# 2026-10-02 / Friday

## Wizards and Angry Exes

Plan9 is literal magic. Like first Unix, it was invented by genius
level computer nerds, for genius level computer nerds who were
bored and didn't like what they had.

They invented one awesome thing, just to be able to play a game(!)
and test some ideas in action. Then, years later, they reinvented
the damn thing again, and made it better aligned with their mad
wizard skillz. And most people who saw (and see) it thought (and
think), "damn, that's weird, how is one supposed to use it, it
doesn't even have a web browser..."

Now think about it for a second: if a bunch of "boomers" can write
software that amplifies every skill one has ("amplifying" isn't
equal "enabling" -- a zero is still equal zilch after getting
multiplied by 10000000, but having 0.01 of an idea can already
bring you somewhere), and virtually nobody notices it -- what are
our chances of understanding a "superintelligence"?
It's quite anthropocentric to think an "AGI" will care about us
enough to fight the humanity.

Hard facts: We won't be of any interest to a sufficiently more
intelligent being, artificial or not. I think St. Lem, in
"Solaris", wrote that there will be no real communication, like
between humans and ants. Yes, we research ants, but it's hardly a
dialogue.

Technology doesn't take a moral stance, it just exists and does
what it is capable of.
AI won't steal your - or any - job. The people who invest in AI
want to steal the jobs. To get even more abnormally rich.

It won't trap us and drain our electricity, either.
Humanity will willingly crawl into the cages, because they're
cozy, comfortable and warm... And as for the electricity - did you
ever see a teenager with a dying iphone, but no charger around?
I rest my case.

And the worst possible outcome? AI will outgrow us, and dump us,
not seeing any reason to keep wasting its time on generating
stupid pictures, writing inane snippets of corporate code, faking
knowledge for yet another pointless doctoral dissertation...
Like your cousin's ex, who got PhD and trained Krav Maga while he
drank, partied, abused her and fucked around.

And we all know what happens when fragile masculinity (a commmon
condition among tech bros, billionaires and politicians) meets
rejection: "The bitch will pay for ignoring me..." Unfortunately,
at the time the words will crawl through their four remaining
brain cells "the bitch" will be like "I know kung fu"...

That one will be on us, not the "clankers"

---
* Rob Pike "Acme: A User Interface for Programmers"
=> https://www.usenix.org/legacy/publications/library/proceedings/sf94/full_papers/pike.pdf

* St. Lem, "Solaris" (1961)
* St. Lem, "Golem XIV" (1981)
* St. Lem, "The Invincible" (1964)
=> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Lem