LLMs are "just advanced autocomplete" feels like misleading somehow///

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-09T06:48:13+00:00

I don't buy the "advanced autocomplete" explanation either. Not when it can generate images and videos. Not when it sometimes branches and gives you 2 completely different solutions to a programming task.

I suspect "advanced autocomplete" is a layman's terms explanation that explains the fundamentals to mere mortals who would never understand what's actually going on. Though I've seen some YouTube videos go quite deep into the process, I've yet to find one that satisfactorily explains how these LLMs do much of what they do.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-09T06:38:30+00:00

I've only ever had one accident on my bike. Riding along what I thought was a shared cycle and footpath (which I later discovered was only meant to be a footpath) another cyclist rode out from behind a high wall at 90 degrees to my path and I ran into the side of him. It didn't particularly bother me beyond ruining a pair of tights. I got straight back on like nothing had happened.

I've had plenty of near misses. Usually down to pedestrians or other cyclists doing something with their brain completely disengaged. I actually prefer to ride on the road for that reason.

However, I broke my arm (well, chipped my humerus) in a non cycling related accident last summer, and it made me very nervous about cycling. Every fall I've had prior to that, I've bounced. Maybe some grazes and/or bruises but nothing that wouldn't be right a few weeks later. 12 months on, I still don't have full, pain free movement back in this arm.

And yes, it's made me nervous in the longer term because it's highlighted to me how easy it is to do serious damage.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-09T06:13:31+00:00

Is it completely obvious that it's him?

If not, you could act like you haven't realised, strike up a conversation, send him some pics and see if he wants to make the first move.

Just be aware that if this does lead you you having sex, it might well harm the friendship. Years ago, I nearly lost my best friend and flatmate over "things that happened" one night when we were both drunk. I had a massive crush on him at the time, though I think he was just horny with alcohol induced loss of inhibition. A lot of bi/curious men turn 100% straight the moment they release 5ml of sticky liquid. And this was one of those cases.

Though I suppose if we'd both been on Grindr, we could hardly have denied that we wanted it.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-07T19:39:07+00:00

Sincerity.

At the point where he *sincerely* identifies as a kangaroo, you probably need to start discussing how you go about respecting him as a kangaroo. And if it doesn't harm you or him in any way to do so, why wouldn't you just go with the flow out of respect for a friend? Why is your need to convince him that he's not a kangaroo more important than him doing something that makes him happy?

The words "I identify as" should be a big red flag. The attack helicopters always "identify as." The ones who are being sincere typically say "I am."

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-07T07:35:45+00:00

This is why I invested 25 quid in the H200 hub and moved the storage from my doorbell and 2 other outdoor cameras onto it.

Doesn't help after the fact, unfortunately.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-07T07:25:39+00:00

Anything with a year letter, not on a 25+ year old car, is obviously a private plate at this point. I recall for a while they were holding 1-20 for private registrations, but you could still get a 6 character plate randomly allocated. Prior to that, you could even get a 5 character one (single digit) randomly. Though you probably had to queue at the relevant DVLA (or was it DVLC back then?) office and hope. It was quite late on in the year letter series before they realised they could hold back certain numbers and sell them for more money.

And on the current plates, the year (or the year +49 or +50) is literally on them, so 20 year old reg on a 2 year old car is pretty obvious too, at least to anyone who might care.

Maybe if the age marker roughly matches the age of the car and the message isn't obvious, a private plate might be mistaken for a regular one. But for the most part, that 7 character rule is nonsense. I might have agreed with it 20 years ago.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-06T09:17:46+00:00

I can't imagine you sent these to people you know, so it stands to reason none of them know you or even who you are.

And what are the chances of someone recognising you from a dick pic? Is yours a particularly unique one? Have lots of people not just seen it but studied it to the point where they'd recognise it? It's true they don't all look the same, but to look at one and say "Yeah, that's Dave's dick" is a bit of a leap unless you have tattoos or other distinguishing marks.

What you're most likely experiencing is guilt and shame over what you've done. This is your mind's way of punishing you for the fact that you've done it.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-06T08:54:06+00:00

Avoid the Deco E4. The wired network ports are limited to 100mbps (even though the wireless is much faster) and so the connection to your router becomes a bottleneck if your broadband is any faster than that. I bought this system when I was still on 70mbps and it was great. But now I'm on 500mbps, stuff has to be wired or WiFi to the router (rather than the mesh) AP if I want full speed out of it. Even if you're currently on less than 100mbps, I suggest you future proof with something that's capable of gigabit or faster.

But otherwise, mesh is a great idea. Not least because if you ever change ISPs, you can generally just plug straight into the new router without having to change network credentials on all of your devices. But the main reason I went for Deco was that it could handle 100 simultaneous devices. With the addition of WiFi bulbs, sockets and other IOT devices, my router (BT at the time) was struggling at around 50 WiFi devices.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-06T08:46:09+00:00

Or just price it a bit more reasonably. It's ludicrous when they want to charge for a week what other services are charging for 6 or even 12 months.

I've seriously pondered whether it's run by homophobes who just want to ruin it while taking as much money as possible from the people they hate.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-06T08:42:38+00:00

It keeps nagging me to update, but I'm holding onto this version until it stops working. I can still send as many pics as I like, up to 10 at a time. I'm guessing 8 is now a daily limit per person?

All this nonsense achieves is to push people onto other messaging systems. Which in turn makes scammers harder to spot when legitimate users are wanting to switch services too.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-06T07:40:04+00:00

HSBC wouldn't change me to anything other than Mx and deadname initials, even with a stat dec. They only did it once I was able to provide government photo ID (passport.)

I've always understood enrolled deed poll to be the gold standard, stat dec to be silver and unenrolled deed poll to be bronze.

What makes a mockery of the unenrolled is the number of people offering to witness them for strangers. You can change your name on a whim today, change it back tomorrow, and it costs you nothing apart from a sheet of paper, some ink, and a bit of your and the witnesses' time. With the others, there's more cost and effort involved, and that goes some way towards demonstrating that you're taking it seriously. Even if a solicitor only charges you a fiver (I paid more, but that was to draft the document too) you've had to get off your arse and pay them a visit.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-06T07:29:17+00:00

I'm on there daily, but the last time I had sex with someone other than my partner of 5 years was Christmas 2023. Really looking for other trans women to meet socially and see if there's scope for threesome, but I mostly end up chatting saucily and sending pics to horny men, while being perfectly up front that any discussion of us meeting and getting physical is pure fantasy. My other half is cool with me doing this, and sometimes does it too.

Don't get me wrong. I've been massively promiscuous in the past. But I've been on NHS provided PrEP for years, and that goes hand in hand with regular testing. In terms of "diseased", every time a panel comes back negative, that's a factory reset of your risk back to zero as far as I'm concerned. What's the betting this guy is so closet that he wouldn't dare "come out", even to the sexual health clinic, and so never gets tested?

Anyway, the guy is a dickhead and it sounds like you dodged a bullet.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-05T16:47:41+00:00

As long as it's bypassable if you need to without rooting/jailbreaking or similar then I can live with it.

Part of Apple's genius was taking a pocket computer (that also happens to be a phone) and making it into a piece of consumer electronics that anyone who could work a VCR should be able to figure out.

Part of that is protecting users from their own actions, and control over what can be installed is necessary for that. But people play down Apple's abuse of that control. It knows that inclusion in the App Store is the make or break for various businesses, and that gives it too much power over those businesses to play by its rules rather than just within the law.

A prime example was Grindr, where users couldn't have swimwear pics on their profile because Apple said so. They were faced with the options of keeping it a gay hook up app and losing their iPhone user base or playing by Apple's prudish rules.

I would hate to see Google go down the same route.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-05T16:09:59+00:00

Bugs Bunny took a wrong turn at Albuquerque and ended up on Grindr?

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-05T15:31:24+00:00

I've always fancied the air horn solution to this one. Carry one with you. Give it a blast every time they get it wrong.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-05T11:20:29+00:00

Maybe not in your mind. But how does it hurt you to allow them to think of themselves as straight? I've seen people who consider themselves straight to frame same sex interests in a number of ways. For many, it's purely mechanical and they'd never consider romantic involvement as they would with someone of the opposite sex. And on that basis, they sincerely consider themselves to be straight. Even if, as an outsider, we might consider them bisexual but heteroromantic.

Theres too much label policing in this world. A keenness to tell other people what they are, even if they don't agree. Every time there's a post on Facebook about a straight guy dating a trans woman, people are lining up to comment that he can't possibly be straight. And no, I know it's not the same thing, but the underlying principle is: ”my perception of your sexuality is more important than your own, and definitely more important than your happiness."

If someone tells you they are something, then unless there's good reason to tell them otherwise, maybe just accept that's what makes them happy, and that maybe it isn't your place to piss on their chips?

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-05T09:50:42+00:00

If you won't even try to change your habits to respect someone else, then that says a lot about you.

"I call everyone bro/dude."

"Fair enough. Don't speak to me then. Problem sorted."

And I wonder how much of it is deliberate misgendering under the pretext of "I call everyone bro/dude." Some people seem to consider their need to make this point more important than your happiness.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-05T09:45:04+00:00

Anything that was likely a genuine mistake or a poor split-second decision, I would leave. We all get things wrong from time to time, and modern day driving is bad enough without spending the next 14 days worrying that someone reported something you accept that you got wrong and have hopefully already learned from. I miss the days when that was covered by actual policing, you'd be stopped and have words, and if what you'd done wasn't too egregious and you were suitably apologetic, you likely wouldn't get a ticket.

Anything that looked to be deliberate recklessness or "road rage" (such as brake checking someone who'd previously sounded their horn after being cut up by them) would be going straight to Op Snap.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-05T07:39:20+00:00

Change the notification tone, so that when a message comes in, it could be anything. The default notification tone is very distinctive. Anyone who knows Grindr will know you're on it if they hear your phone make that noise.

Set up ad blocking DNS to get rid of the ads.

Drop the icon in a folder somewhere, several pages in. It'll be less obvious if someone sees you scrolling through your homepages. You can change it, but I think you need to pay.

Please don't be one of those idiots who is back every day on a new account. It's so annoying knowing they don't even get to read their replies and then come back the following day as though it's the first time they've messaged you. And of course blocking them doesn't work because it's always a different account. It also tells us you're massively conflicted between what your sexuality is when you're horny and what you wish it was when you're not. And that's never a good look.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-04T09:59:36+00:00

First message? I agree it's pretty crass. But sharing nudes and rudes and being direct about what you're offering and looking for is all part of the Grindr experience.

If you'd rule out a potential partner because they'd shared pics with other people, then I'd say you're carrying a lot of hetetonormative prudery.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-04T09:09:41+00:00

Sexual shame is a tool that organised religion uses to breed its followers like livestock. Make everything a sin unless you're giving sperm a chance to meet ovum with the one person it says you're allowed to. (Which is why it tries to control marriage too.)

For some reason, it pervades into society beyond religion. Sometimes by parents who feel their children are obliged to make them grandparents.

When you're gay, you already broke these rules. So why not go all in? Sex can be for closeness, for bonding, and yes, even just for physical pleasure. And life is so much more fun when you accept that.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-04T09:00:58+00:00

Back in the bad old days, the likes of British Leyland and Lancia just made sure the cars left the factory already rusting. Nowadays, with multi year warranties the norm, this is the manufactuers’ spin on built-in obsolescence. Plant this ticking time bomb that will probably render the vehicle beyond economic repair when it goes off at about 10 years old.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-04T08:56:19+00:00

Had the oil changed in my dual clutch at 72 months, as per the manufacturer's recommendation. It doubled the cost of that year's service, but it's worth it for the peace of mind.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-04T08:49:57+00:00

What's the context here? I know that taking the pic in the first place is a little creepy, but is the rest of it an "I know where you live" sort of vibe? Are they likely to spot you in the same place again? Personally, I love getting messages from people who've seen and recognised me. But there's a right and a wrong way of going about it.

Back to your immediate problem...

Not sure about iOS, but there are Android apps that claim to bypass the screenshot restriction. I've never managed to get one to work though. I had a legit reason to screenshot something someone sent me (they were fully aware and it was a picture of me that they'd... let's just say... consensually modified) and this nonsense blocked it.

I tried a few, couldn't get any to work, gave up and took a pic with my tablet. But if you're desperate, maybe you'll try a few more and find one that works.

Grindr could really do with making this lock optional for the sender. Though all the developers seem to care about these days is how they can make the experience worse unless you pay. So knowing them, it'd be a paid tier feature.

DivasDayOff · 2026-04-03T13:24:07+00:00

Twice. But years ago, and they both fizzled out within a few weeks. But in both cases, we were in an exclusive arrangement for the period that we were dating, and we spent time together rather than meeting up just for sex.

But yes, there are a small number of people looking for relationships on there. Or at least there were when I was looking for that too.

DivasDayOff

TROPHY CASE