its_me_xiphos
@its_me_xiphos@beehaw.org
- Comment on There's never been an easier time to boycott Microsoft, the most boring video game publisher in the business 1 week ago:
Thanks!
- Comment on There's never been an easier time to boycott Microsoft, the most boring video game publisher in the business 1 week ago:
Thanks. Its hard to find good video game journalism at all.
- Comment on Your Search Results Are Getting Sloptimized: How companies are gaming the chatbot internet 1 week ago:
I do miss the internet of the early 2000s.
- Comment on Electric cars are starting to take over the world 1 week ago:
Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good!
Cars suck. Huge cars suck more. But without the biking infrastructure and culture of, say, the Dutch, it’ll be hard to get people in small cities, suburban, and rural areas off cars.
I went from a bolt EV with a 108 mile commute across Oregon to a bike in the Netherlands. Didn’t touch a car for a year. I could get everywhere by bike, carried my Xmas tree home via bike, and even on rural rides the culture and rules mean cars wait and work around you. Its incredible.
You can not hope to replace cars until bikes are the cultural, social, and urban planning focus of private transportation.
- Comment on AI Data Centers’ Water Consumption Breaks 264 Billion Gallons in 2025 as Devastating Drought Hits Nearly 63% of U.S. 1 week ago:
I thought that myself and honestly I don’t know.
- Comment on AI Data Centers’ Water Consumption Breaks 264 Billion Gallons in 2025 as Devastating Drought Hits Nearly 63% of U.S. 1 week ago:
Love what you did here…but I don’t think the same logic applies to data centers.
- Comment on A new MMO announcement is more exciting than all the other SGF news combined: Thanks, Guild Wars 3. 1 week ago:
Never played GW or GW2. Maybe I’ll hop onto this just for something new.
- Comment on AI Data Centers’ Water Consumption Breaks 264 Billion Gallons in 2025 as Devastating Drought Hits Nearly 63% of U.S. 1 week ago:
Of course! Thanks for asking for clarification.
- Comment on AI Data Centers’ Water Consumption Breaks 264 Billion Gallons in 2025 as Devastating Drought Hits Nearly 63% of U.S. 1 week ago:
Let’s go to the Dalles in lovely Oregon. There is a Google data center there that draws water from the public supplies. It draws so much in a day, that at times the need for water in the whole community outstrips the ability of infrastructure to supply water. So people in the area see their water slow or cease altogether. The water is drawn so fast and in such amounts, wells dry up as the water table drops.
Water does eventually evaporate or get discharged from said data center, but its not like adding it in is an instantaneous event. It also doesn’t reenter the same system. Like picking up flour and trying to drop it back in the bag. Some ends up on your counter.
The data center in the Dalles is one hell of a story, too, for reason beyond that.
- Comment on GOG apologizes for emailing Nazi runes to its followers 1 week ago:
What…what the hell?
On further research, I had no idea CD Projekt Red sold GoG Games. CD Projekt sold GOG to its original co-founder, Michał Kiciński, in December 2025 for approximately $25.2 million. I’m downloading what I bought over the years and closing my account.
- Comment on Cloudflare CEO says bot internet traffic has overtaken humans 2 weeks ago:
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I2P doesn’t seem to fill the void. I think what is missing from that is the “norm” of the old internet. The internet was a playground with tons of hobby projects and experiments in its earlier days. I don’t see TOR, I2P, etc, building the same playground because the novelty and ease of access can’t be replicated.
- Comment on Cloudflare CEO says bot internet traffic has overtaken humans 2 weeks ago:
Bots are, essentially, a virus. We are at the point now where they are killing the host. That is if they haven’t already moved us to the point of no return.
A new internet isn’t going to happen. We are stuck with the anonymous rage inducing or monetization system that took over because the systems of power let it.
- Comment on Cloudflare CEO says bot internet traffic has overtaken humans 2 weeks ago:
AI customer service bots, which I know are soulless firewalls really more than helpers, are beyond frustrating.
- Comment on The Dead Economy Theory 2 weeks ago:
They don’t care. They also are not stupid. Its both part of their upbringing and their character. But more importantly their entire moral, ethical, religious, and societal compass is pointed to “reap it all.”
They’ve been educated and had short term reinforced since they were in Pampers. “Short term profits,” “Can’t take it with you,” “yolo,” and other varieties of get it while you can. There’s also continued moral and religious approval for this behavior. Hell, they manufacture systems of approval when they can’t find it out in the world already. Thiel is masterful at this self deception.
Take for instance altruism. You had that altruism movement (the crypto bros went fill tilt on that, name escapes me at the moment) now its the “school moral ambition.” Its like Nietzsche’s worst philosophical nightmare come to bear. Doing good at the end of your life makes up for being a total nightmare during it. Make as much as you can as fast as you can so you can give a pittance back. That’s one style of justification the ultra rich like Gates give us.
The entire institution of contemporary wealth is both a mentality and world view. That’s hard to counter.
- Comment on The Dead Economy Theory 2 weeks ago:
There are people who want violence. They relish in it because of the power. War, economic, domestic, people exist that want violence.
Look, I strive for peace because I’ve seen war. But the kind of violence being perpetrated on people, nature, and general “good” is well funded, unrestrained, and unrelenting. It’s beyond a war in the conventional sense. I believe more people are looking to meet that violence with violence because its the only option left.
- Comment on A Witcher Expansion? In 2026? 3 weeks ago:
Gotta keep it alive since Netflix is actively trying to kill it.
Joking aside, great to see a game like this get new content.
- Comment on Students Are Learning Less and Getting Higher Grades Because of AI, Study Finds 5 weeks ago:
Former professor here!
Students these days are fucked. Professors are fucked too. I’ll keep this brief and give you three quick observations:
- US, Canadian, and UK students are increasingly under pressure to pay more for everything. When you need to choose between working to pay rent and studying, you outsource to AI. Student athletes are, by far, the worst due to the exploitation opportunity athletics programs view them as. Practice more, study less, shop it to AI.
- Student evaluations caused me more pain than anything else. I won a student curated Teacher of the Year award at my university. I’m good at teaching and love it. My student evals were from the ones that got bad grades. Those students spent more time challenging a C or below than actually studying. I know other professors grade inflate just to avoid bad evals and lost time. The eval system needs reform.
- The rapidity in the decline in critical thinking, writing, and problem solving skills is shocking. One moment that sticks with me was when a student insisted Flint, MI didn’t have a water problem but a political leadership problem. OK, fair, explain. They just stared at their laptop blankly. Started typing. Read a chatgpt response. That stuck with me. They probably heard a talking point or used AI for their question and had zero understanding of the situation at all.
- Comment on The Internet has no benches: on building free public infrastructure for enjoyment 5 weeks ago:
Neocities.org is.mynnew favorite surfing the web activity.
- Comment on The AI Backlash Could Get Very Ugly 5 weeks ago:
I have an internal morality, economy, and democracy check:
Does Steve Bannon, Steve Miller, or Russell Vought think it’s a good idea? If yes, it’s terrible and will hurt everything and everyone but them.
- Comment on Android is getting a big AI overhaul in 2026 5 weeks ago:
I will buy a used Pixel for this from a third party.
- Comment on Android is getting a big AI overhaul in 2026 5 weeks ago:
This coincides with my former university pushing a very biased survey on how we will use AI! Coincidence? Yes.
But seriously, fuck this noise. Killing our brains, our environment, and our privacy.
- Comment on Weekly “What are you playing” Thread || Week of May 10th 5 weeks ago:
Windrose but I’m hitting the “this got repetitive fast” stage and am starting to return to my classic RPGs. I’ve fired up an oldie but a goodie from the glory days of Bioware - Dragon Age: Origins. Dark high fantasy RPG. Absolutely loved it when it came out and I’m revisiting it. Its a little wonky compared to similar contemporary games like BG3 but oh so much fun.
“Enchantment? Enchantment!”
- Comment on ‘Close to zero impact’: US study casts doubt on effect of phone ban in schools 1 month ago:
That is an excellent breakdown. I’m glad I’m not the only one noticing these posts. Poor data analysis being published or claims taken at face value.
I interacted with the Guardian editorial team once in the UK. I had a dataset on academic censoring and we were focusing on sharing the qualitative responses. All seemed on the up and up but we never moved forward for a variety of reasons with the story. Editors and the journalist were great. Tough questions, good insight, etc. Seemed like a good outlet. But that was earlier 2025 and in less than a year, I read that trash we are discussing.
- Comment on ‘Close to zero impact’: US study casts doubt on effect of phone ban in schools 1 month ago:
This paper is of the same caliber as all of those cigarettes are safe papers from the 70s. Funded propganada with a PR firm plying it to a willing news source.
As an aside, is the Guardian becoming a shit rag? Lately (last year or two) I’ve noticed a huge dip in their quality.
- Comment on ChatGPT’s latest stylistic quirk is sinister, infuriating – and absolutely everywhere 1 month ago:
When I’m tired this is my shortcut. I usually edit them out in drafts but miss a few in my substack posts. I am more machine now than man I guess.
- Comment on ChatGPT’s latest stylistic quirk is sinister, infuriating – and absolutely everywhere 2 months ago:
Nailed it.
- Comment on The blue light from your phone isn't ruining your sleep 2 months ago:
You, dear user, are my spirit animal now.
- Comment on Used EV sales spike alongside gas prices 2 months ago:
No worries. 39,000 CAD.
- Comment on Used EV sales spike alongside gas prices 2 months ago:
Got a Chevy Bolt used with a battery replacement after their warranty debacle. They had a glut of them due to that. Never looked back. It got me, realistically, 200+ miles of range. I never had a problem. No mechnical, no range issues, nothing. I’ve never had a flawless car experience.
If you have the ability to charge at home or reliably at work, get an EV. There is nothing to fear.
- Comment on US tech firm Oracle cuts thousands of jobs as it steps up AI spending 2 months ago:
Hopefully he can dock in the UAE and use AI to repair the crater that was a data center.