@cstross ...i hate to break the news but AI is a "tool" that has it's uses but also it's limitations, AI is great for several things but certainly not for this... The movement calling everything AI "slop", should be replaced by a serious discussion how and when to use AI (and when not).

@TimWardCam @swetland The house I grew up in was only rewired with modern sockets and ring mains in 1974. Before then it was all round-pin sockets (two sizes, small ones for lamps only).

@swetland @cstross You can still buy the plugs separately of course - you might want to do something like build your own extension lead.

@TimWardCam @swetland @cstross 5A lighting circuits use round pin plugs. We have a couple of those in our 2009 house to allow us switch on a couple of small table lights. So I have wired round pin plugs in a modern house.

@cstross @swetland Yes, I remember there were two sizes, what I don't remember was the precise mix of two- and three-pin variants.

@cstross Nor can I, now you come to mention it.

Though I was just discussing with someone recently about when I last sent a fax, which was sometime around 2013, give or take. Probably several years after the penultimate time I sent a fax, but I was communicating with my bank, and weirdly it was the only way they could accept correspondence about what I wanted to talk to them about.

@ErikJonker Shocking to you, I know, but I think the stuff currently sold as AI is bullshit.

@cstross
Pretty though

@cstross in the US a 220V appliance comes without plugs so you get to spend $120 on an electrician to wire one on

@greem @cstross we have those already https://aidarwinawards.org/

@cstross how many do you keep around, "just in case"? (Me: two or three at least)

@mpjgregoire @jbayes

@cstross out of curiosity, surely it spits out a slightly different thing every time? Have people replicated this? I'm sure it'd give similarly deadly results multiple times

which is why people really need to do better and learn what these things are (not) so they don't fking go to it for advice and how-tos in the first place

@cstross I am fully aware of all it's limitations , there is an awful lot of AI bullshit around, but actually also a considerable amount of useful applications

@cstross But a lot has changed in basic ability since 1992. Not in the positive sense either.
And people in China now wire the UK plugs on for you.

@tops @mpjgregoire @jbayes I don't any more. Used to keep a couple on hand until the mid-90s.

@sotolf @cstross Anthropic's Claude Opus 4.6 uncovers 500 zero-day flaws in open-source code https://www.axios.com/2026/02/05/anthropic-claude-opus-46-software-hunting

@TimWardCam @cstross @swetland
There were (and still are) three sizes of round three-pin plugs in UK: 2A, 5A and 15A. Because they don’t have fuses in the plug, the 5A and 15A outlets must be radially wired from a correspondingly-rated circuit breaker. (I’m not sure what the rules are for 2A; that’s almost exclusively used for lighting appliances, often controlled by light switches.)

@sotolf @cstross or if you are into biology, AlphaFold — Google DeepMind https://deepmind.google/science/alphafold/ ,

@Sie @nygl @cstross r/DINgore would be proud of you.

@sotolf @cstross AlphaFold 3 (2024) explicitly uses a generative diffusion model