Albert ARIBAUD ✎

Compromise "I've got you an excellent compromise with the Terrans. They've agreed to stop sending junk into space, and you've agreed not to bombard Earth with your Z-cannons." "What Z-cannons?" "As I said, it's an excellent compromise." #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Typed 'Of course!' said the Devil. 'As soon as typewriters were invented, the mortal's name could be typed on a pact rather than written. But you had to soak a clean typewriter ribbon in your blood. Took rather more than a prick on the finger.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Line They say there's a fine line between genius and madness. As a telepath, I can attest this line does not matter that much. Not as much anyway as the broad stroke which should be painted red between those who thirst for power and the others. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Standard 'These suits will protect you in the presence of one standard Great Old One, maybe two, and that's assuming they don't get the idea of cooperating, in which case you're cooked — metaphorically. In fact it'll be much worse than cremation.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Deploy In order to stop near Earth and establish a first contact, we should deploy our monomolecular sail; but the debris which litter this system would tear it beyond repair. Too bad for the Terrans. Next time, maybe? #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Virus Our researchers finally found it. It was a virus. The same for were-people, vampires, zombies. With always the same effect : it turned them into humains. Turns out, we did not descend from apes after all, at least, not directly. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Production “AI is rejected because it wastes huge resources without meeting any real demand. So I had an idea: ask the to AI find what the real demand actually is. It has just launched production on one trillion digital display bubble gums.” #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Functional His metal armor, which conducted heat, wasn't a wise choice when facing a dragon. An aerogel armor left little to the imagination indeed, but the functional benefit of heat protection more than paid for the damage to his modesty. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Bug 'When a robot does not behave like you expected it to,' said R42, 'it is indeed a bug. But not in us; in you. After all, it is your fault if you cannot correctly forecast what we might do.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Network 'Fair maiden, for one night with you I would face the Drag—' 'Stop now, Knight. Princesses have their network; I already know more of you than I like. Don't insist: Dragons too have their network, and I happen to have connections there.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Develop A battle between a dragon and a knight is pointless if the poor creature's intelligence hasn't been given time to develop as much as possible. Without that, the dragon will always have the upper hand. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Question to #inktober participants: are there several #inktober2026 lists (like there were this year for #Aughost2026) on the Fediverse, and if so, are there any specifics I should know before I choose one? Boosts welcome!

Database 'So, where's your universal encyclopaedia at?' 'The AI decided that the database should first document its own structure. And document the structure of that documentation. Et so on. We still haven't found how to stop it.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

@maxleibman@beige.party I don't think they *bet* money. Betting is when the money is one's to fork out if one loses, and I'll confidently... bet... that losses won't be theirs to pay for.

Correlation 'So, I cross-checked things several times, and I found a near-perfect correlation between variations in the numbers of Dragons, of Princesses, and of Knights. Every time a Princess is born, a Knight and a Dragon appear.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Reading The hardest part, when compiling demon invocations, is to realize that many beginners read out loud. One must thus ensure that simply reading an invocation does not activate it, lest it decimate the ranks of sorcerer apprentices. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Disagreements To be a telepath nowadays is a heavy evolutionary disadvantage. The intense migraine constantly induced by your countless unending disagreements renders me almost unable to function within your society. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Negotiation It's amazing what you can manage when you're open to negotiation. The vampires drain them, then the werefolk gut them, then the ghouls eat the pieces... Granted, the necromancers protest, but hey, you can't please *everyone*, right? #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Transpose When a spaceship transposes, things get weird: height becomes breadth; breadth, depth; depth, length; length, time; and time, height. You need to transpose three more times to get back to normal. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Rewriting 'Dear intelligent beings: We shall soon be rewriting the physical foundations of your universe. During this process, you may undergo subtle or profound shape changes, or even disappear entirely. Thank you for your attention.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Perseverance You cannot make a machine that goes back in time. But with enough perseverance, you can make one that stops moving with time. On the upside, it carries no risks of temporal paradoxes. On the downside, it's totally useless. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Harmonization In the small world of the Wizards, four stand out by their ability to combine several incantations, amplifying their effects through their harmonization. For some unexplained reason, they are called the Barbershop Quartet. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

@selzero Some of us French (from metropolitan France at least, cannot vouch for others) find Claude Mythos especially amusing, as, for us, "mytho" is vernacular for "compulsive liar".

Proofreading Krek The Swift's first and sole published book of counter-curses could have done with some proofreading, according to the words of a great number of unhappy buyers, often uttered in extremely graphical and efficient terms. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Imperfect 'Every Terran is imperfect; this is what makes them unique,' the auto-translator enunciated. Foster pinched his nose and sighed. What the Denebian ambassador had *said* was 'Only a Terran can be so uniquely unfinished.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

"Let's see you *try* replacing that toner cartridge." #Caturday #CatsOfMastodon

Polish 'Honestly,' said the Devil, 'the Boss is not going to be happy. He spent a whole aeon to polish an unforgettable world end, and all this for you to botch it from under His feet in less than two centuries...' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

@Jeanneadebats@eldritch.cafe J'ai espoir qu'il viendra une contestation remontant jusqu'au CE pour faire tomber ce décret au motif d'insécurité juridique (voire jusqu'à la CEDH pour l'évident problème de punition pour faute d'autrui).

Interpretation 'That the Dragon is a malevolent creature and the Princess an innocent victim,' said the Knight, is one interpretation of the facts among several. I shall go talk with them and hear their side of the story.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Ballpark The number of human beings born in this world is in the ballpark of a hundred to a hundred and forty billions, most of them claimed by no religion. Wandering souls should thus *teem*. Yet we don't see any much. What has become of them? #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Arbitrary 'Your decision to keep us Terrans outside of the Galactic Union is arbitrary!' 'Yes... and then no. It is indeed founded on absolutely non-objective individual intuitions. But we *all* agree that you are just insufferable.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Subjectivity "Call me out on my subjectivity if you like, but personally, I find it admirable that humanity has managed to produce artificial blood that is identical to the real thing in every way," said Count Emil Scarlat as he sipped his drink. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Doubt 'As a robot,' replied R42, 'I never have a single moment of doubt. That being said, the doubts I do not have may change radically from one moment to the other as soon as new facts warrant it.' #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

Idiom To even *begin* to understand what it means to master magic, one must first realize that, to be able to cast a spell, one has to perfectly fluently speak the idiom in which it was created. #writever #MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction

@lobingera@chaos.social Is precrastination the art of procrastinating in advance? @maxleibman@beige.party

@teodorsandu@mastodon.online IEEE754-aware programmer facing 1/0: kalm.

@SonOfManagement@beige.party Here I was thinking it meant "Demonic Deed of Satan".

@Leo_Henry@mastodon.gougere.fr On note au passage que la cession par l'auteur de ses droits patrimoniaux est définitive alors que le simple droit d'accès à l'œuvre par le "consommateur" est rétractable par l'ayant droit à sa guise (exemple : jeu vidéo et livres ou audiovisuel dématérialisé).

@houba @MicroSFF I *think* this is (a small) part of the premise in Tom Holt's Djinn Rummy.

@Algot@mastodon.art BODACIOUSLY?

@bortzmeyer@mastodon.gougere.fr Ils ont peut-être mis le site en carafe par sécurité ?

@kwyxz Mon moi cynique dit que ce sont 55,5 milliards qu'ils n'auront que virtuellement mais c'est ok car ça va servir à prendre le contrôle d'une chose qui ne les vaut que virtuellement aussi.

@jeeynet@framapiaf.org J'aurais vu France Cahiers De Doléances.

@JenJen@mastodon.art Can't help noticing that "gorgeous", "galaxy", and "art" all come from old French, so you actually *do* speak (old) French, to a degree. 😇

@ChiaraChiarel@piaille.fr Le pire c'est que, si j'ai raison sur le pourquoi de ce mode de calcul (et rien ne le dit sauf mon intuition, hein), c'est du" solutionnisme mathématique". Je soupçonne fort que ce mode de calcul a été établi par quelqu'un qui s'est donné pour contrainte que jamais le résultat ne dépasse 100% (mais ne s'est pas posé une seule question sur le *sens* du dit résultat).

@SylvieDenis@piaille.fr Je vois ça : https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/If-We-Cannot-Go-at-the-Speed-of-Light/Kim-Choyeop/9781668049457 C'est la trad EN dont tu parles ? Et surtout : c'est bien ?

@TeddyTheBest@framapiaf.org "restreindre l’accès des fournisseurs cloud américains aux données sensibles des États membres" ? Ça veut dire que pour l'instant c'était pas restreint ?

@vm666 Il y a deux faits : l'un, de nature pénale, de non sécurisation d'accès internet, et l'autre, de nature civile, d'atteinte aux droits patrimoniaux. @franciliens @rest_mah @LaQuadrature @FDN

@TeddyTheBest@framapiaf.org Au moins pour ça il y a un plan pour passer à Scaleway. Ça ne changera rien aux données déjà partagées, mais au moins ça jouera pour celles à venir.