Mike Becker

Just released a new version of my SrtExtractor. Get SRT files from PGS subtitles, OCR correct the ones you have, or fix those annoying ones that play bottom to top github.com/ZentrixLabs/Sr…

@TeaAndDates Can you make the start button be a button again and not a constantly crashing react app?

Since (re)joining Windows a few years ago, I've never seen my team as excited about an initiative as they are about this. Can't wait to get these improvements and fixes to Start, Taskbar, File Explorer, and more out to customers!

@HairMetalGuru Mane Attraction is a freaking great album

Did White Lion predict the end of Hair Metal? The band blew up on 1987's Pride album, but by the time they put out Mane Attraction in 1991 radio & MTV had moved on. I had Patrick & Matt on to discuss the album and the song that may have predicted the end of the genre... video below. @coolasice232

@SenTedCruz @POTUS The biggest thing American companies could do if they really want to help is open source some models. If you run local AI at all, your options come from China. They’re the only ones sharing them.

I have repeatedly said that under no circumstances can we let China win the AI race. The world would be at risk of a powerful tool being in the hands of an adversary that could be used for global surveillance and control. @POTUS is taking meaningful steps, including the framework released today, to protect our values of free speech and ensure American leadership in AI. I look forward to working with the White House and members of the Commerce Committee to advance meaningful AI legislation that safeguards free speech, establishes regulatory sandboxes, protects children, and provides a national standard for AI in the United States.

@cb_doge Who is John Galt?

@jgoCyberMan @ChiefEngineerCE That’s a big problem too. Especially with industrial environments. I’ve learned a TON about OT controls environments I had no exposure to in corporate IT side. It’s a whole different world to learn

@_mainframe79 @ChiefEngineerCE And how fast can new people (let alone foreign guest-workers) learn the new stuff, often new terminology...?

The 40 Percent Rule: How Organizations Quietly Lose Competence There is a rule of thumb that has been passed around operations and turnaround circles for decades. It is rarely taught in business school anymore, but those of us who have watched organizations get gutted by private equity or aggressive cost, outsourcing, and offshoring have seen it play out repeatedly. We are all witnessing it ...because Financial folks aren't aware of it and think a warm body is all an org chart needs. It starts with layoffs justified for financial reasons. About three months later the first cracks appear. The experienced people who kept systems running through undocumented workarounds and tribal knowledge are gone. The new staff assumed those tasks were obvious. The organization hobbles along at first, but the clock has started. Then the 40 percent rule kicks in. Any organization that replaces more than 40 percent of its core technical and operational personnel within a 3 yr period, typically crosses into intellectual bankruptcy roughly two years later. By year three the loss of institutional know-how becomes irreversible. The company breaks down into silos that spend most of their time firefighting until competitors take their customers or the organization slowly decomposes. This pattern is not theoretical. It has been observed across multiple large corporations over the last century whenever finance or HR fully takes over hiring and firing decisions. Amazon is currently tracking this trajectory in real time. Microsoft appears to have passed the point several years ago. From an engineering perspective this is straightforward systems failure analysis. Tacit knowledge - the undocumented glue that holds complex operations together, cannot be transferred or recreated at the same speed it is removed. When you lose too much of it too quickly, the remaining staff no longer have enough context to rebuild what is missing. The decay then becomes self-reinforcing. This explains why so many organizations that looked healthy on paper suddenly begin missing deadlines, burning cash, and losing market position two to three years after major workforce reductions. Downtime events, meetings to say- we cant do that any longer (as if it were intentional). The balance sheet improved for now. The institutional competence did not. Yes the balance sheet always improves because it takes a while for customers to find a new source and for the new companies to form to take the business. Engineers usually see the warning signs first because we are the ones forced to keep undocumented systems alive long after the experienced people are gone. Real question for the engineers, operators, techs and turnaround people reading this: What was the earliest operational signal you noticed when your organization crossed the 40 percent threshold? Comment if you have experienced similar below. No names needed - just the signs you saw on the ground. Bookmark this if you have watched a once-strong company slowly lose its ability to execute after heavy cuts. Tech Wednesday

@jondelarroz The best part? The book was great, and actually feels like real sci-fi without weird ass woke agenda. It’s just a damn good book

I had a #1 bestseller that sold thousands of copies in this last month and triggered Robert Picardo from Starfleet Academy into a complete meltdown. How many "anti-woke influencers" did you see mentioning it or reaching out to me to talk about it? Says a lot.

@ItsTomWoolley @WindowsLatest I just started experimenting with rust in a swift app in macOS, and the performance gains are real. I used it to test low level file operations, read wrote copy stuff and it’s crazy how much faster it is. I’m sold on it

@WindowsLatest Meanwhile Linux is moving to Rust and their platform is flying.

Microsoft's Copilot is dumping native code for web crap on Windows 11 yet again. Microsoft still can’t figure out what Copilot on Windows 11 is supposed to be. It started as a sidebar, then became an Edge-powered sidebar, then a PWA, then a proper WinUI-style native app, and now it feels like it has gone full circle back to being web junk in a Windows shell again. The worst part is that Microsoft already has its own modern Windows app framework, but it keeps falling back to web-based packaging for one of the most important apps it is trying to push on users. In fact, it looks like Microsoft now makes better apps for macOS than Windows 11.

@windbt1 @Pirat_Nation I wrote C# and .net stuff for years for tooling, and I’ve shifted all my work to Linux and Mac now. Windows compat is bottom of the list

@Pirat_Nation Abandoning the consumer market is tantamount to abandoning an ever-growing number of independent developers.

Microsoft is merging its consumer and commercial Copilot teams into one organization. The company is now focused on building its own in-house superintelligence AI models over the next 5 years to compete with OpenAI, Google Gemini, and others.

@promptpirate_x @Pirat_Nation Too late for that I think. Enterprise inertia is the only thing to save windows now. Especially as devs focus on Steam Deck and the steam machine for gaming

@Pirat_Nation It "should" be focused on making people not want to uninstall Windows 😑

@ChiefEngineerCE @InsiderWire Goodbye and good riddance to the troll regions

@InsiderWire My guess is ... They pushed it too far and when they start to tag X folks for hate speech it's going to backfire.

#BREAKING: 𝕏 will soon let users restrict both posts and replies by region or country.

@SeHozaifa @nikitabier I submitted a simple app a week ago and it’s still waiting for review. I’ve never gotten an app past that step. And I’ve filled out all the forms and agreements. They just sit forever

Apple’s review team is effectively the final boss of every iOS dev’s career. 🎮 It’s wild that in 2026, we have AI that can code entire apps in minutes, but we still need a manual review process that takes weeks. The bottleneck is no longer human intelligence; it’s corporate bureaucracy.

iOS developers: How long is App Review taking for everyone these days? It is now taking longer to get our app approved than it is to build the actual features.

@nikitabier At least it’s not just me then. That makes me feel somewhat better

@Shaeikhweeder And how many swords were at their throats?

42 pastors and 2 Bishop with their wife's Converted to Islam in Abuja, Nigeria 🇳🇬. Indeed Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. ALLAHU AKBAR!!!

@ThrillaRilla369 All the time. My first big concert was Slayer in 1995

Who else still listens to music from the 70s-90s? What was the first concert you attended?

@arash_tehran Lmao that’s the old normal. So apparently you’d prefer countries throw their young men’s into the meat grinder, and the leaders who cause it have no consequences? Guess what? You start a war, you better be ready to fight it. Personally.

On Larijani's killing: Do we realize that, until recently, it was extremely rare for countries, even those at war, to simply kill each other's top political officials? Are we ready for this to be the 'new normal'?

@LundukeJournal Well shit I was planning to switch TO them. That plan is right out now

It looks like the Debian Linux project will soon have a new Leader focused on having fewer "(cis)male" contributors to Debian Linux. Nominations are closed for the new Debian Project Leader... and the election period is underway. Voters have exactly 1 (one) candidate to choose from when they vote. That's right. The Debian Project is giving their members only one option. That person, Sruthi Chandran, describes herself as a "librarian turned Free Software enthusiast and Debian Developer from India". She is focused on what she calls the "skewed gender ratios within the Free Software community", saying, "how many times did we have a non-(cis)male candidate for [Debian Project Leader]?" Sruthi says that diversity should "come up for discussion in each and every aspect of the project," adding the goal is to have "more women (both cis and trans), trans men, and genderqueer people." Voting officially begins on April 4th. lists.debian.org/debian-devel-a…

He was the greatest Roman. He was betrayed by his own countrymen but his legacy will never die. So today we Caesar post.

@WallStreetApes Every new development in Vegas looks like that too. I hate it.

The is a new housing development in Richmond, Kentucky Many people find this to be very eerie as all the homes look the same, it seems very dystopian The character and charm of home building in America is vanishing

@SaraForTexLege Sara's fabricated story caught my attention because I graduated from Katy Taylor High School and know the area well. Before you vote, read Sara's story and ask yourself if you want a liar representing you in Austin. Vote for @RepSchofield instead. x.com/amuse/status/2…