NaraVara's recent activity
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Comment on How a WhatsApp group for DC parents broke apart over politics in ~society
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Comment on Some of my family members aren't convinced that ICE isn't overstepping and that they are just deporting people that broke the law, can you help me share unbiased links that proves they are? in ~society
NaraVara Link ParentThe problem is, if you are habitually right about everything all the time then on the rare occasion when people do catch you being wrong about something they will really rub it in and gloat about...The problem is, if you are habitually right about everything all the time then on the rare occasion when people do catch you being wrong about something they will really rub it in and gloat about it.
You can avoid this by strategically picking small, inconsequential things to be wrong about now and then to let them have some small victories that don’t undermine your general credibility. It’s like letting a kid beat you at basketball so they don’t get discouraged.
Follow me for more tips on having no friends.
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Comment on Some of my family members aren't convinced that ICE isn't overstepping and that they are just deporting people that broke the law, can you help me share unbiased links that proves they are? in ~society
NaraVara LinkThe Tangle is specifically written and designed to cover these sorts of issues for non-news junkies without getting anyone’s partisan hackles up. You could maybe start there as a source to send...The Tangle is specifically written and designed to cover these sorts of issues for non-news junkies without getting anyone’s partisan hackles up. You could maybe start there as a source to send them and hope they won’t dig in their heels.
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Comment on Kim Jong Un chooses daughter as heir, says Seoul in ~society
NaraVara LinkI’ve got played enough Crusader Kings to know how this goes. She’d better be an exemplary woman if she wants to keep her head.I’ve got played enough Crusader Kings to know how this goes. She’d better be an exemplary woman if she wants to keep her head.
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Comment on Something big is happening in ~tech
NaraVara Link ParentI just realized the author is this guy. Which, by itself, is a rebuttal if you ask me. This dude has no idea what quality work looks like.I just realized the author is this guy. Which, by itself, is a rebuttal if you ask me. This dude has no idea what quality work looks like.
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Comment on Why Jony Ive put buttons in the electric Ferrari in ~transport
NaraVara Link ParentI worry about the fail state if power goes out. So at least one door needs to be manually openable. But yeah otherwise I’m down with just swiping a token for everything.I worry about the fail state if power goes out. So at least one door needs to be manually openable. But yeah otherwise I’m down with just swiping a token for everything.
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Comment on Liberals who were formerly far-left (communist, anarchist, etc.), what led to you coming to liberalism? in ~society
NaraVara (edited )Link ParentIronically the material abundance of modern society has created a class of people who actually don’t like owning stuff and, in fact, find owning stuff to be anxiety inducing. Hence they express...Ironically the material abundance of modern society has created a class of people who actually don’t like owning stuff and, in fact, find owning stuff to be anxiety inducing.
Hence they express their affluence in the form of conspicuous non-consumption. Holdong onto half broken junk, out-of-fashion clothes, spare parts, and surplus items because they might come in handy some day is a habit borne of privation. If you’re actually post scarcity you’d end up appreciating the convenience of just using things and then dropping them instead of needing to be responsible for their care and maintenance.
If resources are abounding you can have faith you can always get another if and when you need it. Renting is freedom! And you pay for it by surrendering the chance to build equity.
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Comment on Liberals who were formerly far-left (communist, anarchist, etc.), what led to you coming to liberalism? in ~society
NaraVara (edited )Link ParentMarx and Engels aren’t the “original texts.” Socialism predates Marx and Marxism. Historically it encompassed a lot more political tendencies than it does today, including things like welfare...- Exemplary
Marx and Engels aren’t the “original texts.” Socialism predates Marx and Marxism. Historically it encompassed a lot more political tendencies than it does today, including things like welfare capitalism and Georgism, which would be pretty firmly in the mainstream of liberal politics now.
The main reason Marx became such a foundational text is because he was popular with a circle of intellectuals who all liked to hang out near one coffee shop in Vienna in the interwar period. And that specific strain would end up being pushed as part of the propaganda to advance the imperial interests of the USSR in contrast to the liberal democratic propaganda used to advance the interests of the West. This would wind up forcing a lot of political tendencies that straddled the lines to choose sides in a way didn’t have to before.
But it’s not like much of what’s in Marx when he talks about a potentially more just society is alien to the Liberal tradition. You can read half of that stuff in the works of Voltaire or Thomas Paine. The main thing that specifically differentiates Marx from the others is the evolutionary theory of social progress towards a stateless communist utopia. Liberal theories generally tended to be much more skeptical of having a final stage society where all internal contradictions are synthesized away. Enlightenment liberalism generally assumed political regimes were cyclical. Hence the term “revolution,” literally a turning of the wheel. Eventually the wheel comes back around again! Hence quotes like “the tree of liberty bust occasionally be watered with the blood of tyrants and patriots.” The cycle doesn’t end!
That’s where the political theories around separation of powers and representative democracy comes from. Because we acknowledge that the transitions are cyclical and thermostatic it becomes imperative to create political institutions that can persist through these pendulum swings. By lowering the stakes of political action you can have some of the transformative, creative-destruction of periodically revolutionary change without needing to (for example) murder every Catholic you can find only to have them come back and murder all the Protestants 20 years later.
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Comment on Why Jony Ive put buttons in the electric Ferrari in ~transport
NaraVara LinkLots of cool ideas here. Unfortunately some of it is going to be annoyingly expensive and a pain in the ass to fix if it breaks, which is fine for a Ferrari but will never trickle down to a Fiat....Lots of cool ideas here. Unfortunately some of it is going to be annoyingly expensive and a pain in the ass to fix if it breaks, which is fine for a Ferrari but will never trickle down to a Fiat. But I love the choices of buttons and dials and switches across the board. The key concept is also great, though I think it’s very silly that every car keys is the size of a fucking Duplo block nowadays. They could have achieved the same effect with a normal key-sized-key.
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Why Jony Ive put buttons in the electric Ferrari
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
NaraVara Link ParentNot being friended by strangers or able to receive messages from people outside approved channels would pretty much take away opportunities for private, side channel conversations between adults...Not being friended by strangers or able to receive messages from people outside approved channels would pretty much take away opportunities for private, side channel conversations between adults and kids.
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
NaraVara Link ParentThere’s no need to speculate, they’ve already implemented this in the UK and I think basically every grow adult from there I know has said they never had to submit anything.There’s no need to speculate, they’ve already implemented this in the UK and I think basically every grow adult from there I know has said they never had to submit anything.
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
NaraVara Link ParentThe primary check is behavioral analysis so I suspect if you’ve ever talked about doing taxes or having a job with normal working hours it’ll pass you by default. It also checks against linked...The primary check is behavioral analysis so I suspect if you’ve ever talked about doing taxes or having a job with normal working hours it’ll pass you by default. It also checks against linked accounts, do if you’ve linked it to Steam, PS+, Spotify, or anything like that with an account that’s more than around 14 years old you probably also just pass by default.
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
NaraVara Link ParentMy question is why does anyone feel like they need a “discord-like experience?” Discord does a couple of things well and a lot of different things kind of poorly. It’s main perk is the network...My question is why does anyone feel like they need a “discord-like experience?” Discord does a couple of things well and a lot of different things kind of poorly. It’s main perk is the network effect of lots of people already having accounts, a big bot ecosystem to extend functionalities, and there being a bunch of integrations to link other accounts. You’ll never get any of that off Discord because it depends on the network effect. The closest way to replicate it is something that can be accessed via browser. But voice calls are doable with other apps, video chats and streams are too. You can do a big chat room with a whole bunch of tools about as well as Discord allows and Discord’s implementations of threading and forums are pretty bad.
It would behoove people to think through what they actually want to do with their “Discord alternative” and try to find a service suited to that rather than just replacing Discord. Discord was kind of cobbled together on top of a Teamspeak + groupchat base. I think the ease of setting it up made a lot of people form their communities around Discord’s UI and feature-set rather than thinking through what kind of tool they actually wanted to be their community hub or groupchat.
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Comment on Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month in ~tech
NaraVara Link ParentMore significantly, a great many people actually just post selfies and pictures of their daily lives to Discord, where it will then live on Discord’s servers. The selfie scan is probably more...More significantly, a great many people actually just post selfies and pictures of their daily lives to Discord, where it will then live on Discord’s servers. The selfie scan is probably more secure than the normal activities people are doing on the platform.
I think the main problem is going to be for people who are kind of borderline, so anyone in that transition period from about 16 to 22 where face scans won’t be able to confirm your age for sure, your linked accounts probably won’t be old enough to make a definitive call one way or another, and your posting behavior probably isn’t that indistinguishable from someone underaged. But, like they said, this is maybe 20% of their users at most. And most of them likely wouldn’t notice the restriction unless they’re trying to access an NSFW channel, and those NSFW distinctions are placed by server admins rather than Discord itself.
Basically I think people are catastrophizing a lot here, and the actual additional risk exposure the vast majority of users are being exposed to is basically negligible. That said, it probably is healthy for more self-hosted and open alternatives to Discord to exist so I don’t really feel like pushing back on people actively seeking those out. I think it was actually a bad fit for a lot of what people were trying to do with it and it’ll be good if there is some branching out to more purpose-built spaces to set up communities for different things. I am glad the energy seems to be directed towards self-hosted and open platforms now rather than trying to decamp to Reddit or Digg or whatever.
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Comment on Elon Musk says Tesla ending Models S and X production in ~transport
NaraVara Link ParentThe secret here is that he’s spinning a line of bullshit. Tesla needs to shut down production on these because sales have cratered, the competition has caught up technology-wise, and they can’t...The secret here is that he’s spinning a line of bullshit. Tesla needs to shut down production on these because sales have cratered, the competition has caught up technology-wise, and they can’t justify the investment in updating these older, expensive models to keep them relevant. Luxury buyers have better options now, the only place they can be competitive is at the econo-box tier. It’s a bad sign if Tesla feels like it cannot compete with what Audi/BMW/Mercedes are offering. Their whole growth story depends on them learning how to do what traditional car-makers do well before traditional car-makers can learn to do the software and battery technology that is Tesla’s strength. If Tesla can’t do that they’re cooked. If Honda and Toyota weren’t so behind on the EV transition Tesla would be cooked already.
But he can’t outright admit that the company is in dire straits, so to try and head off investor panic he’s trying to spin it as a strategic pivot to humanoid robots. A strategic pivot to automated golf-carts would probably be more plausible as that at least has a proven and addressable market, but he’s a child who needs to pursue the coolest next thing so he can’t think like that.
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Comment on ‘House burping’ is a cold reality in Germany. Americans are warming to it. in ~life.home_improvement
NaraVara Link ParentI live in DC, which is very humid, and do this regularly in summer and winter. Even though I have an HVAC forced air system things like dust and mildew and pollen still linger. You gotta air the...I live in DC, which is very humid, and do this regularly in summer and winter. Even though I have an HVAC forced air system things like dust and mildew and pollen still linger. You gotta air the place out and then vacuum to keep it smelling fresh.
Also my dog sheds a lot, so the airflow from the housewide breeze ends up collecting all the fur into specific corners of the house. It’s a good way to determine where in the house you don’t get good air circulation!
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Comment on A 24-year-old Frenchman shows up at hospital with a World War I shell lodged in his rectum in ~news
NaraVara Link“Un coup à un million, doc. Un coup à un million.““Un coup à un million, doc. Un coup à un million.“
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Comment on US Democrats determined to squander advantage on Department of Homeland Security funding in ~society
NaraVara Link ParentYeah it seems like they actually played it well and forced Republicans to have to negotiate over the thing in question without being able to take the rest of the government hostage. It usually...Yeah it seems like they actually played it well and forced Republicans to have to negotiate over the thing in question without being able to take the rest of the government hostage.
It usually goes the other way where Republicans can hold the government (which they want to destroy anyway) hostage and Dems have to save it. This is a reversal where the one part of the government the Republicans do care about, the police state, is the only thing we need to worry about.
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Comment on Catherine O’Hara - legendary actress dead at 71 in ~movies
NaraVara Link ParentShe elevated everything she was in, even when the thing she was in was already fantastic.She elevated everything she was in, even when the thing she was in was already fantastic.
This is a DC parents chat. The thing to understand is that in DC literally every person in a cohort to be a parent has either lost their job themselves or directly knows multiple people who have lost their jobs. Their home values have tanked and the city’s municipal budget is constantly being threatened by the federal government. Many of those who are employed are being actively terrorized and intentionally burned out by their management chain in an effort to push them out.
In that context trying to “stay on topic” is like trying to raise kids in Vichy France without being able to talk about the Germans roaming the streets.