mantrid's recent activity

  1. Comment on DuSable Bridge Chicago: is this dangerous infrastructure decay? Should I report it and where? in ~engineering

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    Isn't that news from the beginning of this year? Looks like whatever repairs they were doing were expected to be completed in May 2024.

    Isn't that news from the beginning of this year? Looks like whatever repairs they were doing were expected to be completed in May 2024.

    4 votes

  2. Comment on Weekly US politics news and updates thread - week of November 25 in ~society

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    Wouldn't that violate the free trade agreement that he set up after scrapping the previous one because he said it was unfair to the USA?

    Wouldn't that violate the free trade agreement that he set up after scrapping the previous one because he said it was unfair to the USA?

    7 votes

  3. Comment on Air fryers are simpler than you think, but still pretty neat in ~tech

    mantrid
    Link
    I already knew that air fryers were basically just mini convection ovens, so curious why the toaster ovens in convection mode didn't cook the fries as quickly. They're not that much bigger. Do...

    I already knew that air fryers were basically just mini convection ovens, so curious why the toaster ovens in convection mode didn't cook the fries as quickly. They're not that much bigger. Do they have slower fans? Less efficient airflow?

    6 votes

  4. Comment on American election mental health thread in ~health.mental

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    I'm left wondering what a Trump presidency might mean for Taiwan. During his first term, some considered him an ally due to his feud with China, but I expect he'd sell out for a chance to build a...

    I'm left wondering what a Trump presidency might mean for Taiwan. During his first term, some considered him an ally due to his feud with China, but I expect he'd sell out for a chance to build a hotel in Beijing or something equally self-serving.

    7 votes

  5. Comment on US Election Distractions Thread in ~talk

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    To paraphrase: When using the Latin abbreviation for "for example," i.e. e.g., don't conflate it with some other abbreviation, e.g. i.e. It's equally important to avoid mixing up the one that is...

    To paraphrase: When using the Latin abbreviation for "for example," i.e. e.g., don't conflate it with some other abbreviation, e.g. i.e. It's equally important to avoid mixing up the one that is "that is" — i.e. i.e. — with something altogether different — e.g. e.g. etc.

    That should clear up any confusion.

    15 votes

  6. Comment on Character amnesia in China in ~humanities.languages

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    Do you feel you would be less embarrassed if you had to fall back on bopomofo instead of pinyin? I find it about equal.

    Do you feel you would be less embarrassed if you had to fall back on bopomofo instead of pinyin? I find it about equal.

    3 votes

  7. Comment on ‘Venom 3’ slinks to $51 million, lowest opening weekend of comic book trilogy in ~movies

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    That was my reaction as well. I don't remember seeing anything about it until just now.

    That was my reaction as well. I don't remember seeing anything about it until just now.

    14 votes

  8. Comment on Anthropic announces New Claude 3.5 Sonnet, Claude 3.5 Haiku and the Computer Use API in ~tech

    mantrid
    Link
    Computer Use sounds like what Rabbit R1's "large action model" was supposed to be.

    Computer Use sounds like what Rabbit R1's "large action model" was supposed to be.

    5 votes

  9. Comment on Subnautica 2 | Official teaser trailer in ~games

    mantrid
    Link
    Isn't this the third one?

    Isn't this the third one?

    6 votes

  10. Comment on WordPress.org’s latest move involves taking control of a WP Engine plugin in ~tech

  11. Comment on RIAA's flags latest piracy threats, sees a future for AI in ~tech

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    Do we know the demographics of Tildes? I would expect it to lean 30+, but really I have no idea.

    Do we know the demographics of Tildes? I would expect it to lean 30+, but really I have no idea.

    5 votes

  12. Comment on Sunderfolk in ~games

    mantrid
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    A similar-sounding game called Eon Altar came out in 2016. The developers wanted to translate a tabletop RPG experience to the PC, with everyone sitting around a large screen and controlling their...

    A similar-sounding game called Eon Altar came out in 2016. The developers wanted to translate a tabletop RPG experience to the PC, with everyone sitting around a large screen and controlling their individual characters with their smartphones. I thought it was a great idea, but they unfortunately ran out of money in 2018 after completing their first "season" of episodic content. Now, even though the game runs on the host's local network, most players are still locked out of the game because it requires a free companion app but newer versions of Android and iOS refuse to install something that was made for an OS version from 8 years ago.

    I wish they had open-sourced the app so it could be recompiled for newer OSes, or designed it as a javascript web app that could be served directly by the host computer. That way, it would still be playable into the future. As it is, the game is still for sale on Steam, and anyone who buys it can do nothing but apply for a refund.

    Hopefully Sunderfolk will be designed in a more futureproof fashion.

    5 votes

  13. Choosing a TTRPG system

    ~games.tabletop Ask (advice)
    When I was in elementary school, I found some Advanced Dungeons & Dragons books at a yardsale. I read through them, brought them to school, and played through a basic campaign with some friends....

    When I was in elementary school, I found some Advanced Dungeons & Dragons books at a yardsale. I read through them, brought them to school, and played through a basic campaign with some friends. Since then, I haven't met anyone interested in pen-and-paper RPGs. I still hope that I can one day convince someone to play with me, but I don't even know which system I should try to learn. There are now so many different editions of D&D, in addition to countless alternatives and endless arguments over the merits of each.

    Whatever system I decide to learn, I will need to invest time and energy into learning and teaching the game to others, and I'll most likely be the DM, so I'd like to choose one that won't be too difficult for beginners to get into. While I enjoy exploring interesting game mechanics, I think the idea of creating an interactive adventure story or a world to explore with friends is what attracts me the most. The Fate system sounded interesting, but I had a hard time understanding the core rulebook. I've recently read short summaries of several other systems that seem like they could be fun and not too hard to get into, such as Index Card RPG, Shadowdark, Tiny Dungeon, Five Torches Deep, Fantasy AGE, and Creative Card Chaos; but I can't afford to read through each of them and seven editions of D&D to determine which one is most suitable for me.

    Does anyone have any advice on how to evaluate my options or a suggestion for a good one to start out with?

    21 votes

  14. Comment on Is all language linear to a native speaker? in ~humanities.languages

    mantrid
    Link
    It may be more helpful to translate the phrase as "the food that Mom cooks," as in 妈妈做的菜很好吃 ("The food that Mom cooks is delicious"). Here, it functions like a relative pronoun in English (e.g....

    It may be more helpful to translate the phrase as "the food that Mom cooks," as in 妈妈做的菜很好吃 ("The food that Mom cooks is delicious"). Here, it functions like a relative pronoun in English (e.g. which, that, who, etc.):
    你买的车太贵了 The car (that) you bought is too expensive.
    我喜欢的女孩不喜欢我 The girl (that) I like doesn't like me.
    桌上的书是小说 The book (which is) on the table is a novel.

    Generally speaking, in English, nouns are modified by simple and compound adjectives on the left and by most other things (e.g. relative clauses and adjectival prepositional phrases) on the right. In French, many adjectives that English speakers expect before a noun go after it, as in "le chat noir" ("the black cat). In Chinese, when modifying a noun similarly to how you would in English, the modifiers go to the left of the noun. In fact, if you continue to learn Chinese, you will find that there are a lot of phrases and sentence structures that go in reverse of the order you are accustomed to, but at least it usually follows subject - verb - object order, which not every language does.

    People learning a language with a word order different from that of their mother tongue tend to find it difficult at first, and may even complain that they need to "think backwards" in order to produce or understand phrases in the target language, but it's really just a difference of convention, and they usually get used to it once they learn to think in the target language instead of translating into and out of their native language.

    I've heard that in Latin, due to the heavy inflection, you can basically put the words in any order you like without affecting the meaning of the sentence, but I don't have any first-hand knowledge of that.

    25 votes

  15. Comment on Brothers | Official trailer in ~movies

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    That's a long time to be stuck in limbo after everything has been filmed. What happened?

    That's a long time to be stuck in limbo after everything has been filmed. What happened?

    1 vote

  16. Comment on Kagi is announcing AI Assistant in ~tech

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    That seems like a lot. Did they pay retail price for the shirts?

    That seems like a lot. Did they pay retail price for the shirts?

    1 vote

  17. Comment on Kagi is announcing AI Assistant in ~tech

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    I can order 20,000 custom-printed T-shirts from Alibaba for $15,600. If Kagi could only raise less than $50,000, I'd be worried about them regardless of what they spent that money on.

    I can order 20,000 custom-printed T-shirts from Alibaba for $15,600. If Kagi could only raise less than $50,000, I'd be worried about them regardless of what they spent that money on.

    3 votes

  18. Comment on California lawmakers pass bill allowing Amsterdam-style cannabis cafes in ~society

    mantrid
    Link
    I'm a little surprised that California is allowing indoor smoking, even if it's only in this particular type of establishment.

    I'm a little surprised that California is allowing indoor smoking, even if it's only in this particular type of establishment.

    3 votes

  19. Comment on Gearbox's first Risk of Rain 2 expansion gets hammered on Steam as developer admits the PC version 'is in a really bad place' in ~games

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    As a business decision, it seems like an obvious one: why pay your programmers to code the same thing twice when you can have them do it once and cover everything? I guess whoever made that...

    I genuinely do not understand why they felt the need to unify the console and PC code.

    As a business decision, it seems like an obvious one: why pay your programmers to code the same thing twice when you can have them do it once and cover everything? I guess whoever made that decision was not aware of the difficulty that would entail.

    5 votes

  20. Comment on In search of: audiobook versions of The Worst Witch series in ~books

    mantrid
    Link Parent
    Thanks. I thought it was a link to an ISO image file of an audiobook.

    Thanks. I thought it was a link to an ISO image file of an audiobook.

    3 votes