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    1. Have you ever watched a zeitgeisty show a long time after it finished? What did you think?

      I live in the UK and Channel 4 got the rights to Seinfeld. I never saw them before, so I'm watching them all now. It's weird, because people make (still!) a lot of noise about the show, and so far...

      I live in the UK and Channel 4 got the rights to Seinfeld. I never saw them before, so I'm watching them all now.

      It's weird, because people make (still!) a lot of noise about the show, and so far (although I'm only 5 episodes in) I don't get it.

      I had a similar experience when I re-watched Allie McBeal -- I enjoyed it the first time around, but the second time it just felt tedious.

      I watched Lost a long time after that finished, and I mostly enjoyed it, and I could understand why at the time it was so popular.

      So, I was wondering, have you watched any of the zeitgeisty shows long after the buzz died down, and what did you think of them?

      15 votes
    2. What's gonna happen in the 2020s?

      I personally see: The enaction of the progressive policies that have been continuosly amplified over the last 5 years during the election of Bernie or Warren (in the US, be it after 2020 or 2024)...

      I personally see:

      • The enaction of the progressive policies that have been continuosly amplified over the last 5 years during the election of Bernie or Warren (in the US, be it after 2020 or 2024)

      • Increasing regulation of the Internet (be it the breakup of tech conglomerates, increased pressure by VC investors for the companies in the red to turn a profit or more surveillance by 3-letter agencies in bad faith)

      • Increased tension between the US and China as China becomes increasingly more powerful especially over tech companies

      • A recession which throws the item in the top 15 years down the line.

      • Automation and AI begin to become more pressing issues during the next depression, leading to people taking candidates like Yang more seriously.

      • "Apophis 2029 is gonna hit the earth." "Finally."

      Edit: Ok, here's some non-political predictions:

      • Mojang runs out of already existing biomes and dimensions to overhaul in minecraft, so they'll shift their development focus to adding more unique biomes, worldgen and mechanical depth and maybe some sort of progression to the game (more complex combat, more dimensions, more bossfights, more mobs like the iron golem with better attacks, more Redstone components, more unique worldgen). By the time this happens, hytale will already be a big competitor and great at al this, causing high controversy that Microsoft is stealing their ideas.

      • This also applies to mobile phone makers as they get rid of all notches, bezels and ports and so they either focus on specs and battery life and nirvana is supposedly achieved at 1600$ per phone, in making the phones as cheap as possible , which makes people get mad about the working conditions of the laborers or in even more exclusive wearables like now.

      • A new manned moon landing, finally. This time the whole journey will be streamed live on an 8k camera via starlink.

      • The (further) normalization of anime, similar to what happened to gaming this decade. More people from more different backgrounds will be watching anime, and they will be less focused on self-depreciation because of it. They will watch anime in public, and will demand more and better anime from the production teams in Japan. The more diverse audience will mean that fanservice will be gradually less effective and non-tanned black characters will appear way more often (and someone will lose their shit over it).

      • HN finally comes up with a site redesign, mainly to make it clearer which threads are which. The new design is similar to Tilde's now and HN usage grows 3-fold.

      30 votes
    3. What did you do this weekend?

      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 weekend. Did you make any plans? Take a trip? Do nothing at...

      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 weekend. Did you make any plans? Take a trip? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

      8 votes
    4. Cellphone review: Umidigi F2

      I was recently in the market for a cheap used phone. I was looking for an Android device, preferably less than 3 years old, preferably with an unlockable bootloader and rootable, for $200 or less....

      I was recently in the market for a cheap used phone. I was looking for an Android device, preferably less than 3 years old, preferably with an unlockable bootloader and rootable, for $200 or less. I was looking at used Pixel 2's when I came across this weird Chinese manufacturer I'd never heard of.

      The Umidigi F2 is a bizarre device. I was blown away by the specs, and the seller was only asking $200CAD for it, so I took a chance. I've got to say, so far I'm pretty impressed.

      Quick Specs:

      • 6.5" IPS LCD, 2340x1080px, bezelless, w/ hole-punch camera, no notch
      • 6GB Dual-channel LPDDR4 RAM, 128GB Storage
      • Mediatek P70 - ARM Cortex A73/A53 Octo-core 2.0/2.1GHz CPU
      • 5 cameras, 32MP front-facing, 48MP rear, 13MP wide-angle, 5MP depth, 5MP macro
      • Dual SIM, MicroSD
      • 5150mAh battery
      • ~40 frequency bands
      • 3.5mm headphone jack
      • Stock Android 10

      At this price I was initially skeptical. There must be something wrong with it, some glaring flaw I wasn't seeing, and/or those specs must be fake. I'm happy to say though, they're real, and the device seems much more solid than I expected.

      I've had the thing a little over a week so far, and have only charged it once. On the first charge it lasted 4 days before I charged it, and still had 30% battery remaining after I'd spent a couple hours surfing the web and two hours watching youtube (total screen-on time was ~4.5hrs). After charging it I haven't been using it as much, but it's currently been running 3 days and it has 70% battery remaining. I've used it to listen to the radio for 3 hours this morning. Oh yeah, did I mention? Bizarrely, it has a FM radio tuner for some reason.

      So far everything has been smooth, the device performs really well, which is not something I expected from a Mediatek CPU. Rooting it went smoothly, and I've been able to tweak a bunch of settings via the EdXposed framework, as much as you can in Android 10 anyway. I did remove some background bloat, but otherwise the default ROM is very close to vanilla AOSP.

      The build quality of the thing is honestly not bad. I've used mid-range Samsung devices that have felt cheaper and more plastic-y than this. I have read some reports of bad touchscreens, but so far I haven't had any problems. There's also a DIY solution to solve that. Unfortunately, if it dies, this is pretty much my only option, since the warranty and support is pretty much nonexistent. At a quarter the price of a brand-name phone with similar specs though, I'm willing to roll those dice.

      So, other than warranty, what are the downsides? Well, so far the biggest gripe I have is there is no notification LED on it. So if I go to the washroom and come back I can't just tell at a glance if I've missed a call or text, I actually need to unlock it. Luckily the fingerprint reader and face unlock are both pretty reliable. There is no wireless charging, which I'm more or less okay with. The main reason I'd want that is if the USB port died, but again, this is the sort of phone that if anything is wrong with it you're pretty much meant to throw it out. The speaker is a bit tinny, and unfortunately it's mono. The cameras are bad. The 48MP camera does take 8000x6000 pictures, but they're grainy to the point where even if you resize them down they still look worse than something taken with a good 6MP camera. This seems to be a software problem though. The camera module is apparently made by Samsung, and people have said it's gotten better with every OTA update. As for that, there's been an update this month, but a lot of people are expecting it might be the last update they put out. Umidigi apparently has a bad track record of only providing updates for a few months.

      In conclusion, this is objectively a decent phone, and for it's price, it's exceptional. You sacrifice warranty, updates, any kind of support really, but you get some very decent hardware for $200.

      Official site: https://www.umidigi.com/page-umidigi_f2_specification.html
      Purchasable on amazon for fast shipping, purchase on aliexpress to save $50.

      9 votes
    5. What file access do programs have if I install them? Can they see everything?

      I am thinking on installing League of Legends, but I am not sure about the privacy implications of doing so. If I install it, would it be able to read all the other files in my computer? If it...

      I am thinking on installing League of Legends, but I am not sure about the privacy implications of doing so. If I install it, would it be able to read all the other files in my computer? If it can, can I avoid the problem by using a guest account on my computer to play? Riot's privacy policy seems to be standard as far data mining goes, but I would like to know how much it can see if install it. I am playing on a Mac.

      6 votes