mctoasterson

@mctoasterson@reddthat.com

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Whatever happened to pickup artists? Did they evolve into alpha males or ascend to a higher plane?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  In the early 2000s there was seemingly infinite television studio budget to pick a random subculture or even individual sociopaths, and just give them a reality show. I just assumed as broadcast and cable viewership declined, these types of grifters also went away or were forced to get real jobs.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tech left teens fighting over scraps, and now it wants those too⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  (From a US perspective)

  I’d say most teens work jobs in order to have spending money for outings with friends, any maybe to save for a car or something. Maybe sock away a bit of money for college. Their real basic living expenses (shelter, food, clothes, school fees) are covered by their parents.

  So menial fast food, retail, and service industry jobs going away does impact their ability to earn some cash and learn responsibilities in a relatively low risk way. These jobs disappearing isn’t necessarily a bad thing, if reasonable alternatives emerge that accomplish the same thing.

  It can go one of two ways. Maybe teens and students will get entrepreneurial and start their own small businesses. I know some high school kids down the street who started a lawn care business when they were ~12, and they saved so much money throughout their teen years that they both own their own pickup trucks outright, they now have employees, and they just continued growing their business instead of going to college. They are actually providing a service to the economy that people want and need.

  The other way it can go is that all traditionally teen jobs go away and there becomes a whole generation of teens who exist solely on the patronage of their parents, which combined with the “keeping up” mentality prevalent in some areas, results in entitled little bitches. There are many kids who would be happy not to work while still expecting to be handed the keys to a late model car, and the newest iPhone. And let’s not forget the multithousand dollar production surrounding the “average” prom date experience or spring break trip. Or worse, these trends further exacerbate the rift between the haves and the have nots because naturally not everyone’s parents are going to be able to afford all this shit.

  More than likely we will always need some retail workers, ice cream scoopers, golf caddys, recreation league baseball umpires, and pool lifeguards. Not all first jobs need to be literally McDonalds. I would like more young people to innovate and offer new products and services people actually need and want, because it is better for society as a whole. Otherwise, in 10 years we will look up and find 90% of the US economy is AI, shitcoin speculation, vape and CBD shops, and OnlyFans.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Counter Strike 2 update wipes nearly $2 billion off skin market value by making fancy knives and gloves easier to get [Eurogamer]⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  “Blood on cs_siege” is still out there on YouTube to document the dangers of drunk APC driving.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Counter Strike 2 update wipes nearly $2 billion off skin market value by making fancy knives and gloves easier to get [Eurogamer]⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  CS 1.6 with War3 mod was peak. Classes, Skill Trees, leveling up based on kills and rounds won.

  Reviving teammates, insanely OP grenades, partial invisibility, and other ridiculous abilities.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What are your top games to emulate on a long trip?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  I’d get some of the decomp/recomps working like Zelda 64 and Perfect Dark. It is really something to experience these titles again with 60 fps, widescreen etc.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨i 💚 animals.⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Worse - Sociology

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If you were born after 1990, you've never had this experience⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  No Mingus Dew or Bebop Cola?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨India bans streaming apps you’ve never heard of — but millions watch⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  People forget what a ridiculously large steaming market India is.

  The second biggest YT channel by subscriber base is T-Series.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨3D Printing Patterns Might Make Ghost Guns More Traceable Than We Thought | 404 Media⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  A criminal could buy an Ender3 or other extremely ubiquitous, non-internet-connected printer. Maybe used, in cash, on various marketplaces.

  Filament can be bought in cash as well from a bunch of retailers and the leftover stock (evidence) easily disposed by dumping or burning/melting after the “suspect objects” are created.

  Furthermore, nozzles are like $1 apiece in some cases. Printbed replacements or sheets of glass (also often used as printbed surfaces) are like $20 and can be changed often and easily. Changing these two components completely invalidates the “match” of the toolmarks.

  This type of forensics is only practical if the target suspect is dumb enough to use the same settings for everything, never change a nozzle or bed, keep all his empty filament spools and receipts, pay for everything with credit cards in his name, and have a bunch of cloud-saved bambu-sliced files called “super illegal weaponry.gcode” associated with his printer.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Nick Clegg says asking artists for use permission would ‘kill’ the AI industry⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Maybe the question is how do you sanction other malign actors who intend to steal the data. We know China and others do not give a shit about (especially western) IP rights. Not sure if that really justifies us ignoring IP rights.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Warhammer 40,000 Maker Games Workshop Is Doing So Well It’s Giving $27 Million to Its Staff⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I dunno if there is a subculture of printing the models at home. I would think resin printers would have more than enough resolution to make good miniatures. Is that frowned upon? There is no reason to buy overpriced licensed shit.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Star Wars Shows the Future of AI Special Effects and It Sucks [404 Media]⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Kubrick did more compelling practical effects with matte backgrounds, invisible wires and dudes in monkey suits in 1968.

  Modern Hollywood would rather film everything in a greenscreen closet and then “fix” it in post. The result is uninspired garbage that doesn’t look good in any era.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Nintendo Anti-Piracy Policy Device Lock Update Warns of Console Bricks for Unauthorized Use⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Is this to me counteract the Migswitch specifically?

  Seems like a load of crap either way.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Recommendations for "girly" games?⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  You could try Animal Well. Dark yet pastel-oriented colorschemes. Minimal “combat” but more of a puzzle and exploration style of gameplay. More mysterious than scary. Mild peril. Not romantic in the slightest, but very original.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Bitcoin mining is no longer profitable⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  It remains profitable for scammers who use malware botnets consisting of other peoples computing power and electricity.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Almost 19% of Japanese people in their 20s have spent so much money on gacha they struggled with covering living expenses, survey reveals - AUTOMATON WEST⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I knew this was a fucked up industry when I heard they were successfully diversifying into women-centric gatcha games where the game is also centered on gooning over various character designs but the gatcha pulls correspond to specific romance scenes and interactions.

  Japanese companies really have minmaxed exploiting every demographic. They have this garbage for the young people and pachinko parlors for old people and rural folks.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Trump Will Bring America First Drug Prices by Knocking Out the Middlemen, Making Europe Pay Its Fair Share⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Many critical treatments and medicines are developed in the US. Congress could pass protectionist trade laws requiring that the poorest uninsured American can’t be charged a penny more than whatever artificially low negotiated costs are paid by foreign countries systems like the Canadians or the British NHS.

  Its possible that other countries could retaliate with cost controls for their own domestically developed drugs but it feels like this is an area where the US can and should have leverage.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Xbox Sales Hit Rock Bottom After Historic 2024 Decline⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Honestly all of this bullshit is why I went with a Steamdeck a few years ago. As a working adult with a family I have different economic obligations and priorities.

  I need to build a new PC soon (mine is now 10 years old) but I can’t justify spending $5K on a gaming rig. If I built now with a flagship card, just the card itself would cost more than I spent on my entire rig when I built it in 2014/2015. Pair that with Microsoft’s ridiculous operating system enshittification, and the PC situation gets even more complicated for me.

  Consoles have gotten to be a bad value proposition for me as well. Paper launches, scalping during the pandemic, DRM etc., services going offline. All that garbage leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

  I’m having a decent enough time with Steam sale games, Indy games, and retro emulation.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I would do this for just 1.99⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Yknow one great thing that costs about 1.99 (one time cost)?

  Those little plastic slidy bits that cover up the laptop webcam and mic.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why was Hitler so mean and hateful toward one group or another? I find it hard to believe he woke up one day and said you and you suck but these people over here are good. Taking it so far as killing?⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Respectfully, do some reading of even middleschool level history books. He didn’t personally decide to “be mean” to particular groups. His worldview was shaped by the post WWI dynamics in Europe, latent stereotypes and domestic problems within Germany, and a whole lot of misapplied emerging science. He literally believed in racial supremecy and was trying to build an ethnostate. This motivated him to define groups of ethnic “undesirables” and also to lump in other groups that he found politically inconvenient. Read about the scapegoating of Jews circa that time. He likely believed his cruelty towards them was somehow justified because he laid all of Germany’s problems (economic issues, humiliation of the country and loss of territory post-WWI) at their feet.

  TL; DR - Bad actors believe their evil behavior is justified.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨An independent voter explains why they chose a moronic, oligarcho-fascist demagogue over Joe Biden (c. November 2020) [Day 58]⁩ ⁨⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  What is this meme template from

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Call of Duty's massive development budgets revealed: $700 million for Black Ops Cold War⁩ ⁨⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  All they have to do is sell a million copies for $700 each and they break even!

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I love my smart TV (From Mastodon) - Repost⁩ ⁨⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Luckily the YouTube app gets way worse with each update. Mine now tries to dark pattern you into signing in, and now features extra ads when pause a video.

  I’m switching to sideloaded SmartTube on a GoogleTV with Chromecast dongle.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨NBC News Does Entire Piece Trying To Link CEO Shooting To ‘Violent Video Game’⁩ ⁨⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Did Tipper Gore get resurrected somehow? I thought she got banished to the shadow realm.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨i hate hate hate stuart little⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  My money is on Fievel. After he went West, of course.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Anon is a nostalgic gamer⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  So much scoutzknivez and iceworld

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨That funny feeling⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Drink water. Fix your shitty diet. Eat bananas or sweet potatoes or other sources of potassium. Take dietary magnesium supplements or use the topical magnesium stuff (like Theraworx foam) on your affected muscle groups before bed.

  By doing the above, I went from frequently having calf cramps to never having calf cramps.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Realistically... How fucked is the US?⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  The House isn’t stuck with that though. They can amend the rules for the next session, and I’d imagine any speaker worth his salt would demand that rule be stricken because it is unworkable.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[Même] Which movie was this for you?⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I saw this as a kid and completely forgot it had both Tim Curry and Laura Linney in it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The original Facebook was something we’ll never get back⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  Don’t forget it also created a 5-10 year period of otherwise-tech-illiterate ditsy chicks with comm or marketing degrees rebranding themselves as “Social Media Marketing Expert”.