Uli
@Uli@sopuli.xyz
- Comment on Why do I have this weird reversed-"FOMO" feeling when I watch TV shows or Movies about Pre-Information-Era time period, like not as in "I miss the past", but actually as in "Okay this era is weird"? 1 day ago:
I guess there’s two kinds of ignorance at play here.
The kind I was referring to is the ignorance of high standards. If you don’t know that you can live in a state of constant dopamine drip supplied by your cellular device, because cellular devices haven’t been invented yet, you wouldn’t miss those dopamine hits that you don’t even know will exist. I think OP would have been just fine if they were born into an earlier generation. Because they would have the bliss of not knowing what future they’re missing out on.
But to your point, the constantly supplied bliss from our internet bubbles does make us more ignorant to the things outside our bubble. And these days, the things we focus on are often dictated by the corporations who make the addictive apps. So, those corporations will profit by directing away from knowledge about how those same corporations are destroying so many parts of our world. In this case, I would argue that the ignorance is still bliss. It’s just a malignant harmful bliss that distracts from the real things we should be concerned about. And in a way, if it could snap us out the destructive path we’re on, I could see how another Carrington event might actually act as a wake-up call regarding our blatant hubris in thinking that society is ever safe from collapse.
As you mentioned, there are those who live in parts of the world where they have no access to technology, still living in that blissful ignorance of pre-computerized times. But that is a social bliss. They will still be hurt by the geological effects that the industrial age has wrought. And it won’t be pretty.
So, I think I would agree with your assertion, plus an addendum. Ignorance isn’t bliss. But it was.
- Comment on Why do I have this weird reversed-"FOMO" feeling when I watch TV shows or Movies about Pre-Information-Era time period, like not as in "I miss the past", but actually as in "Okay this era is weird"? 1 day ago:
I look at TV shows like OP is talking about and think it might be kind of nice to live in an era where things are slower. If a library book might take weeks and you need to go into town to get a comic book, or there’s nothing to do until dinner except maybe some activity with the people in your close vicinity, it feels like a much more intimate way to experience the world. But I do remember in my early teens when the first wave of Personal Data Assistants came out, and I was wowed by the technology. I can edit a computer document right here in the palm of my hand. Keep my contacts with me, a calendar, a calculator, simple drawing programs. It felt like that device could do everything, years before smartphone was a word. Now I carry two phones around on two different carriers because I too fear a world without service. I sometimes want to go back to the slower world, so I do at times relish long waits at the DMV with nothing to do, or a power outage on a stormy night. But I hate feeling like I’m wasting my time. Even when there’s nothing to do, I’m always trying to do something, it’s just that being constrained forces me to pick different things. So, I’m not sure if it would help or hurt OP to hear that if they grew up before any of this existed, there’s every possibility they would have felt more fulfilled. Because time was something you could still get a handle on and not feel like it’s always slipping away. At least, not so much. In that sense, ignorance can really be bliss.
- Comment on What a wonderful world we live in! 2 weeks ago:
He’s moved on to another plane.
- Comment on Number neighbors! 2 weeks ago:
I can believe this - that Trump was paying Epstein for pedophile shit and Clinton never got involved. I also find it pretty easy to believe that despite never being involved with Epstein, Bill Clinton is a scumbag and a rapist, considering the numerous allegations against him:
…wikipedia.org/…/Bill_Clinton_sexual_assault_and_…
It’s not proof per se, but with politicians these days, I believe it’s most accurate to find them dirty and corrupt until proven otherwise via their legislative actions (to wit, I’m not holding my breath vis-à-vis 99% of Congress).
- Comment on What more you want? 2 weeks ago:
“That line’s not supposed to ring. Who is it?”
“Sir, it sounds like… you know that movie from the 2010s, the one with the cave people?”
“Ice Age?”
“No. No, not that one. It’s got Nick Cage in it.”
Grug: “He actually goes by Nicolas.”
“What?”
“What?”
Grug: “You can say Nick, it’s fine. You’ve gotta get us out of here!”
- Comment on Tis the way 3 weeks ago:
Yes, it’s me, I’m the buyer. At any expense, I must possess all the apes. I’m here from the future, to spread the word that if we allow the genral public to have ownership over this level of stupidity, it will result in a runaway moron effect. And if left unchecked, then in my time, four hundred years from now, when we make first contact with other spacefaring civilizations, they’re going to think we’re really lame.
- Comment on Papa I'm scared 3 weeks ago:
Vonnegut is my favorite, the one I model my own writing style after. Galopagos is my jam.
- Comment on [deleted] 3 weeks ago:
Guys, I’m beginning to suspect this guy might live in canada.
- Comment on Audible unveils plans to use AI voices to narrate audiobooks 4 weeks ago:
Completely fair. I kind of like them. They did it for Redwall and I listen to those books on long drives sometimes. It works for me. Now I guess the advantage could be to have both versions and get to choose which you listen to–but even I’m skeptical that a corporation would have that much regard for the preferences of its consumers.
- Comment on Audible unveils plans to use AI voices to narrate audiobooks 4 weeks ago:
I made some AI animated content that I never released because I don’t have the rights to the voices I was using. Even though I was blending several voices together to make them unrecognizable, it made me uncomfortable.
But in the process I learned the capabilities and limitations of AI voices. If you’re going purely from text to speech, it’s horrendous (as far as I experienced). Very robotic. It’s a bit better when melodic information is included (as in Suno) but still sounds like AI.
But when I recorded my own voice saying the lines and then converted it to another voice, it took all of the nuance of my line reads and converted it into the other voice.
So, would your opinion change if it turns out they’re going to use purchased voice rights to have a single narrator perform the whole book and then use AI to turn the narrators voice into a full voice cast?
I could see how it would allow lesser known books to have a better experience with a truly separate voice for each character, but I could also see how this might drive out lesser known/minority voice actors. Not advocating one way or another, just providing a piece of this conversation I think we should bear in mind.
- Comment on Choose a number, 1-5! 1 month ago:
Yeah, 2 tines and 4 handle is a pretty good fork, I’ll admit. I just worry about the concave shape of the top side of the handle causing the edges to dig into my fingers with long-term use.
- Comment on Choose a number, 1-5! 1 month ago:
Those prongs are fine. The handle, though, it’s like having a huge counterweight on the back of the utensil. I can imagine liking it if it’s always been that way or if you have big hands. Otherwise, handle number 5 is the clear improvement - no sharp edges, properly balanced, not shaped like a wedge. Could hold that fork for days.
- Comment on Choose a number, 1-5! 1 month ago:
The will of the people
- Comment on Choose a number, 1-5! 1 month ago:
It is clear to me that the only explanation for your preference is nostalgia.
- Comment on The pipeline 1 month ago:
Yeah, I want to feel that bone in my mouth. Put that bone inside me, chicken. Let me suck the meat from your bone.
This comment brought to you by manly men who are straight and also not gay.
- Comment on An oldie but a goodie 1 month ago:
She should swallow a hydrogen cyanide capsule that only dissolves if triggered by the detection of radioactive decay.
Who knows what will happen to that cat?
- Comment on An oldie but a goodie 1 month ago:
Well, it gets confusing when your mom is a famous stock photo hand model.
- Comment on Couldn't be worse than what we have now... 2 months ago:
Free popcorn and squeezy cheese for everyone. Free them! Narf!
- Comment on 6* months away now. If you're on 10, do you plan to upgrade? Make the jump to Linux? 2 months ago:
I don’t like the rootkit. I do everything I possibly can on Linux aside from the one game that requires it. That said, since they started using the rootkit, there has been a steep drop-off in bots in the game. As in I don’t see any anymore. So, annoying and a huge security risk? Absolutely. Dubious? Maybe? Depends on what you mean.
- Comment on Madison Square Garden’s surveillance system banned this fan over his T-shirt design. And he didn’t even wear it to the venue. 2 months ago:
That was a big factor, sure. But no, it was the “deconfliction” queue they made for Texas DPS to track repeated facial recognition hits without any evidence tying the suspect to the crime scene - in theory identifying repeat offenders, but in practice, targeting black and brown people whose faces are likely to be harder for facial recognition to differentiate and therefore they may end up with random no-knock warrants on their names having never actually committed any crime. That toilet paper though… it’s in the running.
- Comment on Madison Square Garden’s surveillance system banned this fan over his T-shirt design. And he didn’t even wear it to the venue. 2 months ago:
I used to work for the company that creates the facial recognition system inside MSG. Three guesses why I don’t work there anymore.
- Comment on Docker Hub limiting unauthenticated users to 10 pulls per hour 3 months ago:
Same here. I’ve been building a bootstrap script, and each time I test it, it tears down the whole cluster and starts from scratch, pulling all of the images again. Every time I hit the Docker pull limit after 10 - 12 hours of work, I treat that as my “that’s enough work for today” signal. I’m going to need to set up a caching system ASAP or the hours I work on this project are about to suddenly get a lot shorter.
- Comment on HDMI 2.2 will require new “Ultra96” cables, whenever we have 8K TVs and content 5 months ago:
I also find USB to be limiting when it comes to range. I can go about 50 feet with a nice thick HDMI with copper wiring, but any further than 20 feet on USB necessitates fiber optics. Not an issue for everyone, but something I have been running into.
- Comment on Use 'Bridgy Fed' to connect Mastodon and Bluesky 6 months ago:
Yeah, I’m not sure if we’re talking about the same thing. What I’m looking for:
I make a Mastodon account
I make a Bluesky account
I connect them via the bridge
I post on one account, the same content is posted on both accounts
If someone replies to my post on Mastodon (which all Mastodon users can see), I can reply using my Mastodon account
If someone replies to my post on Bluesky (which all Bluesky users can see even if they have not opted into using the bridge), I can reply using my Bluesky account
From what you’re describing, it doesn’t sound like the bridge can facilitate this.
- Comment on Use 'Bridgy Fed' to connect Mastodon and Bluesky 6 months ago:
I’ve never been on Twitter/X, Bluesky, or Mastodon. But maybe I’d like to try.
So far I can’t decide because I prefer Activity Pub in principle, but always felt FOMO with Twitter and don’t want the same thing to happen with Bluesky.
I think the best of both worlds would be if I could make an account on both and have one account essentially repost anything from the main account, unless I’m replying to someone specifically where it wouldn’t make sense to reply on both accounts.
Not sure if this bridge is a step in that direction, but it’s far more important to me that everyone can see what I post on both sides than it is that people from both sides can reach me on a singular account. Not sure if others feel the same way.
- Comment on YouTube Shorts can now run up to three minutes 8 months ago:
Hey, that’s longer than I can run.
- Comment on No further questions your honour 8 months ago:
No, you’ve misunderstood. She married the Bigfoot and now she’s suing because she was perfectly happy not knowing he was just a bear. They had a destination wedding in London and the divorce lawyer’s bear-wedding annulment fee was 125 pounds.