sparksbet's recent activity
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Comment on The big little penis panic in ~life.men
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Comment on Emacs bra size calculator in ~comp
sparksbet Link ParentI've also heard good things about this calculator from other boob-havers (though I personally took the nuclear option of having my tits removed, and wore sports bras only for years before that for...I've also heard good things about this calculator from other boob-havers (though I personally took the nuclear option of having my tits removed, and wore sports bras only for years before that for both comfort and dysphoria reasons)
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Comment on The dead economy theory in ~society
sparksbet Link ParentThis does not entail gulags even if it does entail violent revolution (which most Marxists do believe afaik). The violence required to seize the means of production is mostly orthogonal to the...Therefore force must be applied to seize said property.
This does not entail gulags even if it does entail violent revolution (which most Marxists do believe afaik). The violence required to seize the means of production is mostly orthogonal to the existence of gulags, as gulags existed and "flourished" well after the means of production had been seized from private owners. Plenty of Marxists, including even some pretty influential ones, were themselves put in gulags for dissidence.
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Comment on What change would make you quit Tildes? in ~tildes
sparksbet Link ParentI agree with this comment wholeheartedly, including both the specific examples you give. There have been a few times when a thread has gotten me really pissed and discouraged about the Tildes...I agree with this comment wholeheartedly, including both the specific examples you give. There have been a few times when a thread has gotten me really pissed and discouraged about the Tildes userbase only for DMs with another user who feels the same way to pull me back from the brink. Luckily these aren't super frequent here, but they unfortunately do happen.
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Comment on Movie fatigue in ~movies
sparksbet (edited )LinkLots of people have recommended great movies in this thread, but I'd just like to say that one of the things I've appreciated about making a letterboxd account is being able to see what people I...Lots of people have recommended great movies in this thread, but I'd just like to say that one of the things I've appreciated about making a letterboxd account is being able to see what people I follow have watched/reviewed recently. If I have a good sense that someone shares similar tastes with me and I see they rated a movie I haven't heard of highly recently, I'll look into watching a movie I otherwise wouldn't have. And some of the user-curated lists are also quite nice. Interacting with the subset of people who take movies a little too seriously, at least to the extent that they regularly use letterboxd, helps introduce you to the kind of stuff that isn't the super mainstream stuff you seem tired of. Letterboxd users have their own biases and annoying quirks, of course, but I think it does so in ways that will counteract or at least not exacerbate your current exhaustion.
I'm also very forgetful and find being able to add titles to the watchlist very helpful for not completely forgetting when I get a movie recommendation lol, though I suppose whether you get a similar benefit depends on if you have similar forgetfulness problems... đŸ˜…
Anyway if anyone on Tildes wants to become mutuals there, my username is the same on letterboxd as it is here.
EDIT TO ADD MOVIE RECS:
Since I realized I didn't recommend any movies myself, I've been on a Park Chan-wook kick lately, and I absolutely adore his directing style. His most recent film No Other Choice is very good and feels extremely timely. I'm also a huge fan of The Handmaiden, which was how I got introduced to his work and is really a phenomenally constructed movie. I haven't yet watched his biggest hit Oldboy myself, but it's extremely heavily praised as well.I'm also a ho for Rian Johnson's Knives Out movies and am thus obligated to evangelize them here where I've got the chance. They're standalone and can be watched in any order, and they're very consistently high quality.
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Comment on US FBI says Google engineer used internal search data to win $1.2M on Polymarket in ~tech
sparksbet Link Parentlmao by this definition poker isn't gambling fwiw the fact that there's insider trading isn't what anyone thinks makes it gambling. The insider trading is what makes it rigged and unfair gambling....It's not gambling because you might have some information which influences the odds and bet accordingly.
lmao by this definition poker isn't gambling
fwiw the fact that there's insider trading isn't what anyone thinks makes it gambling. The insider trading is what makes it rigged and unfair gambling.
The funny thing is that arguing it's not gambling is actually counterproductive to your argument that there shouldn't be consequences for insider trading, since insider trading being illegal in the context of financial markets is even more clearly established legally than doing the equivalent with gambling.
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Comment on The one-and-done pen? in ~hobbies
sparksbet Link ParentWow this was a phenomenally thorough reply, thank you so much. Bookmarking this for if/when I'm looking for a longer-term prettier pen for special occasions, rather than just continuing my...Wow this was a phenomenally thorough reply, thank you so much. Bookmarking this for if/when I'm looking for a longer-term prettier pen for special occasions, rather than just continuing my pen-losing habits lol. I loathe the feeling of friction with paper, I hate writing even with mechanical pencils, so I know I'm never gonna be a fountain pen person.
I also prefer the 0.7 on my Pilot G2s, I feel like it feels smoother than the 0.5 one. I have a few of both but I definitely favor the 0.7
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Comment on Tildes Survey #7: What is your gender identity? in ~talk
sparksbet Link ParentFun fact, "cis" is actually derived from a Latin prefix that means "on the same side of", as opposed to "trans" meaning "on the opposite side of." You can see it used this way in older words...Fun fact, "cis" is actually derived from a Latin prefix that means "on the same side of", as opposed to "trans" meaning "on the opposite side of." You can see it used this way in older words referring to place, like "cisalpine" vs "transalpine", and they've been used in chemistry to describe certain isomers. It was borrowed in the 2010s to be used as a counterpart to trans in the context of gender for this reason.
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Comment on Tildes Survey #7: What is your gender identity? in ~talk
sparksbet (edited )Link ParentIn my personal experience, people who most want to draw the line between themselves and trans people will insist on not using labels like "cis" because they want to just be "normal". When you get...but I don’t have any particular desire, as part of my identity, to draw a line between myself and a transgender person
In my personal experience, people who most want to draw the line between themselves and trans people will insist on not using labels like "cis" because they want to just be "normal". When you get to define the categories as "woman/man" and "trans woman/man", there's an implication that trans people are less part of the category man/woman, at least compared to using "cis woman/man" and "trans woman/man". It's much like a label like "straight", in my eyes. Obviously most cis people won't have being cis as a core part of their identity, just like most straight people don't, but including this separate label makes it feel like a more equitable "here are two different equal descriptors of different types of men/women" rather than "there are normal people and then there are trans people".
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Comment on What are people's experiences with using Kagi? in ~tech
sparksbet LinkI started paying for it after I first tried it a little over a year ago, and it's continued to offer me what I want to the extent that I continue to pay for it -- it's what I used to get from...I started paying for it after I first tried it a little over a year ago, and it's continued to offer me what I want to the extent that I continue to pay for it -- it's what I used to get from Google without constantly seeing obvious ads and with the ability to control whether I get AI results rather than being forced into it the way Google tends to. It's also got a shockingly good Translate app now, but I wouldn't be paying just for that as I no longer need translations as often. But the current results are more than satisfactory enough for me to keep paying (as opposed to previous unsuccessful attempts to switch to Duck Duck Go). But similarly to some others, I would dump a lot of other subscriptions before I dumped Kagi.
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Comment on The one-and-done pen? in ~hobbies
sparksbet (edited )Link Parentis the Parker G2 similar to what's used inside the Pilot G2, or is the name just coincidentally similar? I know they're not the same, but I'm curious whether they write similarly. That's been my...is the Parker G2 similar to what's used inside the Pilot G2, or is the name just coincidentally similar? I know they're not the same, but I'm curious whether they write similarly. That's been my pen of choice for ages (though I'm the sort of person who frequently loses pens, so I tend to just buy the pens themselves in large quantities rather than getting a BIFL housing and getting the refills)
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Comment on Tildes Survey #7: What is your gender identity? in ~talk
sparksbet Link ParentI have never seen all-caps CIS before outside of in Star Wars fan spaces tbqh.I have never seen all-caps CIS before outside of in Star Wars fan spaces tbqh.
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Comment on US FBI says Google engineer used internal search data to win $1.2M on Polymarket in ~tech
sparksbet Link ParentI think that many people would argue that the "pro-social" argument for prediction markets is transparently bullshit and that they shouldn't exist in the first place (that's certainly my opinion),...I think that many people would argue that the "pro-social" argument for prediction markets is transparently bullshit and that they shouldn't exist in the first place (that's certainly my opinion), but it seems to me that even if you accept that argument as your premise, the arguments against insider trading should be identical to those used in the context of other futures markets, the stock market, and sports betting -- namely, that it doesn't actually make the forecasting more accurate and that it in fact incentivizes unpredictable changes in behavior by those with insider knowledge and power.
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Comment on US FBI says Google engineer used internal search data to win $1.2M on Polymarket in ~tech
sparksbet Link ParentThe legal grey zone they've put themselves in to avoid being regulated as gambling is one that already has regulations against insider trading. I don't think anyone should be advocating for their...The legal grey zone they've put themselves in to avoid being regulated as gambling is one that already has regulations against insider trading. I don't think anyone should be advocating for their stupid legal grey zone shenanigans to get them out of even more regulations than they're already managing to do.
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Comment on Tildes Survey #7: What is your gender identity? in ~talk
sparksbet Link ParentTo follow up on your theme of this being complicated and differing a lot between people, this is a sentiment I am very much opposed to (for myself, obviously other people can feel however they...Sure, it'd have been ideal for me to be cis,
To follow up on your theme of this being complicated and differing a lot between people, this is a sentiment I am very much opposed to (for myself, obviously other people can feel however they feel). I do not think that I or the world would be better if I had been born cis. I have more pride in being trans than I do in any particular other label for my gender.
This is probably in large part because with my gender identity assimilating with an existing group of cis people simply isn't possible, but I have encountered "binary" trans people that feel this way about trans-ness in the past. Removing the categories of "trans" and "cis" doesn't necessarily make for a better or more "accepting" system of categorization, because for a lot of people transness is integral to our identity and does make our experiences different than cis people with the same or similar gender identities. I think framing labels and acceptance as inherently at odds with each other simply isn't true to life (and to be clear I don't think you're doing that and I think your answers here are good and nuanced, but the question being responded to definitely does frame these things as opposites when they aren't.)
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Comment on Tildes Survey #7: What is your gender identity? in ~talk
sparksbet Link ParentI'm not really familiar with the use of "CIS" in all-caps, that way of writing it seems weird and unnecessary to me, but in the context of gender surveys and other contexts like this, I generally...I'm not really familiar with the use of "CIS" in all-caps, that way of writing it seems weird and unnecessary to me, but in the context of gender surveys and other contexts like this, I generally prefer it when cis people are self-aware enough to include "cis" as a descriptor. Since I'm non-binary, surveys like these always force me into a category, so I'm not particularly sympathetic to the idea that just specifying that cis people are cis is bad because it pushes people into a certain group rather than accepting them, as I don't think categorizing people as cis or trans is mutually exclusive with accepting them, at least not in the context of gathering data like this. In a context where distinguishing between the two is unnecessary and discriminatory, like when advertising something exclusively for cis people or exclusively for cis women, that's another story. But in my experience cis people who don't accept trans people are more often to be the ones whining about the word "cis" and demanding people not use it than the other way around.
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Comment on Waymo pauses Atlanta service as its robotaxis keep driving into floods in ~transport
sparksbet Link ParentThere is a big difference between "waiting until they're perfect" and "waiting until they're safe enough encountering known common hazards in the area where they're being rolled out", though, and...There is a big difference between "waiting until they're perfect" and "waiting until they're safe enough encountering known common hazards in the area where they're being rolled out", though, and failing to meet the latter threshold before rolling them out commercially is imo negligence and even at best simply isn't making the roads safer. To my knowledge they haven't been rolled out anywhere where there's heavy snow in the winter, and it would be ludicrously evil to roll them out somewhere like that before you had a certain ability to handle that common weather condition with a certain degree of safety.
Yes, training them to handle these circumstances is a difficult task, but that difficulty doesn't absolve the companies from ensuring that their vehicles are operating safely where they've been rolled out. This isn't just a matter of "slightly buggier cars" -- being unable to handle common severe weather conditions in an area endangers customers and bystanders. If your goal is to actually increase safety by replacing fallible human drivers, you can't ignore huge safety defects in self-driving cars. The fact that this is the case is why they're backing out of these locations now until they can find solutions to flooded roads that are safe enough, and they should have had better testing in extreme conditions like this to recognize this problem earlier, before rolling out the paid taxi service to consumers.
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Comment on Memorial Day weekend box office: ‘Mandalorian and Grogu’ opens to $100 million domestically, $163 million globally for the four-day weekend in ~movies
sparksbet Link ParentI absolutely loathe Solo, so I think my threshold for "worse than Solo" is higher than yours. But then again, I saw Solo in theaters, whereas I'm not planning to see this at all (I haven't watched...I absolutely loathe Solo, so I think my threshold for "worse than Solo" is higher than yours. But then again, I saw Solo in theaters, whereas I'm not planning to see this at all (I haven't watched any of the show anyway).
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Comment on Why airlines are always going bankrupt in ~transport
sparksbet Link ParentYeah the comments on flight attendants and pilots seem extremely out of touch to me and rooted in a concerning mentality that cares more about the appearance of comfort on planes than on the...Yeah the comments on flight attendants and pilots seem extremely out of touch to me and rooted in a concerning mentality that cares more about the appearance of comfort on planes than on the actual material conditions these employees work in (and based on other comments pointing out that they have objectively improved for pilots since the 90s, I don't have much trust in the original comment's attempts to tie this to their complaints about service quality, which I agree with you has been extremely pleasant and adequate at minimum on every flight I've taken)
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Comment on Memorial Day weekend box office: ‘Mandalorian and Grogu’ opens to $100 million domestically, $163 million globally for the four-day weekend in ~movies
sparksbet Link ParentOof. There's no way it's as much of a mess as Solo was, but it's also being released into a very different post-Covid market.Oof. There's no way it's as much of a mess as Solo was, but it's also being released into a very different post-Covid market.
In women's spaces, even those that are arguably overly permissive/accepting of bad behavior on the part of women who post there like r/GirlDinnerDiaries, this exact sentiment is extremely common and expressed pretty damn openly. "I don't do those things and not all men do" would be less acceptable both because it's unnecessarily centering yourself in someone else's issues (in a way that the comments you're replying to are not doing imho) and due to the extremely extensive history of misogynistic men using similar rhetoric to dismiss women altogether when they try to advocate for combatting the misogynistic abuse and violence they have experienced in our society on a systemic level. But "throw that whole man out and don't date guys who treat you like that, raise your standards" is overwhelmingly common and accepted even in spaces that are dedicated to being supportive to women.
Frankly, I think more or less an exact copy of @RoyalHenOil's comment with the genders swapped would be met with an overwhelmingly positive response in such spaces, assuming it was offered in an appropriate context in which advice was solicited/welcome in the first place.