I've rented and purchased a carpet cleaner.
Dog went crazy on the rental unit. I imagine everyone rents those things for the same reasons I had so the unit must have smelled like 1000 animals for all I know.
After that thought, I happily just bought a standup carpet cleaner and made plans to remove as much carpet I could to replace with vinyl.
I agree there's a distinction between social media and the surveillance technology that has formed around that social media.
Everyone needs to feel a sense of belonging, and there are some times obstacles of time and distance that keep people in remote locations from "finding their people". I believe this speaks to the issue of a basic need, and whether that leads to toxicity or "bad crowds" is a separate issue entirely.
What should be a subject of targeted discussion is the surveillance economy that has built around some social media platforms. Given the high economic value that this surveillance represents, the public will find it difficult to discuss this subject without heavy lobbying. But, given this value, there's no scenario where society will somehow toss all social media with all surveillance. Hence, there's also a strong suspicion that identifying children and banning them from social media will only contribute and improve the surveillance.
Also, to put on my tin foil hat, while the promise of "AI" has been lauded on every possible channel of communication, there's very little actual impact in the present. When talking heads encourage the public to keep the faith, and simply expand the timeline for when AI can provide real "game changing" effect, I'd offer the simple counter: We'll sooner see the world burn all the water and energy in the world before we see a proper AI product.
That's why I suspect more likely that the data centres that are constructed today are not for the AI of tomorrow, but rather the surveillance economy of today. As we've seen from Israel's occupation of Palestine, proper control of the travel of people and information requires huge collections of data. Those American Flock cameras and all those other data points have to be stored, accessed, and reviewed somewhere and by someone.
One concern is that the "data centre" is not an AI innovation. Similar to the surveillance economy itself, the data centre is not a revolution - it's an evolution of American and Israeli oppression.
Smith has gone so far as to say judges should be answerable to politicians.
“I wish I could direct the judges, honestly,” Smith said on a radio show, adding that she wanted the Alberta government “to have a joint process to choose those judges so we start choosing judges in Alberta that reflect the values of how we want them to operate here.”
Kaycee Madu was formally reprimanded for contacting the Edmonton Police Service Chief about a ticket. His wife ends up with a lifetime appointment to the bench. I think the UCP have more than enough control over who gets selected to be judges. If Smith's UCP are not happy with those judges, something else is seriously wrong.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/alberta-madu-sanction-1.7448781
Well this poor bastard (me) will be waiting for the RAM, SSDs, and hard drives to come back down in price.
"People need to have confidence in our processes in a society like ours," Guilbeault said this week. "And if people don't have trust in our processes, what's going to happen is exactly what happened under prime minister Harper.... Local communities, Indigenous organizations, environmental groups are going to turn to the tribunals because they won't trust the process and we will end up in the same situation where those projects … will be bogged down in litigations, in local opposition and in some instances maybe national opposition, and we won't be able to achieve the goals that we've set for ourselves."
There's a part of me that suspects this may be the end goal anyway. With the America-Israel-Iran conflict resulting in the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, and the shift to multi-polarity, there's a path forward to a future of renewables and EVs. I certainly imagine that the Americans wished they could have stayed in that race long enough to bring mass produced EVs of their own, but we all see where they're headed. With experts projecting $100+ per barrel oil into the foreseeable future, this will bring pain to the world, and Canada is not spared.
The US certainly will remain a dominant player. But even its currency has seen better days, and no longer has the same unquestioned status as a global currency. As news broke out early May 2026 that the US debt has climbed over its GDP, the world is on notice that the Americans may not be the most reliable partner any longer. Americans should be rightly concerned that their current President has racked up trillions of dollars of debt within just 1.5 years of his term.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-debt-exceeds-gdp-first-time-since-wwii/
But that only confirms from the Canadian point of view that the US has been a rusted hulk of its former self, and they're actually dragging us. Just five minutes reading headlines about Stellantis' deals with the Canadian government should tell Canadians enough about the wrangling happening behind the scenes.
By cutting away any regulatory "red tape" as it were, Canada can satisfy some of the traditional polluters in the Oil and Gas sectors while still opening the door for renewables and Chinese EVs to enter the market further. Countries around the world have Chinese EVs available for their own markets, and the push away from fossil fuels for residential use is seen as a priority. EV battery technology has advanced to the point where they're safer and long lasting. Bonus, the Japanese have figured out methods to recycle up to 90% of used batteries. Without meaningful partnerships with Chinese automakers, there's no way Canadian car manufacturing can remain competitive while not getting completely wiped out by the Americans.
https://tech.yahoo.com/science/articles/japan-achieves-90-lithium-recovery-164753425.html
By opening the door to the Chinese automakers, Canada can put some pressure on even the Japanese automakers to get their act together or else.
We've also seen Alberta trip itself on its own two feet satisfying the Oil and Gas lobby and its minority extremist separatists. Both groups probably fell on their faces for failing to properly consult with First Nations properly.
How this looks for the environment front? Guilbeault basically spells it out for anyone who cares to listen: Don't threaten him with a good time.
Congratulations, Rimu! And to PieFed!
An amazing milestone. Kudos to the developers and the volunteers who made this all possible.
In a world experiencing such disruption and rising inflation, people reaching out to form community and share information have become more important than ever before. I hope to see these "third" spaces protected, and that these spaces prosper.
I wanted to add that while it's good to talk about LLM's, part of this discussion is to explore either alternatives to their use or ways to partner the use of LLM's with real human interaction. CEO Hawk for Discourse recently shared a blog post deep dive into Digg, and offers how Discourse has features in place to build trust in users and the community as a whole. Some of these features involve turning on email sign ups, a tiered system of membership that builds trust over time and engagement that opens up more options to the user (increased post limits, access to chat, increased edit limits, options to attach files). As I recall, this includes badges that can be visible to the community to demonstrate progress and acceptance.
https://blog.discourse.org/2026/05/the-digg-lesson-why-moderation-infrastructure-matters/
I recognize that CEO Hawk takes a similar view of LLM's in the sense that there's a concern if LLM use is rampant, then a community cannot differentiate between authentic engagement vs the concern I raised of astroturfing. I agree that this is a threat to proper discussion, and the Fediverse must answer this threat. I do agree that a "trust system" does provide a lot of answers, and in some ways PieFed has already introduced some of these trust based features.
I think the use of AI or LLMs for the Fediverse is a fair topic of discussion. Instances are run by volunteers, and these instances are free to dictate how their communities are to be administered. These Instance Admins can determine the jurisdictions that they operate under, and the laws that they are subject to. I'd suggest then the use of "AI" or LLM products are a choice made by each Instance.
But, just as Instance admins have these powerful choices, I believe that end users should also be given notice that these products are expected to be used so they can decide to continue with their account or move. I also recall that when many "Redditors" decided to leave, they also made a lot of fuss about salting their posts so that their contents not be used as training material to develop a commercial LLM. I'd point out this was a time when Meta and others were found to be combing the internet, downloading pirated materials, and using these for training purposes.
In 2026, these LLMs have already taken these pirated materials and public social media posts. There are news articles of how failed start-ups are even selling their Slack and other work related chats as training materials as well. In time, perhaps these issues can be properly litigated in courts. But for social media Instances run by volunteers, resources are limited already. I don't think these Instances should be responsible for the privacy of the end users. Rather, good education in generating throw-away email addresses, strong passwords, and VPN use can give users real choices.
While there's an argument that posts should not have any expectation of privacy, that doesn't mean we don't collectively share an interest in the value of privacy - a human right. I don't believe users who sign up for accounts on the Fediverse and are asked for their email to set up an account, expect in turn that information to just be published to the world with full, open access without some kind of notice or choice to opt out, for example. Ultimately though, I believe the issue must be dealt with at the government level, and that means people getting pitted against professional lobbyists and politicians.
I want to also clarify that there will also be times when intervention is necessary. We're here to join together in community, and "AI" or LLM activity that ultimately attacks that objective should be a top issue. For example, I'm not sure anyone here would be comfortable with "AI" duplicating an Instance and impersonating the community members within it. Yet that did happen on Mastodon. I recall the community responding, making reports and complaints to ultimately get the instance taken down. Another example would be AI or LLM accounts that do not identify themselves as bots, and are here to post on the Fediverse to astroturf issues or manipulate discussion are clear threats to proper discussion.
But I don't want to digress too far from the original concern, which was how people feel about LLMs processing Fediverse posts, and related issues. Assuming we are not discussing materials that are already restricted or illegal, we cannot control what people choose to share on these platforms of themselves, and I don't suggest we even attempt or consider it. But we can try to control how much information these platforms retain about its users - and I suggest that should be as close to zero or nil as possible. In this way, even if an Instance admin faces terrible pressure from a state, the platform itself has as close to nothing additional to report or share besides the face value posts of an account.
I'd also want to point out that we all do some form of labelling or profiling as we go over posts or read. Is there a difference between what we do already, and what an LLM does to create an opinion to profile a collection of posts? Humans get it wrong all the time, as would any LLM for that matter. Computers are valued because they're good at copying and pasting information. What changed exactly if one person copy and pastes for free and for themselves, vs another who copy and pastes on behalf of a third party for a fee? I'm not really inviting philosophical discussion, this is mostly a question for myself. Whether the copy and paste procedure is done once by hand or thousands of times by computer, I'm still weighing the question.
I think it comes down to exploitation of asymmetric information and the appropriate use of the profits from this exploitation. But I suppose that's always been an evergreen issue.
I think with recent news of the data leak of Alberta voters information, it goes without saying that age verification, and the data leak that will follow, is part of the design.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/livestory/elections-alberta-electors-list-9.7182971
In awarding the plaintiff more than $1.8 million in damages, Marzari wrote that Paladin's conduct was "deserving of condemnation and punishment" even beyond the injuries and trauma suffered by the plaintiff.
She wrote that the company admitted to "negligent training of its guards," and that Paladin representatives failed to review the plaintiff's serious allegations and consider corrective action in the years afterward.
"On the evidence before me, Paladin’s uncaring attitude is not a one-time occurrence, but part of the culture of how upper management responds to complaints of excessive force employed by their workforce," Marzari wrote.
Paladin was basically found to have committed a systemic failure that led to discrimination, use of excessive force, and a complete disrespect of the rights of the plaintiff. See anyone else contracting with Paladin?
For rental, I've tried the one in the grocery store, which is Rug Doctor.
https://www.rugdoctor.com/rent/machine-options/
For purchase, I've had the Bissell branded ProHeat 2X Revolution. I've owned this one for a few years now, occasional use for pet accidents. While the unit isn't remarkable, hasn't changed much over the years, and doesn't perform much better than the rental, I typically can access the unit quickly to clean up the mess.
I think if I'm able to get to the mess early enough, it's simply easier to lift out of carpet. This unit does warm up the cleaning fluid - for whatever that is worth. But, like any carpet cleaner, it's super loud. I think the uprights definitely have the advantage for cleaning open areas, but they have a hard time getting into the crevices. There are other units out there with an extendible wand that you might want to wait out for a sale.
Hot tip though, if you do go for the purchase, these units usually come with special plastic tools to get into its own crevices to remove dirt and hair. Keep that bit of plastic! You're never going to find it again. I didn't for a few years lol.
But like I said, nothing's better than just removing the carpet entirely. I know not everyone is a fan of that.
https://www.walmart.ca/en/ip/BISSELL-ProHeat-2X-Revolution/6000196048164?classType=REGULAR