Record El Nino event might bring drought, heatwaves, to Australia in spring

1 August 2026

A “record” El Niño event, presently wreaking havoc in the northern hemisphere, is expected to lead to an excessively warm and dry spring in Australia, and, no doubt, other regions south of the equator.

We’ve barely had a winter in my part of the world this year. To be sure, there’s been one or two cooler days, and evenings can get chilly, but the winter woollens have seen little use thus far.

I’ve been dreading the upcoming summer, but by the sounds of it, spring is going to be worse.

But it’s important to remember that El Niño events are but one of several environmental phenomena that play a part in influencing the weather hereabouts.

LinkedIn users can report AI slop, but what about the rest of it?

1 August 2026

Members of the professional network will be able to flag posts they think are AI generated. I haven’t been a LinkedIn participant in years — I have a personal website, why would I? — but it seems to me slop has been a problem on the platform since before AI was what it is.

The threat of toxic content on decentralised social media platforms

31 July 2026

Mastodon is a truly decentralised micro-bloging platform. Anyone sufficiently motivated, and technically proficient, can start their own instance, or community.

Depending on the administrator, instances can be completely isolated, accessible only to its members, or federated, that is, interconnected to all other instances that are likewise federated.

Presently there eight-thousand instances, give or take, and each has, or can have, its own individual community guidelines and moderation policies.

This can mean content permissible on one instance might be unacceptable somewhere else. But if that instance is federated, members’ posts may be visible to just about all Mastodon members.

It’s something that can allow content of a toxic nature to disseminate freely across the Mastodon network, as there are no standard platform-wide moderation policies.

And according to research carried out by Pasan Kamburugamuwa and Olga Scrivner, toxic content is becoming more prevalent on Mastodon.

Tens of millions of people migrated to places like Mastodon and Bluesky, to escape the toxicity that had become rife on other social media platforms. It’s unfortunate, to say the least, that content many consider unacceptable, is taking hold.

Mastodon’s decentralised structure is one of its advantages. For one, it means no single person, or entity, can assume control of the entire network, and do with it as they please.

But decentralisation is a double-edged sword, if it allows people to set up shop in their own corner, and spread content others don’t want to see.

Finding a solution in an environment such as Mastodon’s will be challenging.

David vs Goliath Australian film classic The Castle being adapted for stage

30 July 2026

Feel good Australian comedy classic movie, The Castle, made in 1997, is set the join the likes of Back to the Future, The Color Purple, and Titanic, in being adapted for the stage. The story follows a working class family trying to stop cashed-up property developers seizing their home.

The producers of the film, including Tom Gleisner, Santo Cilauro, Jane Kennedy, and Rob Sitch, will be involved in the writing and production of the stage show. Fingers crossed then the adaptation will retain the quirkiness and candour of the original film.

Talking of Kennedy and Sitch, I stumbled upon a satirical show they starred in about thirty years ago, Frontline, a send-up of Australian current affairs shows, in the iView archives. It’s a great show, but a lot has changed since the mid 1990’s. I’m not sure something like that could be made today.

When is an exomoon not an exomoon? When it orbits a failed star, not a planet

29 July 2026

Astronomers may have discovered the first moon, or satellite, outside the solar system, about seventy-three light years from Earth.

Plenty of exoplanets, planets orbiting stars other than the Sun, have been found, but this might be the first time a moon accompanying one of these bodies has been located.

But there’s a problem. The apparent exoplanet in question is a brown dwarf. These unusual Jupiter size objects often referred to as failed stars. But they are neither planet nor star.

That’s not all though. The brown dwarf hosting the would-be exomoon, is it self orbiting another star. The situation has scientists puzzled. From what I can understand, the moon of the brown dwarf has some substance. It is of a decent size. It is a real moon.

Quite unlike, for instance, the multitude of pebble-size excuses of “moons” orbiting Saturn.

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AI does not compose my pickup lines, I do, have the t-shirt to prove it

29 July 2026

Natalie Kaufman, writing for the Wall Street Journal, about an apparent trend in early twenty-somethings, to rely on AI agents to supply them with conversation starters, and pickup lines.

The article is paywalled, but would you really want to read about this?

I think these things are best learned through experience, and watching other people, rather than turning to AI for pointers. It gives me an idea for a t-shirt though.

Some websites and blogs sport not by AI buttons, as a way of reassuring readers their content was written by a person, and not an AI agent.

People who want others to know their conversation starters, and, where applicable, pickup lines, are their own effort, could wear a not by AI-style t-shirt, perhaps bearing the slogan “AI does not compose my pickup lines, I do”.

It might help eliminate the confusion as to what banter is AI-generated, and what is not.

For the record, my pickup lines are reserved for the only person who reads this website…

My old red iPhone SE 2, no AusAlert alert, much embarrassment

28 July 2026

AusAlert is a new, nation wide, emergency warning system being rolled out by the Australian government. Should there be a crisis or disaster of some sort, authorities will be able to send warnings to mobile phones in the vicinity.

The alerts, which will be heralded by a short, but loud siren sound, are designed to override both silent, and do not disturb (DND) modes. That’s a good thing, as I avail myself of both constantly.

To test the system, an AusAlert message was to be sent to every mobile device in Australia, yesterday afternoon. It is unlikely nationwide broadcasts will occur regularly, if at all, as alerts are only intended to go only to phones in a specific region, if something is wrong. But saying every mobile device in Australia would receive the test warning was something of an exaggeration.

At 2PM AEST yesterday, my phone sat silent, even though phones all around me wailed for about ten seconds. As it happens though, AusAlerts cannot reach every phone, or mobile device, after all. For one, devices switched off, or in aeroplane mode, would not have received the test warning.

The same goes for older devices, of which mine, an iPhone SE 2, must be considered as far as AusAlert goes. I had heard “older” phones would instead receive a backup “presidential alert”, but I saw nothing. Landlines are likewise incapable of receiving the warnings, though I believe plans are in the works to include them eventually.

Later yesterday afternoon, Kristy McBain, the Australian Emergency Management Minister, said ninety-four percent of phone towers sent the alert.

That sounds a little low for what is meant to be national warning framework. It seems to me a lot of people could miss out in the event of a crisis. Still, the system is a work-in-progress, and doubtless coverage will move closer to one-hundred percent of towers.

I (still) have an iPhone SE 2, which I am reluctant to part with. It’s one of the (RED) red ones, which I had struggled to obtain. So I’m still using it. This is disassociated not Daring Fireball.

But I felt slightly embarrassed my phone didn’t join in the test. Most people knew what was happening, but some — despite pre-test publicity — seemed confused. I needn’t have fretted about my old red phone though, I doubt anyone had the slightest idea it remained mute during the drill.

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Facebook Verified, distinguishing human users from AI accounts, cats, dogs, etc

27 July 2026

The basic, free, verification badge, differs from the more familiar, paid for, Meta‌ Verified blue badge.

To qualify, applicants need to satisfy a number of requirements, including having a Facebook (FB) account that is in “good standing”. They will need to record a short video, which will be compared to selfies previously posted on their page.

I don’t use FB much, but did encounter a number of people using pictures of their pet, say a cat or a dog, as an avatar. Will we then see animals with Facebook Verified badges on their pages? And how many AI-generated accounts might slip through the cracks, and end up being verified?

Webmentions, easier said than done?

27 July 2026

I like the idea of Webmentions, a protocol informing a blogger, website owner, that another blog/website has linked to them. Similar to pingbacks, Webmentions aren’t just another tech-gimmick though. In 2017 they were adopted as a recommendation by the W3C, the international body publishing standards for the web.

They’re also favoured within the IndieWeb/SmallWeb communities. So far, so good. The drawback however comes in their implementation.

It’s not a simple case of adding a few lines of code to a template, or, where available, installing a plug-in (something I aim to keep a minimum). The process requires jumping through a number of hoops, something, I gather, that ends up deterring a number of people.

Webmentions sound ideal for people who enjoy tinkering with their websites, but remain on the back burner here for the time being.

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Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie, by Matt Johnson, Jay McCarrol

25 July 2026

Nirvana the Band the Show the Movie, trailer, is a bat-shit crazy (to say the least) time-travel caper I found while perusing the movie listings on Kanopy last week. It’s a story about two musicians, Matt Johnson, and Jay McCarrol, portraying themselves, who live in Toronto, Canada.

Both are in a music act named Nirvanna the Band, where they usually improvise their songs.

Although they’ve been at it for nearly two decades, as of 2025, success has eluded the duo, and many of the city’s live music venues refuse to book them.

Matt is convinced a daring stunt might sufficiently impress the Rivoli, a Toronto bar they’ve long wanted to perform at. He thinks parachuting from the top of the city’s CN Tower, into a nearby sports stadium, during the middle of game, will do the trick.

When that doesn’t quite succeed — so close, yet so far — Matt quickly formulates a plan to trick Rivoli management into believing they are time travellers from the year 2008.

He fits out their RV with a mock flux capacitor, as seen in Back to the Future (BTTF), which somehow ends up sending the pair back to 2008.

It’s at this point the making of the story becomes as an impressive as the story itself. Much of the feature is made using guerrilla filmmaking techniques.

Johnson and McCarrol filmed many of the people, members of the public, they encountered with hidden cameras, usually without their knowledge. Nor did they seek approval from city authorities, or CN Tower operators, to film, meaning many (but not all) of the scenes on the tower were not staged, they were clandestinely recorded.

Some years ago I went on a Sydney Harbour Bridge climb. I was lucky to be able to take my sunglasses up with me, let alone anything else (parachutes, secateurs, etc). Bridge climbers had to strip to their underwear, and dress in boiler-suits before setting out.

Smartphones were stowed in lockers at street level, with just about everything else we arrived with. We could wear sunglasses and bridge climb issue caps, but these were latched to our outfits. This was of course so objects didn’t fall on people and vehicles using the bridge.

I’d have thought the same requirements applied to people on the outside platform of the CN Tower. Indeed everyone was dressed in boiler-suits, similar to those of the bridge climb, but Johnson and McCarrol managed to conceal extraneous, and potentially dangerous, items under them.

You need to see Nirvana the Band the Show the Movie to appreciate just how astonishing parts of it are. Johnson and McCarrol did not obtain clearance to use excerpts, or theme music from BTTF either, something I was certain — while watching — they must have.

Johnson and McCarrol claim use of BTTF footage constitutes fair use, saying their film is parody.

The film is not a one-off affair either. It was based on a web series Johnson and McCarrol made between 2007 and 2009, called Nirvana the Band the Show. That went on to spawn a TV series Nirvanna the Band the Show (note the changed spelling), which screened in 2017 and 2018.

In 2023 Johnson directed BlackBerry, which traced the rise and fall of the once popular smartphone.

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