bigbangdangler

@bigbangdangler@reddthat.com

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The Great Steam Deck Crash of 2026: How The New Pricing Slashed Demand by 80%⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  That’s cool, I hadn’t thought to check.

  And they sell boards and pieces for Shogi and Go, apparently.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The Great Steam Deck Crash of 2026: How The New Pricing Slashed Demand by 80%⁩ ⁨⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  Also, Nintendo still made playing cards as late as the 1980s (for the Japanese market). Kind of crazy to think that they’re arguably more experienced at playing cards.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Trump’s popularity worsens with Iran ceasefire falling apart⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  That means more than 1 in 3 Americans are still licking the boot.

  Pathetic.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨US Government Official refuses to answer basic question⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  These people are disconnected from reality and need real psychological help. In the meantime, this behavior is not acceptable for anyone in any kind of official position. Hell, this amount of deflection wouldn’t even be acceptable if he were trying to be a fucking barista.

  No offense at all meant to baristas. You have likely worked harder than this clown ever will.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are separable verbs a thing in ENG?⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah, I’m not sure it’s entirely relevant to the existing conversation, but maybe at least in part.

  I don’t have anything to cite directly in front of me for other examples from non-English languages, but I know some work exists out there, particularly in cognitive linguistics. If I remember right, some papers under the “construction grammar” umbrella touch on this in an effort to explain relative preferences between what would otherwise be equally weighted constructions. Also look into works by Dryer and Haspelmath (together and separately) for similar discussion with a more typological bent.

  German does have one typological distinction which might also play a role in how permissive it is with seperable prefixes: the verb-second constraint, which basically exists in the Germanic branch of Indo-European and only a handful of languages elsewhere. This is why German allows basic clauses which are SVO (e.g. Der Hund frisst den Fleisch), but as soon as there is an auxiliary verb, it looks more like an SOV hybrid with the main verb at the end (der Hund wird den Fleisch fressen), or fully SOV if a subordinate of a matrix clause (Wir glauben, dass der Hund den Fleisch fressen wird).

  That doesn’t really explain why you have to do ich sage ab instead of the ungrammatical *ich absage, but having to move that ab to the end is at least reminiscent of having to move verbs in the same way. I don’t think there’s even an alternative, so extremely long examples persist by necessity.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are separable verbs a thing in ENG?⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  There are also working memory constraints, or similar real-time processing constraints, at play which can affect how acceptable (in terms of native speaker intuition) some examples are.

  • I’m going to call my best friend Lenora up (very acceptable)
  • I’m going to call my best friend Lenora, who I’ve known since high school, up (less acceptable)
  • I’m going to call my best friend and longtime dancing partner from Brighton, Lenora up (less acceptable, comma for written clarity only)

  I won’t get into the possible differences in the intervening structures (e.g. the relative clause), but as a mostly fair generalization: in these cases, the preference to split the verb into parts is inversely correlated with the number of intervening elements.

  • I’m going to call up my best friend and longtime dancing partner from Brighton, Lenora (more acceptable than above)

  Something similar occurs without phrasal verbs but with indirect objects optionally expressed as prepositional phrases:

  • I gave an extremely rare and hard-to-find cassette tape from Tokyo in the 1980s to Mary (still acceptable, but right on the cusp of awkward)
  • I gave Mary an extremely rare and hard-to-find cassette tape from Tokyo in the 1980s (better)

  The similarities suggest that the pattern has more to do with heavy intervening phrases, or even more generally syntactic headedness, and not wanting to rebuild or finish building earlier structures later in the parse.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨After laying off thousands, Ubisoft says losing "key talents and skills" is a big danger for the company⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Surely the C-suite thought about this. Or they had Claude think about it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨As Xbox and PlayStation flounder, Steam is reportedly having another record year⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Then you didn’t try it on a DRM free game.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨As Xbox and PlayStation flounder, Steam is reportedly having another record year⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Incorrect. DRM free games on Steam do not require the Steam client to be running to run them.

  Try if before commenting.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨As Xbox and PlayStation flounder, Steam is reportedly having another record year⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  There are many, many DRM free games on Steam.

  Stop spreading this nonsense. There are arguments against Steam, but until they require DRM to be on their platform, this isn’t one of them.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Finally gonna solve how the pee is stored⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Ffs, pee is stored in the legs. Stop with this balls nonsense.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Mitch McConnel's Wikipedia page has been heavily edited the last few days, with the last ones being 4 hours ago. So around 1PM EST. What could that mean?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  is

  was

  is

  was

  is

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If Steam were to shut down tomorrow how much money would you have lost in total on games / DLC ??⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  And, friendly nudge:

  It’s not hard to back up games from Steam. Especially those with no DRM. Just keep them on a drive somewhere.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Microsoft Just Released a... Linux Distro?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  If you think Windows is bad on the desktop, just wait until you try the server version. Even MS knows it sucks.

  Azure Linux isn’t new, but it does seem like a response to MS losing market share.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How do students who are always involved in mathematics and physics get to know about sex?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  If I’m reading this correctly, then an orgy isn’t an orgy if there is at least one person not fucking. This means that a single camera person not getting any turns what could be an orgy into just a set of sets of people fucking.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What can be done to prevent more dangerous heatwaves in Europe?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  There is nothing else to do. We went beyond the tipping point on warming and those in charge didn’t listen. It only gets worse from here.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨GTA 6 is a 'singleplayer experience,' GTA Online may be sold separately⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  No issues with this. I’m increasingly tired of the online multiplayer money machines. If you like them, you probably have no issues buying that version. I think Rockstar is reading their market correctly here.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam Summer Sale 2026 Has Begun⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Hoping to snag a Frame when they come out so I can finally play HL Alyx.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is Ace Combat 8 (Deluxe) worth getting for ¥11,990?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Agreed, and good point.

  I’d also say support projects in Early Access that you want to succeed, with the same conditions.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is Ace Combat 8 (Deluxe) worth getting for ¥11,990?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Digital distribution of games means that no game should be preordered. Ever.

  Back in the day, a preorder was done to get the physical media (cartridge, disk, CD) in your hands on release day. The premium was either paying for early shipment, or ensuring a copy was reserved so that you could pick it up on release day.

  Then digital distribution meant that you could buy a game and be playing it in minutes. When there is no physical media, there is no need to reserve anything.

  The industry responded by turning preorders into bonuses. But almost universally, these bonuses are not worth the premium. They tend to be a single mission, or some custom skins, or other items that were relatively cheap to produce and that serve only to justify charging more for a “preorder” on a product which is distributed digitally.

  So:

  Is Ace Combat 8 (Deluxe) worth pre-ordering for ¥11,990?

  Negative. And neither is any modern game. If you want to play a game, wait until it releases and buy it.

  Let the concept of preordering die.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When Windows users find the Threadiverse⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  How dare you come at me with self awareness!!

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I still can't get over Skyrim. Are there any games that can replace it?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It definitely was.

  Besides just the bugs back in the day, the nature of them was so drastically different between systems. I played at launch on PC, and even then I put ~100 hours into it. The bugs on the PC version were more gameplay/story based and less about performance. I think it was easily the most playable version at launch. Some of them were just funny and I remember giggling when a car would fly into the air or an NPC would t-pose. But I was able to progress and the game didn’t run like dogshit.

  Console versions depended heavily on which console. The PS4 (non-Pro) version probably just should never have existed. Downright unplayable mess.

  But the turnaround really even rivals No Man’s Sky’s turnaround. It helps that the story in Cyberpunk was always pretty solid. I still wish there were more variation between character paths in the early game. That’s really my only remaining gripe.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Reddit when they eliminated the ability to turn off "recommendations" in your fucking feed recently⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Ok, no reddit

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I still can't get over Skyrim. Are there any games that can replace it?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It is. Easily one of the best games of all time.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨They should be.⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Right?? Lol

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨They should be.⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  They’re named after Dr. Arnold Kegel.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Foreign workers say they were paid less than $2 an hour to build a new US Consulate in Milan⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Don’t worry, I’m sure the term “market rate” was used by some clueless rich person somewhere in that chain of events. It’s the American way.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What do they put in this stuff?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Irn Bru is fantastic. Gather it at all costs.

  Fun fact: it outsold Coca Cola for a few years in its native Scotland. Unfortunately changes to the sugar tax in the UK, and the changes both companies made to their products as a result, mean that so Coke does now outsell it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Whales are Chinese⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Indeed, which is why it is generally classified as an analytic language (as opposed to e.g. fusional). It is sometimes misclassified as an isolating language, which it really isn’t, since Mandarin does have compounds. It is worth noting, though, that no natural language fits perfectly into the morphological prototypes.

  That said, fewer complexities in one part of a grammar tend to even out in others. In fact, there is some tendency of tonal languages to lean isolating or analytic exactly because the ratio of morphemes-to-word is lower (often 1-to-1); given that syllables can only be so complex (a limitation of anatomy), analytic languages will tend to have more homophones than non-analytic ones, and thus the tone tends to be required to maintain the same information density. To look at it another way, tone is a method for distinguishing what are otherwise homophones.

  Now, how any of that relates to whales… well, it very likely doesn’t.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Whales are Chinese⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Thanks for sharing the actual research.

  I’m curious to dive into this (pun intended). It sounds like a bit of a stretch to analogize these whale signals to Mandarin or any other human language simply because of this:

  However, our analogy has a limit: while in human languages, different tones can be associated with different meanings, the meanings conveyed by sperm whale codas have not been established.

  The jump is, though they may be referring to the whale sounds as “tones”, in human languages “tone” and “pitch” are two distinct concepts which share a modality. The former has to do with meaning, while the latter has to do with things that are extrasentential or even extralinguistic. Consider the rising pitch at the end of a question in English: this nudges the listener into thinking they heard a question, but it doesn’t carry meaning in the lexical sense, which makes it pitch and not tone (cf. the various books like e.g. the Cambridge series on Pitch vs. Tone, even though there are common terms like “intonation” which belie the scientific terms).

  If there is no evidence of a mapping between meaning and pitch in whales (as the above quote suggests) then it really isn’t linguistic “tone”, even if it musical tone or some other type. It’s certainly a sound with some sonorant quality, minimally pitch.

  Could all be entirely wrong. As I mentioned, I haven’t yet read the paper fully.