BIRDWATCHING GOES BOTH WAYS

a bunch of archives of incredibly important government datasets like maternal mortality statistics are about to be deleted forever. in a regime where they're known to fudge numbers, we can't trust a lot of the data coming from them to not be altered. open source backups like those found on data.world are vital to being able to verify that the data coming from our government is still intact and not altered. and they're about to delete all of it.

i don't know if we need to start a petition or what. nobody seems to fucking care. there are millions of users on data.world and yet nobody is raising the alarm bells and it makes me feel like I'm going insane. somebody needs to do something. i don't know what to do. it feels like more and more of this world is being destroyed and dismantled. it's not only US centric data, either! it's all sorts of countries from around the world! and they're about to fucking delete everything.

the only things that won't be deleted are private companies who happen to use the paid version of their platform (which isn't accessible data to the open source community; some people have just been using their service to host their own data on privately)

and the kicker? this announcement was made... via an AI generated blog post. so not even any sort of human touch. just a generic, soulless announcement made by a soulless human about to take a wrecking ball to one of the more important websites that exists on the internet.

an example of some of the things that will be deleted on July 11th:

https://www.re3data.org

There are over 3500 respectable data repositories on one respectable global registry; to a researcher there’s no point in data existing if not findable; if you’re trying to find a new home for your dataset, start there

GRACKLE, 2025

8x10 Linocut Print

And it not being socially acceptable to talk about your own childhood is super alienating. Sometimes people want to know why, and any answer you can give them is going to be off putting.

One of them said something like, "it doesn't bother me that [Friend] was in residential mental health treatment, I just wish they wouldn't talk about it ALL the time".

The other replied, "Well, that was all of last year for them. So when they say 'when I was in treatment,' it's like when you say 'last year'."

Uncontacted Indigenous peoples reject contact with outsiders, as an active and ongoing choice. Survival International has calculated that there are 196 uncontacted groups worldwide; some of these are entire peoples who are uncontacted – such as the Sentinelese in India. Some uncontacted groups – such as the Ayoreo Totobiegosode in the Paraguayan Chaco or the Amahuaca in Peru – are sub-groups of bigger tribes with whom they share a language and often a territory. All are aware of the outside world, and reject it. They are self-sufficient and resilient. They live independently in forests, sometimes on islands. They resist intrusion, and thrive when their rights are respected. Uncontacted peoples may encounter outsiders sporadically, or not at all. They are aware of neighboring Indigenous peoples, who may be closely or distantly related. The uncontacted Hongana Manyawa in Indonesia have family members who have left the forest, mostly under duress. The uncontacted Pirititi occasionally encounter their contacted Kinja neighbors in the Brazilian Amazon. The Massaco, also in Brazil, were for decades known only by traces in the forest, including booby traps sharpened with rodents' teeth and placed on their hunting trails to warn off outsiders. Uncontacted peoples’ rejection of contact is often rooted in memories of devastating past contact and invasion, which brought violence, epidemics and death. Their denial of contact is a clear expression of their autonomy and self-determination.

I was trained in the dark arts of the cover letter by my mother, who is a hiring manager. And her training has paid off: I've been consistently told my cover letters are excellent. Let me pass on the wisdom.

The job of a cover letter is to give a prospective employer strictly more information than is on the resume. This is where you take the resume contents and put them into context. You look at the job requirements (you are looking at the job requirements before applying, right?) and look at your resume and ask the question (in your head) "why would a person think this candidate would be good for this job?" and your cover letter is the answer to that question. If you don't answer that question, the hiring manager is going to have to do it themselves, and you have way more information to work with than they do.

This is especially important if you're moving from one industry to another, because then the relevant connections aren't obvious. It's also very important if you're overqualified, because then you can use the letter to say "I know it looks like this job would be too entry-level for me, but I'm interested to pursue it for reasons x, y, and z". You can also use this space to explain away something that might otherwise be disqualifying, like job-hopping or a long break in employment. The tone to strike here is always matter-of-fact and constrained to topic - don't go into detail about health stuff or personal tragedy, just tell them what they need to hear: that this period of your resume was affected by [bad thing] but that it's now in the past and you're looking forward to the next chapter. Remember, one of the things they're trying to learn is whether you'd be content in this role, or whether you'd be miserable and leave after 2 months, which would force them to do all the work of hiring again. You're trying to establish that you will fit right in and not cause problems. Knowing what drew you to this job in particular (and don't just say 'money', that's true for everyone) helps with that.

Siblings! We have gathered here today to celebrate the finale of our most venerated Silt Verses; as the Trawlerman spoke through Jon & Muna so many years ago so he speaks through us today and orders us to deliver this gift to you: Rejoice! He asks, for we have appeased him with this offering.

(in a hushed voice he thanks everyone for their wonderful contributions. a meal this filling will last him for an entire year….. probably)

He invites you to share the table with him:

Will you take the offer?