This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

My thoughts are that apps can have end-to-end encryption, but if the app on the end is still connected to someone's servers, there's nothing stopping them from pulling the contents of the chat after it's been decrypted on the other end. What options do we have for messaging that don't have this issue? I understand that anything that I can see can still get taken by the OS, etc., but I'm curious about that first step.

I've used eBay for many years. It seems to me their support is just getting worse and worse, and their buying experience is beyond confusing.

Most recently, I've been getting an invoice for items that I never committed to buy, I merely asked the seller if combined shipping was a possibility on these items. eBay support first told me that I made a bid on the items. I responded that is incorrect because the items weren't even up for auction, it was a fixed price. They responded with "oh sorry, I see you did not bid, but you did send an offer and if the seller accepts, you must pay the amount". But I never sent any monetary offer, I didn't even request a shipping price.

This is the most recent of a few experiences that just seem beyond confusing to me. Is anyone else having these kind of experiences?

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.

(Inspired by some discussion over at the The New Lifetime Reading Plan topic)

Which authors or texts do you feel deserve a place in the literary canon, but don't currently have one?

There is, of course, not one singular, well-defined "canon" -- so interpret "the canon" as "the classics" or "required reading" or "most important works of literature" or however else you care to define it.

In particular, consider areas that the canon tends to overlook: female authors, eastern perspectives, plays (besides Shakespeare's works), etc.

As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

It’s been about a month and a half since our big Kagi trial giveaway, which means most people are probably about halfway through their trial periods, so I figured we were due for a follow-up.

To those who started using it recently, what are your thoughts?

What do you like and dislike about Kagi?

Do you think you will continue your subscription past the end of the trial?

Note: I’m not affiliated with Kagi in any way besides being a happy customer myself. I’m asking this entirely out of curiosity.

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

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 recently just restarted my monthly donation to the ACLU because.... well... ya know. I was wondering what other people donate to regularly and why! I hope this isn't a contentious topic or anything, I do think that what you decide to donate to does really show what you care about in this capitalistic society.

Other organizations I've donated to within the last year (not regularly though sadly) include Planned Parenthood, Doctors Without Borders, and the Signal Foundation, and I also donate to the Boston Greater Food Bank.

Another post got me thinking about this community as a whole. Where in each country do people live? What is the general age range? What occupations and industries are represented here?

Have there been Tildes surveys in the past, and if so, where might I find one?

Specifically low-stakes.

I’m sure many of us have been having more than our our fill of high-stakes stuff recently.

Think: minor, inconsequential, petty, mundane, etc.

Your “circles” can be home, work, school, friends, gym, library, grocery store, Discord server — anything really.

This topic is part of a series. It is meant to be a place for users to discuss creative projects they have been working on.

Projects can be personal, professional, physical, digital, or even just ideas.

If you have any creative projects that you have been working on or want to eventually work on, this is a place for discussing those.

I’m wondering what people choose to drink with a Mac and cheese meal? This has long been a conundrum for me. Probably for 20 years I have finished making the mac only to stop for a minute and think “should I have milk? Water? Soda/pop? Something else?”

Seriously, I have this question almost every time. Doesn’t matter if it’s homemade mac or kraft box. For the last 8 years it hasn’t really come up because I just didn’t buy mac and cheese (box “dinner”), but now I have a kid coming into the age where they want it occasionally so it’s back on the menu.

Am I being weird about this?

Are there other foods that people have a hard time pairing with a drink?

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.

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?

In the corners of Tildes that I read on, I’ve noticed that a lot of us on here subscribe to online services like - Netflix, Kagi, Spotify, Dropbox, Mailbox.org, Patreon, Twitch, Bandcamp, etc.

I, myself, am kind of stingy about subscriptions but lately I’ve been considering subscribing to some online services.

So I’d like to know which online services (like those with monthly and annual fees) have you subscribed to (which tier if applicable) and which ones do you think is worth it and which ones are not?

To get the ball rolling, the only regularly recurring monthly payments I have right now are with Namecheap for the domain and IONOS for my server (the cheapest tier).

I’ve managed to avoid subscribing for entertainment like Disney+ or YouTube Premium or even music streaming platforms. Though I’m considering Deezer for the hifi option.

I’ve at some point subscribed to Patreon, Bandcamp and Twitch for artists I really liked.

And I’m currently looking into productivity apps that might be worth it to me.

—-

PS: It’s my first time posting and if this post would be better elsewhere, don’t hesitate to move it. Thank you!

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

Many times people credited with creating a genre or style simply placed the final brick, standing on the shoulders of giants. But who had the most profound impact through both luck and effort?

I’m interested in any art form - theater, painting, film making, video games, etc.

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

This is primarily aimed at the younger folks here, but it can conceivably work for anyone.

Is there a game that came out from before you started gaming that you have since played and loved? An oldie for you, but still a goodie?

I’m curious because gaming has changed so much so quickly that a lot of older games feel like they almost require fond nostalgia to counterbalance their clunkiness. For others, they were sort of a “you had to be there” moment because gaming hadn’t developed fully as a medium so we players weren’t aware of their limitations at the time.

Without nostalgia or direct experience with them, a lot of their magic is gone.

Has anyone found that magic in a game even without the nostalgia? If so, which one(s). What made them resonate for you?

In particular, I’m interested in games that specifically aren’t remakes/remasters since those often modernize elements, but I won’t say they aren’t allowed for the purposes of the question or anything, since they’re also a very accessible way for modern gamers to access older titles.

The flip can be from widely liked to widely disliked, or it can go the opposite direction.

Also, it doesn’t have to be based solely on the book itself (though it certainly can be).

• Maybe the actions of the author changed the perception of the book.
• Maybe a bad sequel tanked the esteem of the original story in hindsight.
• Maybe cultural changes now cast the book in a different light.
• etc.

Whatever the case: what’s a book where opinion has flipped, and why do you think people’s opinions changed?

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

Since it is the Oscar season and there are awards for acting, I thought it will be interesting to hear about peoples favorite actresses. As an alternative to the usual "my favorite movies". I will make another topic about actors in a couple of days.

So who are favorite actresses, what makes them special for you and what are their best movies?

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

For as long as I can remember, I've been unnerved by passive infrared motion detectors. You know the ones, those that have a milky-white lens and on occasion blink red when they detect motion. They're absolutely terrifying to me and I don't know why.

I got a few other strangely specific phobias as well - I hate bathroom extractor fans, specifically in bathrooms with high ceilings (which are very common here in Europe), I can't bear to be near industrial light signals even if they're off, and when I recently went to the US, the absolute ubiquity of emergency battery backup light fixtures paralysed me in more than one building. My worst irrational fear is that of horn-style speakers, especially in public spaces or industrial settings, and in those, especially those that fire downwards. (Incidentally, sirens on emergency vehicles, even when they suddenly go off, never triggered this phobia)

So apart from my weird damage, I have to wonder - what are some of your weird uncommon phobias? I don't mean stuff like a fear of needles or spiders, those are quite common and well documented, but something truly odd you can't make sense of and you kind of know should not be able to scare or disgust you.

My phone, Samsung Galaxy S20, has finally started having some screen issues and made me start looking seriously at a new phone. I felt like I got great use out of this phone after 5 years, and I anticipate trying to get a similar or (hopefully) longer life span from my next phone.

Ideally I'd like to keep this phone going for another year, currently the screen issue is more annoying than actually preventing me from using the phone. The OLED can no longer properly display black colors and when the screen goes to sub 10% brightness it adds a yellow tinge to the screen, and using my blue light filter only makes it worse. This has led me to use my phone less at night or when it's dark, since it's like having a dim flashlight shining in my eyes.

A bit of a startling realization, was that I've been putting off building a new computer since I moved over here due to the expense, but I'd happily drop more than I'd be willing to spend on that new computer on a new phone since I use it everyday throughout the day.

This made me wonder how often others replace their phones.

Are there any criteria you look for when picking new phones?
Are you a brand loyalist, or do you shop around?
Do you do camera comparisons between phones/models?
Or simply, how do you choose your phone?

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.

As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.