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US TikTok-ers moving to triller, YouTube and Xiaohongshu ('RedNote'), not Instagram, the former offering to transfer all their videos.


You season 5 will be on Netflix on 24 April. I don't know which characters/actresses will come back, the two I'm hoping for I didn't spot in the teaser.
#You #YouNetflix


Be prepared that when soon even more of those that blame everything on others are themselves in power, it will still be everyone else's fault.


New toy: a Laowa 2x macro lens. Comes very favourably out of reviews, also for non-macro distances. It's the crop sensor advantage that this is small-ish and cheap-ish, while still being a super-sharp f/2.8 apochromatic lens. Now I have to learn to manually focus, and to use (flash) lighting.
#Laowa #Macro
in reply to Gidi Kroon

Glad it's winter and there are no insects about, testing out my macro lens.

Canon R10 with Laowa 65mm F2.8, either with Godox speedlite flash off-camera or the light of my Samsung phone when I had already put the speedlite away.


#Photography #macro #Laowa #Canon #Godox #Samsung



the only social media platform that operates out of the EU


Except for all the other ones.



And it's that resource usage for training that is my problem with it, so I'm not happy about AI subtitles in VLC. I also suspect it doesn't work, but that is maybe just me.


So, here is the first concrete technical info about VLC AI subtitles:

* it uses OpenAI whisper model.
* you'll have to download that bit separately [1].
* vlc will use that on your computer, so it is not using the paid for API version.

So still using all the water and power to train models, and to run on your computer when you watch something that need translation.

#VLC

[0] numerama.com/tech/1879712-vlc-…

[1] github.com/openai/whisper




I've been there! (It was already broken)


Temple of Poseidon is one of the most important monuments from the Golden Age of Athens. It is perched on the edge of a cliff, located 70m above the sea, located at Cape Sounion 🇬🇷

Built in 5th Century BC, the temple is in the typical Greek hexastyle - featuring six doric columns on the front portico. 16 out of the original 38 columns are still standing today, and they were 20ft tall.

#archaeohistories




Happy New Year, everybody! Here we've started already.



Looks like Google did a not so nice thing. The Google Authenticator app no longer will generate the codes for some items, including Google's own account. This happened after they offered to backup all items to their cloud in case you lose your phone; if you don't do that, their app will break itself like this.

Two-factor authentication is about 'one thing you know and one thing you have'. The first thing is your password, the second thing your phone. The generated codes on your phone prove that you have your phone. Backing up the app in your Google account renders the latter useless and puts you back at one-factor authentication.

Of course you can and maybe should backup the secrets stored in the app. But that must be on 'something you have' and not somebody's cloud.
#GoogleAuthenticator



I went to the Christmas market in Maastricht today. It was nice and cold and crowded. It gets dark quickly this close to midwinter.

Photos taken with Canon EOS R10 and Canon RF 28 F2.8. Cc-by.
#ChristmasMarket #Maastricht #Photography



My dishwasher was like 'hold my beer' and didn't hold its water anymore. Meanwhile my tablet seems to be fixed for now by uninstalling the TikTok app (it literally caused the display to flash, have interference, etc).


Insider trading tip for people trading in Samsung shares: both my tablet and phone are showing near-end-of-life signs and I may soon need to be buying new ones. With the insane device prices nowadays, this sure is going to raise their shares.

(Just to be clear, the above is obviously sarcasm. I have no inside knowledge. Just a consumer.)





Insider trading tip for people trading in Samsung shares: both my tablet and phone are showing near-end-of-life signs and I may soon need to be buying new ones. With the insane device prices nowadays, this sure is going to raise their shares.

(Just to be clear, the above is obviously sarcasm. I have no inside knowledge. Just a consumer.)




My 1000th Wordle today! Not a stellar performance, only in the fifth guess.
#Wordle


Spring can't come fast enough!

The trailer for the new film with Jenna Ortega is out! Death of a Unicorn, coming soon.
#JennaOrtega #DeathOfAUnicorn
instagram.com/reel/DDuPMQQo2wv…



Beetlejuice Beetlejuice with Jenna Ortega and The Pod Generation with Emilia Clarke arrived on blu-ray!

The German release of the latter has an alternative title Baby To Go, which isn't even in German. In my own country hardly any discs are released anymore, so we have to make do with these German releases.
#JennaOrtega #BeetlejuiceBeetlejuice #EmiliaClarke #ThePodGeneration #BabyToGo



I assume I won't see Spotify Wrapped posts from people berating others they use platforms that support right wing extremism. Right?

To me Spotify is still cancelled. I'm surprised how normalised it is again among others.



AI noise reduction in bird photography: I hope all these photographers spending hours in the wilderness to photograph a bird, know that when they apply AI noise reduction to remove the noise from the bird's feathers, it instead removes the noisy feathers and inserts completely made up feathers without noise. Is it even the same bird? Why not stay home and draw a bird instead?



This video of Corina Bradley singing a cover is very beautiful, as is her voice. As far as I know she didn't publish anything like this before.
youtu.be/LmhV3gVWbKY
#CorinaBradley
in reply to Gidi Kroon

I also love how this video is shot, with the Corina on the right doing backing vocals for the Corina on the left.
#CorinaBradley
in reply to Gidi Kroon

I can't add it to my music playlist due to YouTube being weird, but it reminded me of this other video on that list of a slightly more famous actress also showing her gorgeous voice in a beautifully filmed studio setting in a video for her YouTube channel.
#MirandaCosgrove
youtu.be/dAfYBOsQQY8


It's around freezing outside, so it's a great time for the heating in my flat to not be working.
in reply to Gidi Kroon

It's fixed! It took a few days but it's so great to be able to be in a living room where I can raise the temperature above 15 degrees.


Glow is also in Best this year, as last year, side-Glow as it were.

Canon EOS R10, RF-S 10-18mm. cc-by.
#Photography #Glow2024

Photography Feed reshared this.

in reply to Gidi Kroon

More of Glow in Best, with the Windmill, the cemetery and eyes at the train station. The main Glow festival is of course in Eindhoven.
#Glow2024
in reply to Gidi Kroon

I had also taken photos in Best some days earlier with my RF 50mm 1.8 lens. Nothing wrong with those results, but I haven't processed these to jpeg yet. The 50mm, on an APS-C camera, didn't allow me to capture whole buildings, yet the aperture difference of 1.8 vs 4.5-6.3 makes itself felt in the dark...