Craig Nicholson

Geek, gamer, developer, architect, photographer. Microsoft Xbox MVP 2008, 2009. Stepfather. Cats before dogs. He/him.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

@PamelaNTenn @Prisonmitch @grok @elon Good going ChatGPT, but that’s a helluva woke son. 🤣

[Brivael Le Pogam @brivael]

Aujourd'hui grosse discussion avec mes ingés (chez Argil) sur pourquoi Elon a viré le LIDAR de ses voitures autonomes. Choix radical, moqué pendant des années, et comme d'hab il avait raison depuis le début.

Le LIDAR c'est un laser qui balaye l'environnement et crache un nuage de points 3D. Sur le papier tu obtiens la géométrie exacte du monde. Dans la vraie vie c'est une verrue technologique collée sur le toit parce qu'on sait pas faire mieux avec la vision seule.

Problème numéro un : ça rajoute une modalité dans le training du modèle. Ton réseau doit apprendre à fusionner vision + lidar + radar + ultrasons. Chaque capteur en plus c'est une source de désaccord à arbitrer, pas une source d'info supplémentaire. Sensor fusion artisanale = dette technique permanente.

Problème numéro deux, la bitter lesson de Rich Sutton : scaler le compute sur une seule modalité bat systématiquement les architectures bricolées à la main. Tesla a dropé le radar, puis les ultrasons, est passé full end-to-end vision. Leur courbe sur les edge cases s'est accélérée APRÈS, pas avant. Waymo fait l'inverse et reste stuck en ops géofencée.

Problème numéro trois, le plus fondamental : le LIDAR voit la géométrie, pas la sémantique. Il sait qu'il y a un truc, pas ce que c'est ni ce que ça va faire. Les derniers 9 de fiabilité sont des problèmes de cognition, pas de perception brute. Un capteur de plus résout rien, il ajoute du bruit.

Sébastien Loeb balance une 208 T16 à 180 dans un chemin boueux corse sous la pluie avec zéro LIDAR. Deux yeux, un cerveau. L'évolution a donné des yeux aux prédateurs pendant 500 millions d'années, pas des lasers. Il y a une raison.

Le LIDAR c'est l'équivalent du marxisme appliqué à l'économie. Une solution planifiée, centralisée, qui prétend modéliser explicitement ce qui doit émerger d'un système distribué et adaptatif. Tu remplaces l'intelligence par de la mesure, la compréhension par de la donnée, l'émergence par le contrôle. Ça rassure les ingénieurs qui veulent tout spécifier en amont, exactement comme la planif rassurait les économistes soviétiques. Et ça échoue pour les mêmes raisons : la réalité est trop riche pour être capturée par un capteur, comme elle est trop riche pour être capturée par un plan quinquennal.

La vraie intelligence, celle de Hayek comme celle de Tesla, c'est de faire confiance à un système qui apprend de l'expérience plutôt que de tout pré-encoder. L'élégance d'une solution c'est son rapport signal sur complexité. Le LIDAR explose le dénominateur.

Défendre le LIDAR en 2026 c'est préférer empiler des hacks plutôt que résoudre le vrai problème. C'est de la feignasserie intellectuelle maquillée en rigueur d'ingénieur. Les mêmes gens qui défendaient les systèmes experts en 2012 contre le deep learning. Ils finiront pareil.

Never bet against end-to-end. Never bet against la simplicité. Never bet against Elon.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

@elonmusk I am still suffering with long COVID symptoms post vaccine. Following the IMA Health post COVID treatment protocol (https://t.co/G36bmkunVF) and it’s working so far. But it should never have gotten to this point in the first place.

[Wayne Borowsky @WBorowsky]

@MyJRA @Parkhurst_JHB @iloveparkhurst @PotholeWarriors @PotholesInBlog @CityofJoburgZA guys three craters and holes in victory road over a year please fix victory road parkhrust thanx

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

Should South African medical aids be POPIA compliant or is it acceptable to provide access to online health services that are only GDPR compliant?

What is the impact on data sovereignty, protection of patient rights and cross-border transfers?

#privacy #legal #GDPR #POPIA

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

Why do mobile app providers like @medisafeapp so greedy?

I’ve been a long time user of the Medisafe app. At first it was free to use and then they introduced premium features and added a subscription model. Great. The basic medication tracking and reminders functionality remained functional.

However they have now introduced a monthly subscription model ONLY for non-US users. And here lies the issue. Offer something for free for MANY years and then try force all users to pay for a premium set of features they don’t want. No option to pay once off for basic features.

As soon as you open the app you are presented with a subscription pay wall with no access to any of your data.

And they claim to allow you to export your data, however the app feature doesn’t work.

I don’t mind paying my dues but I won’t be extorted to access my own data.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

@flexiclub your website is broken once again. Unable to search for holidays or logon to use expiring points. And you have conveniently closed early today.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

@effectuator @GFS_Care It would appear that way. It would appear to be a stock reply from their bot.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

If you ever order off Temu and they send it via GFS Express, you might as well just forget your order.

My orders were packed in one parcel and arrived in JNB on the 17th Dec. It’s been status of out for delivery since the 20th. Nothing. I called them. Was told my parcel is sitting in Soweto and no plan could be shared when it would be delivered.

This was Christmas gifts scheduled to arrived latest on the 22nd and 24th respectively.

Nothing from GFS Express. Temu you need to drop them. They’re a scam.

@shoptemu @temu_africa @GFS_Care @gfs_za

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

@GFS_Care Sorry what private messages? I’ve heard nothing from GFS Express directly. Additionally your agent in South Africa rudely put the phone down on me when I called and asked to speak to a manager.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

I like EF Core but I don’t like breaking changes on version upgrades. It’s good for small scale databases.

Dapper gives me more control of the query itself. If you know the backend you can craft some powerful queries. Also a lot easier to debug the query as you don’t need to capture a query at runtime.

I can honestly say that I hate NHibernate.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

Coming up in next weeks podcast episode, Khobe's health Sanctuary is talking about Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (HEDS)
https://t.co/XTjwZCJPa2
@rarediseasessa #heds #EDS

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

It’s time to cancel my Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription.

1. No cloud gaming support for South Africa.
2. No rewards programme support for South Africa.
3. A 75% price hike from R199 to R349 per month to maintain status quo.
4. No annual subscription discount option anymore.

As the first Microsoft Xbox MVP for Africa I feel that Microsoft and Xbox are willing to destroy Xbox gaming in South Africa after all the work we put in to build it.

And not a peep from @XboxZA about it.

So looks like there will be no Call of Duty Black Ops 7 for me this year as I’m not paying R3167 (R139x12 + R1499) - R4188 (R349x12) to play it for a year.

@XboxP3

[XBOX Game Pass @XBOXGamePass]

we've got updates! here's what's changing with Xbox Game Pass:

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

While this might be great for markets that have reward points, some markets do not. So thank you for not thinking about all of us. @Xbox @XboxZA @XboxGamePass

[CharlieIntel @charlieINTEL]

A Microsoft spokesperson has sent us a statement on the 10% discount being removed:

“This is not specific to any one game and reflects all games and DLC purchases. Instead of a discount on the purchases, Ultimate and Premium subscribers will earn 10% and 5% - respectively - in points when purchasing select games and add-ons from the Game Pass library. Ultimate members continue to have 20% discount on select games from the Game Pass library. On top of that, all Rewards members will earn points when shopping games and add-ons on the Store, while Premium and Ultimate subscribers will earn even more, 2x and 4x respectively."

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

In terms of online stores I think @PetHeavenSA must be one of the worst run businesses in the country.

I placed an order for cat food on the 9th. Express delivery scheduled for the 10th. Turns on 2 of the 3 items were not available in their warehouse so they decided not to delivery the in stock item until the 11th after I had to escalate the matter. The website still reported delivery occurring on the 10th.

The remainder would be in the warehouse the 12th. So after no delivery by the 13th I ask and get told on the 16th it will be delivered on the 18th as the latest.

So today it’s dispatched and they don’t use a priority or express delivery service, no they send it using Wumdrop and the driver forgets to do the delivery.

It would be useful if they actually cared about their customers and took pride in their “express delivery” service.

And this was all under the watchful eye of their customer service manager.

#pathetic #petheaven #wumdrop

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

Kudos to the FNB online shop. Ordered something this morning from the iStore using e-Bucks and was pleasantly surprised that it delivered before my Takealot order from 2 days ago that was available for same day delivery but I missed the chance to order by 2 mins.

FNB just needs to improve their store app experience.

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

@SheBeeGee For sure

[Craig Nicholson @CraigN]

You might know her from YouTube as Physics Girl. Her story, while sad, is amazing.

People need to try and understand that it can happen to anyone.

@rarediseasessa #LongCovid

[dianna haze @diannahaze]

This is me—before and after becoming bed bound with Long COVID and ME/CFS. Two years ago, I made videos on YouTube. I ran half-marathons. I traveled. I lived fully. Then my body collapsed. I lost my energy, my independence, and my ability to connect. I lost my life.

This illness isn't "just fatigue." It's a devastating, invisible disease that left me in a dark room, unable to sit up, talk, or tolerate light and sound.

But slowly—very slowly—I'm starting to improve. Each small step feels like a quiet victory.

Please listen. Please learn. Please share.

#MECFS #MillionsMissing #MEAwarenessDay #MECFSAwarenessday