Il viaggio interstellare è fantasia, non fantascienza - perlomeno, è quello che spiego su Fumettologica

https://fumettologica.it/2026/02/viaggio-interstellare-fantasia-fantascienza/

Sotto i mari c’è un groviglio di cavi che sta oltretutto crescendo. È un tema interessante, e lo è altrettanto anche quello della sua rappresentazione con le mappe. Spaghetti underwater?

Money quote: "There's been lots of conversation about the recent boom in submarine cable construction. This flurry of activity becomes clearer when our annual map is viewed over time.

Today, we're putting several years' worth of maps back-to-back to visualize an evolving undersea network. (And to reminisce about some of our favorite designs, if I'm being honest.) Give each map a click for a larger interactive view."

https://blog.telegeography.com/submarine-cables-over-time-through-the-years

Il Codice fiorentino (1577) è un'enciclopedia illustrata del Messico precolombiano. È considerata la fonte più affidabile di informazioni sulla cultura Mexica, sull'Impero azteco e sulla conquista del Messico. L'intero codice è online e ricercabile. Ottima risorsa!

Money quote: "The Digital Florentine Codex gives access to a singular manunoscript created by Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahagún and a group of Nahua elders, authors, and artists. Written in parallel columns of Nahuatl and Spanish texts and hand painted with nearly 2,500 images, the encyclopedic codex is widely regarded as the most reliable source of information about Mexica culture, the Aztec Empire, and the conquest of Mexico. Upon completion in 1577 at the Imperial Colegio de la Santa Cruz in Tlatelolco (today Mexico City), the manunoscript was sent to Europe where it entered the Medici family's library in Florence--thus, the Florentine Codex. This digital edition unlocks the manunoscript's content by making the texts and images searchable."

https://florentinecodex.getty.edu

I chatbot stanno cambiando il nostro modo di parlare, le pecore gay fanno lana tutto l'anno e i paperback stanno andando in soffitta. Insomma, Mostly Weekly 362 è online

https://antoniodini.com/weekly/362/

Lettura per la domenica

Ah, il pragmatismo anglosassone. Ad esempio: dopo aver perso il suo lavoro di copywriter a favore dell’AI, Brian Groh, che vive a Lawrenceburg, Indiana, per sbarcare il lunario si è rivolto al lavoro sugli alberi (cioè fa il boscaiolo). Nonostante gli piacesse il nuovo lavoro, ha affrontato sfide fisiche (ma va) e l'incombente minaccia dell’AI che potrebbe sostituire anche il suo nuovo lavoro (eh sì). Groh però sa scrivere anche senza bisogno dell’AI e mette giù questo pippone in cui evidenzia il problema più ampio dell'AI che fa saltare i posti di lavoro tradizionali e la necessità di una preparazione sociale per un futuro con meno opportunità di lavoro tradizionali. Insomma, buongiorno stellina e benvenuta nel 2026.

Money quote: "Maybe I should have seen it coming. I had hired a woman in the Philippines to do trannoscription work, but once A.I. proved just as capable, I began using the trannoscriptionist less often, then not at all. When my own work was being replaced, though, I felt shocked and ashamed. I was like a factory worker who had watched manufacturing jobs disappear for years yet, after decades on a production line, still couldn't believe that he, too, was being let go."

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/28/opinion/artificial-intelligence-jobs.html

archivio: https://archive.is/M8J7R

Perché i paywall hanno senso (e bisognerebbe smettere di lamentarsi). Più qualche consiglio su come aggirarli

Money quote: "Hi there, I would like to talk about paywalls. Today I had a rather large article drop in Slate and there was a soft paywall. A lot of people commented upset about that paywall Let's talk about: a) how to get around paywalls b) why you shouldn't be mad about them"

https://bsky.app/profile/laurajedeed.bsky.social/post/3mcdwspcms223

In Francia si torna a parlare di un tema che da noi va nella direzione opposta: cosa fare delle tracce di passato coloniale presenti nella toponomastica delle città, cioè di Parigi?

Money quote: "Ruben Pereira sillonne les rues de Paris, une pancarte en main ornée d'un QR code renvoyant vers une pétition. Son objectif ? Sensibiliser les passants à l'histoire coloniale congolaise et militer pour que soit débaptisée l'avenue Léopold-II, dans le 16e arrondissement de la capitale. Le jeune homme est déterminé depuis qu'il a vu, un jour de mai 2025, un documentaire retraçant l'histoire du roi des Belges et souverain du Congo de 1885 à 1908. Un monarque honoré par des statues et des noms de rues en France bien qu'il fût responsable d'une politique violente à laquelle les historiens attribuent la mort de millions de Congolais."

https://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2026/01/18/que-faire-des-traces-du-passe-colonial-francais-dans-l-espace-public-la-question-fache-quelques-villes-agissent_6663010_4355770.html

Scrivere codice con gli LLM va bene, ma fargli compilare il suddetto codice no, quella pare sia una pessima idea

Money quote: "This loss of control raises a question: how do we know the abstraction is implemented correctly? More importantly, what does it mean for an abstraction to be correct?"

https://alperenkeles.com/posts/llms-could-be-but-shouldnt-be-compilers/

Marco Andreoletti, mio compagno di banco su Fumettologica, ne ha preparato un altro, dei suoi fantastici (e micidiali) articoli su disincanto, subculture, estetiche e tutto il resto. Avrei voglia di prendere per mano i giovani, e anche Marco che è una generazione sotto la mia e dirgli di non aver paura, perché il peggio deve ancora venire. Ma non si può fare, perché no lo intende chi no lo prova.

https://fumettologica.it/2026/02/mondo-senza-sottoculture-ironia-algoritmi-meta-sincerita/

Surreale articolo che descrive le personalità di tipo B (facendo di ogni punto negativo un pregio, ammesso che in prima battuta abbia senso tutto questo).

Money quote: "According to Lau, type B people also tend to be happy at work or at school because they find “work to be less stressful — and everything to be less stressful.” This leads to more satisfaction in their careers, Lau added.

They generally handle pressure in a nonoverwhelming way, said Shandy Anway, so they aren’t often faced with high anxiety or high stress."

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/type-b-personality-goog_l_68701608e4b09b00d72b3ac9

Se il codice diventa “write-only”, chi resterà davvero a capire le macchine e chi invece le seguirà a occhi chiusi? Avvertite anche i vostri amici, perché è arrivata Mostly Weekly 363

https://antoniodini.com/weekly/363/

Letture per una domenica rilassante

Quella volta che vennero sganciate quattro bombe atomiche sulla Spagna. Era il 1966 "nostro", non di un romanzo di Philip K. Dick.

Money quote: "This terrifying situation had come about because of a US operation code-named Chrome Dome. At the beginning of the 1960s, the US had developed a project to deter its Cold War rival, the Soviet Union, from launching a pre-emptive strike. A patrol of nuclear-armed B-52 bombers would continuously criss-cross the skies, primed to attack Moscow at a moment's notice. But to stay airborne on these long looping routes, the planes needed to refuel while in flight."

https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20250404-how-the-us-dropped-nuclear-bombs-on-spain-in-1966

L'esperta di cibo e salute del Guardian si lancia in un articolo complesso sulle proteine: quante e quali mangiarne?

Money quote: "The recommended daily intake of protein for healthy adults is 0.75g per kilogram of body weight (or 0.8g if you’re in the US). This means, according to the British Nutrition Foundation, the average woman should eat about 45g of protein a day, while the average man should stick to around 56g – about two portions of nuts, tofu, fish or other protein source. Your ideal protein portion should fit into the palm of your hand. There are plenty of non-animal foods that are high in protein and rich in other nutrients and fibre to boot: beans, peas and lentils, soy products such as tofu, not to mention a plethora of nuts and seeds. You can find out how much protein is in individual foods by checking the packaging or consulting a website such as the British Nutrition Foundation’s. Some maths may be involved."

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/apr/15/truth-about-protein-how-to-get-enough-every-age

Vi siete mai chiesti come mai in molti software particolarmente longevi i bug rimangano per anni, alle volte per decenni, iterazione dopo iterazione?

Money quote: "t0st’s fix was a PR win for Rockstar, but it didn’t solve the underlying issue. For every high-profile bug that gets fixed, thousands languish in backlogs, forgotten and ignored. The real takeaway here isn’t that companies don’t care about bugs. It’s that they’re often paralyzed by competing priorities, bureaucratic inertia, and the cold calculus of profit."

https://idiallo.com/blog/companies-dont-fix-bugs

Un divertente gioco basato sui luoghi comuni: le cose maleducate che gli americani dicono viaggiando nel mondo

Money quote "“Something I actually heard: I was in London last week, somebody was arguing with the front desk of the hotel, and they were saying, ‘Well, the customer is always right,’ and it’s sort of like, that’s actually a very American approach to customer service,” said Nick Leighton, an etiquette expert and host of the “Were You Raised by Wolves?” podcast.

It’s not a globally-shared thought pattern. “And very often, the customer is not right,” Leighton added."

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/rudest-things-traveling-abroad_l_67eec1dce4b0d734a36dcd71