Akir's recent activity
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Comment on Apple will soon support encrypted RCS messaging with Android users in ~tech
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Comment on USA asks Sweden for help in the egg crisis in ~food
Akir Link ParentIt doesn’t surprise me that I’m out of the loop, but it looks like I’m not even in orbit around the same sun anymore. 😕 Im not even middle aged yet….It doesn’t surprise me that I’m out of the loop, but it looks like I’m not even in orbit around the same sun anymore. 😕
Im not even middle aged yet….
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Comment on USA asks Sweden for help in the egg crisis in ~food
Akir Link ParentI've had pretty good luck with removing eggs from everything I've tried. The only ones where substitutes were not really acceptable are the ones that are built around eggs specifically (omelets,...I've had pretty good luck with removing eggs from everything I've tried. The only ones where substitutes were not really acceptable are the ones that are built around eggs specifically (omelets, eggs benedict, etc).
But then again I never particularly cared for eggs to begin with.
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Comment on USA asks Sweden for help in the egg crisis in ~food
Akir Link ParentOn a side note, I'm finding it really weird how many people have begun describing their eating habits as "like a goblin". A recent Adam Ragusea video had his wife make broiler nachos and when...On a side note, I'm finding it really weird how many people have begun describing their eating habits as "like a goblin". A recent Adam Ragusea video had his wife make broiler nachos and when asked how it would be served she said something like you lean over it and pick at it like a goblin. But I mean, yeah, that's kind of just how you eat nachos. It's not goblin-like at all.
It's just strange to me that people would dehumanize themselves like that. I can get that you might want to use it over the other popular idiomatic comparison, like a pig, but it actually feels worse because goblins are pretty solidly on the "evil" scale of mythical creatures.
I get that it's probably stemming from the phrase "goblin mode", but I've heard "like a goblin" many times more than that.
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Comment on Anyone interested in trying out Kagi? (trial giveaway: round #2) in ~tech
Akir Link ParentIt doesn't give access to all of their AI tools. That's their Unlimited plan. It gives you access to FastGPT - which appears to actually be free for their trial users, since it didn't show up in...It doesn't give access to all of their AI tools. That's their Unlimited plan. It gives you access to FastGPT - which appears to actually be free for their trial users, since it didn't show up in my quota after using it a lot (in fact, I'm not sure I was even logged in when I used it!) - and to Universal Summarizer. I'm not sure if the latter is free since I haven't cared to use it.
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Comment on Super Nintendo hardware is running faster as it ages in ~games
Akir LinkThe title is a little bit misleading. Yes, it's faster than the original rating, but it's by such a small bit that it's not really going to affect anyone except people who are extremely particular...The title is a little bit misleading. Yes, it's faster than the original rating, but it's by such a small bit that it's not really going to affect anyone except people who are extremely particular about TAS runs - perhaps only to the few people like Cecil who are making tooling for them. The example given with the APU has a drift of roughly 0.3% more than spec.
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Comment on Chromecast alternatives in ~tech
Akir Link ParentThis is basically the entire raison d'etre for kodi.This is basically the entire raison d'etre for kodi.
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Comment on ‘Pokémon Go’ video game maker Niantic acquired by Scopely for $3.5 billion in ~games
Akir Link ParentAh, OK then. I just didn't remember it saying Toolbox AI before. In the app it still says Niantic like it has been since I started using it.Ah, OK then. I just didn't remember it saying Toolbox AI before. In the app it still says Niantic like it has been since I started using it.
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Comment on Danish deposit system: 93% of bottles and cans are returned and of those, 99.7% recycled (translation in comment) in ~enviro
Akir Link ParentMy experience of CRV (California’s deposit recycling program) is that it triggers anxiety and is harder than it needs to be. I have never seen a machine that will take single bottles anywhere. You...My experience of CRV (California’s deposit recycling program) is that it triggers anxiety and is harder than it needs to be. I have never seen a machine that will take single bottles anywhere. You have to go to the recycling centers which always seem to be either closed or are busy, because people bring their stuff in bulk and need to have it sorted and weighed, so a visit could rather easily take a half hour to complete. I seem to remember not getting paid in cash either, but a grocery store voucher, but that may be a distortion of memory.
Recycle centers I have seen have been universally shabby and unfriendly-looking places. They are often just sheds or even cargo containers. They are very poorly advertised; you are not likely to find them on any business directories, and it’s completely beyond me why they are often behind grocery stores. I found one a while back entirely on accident because I was going behind them to get to the back of goodwill for a donation drop off. And the fact that they don’t check every item, instead relying on a scale, really makes me doubt their accuracy. After all, my CRV deposit is per bottle, not by weight.
The experience is so bad that I don’t use them. I don’t like holding on to trash, and to me the meager payout make up for the time they spend taking up space in my home waiting for the bag to be full, for the hopes and dreams that I will be able to get a whole dollar sometime in the future. But I also don’t buy soft drinks to begin with. The rare times I do, I put them in my home recycle bin, which gives me a negative payback since we pay for that pickup.
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Comment on ‘Pokémon Go’ video game maker Niantic acquired by Scopely for $3.5 billion in ~games
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Comment on New anti-obesity drugs will outperform Ozempic in ~health
Akir Link ParentI am all in on the American cardamom revolution.Maybe we'll get food with actual spices in them?
I am all in on the American cardamom revolution.
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Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp
Akir LinkLearning Minecraft, surprisingly. My work has scheduled me without asking my availability to teach a pair of students the their next level of Python classes in a newer format that uses Minecraft...Learning Minecraft, surprisingly.
My work has scheduled me without asking my availability to teach a pair of students the their next level of Python classes in a newer format that uses Minecraft Education Edition. I'm not really sure if I really like it or not. There are parts of it that have extremely rough edges, some of which I think are because of the company I'm working at, and others because of Minecraft Education Edition seems to be a not-so-great way to teach. I'm worried about having to wrestle the kids away from the game that I am literally putting them right in front of. There are a lot of really mixed incentives with the program, I think. I've played around with the lessons that Microsoft has made, and they are ... not rudimentary, exactly, but they show off the constraints. Every task they have you do is in a world and it seems like it's good because it makes logical sense, but then again you are programming a little robot to do things that if you weren't constrained would be so much easier for you to go out and do it yourself.
But the curriculum I'm teaching is the more advanced stuff, for kids who have already learned these concepts that Microsoft's lessons have been teaching. And so what exactly is the point?
I say this, but really, I think this might be helpful to these particular students because the thing that I find most of my students have a hard time with is being flexable in their thinking. Even if all they did were drawing with blocks, it's still going to need them to learn to think a little differently.
The thing that's really bugging me, though, is that this uses the relatively new Python Notebook editor. The Notebook editor is just stupid.
For one, the editor is just a web browser integrated into minecraft. It's not well integrated, either. You need to click on it before it will register any inputs, so if you want to, for instance, click on a piece of your code. you will have to open the editor with the "c" key, and then click somewhere in the editor before it will actually allow you to click on your code. To run any given piece of code, you will need to open the editor, click on it, then click a second time to actually run it. If you want to see the code in action, you can theoretically press escape to close the editor, but in reality your input is being captured by the browser so you will have to click on the "X" close window button - twice. So basically, everything feels like it's barely working because it doesn't actually do what you want to do the first time.
Beyond that, there is almost zero advantage to using notebooks over a basic editor. For one thing, you cannot save your own projects. Officially, at least; the program tells you when you start a new project it will not save, but it's persisted every time in the world I've created. But even then, the actual usefulness is gimped. For one, you cannot write plain text anywhere. The only option you have is to write code. It seems like they are using the format to integrate lessons - that's how they do it in their example teaching worlds - but for the life of me I cannot find a way to write my own and include it in a world. It seems like you are supposed to be able to write rich text and insert gifs and images and even have multiple pages, but none of that functionality is exposed to the user. The only things I have found - by accident - were that you can press "a" when not in an editor and a new editor will appear somewhere, press "x" and some editor will be deleted, and sometimes pressing "z" will bring back an editor that was deleted. So basically, my only real option to teach my students is to be sitting next to them and walking through everything bit by bit.
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Comment on ‘Pokémon Go’ video game maker Niantic acquired by Scopely for $3.5 billion in ~games
Akir LinkI'm much more annoyed because Niantic was publishing the best free photogrammetry app out there, Scaniverse, which supported both mesh and gaussian splatting. I just checked on the App Store and...I'm much more annoyed because Niantic was publishing the best free photogrammetry app out there, Scaniverse, which supported both mesh and gaussian splatting. I just checked on the App Store and it looks like the name of the publisher has been changed to "Toolbox AI", which is just gross.
So I guess the future of 3D scanning is buying a dedicated scanner for hundreds of dollars and be stuck with their PC-only applications of varying and sometimes questionable quality.
(re-reading the article, Scopely might have just acquired their video game assets and not the entire company. The renaming on the app store is still worrying, though.)
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Comment on Xbox's new hardware plans begin with a gaming handheld in 2025 in ~games
Akir Link ParentLiterally all Microsoft needs to do to destroy Valve’s hardware dreams is to make touch-friendly interfaces for Windows, I think. That, and offer it to OEMs in a package that isn’t full of the...Literally all Microsoft needs to do to destroy Valve’s hardware dreams is to make touch-friendly interfaces for Windows, I think. That, and offer it to OEMs in a package that isn’t full of the full Windows 11 bloat.
It feels so ironic that people hated Windows 8’s metro design because at the time most people didn’t have touchscreens, but now that Microsoft has abandoned it touchscreens are ubiquitous even though modern windows is pretty terrible with touch. When I am dealing with students I will often be startled with movement when I point at their screen and my finger grazes it. Scrolling up and down websites kind of feels like it’s the only thing that touchscreens on laptops are good for.
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Comment on Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and US influencers bash seed oils, baffling nutrition scientists in ~food
Akir Link ParentOils are worse than the nuts and seeds they are pressed from because the process of refining them is the disposal of important nutrients. Take, for instance, the nutrition of peanut oil vs....Oils are worse than the nuts and seeds they are pressed from because the process of refining them is the disposal of important nutrients.
Take, for instance, the nutrition of peanut oil vs. peanuts. For this demonstration with those links, you'll want to up the serving of peanuts to 14 to compare them fairly. Take a look down at the micronutriants section. Phosphorus, Vitamin D, Iron, and Calcium are all present in peanuts, but are completely gone in the oil. But the macronutrients are where it really gets concerning. The amount of fat has doubled! But you will also notice that the amount of calories hasn't gone up by all that much. That's because it's missing some of the other nutrients you would expect, most notably the carbohydrates and proteins, both of which are extremely important. You need a balanced diet, and oil can make the meal unbalanced fairly quickly, especially if you're also cooking with meat or egg yolks.
Keep in mind also that the oil is very calorie-dense. 14g of oil is significantly less volume that 14g of peanuts. Those peanuts also have more things that will help you become full because they have more nutrients in them. One of those critical nutrients is fiber, something that is very common to be deficient in the standard American diet and is one of the things that triggers satiety. You will get full faster from peanuts than you will peanut oil.
Another thing to think about is that if you didn't cook the meal yourself, it's hard to tell exactly how much oil has been added to a given prepared food. So you are likely consuming a lot more of it than you imagine unless you're paying a lot of attention.
I used peanuts as an example, but this applies to every oil out there. While animal sources of fat will have very different nutritional differences, it's not all that much different except that the unprocessed forms aren't quite as wholesome as plant-based sources. It should be noted as well that whole seeds and nuts are also bad for you if you eat a lot of them. But once again, the problem with oils is that they make you eat the equivalent of them a whole lot easier.
None of this is to say to stop eating any given kind of food. But everyone should really be eating more whole foods - vegetables in particular.
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Comment on Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and US influencers bash seed oils, baffling nutrition scientists in ~food
Akir Link ParentI think if you dig deeper you will find a lot of the same things happening though. If you look at patterns of where obesity happens, you’ll find that it centers around big cities, places where...I think if you dig deeper you will find a lot of the same things happening though. If you look at patterns of where obesity happens, you’ll find that it centers around big cities, places where convenience food availability and overbearing work culture collide.
Those countries also have other things going for them. Japan, for instance, has a lot better food education. Elementary school basically forces them to eat healthy meals, so they are better equipped to make better decisions and healthier options are more commonplace. Many Asian countries see higher rates of obesity because they are adopting western cuisine but this system helps preserve traditional cuisine (to an extent; there is plenty of western food available there).
In any case, I did mention that this is a multivariate problem, it’s just that the two things I mentioned seem to be the biggest problems.
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Comment on Looking for lighthearted action anime in ~anime
Akir Link ParentAs an aside, I’m a bit annoyed at how it seems that character driven dramas tend to turn into battle anime. As much as I have been enjoying the latest run of the Re:Zero anime, it really feels...As an aside, I’m a bit annoyed at how it seems that character driven dramas tend to turn into battle anime. As much as I have been enjoying the latest run of the Re:Zero anime, it really feels like it just entered a metaphorical tournament arc with how much action it has. Though I really shouldn’t complain because the fights are still advancing the character growth and plot, which isn’t always the case with your average shonen anime.
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Comment on LAZARUS (ラザロ)｜Main trailer in ~anime
Akir Link ParentI’m just excited to get another Dai Satou joint. He’s famous for writing Ergo Proxy and Wolf’s Rain, and has also been in the writing room for a number of other projects. He’s a frequent...I’m just excited to get another Dai Satou joint. He’s famous for writing Ergo Proxy and Wolf’s Rain, and has also been in the writing room for a number of other projects. He’s a frequent collaborator with Watanabe.
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Comment on Suggest a remote desktop program? in ~tech
Akir Link ParentThe fact that it locks out the local user is a plus in my book. It means that if I’m using my computer, it’s only going to be me. But I can understand why people wouldn’t want that.The fact that it locks out the local user is a plus in my book. It means that if I’m using my computer, it’s only going to be me. But I can understand why people wouldn’t want that.
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Comment on I used to teach students. Now I catch ChatGPT cheats. in ~tech
Akir Link ParentAs someone who has just began to work in teaching, I am starting to realize that one of the biggest problems with education is that it’s really hard to get the time to sit down and talk to...As someone who has just began to work in teaching, I am starting to realize that one of the biggest problems with education is that it’s really hard to get the time to sit down and talk to individual students long enough to get them fully engaged and fill in their understanding. My classes have been mostly 1-on-1 but even with that, being limited to one hour chunks means that I’ll often need to just give up on teaching a concept before they have good understanding and then next week we waste a lot more time doing “review” which is actually going back and finishing what we were supposed to have already learned, which can take longer than if we had just finished the first time.
While I’m glad that students have access to something that can help them to fill in those gaps, let’s be honest - most of them probably won’t. They will take the path of least resistance and use it to simply give them the correct answers rather than teaching them how to come to it themselves.
Given that I am still waiting for my iPhone to work with plain ol'e unencrypted RCS on my carrier, I'm utterly unenthused to hear this.
Presumably the latest iOS beta has it working but I've heard it's still very buggy.