DarthYoshiBoy's recent activity
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Comment on For those involved / interested in Web3, what do you make of the near and long term future for it? in ~tech
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Comment on Reasons why World of Warcraft private servers fail in ~games
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentMaybe things have changed, but way back in the day when I played around with some private servers you had to provide your own copy of the client and it was fully unmodified, you just went and...Maybe things have changed, but way back in the day when I played around with some private servers you had to provide your own copy of the client and it was fully unmodified, you just went and dumped some crap in your hosts file to get everything wired up properly and off you went. Granted that was shy of 2 decades ago now, so 🤷♂️.
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Comment on I’ve been at NPR for twenty-five years. Here’s how we lost America’s trust. in ~news
DarthYoshiBoy Linkhttps://archive.is/kX4dH if you prefer to not feed the clickbait machine.https://archive.is/kX4dH if you prefer to not feed the clickbait machine.
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Comment on Why Bluesky remains the most interesting experiment in social media, by far in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentThey are for profit, but they have chosen to be a Public Benefit Corporation which allows them (and their board) to take actions they otherwise would be liable for, in the interest of serving the...They are for profit, but they have chosen to be a Public Benefit Corporation which allows them (and their board) to take actions they otherwise would be liable for, in the interest of serving the Public Benefit they've identified (In this case, "open and decentralized public discussion.") So there's even a hedge there.
As a PBC they have a duty to (a) the shareholders, (b) the constituencies materially affected by the PBC's conduct, and (c) the public benefit(s) identified in their charter; and crucially shareholders cannot end or dilute the public benefit commitment of the PBC from year to year. Which isn't perfect, but what really is? They're trying, and as a user of both Mastodon and Bluesky, I have to say that they're doing the better job. I can't get my socials to join Mastodon for anything, but many of them will hop onto Bluesky easy.
For them as a PBC, the financial incentives only exist so long as they're serving their charter public benefit, so while it's entirely possible that they one day choose to reincorporate or something (I don't know if that's allowed/possible) to drop their charter cause, I think their mission to build a functional protocol above and beyond the platform itself has ensured that they wouldn't be able to do so without materially ending their existence because the genie is already out of the bottle and their product is out there for anyone to duplicate if desired. 🤷♂️
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Comment on Why Bluesky remains the most interesting experiment in social media, by far in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentIf you hop into the settings for Bluesky, there's a setting for how many likes a reply needs to have to be shown in your feed, setting that significantly up from the default of 2 cleared a bunch...If you hop into the settings for Bluesky, there's a setting for how many likes a reply needs to have to be shown in your feed, setting that significantly up from the default of
2cleared a bunch of Neil off of my follow feed. I still enjoy seeing his replies and stuff in general that he posts, but the default2likes was far too few. You can also enable a setting that will only show replies in your feed if you follow both of the users involved in the transaction. I don't have that one on, but I might use it some day once the userbase starts to flesh out. -
Comment on Nobody warned electric vehicle owners how quickly they would burn through tires in ~transport
DarthYoshiBoy LinkI own a Nissan Leaf that hasn't been going through tires any faster than any other car I've ever owned. That said, I drive it exclusively in Eco mode with the enhanced regenerative braking drive...I own a Nissan Leaf that hasn't been going through tires any faster than any other car I've ever owned. That said, I drive it exclusively in Eco mode with the enhanced regenerative braking drive setting engaged so it's not laying down 100% of the torque it's capable of producing ever and my starts in it are generally slower/smoother than anything I've ever gotten from an ICE car.
I have taken it out of Eco mode once or twice and really given it "the gas" and I can see how you'd just shred tires if that was your day to day driving; it'll have no issues with putting a ton of torque straight into the wheels if you let it, but it also shreds your maximum range to drive like that so I take things slow and steady while remaining quite pleased.
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Comment on Why Bluesky remains the most interesting experiment in social media, by far in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentDid you read the piece? I (like the author of the piece) think the abstracted moderation and decentralized nature will probably do a decent job of keeping enshittification at bay. It's entirely...Personally I fail to see how it could be anything but temporary, when all the same preconditions for enshittification are there
Did you read the piece? I (like the author of the piece) think the abstracted moderation and decentralized nature will probably do a decent job of keeping enshittification at bay. It's entirely possible that some new path towards enshittification emerges, but for the ones we know of now, it looks like they're doing their honest best to keep them in check.
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Comment on I have an issue with the 3 Body Problem in ~tv
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentStill sorta spoilers I guess? Meh. It was too much suspension of disbelief for me. Perhaps that's my bias coming from a computer science background, but in earnest, the kinds of energy they're...Still sorta spoilers I guess?
Meh. It was too much suspension of disbelief for me.Perhaps that's my bias coming from a computer science background, but in earnest, the kinds of energy they're talking about would be enough for them to subtly (or full blast "Hey pay attention to us!" mode if desired) effect any changes they wanted in the world of computing almost without limit. They wouldn't have to make any particle collisions look screwy when a significantly smaller amount of energy could meddle with the outputs from every COMPUTER BASED device watching the explosion to show whatever results the Trisolarans wanted. They wouldn't need humans at all to affect their will for things when the Sophons could just flip a few bits here and there and make the systems we rely on say the right things for people to do whatever the Trisolarans want without any human having to know there's anyone out there pushing their buttons.
We know from the game that the Trisolarans figured computers out as a fundamental of their being so that they could do advanced calculations with their bodies, emulating computer systems as we know them as naturally as bears shit in the woods. So it's incomprehensible that they would view sabotaging our real world scientific endeavors as a more reliable plan than sabotaging our computing power, which again is a trivial action for something that exists in 11 dimensions and is able to manifest as a proton in our 3 dimensional reality. A single charged particle in the right place at the right time can do basically anything at our current technology level and if it can move at relativistic speeds, it's basically not limited in any way that would be meaningful to its abilities to modify our computers. Things aren't as robust in our computer infrastructure as people seem to just take for granted that they are, much of what we use day to day even still here in 2024 is basically working on pinky swears and good wishes, a motivated attacker with the power of two Sophons would own our asses overnight and how are we supposed to advance at all without computers? We'd be back to the technological level of the 50's overnight with no road forward to rebuilding where we are now in a timescale that would be meaningful for the Trisolaran plans.
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Comment on I have an issue with the 3 Body Problem in ~tv
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentHere's my problem, having read the books a few years back and about half way through the show so far... Maybe spoilers? If you can make particle collisions break down everywhere on Earth to the...Here's my problem, having read the books a few years back and about half way through the show so far...
Maybe spoilers?
If you can make particle collisions break down everywhere on Earth to the point that physicists think they can no longer do physics and choose to kill themselves, you can far more easily just break enough of modern computing to send humans back to the stone age. The Trisolarans have a very firm understanding of how important computers are, but that's not what they choose to do with the Sophons. It's just insane. They could launch nukes, they could blow up power grids, they could basically destroy all meaningful technology on Earth, or they could just subtly corrupt human understanding to their ends by controlling all information, but they do none of that, they mess with physicists vision, make particle collisions look funny, and blink the sky. It's insane that it's never addressed how these things have godlike power in our modern world to really truly wreck us and they never use ANY of it to achieve their specific stated goal, instead they try to stop us from learning further physics, which is Bond villain levels of roundabout non-sense. -
Comment on Apple has kept an illegal monopoly over smartphones in US, Justice Department says in antitrust suit in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentI mean, this has always been the case with Android. I've purchased a number of apps in the years that I've used Android where I bought a license directly from the dev's website and just put a...The smartphone market is so complex and the market players are split into a duopoly that are extremely similar. Let’s say I want to buy a smartphone that pays developers a better percentage than 70% (this is slowly changing, but let’s assume not for the sake of argument). Well, touch luck.
I mean, this has always been the case with Android. I've purchased a number of apps in the years that I've used Android where I bought a license directly from the dev's website and just put a license key into the app that I got from the Play Store to unlock the full features of the app. I once even bought an APK that the dev provided themselves, outside of the Play Store. 😱 If those devs weren't taking the full payment, lacking processing fees that are usually 3-5% on the top end of things, then that was on them, they certainly had the option to take it all if they wanted it, there was nobody else involved in the transaction.
The options are there even if most people don't like going outside of the "curated" experience of the Play Store with Android.
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Comment on Time to delete your Glassdoor account and data in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentWow. I hadn't noticed until you quoted it that I said To: when I meant From: so I went ahead and fixed that. Thanks. That said, I did address SPF and DKIM when I said the following: I didn't...Wow. I hadn't noticed until you quoted it that I said
To:when I meantFrom:so I went ahead and fixed that. Thanks.That said, I did address SPF and DKIM when I said the following:
Now there are some standards that can at least prevent full stop email spoofing if everyone involved is adhering to the standard
I didn't figure it was worth bothering with naming the standards specifically since most people outside of IT/Admin circles will never have to think about them, but the sentiment still correlates with what you're saying. The server on the both ends has to be deploying those standards or the mail more or less just slides on by in most cases.
...and even then, if your email domain has DKIM and SPF setup correctly, and Glassdoor's email server has done likewise, none of that stops you from saying in the
From:header that your name is John Doe when it's actually Jane Smith. So even with proper email standards implemented, just taking the sender name from an email as gospel about who you're talking to is an absurd failure. -
Comment on Time to delete your Glassdoor account and data in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentI honestly don't know. I've only ever used Glassdoor to check prospective employers out, never to kvetch, so I was basing my analysis on the first line of the TL;DR which claims they're now...Glassdoor now requires your real name
I honestly don't know. I've only ever used Glassdoor to check prospective employers out, never to kvetch, so I was basing my analysis on the first line of the TL;DR which claims they're now requiring a "real name." I assumed that they've never had any validation ever but they're now trying to claim that they're getting real names?
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Comment on Time to delete your Glassdoor account and data in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy (edited )Link ParentThis is just so misinformed as a policy too. Like you can set the name on your emails with Glassdoor to anything. There's no ensuring that the name in an email From: header is the legit sender of...This is just so misinformed as a policy too. Like you can set the name on your emails with Glassdoor to anything. There's no ensuring that the name in an email
From:header is the legit sender of the message. That's more or less the whole reason we have spam in the first place, you can just make up whatever shit you want in email and the whole thing was built from the start to be a trust first, interoperate as much as possible philosophy so there's no way to validate that information. Now there are some standards that can at least prevent full stop email spoofing if everyone involved is adhering to the standard, but none of those ensure that the name that the sender has set for themselves is their actual name.I could set my name in my emails with Glassdoor to that of a co-worker I want fired, go leave a tirade on the company I work for, and Glassdoor is just going to slap that co-worker's name on the tirade with no other checks?
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Comment on Looking for songs that include recordings of commentary in ~music
DarthYoshiBoy LinkHey Pretty (Drive-by Remix) by Poe is my favorite form of this ever. It has Mark Z. Danielewski (poe's Brother) reading from his book House of Leaves interspersed with the original chorus of the song.Hey Pretty (Drive-by Remix) by Poe is my favorite form of this ever. It has Mark Z. Danielewski (poe's Brother) reading from his book House of Leaves interspersed with the original chorus of the song.
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Comment on Jordan Klepper presses Nikki Haley supporters: Donald Trump or Joe Biden in 2024 US Presidential election? in ~misc
DarthYoshiBoy LinkThe dude saying that if you're kicked in the balls at least you can fight back. 🤦♂️ My man, don't you think if you needed to fight back, it'd be easier to do so not having been kicked in the...The dude saying that if you're kicked in the balls at least you can fight back. 🤦♂️
My man, don't you think if you needed to fight back, it'd be easier to do so not having been kicked in the jewels? I honestly can't believe how disconnected from logic all these people are. "I can never vote for being kicked in the balls." "So you'll vote for the other option that doesn't kick you in the balls?" "I don't know, that's a toughie... I'd have to think about it."
It's not like there's an choice where we don't get one of the two outcomes. I can't believe they aren't able to see which direction the dichotomy breaks if you opt to vote for the bad choice or just not vote at all. You have two outcomes, one is demonstrably better, how is this so hard?
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Comment on "The biggest myth in speedrunning history": A cosmic ray didn't help a Mario 64 speedrunner in ~games
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentSure. I also think that it's a hardware failure at the root of what went down, but someone who knows the innards of Mario 64 reproduced almost (ALMOST, as I noted, the playback isn't perfect, but...Sure. I also think that it's a hardware failure at the root of what went down, but someone who knows the innards of Mario 64 reproduced almost (ALMOST, as I noted, the playback isn't perfect, but getting that would be difficult beyond reason from a Twitch clip of the original event) perfectly the same glitch by flipping a single bit, so it very much seems likely that the flipping of a bit was the cause of the original occurrence as well however that bit flip came to be and this video is 100% dismissive of that possibility.
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Comment on "The biggest myth in speedrunning history": A cosmic ray didn't help a Mario 64 speedrunner in ~games
DarthYoshiBoy LinkI tend to think that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vj8DzA9y8ls&lc=Ugz4FWk8qAk5qpc_80J4AaABAg and the thread following it get my sentiments here on the nose. LunaticJ's dismissive to the point...I tend to think that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vj8DzA9y8ls&lc=Ugz4FWk8qAk5qpc_80J4AaABAg and the thread following it get my sentiments here on the nose. LunaticJ's dismissive to the point that he's becoming the machine he's raging against. Infinitesimally small odds things are happening everywhere every day in the universe and it's human beings' inability to comprehend the concept that "infinitesimally small doesn't mean never" that causes him to create the mirror image of his major complaint.
He's upset that everyone buys the Cosmic Ray as truth, but he also states several times that it's absolutely a myth rather than what should be the accepted reality, which is that it's unlikely, but it's just about as likely as any other highly unlikely occurrence all things considered. He provides no proof that any of the other possibilities are any more likely than the one that he claims to be debunking, he's just certain that that one isn't it for... reasons?
In fact, his only real claim is that a bit flip working from imprecise knowledge of the inputs in use at the time of the original incident doesn't match the original perfectly, while offering no other explanation that even comes close. Honestly the recreated bitflip looks insanely similar. Given that an N64 joystick can register something like 7600 different positions and that number isn't even "the law" since the joystick technically uses 8 bits for up/down and left/right. It's only the shape of the stick enclosure that limits it to the ~7600 number. Wear and tear on the physical components can expand or contract that number.
So combine everything above with the fact that you're transcoding the video while streaming to Twitch, so frames won't necessarily line up one to one in the recording vs what was actually happening in a frame, and then you realize that you'd have to perfectly replicate one of ~7600 joystick positions (maybe less, depending on how Mario 64 handles the analog motion curve, I've actually never looked) every frame at ~30 frames per second from a copy of the original that doesn't necessarily represent an exact frame by frame replay thanks to the nature of perceptual encoding. It's extremely unlikely that a replay attempt will ever recreate an exact 1 to 1 and it seems even more unlikely that the recreation we have being so damn close would allow for another explanation to offer a more compelling solution.
Is it right to say that it was a cosmic particle? Probably not. Is it right to say that it was a flipped bit? Probably yes. There's no 100% confirmation for either, but the bit flip is probably as close as any recognized scientific theory is to reality given what we've been able to observe. If you start from that reality and start to enumerate potential causes for a bit to flip, the previously infinitesimally small chance starts to become slightly less so and at that stage a cosmic particle is probably only slightly less likely than any of the other contenders.
TL;DR: A decent video one issue aside. He was far too certain in his dismissal of the bit flip for someone that failed to provide anything else that came within a country mile of reproducing the same effect. But he is getting north of 175k views and he got my view, so it's probably paying just fine for him to be probably wrong about this not being a flipped bit, however it happened.
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Comment on Reddit is letting power users in on its IPO in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentI got that email. I'm just shy of 7k post/45k comment karma on a 14 year old account. They're desperate to get users to buy in if they've resorted to sending me an email when I haven't been an...I got that email. I'm just shy of 7k post/45k comment karma on a 14 year old account.
They're desperate to get users to buy in if they've resorted to sending me an email when I haven't been an active user for 8 months now.
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Comment on Texas is right. The tech giants need to be regulated. in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy Link ParentThat hardly seems like a big issue. Nobody is owed exposure or a platform and he seems all the world to be having a ton of fun while getting some news coverage so I'd say he's doing alright.And the big issue is I never heard of him until I read this comment.
That hardly seems like a big issue. Nobody is owed exposure or a platform and he seems all the world to be having a ton of fun while getting some news coverage so I'd say he's doing alright.
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Comment on Texas is right. The tech giants need to be regulated. in ~tech
DarthYoshiBoy (edited )Link ParentThey're unconstitutional because the government isn't supposed to dictate speech. That social media companies are huge fetid massively stinky shit piles is irrelevant. If you don't like Twitter......to rule that the Texas and Florida laws are unconstitutional because you trust social media companies more than certain state governments is a bad precedent.
They're unconstitutional because the government isn't supposed to dictate speech. That social media companies are huge fetid massively stinky shit piles is irrelevant. If you don't like Twitter you are free to go start a Truth Social. If you don't like Reddit you are free to go start a Tildes.
In social media there's literally nothing stopping anyone from going out there and saying whatever they want, except for potentially the social norms that their peers will enforce on them and the difficulty they might encounter in finding an audience on a platform they prefer. Even if you can't have your speech heard on the platform you would prefer, you still have the option to roll your own platform and say whatever bullshit is too hot of a take for where you'd like to say it.
If the government can force you to say things you don't agree with, there is no peaceful alternative, the government governs and you either extradite yourself from their governance or you do the shitlord thing and stage a violent coup. And the reason that I malign that later option is because ideally government should represent its people and we should be smart enough to never allow that power to be used for despicable ends like Florida and Texas are trying to pull here where we compromise life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness so that we can make certain that people are saying the things we want to hear.
It should be noted that the phrase "Tamper Proof" is probably a bit misleading as there is plenty one can do to tamper with a blockchain outside of the chain itself and the "Tamper Proof" nature just makes it so that there's no recourse when the outside the chain tampering goes down.
If you give someone 10,000 Bitcoin in exchange for a couple pizzas and they just take the Bitcoin and disappear without providing any pizza, you've lost your Bitcoin and there's no mechanism to get it back, whereas your purchase of pizza via a debit card has protections that will "Tamper" with the ledger to ensure that you get your money back when due pizza does not materialize. This has been mentioned elsewhere here in the thread, but it's called The Oracle Problem and it basically boils down to the fact that you can only trust a blockchain to be accurate about itself, it can't do anything to square its internal state with reality AND MORE IMPORTANTLY it can't do anything to make reality conform to its internal state. The fact is that there's more than enough that lives outside the chain (almost everything in actual fact) to make that a rife playground for troublemakers and it's why literally no other system in the history of society has evolved to fill this niche, it assumes a lot of spherical cows to function as intended. It demands a TON of trust (I'd argue more than what our traditional system does) for what's supposed to be a trustless system.
Regardless, Randall Munroe said it best all the way back in 2009: https://xkcd.com/538/
If the Government wants to "Tamper" with your ledger, they're not going to be thwarted because you have great crypto protecting you and they probably don't actually care about you to begin with so the whole exercise is a farce. (Humorously enough, Randall was probably wrong about the wrench in the alt-text, this bad boy adjusted for inflation would have been $4.80 back in 2009: https://www.harborfreight.com/14-in-steel-pipe-wrench-61349.html)