Raistlin's recent activity

  1. Comment on US DOJ indicates it’s considering Google breakup following monopoly ruling in ~tech

    Raistlin
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    I hope so. I'll believe it when I see it. I have no faith that the modern US actually has the will to break the tech megacorps. I seriously hope it does.

    I hope so. I'll believe it when I see it. I have no faith that the modern US actually has the will to break the tech megacorps. I seriously hope it does.

    2 votes
  2. Comment on US judge rules Google must give rival third-party app stores access to the full catalog of Google Play apps — and distribute third-party stores in ~tech

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    That's where I'm at. I'm not a lawyer and can't speak to how that aspect of things. But I'll take literally any action that hints at the breaking of huge megacorps.

    That's where I'm at. I'm not a lawyer and can't speak to how that aspect of things. But I'll take literally any action that hints at the breaking of huge megacorps.

    4 votes
  3. Comment on Ask the Developer Vol. 13, The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom — Part 1 & 2 in ~games

    Raistlin
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    I hope the game does well and that people enjoy it. I'm a bit sad that crafting (and elements adjacent to that) is going to be a feature in both 3D and 2D. I thought that maybe at least the 2D...

    I hope the game does well and that people enjoy it. I'm a bit sad that crafting (and elements adjacent to that) is going to be a feature in both 3D and 2D. I thought that maybe at least the 2D titles would continue the formula of limited items, limited puzzle solutions. But this doesn't seem to be the case.

    1 vote
  4. Comment on YouTube Premium is getting a big price hike internationally in ~tech

    Raistlin
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    I just... it's so easy to install NewPipe on your phone and FreeTube on your computer. This isn't a problem if you get frontends. It's not illegal, and quite simple.

    I just... it's so easy to install NewPipe on your phone and FreeTube on your computer. This isn't a problem if you get frontends. It's not illegal, and quite simple.

  5. Comment on YouTube Premium is getting a big price hike internationally in ~tech

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    Does YouTube Premium exempt me from them raiding my personal information for profit? If not, I'm using an ad blocker and FreeTube/NewPipe. It's not a God given right, it's just a normal government...

    Does YouTube Premium exempt me from them raiding my personal information for profit? If not, I'm using an ad blocker and FreeTube/NewPipe. It's not a God given right, it's just a normal government given right, as ad blockers aren't illegal in my country. The second they stop trying to steal my personal data at every interaction, then I might pay, like I do for content creators and podcasters in Patreon that I particularly like. But I'm not giving Google a cent.

    3 votes
  6. Comment on English still rules the world, but that’s not necessarily OK. Is it time to curb its power? in ~humanities.languages

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    I don't necessarily wholly disagree, but I'm not sure that was the wider point of the poster I replied to. You might say, you can easily control languages with tens of millions of speakers. But...

    I don't necessarily wholly disagree, but I'm not sure that was the wider point of the poster I replied to.

    You might say, you can easily control languages with tens of millions of speakers. But you can easily control Romansh, if your intent is to destroy it. My wider point is that the sentiment only really applies to dominant languages, and they're dominant mostly because of force.

  7. Comment on English still rules the world, but that’s not necessarily OK. Is it time to curb its power? in ~humanities.languages

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    But again, it's not more flexible. How are you? ¿Cómo estás? = Informal, singular ¿Cómo está? = Formal, singular. ¿Cómo están? = Plural. These a three ways I can say "how are you?" in Spanish,...

    But again, it's not more flexible.

    How are you?

    ¿Cómo estás? = Informal, singular

    ¿Cómo está? = Formal, singular.

    ¿Cómo están? = Plural.

    These a three ways I can say "how are you?" in Spanish, reflecting amount of people and formality. English comes off as really poor here. And of course, you can say that you can say things like "how are you doing", and I could counter that you could say "que es la que", and I'm not sure I follow you when you say English is more flexible. It just looks like a regular language to me. Flexible in some areas, inflexible in others.

    Regarding spelling, I can spell nearly everything I hear in Spanish. There are foreign loan words that might trip you up, and in many Latin American countries some distinctions have been abandoned (the difference between s, c and z), but the vast majority of the time, if you say a word, I can spell it correctly. This part isn't directly relevant, but you responded to it, so I felt I should address.

    And I'm sorry, if you start saying some languages are more flexible than others, you're going to get pushback. I don't think anyone's being rude. They just think you're wrong.

    2 votes
  8. Comment on English still rules the world, but that’s not necessarily OK. Is it time to curb its power? in ~humanities.languages

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    I just don't see that as a problem. If I were writing in Spanish, I would use context. Quedaban cuatro libras de pan, or quedaban 4 pedazos de pan, or quedaban 4 panes. This isn't a real issue...

    I just don't see that as a problem. If I were writing in Spanish, I would use context. Quedaban cuatro libras de pan, or quedaban 4 pedazos de pan, or quedaban 4 panes. This isn't a real issue when writing.

    It's like complaining about... I dunno, having to use the word "do" in English. You can't just say "you want bread?" like every language. You have to say "do you want bread?", even though the "do" is probably some sort of Celtic remnant that adds nothing to the sentence. But I don't think I'd say this English-only silly requirement makes it hard to write. It's just part of the language. Or how Spanish (and I'm assuming French) has a plural second person, yet in English, you have to use context when using "you", as it might be either singular or plural. English also lacks a formal you. If you want to write a character speaking formally, you have to add context, you can't just drop in an "usted".

    Or even worse, how I can see literally any Spanish word in existence and immediately know how to pronounce it, yet even native English speakers mess up words like epitome and haphazard all the time.

    There's a million things in English that are dumb, and plenty of times where you're forced to use context because the sentence isn't clear on its own. This is true of every language.

    2 votes
  9. Comment on English still rules the world, but that’s not necessarily OK. Is it time to curb its power? in ~humanities.languages

    Raistlin
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    I don't necessarily disagree with the article. I'm just... not sure that there's a solution. Lingua francas have always been here. Akkadian, Aramean, Greek, Latin, French, Arabic, English,...

    I don't necessarily disagree with the article. I'm just... not sure that there's a solution. Lingua francas have always been here. Akkadian, Aramean, Greek, Latin, French, Arabic, English, Spanish. The languages of dominant powers become lingua francas. Not always violently, but often so. Is this fair? No, but that's just how things are. You're never going to force monolinguals of the dominant powers to learn a second language.

    6 votes
  10. Comment on English still rules the world, but that’s not necessarily OK. Is it time to curb its power? in ~humanities.languages

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    I mean, you would just specify. When Spanish doesn't have a bespoke word for something, I just specify what I mean. I don't get the sense that contracts in Spanish are particularly more difficult...

    I mean, you would just specify. When Spanish doesn't have a bespoke word for something, I just specify what I mean. I don't get the sense that contracts in Spanish are particularly more difficult to write that contracts in English. A common parlance would've evolved (or have been defined in legislation), and that's what's used.

    I don't see how English is particularly very different. Half the legal terms are in Latin. Which makes sense for French and Spanish, since those are just local varieties of Latin. But doesn't the fact that English, a Germanic language, seems to still need Latin in law imply that it's lacking as well?

    5 votes
  11. Comment on English still rules the world, but that’s not necessarily OK. Is it time to curb its power? in ~humanities.languages

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    I don't think it's your wider point, but you can very easily control language to a large extent. I see the point about the French below, and I'll not the French stage has mostly killed all...

    I don't think it's your wider point, but you can very easily control language to a large extent. I see the point about the French below, and I'll not the French stage has mostly killed all competitors to French. Arabic mostly killed Coptic, English mostly killed te reo māori, etc. For that matter one, it's quite easy to control a language when the state kidnaps children. See also Australia. See also Nahuatl. All it takes is a state willing to kill.

    4 votes
  12. Comment on The new Flappy Bird game has a hidden secret; crypto in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    Sorry, no, I believe that you're right in that's how it works. I'm not a lawyer. I just don't think that it's "fair" that someone can nab it. It's certainly a thing the law allows seems like, but...

    Sorry, no, I believe that you're right in that's how it works. I'm not a lawyer. I just don't think that it's "fair" that someone can nab it. It's certainly a thing the law allows seems like, but I think what would be more fair is that anyone can now use it, since the original creator no longer wants it.

    1 vote
  13. Comment on The new Flappy Bird game has a hidden secret; crypto in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    In that case, it feels like the fair thing would be that it enters into the public domain, not that someone unrelated owns it.

    In that case, it feels like the fair thing would be that it enters into the public domain, not that someone unrelated owns it.

    3 votes
  14. Comment on You should own your games in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    Yeah, I just kinda wanted to at least use Rody for a bit. I was using Retroarch's machine translation thing at first, which was fine, if slow. Then having the script next to me, but I found it...

    Yeah, I just kinda wanted to at least use Rody for a bit. I was using Retroarch's machine translation thing at first, which was fine, if slow. Then having the script next to me, but I found it just took me out of the game too much.

    I'm just really really hoping they port it one day, or that a fan translation team picks it up. It's not even the translation, that part's finished. It's integrating it into the game.

    1 vote
  15. Comment on You should own your games in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    I actually did try playing it with the script at hand. Got as far as the Gnome battle, I think. But it was just too frustrating. But I think some rudimentary Japanese would be enough, it's a...

    I actually did try playing it with the script at hand. Got as far as the Gnome battle, I think. But it was just too frustrating.

    But I think some rudimentary Japanese would be enough, it's a really simple script.

    1 vote
  16. Comment on You should own your games in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    Ooh, that's one of the more famous ones. How are you finding it so far?

    Ooh, that's one of the more famous ones. How are you finding it so far?

  17. Comment on How far away are we from the location of the Big Bang? in ~space

    Raistlin
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    A good analogy from PBS spacetime that stuck with me is to imagine that things aren't really moving; space is being created between things. So 100 kms to a star becomes 200 KMs, a million, a...

    A good analogy from PBS spacetime that stuck with me is to imagine that things aren't really moving; space is being created between things. So 100 kms to a star becomes 200 KMs, a million, a billion, etc. It looks to us as if we're racing away from each other, but it's just the expansion of space.

    This is how an infinite universe can even expand, and you can model it very easily on a piece of paper. 20 kms between two objects, 10 kms, 1 cm, 0. You've just now collapsed an infinite universe into a single point, and it didn't take any calculus to do it. Doesn't matter how big the universe is, if the distance between all objects is zero, they're all in the same point now.

    7 votes
  18. Comment on You should own your games in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    Yeah, so the PSX version has multiple fan translations, and is the usual recommendation. You then have full voice. But then the definitive version now is Cross Edition, which comes with Narikiri....

    Yeah, so the PSX version has multiple fan translations, and is the usual recommendation. You then have full voice. But then the definitive version now is Cross Edition, which comes with Narikiri. Cross Edition has a new playable character, and all the upgrades from Full Voice.

    Haha, no worries, I was pretty sure it still didn't have a translation, so I'm not too disappointed!

    1 vote
  19. Comment on You should own your games in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    For Cross Edition? As far as I know, that hasn't been done yet.

    For Cross Edition? As far as I know, that hasn't been done yet.

  20. Comment on You should own your games in ~games

    Raistlin
    Link Parent
    I believe you. Me personally, there's never been an old game I wanted that I haven't been able to get. The closest is versions of games that have never been translated, like the definitive version...

    I believe you. Me personally, there's never been an old game I wanted that I haven't been able to get. The closest is versions of games that have never been translated, like the definitive version of Tales of Phantasia. I'm sure there's exception, though I suspect it won't be very many (proportionally compared to modern games).

    But just trying to get, I dunno, Anthem after the servers go down is going to be far sight harder than Radiant Historia for the 3DS.

    1 vote