Monarch butterfly fluttering along the street, more or less heading south and west. I wish it a pleasant voyage. Have to assume they've figured out the Gulf of Maine by now -- it has been around since the last ice age.
Air temperature 52 F, wind west about 5 mph, airport reports fog. None here. Weather people tell us we got about 1" of rain over the weekend, which only puts a dent in the drought. No more rain in the forecast. Crops suffering.
Should finish filling the cracks in the driveway today, making way for seal-coat at some future time.
Should finish filling the cracks in the driveway today, making way for seal-coat at some future time.
(![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thewayne Sep. 7th, 2025 12:11 pm)
thewayne Sep. 7th, 2025 12:11 pm)This is really cool.
In the town of Pornainen, they've built a 13 meter tall battery of "low-grade" sand that they warm-up to 450 degrees C - that 842 degrees F! - and it can hold that temperatures for weeks if not months, then they can use the hot air from it to heat the town's local heating network!
I think that's a pretty awesome use. They're using excess energy generated by renewable sources - free energy - to heat up the sand, then piping it around town. The former method to warm up the town was a woodchip furnace plant, clearly they're drastically cutting their CO2 footprint with this. And by using low-grade sand, their costs are pretty low.
But let's talk about sand for a minute. Businesses are literally dredging up ocean floors for sand to make more concrete. And you can't recover it from broken-up concrete when buildings are demolished. Now, to use sand to make a thermal battery I think is a worthwhile endeavor. I just wish they'd work out better ways to repurpose and recycle existing demolished concrete.
https://www.the-independent.com/tech/sand-battery-renewable-energy-finland-b2818348.html
https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/09/06/027211/a-very-finnish-thing-huge-sand-battery-starts-storing-wind-energy-in-soapstone
In the town of Pornainen, they've built a 13 meter tall battery of "low-grade" sand that they warm-up to 450 degrees C - that 842 degrees F! - and it can hold that temperatures for weeks if not months, then they can use the hot air from it to heat the town's local heating network!
I think that's a pretty awesome use. They're using excess energy generated by renewable sources - free energy - to heat up the sand, then piping it around town. The former method to warm up the town was a woodchip furnace plant, clearly they're drastically cutting their CO2 footprint with this. And by using low-grade sand, their costs are pretty low.
But let's talk about sand for a minute. Businesses are literally dredging up ocean floors for sand to make more concrete. And you can't recover it from broken-up concrete when buildings are demolished. Now, to use sand to make a thermal battery I think is a worthwhile endeavor. I just wish they'd work out better ways to repurpose and recycle existing demolished concrete.
https://www.the-independent.com/tech/sand-battery-renewable-energy-finland-b2818348.html
https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/09/06/027211/a-very-finnish-thing-huge-sand-battery-starts-storing-wind-energy-in-soapstone
Tags:
Still light rain falling, and the park is showing more green than I've seen in a month. Our "lawn" also is greening up. We may avoid being dust in the wind.
Air temperature 57 F, wind near calm, light rain. Supposed to do this pretty much all day, but with minor accumulation. We need it. Our leopard slugs need it -- one oozing across the concrete pavers of our front walk right now. Wonder how they cope with extended drought.
Raining now, with rolling thunder revue for accompaniment.
(thewayne Sep. 6th, 2025 10:21 am)
thewayne Sep. 6th, 2025 10:21 am)To briefly recap, a group of authors sued the AI company Anthropic for pirating their books off the internet through illegal downloads and incorporating it into their AI data training sets, alleging piracy, copyright violation and theft. Which it clearly was. In an interesting twist, Anthropic then went out and bought quite literally tons of books, cut the spines off of them, scanned the pages, then trashed the then-scanned books, claiming the rights of first-ownership that they could do what they wanted to with the books.
But that was a bit of ex post facto reasoning: they'd already committed the crime of stealing the contents of the books, subsequently buying them after having already incorporated the contents into the datasets doesn't make it all better.
From the article: "In June, U.S. District Judge William Alsup ruled that Anthropic’s use of the books in training models was “exceedingly transformative,” one of the factors courts have used in determining whether the use of protected works without authorization was a legal “fair use.” His decision was the first major decision that weighed the fair use question in generative AI systems.
Yet Alsup also ruled that Anthropic had to face a trial on the question of whether it is liable for downloading millions of pirated books in digital form off the internet, something it had to do in order to train its models for its AI service Claude. The books were obtained from datasets Library Genesis and Pirate Library Mirror.
“That Anthropic later bought a copy of a book it earlier stole off the internet will not absolve it of liability for the theft but it may affect the extent of statutory damages,” the judge wrote. (emphasis mine)
The piracy issue was a huge one. in court, Anthropic IT staff testified that they used bit torrent software to download vast troves of books at the direction of management. The problem is with bit torrent. Bit torrent uses "seeds". When you download a file, you are downloading small pieces of it from many clients and servers from around the world. And your computer becomes one such piece of this network and starts serving up pieces of the files that you've downloaded to people requesting those files.
As a general rule, companies don't go after people downloading pirated material if they're not downloading it 24/7/365. But they do go after people providing pirated material! And if you use bit torrent software to download pirated material, you're downloading AND uploading material that shouldn't be shared! Eventually they're going to notice you and their attorneys are going to dust off their giant mallets of loving correction.
I've used bit torrent software before. But what I use it for is downloading books that I've bought from Humble Bundle where I've got 20 large PDF books to download, it's the only practical way to do it even when I have a fairly fast fiberoptic internet connection. And I leave my torrent connection open so other people who've bought the bundle can benefit from my PC having those books on it.
I have no idea how many books Anthropic downloaded. It's quite possible that Anthropic has no absolute count as to how many books they downloaded. And that's probably why they agreed to this settlement. They wanted to avoid a damages trial which would dig into exactly how many books they had stolen.
And let's take that one step further. This would have branded them - in court! - as the world's largest piracy case. EVER. That's one thing that they definitely did not want to be branded with. A great big Scarlet P that they would wear forever. Much better to pay $1.5 billion and be rid of it.
Two additional things about this of interest. First, the settlement only covers their misdeeds through August 25. If they are found to have conducted any additional piracy after this date, then all the court processes could get reset and everything starts over again. Second, and this is the most significant part: "Anthropic also has agreed to destroy the datasets used in its models."
I have no idea what this fully means. Since they bought all these books and scanned them, they presumably have an even better dataset on standby once this pirated set is destroyed, so it shouldn't affect them much. Perhaps this is purely a symbolic victory, but it is an important one. We shall see.
https://deadline.com/2025/09/anthropic-ai-lawsuit-settlement-1-5-billion-1236509423/
https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/09/05/1941245/anthropic-agrees-to-pay-record-15-billion-to-settle-authors-ai-lawsuit
But that was a bit of ex post facto reasoning: they'd already committed the crime of stealing the contents of the books, subsequently buying them after having already incorporated the contents into the datasets doesn't make it all better.
From the article: "In June, U.S. District Judge William Alsup ruled that Anthropic’s use of the books in training models was “exceedingly transformative,” one of the factors courts have used in determining whether the use of protected works without authorization was a legal “fair use.” His decision was the first major decision that weighed the fair use question in generative AI systems.
Yet Alsup also ruled that Anthropic had to face a trial on the question of whether it is liable for downloading millions of pirated books in digital form off the internet, something it had to do in order to train its models for its AI service Claude. The books were obtained from datasets Library Genesis and Pirate Library Mirror.
“That Anthropic later bought a copy of a book it earlier stole off the internet will not absolve it of liability for the theft but it may affect the extent of statutory damages,” the judge wrote. (emphasis mine)
The piracy issue was a huge one. in court, Anthropic IT staff testified that they used bit torrent software to download vast troves of books at the direction of management. The problem is with bit torrent. Bit torrent uses "seeds". When you download a file, you are downloading small pieces of it from many clients and servers from around the world. And your computer becomes one such piece of this network and starts serving up pieces of the files that you've downloaded to people requesting those files.
As a general rule, companies don't go after people downloading pirated material if they're not downloading it 24/7/365. But they do go after people providing pirated material! And if you use bit torrent software to download pirated material, you're downloading AND uploading material that shouldn't be shared! Eventually they're going to notice you and their attorneys are going to dust off their giant mallets of loving correction.
I've used bit torrent software before. But what I use it for is downloading books that I've bought from Humble Bundle where I've got 20 large PDF books to download, it's the only practical way to do it even when I have a fairly fast fiberoptic internet connection. And I leave my torrent connection open so other people who've bought the bundle can benefit from my PC having those books on it.
I have no idea how many books Anthropic downloaded. It's quite possible that Anthropic has no absolute count as to how many books they downloaded. And that's probably why they agreed to this settlement. They wanted to avoid a damages trial which would dig into exactly how many books they had stolen.
And let's take that one step further. This would have branded them - in court! - as the world's largest piracy case. EVER. That's one thing that they definitely did not want to be branded with. A great big Scarlet P that they would wear forever. Much better to pay $1.5 billion and be rid of it.
Two additional things about this of interest. First, the settlement only covers their misdeeds through August 25. If they are found to have conducted any additional piracy after this date, then all the court processes could get reset and everything starts over again. Second, and this is the most significant part: "Anthropic also has agreed to destroy the datasets used in its models."
I have no idea what this fully means. Since they bought all these books and scanned them, they presumably have an even better dataset on standby once this pirated set is destroyed, so it shouldn't affect them much. Perhaps this is purely a symbolic victory, but it is an important one. We shall see.
https://deadline.com/2025/09/anthropic-ai-lawsuit-settlement-1-5-billion-1236509423/
https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/09/05/1941245/anthropic-agrees-to-pay-record-15-billion-to-settle-authors-ai-lawsuit
Tags:
(thewayne Sep. 6th, 2025 10:05 am)
thewayne Sep. 6th, 2025 10:05 am)Natron had been trying to raise $1.4b in funding to build a mega-factory in North Carolina that would have employed 1,000 people. It failed. Sales for its industrial sodium-ion batteries were not enough to keep the 13-year old company in the black, and an excellent tech company is no more.
Sodium-ion batteries have some great tech advantages over lithium-ion. Most importantly, they don't catch on fire as easily. They don't use lithium, so they're less expensive and don't consume a rare earth mineral. Sodium is much more readily available and cheaper to produce. They also don't use copper, a somewhat rare mineral, and using aluminum instead of copper makes for a much lighter battery.
However, sodium-ion has a lower energy density than lithium-ion, which makes it a bit less desirable than LIon. Whether this disadvantage can be overcome in time, we shall see.
I have no idea if this company's products were targeted for the EV market, or just for industrial use.
https://www.wral.com/story/battery-maker-natron-closes-shop-killing-plans-for-1-000-jobs-in-north-carolina/22144342/
https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/09/05/2126200/americas-first-sodium-ion-battery-manufacturer-ceases-operations
Sodium-ion batteries have some great tech advantages over lithium-ion. Most importantly, they don't catch on fire as easily. They don't use lithium, so they're less expensive and don't consume a rare earth mineral. Sodium is much more readily available and cheaper to produce. They also don't use copper, a somewhat rare mineral, and using aluminum instead of copper makes for a much lighter battery.
However, sodium-ion has a lower energy density than lithium-ion, which makes it a bit less desirable than LIon. Whether this disadvantage can be overcome in time, we shall see.
I have no idea if this company's products were targeted for the EV market, or just for industrial use.
https://www.wral.com/story/battery-maker-natron-closes-shop-killing-plans-for-1-000-jobs-in-north-carolina/22144342/
https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/09/05/2126200/americas-first-sodium-ion-battery-manufacturer-ceases-operations
Tags:
Air temperature 65 F, wind south about 8 mph, cloudy. Got a small measure of rain overnight, actual accumulation scheduled for tonight. Front off in New York now. Should be able to get a walk in ahead of afternoon thunderstorms.
Eric and took a one-day road trip to New Ulm this past weekend, a little Year of Adventure event. We ate lunch at a friendly bistro, Lola's and then spent an absorbing hour touring the childhood home of Wanda Gág, the owner of Millions of Cats. The two docents seemed absolutely delighted to have visitors and almost talked our ears off about the Gág family.
There were a couple of other stops, to poke around an antique store or two, and to take pictures at the statue of Hermann the Cheruscan ("Hermann the German"), the statue of Wanda Gág in front of the public library, and the Minnesota Music Hall of Fame. A very pleasant getaway.
Image Description: A Victorian Queen Anne home, overlaid with a black and white picture of a young woman holding an easel and paintbrush. Left: A guitar in the shape of the Prince Love symbol, made of musical instruments (the instrument's neck is a keyboard). Right: an iron lamppost. Center: the statue of Herman the German, sword raised, overlaid with a statue of Wanda Gág reading to a cat. Right corner: a black cat with an arched back. Upper right: logo for Lola Bistro.
New Ulm
Click on the links to see the 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.
There were a couple of other stops, to poke around an antique store or two, and to take pictures at the statue of Hermann the Cheruscan ("Hermann the German"), the statue of Wanda Gág in front of the public library, and the Minnesota Music Hall of Fame. A very pleasant getaway.
Image Description: A Victorian Queen Anne home, overlaid with a black and white picture of a young woman holding an easel and paintbrush. Left: A guitar in the shape of the Prince Love symbol, made of musical instruments (the instrument's neck is a keyboard). Right: an iron lamppost. Center: the statue of Herman the German, sword raised, overlaid with a statue of Wanda Gág reading to a cat. Right corner: a black cat with an arched back. Upper right: logo for Lola Bistro.
Click on the links to see the 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.
Air temperature 65 F, wind south gusting to 25 mph, cloudy. Rain on the weather radar, supposed to clear out in a couple of hours, then more tomorrow. We need it.
"Kill 'em all, let God sort 'em out."
Your tax dollars at work.
Your tax dollars at work.
Air temperature 59 F, wind near calm, "mist" (not Myst) at the airport. We also have an elevated fire danger alert due to the continued drought. Need to get out and finish the driveway crack filler so it can cure before spreading seal coat. Whee.
The regime claims to have executed 11 people without trial.
Air temperature 56 F, wind south about 5 mph, airport has its fog generator going again with visibility under a quarter mile. We had a bit of creepy ground fog earlier but gone now. Reset foraging schedule for this morning.
I wish I had thought to take a picture of the chickens, but I didn't.
Okay, context.naomikritzer invited me to be her come-along friend to an experimental peach farm near Taylors Falls, Minnesota. For those of you not from around here, Minnesota is NOT typically peach country and people around here go absoutely SPARE for fresh peaches. There are entire forums full of people making runs to the south, gathering up fresh peaches, and making exchanges in sketchy parking lots. Okay, not EXACTLY, but dang near. I'm not one of these peach hounds, but Naomi is. So, she made arrangements with the farmer, Dan, to come get some fresh, directly off the tree peaches. Taylors Falls is about an hour away, so it's a long trip to go alone. So, of course, I volunteered!
Dan was absolutely charming. He had free range chickens who came out to see if we were interested in feeding them (We were! But we did not have food!) and then Dan had us follow him out to his greenhouses and he hand picked us some ripe peaches. Along the way he told us stories about his family and how he came to have a pizza oven on his poperty and how he feels like emphathy is something you need to clearly speak so that people know where you stand.
We left with several pounds of peaches.
I was glad I went.
What have you been up to?
Okay, context.
naomikritzer invited me to be her come-along friend to an experimental peach farm near Taylors Falls, Minnesota. For those of you not from around here, Minnesota is NOT typically peach country and people around here go absoutely SPARE for fresh peaches. There are entire forums full of people making runs to the south, gathering up fresh peaches, and making exchanges in sketchy parking lots. Okay, not EXACTLY, but dang near. I'm not one of these peach hounds, but Naomi is. So, she made arrangements with the farmer, Dan, to come get some fresh, directly off the tree peaches. Taylors Falls is about an hour away, so it's a long trip to go alone. So, of course, I volunteered!Dan was absolutely charming. He had free range chickens who came out to see if we were interested in feeding them (We were! But we did not have food!) and then Dan had us follow him out to his greenhouses and he hand picked us some ripe peaches. Along the way he told us stories about his family and how he came to have a pizza oven on his poperty and how he feels like emphathy is something you need to clearly speak so that people know where you stand.
We left with several pounds of peaches.
I was glad I went.
What have you been up to?
Air temperature 55 F, wind near calm, partly cloudy. Waxing moon low in the south last night, poking through trees. Needs to come north where we can bay at it in proper fashion. Foraging run morning.
Image: A cat/phoniex atop a UFO overlooking an apocalyptic scene where everything is on fire, including a random robot in the distance.
I really love this art, btw, I hope they have t-shirts.
So, yeah, you doing anything this weekend?
naomikritzer and I are going to be guests of honor at what may very well be the very last Diversicon, ever. If you're not doing anything and have an extra $55 in your pocket, why don't you consider stopping by? We'd love to see you. There is a programming list online: https://diversicon32.mnstf.org/schedule.htmlTags:
House down the street has pumpkins on the front steps. Unless they're fakes, those won't last 'til Halloween. Squirrel attack pending.
Air temperature 52 F, wind near calm, fog at the airport but none over here. I think the National Guard has a fog generator over there for training purposes. Or maybe it's just radioactive miasma left over from the Strategic Air Command. Anyway, plans include poking gunk into cracks in the driveway in preparation for overall seal-coat. Whee. Also, afternoon baseball game.
.