Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

Celebrate the fucking wins.

They punch you in the face and then start crying because their fist hurts.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

This blog will pay for itself.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. do not touch it.”

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

When you’re in more danger from the IDF than from Russian shelling, that’s really bad.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

He really is that stupid.

Giving up is unforgivable.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

When I was faster i was always behind.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread: Spoutible Sneak Peek

Open Thread: Spoutible Sneak Peek

by | 206 Comments

This post is in: 

Open thread.

Spoutible Sneak Peek (below) and link to survey (even further below).

Spoutible Sneak Peek

Email message with the update, and link to the survey.

We designed Spoutible to be familiar, and it should be easy to navigate for most people migrating from Twitter. But don’t be mistaken; Spoutible isn’t just another Twitter alternative or clone. We have read your comments and suggestions and implemented many of the top-requested features.

We are building Spoutible for the community, and Spoutible can’t be successful without an active community.

So please take a moment to answer our latest survey and help us make Spoutible better:  Survey Link

We will publish the results on Monday.

I’ve been working all day.  What did I miss?

Open thread.  (But I repeat myself.)

Reader Interactions

206Comments

  3. 3.

    RedDirtGirl

    I just pre-registered. I haven’t migrated over to any other platform yet. Mastodon confused me. We’ll see.

  5. 5.

    SpaceUnit

    If they intend to compete with Twitter they’ll need to have both harassment and disinformation.

  6. 6.

    Scout211

    Reposting from downstairs, Barbara Lee is planning to run for Senate.

    CNN — 
    Rep. Barbara Lee of California told her colleagues in the Congressional Black Caucus during a closed-door meeting Wednesday that she plans to run for the Senate, multiple sources told CNN.

    This comes a day after Rep. Katie Porter of California announced a 2024 Senate bid, launching her campaign for Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s seat in what could be a crowded Democratic primary.

    One source close to Lee told CNN she has no intention of announcing her run right now amid the storms in California, as well as out of respect for Feinstein, but she plans to run. Politico first reported Lee’s comments to the CBC at a closed-door meeting.

  9. 9.

    JWR

    “What did I miss?”

    I left this at the end of the last, almost dead thread. Via NBC:

    WASHINGTON — Aides to President Joe Biden have discovered at least one additional batch of classified documents in a location separate from the Washington office he used after leaving the Obama administration, according to a person familiar with the matter.

    Thanks for the new thread!

  12. 12.

    David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    J. Robert Oppenheimer Cleared of ‘Black Mark’ After 68 Years

    The physicist and architect of the American atomic bomb was stripped of his security clearance in 1954 after what is now called a flawed investigation.

    “I’m overwhelmed with emotion,” said Kai Bird, co-author with Martin J. Sherwin of “American Prometheus,” a 2005 biography of Oppenheimer that won the Pulitzer Prize.

    “History matters and what was done to Oppenheimer in 1954 was a travesty, a black mark on the honor of the nation,” Mr. Bird said. “Students of American history will now be able to read the last chapter and see that what was done to Oppenheimer in that kangaroo court proceeding was not the last word.”

    Alex Wellerstein, historian of nuclear weapons, a professor at the Stevens Institute of Technology

    It completely surprised me.

    I knew that they had this requested. I knew that various administrations had thought about this. But it was surprising, because the easiest thing for a bureaucrat to do is not do anything, right? There was no great public outcry or demand for this. There are ways you could imagine this being spun by enemies of the current political administration.

    There’s not a lot of obvious need or gain. It’s just sort of a righting of historical wrongs, which, unfortunately, is not usually a priority. So, yes, I was surprised. It’d be much easier for them to do nothing on this than to do something. And them having done this is them sticking their neck out a bit.

  13. 13.

    WaterGirl

    @SpaceUnit: hahaha

    I assume that they assume that all of the choices in that question are important.  My guess is that they are looking for cues for how to prioritize as they roll it out.

  14. 14.

    BR

    I think the strength of Mastodon is that it’s open and not run by one company. It’s always tempting to join some new platform that says it’s going to give you the best of what Twitter had without the worst, but I doubt that’s possible. Most likely Spoutible, like Post and others popping up, will deliver neither.I’m finding Mastodon to be excellent, and I think a lot of confusion comes from people being told that there’s some complex step where you have to pick a server. Don’t worry about that: just go to the main server and sign up:

    https://mastodon.social

    And then to figure out who you want to follow at first, just browse the explore tab to start things off and follow anyone and everyone who seems even vaguely interesting, and then they will lead you to new folks over time.

  15. 15.

    Scout211

    That emergency alert that woke us up at 3:40 am yesterday with a tornado warning was scary. We had a strong thunderstorm and gale force winds but no tornado. It turns out, that cell did produce a tornado after it passed over our area. Link

    Then at 4:10 a.m., a brief EF-1 tornado touched down near a small reservoir and Hogan Dam Road about six miles northeast of Milton and tore a 50-yard-wide path through trees for about 0.4 miles.

    So in California we now have rain, snow, gale-force and hurricane-force winds, bomb cyclones, floods, mudslides, sink holes,  power outages, at least 17 deaths and now a tornado.

  16. 16.

    Ken

    Wait, did I miss something?  Is Balloon Juice migrating to Spoutible?

    (This is how rumors start…)

  17. 17.

    fancycwabs

    @rikyrah: I’ve been watching it–it’s fine? I don’t recall the movies it’s only tangentially related to having quite so much exposition, but admittedly it’s been a while since I’ve seen them.

    Also, if Nick Cage doesn’t make a cameo I’m going to be very disappointed.

  22. 22.

    Matt McIrvin

    Vox ran a story the gist of which was “users are fleeing Mastodon, Elon Musk is gonna win” and it seemed a bit overblown to say the least. The point of Mastodon wasn’t really to be the Twitter replacement, of course.

  23. 23.

    WaterGirl

    @BR:

    I think the strength of Mastodon is that it’s open and not run by one company.

    That’s a double-edged sword.  It’s a strength and potentially a clusterfuck.  There’s just no telling.  Which it is will totally depend on the people who run the individual instances.  And perhaps it will be some of both.

    Most likely Spoutible, like Post and others popping up, with deliver neither.

    Wondering if you have a magic 8-ball or perhaps you’re a time traveler.  :-)   Seems odd to dismiss something like this as a failure before you’ve even seen it.

  24. 24.

    BR

    @WaterGirl: ​

    Oh, I’m speculating, of course. But Post is already showing signs of this — I’m hearing way fewer people enjoying or even trying Post and way fewer folks posting links to it. And I’m just finding personally that there are a lot of Balloon Juice aligned conversations happening over among Mastodon users. To each their own of course.

  26. 26.

    WaterGirl

    @Scout211: I was about to make a joke about the universe making a statement about the lost House seats in CA, but that’s just too much stuff to even joke about.

    And you didn’t even mention earthquakes!

  28. 28.

    MattF

    So… who’s behind Spoutible? Where is the money coming from?

    I’ve shifted a chunk of my ‘social media’ time to Mastodon, after figuring out how to do the various Twittery things. Some shift of subject matter as well, since the server I’ve signed onto (mathstodon.xyz) favors mathematical subjects. Mastodon’s decentralized structure means everything is somewhat more complicated.

  29. 29.

    WaterGirl

    @SpaceUnit: Yes, it’s being developed by the Bot Sentinel guy.  He announced in early December (?) that they would be rolling it out at some point in January, and they have been putting out surveys asking for input.

    I think this might be the 3rd survey I’ve seen.

  30. 30.

    WaterGirl

    @Roger Moore: @Jess:

    I didn’t read the question / comment from Jess closely enough, Thanks for clarifying.

    There were something like 6 or 7 options to choose from as the MOST IMPORTANT THING.  I just mentioned those two because to me they were both top choices, and necessary.

  32. 32.

    Layer8Problem

    @Baud:  I haven’t been hearing as many brain-dead pronouncements from him.  Perhaps he’s been given a good talking to by the Tesla board and shareholders and his birdsite creditors overseas.

  33. 33.

    Scout211

    @WaterGirl: ha! I was actually talking about what is happening in California right now in this never-ending weather pattern. It feels like 40 days and 40 nights . . .

  34. 34.

    Old School

    @fancycwabs:

    Also, if Nick Cage doesn’t make a cameo I’m going to be very disappointed.

    He’s not going to be in the first season.  I read that the producers hope to get at least a cameo in a second season.

  35. 35.

    WaterGirl

    @MattF: Christopher Bouzy is creating Spoutify.

    Twitter: @cbouzy

    He asked for $5 donations, in December, I think, from folks who were interested in the possibility of Spoutify.

  36. 36.

    schrodingers_cat

    I am a late adopter of social media, still on Twitter and am reviving my old blog. I never join Farce Book and the only other social media I use is Pinterest as inspiration for my home, fashion and art. My boards are private.

  37. 37.

    Baud

    I was not a Twitter user, but have been waiting to see if people moved to any particular alternative before thinking about signing on.  Sounds like the jury is still out.

  38. 38.

    Geminid

    @Scout211: Politico’s article on Lee’s heads up to the Congressional Black Caucus said that Adam Schiff also  intends to run for that Senate seat. A 3-way race between Porter, Lee and Schiff will be interesting. It’s a jungle primary so there will be other Republicans as well as more Democrats. The three Democratic Reps could be the big three, though.

    I wonder if Republican David Valadeo will enter the Senate race. He might as well; Valadeo represents a purple district and the 2024 election may be an extintion event for purple district Republicans.

    Valadeo is one of only two Republican Impeachers to win reelection. The other is Newhouse (WA). Four retired and four lost primaries.

  40. 40.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Geminid: It will be funny if White Board Wendy (h/t Black Twitter) comes 3rd or doesn’t finish in the top 3.

    Then I think she will be headed to MSNBC to duel with the Fox White Board wielder, Karl Rove.

  41. 41.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: ​
    My very tenuous connection to Oppenheimer is that one of my favorite professors was a grad student of his. Joe Weinberg hated the academic physics establishment, and the way I heard it was that it had to do with how Oppenheimer was treated.​

    Edit: Just googled him. Might have been more than that, it appears Weinberg himself ran afoul of the House Unamerican Activities Committee and lost his position as a result.​

  42. 42.

    Righteous Hazard

    No matter how decent a dude Bouzy is, I am done with trusting single individuals when so much is at stake. Zuck and Dumbass Bitcoin Jack (and his ‘singular trusted solution’ Musk) have permanently cured me of that.

    YMMV, and if Bouzy’s Spoutible is anyone’s offramp out of Musk’s cursed exploitation engine, that is great. For me, Mastodon ain’t perfect, but the math nerd server (mathstodon.xyz) I landed on seems alright, and the minute the mods tip even the slightest bit shitheel, I’ll just move to a different server, and take my account with me.

  45. 45.

    Quiltingfool

    I just scheduled a knee replacement surgery!  In March!

    I know it will not be fun, but I am looking forward to the day when the simple act of walking does not cause me pain…and I can enjoy all sorts of things like museums, fabric shopping at Missouri Star Quilting, staying at a quilt show for more than 30 minutes…you get the drift.

    My doctor also has to remove a mass behind my bad knee, composed of encapsulated synovial fluid.  The best way I can describe what THAT looks like on an X-ray is, well, have you ever seen one of those squishy stress balls that looks like it has thousands of tiny balls surrounded by a viscous fluid inside it?  That’s what the mass looks like.  Big ol’ lump.  Not very attractive.

    I’ve had way too much people interaction today.  I was charming as hell, but my “charming” bucket is empty.  Oh, and I got jury duty notice – to start during the six week rehab…hmmm…

  47. 47.

    Geminid

    @schrodingers_cat: There has been a “brushfire” war on Twitter since Porter’s announcement. I’m not sure the Porter fans understand why she is a polarizing figure among Democrats.

    I’ll be watching this race because I’m curious about California’s Democratic politics. They are very different from my own state’s, and not just because California is so much bigger. Jungle primaries are a factor but there seem to be others too.

  49. 49.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Geminid: Its the same demographic that went hard for Elizabeth Warren and was surprised that not everyone was into her like they were

    ETA: Black people haven’t forgotten the stunt she tried with Maxine Waters. And the Nina Turner endorsement

    There are stories about her ill-treating her staff especially the ones of the not so pale hues. But since there are horrors stories out there about many women legislators I don’t know how much credence I should give this.

  50. 50.

    Barbara

    @Geminid: I didn’t actually know that she was polarizing among Democrats — but I can definitely see how Schiff and Lee might be viewed as more credible candidates.  The number of higher profile (and frankly, great) candidates makes me think DiFi will not be re-elected, the only question being whether she will make that decision herself by choosing not to run.  Any of these three is an improvement over Kevin DeLeon, IMHO.

  52. 52.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Geminid:

    I’m not sure the Porter fans understand why she is a polarizing figure among Democrats.

    I about rolled my eyes out of my head when I saw the little stunt with the book, which seemed out of character, and I was kind of surprised how many other people seemed to view it the same way, especially here.

  54. 54.

    Baud

    @Barbara:

    I didn’t actually know that she was polarizing among Democrats

    In fairness, the number of Democrats who know who any of these people are is pretty low.

  56. 56.

    Geminid

    @schrodingers_cat: My friend Joan was a big Warren fan, and she sent Porter money yesterday. Joan is very excited by the prospect of Porter joining Warren in the Senate.

    I guess we are all entitled to our own heros. I think Joan will be disappointed, though.

  57. 57.

    Baud

    @schrodingers_cat: I don’t know anything about the book or the author, but I’m not going to require any Dem to police what other people say on Twitter to ensure they aren’t being offensive.

  59. 59.

    Baud

    I wouldn’t be surprised if the next senator from the great state of California is someone we’ve never heard of.

  62. 62.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Barbara:

    I didn’t actually know that she was polarizing among Democrats

    Between trying to do an end-run around Maxine Waters (to say nothing of a whole bunch of other backbench Dems) on her committee assignments to endorsing Nina Turner, one might very well conclude that the fawning responses she’s gotten from twitter and Lawrence O’Donnell for her white board skewed her perspective and led her to alienate some significant parts of the voters (and potentially donors) she’ll need. She certainly wouldn’t be the first Dem of the last few years to buy into their own very favorable, yet very narrow, press coverage

  63. 63.

    TriassicSands

    I’ve been working all day.  What did I miss? — WaterGirl

    What did you miss? Relaxing and having fun, maybe? You spend so much time helping to make B-J work, you deserve some serious downtime.

  64. 64.

    WaterGirl

    @Geminid: I worry about the jungle primary in CA, hoping the likely 3-way vote split between the 3 bigger names in the House doesn’t mean we end up with a fucking Republican.

  65. 65.

    Ken

    As long as having three (or more) Democrats running in the jungle primary, doesn’t result in having two Republicans running  in the election

    EDIT: I see WaterGirl got there seconds before me. Ah well.

  69. 69.

    Geminid

    @Barbara: Yesterday’s Politico article about Katie Porter’s announcement noted that it comes

    “before Feinstein announces her retirement- which is expected in the next couple months.”

    According to today’s Politico article, Barbara Lee met with Senator Feinstein recently to discuss their respective plans.

  70. 70.

    laura

    I’m interested in spoutible BECAUSE it will center black voices and this old white gal is here for it!

    Show pony is not my choice. No legislative record to run on, stunt-reading in the House last week, shivving Maxine Waters on behalf of Nina Turner- hard pass. And if she texts my with a money beg I’ll throw a chair.

  71. 71.

    Kelly

    Waiting for Mrs Kelly s dermatology appointment to finish. The clinic is only allowing patients in building. I’m in favor of this level of caution

  74. 74.

    WaterGirl

    @Baud: I assume you can run in a primary for Senate without having to give up your seat in the House?

    Hoping that you only have to give up the seat in the House if you are the candidate in the General election.

  77. 77.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Porter is somewhat of a celebrity now, with a state and national fan base among white (it seems), liberal Democrats. She’ll need to attract California voters outside this base to win that seat, though.

  82. 82.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Geminid: @Baud: I got forwarded a clip with her and white board by a cousin in Delhi.

    ETA: This cousin used to be a journalist for the Times of India (India’s equivalent of the NYT). And was here on a state dept scholarship in the aughts for a semester. So not quite a normie Indian but still.

  83. 83.

    M31

    @Baud: Hasn’t Elon been making less news recently?

    just read on Twitter that the landlords of the Singapore offices of Twitter just marched everyone out of the buildings for nonpayment of rent

    lol

  85. 85.

    Doc Sardonic

    @geg6: Damn…..meningitis from what I’ve read. Saw him not too long ago, put on a really good show. Guess I we’ll find out how the new pacemaker gets along with my Strats and tube amp tonight.

  86. 86.

    narya

    @geg6: Bummer. Only time I saw him live was when the Clapton road show thingy came to Chicago. Even in that abbreviated format, he was transcendent.

  89. 89.

    Geminid

    @WaterGirl: I don’t think someone can run for both offices, but that is a matter of state law. You can in Virginia. As a practical matter, even if you can you could lose both primaries.

    That happened to Lee Carter in Virginia in 2021. He lost in the Governor primary- which was a certainty- but he also lost the Democratic primary for his House of Delegats seat. Now Carter’s grown a beard and he tweets about farming in Louisa County.

  90. 90.

    Quiltingfool

    @Gin & Tonic: Perhaps I should say I play “charming” fairly well.  Or maybe one could call it “friendly and witty.”  The friendly/witty bucket is also empty.

    My husband just bought a truck today – he’s out of town, so we had to FaceTime the process.  Yay technology, I don’t have to drive 3 hours one way to do the paperwork.

    The things I do for love.  I’m exhausted.  I really want someone to make me dinner, but the cat has indicated she Will.Not.Be.Doing.That.

  91. 91.

    Baud

    @M31: Heh. Even if Twitter has stabilized in terms of the tech and content moderation issues, there is still the question of whether it can survive financially.

  94. 94.

    Mallard Filmore

    @geg6:

    RIP Jeff Beck, guitar god.

    Also in the bad news department …

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/11/2146696/-Michael-Flatley-Diagnosed-With-Aggressive-Form-of-Cancer

    Michael Flatley has been diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer, has undergone surgery and is under the care of doctors. No other information on his condition has been released at this time.

    I simply cannot imagine this world without the presence of this brilliant and talented man, who brought Irish dance into the modern era with “Riverdance” in 1995.

  95. 95.

    WaterGirl

    @Baud: I guess what I’m asking is whether the House people who are Senate candidates can run for both the House and the Senate at the same time.

    Or if you run in the primary for Senate, are you unable to also run for your seat in the next House?

  96. 96.

    JWR

    @geg6:

    RIP Jeff Beck, guitar god.

    Oh sh*t! And only 76! Screw bacterial meningitis!

    I’ve always been a huge Jimmy Page acolyte, but for my money Beck was the most creative of the Beck, Clapton and Page triumvirate. (To be honest, aside from Disraeli Gears, I never cared much at all for EC.)

    But damn! May this god Rest In Peace. :(

  99. 99.

    moonbat

    Bouzy has been listening to potential users every step of the way. I think he is building a platform that looks enough like Twitter that it will be easy for people to switch. And because of his background with BotSentinel it is not going to be overrun by trolls and bots and with strict guardrails against disinformation and hate speech. He’s also made a commitment to hire a diverse group of men and women to run the company.

    If I remember correctly the equivalent of a Tweet will be a Spout and the equivalent of a retweet will be an echo. I’m looking forward to it. It’s about three weeks away from launching the beta. Folks who preregister will get first dibs on their user names.

  100. 100.

    Baud

    @moonbat:

    If I remember correctly the equivalent of a Tweet will be a Spout

    I’m not sure if that’s better or worse than the mastadon “toot.”

    On my social media platform, posts will be called “discharges.”

  102. 102.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Porter would have a good shot at reelection. Cook gives the California 47th CD a PVI of D+3. She won this time by about the same number, and 2024 should be a more favorable electorate for Democrats generally.

  106. 106.

    Roger Moore

    @Geminid:

    Politico’s article on Lee’s heads up to the Congressional Black Caucus said that Adam Schiff also  intends to run for that Senate seat. A 3-way race between Porter, Lee and Schiff will be interesting. It’s a jungle primary so there will be other Republicans as well as more Democrats.

    My gut feeling is that the Democrats will figure out something before the primary so they don’t have too many people running.  The more serious candidates who run, the greater the chance of splitting the vote and winding up with Republicans taking the two top spots, which would be a complete disaster.  Also, any House member will have to give up their shot at reelection, so they have a strong desire to make up their mind on which way to go in time to wind up on the right ballot.

  109. 109.

    moonbat

    @karen marie: ​
      They wanted Spout.com but someone had already camped out on the domain name and wanted $1 million to give it up. Bouzy wasn’t willing to pay that ransom so Spoutible it is.
    I’m so old I remember when everyone thought Tweet sounded stupid.

  111. 111.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud: Yeah, I think he quieted down for a while and it did slow the exodus from Twitter; people figure they can live with it.

    I don’t know. I more or less left Twitter several months before this all happened so I was kind of viewing it as a spectator. It did drive me to get off my duff and get a Mastodon account, but for me, Mastodon is not functionally a replacement for Twitter so much as a replacement for the long-gone Google+. I don’t think I actually need a replacement for Twitter. Was doing bad things to my mind.

  113. 113.

    Redshift

    @WaterGirl:

    Or if you run in the primary for Senate, are you unable to also run for your seat in the next House?

    I agree with Geminid, it’s definitely a matter of state law. (Though did you mean can or can’t in Virginia, G?)

    There was nothing preventing candidates from running for multiple offices simultaneously here in VA until a local perennial weirdo candidate, C.W. “Levi” Levy, successfully got on the primary ballot for five different offices. He wouldn’t have been able to serve effectively in more than one, but there was nothing preventing it, and after that the legislature changed the law.

  115. 115.

    VeniceRiley

    As a former Porter constituent and native Californian, I can say I would prefer a candidate with winning statewide experience.

    As for Spoutible, I give my whole social media endorsement to Chris Bouzy, who has been doing the hard work to expose Bot accounts amplifying bulship on social media for years

    PS waiting for POC endorsements for senator to back who the people who do the work back.

  117. 117.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Geminid:

    and 2024 should be a more favorable electorate for Democrats generally.

    I agree (with the usual caveat about not counting chickens and events, dear boy, events!)

    I looked up the 18 margin and was surprised Feinstein only beat De Leon by about eight points. I remembered it being a blow out

  118. 118.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Set in British India, an over the top and simplistic spectacle with little relation to reality by the director of Bahubali (Think of movies like GWTW or Ben-Hur

    It is slick so the subtext goes over the head of many American reviewers. Who are all ga ga about the spectacle. I think the RSS has found its Riefenstahl.

  120. 120.

    karen marie

    @Righteous Hazard:   I’m having a fine time on Mastodon.  Feel free to take a look at who I follow (or even follow me, though I’m not hung up on that aspect, so no pressure) to see if there are any that interest you (I’ve got a bunch of “politics” people in the mix).  You can find me at “at axomamma at mastodon dot online.”

    For me, there are two things which have made my experience there the pleasure it is.  First is, go to “preferences” and choose “slow mode.”  It stops the wild refreshing that shoves new content in front of you at a whiplash rate.  The second is, use of lists.  I have one list that I use to segregate the people I’m interested in seeing on the regular.  I’ve seen others report that they’ve created multiple lists because they have multiple interests – whatever works for you.

    Other than missing many of the animal accounts I followed on twitter, I haven’t found mastodon wanting in terms of interesting and informative people to follow.  I’ve actually found many new (to me) accounts I hadn’t come across on twitter.

    If anyone wants an invite to make signup even easier, just click here.

  121. 121.

    Danielx

    Things going downhill – scheduled for two hours quality time with periodontist tomorrow and Jeff Beck died today.

  122. 122.

    Geminid

    @Roger Moore: Will there a real chance of Republicans taking both spots?

    I guess if polling shows this is a prospect the low polling Democrat will be pressured to drop out. The second-polling Republican would have to be pretty strong though.

  123. 123.

    karen marie

    @Geminid:   I did not know that Porter was “a polarizing figure among Democrats.”  Please do tell.

    @Baud: I’m pretty sure Barbara was referring to herself.  Like her, I had no idea that Porter was “polarizing.”

  125. 125.

    Kelly

    Mrs Kelly s dermatology has stretched to 3 hours now. Ah, those innocent days of a healthy tan

  126. 126.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Quiltingfool: ​
     

    I’m exhausted. I really want someone to make me dinner, but the cat has indicated she Will.Not.Be.Doing.That.

    You probably didn’t want Mouse Tartare anyway.

  129. 129.

    Danielx

    @kalakal:

    As have others – taking this hard. Of course it may be that I’m in a mood anyway because of the whole periodontal thing tomorrow, but I don’t think so.

  130. 130.

    lowtechcyclist

    @JWR: ​
     

    And only 76! Screw bacterial meningitis!

    Nitpick: he’d have turned 79 in June.

    I think those of us who remember the British Invasion just have to get used to seeing our musical heroes pass on. They were largely WWII babies, which means they’re all either pushing 80, past 80, or have passed on.

  131. 131.

    Roger Moore

    @Baud:

    None of the candidates being talked about have statewide experience.

    Let’s go John Chiang! For non Californians, Chiang was state Controller and Treasurer, and ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2018.  I admit he’s a long shot for Senator, but I still have a big soft spot for him.

  132. 132.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    somebody’s gonna take this guy seriously, but in the meantime I chuckled

    Scott Charles @TheScottCharles 8h

    I haven’t slept a wink since learning that 87,000 IRS agents dressed in drag and high on rainbow fentanyl plan to replace our gas stoves with electric ranges smuggled into the country by Mexican cartels.

  133. 133.

    Geminid

    @karen marie: She is polarizing. If you do Twitter you can see for yourself. There should be stories about this on news sites before too long also.

    I’m not sure what your “Please do tell” means. It may be a challenge from a Porter adherent. I know my friend Joan is very touchy about Porter criticism.

    This is nothing I particularly want to argue about, but I can dig up a short,  representative anti-Porter view that Catherine Prendergast retweeted this morning if you want.

  134. 134.

    Roger Moore

    @Geminid:

    Will there a real chance of Republicans taking both spots?

    Things could get wild if too many Democrats run.  If there are just a couple of Republicans and a bunch of Democrats, the Democrats could split their vote too many ways and let the Republicans slip onto the ballot.  I don’t think that’s likely, but mostly because the Democrats are much better organized here and are more likely to keep their slate to a decent size.  If they fail at that, though, all bets are off.

  137. 137.

    cain

    @WaterGirl: You can apply that to anything, right? Ultimately, it sorts itself out and there will be a small group of “good ones”.

    You could move to sproutible until it goes off the deep end and you’ll be moving again – it took what 14 years for this to die? Meh. I’ll stick to the open source/community edition – in a world where my privacy is constantly up for sale and being profited off of I’m going to with my fellow humans and honestly Mastodon has been more lovely than twitter ever was.

  140. 140.

    Geminid

    @Roger Moore: This potential problem may resolve itself. This time next year, if one of the 3 Democratic Reps is trailing badly, they could bail and concentrate on reelection to their House seat.

    I’m not sure the Republicans have two dynamic candidates. David Valadeo might appeal to Independents, though. I think California may have more Independents than Republicans now..

  141. 141.

    Quiltingfool

    @Narya: For hand quilting?  No, not offhand.  I do have a frame for hand quilting, but the joints in my hands protest!  Lol!

    Nowadays, it seems like lots of quilters are doing machine quilting – either on sewing machines, or the big quilting machines (like I have).  There is an art to doing good hand quilting.  The Amish and Mennonite ladies are quite good – 10 to 12 stitches per inch, which is TINY stitches.  I thought I did well to do 6 per inch.

  142. 142.

    NotMax

    For those across the pond, an FYI courtesy of BBC.

    Royal Mail tells people not to send post abroad due to ‘cyber incident’ Source

  143. 143.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @cain: So far, I don’t really care for Mastodon.  Then again, I am not an early adopter so I probably woke invest the time to navigate it until I see whether or not it is the place where everyone ends up.  Spoutible actually sounds plausible to me.  But I don’t want grab the next Betamax.

  147. 147.

    Scout211

    Oh my. Arkansas Governor Sanders hit the ground running.

    Within hours of being sworn in as the new governor of Arkansas, Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed an executive order Tuesday banning the term “Latinx” from official use in the state government.
     
    It is one of the first, if not the first, executive order of its kind, Tabitha Bonilla, an associate professor of human development and social policy at Northwestern University, told NBC News.
     
    It was one of seven orders signed by Sanders, a Republican, right after taking the oath. The other ones focused on prohibiting Arkansas schools from teaching critical race theory, budgeting and spending as well as other government affairs.

  148. 148.

    Omnes Omnibus

    I just got to make a “helicopters aren’t laughing” joke on Twitter.  We’ll see how broad this blog’s reach actually is.

  150. 150.

    Quiltingfool

    @lowtechcyclist: Well, I’m not sure she is a mouser.  She gives her little stuffed fish hell, and she spent about 15 minutes playing with a pencil she found on the floor.  She does enjoy knocking things off the dresser.  I watched her knock a small pocket knife to the floor, and it went under the dresser.  She hopped down and carefully fished out the knife.  Good thing, that meant I didn’t have to hear my husband complain that he lost another pocket knife!

  152. 152.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Kelly: Unfortunately not necessarily. We’ve had years where California had lots of rain in December and January — and then the rains just (more or less) stopped. It actually made the fire danger worse because we had greater than usual vegetation growth* and then the earlier end to the rain resulted in drier than normal vegetation later in the year.

    *The winter wet season is CA’s natural growing season followed by a months long dry season that literally doesn’t have rain in the non-mountain areas from late spring through last fall.

  156. 156.

    Brachiator

    @Geminid:

    I think California may have more Independents than Republicans now..

    Yep. From a 2018 study:

    Independent voters are now the second-largest voting bloc in California.

    As of the June 2018 primary, the share of California voters registered as independents, also known as “decline to state” or “no party preference” voters, was 25.5%—surpassing the number of registered Republicans in the state for the first time. The share of registered independents has increased more than twofold since the November 1994 gubernatorial election (10.3%). Over the same period, the percentage of voters affiliated with each major party has fallen: Republicans from 37.2% to 25.1%, and Democrats from 49% to 44.4%.

    But Independent voters lean toward the Democrats.

    A plurality of independents lean toward the Democratic Party.

    Our surveys over the past year indicate that more independents who are likely to vote lean toward the Democratic than toward the Republican Party (43% to 29%), while 28% lean toward neither party.

  158. 158.

    TriassicSands

    @Baud:

    I have no interest in Twitter/Mastodon/etc. but if everyone waits to sign up that seems like it will kind of defeat the purpose of  waiting.

    If you are interested, why not sign up and see what happens. That will be one more nudge in that direction. You can always quit, right? Just a suggestion.

  159. 159.

    C Stars

    @schrodingers_cat: Interesting to know. We started watching it but found it problematic and stopped after ten minutes. Mainly because of the violence (watching with our 9 year old). Seemed of course anti British/colonialist but did not realize the context in the present day.

  165. 165.

    JWR

    I figure I’ll try setting up a Mastodon account, if only to change the default light text, dark background theme. (Me hatesss it!)

  166. 166.

    JWR

    @Baud:

    I currently don’t do any social media.

    Okay, here’s what I don’t get: Isn’t participating in this here blurgh social media-ing?

  168. 168.

    Roger Moore

    @TriassicSands:

    If you are interested, why not sign up and see what happens. That will be one more nudge in that direction. You can always quit, right? Just a suggestion.

    Well put.  I understand the desire not to spend a bunch of time getting going in a new system that you’ll wind up abandoning, but it honestly isn’t that much work.  Meanwhile, by holding out, you wind up losing all the potential benefit you would get by using it while waiting for the perfect thing to show up.

  169. 169.

    C Stars

    @karen marie: Way back when Melon Husk first acquired twitter I made a counter social account. Just clicked on your link for mastodon, and the interface is completely the same but my sign in info doesn’t work? Arrgh

     

    ETA: Ah, never mind. I was looking at three separate tabs on my browser. I’m gonna go ahead and wait until one of these rises to the top. Joining counter social in retrospect seems naive. And I did it no less than three months ago…

  170. 170.

    Roger Moore

    @HumboldtBlue:

    Now what the hell do I do?

    The hardest part is connecting with the people you want to connect with.  I think someone came up with a list of Balloon-Juice people who are on Mastodon, which might be a good place to start.  Of course it could also be a terrible place.  YMMV.

  171. 171.

    HumboldtBlue

    @JWR:

    I hate it too, and I just changed mine from dark to light.

    @Roger Moore:

    I’m currently copying and pasting names from twitter into Mastodon to see if they are active. Tedious.

  174. 174.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud: Twitter (pre-Musk) seemed to be trying to expose me to as many hot takes that would make me angry or anxious as possible, in a way that BJ doesn’t. Some people seem to be able to avoid that by carefully pruning their stream, but of course it’s not precise because Twitter’s recommendation heuristics had a mind of their own.

  175. 175.

    Roger Moore

    @HumboldtBlue:

    I’m currently copying and pasting names from twitter into Mastodon to see if they are active. Tedious.

    For that, you could try something like Movetodon, which helps to automate the process.  It depends on people mentioning their Mastodon account in their Twitter profile, but it can help a lot.

  177. 177.

    C Stars

    @HumboldtBlue: I’m struggling too. I went ahead and joined and followed several folks, but when I tried to follow a rabbit person who I followed on Twitter, was told that account was on a different server and I’d have to sign in again. Then my login credentials didn’t work on that server. Sigh.

  182. 182.

    Scout211

    @Kelly: Many in my family have had Mohs surgeries, some have had more  than one. It really does take a long time in the office.

  183. 183.

    prostratedragon

    Well if this don’t beat all! From WaPost:

    A wide-ranging subpoena sent to Trump campaign officials last month shows new areas of investigative interest as part of the Justice Department’s extensive Jan. 6 criminal probe, according to a copy reviewed by The Washington Post, and lawyers say a grand jury focused on the day’s events and related fundraising has increased its activities in recent months.

    The subpoena was received in early December, according to a former Trump campaign official who provided the document to The Post on the condition of anonymity because a criminal investigation is ongoing. The document seeks more than two dozen categories of information, and includes some questions that were not part of a series of similar subpoenas reviewed by The Post that were sent to several dozen people in September.

    My emphasis. I guess this is what happens when DOJ won’t do the leaking in a sufficiently timely manner.

  185. 185.

    Roger Moore

    @C Stars:

    The thing with multiple servers is the hardest part of Mastodon to adapt to when moving from Twitter, but once you get a decent handle on it, everything should work smoothly.  You only have an account on one server; that’s what makes it your server.  If you accidentally click on a link and get to a different server, it won’t match your settings, it will demand you log in, and nothing will work right.  You might actually want to change your visual settings from the default in some way just to make it easier to notice when you’ve moved to a different server.

    If you find someone on a different server who you want to follow, there are two ways of following them:

    1. Type their username (e.g. @VATVSLPR for me) into the search box and click search.  This will present you with a list of people matching that handle.  You can click on the name to see their profile or just click on the little person icon to the right to follow them.
    2. If you see a post by someone you want to follow, you can click on their avatar to see their profile.  Then you just have to click on the big “Follow” button.

    The other thing that took me a while to figure out when getting started is that your local server may not have a full profile for someone from a different server.  Suppose you search for someone who nobody on your server has linked to yet.  If you click on their avatar, you’ll get a very incomplete version of their profile.  You can follow this back to their home server and get the full profile, but then you’ll be on a different server and the links won’t work the same way because it won’t be able to connect them to your server.

    A good example of this is if you find a friend who’s on a different server.  You want to see who they’re following, since you figure a bunch of your mutual friends will be on the list.  If you look at the profile on your server, you will get few or even none of the people they’re following.  There will be a link that says something like “Browse More On The Original Profile” that will take you to their server.  You can then see their full follow list, but you can’t instantly follow any of their follows because it’s on another server.  It’s actually pretty frustrating.

  187. 187.

    Cheez Whiz

    @Baud: its gonna be a while. Twitter is popular because it’s popular, and Musk is going to have to up his game to drive more people away. Mastodon and Post will suffer because new users will try to force them to be Twitter, and that trick never works. A new service built to copy Twitter has a chance, but again Musk is going to have to up his game substantially to drive remaining users away.

  188. 188.

    VFX Lurker

    @schrodingers_cat:

    It has little to do with the actual freedom struggle.

    Has any BJer watched it? It has got very gushy reviews in the US.

    It was on my “to watch” list because of its ambitious use of VFX. The “Corridor Crew” channel on YouTube did a 21-minute overview of the film’s VFX highlights.

    If I do get a chance to watch it, I will keep your caveat in mind.

  189. 189.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Roger Moore: You can paste the FULL account name (e.g. @[email protected] ) into the search box on your home Mastodon instance, and that should, I believe, always give you a link to a version of the account you can follow, unless it’s actually blocked on your instance.

    This procedure is NOT AT ALL OBVIOUS and there surely has to be a better way to do it.

  190. 190.

    Roger Moore

    @Cheez Whiz: ​
     

    its gonna be a while.

    Sadly, eviction proceedings can take a while. But once Twitter is kicked out of its headquarters for nonpayment of rent- and yes, there is a lawsuit about this going on right now- I think they’ll have a hard time keeping the system running.

  191. 191.

    zeecube

    @schrodingers_cat: Saw it on Netflix (I think) a few months ago.   3 hr movie.  British soldiers and evil spouses the baddies.  Lot’s of wtf-over-the-top action scenes.  Every now and then the action pauses for Bollywood dance scene.  Spectacular stunt work. And battle tigers!

  192. 192.

    NotMax

    @schrodingers_cat

    The Golden Globes are a curiosity unto themselves, what with no one being able to definitively pin down who constitutes the varied and fluid cast of voters.

    Boost for the egos of the recipients and their studios but of little import otherwise.

  196. 196.

    Rebel’s Dad

    @Quiltingfool: Mazel Tov! My father got both knees replaced a few years ago and he wishes he’d done it 10 years sooner. I pray you have a fantastic surgeon and a speedy recovery.

  198. 198.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Matt McIrvin:

    I just followed you. Movetodon helped a bit as well, found 49 of the 1500 or so I follow on Twitter. Only Betty and De Perfesser Levenson from here, though. Also Edroso and Steve M are there.

  199. 199.

    Quiltingfool

    @kmax: Just because one is at the end of “official” rehab doesn’t mean you’re done with doing all the things you do during rehab.  The doc told me it takes a good while to get the healing, etc. completed.

    I haven’t done the online questionnaire, and I will be addressing the health issue!

  200. 200.

    KrackenJack

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: There were like a dozen Republicans in that race and the state Democratic declined to endorse DiFi. Guess they knew something already. Porter seems to be listening to her stans. The timing of her announcement and immediate fundraising blast show poor judgement at best. In a race between Schiff and Lee, she is mincemeat. I trust the three of them to do the right thing in a jungle primary.

    The old white guys need to stand down for a while. The seat is not at risk and there are plenty of qualified non-white, non males.

  201. 201.

    kalakal

     

    @Quiltingfool: Mrs kalakal had a knee replacement about 11 months ago. It’s a fantastic improvement! No more pain, can walk easily etc etc. The rehab started about 4 hours after she got off the operating table and it is hard work. The main bit is the first few weeks, they’re really, really keen on you keeping the knee flexible while the wounds heal but full recovery takes a lot longer and yes keep going with the bends and stretches. Everyone I know who’s had it done says the same, tough at the the time but months down the line it’s wonderful. Just keep at it

  202. 202.

    kmax

    @Quiltingfool: best of luck to you.

    Mrs kmax had a total replacement a few years back (and a DVT).

    She worked her butt off in PT and has had a great outcome.

    Work hard on rehab.  It will be worth it

    You are from Missouri I think.   I can recommend a great physical therapist in Jeff City if that is your neighborhood.

  204. 204.

    GibberJack

    @JWR: Only?

    How long do you think most men live?

    eta: Most Zoomers have no idea who he is/was. If not for the man certainly for the legend it was time.

  206. 206.

    NaijaGal

    @schrodingers_cat: Yikes – I hadn’t heard that he was a bigot. He and I share a literary agent. We’re talking about “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck,” right (I know Porter read some other books as well during the 9000 rounds of voting for speaker)?

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