BananaTrifleViolin

@BananaTrifleViolin@lemmy.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tesla (TSLA) has to replace computer in ~4 million cars or compensate their owners⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  And the company remains massively overvalued despite the recent falls in value. It has a long way to fall yet.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨As a US citizen who was born in the UK, how risky is it to leave and reenter the US right now?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  It honestly seems very unpredictable. Anecdotally the worst behaviour seems to have been at the most republican states but not exclusively.

  For example the Australian who had a work visa and lived in the US for years flew in to Texas where it was arbitrarily nullified. There are plenty of stories of people crossing southern and northern borders and being detained by ICE. Thats included British, German, Australian and French cirizens that ive seen in the UK press coverage anyway.

  As a US citizen you shouldnt have an issue but I’d probably travel through a major hub like JFK in New York to be safer. I wouldn’t re-enter through Republican states like Florida, Texas, nor probably Washington DCs airports. Obviously travel on your US passport.

  You should he OK as a US citizen but it does look like there is a breakdown in the rule of law in the US. People imagine that means riots and the police not able to keep control, but in this case its the government and government agencies doing whatever they want and the legal system unable to stop them.

  I’m a UK citizen and am not intending to travel to the US - I often cone for a major conference but having seen what happened to the French scientist who had his phone searched and then was denied entry for criticising Trump I won’t be risking it. I’m sure a lot of other UK and Europeans feel the same way.

  Sasly the only 100% safe option for you is to not leave the country. Its madness as youre a US citizen but at this point things are still going through the courts and its not clear where this will stop.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨YSK that a new internet/account bypass during Windows 11 installs already exists. Here is a 7 step guide.⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Windows intuitively making you jump through 7 steps to not have an online account. The reality sadly is most Windows users will just be pushed by Microsoft to use a Microsoft account to access their own PC.

  Only 1% of Windows users who are IT people and enthusiasts will find out how to avoid being forced into internet based accounts.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨how is it to work everyday but Wednesdays and Thursdays?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I work in a hospital and the worst days to work are weekends. The hospital is still full but most staff are off so its busy. Also all your friends and family are off on the weekend so you can’t see them.

  Meanwhile if you have days off in the week, it’s great because everything is open (unlike a sunday) and all the kids are in school. So you can go out an enjoy the parks or shop freely etc. But most of your friends anf family are also at work.

  I would definitely take 2 days off together, not split them. If I were to have 2 days off and work every weekend I’d either take Mon/Tue off or Thu/Fri. I think its just preference and howbbusy your job is. It could suck being in work on a Friday while everyone else is gearing up for weekend off and discussing their plans, plus also people head off early where they can - I’d probably take The/Fri off so I didn’t have to put up with all that.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah, I’m not sure the BBC have. I think users have been uploading all that stuff. The BBC makes much of its archive available in the UK via iPlayer but not internationally as it has to use then commercially to help fund the organisation.

  Copyright infringement is the biggest threat to the internet archive. Its already been through a case with book publishers and now its facing an existential threat woth a $400m lawsuit from the music industry.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨You should know there's a font designed to make reading easier, especially for people with low vision. It's called Atkinson Hyperlegible Next. It's free for personal and commercial use.⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It’s also aesthetically pleasant which is a big plus.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Plex is locking remote streaming behind a subscription in April⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  How is it misleading? Plex Pass is a subscription? It would be confusing to many people if it said “Plex pass” instead of “Subscription” as not everyone would necessarily even know what that is. Subscription is very clear.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Self-hosted media server to share with 5+ people?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I use Jellyfin as a home media server - in my set up I have it running on my desktop PC, and I use it to stream a media library to my tv.

  A home media server basically just means its meant to be deployed at a small scale rather than as a platform for 1000s of people to use.

  Your scenario is exactly what Jellyfin and Plex can do. If you have 5 users then you just need a host device running the server that is powerful enough to run 5 video streams at the same time. The server can transcode (where the server takes on the heavy lifting needing a more powerful CPU) or direct play (where all the server does is send the bits of the file and the end user’s device such as a phone or smart tv does the hard work of making a quality play, so a lower power server device can work).

  If this is contained within your home, your home wifi or network should be fine to do this, even up to 4k if your network is good enough quality. If the 5 people are outside your home then your internet bandwidth - particularly your upload bandwidth - and your and their internet quality will be important determinant of quality of experience. It will also need more configuring but it is doable.

  This doesn’t need to be expensive. A raspberry pi with storage attached would be able to run Jellyfin or Plex, and would offer a decent experience over a home network if you direct play (I.e. just serve up the files for the end users device to play).

  If you want to use transcoding and hardware acceleration you’d need better hardware for 5 people to stream simultaneously. However most end user devices such as TVs, PCs, Phones and tablets are perfectly capable of direct playing 1080p video themselves without the server transcoding. Transcoding has lots of uses - you can change the audio or video format on the fly, or enable streaming of 4k video from a powerful device to a less powerful device - but its not essential. Transcoding would be where you need to put more money in so the server is powerful enough in terms of CPU or graphics card to serve up 5 high quality streams at a time.

  Direct play is fine for most uses. The only limitation is the files on the server need to be in a format that can be played on the users device. So you may need to stick to mainstream codecs and containers; things like mp4 files and h.264/avc. You could get issues with users not being able to playback files if you have say mkv files and h. 265/hevc or vp9. Then you’d either need to install the codecs in the users device (which may not be possible in a smart tv for example) or use transcoding (so the server converts the format on the fly to something the users device can use but then needing a more powerful server)

  I prefer Jellyfin as its free and open source. It has free apps for the end user for many devices including smart tvs, streaming sticks, phones, tablets and PCs. Its slightly less user friendly than plex to set up but not much. And the big benefit is your users are only exposed to what you have in your library.

  Plex is slightly more user friendly but commerical. You have to pay for a licence to get the best features and even then it pushes advertising and tries to get your users to buy commercial content. Jellyfin does not do that at all.

  Finally if your plan is to self host in the cloud, again this is doable but then you stray into needing to pay for a powerful enough remote computer/server, the bandwidth for all content to be served up (in addition to your existing home internet) and the potential risk of issues with privacy and even copyright infringement issues around the content you are serving. A self hosted device in your home is much more secure and private. A cloud hosted solution can be secure but youre always at risk of the host company snooping your data or having to enforce copyright laws.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The story behind the Oblivion mod Terry Pratchett worked on⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Wow, I’m a huge fan of Terry Pratchett. What a lovely story - I didn’t realise he was a such a big fan of oblivion. Also the makers of that mod are very kind to have adapted the mod in ways that would help him enjoy the game despite his Alzheimer’s.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is it asshole behavior to hate someone for saying "Hi, how are you?"⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  How old are these people? These sound like kids?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Petition Apply for the UK to join the European Union as a full member as soon as possible⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  I wanted to stay in the EU but I don’t want to rejoin.

  Just look at whats going on in Hungary where Viktor Orban is essentially a dictator, and is holding back the EU on it’s Ukraine response. Look at Poland where it skirted past descent into a right wing nightmare, and even now the leftwing government are struggling at unpicking the damage. Look at the Czech Republic where it looks very likely a right wing populist government is going to take power - they’re also against Ukraine. And look at France, which is political turmoil internally - right winger Le Pen has a good chance of being the next french president unless the centre and left can unite around an alternative.

  The EU is powerless to deal with Orban, was powerless to deal with Poland as the right wing government tried to dismantle their democracy and institutions. We’ve already seen what’s happening in the US play out in Europe - twice! And the EU could do nothing.

  We’re better off outside the EU at the moment. I never wanted to leave, but the UK is lucky to be outside the EU as it gives us a degree of flexibility and freedom to deal with the current crisis. We don’t need to be distracted by the internal problems of the EU and it’s rouge member states. Instead we’re working directly with the countries that want to work with us like France and Germany, and not having to deal with the countries that don’t like Hungary.

  I wish the EU the best - I want it to succeed but ultimately it has a serious problem with how you get things done when you have countries inside holding back the EU from pursuing it’s best interests. The EU leaders talk big about grand plans and high ideals including now over defence and Ukraine, but when it comes to getting things done it only takes 1 countries veto and paralysis. The EU needs to reform and become an actual democratic superstate but it won’t happen because again it only takes 1 country to veto progress. It’s clear Hungary will be holding the EU back when it comes to Putin for the foreseeable future. And maybe soon so will the Czech republic. And what happens in the EU if Le Pen is president of France?

  No thanks.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨$16bn health agency managed finances with Excel spreadsheet.⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  In fairness to the register they also ridicule moving to a dedicatdd ERP in the same article.

  Youre right there is nothing wrong with Excel. Its powerful software and ultimately it cones down to human and organisational processes about whether its any good or not. You can have the most expensive top end dedicated ERP in the world and still be a total mess… Similarly business used to run on pen and paper and could EB highly efficient.

  Software is just a tool, and organisation go wrong when they think it alone is the solution to their problems.

  Also I doubt Health NZ overspend has anything whatsoever to do with excel. Instead it’ll be due to rising demand, and inflationary pressures on public finances. We have the exact problems here in the UK with the NHS just scaled up to a £182bn.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨U.S. withdrawal from WHO could bring tragedy at home and abroad⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  And it’s looking increasingly likely the Bird Flu pandemic will move into humans. The US has already been lax on dealing with outbreaks in cattle. Trump has neutered the CDC and withdrawn from WHO.

  The US is creating perfect conditions for a bird flu outbreak to originate in the US itself. It will he potluck how severe it is when it transfers into humans. Certainly the response will be hampered thanks to Trumps political choices so they won’t be able to contain it (which was already a low chance) but worse they have probably created conditions to accelerate its spread. It’ll likely spread further and faster than it would have done, affecting more people before vaccines can be made ready.

  Trump Flu is coming.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨No, Phil Spencer, Having AI Mock Up An Old Game Is Not The Same As Preserving It⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  One thing Phil Spencer does not seem to care about is emulation. There are already Xbox and PlayStation emulators that allow access to more of both platforms back catalogues than any of the current generation consoles are capable of…

  Xbox could build cloud based emulators off the open source tools already available and make their entire Xbox back catalogue accessible to current users to stream. They could help improve the tools to ensure greater and greater compatibility for titles and then it would be there forever.

  The reason it doesn’t happen is money. They dont see money in game preservation so they dont bother beyond a few big name nostalgia hits. Muse AI isn’t about game preservation, its about game development - they’re just pissing around with game preservation to feed it content as a punt on the future for it somehow making game development cheaper.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨No, Phil Spencer, Having AI Mock Up An Old Game Is Not The Same As Preserving It⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  AI can make Shakespeare BETTER! Like it can put it in modern text speak, and shorten it down to fit in a 30 second tiktok, plus give space for ad breaks and team product placement. AI will help enhance user engagement with Shakespeare and also leverage new monetisation options and cross platform synergies.

  All we have to do is let people copyright AI made content because ultimately it wasn’t Shakespeare that did tge hard work, it was the AI tech Bros who transformed it into a modern content meme and raised 3rd quarter profits.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨No, Phil Spencer, Having AI Mock Up An Old Game Is Not The Same As Preserving It⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah, instead game preservation is being solved by abandonware and copyright infringement.

  Legal open source software is doing the heavy lifting, and then torrenting is sharing by he files. But there is a huge risk as there is no safety net to preserve the niche and unpopular games.

  The game publishers and broken copyright laws are blocks to preservation but fortunately people are just doing it anyway. And the more the big companies push against it (including targeting emulation systems for current systems) the more they push it underground and out of any control they might have had. Typical greed and stupidity.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Baldur's Gate 3 and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 show that the future of RPGs is in games way more ambitious, weird and unexpected than anything Bethesda and Bioware have to offer⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  The article totally misses the big intervening step between Skyrim/old Bioware and the failure of Starfield/Dragon Age: CDProjectRED.

  While those studios largely just made “more of the same”, CDPR made Witcher 3 and then Cyberpunk 2077. Both games are way better narrative experiences and pushed RPG forward. Starfield looks very dated in comparison to both, and Dragon Age failed to capture to magic. Baldur’s Gate 3 and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 are successes because they also bring strong narratives and emotional connections to the stories.

  Starfield would have been huge if it had been released soon after Skyrim. But now it just looks old fashioned, and I think the “wide as an ocean, as deep as a puddle” analogy is good for Starfield. Meanwhile Witcher 3 - which is 10 years old! - has quests and storylines with choices and emotional impact. BG3 and KC:D2 are heirs to Witcher 3.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Rumor: GTA Roleplay Server FiveM Victim Of Hostile Takeover - And One Of Rockstar's Own Is Involved⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Out of interest, when GTAVI comes out will it matter?

  Will the next game need a new from-scratch RP mod? Or will some of the open source components of FiveM be reusable?

  FiveM have an advantage being owned by Rockstar but if it all has to be done again from scratch, FiveM may be irrelevant? Interested members of the community will make their own thing like they did before. Or is that wishful thinking?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Kindle Is Making It Harder to Switch to Rival eReader Brands.⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Most services are forced to carry DRM only versions of Ebooks. But there are ways of legally removing the DRM - it’s a faff but doable. I buy epubs and don’t use Kindle (haven’t for a long time) as it’s much harder to remove the DRM and actually own your books.

  But way I look at it - if I bought the Kindle version of a book, I can just download a DRM free version by sailing the seas. Fuck Amazon.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The English word "four" has 4 letters. Are there any other numbers where the English name for them has that many letters?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Yes: Five has four letters. Nine has four letters.

  There are no more.

  If you meant to ask if there are any more whole numbers with the same number of letters in the name as the number, then the answer is no. It is fairly simple to check - you only have to look at the numbers 0-30 before it becomes clear no other number will fit this pattern.

  If you went into fractions like 20.12325 then there will be many numbers where all the letters added would get close but the fraction itself would mean you couldn’t quite reach the exact number as you can’t have fractions of letters.

  If you included negative numbers then “minus eleven” has 11 letters. Minus thirteen has 13 letters. It seems to again break down once you go beyond 13, and its dodgy to include negative numbers as you can’t have negative letters.

  So, no.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are mods usually confusing as hell or am I just an idiot?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Genuinely not had a problem with mods, and I’ve been PC gaming for decades. Of course sometimes mods don’t work but thats life. Just be patient, you’ll get it done.

  Decent mods have a readme file - follow the steps strictly - no skipping thinking you know better - and they should work.

  Also look on YouTube or search online for guides - people often provide step by step guides to mod games purely out of a love for gaming.

  Keep going - mods can be great, and its one of the many benefits of PC gaming.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Psst, the Americans are asleep, post some eggs⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Stop showing off your immense wealth.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Flohmarkt - a Fediverse replacement for Facebook Marketplace⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah but if you had to search for it you’d have a trouble spelling it. Flowmarked would be how English speakers would hear that I think.

  It probably needs an English brand name for outside the germano-sphere - fedimarket?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨US egg prices expected to climb further as farmers strained by bird flu outbreak⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Add to that trumps tarrifs on goods from mexico and Canada, and the price is about to go up even further.

  And will be have Trump Flu this year? Hes going to be busy.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tech stocks tumble as a Chinese competitor threatens to upend the AI industry; Nvidia down 17%⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  OR: “AI speculative bubble deflates as people realise there may not be massive profit in AI”. It’s not upending the AI industry, it’s upending the expectations that AI will be a license to print money (which has been based on nothing).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Review into Axel Rudakubana will criticise Prevent for rejecting his case three times⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah of the focus is on Prevent then its scapegoating. Prevent is there to tackle people being radicalised - its not there to detect and police all violent people in society.

  The real failings are in police, mental health services and social services - all of which have had resources slashed due to austerity.

  Blaming Prevent is a distraction - counter terrorism is not the route this very violent and sick individual should have been caught before committing an atrocity.

  I work in the NHS and the real question for me is how a very sick and dangerous child could have been allowed to walk away by child mental health services whose excuse has been that he “failed to engage”. A child does not have autonomy to decide to engage or not - it is the mental health services and social services that failed to follow him up.

  A child that was too dangerous to even be allowed on site at a specialist school - he was managed from home for staff and pupil safety - should have had heavy mental health and social service input. Prevent would be able to offer nothing.

  The whole story is an indictment of the failure of the state over the last 15 years since the ideological nonsense of austerity has ravaged the UK public sector and services.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Syria minister says open to talks with Kurds, but ready to use 'force'⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  In other words: power struggles and potential for more civil war.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨'Terrorism has changed', says Starmer on Southport attacks⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  This was a tragedy and missed opportunity, but this was not “terrorism” in the sense being used. This was a seriously dangerous, violent and mentally ill person.

  The focus on how Prevent failed is a real problem because the Prevent strategy is there to stop people being radicalised, not to police society for violent individuals.

  The focus here should really be on the mental health system & social services, and how an extremely dangerous person who was excluded from school for violence, went to a special school and could only be dealt with as a home schooled student for staff and student safety, and for whom their family raised concerns. This guy was not radicalised, he was not a “terrorist”, he was someone who was clearly flagged as very dangerous as a child and failed to act.

  There have been dangerous people before, and there are laws and structures to detain extremely dangerous people for public safety. That’s where everything failed - yet again Social Services, Police, Health and Education. It’s a pattern seen over and over again with public agencies not working together, often because they’re under resourced and stretched as it is.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Baldur's Gate 3 publishing director thinks GTA 6 might have the "clout" to normalise a $100 price tag⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  “publishing director”. So Marketing.

  As for game prices, in fairness to the industry prices have actually come down since 2000.

  AAA Games on consoles in 2000 were around $50; that is $92 now due to inflation. Games went up to around $60 on consoles in 2006, that is around $93 now due to inflation. By 2019 they were still $60 but inflation eroded the value, and that is equivalent to $73 today. When they went up to $70 in 2020, that would be equivalent to $84 now.

  So a nominal price of $100 is not as unreasonable as it sounds. It’s higher than games were in 2000 but in the future if static would erode back to equivalent to $90 in probably 3-4 years.

  But the problem is people do not think in terms of inflationary value, and instead in terms of nominal value. And the bigger problem is most peoples earnings are squeezed by inflation and we have not been having pay rises to account for the inflation, so games are more expensive as proportion of income.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Marvel Snap is banned, just like TikTok⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  The law bans the distribution of the app and applies fines to the app store companies of $5,000 per user who is able to access the app to download it.

  So yes, TikToks position is theatrics - current users could continue to access the app but that would mean a slow inevitable decline as no one new could join and the user base would inevitably decline over time. Its not in TikToks interests to allow that and it would take pressure off politicians to do anything. So they’re within their rights to muddy the water and block access with a message blaming it on the politicians.