So You Like To Use The Internet

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I suggest you read the latest at Area Ocho by Dive Medic: “There Is No Hiding Your Thoughts“

He summarizes with:
“You can’t think about taking a crap without someone expecting you to reach for toilet paper.“

I do what I can to prevent much of this on this site – I keep minimal statistics, I don’t use Google Analytics, I use an uncommon theme, I don’t apply cookies (though WordPress does). I don’t use certain plugins that would make maintenance of this site easier but feed back information to the provider. I do use a spam filter which collects info. But by necessity, your IP address is captured as is your browser; both are needed to allow your computer to view this (or any other) site. Several other aspects of your system are also captured. A VPN can help, but the use of such also leaves a “fingerprint”.

For example, yesterday (Friday) this site had 139 visitors from 71 IP addresses (which are recorded). Most viewers show up on Tuesday mornings. The most common browser is Chrome followed by Edge. The most common – by far – country for visitors is US, followed by Hong Kong, China, Serbia, Belgium, Canada. I suspect some of those provide the wonderfully unoriginal spam of which I currently have 99 waiting to be checked for legit comments and then deleted.
Among the more word-for-word common:

“I don’t think the title of your article matches the content lol. Just kidding, mainly because I had some doubts after reading the article.“
“Can you be more specific about the content of your article? After reading it, I still have some doubts. Hope you can help me.”
“Your point of view caught my eye and was very interesting. Thanks. I have a question for you.”

I can’t do anything about what happens from your end.

Your computer may be the culprit: both Apple and particularly Windows “phone home” if for nothing else, to make sure your license is up-to-date. Your browser is tracked to the point where it is possible to record which tabs you have open and where they are connected. Win11 is particularly troublesome – I dumped Windows operating system shortly after Win10 came out. This site (and hosting service) is based on open-source Linux.
(I was working for an agency when Win10 was released. The agency wanted to stick with Win7 due to security concerns in Win10. The agency finally relented though).

Even air-gapped computers are at risk. Every time a USB device is plugged in, the transfer of information is possible whether intended or not. Did you know the technology exists that can track your computer usage through fluctuations in your power line or from electromagnetic fields emanating from your monitor? Not that the use of such is common … but it does exist. Think of those electric company meters that track usage second-by-second (they can record much faster than that though).

There is no escape; to attempt to escape is just adding one more piece of information about yourself to those interested in such information. “Looking to disappear? We can sell you bug-out gear.”

Stay safe out there folks … Embrace the tech. It’s embracing you.
(Advice given by someone who avoids smart phones as much as possible)

We’re Not In Kansas Anymore

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Juneteenth

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On this most pandering of holidays, dedicated to the fear of Nat Turner, we celebrate diversity:

Slipsticks

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For those in technical fields some large number of decades ago, slide rules were THE means of calculation.
No calculators, no PCs, no smart phones, no AI.

Recall (maybe) that slide rules work on the basic principle that adding logarithms is the equivalent of multiplication:
log(A x B) = log A + log B
log (A/B) = log A – log B
log Ac = c log A

Calculators got rid of that principle; Boolean (binary) logic was more conducive to electronic implementation (aka “digital” stuff).
And it’s been that way since … since roughly 1970.

But here now in 2026, AI and quantum computing are the current rage. And Nvidia is the king of the heap in providing the chips that drive that effort. If you have any investments in a ETF or mutual fund, you likely own shares of Nvidia – among if not the largest company in the world with a capitalization of over $5Trillion (1000 times 1 billion) – larger than all but 3 or 4 countries. (Elon Musk himself is now worth about $1T)

This just came over my transom:
A new company is challenging Nvidia … by implementing the electronic slide-rule methodology of using logarithms; binary logic systems have gotten too unwieldy. This is big if they can pull it off.

Tensordyne claims its 72-chip system can run large LLMs four times as fast using 20% of the power of Nvidia’s GB300 system. The “secret” behind the outsized efficiency of the new device is how it does matrix multiplication, the main math of AI. It takes advantage of the fact that the logarithm of A times B equals the logarithm of A plus the logarithm of B.
“We’ve turned multipliers into adders,” explains Gilles Backhus, a Tensordyne founder and vice president of AI. Adders are smaller and more energy-efficient logic circuits than those that do multiplication, he says. So Napier can pack more compute into a smaller area and still save on power.

Can’t help it – this is the kind of stuff that captures my interest.

Somewhere Over The Rainbow

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Off CO92 outside Crawford, Colorado – which incidentally, is where Joe Cocker spent his last years. No, I never met him.

Oregon to California and New York:

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Here – hold my beer.

I see an article on ZeroHedge by Tyler Durden:
“New Oregon Initiative Would Criminalize Hunting, Fishing And Farming“

This has been in the local news recently seeing as the state line is right over there … and it’s heavy ranch and farming country (and desert as well to be fair). Going to be fun, fishing by boat from the Snake River.
One side you fix yourself a meal; the other, the county fixes it for you.

One segment:
“Leftist activists have adopted the age-old mantra that the “squeaky wheel gets the oil”; but imagine a wheel that never gets enough oil?  Imagine a movement specifically designed to keep society constantly on egg shells, trying to figure out different ways to satisfy that squeaky wheel so it will finally shut up?
One eventually has to ask the obvious question:  Why don’t we simply throw that insufferable wheel in the garbage?“

“If passed, the law would effectively criminalize the entire meat production base for the state under “animal cruelty” statutes.“

[Final sentence]
“This is why the majority of Americans distrust and despise vegans: It not because they’ve chosen a different lifestyle, it’s because they are obsessed with forcing that lifestyle on everyone else.“

Two things I noted:
1) Tyler Durden is a pseudonym: This “feels” like it was written by AI … or equally “flat”, a committee.
2) Not just vegans

Rocks

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… with a few cows

Blogger

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Seems to be on the warpath the past few days.

This message is getting to be common:
Sorry, the blog at variouswebsites.blogspot.com has been removed. This address is not available for new blogs.

It’s one reason this site is on WordPress.

Tunesday: King Crimson – Epitaph

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A sample of some obscure – and maybe not obscure – tunes from my strange and off-the-wall collection.

Today’s medley selection: King Crimson – “Epitaph” 1969

From the 1969 album “In The Court Of The Crimson King“, the cut was released as a single in 1976.

King Crimson was a 5-man band formed in London in 1968. “In The Court Of The Crimson King” was their first and most successful album. The original band broke up and personnel fluctuated during the recording of the band’s 2nd and 3rd LPs: “In The Wake Of Poseidon” and “Lizard“. One of those changes in personnel was with Greg Lake (bass, vocals), who because of the band’s uncertain future, teamed up with Keith Emerson of Nice and Carl Palmer of Atomic Rooster to form Emerson, Lake, and Palmer after recording Poseidon.

In Case You Were All Wondering

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Larry Lambert over at Virtual Mirage posted a picture of me preparing posts for New American Digest.

Enjoy … 🙂