bryndos

@bryndos@fedia.io

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Would it be unnecessary or annoying if I put "boycott israel" post it note on a sodastream at Lidl?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  Not even when they're used in pointless work meetings by cluless fuck-wits to trying to innovate new and exciting ways to break (sorry "disrupt") established workflows?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨suspension⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Don't worry about it , there's no joke/meme here; this is just pointing out that mathematicians sometime use words, and often struggle to have a good sense of humour.

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suspension_(topology)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When did the world change to the so called hashtag? When I was younger it was only the pound sign. So hashtag Taylor Swift still reads in my mind pound Taylor Swift?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Yes, probably just style then. Thinking about the context it has to be angled one way or another in sheet music just for clarity against the lines of the staff.

  It'd be interesting to know whether it was used first in sheet music, or otherwise.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When did the world change to the so called hashtag? When I was younger it was only the pound sign. So hashtag Taylor Swift still reads in my mind pound Taylor Swift?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I don't know if this is a new development to differentiate or just a style thing.
  But I think sharp in music is usually slanted up ♯.
  Rather than horizontal #.

  C# in computers is just perverse.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When did the world change to the so called hashtag? When I was younger it was only the pound sign. So hashtag Taylor Swift still reads in my mind pound Taylor Swift?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  "#!" was also used as shorthand for "crunchbang linux".

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If you were in Jail would you stick withe bible or be interest in other religions?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Get the biggest one for emergency toilet paper.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When did programming become "coding"?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Yep. I'm sure its fine in small competent teams with a workflow that they're comfortable with.

  But any large organisation I've worked in involves clueless middle managers and teams with some people who really should move on. Agile seems to make incompetence of managers less obvious, and makes them less accountable. Seems to remove control over both the workflow, cost base and the quality of product/service.

  It also gives them this great universal technique for problem solving.
  "We found that Task X is not being done right" . OK we'll write a job title "X doer". Appoint person who doesn't really know what X is, but neither does the interviewer. Make this person go to 'stand ups' and assign them some jiras. 3 months later, they wonder why X is still not being done and why their new hire left already.

  The root cause for sure is incompetent management not the methods. But their project method seems to protect them and impair actual improvement.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When did programming become "coding"?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I think I noticed it widespread in the mid 2010s.
  Maybe around the same time that DIY and various hobby/handicrafts became just "making".

  I still remember when I bought a tool off someone and was chatting about what i was going to do with it and they declared out of the blue:
  "I am a maker!".
  I just had to end the conversation as quickly and politely as possible. I don't know what the point of that statement was, but it made them sound a bit unhinged.

  That said I'm sure the term coding was in use before, but more like a sub-activity that 'computer programmers' or 'software engineers' might do as part of their job. Maybe 'coder' and 'coding' became more popular with the spread of the term 'agile' into the bullshitting-consultant / middle-management cultures; I think that's when some people started using that term as an excuse for skipping 'design' and 'engineering' parts of any complex project.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Australians banned social media. Now they are worried about teenagers going outside with e-bikes⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  if you don't institute battle royal, you'll pretty soon end up with mad max.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Australians banned social media. Now they are worried about teenagers going outside with e-bikes⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Should maybe be the Toecutter in Oz.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Bonobos can "play pretend"⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  in an omni-blind trial. Everyone is blindfolded including the donkey.
  Donkey is wearing protective synthetic skin except at the right spot.
  It'll let you know.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Bonobos can "play pretend"⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Maybe test if they can play pin the tail on the donkey?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What's with companies naming things "MyNoun"?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  First time I remember it was windows 95 with 'my computer' and 'my documents'.
  So I'm blaming them. Hated it immediately, more for the spaces in dir names for how it screwed up dos syntax.
  "C:\Progra~1"

  Then again I didn't use internet until after I had win 95 (win98 maybe) so maybe they did steal it from internet.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The NLP Paper Experience⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Even samsung doesn't have enough ram to make a LLM as big as your large-large-momma.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If I hear "% is a mathematical operator" one more time...⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  5 % 2 = 1

  Freaking hell even ddg search gives that answer.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How can I find out what graphics card upgrade is compatible with my system?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  If you can identify the specific model of your graphics card and motherboard as accurately as possible that'll help. I'd guess 900 series has a wide variation in power use and performance.

  In linux you'd be able to go into shell and run
  lspci |grep -i vga
  or
  lspci |grep -i nvidia

  In this case lspci is a command to " list pci devices"
  On it's own that might give you a long list of sound, usb, network etc devices, so we "pipe" the output using '|' into the grep command. grep will filter by text pattern.
  the '-i' makes it case insensitive search and 'vga' or 'invidia' is the sequence of characters to filter by.

  Alternatively most desktop environments will have a gui option like "info centre" in kde.
  Windows will probably have something too if you only have that, unless the'yre replaced it with coprolite trying to guess the answer.

  For motherboard and PSU (power supply unit) you might need to open it up and look for labels or text on manufacturer and model.
  For the motherboard, you really just need to know what type of pci it has but getting the manual online will be best.

  For the PSU you need to know power rating in Watts and maybe "efficiency rating" usually as some metallic rating like gold, silver, bronze. The manufacturer helps determine how reliable the ratings are.

  If you go inside you may want a torch, a compressed air can, a dust mask, to be outside. and/or a gentle vacuum cleaner (with a mesh or filter or tissue over the end just in case). or duster or toothbrush or something. If you've a nice clean environment that may all be no big deal, but if you have household dust, there can be a lot of build up in there over 12 years. Best not to breathe too much of that in.

  To learn more there are loads of webshites and videos. I'd search for terms like "diy build pc ".
  try to focus on low power or low to mid price to avoid lots of crap top end bullshit.
  Look at some from back in the day. they should go step by step through components, and how they are installed and connected.

  I'd say try explainingcomputers.com - this is both webpage and links to youtube.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is Valve being sued for almost $900 million, but Epic Games wasn't sued when they bought Rocket League and Fall Guys to remove them from steam?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  UK law basically doesn't use the term.

  My point was that proving dominance and abuse is rarely objective fact. It sure isn't showing market share and that some games companies go out of business. They have to show the things that valve does to restrict competition - being popular isn't enough alone.

  Your last question is quite a good example of how hard it is to prove because it includes counterfactual comparisons.

  This might be why it seems (if the journo is to be believed) that they're going down the tie-ins angle for the DLC, not necessarily headline pricing. Thou the latter would probably a worse outcome for valve if guilty.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is Valve being sued for almost $900 million, but Epic Games wasn't sued when they bought Rocket League and Fall Guys to remove them from steam?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  There are not many objectively provable monopolies and i doubt that English law would support that claim without extremely strong evidence, generally utilities are the only ones that'd get close. A necessity with high fixed costs and infrastructure lock-in.

  Steam has high market share in a segment, but not necessarily a distinct segment, I'm sure steam would argue that there are enough consumers who can and do substitute between pc and console and mobile, as well as other vendors so that their market power is mitigated by a fair amount of consumer mobility.

  So what you're looking to prove is unlikely to be a pure "monopoly" but 'excess market power', and 'abuse of market power'. That is a complex legal art that the competition regulator is usually not that successful at proving, at least in English law.

  Abuse of market power has to impact consumers not producers. There are always marginal producers struggling to make a profit - that happens in competitive markets, producers bidding prices down, some going out of business. I'm not saying I agree, but that's more or less how the law sees it, lookup what they let supermarkets get away with in contracts with farmers.

  To show consumer harm from upstream market manipulation you'd probably have to show a material dearth of choice being created by steam policies in order to jack up prices. Maybe that can be demonstrated, but it's not simple and more likely to come down to subjective interpretation of the arguments and evidence from both sides rather than any unarguable objective truth.

  If it were unarguable or objectively true then the CMA might lead the investigation itself instead of this being a private action. Though maybe this is too small a market for them to worry about.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Looking for a European news service⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I think Europe is about the location of seas, oceans and plate boundaries.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Looking for a European news service⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Downvote for BBC - state propaganda/MI6 vehicle.
  And generally just shit journalism.
  Grauniad is pretty shite too - the crossword is ok.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  00 on cheques . That normally has a line connecting at the top, that's the only one I can think of.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Because seven ate nine.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is it possible that the rich are so rich that they have created inflation?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Yes, not necessarily "because" they hold wealth, but as a consequence of how they got there. It's more of a symptom. Although collateral makes it easier to borrow from a bank, and banks create money supply, thus creating inflation every time they make an investment that wasnt productive. (edit: timing matters here, probably better to say they create general inflationary pressure until their investment becomes productive).

  Any transfer not connected to production can create inflation, especially if they borrow money to do it.

  TBF second hand house purchases do this if transacted for a higher price - and linked to a mortgage. So all property owners are at it to some degree - unless there is price regulation , rent control, or sufficient social housing to prevent housing congestion.

  Same is true for amassing market power in other markets where you do it to extract supernormal profits rather than increase production.
  Simple example would be to monopolise a product - a rational monopolist will jack up prices and withhold supply. So long as they're not regulated directly or by a credible threat of market entry and competition.

  Now combine the two, convince a bank to lend you money in order to buy out all your competition and amass excessive market power. Then you've created both money supply driven and product specific inflation. Nice!

  Might as well grift some govt subsidies that don't actually commit you to producing anything whilst you're at it - if govt borrow to do it then you might get some more money supply based inflation.

  If you're effective at this then dumb short sighted investors keep throwing money at you in the hope that you'll keep doing it and give them a slice of your monopoly profits - in fact it might be "short-term" rational to do this - but i suspect / hope that is due to an underestimated risk.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨ASCII characters are not pixels: a deep dive into ASCII rendering⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  (|)

  edit: fuck this, fucking webshite,. its fucking my ascii-arse

  (UNDERSCORE|UNDERSCORE)

  fml

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Penetration⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  TIL Ernest Rutherford discovered the nucleus as a consequence of rage quitting.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Deep Time⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Ditching our thagomizers for the ability to craft giant iron flails.

  Min-maxing to ruin the game for everyone.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Gonna be here a while⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Can i do:
  dd if=/dev/null of=/
  ?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Gehheie88f3nj3-i-odk3j4y8-fff-jej⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  After the generations of repeated offence to the Betelgeusish by earthlings trying to pronounce the native name for their home star, it's probably for the best.

  "I seem to be having this tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle"

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If the 2028 United States presidential election was held today, who would you vote for?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  yep.

  "If you vote for me, all of your wildest dreams will come true."

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If the 2028 United States presidential election was held today, who would you vote for?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Pedro