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Exploring AI and American Fascism

@mikerugnetta.com’s excellent essay on slopaganda, agit slop, and what it really says about power

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Finished A Little Hatred by Joe Abercrombie 📚

The last 20% of the book was basically setup for the next book. That said, he sure packed in a lot in those two closing chapters.

5th Abercrombie I have read this year. Sheesh! can I hold off for the last two of the series!?

The #polyglotunconf afterparty was held at the False Creek Yacht Club. The organizers did a great job at making the weather nice 😎 Had a good time connecting with some very interesting folks. This is a great conf for bringing together people from many different walks of computing life.

False Creek Yacht club building from water level. In the background is the marina and Burrard Bridge. The sky reflects in the calm water. High angle shot of the marina at the yacht clubChad selfie above the False Creek Yacht Club as the sun goes downUnder Granville bridge and the on ramp from Howe St lit up with a purple light

Just finished #polyglotunconf 🎉 300 people showed up and collaboratively created a multi track conference. I went to sessions on building an eng team post-AI, LoFi software, self-hosting, and managing context in enterprise. Met a TON of new people. Now off to the afterparty 🍻

Gotta go to sleep early tonight since I need to bring the energy to www.polyglotsoftware.com unconf tomorrow!! 🎉🙌

#polyglotconf

POLYGLOT UNCONFERENCE logo with dates (Oct 11th 2025, Vancouver)&10;&10;"Vancouver's best community-led software development conference. A day of spontaneous sharing, learning, and networking for software builders."

Been a year so I updated my Uses/Don’t Uses page: chadkohalyk.com/about/use…

Share me yours!

New Kit! Ricoh GR IV

Early Xmas!🎄🎁 New kit! 📷 I mulled getting a Fujifilm X100VI when they came out but wanted something smaller. Been watching the iteration of GRs and when they announced the IV I signed up right away. Gonna carry this thing everywhere! #photography

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Indigenous Nations Plan a Tariff-Free Trade Corridor Across the US-Canada border

We’re not begging for crumbs anymore. We’re demanding what’s rightly ours.

Tsukimi Moon Viewing celebration at Vancouver Public Library featured shakuhachi, calligraphy, ikebana, poetry, dance, and of course viewing the moon from the roof garden of the library! 🌕🎑

Man playing shakuhachi in the basket hatWoman in an ornate kimono kneeling on a large paper painting wheatgrass. In the foreground a person is videoing herAn amazing hanging flower arrangementThe moon peaks out from behind some clouds above the Vancouver skyline. The image is framed above with some maple leaves turning yellow

Younger daughter made dango 🍡 (coloured for hanami 😅) with kinako and Okinawan kuromitsu. A moon cake 🥮. A full moon stream on YouTube. And some of that grass that cut me earlier today 🌾

Happy Moon Viewing! 🎑

Plates of food with a laptop in the background displaying the full moon

Gorgeous day for a walk in the forest. The leaves are turning in the warm sun and I sliced my finger pulling wheatgrass for the moon viewing fest tonight 🎑

sun rays through the leaves and trees of a nature trailred leaves of treetops and a blue sky above with a skiff of crisp autumn cloudsbright red blood wells up from two thin paper-cut-like slashs in Chad’s pinkie finger

Last trip to the Richmond Night Market before it closes for the season

A busy night market with many people and food booths Chad selfie with “flying ramen” a noodle dish that looks like it is exploding out the cupSign for “ramen donuts”An idol group thanks the crowd before performing on stage

OpenMedia ran a survey on #AI regulation and #DigitalSovereignty.

The findings show a “strong preference for self-hosted, locally developed AI” and a rejection of “one-size-fits-all” policy.

Meanwhile ISED is running a public consultation on #Canada’s AI strategy open until Oct 31.

Tried to hold off, since I want First Law to last forever, but I just was itching for some Steven Pacey-narrated Joe Abercrombie grimdark fantasy: A Little Hatred Book 1 of the final trilogy (and the 8th I have read in the series) 📚

common needs need commons

and:

We believe in proliferation, not scale

Both statements got me right in the cockles. 🫀

Check out the folktechnology.org Principles and come to Vancouver on Oct 18 for their event at Z-Space.

#folktech #technology #event

This 👇

blog.discourse.org/2025/09/w…

If you want to learn about how the Greeks influenced early #Buddhism (writing, analytical thinking) this lecture by Ajahn Sona is pretty mind-bending

Back to Birken

A travel report from my 7 day silent retreat

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Started this for our Metagov book club later this week The Dispossessed: A Novel by Ursula K. Le Guin 📚

Read this during my meditation retreat. It is a bit academic, and there are many more simpler takes, bit it did bring some clarity that I appreciated. Satipaṭṭhāna: The Direct Path to Realization by Bhikkhu Anālayo 📚

Just returned from my 7 day silent retreat at Birken Forest Monastery. I’ve been offline the entire time. It was really lovely. Still somehow took 120+ photos. Will post a travelogue tomorrow. May you all be safe, healthy, and happy 🙏 #Buddhism #Meditation

Chad selfie pointing at the sign for Birken Forest Monastery which is an 8 spoked Dhamma Wheel with a maple leaf in the centerChad selfie outdoors with a large white Vietnamese statue of the Buddha sitting on a lotus leafA meditation hall with an altar full of Buddha statuesSunrise casting rays illuminating a path through a forest of poplar trees with their leaves turned golden