A very astute framing by Ted Chiang—large language models as a form of lossy compression for text.
When we’re dealing with sequences of words, lossy compression looks smarter than lossless compression.
A lot of uses have been proposed for large language models. Thinking about them as blurry JPEGs offers a way to evaluate what they might or might not be well suited for.
Goodreads lost my entire account last week. Nine years as a user, some 600 books and 250 carefully written reviews all deleted and unrecoverable. Their support has not been helpful. In 35 years of being online I’ve never encountered a company with such callous disregard for their users’ data.
Ouch! Lesson learned:
My plan now is to host my own blog-like collection of all my reading notes like Tom does.
This is quite remarkable. On the surface, it’s a short article about the Y2K bug, but the hypertextual footnotes go deeper and deeper into memory, loss, grief …I’m very moved by the rawness and honesty nested within.
This well-researched in-depth piece doesn’t paint a pretty picture for archiving online news:
Of the 21 news organizations in our study, 19 were not taking any protective steps at all to archive their web output. The remaining two lacked formal strategies to ensure that their current practices have the kind of longevity to outlast changes in technology.
From smart dust and spimes, through to online journaling and social media, to machine learning, big data and digital preservation…
Is the archive where information goes to live forever, or where data goes to die?
Fortunately there’s a back-up on the Internet Archive, but this tale of Google’s overnight destruction of fourteen years of writing is truly infuriating.
When we use their services, we trust that companies like Google will preserve some of the most personal things we have to share. They trust that we will not read the fine print.
When you pitch your tent in someone else’s walled garden, they can tear down your home whenever they want.
An A-Z of JavaScript jargon (although some of the “explanations” could do with de-jargonifying themselves).
A heartbreaking tale of companionship, memory and loss.
A thoughtful—and beautifully illustrated—piece by Geri on memory and digital preservation, prompted by the shut-down of Gowalla.
A beautiful glossary of typographic terms.
The beautifully-written and moving story of a father’s last gift to his son. The father is Jef Raskin; the son is Aza Raskin.
The most beautiful piece of letterpress art from Cameron thus far.
A very handy glossary of HTML5 from the medical professionals at HTML5 Doctor.
