AI Model History is Being Lost
Models are being retired and history is going with them.
We're losing vital AI history as properitary, hosted models like the original ChatGPT are retired and become completely inaccessible. This essay examines the rapid disappearance of proprietary AI systems, why preservation matters for research and accountability, and the challenges in archiving these technological milestones. A critical look at our vanishing AI heritage and what it means for future understanding of this transformative technology's development.
https://vale.rocks/posts/ai-model-history-is-being-lost
Firehose
Sitting. Confused.
A wandering eye catches yours.
It starts talking.
It is empty.
You look at its head.
You look in its head.
You look through its head.
Nothing.
Write late; edit early.
“Declan has also been recommended to be awarded the Order of the British Empire for his outstanding services.”
- Hackaday, 2025
https://hackaday.com/2025/03/13/britcss-write-css-with-british-english-spellings/
This post by Richard Rutter has to be one of my most referenced blog posts.
It is just an all-around fantastic breakdown of how to achieve good typographic styling on the web with explanations of each and every bit.
I do love that things on the net continue to be linked long after publication and take on lives of their own.
I’m not sure how my risk matrix is calibrated, but I know that the reward of cheap chocolate milk is worth the risk of drinking chocolate milk past its use-by.
A website that remembers.
It screams in anguish as you reload – instant amnesia on refresh.
Bound to only remember that which its creator has permitted.
You may return and remember the site, but it can’t recall you, no matter how hard it may try. Yet, it misses you.
(Inspired by strange.website)
Still weird to see my stuff end up on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnE02lMpPO8
I knew this was going to be a decisive one, and it is lovely to see people talking about URLs and making up their own opinions on structure in the comments.
This video is a reaction to this article from me:
https://vale.rocks/posts/strong-opinions-on-url-design
I wish to remind that, despite the fact I am in part made up of glass, plastics, and neodymium, I am still very much a fleshy human.
Hopefully this can be fixed with time.
Where do you, personally, dock your browser dev tools?
Nothing gets me going like manually kerning type.
Writing with proper grammar is a curse online because it makes people feel entitled to offer all sorts of unsolicited corrections.
Many people write in phone shorthand, littered with spelling mistakes and without any punctuation, without having anyone pull them up on it.
But because I generally write with correct spelling and grammar, I’ll have multiple people harassing me when I slip up.
A few notes after voting in an election for the first time:
- The queue is non-existent mid-afternoon.
- The upper-house ballot paper is way bigger than I anticipated.
- You can figure out a lot about a party based on their ‘how to vote’ cards.
- I’m sick of stupid corflute cards.
Respecting User Preference
Allowing users choice is satisfying.
Discussion of why respecting user preferences is satisfying, covering how respecting user autonomy, embracing diversity, solving dual-nature problems, practicing quality craftsmanship, and seeing visible impact creates fulfilling work beyond mere functionality.
https://vale.rocks/posts/respecting-user-preference
If you ever feel useless, just be glad you aren’t the HTML title attribute as handled in accessibility contexts.
You’ve called it rss.xml, but it’s actually an Atom feed. Do you do this just to smite me?
Bing Webmaster Tools just generally suck, yeah? Surely it can’t just be me that finds them super buggy and can rarely get them to index anything.
Does anyone have experience with them working nicely?
My favourite CSS addition in recent years is a toss-up between light-dark and nesting.
Both have been such game changers and vital to how I build for the web.
All right, I’m calling a timeout. Can everyone please stop writing so many good articles, please? I’ve got work to do, and you all keep distracting me.
An LCD screen through a microscope.
A sheet of sandpaper through a microscope.
Given the recent hubbub regarding Firefox, I know a lot of people are looking for another browser.
I want to take this opportunity to remind you that almost everything out there is based on Chromium and that this gives Google a dangerous power over our web. Google has a near-complete monopoly – don’t play into it.
https://vale.rocks/posts/everything-is-chrome
Further on this topic, I see a lot of people switching to Vivaldi, which, as well as being built on Chromium, isn’t fully open source.
https://vivaldi.com/blog/technology/why-isnt-vivaldi-browser-open-source/
I’m currently on an 8mbps connection and it is times like these I am glad I spend hours optimising and refining my websites.
Who is working on porting all the PowerPoint transitions to the browser for use with the View Transition API?
When children express objectionable views, we’re quick to ask, ‘Where did they pick that up from?’, ‘What have they been watching?’, or ‘Who told them this?’.
Perhaps we need to ask the same regarding adults.
I is never me, for me is always us.
Every facet of thought builds on the inspiration and input of others – never forget it.
Strong Opinions on URL Design
i-have-some-thoughts
A collection of strong opinions on URL design and structure covering topics including use of capitalisation, use of IDs, spaces, hyphens instead of underscores, trailing slashes, hierarchy, and other gripes and particulars I hold.
https://vale.rocks/posts/strong-opinions-on-url-design
Let’s put this masonry debate to rest. I propose we replace grid with masonry altogether. Think about how much trendier everything will be.
Something about this makes me uncomfortable in a way I struggle to articulate in words.