markjgsmith

2024/06/17 #

• Unbelievably bad day of being constantly warpathed, starved and thirsted yesterday. I think I've traced it back to an incident at a food vendor around 2 days ago. Not a street stand, but a vendor operating out of the front of a actual house. I've been there many times before, they have always seemed nice. As I arrived and stood waiting to say what I wanted, the older chap that works there walked out front to attend to some food that was cooking.

  Before I had even said anything at all, he belched out at me 'Pay' with a strange smirk on his face. I had no idea what he was on about, perhaps he was having a bad day, I thought to myself. A few moments later the other slightly younger bloke asked if I wanted the take away dish I usually get, and I said yes and thank you. The other bloke then held up the coffee he was drinking and said 'coffee'. Then pointed at a coffee stand about 20 meters down the street, and uttered a somewhat malevolent and malicious sounding chuckle. I said that I don't drink coffee, which I don't. I then got the food and paid for it.

  I walked off down the street past the coffee stand, and shortly afterwards someone random started barking orders at me. 'Up!'. I was heading to a shop / caffee that I usually go to. The seating area is upstairs. Well basically ever since then that's when the tsunani of hate and ordering and general harrassment from the past few days started. And it's been rather epic, and not in a good way.

  Another manufactured situation to justify blamming me for everything again and again. Seems like it to me, especially since several of the harrassments since then, in totally different locations have involved people shouting 'Pay!' at me for absolutely no good reason that I could determine, even in places that had no shop or any commercial thing nearby.

  The food place btw is on the same street as the sandwich place that often creates problem situations that I've previously written about. There's something about that street, or perhaps it's just that here, every place eventually turns nasty. #

• There was an interesting discussion around AI & LLMs in the latest All-in podcast. Turns out many researchers that work on various media related projects routinely use LLMs to gather information. That is a new development, but the interesting thing is that they often have multiple LLMs open and run the query through all of them, then cross reference results in order to spot mistakes and hallucinations. #

• cat << EOF > My thoughts on Brexit

  It occurred to me a while back that I hadn't written anything, apart from a few links on the linkblog, about how I view and think about Brexit. It's such a big subject, and for me it crosses very close to my roots since, although I am from the UK, I grew up mostly in europe outside the UK. I feel like I should have very well formed thoughts about the whole debacle at this stage, but the truth is that I don't. I'm still confused by it.

  I'm also in a permanent situation where it's almost impossible to have enough piece and quiet to gather my thoughts on this complex topic, and write something meaningful. So bare that in mind. What follows is just a few notes I wrote down in between tsunamis, spiritual storms, and general crazy world shit that surrounds me 24/7 at the minute. Maybe I'll refine it over time. Even as I write this I'm being dogged by a couple of softly softly murmurers. It never ends.

  I’ve always been pro-Europe. It would be difficult for me not to be. I grew up mostly in Europe. I went to a European School for heck's sake. So I’m kind of biased. Europe is a great place. I really liked living there. Having said that, the way you see things as a kid and the way things are in reality can be quite different. At some point after university, which was in the UK, I became aware that many UK people weren't so into the hole EU project.

  I knew this before, of course, through watching the news, but there's something very different about being in a place, immersed among it's people that's very different from absorbing information through the tele. You get a much more real sense for the general zietgiest. I became aware that much of the politics and government in the EU was organised in a very beurocratic and possibly non-democratic way. Certainly in a way that was at odds with how things are done in the UK. I started to understand why many in the UK didn’t like being part of the EU.

  I was abroad when the vote happened. I think I was in Thailand at the time. I watched some of the build up, and the results, but I didn't vote. I think probably if I were back home, I’d have voted to remain, but I decided before the vote happened, that I'd be okay with whatever result was reached, as long as the election was a true representation of the view from the people of the UK.

  I’m ultimately British and would stand behind whatever the nation wanted. If there are big reasons to not be in the EU, and many have these views, I trust that the people have good vision and know at an instinctive level what is right for the country. They might very well be able to see something that I simply couldn't. There's no sense trying to smash a square peg into a round hole, these differing views ultimately have to be resolved in some way, and maybe leaving would be the best way to do that. That was basically my high level thought process when the vote hapenned.

  Perhaps we will rejoin some day or maybe we won’t. Things change, people change, nations change, the european project will change, let’s see where this goes. I'm not going to turn my back on either side, even if it feels like the world does that sometimes, even if it often feels like it's the world's favorite thing. As a side note, it is kind of cool to know that leaving is possible. That in itself might be the greatest take away for everyone.

  I think ultimately whatever happens both the EU and the UK will be better off for it.

  Hopefully I'll have more time in the future to write something less clumsy about this, when I'm not being pressured by a world on the warpath. I just wanted to get something out there, with the EU elections that just happened, and with the UK elections on the horizon, I've been much more interested in both than I'd expected, so now felt like a good time.

  EOF

• A lot of expats and long term travellers I've met over the past 10 years here in asia, told me that as a westerner you will never really be accepted here in asia. You will always remain a foreigner. Now that I've been here for many years, I totally see what they meant. It occured to me earlier how uterly alien to me this idea of not being accepted by a place was to me. In the places I grew up in the EU it was the complete opposite, it was a matter ov pride for both the natives and those arriving from abroad, that being accepted was possible, that you could really eventually feel good calling it your home. #

Today’s links:

• Apple’s Slow Rollout of Intelligence Features Will Stretch Into 2025 - A bunch of interesting Apple related info in this multi-part article, the most noteworthy probably being more details about Apple Intelligence and a whole load of VisionOS improvements. www.bloomberg.com #

• The Light Phone - "The Light Phone III adds a metal frame, USB-C, fingerprint ID, a flashlight, 5G, an NFC chip, and a clickable wheel." - The idea behind this phone is kind of interesting. It's a phone but with a lot of the smartphone features stripped back. It only does the basics that a feature phone does but with a few extras like podcasts. The point is to try and create a device that is purely functional, that doesn't distract you from the real world around you. There is no web browser, no social media for example. The promo video does a good job of explaining things. Interested to see if this takes off. www.thelightphone.com #

• No One Is Talking About Brexit - I've heard this mentioned in a few places and I've noticed it too. I can understand it though, it is a bit of a distraction. I'm curious about the ongoing relationship with the EU, but I think we need to give the new outside the EU thing a chance to develop. Lots of opportunity to learn about ourselves as a nation imho. politicalwire.com #

• New Post: My thoughts on Brexit markjgsmith.com #