Probably best topic for me would probably be how to statistically model quality in manufacturing. Like what is hypothesis testing, what is a gage r&r, what is spc, how do you properly do those things, what are the footguns, how do you interpret the results, what's a spec limit vs a control limit vs action limit?

How can you manipulate the tests for your business case? To be clear on that last one I'm not saying manipulate to lie, but it depends on business. For example your control limits are typically +/- 3 standard deviations. If you run a dark business making plastic forks but to get a engineer to fly out and adjust the machine is a few thousand dollarsand no one will care if the tongs on the fork are 3 thou longer than normal. You may set your control limits at 5 times. If you make the steel beams which hold up bridges where hundreds of people die if they can't hold the forces and you're measuring width of the beams you may go down to 1 or 2 times standard deviation. Yeah you will waste engineer time which is money but it's hundred of people's lives if it fails. Those are different business cases and you shouldn't just default to the standard 3 st.dev in those cases.

Tsukomogami and Patina: In Praise of Old Things

It's the concept that old mechanical things like typewriters and camera lenses (for example) all age individually. They develop their own quirks and foibles as they are used. They almost (as in Tsukomogami) develop a soul.

We are fundamentally losing that to a society that is about consumable mass-produced trash, and on a long enough timeline, it's going to mean losing a fundamental piece of who we are as a society.

How insurance actually works, so dipshits can understand the real value of a single national health care plan.

Probably slot machines and my system to win for a general audience.

For a technical audience I would have a field day with how I have been degoogeling (also other corps) myself for the past years and why you should too.

I think I'd rather jump.

Why I'm Not Wearing Any Pants (the starter) followed by Furry BDSM: Roleplay Online and IRL, from Vanilla to CNC. I'm your host, Midnight Wolf.

(I'm in the bathroom and the title said "right now" so fuck it, I'll do it live!)

Probably the experience and implications of non-consensual teleportation. It would definitely be the most notable thing I'd done in my life thusfar.

Probably the fact how I just freaking teleported and somehow I'm still alive

"Punishment is the wrong way: Why Rehabilitation will always win out, and how it ties in with poverty, crime and mental health"

I could easily talk half an hour about that thematic complex without getting boring and making a pretty good argument why throwing a substantial portion of your population in jail is just slavery in disguise.

Sit down, we're about to learn all about the black magic that is Carburetors

Optimal crop tables in Stardew Valley.

The reality of life-saving measures in health care, and why a having a DNR (that isn’t a surprise to your loved ones) is so important.

About https://keepandroidopen.org/

The title of my talk is “Innovation as Rebellion against Complexity.”

I’ll start with my experience studying and teaching music history, and demonstrate how every major musical stylistic shift over the past 1500 years or so can be seen as a revolt against excessive complexity developing in the previous style. One example would be the shift from thick, complex polyphony that had become the norm in late Renaissance music, to the relatively simple and much-easier-on-the-ears style of early homophonic music. But I’d actually touch on all periods of music history.

I’d then challenge my audience to ask themselves and each other if this trend can be seen in other fields as well. Do we see such innovative rebellions in, say, art? Or literature? Architecture? The sciences? And what about technology…

…and are we on the cusp of a new rebellion against the massively complex technology that’s thrust upon us today? What does that look like? What innovations await us at the conclusion of that revolution?

I mean I’d be winging the fuck out of it with only a few seconds to prep but wouldn’t that be great to talk about?

You can see I’ve done a lot of thinking about this lol.

How to improvise, using this as an example.

I'd flex the confidence I've built as a social worker and without any preparation at all, ask the audience what they want to talk about. I would call upon audience members to set the subject matter content as needed and the discussion itself would be about how further incorporating mental health could help advance their industry.

There are lasers that can cut metal. I used to operate, program, set up, and maintain such lasers.

I know enough about lasers to make them seem boring and pedestrian.

Strong opinions from uninformed people irritate me, so I'd talk about licensing, ownership, the pros and cons of digital vs physical copies of media, and how/whether different store fronts implement DRM so I don't have to listen to so many strong, uninformed opinions on these topics; they've gotten annoyingly common lately thanks to Sony.

The wonders of nudism.

I'm naked in my bathroom, so teleporting me right NOW leaves me with limited choices.

That or 3D printing

Lost art of tatting (lace making) and why is there a space for it in our modern life

Crash course on how to have a panic attack/nervous breakdown during a live broadcast

Edit: uh oh, my stalker null@piefed.nullspace.lol is back

I was reading a thread where people were talking about Japanese pronouns and remembered that this is my favorite icebreaker question.

My topic is Japanese pronouns. How they differ from English, a little bit of the history, and broadly why they should make us reinspect how we construct identity and how they complicate the idea of "individualism" vs "collectivism"

I could fill 25-30 minutes easily with no preparation.

Uncluttering your life by switching all of your home computers to linux.

The fact I was aiming for a Waffle House.

The way our urban design influences society and community, and how the loss of third spaces and the dominance of cars in Western society has led to the loneliness epidemic and influence bubbles. I would talk about the movement to reclaim main street and encourage "traditional development", and how that leads to the micro-encounters that help people feel like they belong somewhere. How parks, plazas and pedestrian areas create third places where people can casually encounter diverse individuals and create friends and community connections. Also with a hearty side about public transportation and how efficient it is, and what a better neighbor a tram rail is than a road of similar passenger load. This speech is pretty much 30 seconds away from coming out of me during any conversation anyway and it's a conscious effort to stop myself. Would be nice to let it out.

"Does anyone have any questions?"

I could think of a few subjects, but with such a short time to prepare I'd probably ramble on like a rabbit hole of connections to related stuff. It wouldn't be a great TED talk overall.

What it's like to 38 without getting to first base is the first thing that comes to mind

Something on the subject of public transportation. Depending on the city and how much I spent in it before I was teleported (assuming the stage is in the same city), I could whip up a more or less localized talk.

An extended call for more people to follow women's sports. I'd mostly center it around bringing more queer people who otherwise don't follow sports into the fandom:

• sports are really not that different from other serials you follow, fictional or otherwise
• shows are better when the episodes are released week-to-week as appointment viewing
• women's sports are pretty gay, so your blorbos will date and get married and you will squee
• there are cute walk-up fits before the game
• there's a big crafting subculture to make and trade custom apparel like friendship bracelets
• sports fans are easy to socialize with because there's ongoing narratives that are well-described and well-defined
• all the cool lesbians go to the games and the gay sports bars and meet each other
• there is much less corruption and fewer shitty toxic people than men's sports
• sports look simple but there are a lot of really smart people thinking really hard about tough problems and you can see what they think because they use their bodies to show you

The air speed velocity of an unladen swallow

"Hi everyone, welcome to my talk on fainting from anxiety, as triggered by... this... this... uuuuuuuhhhgg..." [Thud]

Either I’ll demonstrate over and undertone Singing, or I‘ll talk about how easy it is to clone voices nowadays (3-5s audio is enough) and how many situations still rely on our voice for authentication.

Idk, extreme metal, its origins, differences between subgenres, and some essential listening.