Introductions | April 2023
It has been 1,071 days since Tildes had a user introduction post. This one here in fact.
After seeing a few new usernames around the corridors since the Reddit API announcement, and seeing Tildes mentioned on Reddit a couple of days ago, I thought it might be kinda fun to do another.
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Brand new users, feel free to spill the beans on a few fun facts about yourself.
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Perhaps you're an old school Tildee returning after a long sabbatical... Fill us in on what's new in your world.
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Those of you who missed out on a little light 'getting to know you' by signing up in the previous 1,070 days, drop a word or two.
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And that leaves the old guard. You know who you are! You aren't excluded from this social gathering today. Perhaps a bio on what you love to post here.
I'm not expecting the 266 comments we saw with the very first 'Introductions', but a number between 1 and 266 is fine. 😊
A bit offtopic but worth pointing out for the newcomers:
Docs.Tildes.net is worth a read, especially the Code of Conduct.
And @Bauke's Tildes Statistics site is worth checking out during interest spikes too, as well as the Browse groups page which has daily activity stats.
Also worth mentioning for all the new users, more of whom joined today (so feel free to introduce yourselves!), Tildes has a topic bump mechanic similar to oldschool forums. So whenever a new comment gets made it moves that topic back to the top of everyone's main page if they have it sorted by Activity.
Activity = orders the topics so that the topics with recent comments posted in them appear at the top. Some comments are excluded and will not cause the topic to "bump", such as ones made in threads labeled as Offtopic and Noise, or if they're made in a long thread (>=5 comments deep)
All Activity = orders the topics so that the topics which have most recently had a comment posted under them appear at the top. This is similar to the "Activity" sort, but without any exclusions (so any comment will always cause a topic to come back to the top)
And speaking of comment labels:
https://docs.tildes.net/instructions/commenting-on-tildes#labelling-comments
But note that labels are only available to users with accounts more than 7 days old. You can't apply labels during your first week on Tildes.
p.s. I would also highly recommend turning on "Collapse old comments when I return to a topic" in your settings
A good call on Bumping! I was about to make a fresh introductions post when I started seeing new names pop up in the Apollo thread.
Cool, didn’t know about this. Are there any guesses to how many active users we have? Definitely seems smaller these days than way back when.
Only @Deimos would probably be able to accurately estimate the number of active users. But every time I think Tildes is starting to feel really small again, and perhaps be at risk of dying off, reddit HQ does something stupid again and we get another influx of new users (and old ones returning). And even when that doesn't happen for a while, occasionally a topic still pops up that suddenly gets way more votes and comments than I thought was possible given the daily activity numbers. So I think there are still a fairly substantial amount of lurkers hanging about the place that only interact with the site when something really piques their interest.
I think I talk too much already, but since nobody else introduced themselves yet, I'll go first.
That's from my bio which I just updated. You can get anybody's bio by clicking on their username (if they've posted one), and you can edit your own bio in settings.
Fellow amateur accordion player here, so extrapolating from the number of comments currently in this thread suggests a minimum of 28% of users here are amateur accordion players.
Well, that's a surprise! What do you play? Quint free-bass, maybe?
Nothing so apt! I have a Hohner button accordion and mostly play Irish folk.
I've been dabbling in folk music a bit. Any tunes you recommend learning?
I think the first ones I learned were polkas such as Britches Full of Stitches, but I'm also a big fan of hornpipes such as The Boys of Bluehill or The Liverpool Hornpipe. The great thing about Irish folk though is that there are so, so many tunes to try out!
Am I new? I guess I'm newer than 2019. I can overshare a bit.
I like indie games, board games, virtual reality, reading and writing fiction (in english), landscape photography, prog rock and metal, occasionally anime and manga, usually cooking--definitely eating--and definitely ice cream. Far too much ice cream. When I travel, I enjoy traipsing relentlessly across foreign cities by foot until I have injured one of my legs and have to limp for a week. I've been known to rant against the unethical behavior of large tech corporations and go deep into weird philosophical arguments with friends despite lacking a background in philosophy post high school. You don't even need to get me drunk.
I've been developing software since I was 8 years old. I have a degree. I was extremely productive for several years but burned out a few years ago and became nearly incapable of doing it despite my best efforts, so I have no idea what to do with my life these days, meaning I'm constantly scared and stressed out (currently unemployed). I'm also culturally displaced here in Portugal, where many of my interests are rare, especially in my age bracket, and LGBT acceptance still amounts to "don't show it in public" (even though it's otherwise of the safest countries in the world).
I've been using this username for 24 years and vastly more people know me by it than my real name. It's also me on github, minecraft and god knows where else, a whole bunch of old games and websites. I'm also known as Pteraspidomorphi on steam, reddit and twitch (Protip: If you're having trouble finding an unused single word username, go to wikipedia and hit random article a bunch of times.) I don't often lose my cool on reddit so I'm not too ashamed of my comment history.
Reading through all of these introductions, I am often struck by how much arts and culture bring people together. With only a few minor changes (taking out anime / manga, and writing fiction) this would also describe a significant number of my interests.
Do you have a favourite board game or are there any photos you've taken that you'd like to share?
Anime and manga can mean a lot of things, maybe there are some out there for you!
If you have a boardgamearena account you can get an idea of the type I game I usually play on my profile. Obviously I've played many games not on BGA as well; one I quite like that immediately comes to mind is Lords of Waterdeep.
In recent years I don't have as much time for going out photographing as I used to, so I have mostly landscapes and cityscapes I got while traveling, such as this panorama I posted in a reddit comment recently, taken in Portugal a few years ago. I have a ton of past photos, but I don't think I'll be uploading anything else to imgur given the circumstances...
(Having a few months ago moved back to my home town which is extremely beautiful, maybe I can start photographing more often again!)
Oh nice, loads of games on your profile are standards in our house, and Lords of Waterdeep is one that I've enjoyed a lot recently; I love a good worker placement game! Have you played Wingspan or Anachrony? Those are my two other current favourite worker placements.
That's a great photo, thanks for sharing!
Yup, I have played Wingspan a few times. I also like worker placement games. In the BGA profile you may notice Viticulture and Agricola.
What about your photos?
I have published some here - I am not a particularly good photographer, and mostly spend my photography time enjoying the photography of other people.
I'm not that good either. My photos after 2014 were all taken with my smartphone. In order to make up for my lack of talent, I make use of:
I use the excellent Autopano Giga for making panoramic images. Unfortunately Gopro bought the company and discontinued the software (as tends to happen to all top tier image manipulation software that's not open source), but it's still very good if you can get your hands on it.
I see you have a drone, that's cool! I think currently drones have been regulated into impracticality around these parts (due to airspace and privacy legislations).
I could share some more photos maybe in a thread in ~art but not sure if it's worth it if it's just going to be me doing it.
I wonder if something like a bi-weekly showcase or something might be worthwhile? Photo Friendly Friday thread every other week?
I'll try it out on Friday and see how it goes.
I didn't know about the original thread and am really enjoying this one. Thanks for posting @mycketforvirrad! As I only know folks here through text, I have created characters in my mind for everyone as you might with a novel. These threads always turn many of my assumptions on their head, be it because I've misgendered someone or I learn more about their interests. I love it!
As for me, I'm one of the... middle guard? I wasn't here at the beginning but I've been here for a while. I love the community here on tildes and the thoughtful, open discussions really are an antidote for so much of online discourse. I check Tildes pretty regularly and am often found on the infrastructure, music, or talk threads.
My professional passions mostly revolve around geospatial technology: satellites, drones, sonar, lidar, or anything imaging related but it is usually just easier say I make maps. I made maps of endangered historic buildings for a long time, think documenting and preparing for events like earthquakes or oddly the spread of ISIS, but now I make maps of ecosystems. They are very different in many ways - ecosystems are much more dynamic - but in many ways the ways I collect/process data and create deliverables are very similar. During the middle of my switch from built environments to natural ones I went back to grad school to get a degree in Coastal Science and Policy which led me to my love to urban planning and natural resource management. It doesn't come up often on tildes, but I can talk for hours about nature based solutions, ecosystem services, and green/grey infrastructure.
Outside of work I try to spend most of my time outside. Like a number of folks on this thread I'd say I'm moderately good at many things: climbing, snowboarding, and mountain biking probably being the big three. I do sometime have an issue where I'll decide I don't have time for a ride and instead sit on my butt watching youtube videos. Things to work on for 2023. Music is also a big passion and I love the threads on tildes that let me explore the tastes of folks on here. There isn't much music I don't like and I really like curating playlists for events. Lastly, I really enjoy cooking and it seriously ramped up during covid. I think experimenting is the best part and I really appreciate my partner for being open to eating some of the more "bold" choices that come out of our kitchen. Farmers markets are absolutely my happy place and I feel fortunate to live in an area with an incredible amount of seasonal agricultural diversity. We also live on the ocean so I get to experiment with the seasonal products the local fish mongers or spear fisher friends have on offer. Oh, and gardening. I freaking love my yard and the wonderful fruit/veg/flowers that we've planted.
Your comment reminded me of a conversation with @kfwyre last year about the mental images we have (or don't have) about other people. I think I do the same as you; there are characters in my mind that map to people here, and they are probably so far from what people actually look like.
Your professional interests sound awesome; I hope that there are more opportunities to opine on green/grey infrastructure and urban planning in the future.
Do you have a favourite seafood? I lived in Vancouver for a while, and was spoilt by fresh fish; living inland now I don't eat much seafood at all.
That's a very nice conversation and exactly what I'm talking about. I actually thought @kfwyre was female during our first interactions, the patience and kindness they display are similar traits I associate with the women in my life. Since then I have an image closer to yours, not exactly Ryan Goesling, but definitely shares some of his traits. ;)
@Skybrian is great at keeping the infrastructure posts coming and the discussion lively! I'm pretty bad at submitting links when I find interesting articles. Something to improve on this year.
As for favorite seafood, that's tough as we're quite spoiled as well. If I have access to fresh muscles then I'd probably go with moules frites. We often go foraging for them here, though our last forage will likely be this week before the shellfish quarantine starts for the summer. A guilty pleasure is Jerked Shrimp. Most shrimp you're likely to encounter out and about have some pretty terrible ecological and human impacts associated with them (think slavery and mangrove clearcutting) so I've made a practice of avoiding them as much as possible. That said, my god are they delicious. I usually get them once a year when one of the local boats sells their catch directly on the wharf. The ones I get a spot prawn, from a sustainable fishery, and cost an arm and a leg. When I don't have access to fresh fish I'm actually a big fan of tinned fish. My partner and I lived in Spain for a bit and really got into the variety of tinned marine goods you can get. Everything from the standard sardine in sunflower oil to oysters in a spicy tomato sauce. If I see a type I haven't tried before in the shore, I'll always pick up a can. It's fun exploration for pretty cheap (most cans range from 2-8 dollars).
Any favorites yourself?
Over time I think my seafood tastes have diminished. I occasionally get mussels or oysters when I'm close to the ocean, but I don't crave them like other people seem to. My wife is all about lobster and crab and I just don't really care for them that much, but I love loads of different kind of fish, and I'll still go out of my way for good sashimi. Frozen Tilapia is something I eat with some frequency, mostly for relatively healthy and inexpensive protein.
I really miss good moderately priced salmon and sushi though.
For me, I think the rarity is part of the pleasure. Like you, I rarely seek out oysters and mussels but when I stumble upon them it's like reconnecting with an old friend. I started foraging during an unemployed period as a means of supplementing my diet and boy foraging mussels and oysters made me feel like I was living high on the hog!
I'm in this boat. My partner is from New England and endlessly raves about lobster boils and lobster rolls. I've had all her favorites out there and honestly, I preferred the cod roll. I don't quite get the hype around lobster. Crab is ok, but sometime I don't think the reward is worth the effort.
I wasn't even thinking about sushi! Oof, I love a good Unagi roll. The best sushi I ever had was scallop sashimi. It was incredibly buttery. Do you have a favorite type?
Unagi is also one of favourites; whenever we (infrequently) get sushi, I'll get an unagi roll. I like a good spicy tuna or salmon skin as well, and most of the "basic" stuff - california rolls, crab rolls, etc. - but generally I'll try just about any sushi and I like most of them.
Welcome! This place is much more like pre-reddit forums (imo) than it is like old reddit, but I think that’s largely a function of the small user base. Either way it’s a fun place to be.
What was your 15 min of fame about if you don’t mind the question?
Cool! Definitely didn't expect your 15 minutes of fame to have a wikipedia page, that's pretty legit. Did you end up having to pay the legal fees involved here? Just curious.
Awesome story you have there! Thanks for answering, and glad to have ya here.
Looks like we got a bona fide folk hero in our midst!
Hilariously, I was taking care of my great-aunt in September of 2009 while my great-uncle was in convalescent care for a severe knee injury and watched a lot of Glenn Beck. Every day for an hour. I'm glad this was happening while I was suffering from his influence.
Hi everyone! Thanks for inviting me, I am shocked at how nice everyone here is. I wasn’t here for the beginning of reddit but I like to think this is what is was like back then. About me, I am a software developer, but I love plants and I love to garden. A few months ago I moved to a place with a backyard and space for gardening, as a result I just planted my first garden this past weekend! So far I have tomatoes, cucumbers, banana peppers, green beans, peas, various herbs, and flowers! Hopefully this season goes well and in a few months I will be swimming in vegetables to make plenty of salads and meals! Nice to meet all of you as well.
It's great to have you! Quite a few us on here are garden nerds so I think you'll be right at home!
I'm very jealous of your tomatoes and peppers! My partner and I moved from a a very warm, fertile area to a coastal zone that is supposedly a 10a but leaves us socked in with fog for most of the summer months. We love it here but it means we've traded night shades for artichokes!
Hello to all! It is an honor to be invited to this community.
I trust you will understand my hesitancy to divulge any personal information given my career in cybersecurity. Allow me to instead share about my journey through online communities.
I got my start in Xat chatrooms by roleplaying a wolf, "SandStriker", as one does in the early 2000s. I didn't mind the character wiki jammed into a free Wetpaint site or our landing page harassed by stock footage of nature and ɛɖɢʏ ʄօռȶʂ. The core members were a tight knit bunch that did not take themselves seriously. We shared a bond of mutual acceptance that can only come from familiarity. They welcomed me, provided encouragement when developing my skill as a writer.
I was later introduced to Reddit through StumbleUpon. The cascading style of replies was confusing and a deterrent to initial interest. I kept seeming to find my way back there, though, especially when researching edge case scenarios and error codes. When it finally clicked, I began exploring the main subs.
I recall feeling conditioned to passively lurk rather than contribute. Redditors on main sub threads are incentivized to fight like rabid seagulls. They scrabble over each other for morsels of wit, snark, and crude sexual innuendo with little regard for thoughtful dialogue. Why bother with laboring over an insightful comment if it would be overlooked in favor of a pun chain?
After finding more niche subreddits that aligned with my hobbies, I put those years behind me. I enjoy listening to NPR podcasts like WWDTM, This American Life, Radiolab, Snap Judgement to name a few. I'm also really into rougue-like and rogue-lite videogames, digital art, museums, exploring new music, meditation, and mindfulness. When reading I tend to gravitate towards graphic novels, science fiction, and investigative journalism.
When Tildes was recommended in the wake of the third party API drama, I researched this community and came away impressed. I've successfully dropped FB and Twitter and will follow suit with Reddit if they ever axe support for old.reddit/RES. The vision of a non-profit, noncommercialized alternative with an emphasis on user empowerment is an admirable one in every respect. It is clear the foundation has been proven strong, and I'm ready to do my part.
Oh my god. I had no idea I would hear about Xat in my life again.
Welcome.
Hello!
I guess I'm one of the "old guard" and looking back through the previous introduction posts it appears I never did one. I'll bullet point this in random order...
...that's all I can think of for the moment.
What's your favourite whiskey? Are you into whiskey only, or do you also enjoy scotch-style whisky?
Favorite tends to depend on mood, sometimes I'm in the mood for something sweet, sometimes something spicy, or something unusual. Recently went to a whiskey event/tasting and had many whiskeys along with other spirits. Found I still prefer whiskey, but do enjoy a good cognac or armagnac as well. Highlight of the event was a George Dickel 8 year, that is both nicely affordable for its age and absolutely delicious neat and does not improve with water, which is a rarity. It is probably my favorite normal whiskey at the moment.
I tend toward well aged whiskey or something that has been finished in other barrels to give it more character.
If forced, at present my absolute favorite is a single malt, single barrel whiskey from a Texas distillery called Balcones that was aged 4 years in oak and then finished in a Madeira barrel, 127 proof. I drank about a third of the bottle within the first month having it, went back for more to find it was all gone, and now keep it for special occasions and I've only had a bit of it since picking it up two years back, half the bottle remains.
My whiskey shelf (the top of the fridge) currently consists of...
Those all sound great. I don't have a great bourbon / rye selection - my father and father-in-law are both Crown Royal enthusiasts, so I have a few bottles of Crown, and that's about it. I have a few different scotch whisky options, but maybe I'll pick up a bottle of Weller Special Reserve (seems more available locally for me than the Dickel you mentioned).
And I completely forgot the Scotch question. At one time I would have turned down pretty much any Scotch as all that I had tried were peat-heavy and I like my whiskey to not taste like shit. Since then I've tried some high end and low/un-peated Scotches and like them just fine, but haven't actually bought any for myself. Just tried others and given some gifts to one of our friends that has Scottish ancestry and loves Scotch. She does enjoy peat-heavy though.
Crown is wheated, so if you like it you may like Weller, as I describe Weller as what Crown wishes it could be.
[...]
Note, all disparaging comments are in jest, humor about my own tastes, and I pass no judgement based on what someone likes. If someone likes Crown more than Weller, then more power to them. Same with peated Scotch, far be it from me to judge someone for liking the taste of near-fossilized poop.
@cfabbro (a fellow Canadian) may be able to provide some suggestions on whiskeys as he and I have had at least a couple of drinks conversations over the years.
I'm definitely still a whiskey amateur, and not the biggest fan of Scotch either (despite loving Drambuie), so I'm probably not the best person to ask for recommendations. I am still very much enjoying the occasional Rusty Bob (Rusty Nail with Bourbon instead of Scotch) and Bourbon Mules made with Buffalo Trace (which I bought on your recommendation) instead of the traditional vodka based Moscow Mules I typically drink. Since then I've also tried Jim Beam, which I was not a huge fan of neat, but which works alright in a Rusty Bob. And I am also intimately familiar with Crown Royal too though, since (being Canadian) we have always had a bottle stocked in our bar. It's okay, and I've made more than a few Donald Sutherlands with it over the years (Rusty Nail with Canadian Rye), but I much prefer the Buffalo Trace over anything else I've tried so far.
Ha, well, I like my near fossilized shitfirewater I guess.
As far as whiskeys go, I like crown well but I'm definitely interested in a better version of it. I am more of a Scotch Whisky guy, so it's nice to have some other opinions on it. I realized that I have a decent bourbon from Woodford Reserve.
Woodford Reserve makes some pretty approachable and available whiskeys. I recently bought a friend a bottle of 1792 Full Proof and it was amazing. All bottles sold out by the time I got back to the store to get my own. It's also high on the availability list, so you may want to try something from them.
What are some things about honey that you think about as an aficionado that perhaps the typical honey user doesn't?
Well the typical honey user probably doesn't stray far from the squeeze bear, so simply picking up a jar of something local gets someone into the above average category.
That said, I have a lot of honey and like fine alcohol, they have character and flavor profiles all their own. I'll point you toward a couple of previous honey comments and you can ask me questions here if you have any:
Uno
Dos
Do you brew mead perchance? I gave it a go once or twice (using a recipe linked by someone on here, don't remember who), but didn't end up with something I was satisfied with. TBF, I also drink only slightly more than an AA meeting, so my standards are perhaps unusual.
I do not. I was never a fan of mead enough to want to brew it.
Hello! I joined a little while ago, but after the original post. I am eggy (he/him), a username I liked, but is certainly not my only one. Hmm what else to share, I enjoy technology, but I have no formal training in anything related to it. My dad taught teachers how to use technology in classes and so he always had access to the newest and coolest tech that he showed me how to use growing up. I joined here from I think a user on tilde.town, but maybe tilde.club. I am studying to be a teacher (idk why im doignt his to myself). I also am mostly a lurker, I tend to forget about tildes, but then ill check it out and it always has cool discussion. I love all kinds of games (board, video, and card among whatever is left). I love reading and political, and social theory. It is very cool to see everyone here! I will try to start learning names. I need to get tildes on my email full of news for the day so i dont miss posts!!
Do you have a favourite game of each type you listed - board, card, video? What's a book that you recently read that you enjoyed?
Hmm good question, I think for board games it has gotta be ticket to ride I think, man I didn't realize how hard that would be though. Card game is either ascension or MtG, I love deckbuilding. Video game pretty much any rogue like but recently it has been peglin, or one step from eden (its like a mega man battle network type game so much fun). A book I have recently read was Teaching To Transgress by bell hooks, it was so so so good highly recommend!
Ticket to Ride is one we return to a lot, though the specific version that is our favourite is Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries. Though my kids are at the point that they're great for playing board games with, they're also at the point that they are generally doing something else, so it's frequently just me and my wife playing games, and we found that the Nordic one is great for two players.
Ascensions is on my list to try. I'm currently playing a fair bit of MtG, almost entirely EDH at my local store. I've been enjoying the deck building a lot as well, and also started sorting my cards, more for insurance reasons than anything else.
I've not played either of those games, but I own one step from eden - maybe I'll give it a try.
Oh yeah I pretty much only play EDH (i do enjoy a good draft, im just not great at keeping up with the new sets and their mechanics). I have not played nordic countries but that sounds like a lot of fun, does it incorporate like boats or whatever the European one has?
Also I cannot recommend Eden enough, its so good and fun to play but hard to master. They have a new version coming out thats an online fighting game that looks like a lot of fun.
I'm terrible at keeping up with new sets - I just came off a ~4 year hiatus of mostly not playing, so I've definitely been enjoying getting back into it.
The Nordic version has some over water "ferries" but not as much as the Rails and Sails version, which has separate boat pieces. It's generally just a bit of a smaller map, and it has less points where you get completely blocked off if someone takes your route. It cuts the time to play down a bit. There's also the New York or London versions with Taxis which are a lot of fun and a lot smaller; they can be done in under half an hour pretty consistently.
I'll check out Eden!
What decks have you been building/playing?
I have these built at the moment, although I need to find time to go through and update them as they're all ~6 months behind my collection additions at this point: https://www.moxfield.com/users/streblo
I should put my current decks in a list somewhere shareable. Our LGS has some rules that I would class as "interesting" and maybe "bad" but I like the people, so most of these decks are pretty half-assed, but they do fairly well in that environment, so these are what I run:
Those are my current decks. I just signed up for a Moxfield account and I'll actually add them at some point.
I want to build a Kadena deck! My favourite card for a long time was Ixidron; I loved seeing it hit the table and seeing everyone grumble. Your sunforgery deck is also close to what I'd like my Kalemn-ity deck to become over time; it's like the grown up version of this deck which is, honestly, just not a great deck (like a 2 or 3 power level) but still wins because it slips through the cracks of our meta, and nobody deals with it properly.
Edit: adding in some decks using Moxfield, which seems superior to tapped out to me (i had some old decklists on there), and then I added my Estrid deck, and my mana base is totally messed up! What the heck am I doing?
Nice decks! I chuckled at the Estrid deck name, seems appropriate given the contents. I love the Empress Galina deck, I see you Isochron Scepter + Dramatic Reversal + Leyline of Singularity. Also, in case you weren't playing at the time, you're missing the best fling spell in Throwmok: Kazuul's Fury // Kazuul's Cliffs. I'm really hyped on all the MDFCs, even the 'bad' ones if they are spells that fit your deck plan.
I play mostly online these days because my local store isn't really my scene, so I build my decks to mostly fit the upper-mid power level that seems to dominate online lobbies. A local scene with some limitations on deck building sounds kinda refreshing, actually.
Kadena is awesome, one of my favourites. It's a control deck that's still playing to the board and I think the 'is it Willbender' tension makes the game kinda fun too. The Wyleth deck is fun too, but I'm still waiting for the day I pull off the Sunforger + Leonin Shikari + Gideon's Sacrifice + Arcbond combo. I could probably switch the commander to Bruenor or Zirda to make this a little easier but then I'm basically going all in on the combo without retooling the entire deck.
I think that I have none of the MDFCs, but perusing your decks made me think that I'll be getting some; I didn't play during Zendikar rising, but I think it would be simple to pick up some from my LGS. Seeing them in your decks got me thinking already about some substitutions that I'll probably be making in my decks.
I like the local scene, even with some limitations, but I don't like all of the limitations. I just had a 2 hour argument with my brother about one of the cards on their ban list - Tunnel Vision. They've banned it because it is "broken in EDH" and I think that after 2 hours I managed to get him to understand that ZERO percent of decks run it because it's not very good, and that the fact that the group collectively wanted it banned is silly. I also realized as of this comment that I have a banned card in my Galina deck because they have banned Isochron as well, so I have to make some adjustments (as juicy as that synergy is).
I love that combo! It's the exact sort of combo that I (would) love to put in; multiple pieces, requires some setup, and really delightful to see it go off properly.
You'll find most people online count them as lands but in my opinion you don't want to cut a land for the non-mythic ones because relying on playing a tap land isn't great. Instead I count the (non-mythic ones) as spells that can bail me out of missing a land drop but ideally I'm playing the front side.
IMO the best ones are Bala Ged Recovery // Bala Ged Sanctuary and Malakir Rebirth // Malakir Mire but they are (mostly) all worth running if the front side fits your game plan.
I've also been here a while - long enough to post in the original thread, at least. I don't contribute here a ton, but I do like to hang out now and then. I've been an internet user since it was MUCH less ubiquitous, though if you find another rogue_cricket out there, it's probably not me: the only contiguous internet presence I have is my real identity for professional purposes and I use a separate username in most places.
I'm a woman in my mid-30s. I live in Canada, near the ocean, with my wonderful wife and our mostly-wonderful pets. Like many people here I'm a programmer, although I like functional languages and mildly dislike OOP, which feels like a cruel joke being played on me by the universe given their relative popularity. I'm likely to have a job soon in either health or climate tech (probably health) coming off of a job in social media.
For hobbies I like video games (all kinds of genres), reading (fiction and non), hiking (nothing overnight), TTRPGs (right now doing Pathfinder 2e) and when I'm feeling it I play music (mostly piano). I try to stay well-rounded.
Come to think of it, I'm kind of a dabbler in general - I've done a bit of a lot of things. Writing, gardening, roller-skating, sculpting, textile art... I don't mind dipping in and giving something a try and then dipping out. I like novelty and get bored quickly if I do the same thing for too long... I don't see this as a negative thing necessarily, but it also means my storage is absolutely a mess. :)
I strongly believe in building community, mentorship, and in mutual aid, and I volunteer my time at a community centre which prioritizes ecological sustainability, lifelong skills development, and active and affordable child-care. For example, there are classes in foraging and plant identification, gardening with local plants, woodworking, darning. The children's programs also include this kind of natural learning and physical activity as part of their curricula. I mostly work in the background doing planning for fundraising events for the kids but I might be spearheading a board games/DnD monthly event for teens and adults soon, I guess!
I'm a bit of a type A, but I've mellowed out a lot over time... I've definitely grown more sensitive and sentimental and I actually really like that about myself. I'm just trying to find something peaceful for myself and doing what I can to make a small positive impact on my community.
What's your favourite functional language?
The monthly board game / DnD event sounds awesome, and your community centre sounds amazing!
I'm a big fan of Clojure for its approach to typing and access to the massive Java standard library. I also like the Lisp syntax and have found occasional use for writing macros, which are just kind of neat. I know a bit of Haskell, and I would like to learn Elixir, but Clojure was my main programming language for a long time and I still do it in my free time.
People sometimes have trouble starting out with the syntax feeling a bit 'backwards', needing to work from the inside-out rather than one thing after another, and sometimes find the parentheses annoying - but you can mitigate the more complex cases of deep nesting with threading macros and the parentheses navigation with a good editor that allows for stuff like "slurping" and "barfing". Eventually the parentheses disappear completely.
Another thing people tend to not be into is the discouragement of iteration - that can be hard to get around if you're used to loops being a big part of your toolkit. You CAN make a loop in Clojure, but there are very few circumstances you should NEED to once you understand recursion, reducers/transducers, and the ability to compose functions and pass them as data. I actually think this is something about Clojure that has made me a better programmer in every language.
And, yeah! Thanks! It is a really great group of people, we just need a bit more cash before we can really start thriving, I think. I kind of lucked into the position: my piano teacher had a studio there and taught lessons there. She eventually became the executive director of the org (long story), had to quit teaching piano, and ended up reaching out to me to volunteer for a haunted house last year. I went for it and it went well. She hit me up for further work and now I'm on the events committee. It is very gratifying work!
I have had a similar experience, though I am not a Clojure expert by any means (heck, or even really a programmer any more, I'm a manager), but so many programmers just look at iteration as a solution and don't even think about how recursion can solve things. I've had my share of "well why is yours executing twelve thousand times faster?" and it's because of knowing different approaches.
Are you still taking piano lessons? Did you start as an adult or is this a continuation from childhood? What's a piece that you're interested in / working on?
My word it's been a while! Sorry about that. I really appreciate seeing you ask all these follow-ups in this thread. :)
I started learning classical piano as a kid, and then in high school a lot of my friends joined band so I did too. I joined up with a small group of the remaining holdouts in my friend group and among them I was the only one able to read sheet music already, so they got popped into percussion with me on melodic percussion doing tympani, xylophone, marimbas, bell chimes, glockenspiel, etc. It was a lot of fun!
After that I moved into a series of small apartments where having a piano was not really possible, so when I was able to get a good electronic piano (NEED those good weighted keys) I started up lessons again. It had been years so it's a bit slow and a little frustrating but it's still fun. The pieces I'm working on lately are a little easy just to keep things fun, I'm currently working on Chopin's Waltz in A minor. One band I like for pop piano is Jukebox The Ghost and I'd like to eventually learn some of their stuff.
I remember vaguely you've mentioned you play music as well - what exactly do you do music-wise? How long have you been doing it?
I think an important part of an introduction thread is that introductions should lead to conversation, so that you're not just introducing into the void. Plus there's so many interesting answers, and I like getting glimpses into who the people behind the usernames are.
I was also a band kid in high school, and always wanted to get into the melodic percussion. We actually have a glockenspiel in our music room, and I would love to add a marimba - my son is interested in melodic percussion, and likes it way more than piano, and has requested one, but I don't see it in our near future, so I'm hoping when he gets to high school he elects to go that route.
I love the Waltz in A minor, and coincidentally my oldest daughter just started on it. I wasn't familiar with Jukebox The Ghost, and wow, they are super enjoyable, so thank you! I feel like one cannot help but smile while listening to them.
I do play a fair bit of music, and have a very musical family. Everyone in the house plays piano, and we have a large variety of other instruments, and are always looking to add (reasonably) to our collection. These days, it's mostly piano, guitar, and voice for me. I'm currently working on my white whale of piano songs, the Maple Leaf Rag. I've got section 1, 2, and 4 down, but the left hand for section three is one that I have some kind of mental block on and have a real tough time with. Other than that, we spend a fair amount of time with someone playing something, and lots of people singing together, which is nice.
I guess I've been making music for 35 years or so! That seems kind of nutty when I write it down.
Melodic percussion is a lot of fun! You really can't beat making music with hammers (pun not intended), and the marimba and vibraphone can both have such beautiful tones. The tympani too (which is its own thing but is something I often got to play due to my ability to read/tune) is such a powerful tool in a band, most people associate it with a bombastic feel but it can also do more subtle things. I really came to appreciate its technicality and physicality... it looks simple but I hardly scratched the surface of it.
I'm the only one in my direct family that's musically inclined, but my dad's father was very musical with no formal training and he mostly played improvisational or by ear. He played the fiddle, the organ, and the button accordion (weirdly common in this thread?)... I can noodle around a bit on the fiddle as a result of his teaching, and I would love to learn the accordion one day. My dad's brother also plays the guitar. It's fun to jam with him, though I don't know the guitar at all so it's usually him playing and me singing. I wish any of my siblings or cousins also played, it'd be nice.
(And yes, Jukebox the Ghost is great! They're very funny too, and every year I watch their Halloween concert virtually... they have a tradition of dressing up as Queen and playing covers and call it, of course, Hallowqueen. Tommy Siegel is the vocalist and has also made some comics that have achieved internet popularity, most notably his Candy Hearts. He also seems to have a thing for putting butts on things that don't normally have butts. (not really nsfw, just silly)
Disjoint pre-coffee response:
The revelation that the lead singer is the putting butts on things that don't normally have butts has blown my tiny tired Monday mind!
Jamming with family is great, and as the dad who plays the guitar, having your kid sing with you is one of the greatest joys of my life.
There are a lot of accordion players here. I don't play the button accordion, but my sister has a piano accordion that I love playing. They are tons of fun.
Oh, hey kindred spirit!
I love Jukebox the Ghost too, but, more importantly, I played piano and did band in high school before falling out of making music entirely. I've always wanted to get a good digital piano (as you said, the weighted keys are essential) and get back into it, but I've never bitten the bullet.
Any pointers or tips? Getting one and restarting lessons is definitely something on my horizon.
For getting/picking the piano, I got one used pretty inexpensively. I think a lot of parents pick them up and get rid of them when their kid loses interest, so they're not hard to find in good quality used! I tried out a couple before I found one I could tolerate. I always had an upright growing up and after trying some electronic ones, I realized there were more factors than I thought that made me like or dislike a particular keyboard although the key action is for sure the biggest one. Like the first one had nice action, but a very unrealistic "decay"on the note that I was surprised by: it's not something I ever thought about until I heard it and I HATED it. There's just no substitute for sitting down and experimenting for a few minutes.
Headphones are a nice investment for this too I think. I find usually the weakest part of a good piano is the speakers because a "pro" musician would be using external speakers any place it mattered anyway, so a decent pair of headphones is useful even if you don't care whether the neighbours hear, they'll probably outperform the speakers.
For getting back into playing I think the main thing is being patient. I 100% felt clumsier and slower after years of not playing and it was easy to get frustrated because "I used to be able to play X and now I can't! I'm stuck with this simple stuff!". But that was the nature of it, and to keep things fun I had to temper my expectations (... another pun not intended).
I think the fact that my brain had not degraded as much as my hands over time made the "boring stuff" pretty important - warming up with scales, arpeggios, triads, that kind of thing. I actually hate doing this but it works.
I do suggest lessons if you can swing it. The lessons themselves were good for me for structure, but I'm the kind of person who needs this external motivation even for stuff I value and WANT to do. Even if you're the type of person who can do this on their own, though, I think the opportunity for community and recitals is so valuable. I enjoy performance even though it scares the bejesus out of me, and performance is a distinct skill that by its nature you cannot practice on your own: you need a supportive space and a community. I am looking for a new teacher currently* and I'm 100% looking with an eye towards regular recitals. I don't care whether I end up playing after a six-year-old doing Three Blind Mice, I love to contribute as both a safe audience and a practising performer.
* It's entirely circumstantial, I believe I mentioned already but my previous teacher had to stop due to another opportunity and I've been unemployed/busy for a little while so I am just now able to commit to finding a new one.
Perfect answer; we got our electric piano used as well. The only thing I would add is that it's important to try the specific piano, not just the same model, that you are buying, because they aren't always consistently of the same quality. We got quite a decent Yamaha, and the action is very good, and it has no issues; I recommended the model to someone, they bought one, and I don't like it, because the action doesn't feel as good.
@kfwyre - comment is relevant to you.
Sound advice all around -- thanks for taking the time to type it all out! The headphone tip is especially good. I never thought about that, and the benefits also include not bothering my dog or husband when I'm repeating the same measure over and over again trying to get it down.
When I was a kid I remember all the boring finger exercises I used to have to do (I specifically remember a Hanon book that got a lot of use), and at the time I didn't really appreciate what they did for my playing.
After I stopped, I still had some muscle memory for a few songs, so I would occasionally find myself at a piano and would sit down to play a bit. When I did, I was always absolutely aghast at how uneven my playing was. I was hitting the right notes, but it sounded clumsy. My fingers -- out of their regular practice -- felt like they were falling over themselves.
It helped me appreciate, in hindsight, why things like those finger exercises and scales were pushed so heavily. I just wish my teacher had explained that to me at the time rather than just insisting I needed to do it.
Hey all, here I am! Thanks again for the invite. This seems like a nice place, much nicer than what Reddit’s turning into. I’ll continue using Apollo while it lasts but I’ll also lurk a bit here now.
i got an invite from a friend after complaining about Reddit, and this does seem like a real neat spot.
this username plays on my initials. it's a recentish shift for me, but i feel like i'll be using this one for a while.
in my early 20s. i live in North Carolina, but i'm originally from Kansas City.
i'm not a doer of much. i live low-key and simple. i like to talk mostly about video games. maybe sometimes a bit of philosophy, sometimes a bit of news, maybe sometimes a bit of music, maybe sometimes a bit of speculation about the future and technology. who knows? i'll be lurking for a bit, but i'll see if i can share or say something good every once in a while.
Happy to have you! We have a weekly video game thread and tbh I'd love to start seeing more music shared in ~music too.
What kinds of games do you like best? :)
not going to lie; i missed this comment for a while until the recent blackout reminded me that this site exists. sorry for the late reply!
i'll consider sharing some music in that area of the site. i'm not as analytical of music as i am of video games, and i'm not sure much of what i would share could find appreciation on this site, but i do like to share sounds that are underappreciated or underground.
as far as games go, i adore most genres. i think that games inherently hold something magical with interactivity being written in their dna. a lot of inspired, unique, and easily digestible messages have been sent and will be sent through this relatively fresh form of media that speaks through interactivity. one of my favorite games of all time is Animal Crossing for the nintendo gamecube, and one of the things i love the most about it is its humble, implicit commentary on moving into an unfamiliar community. maybe there's some connection i could make from this on my migration from reddit to here? :-)
i have begun to write some thoughts on my backloggd account, but i feel like this site might be a better place to leave some impressions. i've always preferred discussion over pouring text into a digital void. i browsed a few of the weekly game threads and i will definitely participate from time to time. from what i've read, i like how discussion tends to go here, though it does feel a bit scattered sometimes. it seems a lot of other new users of this site also share an interest in video games, so maybe it might be worth it to start a "book club" for games here in the future?
No problem, I'm also pokey on replies sometimes - I always want to have time enough to reply well, so occasionally I let things sit in my inbox until I can really dedicate the time to sit down and knock something out. I worry sometimes someone sees I've left them on read but have commented elsewhere but it's a matter of how much effort I want to put in vs. how much I have time/brain power for.
I'm similar on liking lots of genres (though I can't do horror well, and am not good at competitive shooters) - I really appreciate uniqueness in games, and Animal Crossing is certainly a novel one. It wasn't the first chill, life-sim game but it really leaned in harder to that whole vibe than anyone had before, I think. Since then it's really cool to have seen stuff like it explode in popularity, and I'd be interested to explore what that means for the cultural zeitgeist! Like you can credit SDV to some degree for reviving the entire genre, but I don't think it's a coincidence that more cozy games are being released in times that feel busier and more tumultuous.
It's really just so broad generally - I keep typing stuff and deleting it but really it comes down to the medium having SO much room for variety and so many aspects to study. There's technical and art aspects to game design itself - not directly the art design, but the feelings the creator is attempting to invoke by the design of the system - and sometimes I'm extremely impressed by particularly tight systems or clever tricks to guide player emotion and behaviour.
I've always really liked the idea of a book club for games - especially because the cadence of game releases often means that it can be really difficult to find discussion of older titles (even a couple years)! I've actually seen an adventure game enthusiast site where sometimes they do group play threads and have stopping points, like "complete up to the headstone puzzle". This allows them to discuss as a group from the same starting ground, speculate on upcoming story, that kind of thing. Obviously this can't be achieved for more open games but in general I like the idea of having more topics for deeper discussion of particular games on top of the regular megathread.
Another North Carolinian! Welcome.
Hello!
I too am a transplant from Reddit given their current insanity! I'm a trans wife and mother, corpo IT grunt, forever DM for my DnD groups, video game junkie, and I have an unhealthy addiction to charcoal grilling.
Great to have you! I've got a buddy who is really into charcoal grilling too, I'm happy enough to get BBQ by association. :p There are weekly video game threads and a ~games.tabletop area so I hope you can find a place to hang out!
Do you play any systems other than DnD? Interested to try any?
I used to play a LOT of the OG World Of Darkness games (Vampire, Werewolf, and Hunter). Been looking a lot at Pathfinder lately and really interested in playing some tabletop Cyberpunk or Shadowrun. I tried the Star Wars ones a few times but either the DMs have been bad or you need to really really love SW to enjoy that system.
Designer in Bay Area. I have a background in architecture and HCI. Old lesbian soul trapped in a young gay man's body. Moved here 2 yrs ago from Amsterdam to go on a bike tour adventure, but early on a bad crash kiboshed my plan. I'm between work, working on my own things and slowly burning savings because I don't think I have the energy to feign enthusiasm for corporate work. I do find myself in the role of playing therapist to other techies though, so maybe I should start charging.
Interests: architecture, how people use things, bicycles, rollerblading, climbing, video games, nudism, LGBT things, economics, philosophy, cooking, and technology of course.
I have a friend who transitioned into providing therapy for people, for much the same reason, and she finds it intensely fulfilling. It won't necessarily stop the burning of savings, though it might slow it down at least.
How people use things is such a deep topic, and always full of surprises! Are you interested in it from a particular perspective, such as human-computer interaction or material design (for clarity: not the google UI kit)?
Did you friend choose to go back to school for therapy?
I find myself counseling others, talking with mentally healthy people about their careers, philosophical and moral concerns, tech and product decisions, and whatnot. I often serve as their sounding board, listening and understanding, asking clarifying questions, pointing out alternative perspectives, and connecting them with interesting resources and people. I'm a confidant and advisor. My IRL presentation apparently makes people very comfortable: I'm a gay Asian cisman, give off a nerdy-but-trendy vibe, and have been told I have a super calm voice and demeanor, a ready smile, and an all-around friendly, approachable appearance.
I'm unsure this is a real niche or not, and if I should consider making this a side business. I like tech. I like helping people. I like listening. And I also love one-on-one human interaction and have infinite patience. If I could be paid to listen to people all day, I'd be very happy. :)
re: How people use things. It depends! I mainly think through a mixed HCI-systems perspective. In a way, everything—digital or physical—presents an interface, whether designed or undesigned. Ideally, an interface conform to our expectations. Things also exist the ecosystem of our busy lives, so I'm really interested in how things are surfaced at the right times and places or are made readily accessible otherwise, as well as how things can work together.
For example, I'd love to redesign a lot of governmental services in the US to make them more user-friendly and interconnected, and maybe even design new services. Like, imagine you lost your job and are anxious about how you'll survive the coming months. There should be a single gov contact point where you can communicate your situation and then be automatically linked with and processed for all eligible benefit programs — healthcare subsidy, rent assistance, food benefits, etc. etc.
I remember when I lost my job in the Netherlands. There's SSO for all gov services. It took me <15 minutes and a few clicks to quickly enroll in healthcare subsidies, unemployment, etc. There was little/no upfront bureaucracy. The agencies already had my income and employment data, so everything was sorted out instantly.
She did go back to school; I think it was 18 months or so? It sounds like something that you would do well at, so maybe it is something you should do! I will disclose that my friend is now looking into other options, because whole she finds it fulfilling, she does not find it particularly lucrative. I'm not sure if that would be different in your area though, and it's certainly possible to do other things on the side to augment income and she has a great and supportive partner as well, which helps.
I would love to have an opportunity to design a universal interface for government services related to ones area; the exact problem that you have described is one that computers are good at solving and it constantly irks me that there are so many barriers to service.
Fazit, he/him, one of many online handles that I frequently reuse since getting online the first time in ~2004. I am from Germany, a mechanical engineer by education, but a strong inclination towards building half-assed software. I do some artsy stuff like building LED lighting installations for festivals, I read quite a bit, enjoy hiking, sailing, climbing. I'm in a transition period from late adolescence into real adulthood and currently struggle a lot with the question of whether to have children or not.
I like to pick up hobbies and get okay-ish at them, and then move on to the next, so I'm a bit of a jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none. So far I got "okay" in: skateboarding, climbing, bouldering, chess, squash, juggling, diabolo, programming, journaling, snowboarding, skiing, sailing, surfing, bondage, settlers of catan, table tennis, foosball (the table thing), mixing cocktails, cooking, self-hosting, calisthenics...
I'm sometimes a bit sad that most interesting online communities like this one are very US-centric, so if another european would like to point out similiar communities in spirit, I would be glad. This does not imply that I don't enjoy my stay here - quite the contrary, I like the slow pace, the small amount of politics, the nice community activities (although I oculdn't joint so far)... it's beautiful here!
Ooooh, very cool! I think I do basically the same thing with loving to learn to do a lot of stuff badly. When compared to a random person who never done the thing I am still very good at the things tho :). And I am also European, there's a few of us here!
Would be a bit remiss if I didn't contribute to my own endeavour... Hello! I'm @mycketforvirrad.
The Tildes version of my username can occasionally be found posting content from the Nordic region, but I predominantly spend most of my time buried in the topic logs. It's where I do most of my best work, as I'm not much of a social butterfly when it comes to online spheres.
My Reddit version of the username is split between the Swedish and English transport subreddits, where I currently moderate r/tunnelbana and r/LondonUnderground. There's a few other passion subreddits in there too, all pretty low subscriber numbers thankfully!
The bio for me here on Tildes is pretty anodyne. I'm a creative soul with a graphic design degree not being put to use. My best birthday presents were a mountain bike for my fifteenth and the Nikon DSLR my wife got me last year. I like to hike, photograph and generally eat, drink and culture well.
I like the "my best birthday presents" line of introduction quite a bit!
What are your favourite things to photograph? Are you more about portraits or wildlife or landscapes, or something else entirely? I do not want to in any way pressure you, but I have always enjoyed when people share photos in ~creative. Sometimes it reminds me that I used to love photography and I go out and take some pictures on not-my-phone.
My photography leans heavily into my graphic design sensibilities. I photograph patterns, architecture, typography and urban landscapes.
I'm currently fascinated by the angular lines created by the street lights that run on wires between two buildings. Like this. Before that it was industrial landscapes with pink hued skies. It's always small details in the city that catch my attention.
I tried my hand at portraits when I was younger, but I was never able to catch that elusive glint in the eye. My photos never captured the inner energy of people that I experienced when I talked with them. Sad, really.
Doubt I'd ever show my own stuff off in ~creative, but I'm with you in enjoying seeing others creativity, like @Grendel and his photos during 2020.
What was your own best birthday present?
Oh wow, I love that photo. I used to love taking architectural photos, which has sort of transitioned into drone photos that I now seem to be more interested in. I too love the patterns, at various levels. I do have some photos on my website, though it's sorely out of date.
Since I read your original comment, I've been trying to think of the honest answer to that, and I feel awkward being unable to do so after complimenting it as a prompt! I think that a while ago I got to a point where I am quite grateful for all gifts, because the sentiment of people caring enough to think about what to give me is what matters the most. This likely comes from the place of privilege that I am in; anything that I want I can mostly procure for myself, so I don't always have to wait for a day to receive something. So I tried to cast back to what I was happiest about as a child, and was reminiscing a bit about how many of my birthday gifts as a kid were relatively overshadowed by my birthday's proximity to Christmas, as it is just days before.
All that said, I have three items that I think have risen to the top:
I’ve been here a while but I’ll do a brief introduction. Came here from reddit ages back, no longer really use reddit nor my other social media vice, twitter. Still check Tildes pretty regularly and like to engage when there’s topics relevant to me.
I’m doing a PhD in theoretical (computational) cosmology out in California. As such I’m interested in science related things and try to inject some of that into Tildes when I can. Outside of that I am interested in nuclear history and policy, tech policy, computer history / retro computing, urban design, and sustainability. For creative outlets I like to dabble with creative coding and am trying to get back into wheelthrowing pottery, and would like to dip my toes into screen printing as well. I’m recently married as well.
Congrats on your recent marriage!
What does a PhD in theoretical cosmology... I'm struggling with this sentence, because I think I need more degrees than I have to even ask it! What is it that you are researching?
Thank you :) And please, ask away, no degrees needed! Cosmology is the study of the universe as a whole, and by "theoretical" cosmology I only mean that I don't deal directly with the observational aspect of things. That is, I don't work directly with the telescopes or other instruments that we use to make observations, but I do work with the data that they produce.
I specifically study the first 300,000 years of the universe's existence, which was an extremely important time which in many ways determined everything that happened after. One of the best ways to study this important era is through observations of the cosmic microwave background, which in my opinion is one of the most beautiful and exciting things to study. This is essentially the leftover radiation from this era that I am talking about, so by studying it and its properties we can learn about the era in which it formed, roughly 300k years after the big bang. What the CMB looks like today is highly dependent on the conditions in the universe when it formed, so it ends up being an excellent probe of this highly important era.
Hi, I'm Fal. I guess I've been around for a while, though I wouldn't exactly be considered part of the 'old guard' of Tildes. I'm a first year university student, so I'm probably one of the youngest (semi) active users on the site. Like a lot of people, I joined Tildes after becoming somewhat disillusioned with the direction Reddit was taking. I usually post about gaming, international relations (my field of study at university), and whatever cool things I find online.
I spend a lot of my free time gaming, usually Paradox grand strategy games, though I play a wide variety of genres that aren't FPS games. I'm also a fan of board games (Wingspan being my most recent acquisition).
The Three Body Problem is some of the best scifi I've read, and I read a lot.
I want to collect old maps, though its a fairly expensive hobby that I'm not really in a position to throw myself into. Currently my best acquisition is an original 1754 map from Paris depicting the Carolingian empire.
I'm learning to cook! I am very bad at it.
That's awesome, I collect maps as well be it old or new. I make maps for a livings so it's always very inspirational when I come across an unusual or particularly well designed one. What draws you to the maps you choose?
Well usually the first criteria for me is that it’s affordable for me; usually around $100, up to $150 if I think it’s a particularly nice map or a good deal. I’m usually drawn towards map that are on the older side. I’m not sure if I have any kind of stylistic preference, since my collection is really small, but hopefully that changes. Make maps sounds interesting though how is that? And how did you get into it?
I completely understand the need for affordability. My favorite map is actually an old school map from the 50s that's about 6 feet by 4 feet that I picked up at a thrift store for 35 dollars. The teacher who had it marked different paths and locations and we've debated the meaning for years (though I'm pretty confident we figured it out early on). Also the equator is 2/3rd of the way down, which took an embarrassingly long time to realize, which skews the scale of the northern hemisphere even more than a traditional map.
I had a round about path to mapping but I think it started with a love history and I was originally drawn to maps because I'm from California. On many of the historic maps we are depicted as an island. I loved that. As for my career, I came to mapping in a round about way. I joined an affordable field program for archaeology at my university. I didn't know what I wanted to study but the idea of being in the field seemed fun. I ended up loving it and pursuing it for my degree. That meant I got much more time in the field, which then lead to an opportunity doing underwater archaeology (I was already diving at that point as the university had a pretty prolific scuba program), which lead me to working with sonar, which lead me to working with LiDAR, which is 3D mapping. After college I joined a non-profit that specialized in historic mapping using LiDAR and a slough of other techniques. That got me deeper into remote sensing and broader mapping techniques. For a long while I worked mapping historic places in conflict zones, think the expansion of ISIS or Al Shabab, and after a while I decided what I was doing wasn't helping the folks I wanted to. I ended up pivoting into ecological mapping and it is an even more complex/dynamic version of what I used to do.
Overall, I love it. There are so many parts of our life that are affected by mapping, there are so many ways to develop a map, and there are so many considerations when making one. Everything from what is the purpose of what I'm conveying, to what data inputs will allow me to get to the heart of that question, to what is the distillation that I need to be sharing and how will people access it. It's fun to see those questions reflected in the maps I own and I think that's a big component to what I'm attracted to when looking at new ones.
Wingspan is also one of our current family favourites - we have two expansions for it as well (European and Oceanic) and both are pretty good. I'm hoping that it awakens an enjoyment of worker placement games in my wife, but mostly I think it has awoken an interest in birds, as she has downloaded an app to identify birds from their calls.
What's your favourite Paradox game?
That's a tough one! While I have the most hours in HOI4 (I'm a big fan of the Kaiserreich mod), Stellaris is probably my favorite right now. I think that each Paradox title has something it excels at; HOI4 has arguably the best combat system, Victoria has the most in-depth economic system, and the dynastic system of Crusader Kings is a very unique experience compared to other titles. That said, Stellaris does a lot well of those things well (good combat, fairly interesting economy system, diplomatic system, etc), and I really appreciate the setting for its roleplay opportunities. It also helps that I've had the most success with Stellaris' multiplayer, as I've found EU4 and HOI4 to be rather laggy, so Stellaris is something I play with friends once or twice a month. What's yours?
I think it's probably Cities: Skylines. I never got into CK2, but I imagine it would be right up my alley. I own Stellaris and it's on my list to play, but I got fairly into Elite Dangerous, and it scratched that space-game itch for me a very well, so even though they're not really anything alike, when I started thinking of a space game to play, I'd go to ED instead of Stellaris.
Cities Skylines is just a relaxing experience for me, generally, and I've gotten a fair amount of the expansions through humble bundles, so there's a bit more to it than the base game. That said, it's still fairly simple.
Oh, and there's a special spot in my heart for Surviving Mars, which I enjoyed a fair amount.
Ah, I was just thinking about Paradox grand strategy games, but Cities: Skylines is a good game. I only have the base game and got put off by the amount of DLC, so I didn't get too into it, but I really enjoyed watching Citywokcitywall's Cities Skylines: Mars series on Youtube. Sounds like you'll be excited for Cities Skylines 2 though.
I think one of the things that I like about C:S is that the game on its own is very good, and it doesn't require any of the DLCs, so the DLCs all feel like... actual DLCs, I guess? There's certainly a meme about how now for a lot of games, you need the DLC to make the base game playable, but you don't require anything but the base game for this one. I am excited to see what they do with C:S2.
Been here a while, under a different name, but don't think I ever introduced myself. Website in bio. Will try to balance OpSec with posting info, I suppose.
Live in the US. In my 30s. Linux sysadmin as my day job. (Far-ish) leftist politically. Personal interest in music (both consuming and creating), extreme metal being a big portion of the listening part but not all (love synthwave, synthpop, indie rock/singer-songwriter stuff, etc). Also enjoy loose leaf tea, incense, hot sauce, ranting about technology, playing games. Atheist ex-vangelical (baptist/southern-baptist mostly).
What's your favourite hot sauce and why? Also, same question but tea.
Right at this moment my favorite two hot sauces are:
Favorite tea at the moment:
I love Stickermule's mule sauce. As you said, weirdly good for a sticker company to have a good hot sauce, but it is very tasty. I haven't had the Tabenero, but I also love a good habanero hot sauce. I'm about to bottle a sauce that I've been brewing for a while - jalapeno, scott bonnet, and a bit of peach - so I'm excited to try that and see if it comes together. I like hot sauces of all levels - from quite mild to exceptionally spicy - but one of the prerequisites for me is that it has to actually taste good, and so many of the really stupidly hot hot sauces miss out on that. A notable one is "Da Bomb" which is absolutely terrible - it just tastes terrible, and hurts. The whole point is to taste good!
That sounds like a good tea - I'm not an aficionado at all, but my wife loves tea and we have a huge variety as well, and I'm always looking for good options for her, so thank you for sharing!
Sure! Glad to share about my interests. It's fun. That sauce you're making sounds good. I typically don't do things with peach in them, but in a hot sauce I would probably enjoy it just for some sweetness to balance things out.
I was very surprised by Mule Sauce but it is one I keep going back to. I also agree- taste is king for hot sauces for me. If it challenges me on tolerance or spice level that can be okay if it's delicious. Though, I find long lasting "very hot" sauces to make things harder to taste, and also harder to eat at a reasonable pace- so I usually stick to either low/medium heat sauces or if hot- not long-lasting at least. The 500k SHU sauces that burn and give me 20 minutes of panic are not worth it haha... I've also recently gotten into hot honey (Mike's, Red Clay) and chili/dumpling sauces. I definitely often have cravings for some heat :)
For tea- the loose leaf world is wild. I have tea from a number of different sources. Mountain Tea, Bitterleaf, White2Tea, Yunnan Sourcing, Mei Leaf... all great and at varying prices and inventories (Yunnan Sourcing is intimidating on its own). Another one I love is Turtle Dove from White2Tea- It's a really lovely white tea with a very floral flavor. There's just soooo much tea available- enough that I've bought it way faster than I've drank it, which is why I have a collection built up (oops), I should get back to drinking it heavily again!
I actually originally got the stickermule hot sauce when I ordered stickers to go on the bottles for my homemade hot sauces, which I think is kind of a cute story as well. I haven't successfully made one with peaches before, so I'm excited for this one. I tried early on in my hot sauce making journey to put peaches in with the peppers, and that added way too much sugar to the brine and the resulting mixture was gross and I just threw it out, but I had a really good hot sauce with peach in it once and I'm trying to replicate something similar.
We have the same "problem' with teas; we have so many options, and have a whole upper cupboard in our kitchen that is almost entirely dedicated to storing teas. I guess it's a good problem to have though.
I joined back in 2019 but have been away from Tildes for about 2 years now. Just kinda fell off and forgot about the site after a while. But reddit threatening to screw everything up made me want to look at reddit alternatives again and I remembered this place existed.
I love it here. So much smaller and emphasis on discussion. Hope this place continues to grow.
As for me, I'm from the Boston area in the US. I work in IT consulting and do semi-pro photography on the side. Huge geek - into video games, baseball, some anime, and all things technology. I've got two pet snakes (a boa constrictor and a ball python) and also really love most reptiles.
I'm a software engineer (ex-Amazon), with very similar interests to a lot of people in this thread. Are they called threads here? I hope so. I'm mostly a fantasy and DnD buff, but I lift, go camping, and travel as much as I can. I also hunt and fish when I get the chance. I'm old and getting older, but I'm not dead yet.
I'm here because this feels like reddit back when it started. Quality contribution was the key to a good forum. Similar to many, I've done the Fark → Digg → Reddit → Tildes progression, and from what I've seen so far, I think we all got it right this time.
They're called "topics" but we also have "megathreads," so I don't think anyone's too strict about that bit of terminology :-)
Just don't get us started on what users of Tildes are actually called...
Tilda Swintons?
Tildos?
Tilderinos is just a hilarious word. I'm also not even sure if that's the actual term, but it's still hilarious either way.
I'm glad for the knowledge, thank you. :)
I'm new here. I appreciate the invitation!
Bit about me, into technology, with an affinity for open-source. Also keen on urbanism, cycling (both sport and utility), and motorsport. I love transport technology (or lack of) really.
Welcome! When you say you are keen on urbanism what exactly does that entail? Urban planning, urban design, etc?
Both! The two (planning and design) imho are inseparably linked. For me its the functional implementation and emotional impact of our built environment.
For me the real work needs to happen at the local process and bureaucratic end of the spectrum. The process in which how decisions are made at the local level. I think it's super important we get that right, so the correct outcomes are prioritised. Examples like re-scoping metrics to addressing how we move people and addressing the externalities of those decisions rather than just measuring average car speed, or traffic throughput of an intersection. There's already been great progress around the world, but so much more to do!
Totally get that, just wasn't sure if you meant something else by urbanism. Definitely sounds like an interest we might have in common. I've slowly been reading more and more books on these topics over the past few years and am finding myself wishing I had taken a few classes in urban design when I was in college. Cities are truly among humanity's greatest inventions.
I am Coat. I came here from reddit because this website looks cool. It's a nice, simple, text based website with clean design and I'm here for it.
Some hobbies/interests of mine include: writing, drawing, and mycology
I'm also a compsci student and have more recently becoming interested in topics related to that. I am looking forward to reading any interesting IT articles or papers that I find linked on this site!
Oooh, how does your mycology interest manifest? Ever done any foraging or similar? I’m super interested as well but for me it’s been limited mainly to reading about mushrooms.
I've grown mushrooms from spore prints before and from cloning tissue that I've foraged. I've foraged a few types of easy to identify mushrooms- things like oyster mushrooms, chicken of the woods, and hen of the woods. I've successfully cultivated cultures (that I still have in my fridge lol) from the oyster mushrooms and COTW.
Mushrooms are super easy to cultivate once you know how they work and you have a sterile space to work in. It's amazing to me how you can grab a clean spore print or a clean piece of the fruiting body, put it to agar, and have it grow. It's seriously cool. If you want to see a bunch of really informative write ups I recommend the Shroomery's forums. It's a website mostly meant for the less legal side of growing mushrooms (thus pertaining to mostly dung loving mushrooms), but there's also information about growing and foraging gourmet mushrooms too.
I will have to check it out! Honestly I might try growing some, I think that could be very cool. I recently read this book Entangled Life about fungi more generally that really sparked an interest.
Hi there!
I'm Nydie and also migrated from reddit because I stand by the blog post that we can do better in creating online communities that aren't so subject to corporate greed! I'm an ace-identifying creative who enjoys drawing, 3D modeling, game design, vidjya games, shaking my fist at politicians and prolly spending too much time online (but also enjoy hiking and wish to live in the ocean)
I'm excited to have joined this community and thanks for taking the time to read this! (: You have a great day now, friendly reader!
Hello! I live very close to the ocean currently, and honestly couldn't imagine living anywhere else - it's wonderful. Getting in it more long term might be a little trickier. Regardless, you have good taste!
You seem pretty artsy! How long have you been doing 3d modelling and how'd you get into it? I tried it out a while ago but it didn't quite stick, though I've been interested in trying again lately.
Hi there and thanks! I too live close to the ocean! It’s often a bit too cold to fully swim in tho (makes me miss Puerto Rico and Costa Rica!) but I’m natural born fish and in general can’t seem to stay away from the ocean/water, haha.
I got into 3D modeling in school actually! I’ve always been on the artistic side since I was young; I feel like I’ve dabbled in a little bit of everything; 2D, 3D, Seamstress work, etc, but 3D modeling was definitely a whole new spark! At school we started with Maquette Construction for characters which I think is what helped me stick with 3D modeling, honestly, haha- having to do it the manual way really made me appreciate the digital way, y’know? Although, unfortunately I’m not so much into creation nowadays as I was (mostly on the directing end as my side hustle, but it’s still AMAZING watching the artists/animators grow and hone their skills and I still surprise myself when I have to provide redlining guidance like “Oh hey! I still remember how drawing/animating works!” Lmao)
If you’re interested in trying again though, I typically recommend Blender Guru to folx (: I found their introduction videos to be pretty handy and digestible! (Although admittedly if you’re used to something like Autodesk, Blender isn’t always super intuitive, but like learning any new program just takes time and mucking about!)
Hello, I am also not new, I am actually here since 2019 apparently. I originally came here from a post I found on hacker news while I was super bored at my previous job.
I am a gay guy from the Czech Republic.
I am a programmer, currently working in game dev. I have been making games for quite some time, and game dev is how I got to many of my hobbies. I learned to draw (I am very much not goid at this), make music (I play guitar and also have a lyre I use to make noises sometimes, also I know my way around a DAW), 3D model and probably more random stuff you need when you are making games by yourself. Currently from programming I am most interested in graphics programming which is also what I kind of do for my job.
I am a huge fan of game jams, I participated in Ludum Dare 16 times!
I am also learning Finnish for around 2 years now, but I am also not great at it. Overall I just like learning new things, and I am ok with being bad at stuff.
I am also mostly a lurker on Tildes, I check it quite often, just dont post too much :). I love this small cozy community!
What are you doing for learning to draw? I have started on "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" and it has been helpful. Are there any of your LD games you're comfortable sharing? I'm sure either ~creative or another group would definitely want to check them out.
Drawing is probably the one thing that I have been neglecting the most -- I started trying to learn about 10 years ago, and I had a few months where I was actually trying to improve, but that was quite long ago now. Nowadays I just rarely draw some small things for some of my games, but other than that I am not drawing much. I'd really like to try traditional art media more too, I made a few bad paintings before, definitely would like to do more when I will have more time.
I think I already shared some of my games on Tildes before, I made a few games for Timasomo which I definitely shared. Most of the Ludum Dare games are playable on my LD page (https://ldjam.com/users/tygrak/games), the few that aren't were on the old LD site that that is no longer active so they can be a bit hard to dig up, but they also weren't good at all so it isn't too much of a shame :D.
There actually was a Ludum Dare this weekend, which I of course participated in, if anyone would like to play a weird trippy fractaly game you can do so here https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/53/the-dark-forest-and-a-delivery-through-distant-lands-and-geometric-oddities :D
So you have - in fact, I played all three! I checked out the timeline and that was... only six months ago? It feels like eons. They were fun, and thanks for sharing them.
I'll check out the newest one this evening! Thanks for sharing that too.
bump (since a bunch of new people have joined us due to the recent reddit API changes)
Welcome all. Feel free to introduce yourselves here. No pressure though. :)
Thanks for the invite to what seems to be a refreshingly pleasant online community :). I have never been a busy poster/commenter on reddit or online forums, but love to contribute to conversations when I feel I can add something valuable. I’m sure I’ll find some soon as I stumble around and explore here!
A bit about me - avid motorsport enjoyer (mainly F1, Indycar, IMSA, and WEC), I like to play strategy and racing games, I love to travel, I watch too much YouTube, and I’m a Yooper (someone who lives in or is from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan).
Hello fellow motorsport enthusiast! It's a great time to be a fan, IndyCar has been really exciting and IMSA/WEC have gotten pretty interesting with the introduction of the LMDh cars. I'm hoping to make it up to Road America for a race this season!
We visited the UP last fall for the first time time. Beautiful place, can't wait to go back!
Hello! Agreed, motorsport in general is super exciting atm - there are either tons of technical developments going on, really close racing, or even both in most top flight series. RA is definitely on my bucket list and it’s not far from me. I have F1 in Montreal in a couple weeks to look forward to for now though :)
Glad to hear the UP treated you well!
Hello! I joined tonight after finding out about RIF going away which is pretty much the only way I enjoy reddit.
I am a middle-aged mom of one, married and have two large dogs living within 1.5 hours to the border of Canada.
Somehow I fell into accounting, and currently a senior analyst as a vendor to a large company. I have been doing this for 7 years and enjoy it more than I ever expected. My side project is creating a macro to auto fill my journal entries. I am team xlookup all the way. Started learning SQL.
Lifelong reader of fantasy, sci-fi, horror and fiction. I read Game of Thrones when I picked it up on the discount table in Barnes and Noble.
Hobbies outside of my dogs include sewing, knitting, crocheting, photography, painting in oil and acrylics and occasionally gouache, finding and cooking new wfpb recipes but am mostly vegetarian. I watched too many vampire and zombie shows.
Directly from my bio: aphoenix (he/him). You can find me with this username on reddit and lobste.rs as well. I am a father of three, a husband (of one), a software developer using python & typescript a lot of the time, enthusiastic about games (board games, video games, sports), overweight but fixing it, formerly really into lifting heavy things repeatedly, a beer lover that drinks infrequently, casually into playing sports especially disc golf.
Some more info: I guess I'm in the "old guard". I play a fair amount of music and our house is filled with instruments. I am relearning to love movies and television, thanks in part to some of the discussion here. I frequently put down all social media for days or weeks at a time, so sometimes I disappear for a while. I like building things with my hands, and I like them to be built fairly well. I have played an extensive game of Polkaroo with @cfabbro, since around the mid nineties (we have been to a lot of the same places, sometimes at the same time, for decades, but never met each other).
Edit: I added a couple of minor things to my bio. I love coffee, and drink it frequently. I love cooking, and am the main cook in our house of 5. I like activities that require an amount of dexterity, both of hand and body, so things like speedcubing (3x3 PB is just over 19s which isn't good), juggling (used to be able to juggle 5, but don't practice enough to do so, nor to do anything more complicated than a mills mess), that sort of thing. I am located in Canada.
👍 for the Canadian AF reference.
Speaking of, we had some family friends over a few nights ago and we decided to get takeaway for dinner. They thought Indian sounded good, so we ended up ordering from Rangoli. :P
Since we had guests, we didn't just get all our usual dishes like we normally do, and instead let them pick what they wanted (with some suggestions from us). And am I ever glad we did that because the Boatman's Fish Curry, which I hadn't ever had before, was insanely good! So we will definitely be getting that again in the future. They also wanted the Nali Ghost (lamb shanks), which I didn't eat (since I don't eat red meat anymore), but everyone else said was amazing too. And their samosas are still amongst the best I've ever had. So F'n good, especially with their tamarind sauce.
Next time I go (which is sadly infrequent, as it is a bit of a jaunt from here) I'll suggest those dishes. My in-laws love both fish curry and lamb, so I'm surprised we didn't get that last time we went! I wish there was a fast, good samosa place near here, because this is the third time this week someone has talked about samosas, and I am working up a craving.
Hello!
My username is meant to be aspirational, and I am first a seeker of god.
I’m also a lawyer, currently between gigs, in Raleigh, NC. I moved here from Asheville just before the pandemic, not knowing that it was a prelude to a great personal tragedy. I don’t care fore this place at all, but a lot people seem to think it’s really neat, and a few people are trying to make it into something I might appreciate.
I’m a father of some awesome kids. I like to ride my bikes a lot. I like food and art. I was an attorney for a local occupy group. I am the CEO of antifa.
The three body problem is by far the best scifi I have read in a long time, which isn’t saying a lot because I don’t read much.
I’m still off reddit except for viewing a few favorites on teddit.
I’m probably the oldest person on here. My first computer was a TI 99/4A.
Had a 16 bit ensoniq sound chip with 4 voices.I don’t know where i got this information, but a trip down memory (ahem) lane proved it incorrect. In fact, it had a decent sound chip for the time. Also a beefy 16 bit cpu that was severely hampered by a kludge 8 bit bus and slow ram. Still a great little computer with a defender clone called parsec that was good times.This made me actually laugh out loud.
It’s expensive and jobs are not that plentiful. But I miss it every day and twice on Sundays. Ih the food! And weirdos!
A few weeks ago on a visit my daughter spotted a guybwearing a sandwhichboard that said “need weed. Will sing naked for $20. Clothes on for $25.”
Wait, what? Are you joking or is that a thing?
If I remember correctly, over some friends' house I once wrote a program in Basic on an Ti-99 to play "The Entertainer." There was no way of saving the program, though.
Sup nerds? I'm yet another one of the older guard dropping in to talk to the new folks. I was previously in a call center tech support environment but I'm currently in Autonomous Vehicle Testing through some random quirk of fate, and trying to work on a comic book with my brother where we would love to get around to it if either of us had the time.
Hello!
I just joined Tildes today after Reddit decided to commit seppuku. Seems cool so far.
I'm a 25-year-old from Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. I like linguistics, writing, and taking care of my disabled doggo. I'm also an unabashed furry, my sona is a big orange crocodile :3
I like to play Age of Empires II and Left 4 Dead 2, if you're into those please ask for my steam name! I'd love to make new friends.
Hi all. Also here as part of the, dare I say, incumbent Reddit exodus.
Not had a chance to look around yet but I like the idea of an intros round so why not.
I work in IT and am currently engaged as a senior infrastructure engineer looking after domain services for a very exciting client.
As far as I'm aware I am native to planet earth and enjoy many earthly things such as food, music, nature, video games and books. Currently reading the Wheel of Time novels which are far better than the 4 minutes I watched of the Amazon show.
As I said I work in IT and like to stay abreast of trends in the digital community, including security, privacy and the progressing prominence of dark patterns present in everyday apps and services, which make it difficult for people to comfortably and safely enjoy content, or even simply navigate the web, and easier for large companies and organisations to trick people into giving away data they might not normally consent to sharing, or performing in activities they wouldn't normally engage in, or unwillingly support systems that otherwise impact the modern web experience for everyday people.
Clearly, this Reddit announcement has irked me more than I thought.
But I digress, aside from all that I'm also a latent musician having previously played both guitar and drums, but unfortunately I'm well out of practice with both. Maybe one day I'll get serious about it again.
Excited to be part of this community, thank you for your time.
Hey everyone - longtime Reddit user and have been watching it shift with the tides of capitalism so I thought I'd check this place out. Interests - horror, games (video and board), politics. I write short fiction and have a few opinions.
Dunno if this thread is still current, it's my first day here after all, but...
Hi! I do security and programming and stuff. Am into OpenStreetMapping and care about climate change among other things obviously. Slowly becoming more of a space nerd.
Something to ask me: what's a cool thing my phone can do that I never thought of? And why do we send atomic clocks on time travelling journeys? (Also feel free to answer them yourself and I'll rate your answer :D)
Something to tell me: why is it so hard to finish and put a bow tie on side projects?
I'll bite, whats a cool thing my phone can do that I never thought of?
Not all devices have a barometer, but if you do, you can use it to measure the height of stuff. The app Phyphox lets you access most of the sensors in the device and has a few tools such as the "elevator" tool that measures the change in elevation based on air pressure, meant to be used with an elevator of course but it works reasonably well to measure the height of a room by just holding your phone at the top and bottom. There's some error, it was never made for this, but I was rather surprised that it's accurate to about +/-10cm.
A thing that more devices can do is measuring acceleration at a relatively high rate. By doing a fourier transform, also built into Phyphox and called "acceleration spectrum", you can see at what rate something is vibrating. Depending on the vehicle (e.g. a bus), you can see the RPM value this way as a passenger. Even 2000rpm is only a few revolutions per second (~33) and most sensors' rate goes at least to 50 Hz. An outside-the-box application of this would be to use an old phone that feels whether the washing machine is still spinning or if it's done and sends you a notification.
The magnetometer is meant to be used as compass, but can just as well detect metal objects. Finding cables in walls is better done with more sensitive equipment, but as a casual check while brainstorming so you don't have to go out and buy another device, it can work pretty well. For a similar purpose, it can work as a spirit level, but this is more well-known I think.
The things we carry with us nowadays have quite a lot of fun sensors imo :)
Great rec on that app! I am going to check it out and see what my phone can do. Very cool.
I grew up in Siberia. My parents were missionaries there. Now I live in Texas (moving to North Carolina soon). I do software engineering for a company that provides payroll services to people on Medicaid. I enjoy making beautiful, functional interactive websites.
I am thinking about retiring this username, but I haven't come up with a replacement for it yet. Its intent was to represent fighting for things to get better. Now there are actual people who believe God has empowered them to violently turn America into a theocracy; I find that abhorrent, and it makes me like my username less. These days I'm increasingly agnostic. I guess I don't know who I am anymore, and that makes picking a username hard.
I love interactive storytelling, especially video games and tabletop RPGs. I love the Mass Effect games--they have flaws, but they have massive scope and ambition, memorable characters, and great gameplay. I'm excited to see what AI can lend to this art form.
One of my favorite hobbies is reading books to my wife. We're both enjoying LitRPGs (stories set in game-like settings); the best one we've found is called Dungeon Crawler Carl, which has really fun characters and big Burn It All Down energy. My favorite book series are the Dresden Files and the Stormlight Archive.
The future is increasingly uncertain, but uncertainty holds the potential for good surprises as well as bad. While remaining accountable to reality, I try my best to remain hopeful and positive in the face of uncertainty and to help what I can, where I can.
How do y'all decide on a good username? What rubric do you use?
I used a nickname a classmate gave to me when he heard what my name translate to in his language. I like it because:
I don't know about good, but my username was born of my arrogant youth, and my ability in first person shooters amongst my friends. Probably not the best basis for a name, but I kinda can't be bothered changing it.
I didn't attribute any theology themes to your name if that helps!
It does, thank you!
FWIW I did not parse your username as being remotely related to real world theocratic groups; my guess was that it was related solidly to gaming in some way. Alas, I will be no help in the "select a username" discussion, as this was chosen for me.
What's your favourite tabletop RPG? I mean either - in general, ie. is there a system you like in particular, or more specifically is there a game you have been part of that you particularly enjoyed.
Thank you! That's very reassuring.
My favorite RPG is called Lancer. 11,000 years in the future humanity has finally gotten its shit together and is working on building a galactic utopia. This is hampered by the tyrants and corprostates that want to rule their own little fiefdoms instead of letting people be free. Player characters resolve problems by fighting in giant mechs. Also there are AIs from outside of causality; some of them are friendly but all of them are deeply weird.
My favorite campaign that I've been in was set in a magical version of the Roman Empire. We have extremely detailed records of the Roman Empire, so whenever we had a question about how an area was laid out or what were the trade winds on a particular date, the DM could just look it up. Our party discovered a damaged Atlantean flying ship, put it back together, woke up the onboard AI, and made it our flagship. We just wrapped up the campaign by traveling to the Far Realm (after getting a space dragon to generate a bubble of realspace that would travel with us) and killing the eldritch abomination that had been our archnemesis for the entire campaign.
Lancer! Are you going to try the author's ICON playtest?
And hey congrats on finishing a campaign.
I doubt I will find the time for it, although I read through the playtest docs and it looks like fun! I wish much success to the Massif team.
I just recently helped kickstart In Golden Flame, which is proving to be a great read, and Lancer Tactics, which I'm looking forward to as a single-player experience.
Hey all! Electrical engineer here working mostly with machine vision hardware these days, but did software in a former life. Always on the lookout for a new career path.
Too many hobbies at the moment, but the highlights are woodworking, mountain biking, photography, and sim racing. Also trying to teach myself German - slowly making progress!
Loving the site so far! Looking forward to meeting more of you!
Hello everyone!
Been on Reddit for years, but with their recent burst of incredibly poor decision-making, I'm expanding my horizons to new communities. Thanks for the invite to Tildes!
I'm afraid to admit, but I've been around long enough to see how social media has progressed over the years, from places like Digg, Slashdot and Fark, all the way back to Usenet and (dare I say) Fidonet! After the recent hijinks on the part of Reddit, Twitter and the like, I was getting a bit saddened over the state things on the Internet in recent times, but looking around here has raised my hopes a bit on what lies ahead.
As for myself, I'm a 50ish year old IT professional living on the Front Range of Colorado. I've got many interests that keep me busy, including retro-gaming and computers, amateur radio, and I'm also an amateur voice actor. While I enjoy things digital (both old and new), I also have a fascination for the analog as well (fountain pens, pencils, paper... you know, "old-school" tech).
Looking forward to meeting folks here and watching the community grow! It's been a while since I've strayed from mainstream social media, and it's exciting to see the early days of a place like this!
Hi go go by gopher on the internet, came here from reddit, I like metal detecting and coin roll hunting, used to be into Free Software until I got my first phone 2 years ago, now I can't even remember the last time I used my computer, lol I have DWM on Debian, I can't even remember how to use it all the shortcuts left my brain
Checking out this site because reddit nuking the API and my infinity app will stop working
Greetings all. I've been wondering around on Digg way back when and Reddit more recently where I prefer to read interesting commentary about all the various things that are happening around the world. Strange enough, I do not have an account with Slashdot even though I read what is on there on a near daily basis. Being one that reads most of the time, I still can write a long winded comment or two if I feel that my comments would be of assistance.
The commentary on various topics can teach me a thing or two or give me a new "rabbit hole" bit of research that I can embark upon. Communities that encourage high value commentary are usually of great interest to me.
(I tend to read things such as Star Trek books or random nonsense such as SCP articles just to pass the time. The only flaw with passing time in that way is that I tend to read rather quickly. That makes reading a book take a rather short amount of time...)
To focus on another interesting aspect of this place, the user interface of the site should be something that works well for me in regards to everybody communicating with text. As such, the older Reddit interface works well enough and alternative Reddit clients (such as Reddit Is Fun) works well for that end too. With Reddit potentially killing off those alternative clients, I find that there isn't a good way to read Reddit content on my phone. Certain sites (like TV Tropes) work well in a phone's browser and this is also true for Tildes. I can read a bit of what is going on no matter if I am at my main PC or out and about on my phone.
I'm glad places such as this exist. I don't desire that places such as this replace anywhere else since I would rather prefer that many great places exist instead of only a few. I'm thankful that I was sent an invite to this site and I look forward to reading many more interesting things here.
Hello all, I'm also part of the recent reddit exodus. I had heard about tildes before but never knew how to get an invite, so I'm really grateful for one now!
I'm from India and currently work as a senior engineer in a niche IT field for one of the global tech giants. I love the work I do and my interests outside of work are in playing and watching cricket, adding games to my steam library (that I will definitely get to), listening to rock music and catching up on the latest action thriller comedy in theatres.
I'm new here, hope I'm not late to the party!
My interests are mostly in video games, writing, programming, and the New York Mets, but I am really interested in learning about what other people like and why and hopefully get a new hobby out it.
Hello and yes, I'm another Reddit migrant, don't mind me. I've been waiting for a reason to jump ship and the opportunity presented itself. I'm not very good at these presentation things, but I'll try:
I'm into computers and technology in general,
I'm a certified RomeabooI enjoy reading about ancient and medieval history as a hobby, I'm a big Metalhead and I like my Metal very proggy and experimental, I'm also into vidya and the occasional anime/manga as well.I hope I can find some decent discussion here and maybe even learn a few new things!
Romeaboo got a good chuckle out of me. Kingdom, Republic, Empire? Western or Eastern? I'm more of a Byzantine Empire fan, but not a lot of history videos or documentaries focus on it. It's not sexy enough, I guess. :(
Also, welcome to Tildes. :)
Hey, thanks for inviting me actually!
And if I'm being honest I'm very into the Republic period, people are usually more into the Empire because of how grandiose it is, but I find fascinating the path of Rome from small city state into Mediterranean superpower, especially the first Punic War as Rome's first foray outside of the Italian peninsula.
Byzantine history though is something I need to read more about, there's a lot there I'm not very familiar with and it seems very interesting, especially as a conclusion to the whole story!
YVW! And yeah, I like the Republic period as well. But unfortunately the Roman Empire gets shown the most love. It's hard to find good media focused on the Republic (other than those focused on Julius Caesar's rise), and there is almost nothing after the fall of the Western Empire. What I wouldn't give for a Hollywood movie focused on the first (or second) Siege of Constantinople, or the Varangian Guard (Norsemen who served as the Elite bodyguards of the Byzantine emperors... which I think would make for an awesome movie!). :P
JARR - Just Another Reddit Refugee
My Reddit account is over 13 years old and saw someone mention Tildes as an alternative after Reddit's latest BS. I haven’t joined any other alternatives since they just didn’t seem like they clicked for me, but Tildes did. I like the more old school forum vibe but with some Reddit-esque as well. Plus a built in Dracula theme?
I love baseball, chess, metal, horror movies, PlayStation, and cats. About to move across country next month and super anxious!
Happy to be here and thank you for having me.
Hello everyone!
I am a reddit refugee. It's strange to think that I first got on there over a decade ago.
I'm interested in tech/science-related topics, and that's what I primarily read about on Reddit. I also like to learn about politics/humanities and I love music, especially punk.
I've been into gaming since I was child. I was hooked on single player games, like Half-Life and Paper Mario. Nowadays, I'm usually playing co-op/multiplayer games with my friends if I have the time.
The last few years I've been trying to branch out and get into fitness/health. I have been running, biking, or doing very long walks when I can.
I'm really glad to have found this place. I agree with the ideas that are behind Tildes and how it fosters discussion.
Hi, I'm Aaron. I'm a late 30s tech worker living in Southern California; I'm a pretty vanilla dude, really -- married, with a baby on the way. House with a lot of weeds in the back yard.
I came here from Reddit, which I've been on for like 13 years. I'm trying to pretend this is not a rebound site, but its own thing that I won't compare to the old site. Breakups are hard!
I'm into bike riding, hiking, scuba, game development (I've been heavily committed to making a multiplayer game out of Conway's Game of Life since 2016), hard science fiction, and looking up random stuff on Wikipedia.
I've been lurking since the beginning but getting back into posting a little more. These days I'm a combustion engineer researching biofuels. Interested in all things self hosting, automation and machine learning. Also very into ttrpgs and boardgames.
I am trying to get into self hosting as well! I am a software developer but trying to learn all about transcoding, and networking that goes into it is about to make my head explode. In a good way haha.
I've very much been feeling the same as regards head exploding what with migrating this weekend to a proper docker unraid setup from just using Ubuntu server on an old pc.
What's your favourite boardgame? We're currently into Wingspan a lot (my family tends to pick one game and play it to death), but my son has just gotten to the point that we can play games with writing components, so we've been enjoying Hot Seat which is a simple party game, but tons of fun.
Just spotted I somehow overlooked replying to this. I've been enjoying the classics like risk recently and well as quicker games like Carcassonne and battle sheep (which has surprising depth the more you play).
Hot seat looks like good fun. How have you found adjusting it to a family setting?
We had no problems playing it in a family setting. There may have been a card or two that my son didn't know how to answer, but we just had him pick a new one, and for the most part the kids can just play and it's lots of fun.
I'm not so much a Reddit refugee because I deleted my account there a few years ago. I still lurk a little bit but there's not much to engage me anymore. I was interested in Tildes because, as many others have said, it feels like Reddit used to be. Good conversation and nobody being a dick.
I work in IT and am a Sr Manager for a multi national in the EU, but it's functional rather than technical role. I like AC/DC if you hadn't guessed 🙂. I have an eclectic music mix though - from Abba to ZZTop and all sorts in between.
A bit of cycling, a bit of gaming and enjoying life.
Hi all!
Wanted to send a brief hello as my first message here. Hello!
I’m here as I was looking for alternatives to Reddit given all that’s gone on there. An Apollo user myself, I feel put out by recent developments so figured I’d see what else is out there. Came across here, Lemmy and kbin as the options that seemed most worth checking out. So far seeing a number of topics here that catch my fancy, and looking to participate in those over time.
As a super brief background besides that arrival story. I’m a father of four (most recent being twins) living in Australia working in IT for state government. Graduated with a software engineering degree around 15 years ago but now days my careers taken me more into systems admin, management, architecture etc. Still love to dabble in a bit of code here and there though.
In terms of hobbies/interests, I’m into F1 (see a front page article for that right now) and video games (Tears of the Kingdom has my attention right now. Before that it was the Resident Evil 4 remake). Also an on and off again tinkerer when it comes to my Home Assistant home automation setup. Also enjoy movies.
Along with the 4 children we have 3 cats, 6 chickens and 5 ducks.
Anyway, intending to post more. Got my invite today and been a bit busy, but wanted to get an initial first post out of the way and to introduce myself here.
Greetings everyone,
Very new here and consider myself a refugee from reddit. Like most here I wanted to find a community where I can have civil intellectual conversations with people. So far I'm loving it here!
I am a lover of dogs, fishing, camping, nature - all that stuff. I dabble in electronics mainly through an unhealthy ebay habit where I buy junk, mess around with it and eventually give it away or sell it at a loss.
I am currently obsessed with history from the 1300s, having a background in criminal justice I find crime and punishment from that time period both fascinating and horrifying. I just finished up a book on executioners and moved on to a book on the German criminal justice system.
I also like to watch and listen to true crime shows/podcasts and my favorite podcast right now is "Morbid"
Wasn't me. I'm totally not totallynotcfabbro on reddit. Nope, nosiree, that's some other person! ;)
Welcome told Tildes. Also, hello fellow M:TG nerd. I've been playing for close to 30 years now. I used to own a black lotus and a full set of moxes. All my original alpha/beta cards have been gradually sold over the years though, but I still have all my 3E dual lands! Impressed yet? /bragging :P