Cedar Swamp

 

I have tried many times to capture a little of the gloomy mood of the cedar swamp by Nobska Rd. This try is closer than most.

Getting rid of "search". How 'bout internet standardized directories?

Looking to eliminate search algorithms. "How ever am I supposed to find what I am looking for?"

One answer is to reject the idea of internet platforms picking winners and losers that do not show you what you want anyway. So how about standardized subject directories, where a content creator decides how to list links to their content. The trick would be to assign a "1" to each source of content, and divide that weight up - however the creator wishes - across the directories. You could put all weight into one sub-directory, or divide it up a bit here and a bit there. People trying to be listed everywhere would get less weight. The weights would determine list order within the sub-directory.

People who should know better did not notice how exact string matches stopped working in Google and the other search engines circa. 2014. That is when search started to suck. Now it it effectively a catalog designed to optimize shopping - with search weight determined by a platform pretending it is not a publisher or editor [hey Supreme Court: they obviously are, because they edit the 'table of contents'].

Today's search AI is garbage. Here is how I know: I am looking for fruit sock - bags to protect fruit, ripening on the tree. All I can find on Google is links to regular socks with pictures of fruit. Same when I try to find mathematics about language. All Google will show me is content about how mathematics is a language. I want an internet that understands prepositions! Too bad search engines cannot tell fruit pictures on socks, versus sock for fruit. But let's not ask for too much. 

Anyway, if a content creator decides to classify their content - then that sounds like a better system. Save the AI garbage for finding people whose content does not belong in that category - a policing activity that should be public, transparent, and using open source algorithms. In case of ambiguity, go with the opinion of the content creator. 

Would that work?

Signs of Spring - February 2023

First crocuses in the yard: Feb 11

First red-winged blackbird calls: Feb 20

[Added later] I want to say the first ospreys were around March 20.

Also, first swallows April 14. first hummingbird April 25; first goldfinch April 26

Quartz concave base point - Massapoag

Went with Barb to Ward's Berry Farm, an Audubon Society property in Sharon, and found a fine quartz point.

I did not see much and was going to give up on the place, when I saw this little quartz tip sticking out from the side of a rut. Now I know this place, with a rather vast array of fields, is a place worth spending quite a lot more time.

Update: Except, maybe not. I spent maybe more than 3 hours there a few days later and saw almost nary a flake of quartz. It is possible this was an isolated arrowhead? The water weathering on front and back are peculiar, since the edges are still sharp. 

That warm feeling...

...of knowing that you have things to watch until bedtime.

A pretty argillite arrowhead

From "coastal Rhode Island":

Browsing Buddy

An interesting product would allow one person to follow the browsing sequence of a different person. It would be fun, and weird.