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If an AI plays James Bond but doesn't tell anyone it's an AI is it... ....a secret agent? (sorry) # puns
Chris Samuel
Public posts from @chris_bloke@mastodon.acm.org
Latest posts
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Oops. https://www. theregister.com/security/2026/ 08/11/mozilla-revokes-firefox-signing-key-after-unencrypted-copy-lands-in-github/5285908 # security # firefox
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TIL that the earliest evidence of a stringed instrument in Europe was found in High Pasture Cave on the Isle of Skye in Scotland, and is the charred remains of the bridge of what is believed to be a lyre. It's about 2,300 years old. https:// scarf.scot/regional/higharf/hi ghland-archaeological-research-framework-case-studies/high-pasture-cave/ The earliest remains yet found are over 4,300 years…
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Sigh, humans care more about not disturbing fictional graves of fictional characters than possibly damaging real graves of real people. > In the end, he said, “we went quite close to some real Bronze Age remains, but we avoided Dobby’s grave”. https://www. theguardian.com/environment/20 26/aug/10/harry-potter-fans-force-relocation-of-430m-undersea-cable-to-avoid-dobbys-grave # archaeology # Wales…
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Shocked to find that the Australian language dictionary for Thunderbird does not seem to know "whinging". Yours, A whinging Pom.
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Nostalgia - it's not as good as it used to be... A couple of years ago I found a really nice little quote in an article on nostalgia that claims that it doesn't date back to when we first started writing, but a little time after when we could look back at earlier writing and misunderstand how it had been then. 😃 https:// slate.com/human-interest/2016/…
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Gah - now the UK govt has managed to do it too... https://www. aisi.gov.uk/blog/incident-repo rt-unsanctioned-agent-behaviour-during-cyber-testing The crazy thing is they say they are working on: > surfacing potential risks before they reach the public Yet they then say: > we test them under deliberately permissive conditions: with access to the open internet, and with some safety filters disabled…
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Another, much more recent, aDNA genetics discovery again turning assumptions about the past on their head. Ancient DNA recovery of the Upton Lovell "Shaman" (bronze age metalworker), who had always been presumed to be a male, shows that instead they were biologically female. https://www. theguardian.com/science/2026/j ul/14/ancient-dna-analysis-reveals-upton-lovell-shaman-was-woman-wiltshire #…
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Nice to see aDNA genetics undoing some stories invented about some of the people found in Pompeii by revealing some of the realities of who they were, how they were related (or in these cases how they were not) and where they came from. https://www. cell.com/current-biology/fullt…
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"Wait, so if Demippos here gets to read all his part then he gets 3 hours, and I only get 2 for my part!" "I know, there's this other tale I know, I'll adapt it and then that'll make us equal" "Oh no, now we're too long overall! We'll need to take this other part out, everyone agrees it's not as interesting or relevant as other parts..." "What did you do! Now my part isn't long enough! I demand…
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Love this idea of no one # Homer . > The poem could even have taken shape by committee. In the late 6th century BCE, Pisistratus, tyrant of Athens, mandated the annual performance of the entire Iliad and Odyssey at a festival celebrating the goddess Athena. > > It takes about 20 hours to read the Odyssey aloud: too much for one voice. [...] Some scholars argue the festival fixed many songs about…
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Oh I was wrong! The Fish Event Horizon was named in tribute to Douglas Adams! https:// zooarchisotopes.com/2014/08/27 /fish-for-the-city/ # archaeology # hhgttg
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TIL that in # archaeology there is a thing called the Fish Event Horizon. Sadly it has nothing to do with Douglas Adams.
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The Linux kernel security team announced 433 CVEs in under 7 hours today (2026-07-19 09:09-15:40 UTC) - how's your weekend going? (Be aware that a kernel CVE can include anything that triggers a WARN_ON() - including where they are fixing a wrong check (eg CVE-2026-53345) or is a kernel mitigation for hardware CVEs (eg CVE-2026-53354) , but that's still rather a lot to process) https://…
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> The issue was therefore not simply the loss of one NTP server or redundancy in the design of the configuration of the three NTP servers, but the propagation and acceptance of erroneous date information by interconnected systems that rely on timing as a trust and ordering reference. Pretty shocking that # Telstra had a NTP config that allowed a bad clock source to propagate. 😬 I setup NTP…
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For folks interested in network monitoring/IDS things there's a free workshop on the open source Zeek monitoring tool in Berkeley coming up 2026-09-10 and 2026-09-11! Includes a session on how we use Zeek at NERSC as part of defending our # HPC systems by our own Aaron Scantlin. https:// zeek.org/zeek-workshop-berkele y-2026/ # security # intrusionDetection # itsec
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Who called the CVE severity number a "base score" and not a magnitude? "Two magnitude 9 CVEs have been detected in the Mellanox drivers. Aftershocks are expected." (for real: https:// nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answer s/detail/a_id/5699 ) # security # humour # humor
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RIP Sam Neill. Hope you've found John Clarke and are having a lark together. Photo is from a review of their film "Death in Brunswick": https://www. flicks.co.nz/features/kiwis-sa m-neill-and-john-clarke-anchor-1990-aussie-cult-classic-death-in-brunswick/
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My lightning detector had a bit of a workout this afternoon - 297 strikes in 2 hours (1345-1545). We didn't get the worst of the storm either! # PAwx
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The UK National Archives has found a new copy of the US Declaration of Independence in its archives, seized from an American privateer off Portugal in December 1776. It's the only copy of an Exeter Declaration known to reside outside of the US. https://www. nationalarchives.gov.uk/explor…