Currently: @BertramDitore@lemmy.zip

Formerly: @BertramDitore@lemm.ee

Formerly: @BertramDitore@lemmy.world

  • 0 Posts
  • 38 Comments
Joined 2 months ago
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Cake day: June 4th, 2025

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  • BertramDitore@lemmy.ziptoComic Strips@lemmy.worldLet’s not do that.
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    1 day ago

    Yeah, in meetings with outside teams I can usually understand it and it’s tolerable. But honestly I prefer if the person running the meeting prepares enough to make formal introductions for everyone. The worst is being in a meeting with someone nobody knows, and was never introduced nor given the opportunity to introduce themselves.

    My manager does it perfectly, she quickly goes around and says “for the new folks on the call, that’s Bertram, he does x, y, and z. That’s pishadoot, they’ve been here for years and do a, b, and c. It reminds her team that she values them and shows the outside folks that’s she’s a competent manager.


  • BertramDitore@lemmy.ziptoComic Strips@lemmy.worldLet’s not do that.
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    1 day ago

    I’ve worked with people who will sometimes interrupt the natural pre-meeting banter to force an icebreaker. Like, what the hell do you think we were just doing you corporate ass-hat?

    Frankly, I’m deeply suspicious of anyone who forces a “round robin” of any kind during any meeting. It very rarely has any value and tells me that that person shouldn’t be running the meeting, or that that particular meeting didn’t need to happen.



  • I posted this response a while back about a different “AI” comic in the same style, which might have also been yours, but the thread was deleted after lots of people replied so I don’t know for sure. Regardless, it still applies:

    I don’t want to pile on too hard, because hopefully you’ve internalized some of the other criticisms in the comments, but this is actually a great example of why “AI” art makes so many people so angry.

    On its face, this is a nice-ish comic strip with a joke that might get a smirk or chuckle in response. The moment you look at the image critically, that all falls apart. And don’t you want people to look at your art critically? Don’t you want people to zoom in and enjoy every part of what you created? Thing is, this isn’t your art. You didn’t create it. You wrote some sentences, and then an algorithm (without permission) used the real, painstakingly created artwork of artists from all over the world and throughout history, to spit out some pixels that look like this. You didn’t pick up a pencil or stylus, you didn’t ink the lines and labor over the facial expression or color pallets. You didn’t build on a lifetime of artistic experience to create something new in a style that you’ve been developing for yourself. And then you called it OC to make it seem like you had actually done all that. That may seem okay to you, but it’s deeply insulting to lots of people.

    I’m a shitty visual artist. I couldn’t draw to save my life. And that’s totally okay, not everyone is Van Gogh. I find other outlets for my artistic impulses.





  • BertramDitore@lemmy.ziptocats@lemmy.worldJust chilling on my couch
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    11 days ago

    The power of velvet is probably one of the best kept secrets for cat owners. I’m always surprised how few people know about it.

    I got a nice new leather couch a few years back, and my cat loooves to claw at leather, so I got a velvet cover and it’s genuinely like magic. He can scratch it all he wants and not do any damage. I think he actually realized it after a few days of trying to tear it up, because he gave up and now just likes to cuddle on it. I check on the leather every so often to make sure he hasn’t pierced the cover, but every time I check I’m amazed that the velvet cover and the leather underneath still look brand new after about three years of daily use.

    Tldr velvet is basically claw-proof.



  • My mother died recently, and she was the breadwinner and was in charge of everything financial, because my surviving father is a toxic narcissist with zero financial literacy who refuses help from anyone. So I just have to say kudos to you for thinking about this difficult stuff. Your family will appreciate it more than you can imagine.

    Other commenters have already given you solid advice, and I don’t have anything to add there, but more people need to have these difficult conversations and make real practical preparations, as soon as possible. Speaking from experience, not having clear guidance about where things are and what should be done with them, makes an already emotional situation even harder to deal with. Everybody dies, but in death you can make your family’s grieving process slightly easier by thinking ahead like this.

    I’m sorry for whatever you’re going through, but props for thinking about other people while you go through it.



  • I don’t want to pile on too hard, because hopefully you’ve internalized some of the other criticisms in the comments, but this is actually a great example of why “AI” art makes so many people so angry.

    On its face, this is a nice-ish comic strip with a joke that might get a smirk or chuckle in response. The moment you look at the image critically, that all falls apart. And don’t you want people to look at your art critically? Don’t you want people to zoom in and enjoy every part of what you created? Thing is, this isn’t your art. You didn’t create it. You wrote some sentences, and then an algorithm (without permission) used the real, painstakingly created artwork of artists from all over the world and throughout history, to spit out some pixels that look like this. You didn’t pick up a pencil or stylus, you didn’t ink the lines and labor over the facial expression or color pallets. You didn’t build on a lifetime of artistic experience to create something new in a style that you’ve been developing for yourself. And then you signed it to make it seem like you had actually done all that. That may seem okay to you, but it’s deeply insulting to lots of people.

    I’m a shitty visual artist. I couldn’t draw to save my life. And that’s totally okay, not everyone is Van Gogh. I find other outlets for my artistic impulses.


  • BertramDitore@lemmy.ziptoAsklemmy@lemmy.mlIs Bitcoin actually worth anything?
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    1 month ago

    Yeah, this is what I came here to mention. Environmental damage and power consumption are what bitcoins cost, but those costs don’t give bitcoins any inherent value.

    It’s actually a pretty appalling example of human ingenuity. We’ve managed to invent something that has a disproportionately terrible impact on every person on earth through its environmental effects, while simultaneously producing no practical value to anyone other than those wealthy enough to be in control of it.


  • BertramDitore@lemmy.ziptocats@lemmy.worldBug hunting!
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    1 month ago

    Such a pretty cat.

    Mine makes a very specific sound when he’s hunting bugs in particular. Anyone else’s cat do this? The closest thing it sounds like is a squirrel chippering/barking, but it’s totally different from his meow. He never does it any other time, even when he’s hunting his mouse toy, it’s freaking adorable.


  • Yeah paywalls suck, but that’s probably why their journalism remains consistently high quality. I listen to their podcast every so often, and it’s clear that they work their asses off. They just took their first week off since founding the company, because they were worried if they stopped constantly releasing new articles they would quickly go under, so they waited a long time until they were sure they had enough subscribers and had built enough trust to survive a week’s vacation without pissing everybody off.

    I certainly don’t have that kind of work ethic, and I still expect my paycheck.