don't need to actually TELL you that these guys have vehicles and machinery that you need to stay clear of, right? Because I know you figured that out already, and I also know that YOU know how sad I would be if any of you were run over, or squashed, or had a pole fall on you. I would be SO SAD, like, I would probably have to lie down on the floor and cry. So you're not going to make me cry, right? I can trust you to stay away from the trucks and machines no matter where they are on the field? Because you're wonderful and amazing? My favorites? My inspiration?"

And they're laughing at me of course, because I'm being so dramatic. Some of them are "Yes, and-"ing my dramatics and inventing more involved mourning processes I should undertake if any of them get run over. Some of them are yelling at me that they are NOT mature yet and they are VERY STUPID and I should know this.

It's been three weeks. We had one conversation about it. None of them have gone anywhere near the trucks. This is actually in excess of the typical elementary-schooler's working memory and I'm very proud of them. I haven't had to blow the whistle at ONE person for getting too close even when the trucks were literally 40 feet from the actual playground.

Flexible feather armor

https://the-decoder.com/landmark-german-ruling-declares-googles-ai-overviews-are-googles-own-words-and-makes-it-liable-for-false-answers/

The Regional Court of Munich hit Google with a temporary injunction barring the company from spreading false claims about two Munich-based publishers through its AI-generated search overviews (case no. 26 O 869/26). The court classified Google as a direct infringer because the "AI overview" is its own content, not just a list of search results.

Google's AI overviews had falsely tied two publishing companies to scams, subscription traps, and shady business practices for certain search queries. According to the court, the AI mixed up information about other, genuinely sketchy companies with the plaintiffs and drew connections that didn't appear in any of the linked sources...

The court drew a parallel to press law, where publishers are liable for teasers that are understandable on their own, even if readers never read the full article. Google's own argument would also "significantly diminish" the benefit of the feature, the court noted, if the overview were "generally recognized as unreliable."

The court also pointed to a protection gap. If Google were only liable for obvious violations, victims would have no real legal recourse when the AI makes false claims. The third parties whose websites served as sources hadn't even made the statements in question. So victims couldn't sue the sources, and under existing rules they couldn't effectively sue Google either.

As a result, Google couldn't invoke host provider protections under the Digital Services Act or fall back on the standard notice-and-take-down process for search engines.

As if the rest wasn't bad enough for Google, the court also went after free speech protection for AI-generated content. An AI's opinion is "not the expression of an acquired conviction of the persons expressing it, but the result of an algorithm," the court wrote.

Offering AI-powered research is "above all an expression of Google's business activities" and "at most a secondary expression of an interest in being able to freely express one's opinion and beliefs."

full article here

It's rude. You're making someone take their time to read something you couldn't bother to write. You're telling them they were so unimportant you couldn't be bothered to actually take the time to say something yourself. And frankly, you're lying about it while you're at it.