I’ve just heard of the new BBS style forum for Gemini space and wondered if the properties of Tildes could adequately translate to Gemini space. In other words; could Tildes become accessible in Gemini space?

gemini://bbs.geminispace.org/

I’m also curious if there are other Gemini users here but that might be better off as a separate post on a different section of the site.

My upholstery hobby is a fulfilling and creative outlet that allows me to revive old furniture and give it a fresh, stylish look. My favorite fabric to use is velvet. Its luxurious texture and rich colors add a touch of elegance and sophistication to any piece. Velvet not only looks stunning but also feels incredibly soft and comfortable

The rules are you have a magic remote, and you are immediately transported to a location of your choice. You can use it as many times you want, but it will only go to the one location. Where do you put it?

It seems that this thread has sparked a lot of interest from the gamers of Tildes, but the forum just isn't a great place to actually get things going. To remedy this, I've created the Tildes Game Nights discord server where people who like the format of Discord can get together and play games :). I hope to foster the same sort of civility we have here, so the rules are pretty much identical to Tildes' (with a bunch of the rules being taken directly from the code of conduct). I already have some channels set up for the games that got a lot of votes in the linked thread, but I can add more if there's popular demand.

Here is the invite link :)

ChatGPT got all of its information from these websites, but these websites still use advertising to gain revenue. When a user asks ChatGPT a question, instead of going to the site, it's using the information stored on the site without giving the site any revenue.

That's why they're being sued. (Also why Reddit is doing what it's doing with the API)

What do we do? How can we keep these sites alive, and still make use of ChatGPT? I can write code and solve problems days faster than I used to now, but it seems kind of morally bankrupt of me to use this service which is so clearly putting the foundations it was built on out of business.

We have the weekly fitness check-in but I thought it would be valuable to have a thread to discuss more specific lifting topics and resources.

• What type of programs do you gravitate towards?
• Do you compete in Powerlifting/Weightlifting/Strongman or some other discipline? Any upcoming meets worth watching?
• Have you found any resources that others might be interested in?

The final three episodes have dropped from the third season of Netflix' The Witcher adaptation - also marking the final appearance of series lead Henry Cavill. So I reckon it may be ripe for some discussion (assuming sufficient interest exists amongst the community here).

So, despite previous misgivings after a baffling second season and disappointingly bland third seasons thus far, I jumped straight into this finale out of respect for the very fine turn by Mr Cavill throughout. For context, earlier in the day I finished off the third book, Baptism of Fire, during my current re-read so I'm well ahead on plot and had text fresh in head. In S3's favour, indeed, the show runner's claims of hewing closer to the books is actually quite fair. In broad strokes, they have captured every major plot point, and generally in the correct order. But that's also the problem in some respects - the writers are evidently only focused on doing a pure plot adaptation. The book chapters, for reference, are quite long - roughly 50 pages apiece - with only 7-10 of them per novel, and often feature a juxtaposition of several perspectives throughout (a feat Sapkowski becomes ever more skillful at over time). But the key thing that's lost in translation is that each chapter generally has a clear idea or thematic element that ties everything together, i.e., Sapkowski always has something he wants to say, an idea he wants to get across, some comment on war, family, human nature, etc., and this gives an extra richness that underpins the plot elements driving everything forward. Not only that, Sapkowski quite enjoys playing off traditional Fantasy / mythological tropes and conventions and this humour has been completely shed by the show writers - likely an intentional move given what has emerged about their purported disdain for the source material.

In short, I feel the writers are adapting the plot without an understanding of what makes the Witcher stand apart from the sea of other fantasy fiction, and, as a consequence, all of their original additions only wind up a detriment to the storytelling. Nevertheless, it was genuinely nice to see a few certain scenes on screen.

Have you watched any movies recently you want to discuss? Any films you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

The question is for the tilderinoos from japan( cause the movie only released there till now,i think).Did you watch the new miyazaki movie Heron and the boy /How do you live.
How was it and heard it is different from his usual MO,If so how is it different?
Also try to keep posts to no to low spoilers so as not to ruin it for the rest of us ,Thank you.
I love ghibli movies and i for one can't wait to watch it when it releases here.Probably will do a ghibli studio marathon till i wait for this movie.
Has anyone read "How do you live " by Yoshio Genzaburō or "The book of lost things" by John Connolly both said have been an influence for this movie?
Should i read them before watching the film?

Edit: Some context if you're unfamiliar with mistborn: A bend alloy misting (slider) can create a bubble where time moves faster. A cadmium misting (pulser) can create a bubble where time moves slower. These bubbles can't be moved, unless they're on an object of significant mass that is already moving, like a train. The civilisation in The Lost Metal is roughly in the industrial age.

I was reading "The Lost Metal" and the newspaper ad after chapter 2 mentions hiring bend alloy mistings for a fast food restaurant. And I was thinking of more commercially profitable uses. Because fast food, wouldn't (I think) have sufficient margin to support consumption of bend alloy which is supposed to be expensive. So here are some ideas I had:

• One idea I had was a CEO using a bend alloy misting to give them more hours in a day. Time for CEOs is already at a premium so giving them more I think would be economically worth it, but I don't know if they have anyone comparable to that in mistborn era 2.
• I also think this would work for lawyers. I'm not sure how much a lawyer in Elendel gets paid but we do know they exist. In the real world sometimes lawyer bill for more than 24 hours a day (illegally)! But imagine if a lawyer could do that legitimately now. Maybe even 48 hours in a day!
• An idea I had for cadmium mistings was to speed up travel. Maybe for rich people you could use a slider to get up time so that their train journey appears to them to go by really fast. But that might be counteracted by their circadian rhythm getting messed up.

The following links contain some discussion on the usage of bend alloy and cadmium for commercial uses.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Cosmere/comments/ajdsjh/practical_usage_of_powers/

Some ideas mentioned there include using a slider in the waiting room of a hospital, or to preserve food, or to reduce the amount of food needed to support a siege, or to reduce the amount of supplies needed for Interstellar travel.

What are some other ideas you have for how a pulser or slider could be used during that time period in a profitable manner?
If you find other discussion online about these powers, please link them here.

Hi Tilders! I am new here, but my experience with the community thus far has encouraged me to post an AMA. I've specifically decided to post this AMA in ~talk rather than ~science for more exposure, and because I am hoping to field questions ranging from scientifically well-read to less-read, technical to curious, why care to who cares, and everything in between.

I won't be posting "verifying proof", because like many of you, I love my anonymity here. However, I will include peer-reviewed citations to question answers when I feel it necessary. I will do my best to share free-access articles, but this won't always be possible. If I link an article of interest to you that is paid-access, message me; maybe, I may be able to get a copy to you. Also, please be patient for my replies. Even though it is summer where I am, I am still busy in the lab and thoughtful responses take time.

Here is a brief background on the Rice Blast fungus to help get the conversation started:

Rice is an important staple food consumed by nearly half of the global population Khush. 2005. From 10 - 30% of the annual rice harvest is lost to disease caused by Magnaporthe oryzae, which is enough rice to feed greater than 60 million people Skamnioti and Gurr. 2009. To cause infection, a three-celled asexual spore called a conidium attaches to the rice plant's leaves, stems, and even roots. Once attached, a germ tube emerges from one of the three cells and grows along the surface of the plant. Hydrophobic molecules on the plant surface, called hydrophobins, induce a developmental change in the growing germ tube. The growing germ tube tip begins to form a dome-shaped structure called the appressorium. This specialized structure swells and generates up to 80 Mpa of pressure, enough to penetrate kevlar. A penetration peg penetrates the plant cell tissue, and bulbous invasive hyphae colonize the plant cell tissue. The fungus keeps the invaded plant cell alive, while it consumes its nutrients, with the plant cell dying only when the invading growth moves to an adjacent cell Cruz-Mireles et al. 2021. Schematic.

The Rice Blast research community focuses on all stages of its development. My work is focused on nuclear division during different developmental stages, and I am specifically working on understanding which and how motor proteins are involved in nuclear division in this fungus. Understanding the nuclear dynamics and the involved machinery will hopefully open avenues for controlling the plant infection and reducing the global crop loss.

I hope you all find Rice Blast interesting, and I hope I will be able to answer many interesting questions!

Edit: I'm just gonna list the recommendations I found interesting for my future reference

Proudhon - One of the first anarchists. Wrote a lot about mutualism and tried to come up with mechanisms to share resources based on usufruct

The Dispossessed -Describes an alternate society. Supposedly written more like an anthropological study than a narrative

No God's, No Masters - Written by David Graber, who also wrote the 3 Problems with the Revolution

The Dawn of Everything - Talks about the organization structures of early societies

Participatory Economics - Talks about economic organization without compulsion

Walkaway - Recommended when I mentioned stealth anarchism

‐------------------------

I'm gonna be honest, I'm pretty sick of all the existing forms of politics. Conservatives, liberals, progressives, libertarians, I dont feel like I jive with any of them.

The closest thing I've found to a philosophy I can get behind is anarchism, but I'm not really a fan of revolutionary anarchism either. I'm interested in just discussion of the constructive aspects of it. Like how the alternative vision of the world they advocate for works in practice, and what different options there are for implementation.

I find it hard to really get into, because whenever I try to read up on any kind of political philosophy I run into the people who are trying to evangelize and it just really turns me off to the whole thing.

Does anyone have some good reading recommendations that skip past trying to recruit people, and just is a good discussion?

My poor beautiful boy is really going through it at the moment. He's just shy of 5 months and puberty is hitting him like a truck - he's lost two of his puppy teeth in a week, his adult coat is coming through in patches and now he's suddenly becoming terrified of people with seemingly no rhyme or reason.

Strangers (even strangers we walked past 30 minutes ago with no issue), family members that he'd spent the last 4-5 hours around on a visit and yesterday even my partner who's been there since day 1 and takes him out on walks and plays with him every day! It's not constant either; when my partner tentatively came downstairs to go to work this morning it was all smiles and waggy tails like nothing had happened.

I understand this is a pretty normal stage in a dog's development so we've just got to try and endure it until it passes. I've tried leash corrections and moving away, getting him to focus on me and rewarding him when he does, as well as inching closer and getting the scary person to throw treats at a distance when that's feasible. I know teaching him sit/ down would be extremely helpful and we're prioritising that.

I've also booked a 1-2-1 training appointment for the end of this week so hopefully a professional can help us figure things out but I'm hoping to hear from any fellow puppy owners. How did you cope with fear periods? Any tips?

Edit to specify: he's a belgian shepherd. We've had him for just over 5 weeks now.

Thank you so much everyone for your comments so far! The big theme is tiredness so I'm starting to get a plan of action together for dealing with this today:

• light physical activity, training and brain games in the morning/ afternoon
• main physical activity after work to get him good and tired
• keep an eye on his energy levels and try to create some structured naptimes

Also:

• carefully consider puppy classes
• if we have to go visiting, take familiar bedding
• rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat

We'll go to the park again straight after work as we always have in the spirit of consistency and hopefully get good and weary before my partner gets back tonight.

One of my favourites is inspired by Thai green curry and includes:

• Coconut Milk
• Homemade Vegetable Broth (as needed)
• Homemade Green Curry Paste
• Shallots, Garlic, & Ginger
• Kaffir Lime Leaves
• Green Lentils
• Freshly Squeezed Lime Juice & Zest
• Lemongrass Stalks
• Green Bell Peppers
• Solano Peppers
• Bamboo Shoots
• Snow Peas
• Zucchini
• Spinach
• Coconut Sugar
• Soy Sauce
• Salt
• Spices: Cumin, Chilli Powder, Red Pepper Flakes, Black Garlic, Turmeric, Coriander, and Pepper (as needed)

Served with crispy tofu, coconut rice, Thai basil, and homemade “roti” (using sweetened condensed coconut milk and avocado oil).

—

I think we’ve had some variation of this recipe every week for the last two years. It’s not too hard for me to make after work, makes great leftovers, freezes well, and seems to be well liked.

I do try to make as many things from “scratch” as I can, since I find growing the vegetables and herbs, as well as making my own milks, dough, and tofu, really elevate the whole thing. Though ingredients that are store bought or from farmers markets work just as well.

I have a very senior role inside of a 450 person company, in IT. I'm not going to be too specific but it's in the TV industry. I state this because anyone that works in TV probably knows it's full of hot heads and technically inept people. I have a very small team of two in the UK looking after four sites, a couple of guys in the US too, looking after almost pure remote folks, they're mostly cloud.

Every time I go on holiday and as the most technical and senior person, some shit happens that ruins my break. I've had everything from ISP issues caused by finance not paying the bill so we had a site cut off, through to a show not being able to be delivered to channel on a deadline of hours which meant I had to step in, no matter where in the world I am and on what vacation.

I'm away again. Today, 10am, ping after ping about a site outage. Servers unavailable. Telephones not working. IT have failed again. The usual email chains and Teams/Slack chats that start pointing and poking. Absolutely furious and away on a family break I ignored it for the youngsters to solve, it should have been an easy fix. But no, the information given to them was wrong. The diagnosis handed to me incorrect. A cancelled ISP contract kicked in but we have multiple site outbound connections so that should not effect us. The site to site link goes dark for this particular site. I finally get THE CALL. I'm not going to rant too much as it gets technical but there's only so much that can be done from a phone VPN over a poor quality cell connection when you're somewhere between a wooded area a beach, and all you have on you is a 6" android device. I eventually got hold of my US senior tech who spent a four hours trying to direct the UK youngsters on what to touch, where to look. Turns out, some people randomly plugged in a switch, a NAS with DHCP server on and then managed to loopback the network using two ports of a SIP phone over the weekend as they had no clue what they were doing and eventually the network gave out. Spanning tree is not as good as it should be. We're a small team and due to always being overridden in protocol I've never been allowed to MAC address deny by default even though we're often a hacker target. BYOD is rife and it's getting harder to not lose data.

Anyway. Another day of my vacation ruined, time I should have spent concentrating on my family and having fun, building memories. The seething email I have sent to the board will go down like a lead balloon, I cannot wait to read the responses on Monday! Deny is going to get enabled by default or I'm going to resign.

So I ask you, how many others like me are there in here that work pushes in to your personal time, every time you try to get away from it?

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

I am taking a trip soon to London and will possibly be adding a couple days in Paris. It's been a hot minute (few years) since visiting the UK and would like to solicit some timely advice and tips. One thing that comes to mind: How important is it to carry cash? Would I need to pay London and Paris street vendors or any shops with cash or will a card with no exchange fees suffice? While we will of course be visiting some tourist attractions like museums, most of our time will be taken up with book stores, record shops, food and coffee shops.

Numerous studies have shown that talking about the things going on in our life is beneficial for our mental health, but sometimes it’s hard to speak about them with the people in our lives.

So, share with us strangers. We may not be able to fix it for you, but maybe you can leave some of the burden you’re carrying in these comments and walk away a little lighter. I’ll start!

I saw that new “Aged” filter on Tik Tok this week and thought I’d give it a try. The moment my camera opened, I was looking at the spitting image of the deceased father. I panned my head, raised my eyebrows, smiled, and frowned, so many of my facial mannerisms were exactly the same as my dad’s. As I felt all the emotion of missing my dad well up inside me, watching the camera, I said “Hey boyyy” in the way my father used to say it to me. It broke my heart to see the image of my dad staring back at me and talking to me, I miss him so much.

I lost my dad 7 years ago now, and each year I can feel little details of him slip further away. The shirts I kept of his are sealed in bags so I can open them and smell him again, but ziplock can only do so much, the scent is all but gone. I can feel little details about him that I knew so well slip away as time passes. The way the skin of his hands felt when I held hands with him. The feeling of his back when I would give him big bear hugs. The comforting details slip further out of reach as I dive deeper into adulthood on my own, without my dad to help me. So the fact that I could open this app and look at a live image of my dad, embodied in me, both breaks my heart and fills it in a strange way.

Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

This is a calling for all my fellow TESV modders; hello! How are you? What mods are you running? Know of any hidden gems? When will I be satisfied with my modlist and actually play the game? Any and all modding conversations are welcome here, because I don’t want to fill ~games with identical topics lmao.

(US) My Fitbit Charge 2 is on her last legs. I'm torn between looking at a smart watch, a smarter fitness tracker, or something at relatively the same level. I have a Pixel and don't use the Apple ecosystem but really don't know what route to go.

Mostly I like the reminder to move, step tracking, and the simple notifications on the Charge 2. I don't need to answer my phone on my watch, I think, but seeing that it's my partner calling is a big deal. But I also could be that person desperately waiting to discover smart watches and fall in love with them, I suppose.

Longer battery life would be preferable as remembering to charge things is a less than fun side-quest. And I doubt I'd be using GPS on it. But again, maybe I would? Open to all suggestions.

I've been exploring the world of having the TV on in the background. In the world of FAST streaming, (Free Ad Supported Television) I'm a fan of Midnight Pulp, a live feed of weird, macabre, and strange programming that would fit well in a late night block. Is there a recommendation you have for something to put on when you have to have something on, but not want to pay attention?

My wife and I (from the U.S.) are going on vacation and as part of a larger itinerary have scheduled a week in Northern Ireland, based in Belfast. We'll spend the first couple of days decompressing and exploring the city, but besides that I'm wondering what would be worth doing there during that time. I've been focusing on the other parts of our itinerary and have only very limited knowledge of that area and its attractions. We plan on renting a car for a day or two to get out of the city but otherwise will be relying on public transit. Thanks in advance for any recommendations or advice!

I recently watched the limited TV series dramatisation of Les Miserables and really enjoyed it. This made me wonder if there are any recent, faithful adaptations of Treasure Island as either TV serial or movie?

I spontaneously came up with Tildesians, but I have seen others, including Tilders and Tildren.

Edit, I was hoping to surface a variety of nicknames, so thanks for your input, I like to play with language. It's fun.

I mentioned offhand in our introduction thread that I've never dated -- I wanted to hear people's experiences, since chatter online is very dominated by the male experience of mostly looking for casual hookups and struggling to get matches. I particularly want to hear from people who did not go in wanting a casual relationship

Some additional discussion questions: Did it go well or poorly? Did you run into mismatches in expectations? Did you end up in an unsafe situtation? How many people did you explore before you found someone long term?

Age for context would also be helpful, since I know many of you skew older.

Hello,

I have had the Sony ZV-1 for a while, and i was wondering if anyone had any experience with it - namely video stabilization.

I feel like even with Active SteadyShot turned on in the settings, the footage is relatively shaky, and I like to think I have a relatively stable hand. Would using a gimbal of some sorts eliminate most of the shakiness of the footage without having to apply the in-camera stabilization?

I've been keeping a finger on the pulse of analytics & contract valuation in the NFL for the last few years (as a fan, not related to my profession). Anyone else who has been of fan of this is probably aware that we hit a pretty serious breaking point yesterday, as a handful of top-end RBs failed to reach deals with their respective teams resulting in them being franchise tagged. I was wondering what others thought about this whole fiasco.

My thoughts:

In one sense, this is simply effective roster management: RBs add little win probability by themselves (i.e., their production is largely a result of the offensive line and passing game), their age curve is poor (i.e., they're typically out of highly productive years by the end of their rookie deals), and they're easily replaced by rookie talent.

On the other hand, these guys take a beating to produce a product we all love. They spend some of their best years in the college system, where they do seem to add a lot of win probability, being totally uncompensated. They get to the NFL only to have their potential earnings suppressed by the rookie wage scale, then get franchise tagged guaranteeing they'll be SOL with respect to a deal with big fully-guaranteed cash.

What's the solution here? Assuming the draft is an efficient(-ish) market, adjusting the rookie pay scale for them will just cause teams to adjust their drafting behavior. Letting RBs arrive to the NFL sooner than everyone is something that the NCAA almost certainly won't allow without a vicious fight. Is there any hope for these guys?

edit: typos

I've got a basic garage in the backyard - essentially a sheet metal shed with a concrete floor. It would have been built in the 1980s so I doubt the concrete slab had a water barrier - or if it did it probably wore away over time.

When we have wet weather, the concrete gets damp underneath items on the floor - like rubber mats etc. There's also some mineral staining. Doing some reading online, it looks like concrete efflorescence.

I'm considering demolishing the shed and building a better workshop (insulated etc.) on the existing concrete slab. Can I make the existing slab a usable floor by sealing it with something like epoxy? Or would I be better off using the slab as a footing and building the new structure on posts with a separate floor suspended above the slab?

My goal is to avoid getting any damp or mould in the new structure.

I'm sure there are multiple comic artists and writers on Tildes, so let's talk process for designing and planning pages! Hopefully this fits here, but if not feel free to move it.

I've only drawn a few comics myself, and I like to make a script first for longer projects. It can be detailed and break it down by panels, or just give an overall summary of the page. For shorter comics though where I can clearly envision it (e.g. 4 pages), I like to kind of wing it. Someone else I know likes to go right into roughs, and then figure out what to cut as he goes along.

How about everyone else? What are your preferred methods and steps?

I was inspired to write this after reading this reddit post. It ranted about people who attempt to disuade people from commiting suicide by telling them that they are selfish because of the impact it will have on other people (I do think it is explained better in the post if you are interested).
However I have also been thinking about how suicide prevention is handled by most governments. I am not sure of exactly what process happens in other countries, but in America if you fail a suicide attempt you can be involuntarily put into a mental health asylum for a temporary period of time, and from reading many accounts of what people have experienced in these asylums and from my ongoing experience with suicidal idealation I very much feel i would be 10x more likely to commit suicide if I was put into such a facility once i got out.
But I also wanted to talk about other ways individuals may try to disuade people from suicide which i find problematic. Before i continue, i do want to say that I am not blaming these people, they have very good intentions. But something that has bugged me for a while has been that whenever people discuss suicide/mental health problems the first thing that is done is just recommending suicide hotlines/telling the person in question to seek a therapist/psychologist. While these options can be good for many people, i want to mention that

1. Suicide hotlines (mainly 811) are known for reporting people to police and having them put in mental health asylums (often times unnecisarlly). And staff at these suicide hotlines are often uneducated or rude to callers, or will just not answer or even hang up.
2. Many people in these circumstances do not have access to trained proffesionals. Even if you live in a country with public healthcare, you may be in a situations (mainly abuse) where you cant get access to one either way.

Anyways sorry for the rambling, my brain is tired and i just wanted to get this out there. But based off of the above points, do you think that suicide prevention in society is flawed, and what could be better? While i do agree that it is flawed and there are ideas related to government on how to handle suicide prevention, i do not know what could be done on the individual level. To me one of my only resources apart from seeing other people experiences online is music (mainly Elliot Smith, Linkin park, Soundgarden and Nirvana) which I deeply relate to. But anhedonia can prevent enjoyment of such things.

I'm sure most of the nail salon choices near me are fine, but I'm going to have to choose. Are there any red flags I should look for? Are there indications of quality that aren't the same as most expensive option? Any advice would be helpful.

I really like the "Broccoli in Garlic Sauce" dish offered in Chinese takeout restaurants.

I have a few big Asian food markets near me.

Is it possible to buy the garlic sauce the takeout places use in a jar? If so, what would it be called? I imagine there is more than one type of jarred sauce called "garlic sauce" in the world.

If i have a lot of acrylic on canvas paintings and I want to produce prints to sell, where do you make the prints? Local Kinko's/staples?
Clear plastic bag or no? Brief artist blurb at the back? Post card?

Have you ever bought a print? What made you want to buy it or what stopped you, and what would have made it go from no to yes?

My mind is way annoying to listen to and I don’t like it!

I'm 45 years old and I have a hard time coming to term with the fact that the majority of my life---the one which supposedly should had been my golden years---lies in the past. I know I'm still alive but I just can't drum up much enthutiasm for an existence which I mostly see as sad leftovers of something which wasn't worth much either. I simply don't care much. I can distract myself for some time, but I have this deep feeling that, well, what's the point.

And I can ignore it, for some time. But ignorence can only go so far. At some point you need some hope, some sliver of meaning and purpose. And I just don't see it.

And this is all awful impractical, because whenever I try to strive for anything, my brain just goes, “narh, why bother struggle when it doesn’t lead to anything”

Is there any clever way to turn stuff like this around? Some NLP stuff to nudge me towards a less self-defeating mindset?

I’m currently using ProtonMail, I’ve been with them since Indiegogo. I know calendar’s supposed to come out in beta this month, but I’m honestly fed up with the speed of their development and the quality of apps, and I think it’s too expensive.

I need custom domain support, and calendar. Nothing fancy.
Self-hosting email is out of the question in 2019.

What are you guys using for email these days?

The first episode of the new season is out! What do you think of it?

I thought it was pretty okay. It was too self - referential for me. It kept making too many "we're back" jokes but they kind of did that the last time they were cancelled and brought back. They eased off those kind of jokes eventually the last time it happened.

I was worried about how they would handle references to more modern things as "Attack of the killer App" was really painful to watch. But it seems like they handled it pretty decently.

I'm slow, but it took me a while to realise that Scary Mirror as a replacement for Scary Door was a jab at Black Mirror.

I didn't think the episode was very funny, but it wasn't bad either. What was good about it shows promise, so I'm hopeful.

I have a cavalier king charles spaniel that has had some unfortunate health issues for the past few years. The most pressing one that I haven't been able to nail down and fix is her GI issues. Every now and then, she has an all night bout of diarrhea even though the only food she has eaten is her hydrolyzed protein dog food. I remember reading about FMT years ago for people who had GI issues and I'm wondering what the results have been for dogs (and other animals). It seems counter intuitive to fight shit with more shit, but at this point I am willing to try most non-invasive treatments. While taking her to the dog park and asking other dog owners if my dog can eat their dog's poo would be the cheapest option, instead I found a site that purportedly has capsules available.

https://doggybiome.com/dog-products-for-diarrhea/

However, because it is difficult to find more information about this company and because I don't want imagine how this type of business (if it worked) could scale up as an industrial factory farm, I am skeptical.

Any thoughts on treating IBD in dogs for an allergy prone, and sensitive dog? She is already getting fiber and she sometimes gets probiotic with her food.

So, a friend of mine wants to become a Twitch streamer, commenting over movies. I never used Twitch. He showed me some channels over there that made me confused. There are dozens of channels entirely dedicated to people providing minimal commentary to entire movies, animes, and TV shows which are displayed in full, although not on full screen. And they seem to be monetized, otherwise why would anyone stream 5 to 10 hours a day? They have ads.

I have a few questions.

First, how is that legal? Why aren't copyright holders taking these channels down? Do people really care about a streamer that mumbles a single uninteresting word every few minutes, or it's all just an excuse to watch movies for free? Why the same content that will get your video taken down on YouTube is apparently okay on Twitch?

I used to be happy paying $45/year for YNAB (grandfathered plan). But then "lol no, $90/year" happened and I started looking into alternatives. I tried out a bunch but none felt the same. Eventually I found Actual (open-source). I've been using it for ~6 months now and it offers everything I want/need. I self-host the container on my PC (no sync/etc.).

Hey all! I love that comics has its own tag now. So in that vein, I'd like to ask what are some smaller comics you read? Any kind; oneshots, long running epics, webcomics, anthologies, anything that just might not be from a big publisher like marvel or just something that you think deserves more attention.
A few of my personal favorite webcomics are Phantomarine (hosted on website of the same name), as well as City of Blank(on webtoon).

Phantomarine is a maritime mystery with an intriguing world and (for me)absolutely tantalizing central question. A big reveal just happened, so it's an interesting time to read!
City of Blank is an action/mystery about a world in which creatures called Blanks can steal your face(and memories). It's in the final season, and I would say that following the third season it's the best so far.
Ok, your turn!

I'm currently reading The Priory of the Orange Tree, and really enjoying it, but I've got to confess I'm a bit disappointed by how predictable the world is. There's an obvious pseudo-medieval European culture, a vaguely Eastern culture of respect and honour, a wise Southern Arabic-flavoured culture, and so on.

It's making me long for some fantasy that feels genuinely different - as far away as possible from this vision of monotheistic courts, swordsman's honour and mysterious wisdom from far away. Something that feels refreshing in trying to portray a world that I have never seen before.

I recently read C.T. Rwizi's Scarlet Odyssey series, and while that definitely involves analogues to a lot of our cultures, it was told from an African perspective, which was very refreshing. So I'd welcome suggestions for fantasy books that approach the typical enemies from a perspective that I don't often see as an English-speaking European reader. But is there much in the way of fantasy that truly tries to explore places and people that are completely out there and away from any of our experiences?

Hey folks! I’m looking for some audiobook ideas (preferably fantasy and science-fiction). I want them to have a TV series or Movie about them though I could watch before listening to them.

All ideas welcome!