ThrowdoBaggins's recent activity
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Comment on Who’s buying SpaceX and Anthropic? in ~finance
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI’ve played a lot of Risk of Rain 2, so the timer and escalating challenge wasn’t an issue for me, but I’m definitely still struggling with it. I’ve only got one other friend who has it, so...I’ve played a lot of Risk of Rain 2, so the timer and escalating challenge wasn’t an issue for me, but I’m definitely still struggling with it. I’ve only got one other friend who has it, so basically 100% of my gameplay has been 2-player runs. We’re not god gamers, but we’re also certainly not amateurs, so I expected a decent challenge going in, and didn’t expect to win in our early runs. That said, I also didn’t expect us to confidently make it to the boss at the bottom and then promptly run out of ammo before the second orb, several runs in a row.
Maybe it is just a skill issue, that we should be optimising our runs more, but I feel like the ammo mechanic doesn’t add to the game. Or fall damage, for that matter, but that’s a hill I’ve been willing to die on for some time — fall damage rarely improves a game and feels like a cheap way for game developers to reduce player movement and exploration.
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI think you’re expecting a lot more of Riot than they have ever promised. You have to remember that every player they ban is a revenue source they have cut themselves off from. Consider your own...I think you’re expecting a lot more of Riot than they have ever promised. You have to remember that every player they ban is a revenue source they have cut themselves off from.
Consider your own experience — you have already conceded that they were right in throwing a suspension your way, and that your frustration is that other players aren’t also being similarly punished. From some other players perspective, I’m sure there’s someone out there who has seen your behaviour and is lamenting they didn’t go far enough, and that you should have been suspended for the whole season or permanently.
Just consider, if you’re asking for Riot to tighten up their enforcement of the rules, is there a chance that you yourself be caught up in that same net? And if the answer is yes, consider if maybe you might use this revelation to review the behaviour of the only player whose behaviour you can control: your own.
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Comment on Clanker: A word for the machine in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentThere are many more kinds of slurs than just racial, but their visibility or impact would be heavily shaped by your own cultural environment and experiences. I think just about anything can become...and conflating it with racial slurs is not only wrong its offensively stupid
There are many more kinds of slurs than just racial, but their visibility or impact would be heavily shaped by your own cultural environment and experiences. I think just about anything can become a slur if it’s used in a deliberately derogatory way, but the context and history can change the intensity you might view it in.
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Comment on Audible mandating authors transition to new royalty system or lose payments in ~books
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI think in both of these situations, your point here makes sense. I don’t think it’s sensible to be against the very concept of vertical integration in any and all forms. But also yes,...Have you ever decided to cook a meal instead of going out to eat? Is that vertical integration?
Buying a premade or even a customized product gives way less control than building in-house. Plenty of artists mix their own paints to get the perfect hue.
I think in both of these situations, your point here makes sense. I don’t think it’s sensible to be against the very concept of vertical integration in any and all forms. But also yes, technically, I think these are both forms of vertical integration.
Having someone else cook food for me would be healthier for the economy, because I would be spending more money. Additionally, one could argue that the restaurant can prepare better food for cheaper because they can have an expert chef with skills far beyond my own, and they can bulk-buy premium produce because they’re serving many more customers than me cooking for myself. However, the efficiency gains from scale and expertise are more than overshadowed by what you’d need to pay for this expert’s time.
Likewise, if paint stores tried to sell every combination of every pigment of paint to have every hue, technically that would stimulate the economy more than selling a smaller number of pigments for artists to blend for themselves. Maybe a paint mixer professional could become an expert in blending paints to get exactly the hue you want, but currently, painters have to pick this up as a skill required for the job.
In this paint example, you also run into some absurdity when considering the physical space you’d need for nearly infinite colours, and the rate of customers needed to buy these colours which all ultimately have limited shelf life.
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Comment on Audible mandating authors transition to new royalty system or lose payments in ~books
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentBecause companies don’t like competition or healthy markets. They can’t extract as much value if someone else can offer the same goods or services for a competitive price, it’s much easier if they...Why do so many companies build rather than buy?
Because companies don’t like competition or healthy markets. They can’t extract as much value if someone else can offer the same goods or services for a competitive price, it’s much easier if they can vertically integrate to reduce costs (but, importantly, not pass on those price savings to customers except where forced to do so via competition) in a way that gives them an edge over their competition, not from providing a better service but just from reducing competition in the market
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Comment on If you let AI do your writing, I will come to your house and kill you in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins LinkIt doesn’t particularly surprise me that someone whose job seems to be “writer” can easily identify low-quality writing in LLM outputs. I’m sure if you asked an expert on hydroelectric dams to...But AI is not a good writer. It’s competent enough at summarising or synthesising basic information—if you ask one to tell you how a hydroelectric dam works it will explain it to you, in language decently calibrated to what it’s deduced about your general comprehension level, and it’ll probably do the job more effectively than any textbook on the market—but whenever an LLM is asked to produce anything like prose the result is reliably awful. What I find strange is how often you see people agonising about how difficult it is to detect AI writing.
It doesn’t particularly surprise me that someone whose job seems to be “writer” can easily identify low-quality writing in LLM outputs. I’m sure if you asked an expert on hydroelectric dams to review the LLM’s output in explaining how hydroelectric dams work, they would have nuanced objections too subtle for me to understand the difference, in the same way that I can see the hollowness of LLM writing but might not exactly understand the full depths of a good writer’s objection to LLM output.
I’m certainly not the first person to identify this; even early on when LLM writing was much more obvious, I heard common refrains from various experts that “maybe they could replace (someone else’s job) but they’re not enough to replace (my job).” I suspect this stems from not having the expertise to know enough about (other job) to see the sloppiness, but enough competence in their own fields to see the flaws.
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Comment on If you let AI do your writing, I will come to your house and kill you in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentWhat counts as a frontier model? Is Copilot using a frontier model? Is the free experience of chatGPT? What about the chatbot thats there when I’m making a website with Shopify or Squarespace? Or...That said, no current frontier model is going to hallucinate the way the author claims on such a basic and straightforward question.
What counts as a frontier model?
Is Copilot using a frontier model? Is the free experience of chatGPT? What about the chatbot thats there when I’m making a website with Shopify or Squarespace? Or when I open WhatsApp, or highlight any text as I’m writing on my iPhone?
I think there’s a substantial difference in experience if you’re a person who deliberately goes to an LLM to ask questions, especially if you pay, versus having an LLM introduced into an unrelated app or service. And I suspect (at least due to cost) that these injected LLMs will both be much more likely to generate low-value sludge and also be much more likely to be a random person’s most frequent experience with how LLMs behave.
I don’t think pointing to the tippy top of what’s currently possible is a good argument here.
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Comment on Everything in ~science
ThrowdoBaggins LinkSeeing “citation needed” on the wiki page for Everything really tickles meThe primary problem in producing a TOE is that the accepted theories of quantum mechanics, general relativity, and special relativity are hard to combine. Theories exploring quantum mechanics and string theory are easier to combine.[citation needed]
Seeing “citation needed” on the wiki page for Everything really tickles me
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Comment on Weekly US politics news and updates thread - week of May 25 in ~society
ThrowdoBaggins Link Parentcomment box Tone: emotionally charged, likely inflammatory wording It’s fascinating to me that when DoD was throwing a tantrum about their chatbot, they considered the Defense Production Act to...comment box
Tone: emotionally charged, likely inflammatory wording
It’s fascinating to me that when DoD was throwing a tantrum about their chatbot, they considered the Defense Production Act to compel the company to work with them (in addition to the threat of “supply chain risk” which they have since confirmed) and yet when it comes to basically doubling the total cost of using these drones they’re just rolling over with a “yeah okay I guess you can 5x the price and we’ll keep paying no worries bruh”
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Comment on Waymo pauses Atlanta service as its robotaxis keep driving into floods in ~transport
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentHow often during regular trips do these robotaxis get a lidar void and still drive ahead? I’m suddenly imagining a cartoon style driving off a cliff, pause in midair, and then plummeting with that...How often during regular trips do these robotaxis get a lidar void and still drive ahead? I’m suddenly imagining a cartoon style driving off a cliff, pause in midair, and then plummeting with that “oh no not again” look on the cartoon face
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Comment on Can helium-3 create a gold rush on the moon? in ~space
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI can’t even imagine the scale of resources you’d need to go from “a few (ludicrously expensive) launches to get started” all the way to “autonomous self-assembling mining and smelting and...I can’t even imagine the scale of resources you’d need to go from “a few (ludicrously expensive) launches to get started” all the way to “autonomous self-assembling mining and smelting and processing and construction in a vacuum with 1/6 gravity without people to fix things if they get snagged” but I can’t imagine that would be easier on the moon than it is on Earth, and as far as I can tell it’s not possible on Earth.
Getting to the moon is staggeringly expensive, yes, but even that is probably dwarfed by the costs of having a self-assembling factory on the moon.
About the only thing I can think of that tips the favour the other way would be time — if you don’t care about the result on a human timescale, I guess you could launch a few robust self-repairing machines today and maybe in a few centuries they’ll finish what you need. But by then surely it will be cheaper and easier to launch what you need in much less time?
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Comment on What’s something that didn’t work for you? in ~talk
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI think even taking the roll of the dice that your experience will be much more dramatically positive than mine is still worth pursuing! But also I think I have similar sensory issues for my face,...I think even taking the roll of the dice that your experience will be much more dramatically positive than mine is still worth pursuing! But also I think I have similar sensory issues for my face, and it’s not too bad. Maybe not as strongly as you, but I adjusted fairly quickly, and was able to sleep entirely uninterrupted after about a week of consistent use.
For the first few nights, let me tell you as the world’s deepest sleeper, having the mask get bumped or trying to take it off in my sleep will quickly bring me up to the edge of consciousness to fix it. Not enough to uncomfortably wake me up, like it’s not a jolt or anything, but the change in sensation from having positive pressure inside my nose to neutral pressure feels pretty weird. Interestingly, putting it on at the start of the night doesn’t have such a weird sensation, but taking it off certainly does, at least for a minute.
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Comment on How I feel about LLM (AI) writing in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link Parent“If only I had more time, I could have written a shorter (comment)” is an adaptation of a somewhat famous quote. It was only in writing this comment that I thought to check my assumptions about...As well, every meandering post or comment isn't very problematic and I don't think you need to worry about it. I write them myself on the regular because sometimes I just don't have time to write a shorter, more carefully considered version (yes, a shorter format often takes more time to write!)
“If only I had more time, I could have written a shorter (comment)” is an adaptation of a somewhat famous quote. It was only in writing this comment that I thought to check my assumptions about who was the original author, but it’s certainly not who I had in mind!
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Comment on Just published my first game in ~games
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentTo be honest, other than maps, I’m genuinely struggling to even think of any apps at all that use one finger zoom. I feel like two finger pinch has become so ubiquitous, I only knew about the...I can't think of a single app I've ever used in the entire time I've had a smartphone that had one-finger zoom configured the way you describe.
To be honest, other than maps, I’m genuinely struggling to even think of any apps at all that use one finger zoom. I feel like two finger pinch has become so ubiquitous, I only knew about the tap-and-hold one finger zoom because for years I deliberately chose smaller phones that I could use one-handed. (Alas my most recent phone has gone the other way, I finally caved in to seeing the direction phones were going and jumped in the deep end of the biggest phone that Apple sold at the time)
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Comment on Just published my first game in ~games
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentI’d like to disagree with this one. I’m not sure if it’s universal, but all the maps apps on my phone follow the same principle. For single-finger zoom, it’s tap-then-swipe (like a double tap...One-finger zoom feels backwards (dragging down should zoom in, not out IMO)
I’d like to disagree with this one. I’m not sure if it’s universal, but all the maps apps on my phone follow the same principle. For single-finger zoom, it’s tap-then-swipe (like a double tap except the second tap is held, not released straight away) and then upwards to zoom in, downwards to zoom out. My muscle memory is strong enough that I could believe this has been true for as long as smartphones have had map apps, but I’m not 100% confident on that.
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Comment on What’s something that didn’t work for you? in ~talk
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentYeah I think this is about it for me too, but I’ve never been a bright and early morning person, even before sleep apnea. I’m glad it’s not a unique experience then! I haven’t used it regularly...At best I feel a little less groggy in the morning
Yeah I think this is about it for me too, but I’ve never been a bright and early morning person, even before sleep apnea. I’m glad it’s not a unique experience then!
I haven’t used it regularly over a long enough period to notice a difference when I forget it, so maybe that’s something I’ll try later this year when I’m travelling?
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Comment on What’s something that didn’t work for you? in ~talk
ThrowdoBaggins LinkMy CPAP machine. Having heard from other people with sleep apnea about how great they are, how you not only get better sleep but that the better quality sleep means you can get away with shorter...My CPAP machine.
Having heard from other people with sleep apnea about how great they are, how you not only get better sleep but that the better quality sleep means you can get away with shorter sleep, I was really looking forward to reclaiming just a bit of time per day. It would be nice to not have to choose between commuting, going to the gym, and cooking, but currently I can only pick two, so unfortunately the majority of my dinners have been either prepped and frozen on weekends, or bought from a local business who does the cooking and freezing for me. Without the CPAP machine I needed more than 8 hours a night to feel like a normal person, while most people around me can get away with 6-8 hours and seem to operate just fine.
Alas, it has not really helped with that in any noticeable way. What it has helped with is that because I’m no longer snoring like a freight train, my partner (who is a very light sleeper) can get a good night’s sleep whenever we have sleepovers so I still consider that an excellent quality of life improvement overall.
Next on my list: surgery to fix it good and proper forever!
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Comment on ‘It’s shameful’: New York’s elite lash out at Zohran Mamdani’s second-home tax in ~finance
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentYour examples feel more like “I was scammed or mislead” which is about expectations, not value. If you paid a lot of money for a miserable experience at a restaurant, the issue is not that you had...Your examples feel more like “I was scammed or mislead” which is about expectations, not value. If you paid a lot of money for a miserable experience at a restaurant, the issue is not that you had a miserable experience, or that you paid a lot of money, the issue is the expectation of one preventing the other. If you had a miserable restaurant experience but it was basically free, that wouldn’t be an issue, likewise if you paid a lot of money but had a fantastic and unforgettable meal, that also wouldn’t be an issue.
I think the same applies to the car analogy too.
I guess where I’m struggling to understand the frustration on a tax on owning multiple NY homes is where did the expectation (that it would be super cheap...?) come from when you’re buying in one of the most in demand cities in the world? In general I can see it as an immediate emotional response if it was unexpected, but I imagine the backlash if an existing tax was raised from 2% to 3% would be just as high as if it was raised from 92% to 93% so it feels like there’s no value in even turning these complaints into an article.
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Comment on “Rediscovering” the operating system (AKA: the desktop is the killer app) in ~tech
ThrowdoBaggins Link ParentIf only Elon had another half a trillion dollars of someone else’s money, I’m sure he could rebuild a worse version of the entire Internet nested within one website... 🤮If only Elon had another half a trillion dollars of someone else’s money, I’m sure he could rebuild a worse version of the entire Internet nested within one website... 🤮
I suspect there’s a lot of overlap with the people pumping GameStop to prevent the short, and the people who would throw money in the direction Elon suggests. Except in addition to a wide audience of meme traders with shallow pockets, he also has access to a smaller pool of people with much deeper pockets. I can imagine whenever any hedge fund starts shorting any Elon stocks, he’ll be able to drum up support to prevent it. Remember, he doesn’t need to keep valuations high forever, only for long enough to kill the short.