the_abecedarian

@the_abecedarian@piefed.social

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What are your approaches to donating?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Donate locally, to smaller organizations doing important work in your area. Your money will be so much more meaningful than a few extra dollars to a national organization or a politician. Mutual aid organizations are a good example.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How often do thieves (and identity thieves) actually get caught and served justice? Are there actual examples of law enforcement actually doing anything? (Because I think most cops are just lazy)⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Cops have no reason to put forth effort unless you're at least locally important or someone above leans on them to make their numbers/look like they're doing something.

  Also is it "justice" to put someone in jail? Let's say there's no way to return what was stolen (money spent, property sold/destroyed etc). It certainly doesn't stop them from doing more crime, it tends to force them into doing more bc it makes them less hirable and more economically desperate. It doesn't make your situation any better either. It's just more money for the prison companies.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why does America feel the need to control the world? Do what they say? Instead of taking care of their own problems at home? When did the US become police officer of the world and enforcer?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  There are privileges to being an empire and the capitalists in the US continue to use that empire to get access to those privileges. Favorable trade, commercial, and financing terms are a big one.

  Also the US war industry pushes the country to intervene. You can see how there are interventionist and isolationist movements in the US fighting right now over how much the US gets directly involved in Iran-Israel.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Mastodon updates terms of service to ban AI model training on user data⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  That is not true. The terms of service cover "your access and use of Server Operator's ("Administrator", "we", or "us") instance". Access includes reading data from the server.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Patreon will increase the cut it takes from new creators⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  https://alternativeto.net/software/patreon/?license=opensource

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Google is intentionally throttling YouTube videos, slowing down users with ad blockers⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  https://joinpeertube.org/

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Do instances exist where you can be 13+?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  @Aurora: I think most Pixelfed instances/apps have a way to block NSFW content. You'll have to make sure your sister has NSFW content blocking on (and keeps it on) and you'll want to check in with her every now and then about her experience there. I think marking images as NSFW is optional for the person posting the content, so not every single NSFW image will necessarily be blocked. It's hard to give someone a completely clean social media experience.

  One other thing you can try: look for instances that are focused on a topic your sister enjoys that is not likely to have NSFW content in it, like ppl who are interested in trains or playing a musical instrument. There are some here: https://fediverse.party/en/portal/servers/ (but you should check the server before she joins)

  to all the commenters saying the fediverse is not a good place: these kids are going to be on social media, one way or another. It could be tiktok, bluesky, snapchat, or whatever else they can get onto. Some (but not all) parts of the fediverse should be accessible to them. Ofc that means someone has to do the hard work of hosting those instances, which is not easy. Just saying "this isn't for you" isn't doing teens or the fediverse or parents any favors.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is it really doom scrolling if it's just true?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Doomscrolling is scrolling through your phone wallowing in depression/anxiety about these things. Moderate your news intake, spend some time doing mutual aid, ice watch, whatever appeals to you, and get more sleep.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is DOGE still around if Donny and Elon aren't getting along?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  So doge is doing that work. Why get rid of it if it does what they want?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is DOGE still around if Donny and Elon aren't getting along?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  DOGE is not just a Musk thing. Privatizing government has been a long term goal of the republicans and capitalists for a very long time

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Discord's CTO is just as worried about enshittification as you are⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Well if he does anything to stop it, the board of directors will remove him.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Let's play this game again⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  This is amazing and should be in a tabletop rpg session

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Let's play this game again⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Telekinesis

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨7 for me⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  What, no formalwear option?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The world was a nicer place before the advent of leaf blowers⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  fair enough. It's another reason why grass doesn't make sense to me -- it's so incompatible with the landscape unless you put in the effort to make it habitable. Maybe there's a type of ivy that would have an acceptable max height instead?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The world was a nicer place before the advent of leaf blowers⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I have lived in suburbs, subdivisions, and city neighborhoods with green space. People (or their landscapers) use leaf blowers in all of them.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The world was a nicer place before the advent of leaf blowers⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  They're loud, they kick up dust, and they happen at intermittent times based on when the neighbors do it. they also use fossil fuels. Loud mowers are annoying, too! If you -- heaven forbid -- want to keep your windows open and feel a breeze, you're going to get all of that noise and maybe even some of the dust.

  I understand that we have to clear sidewalks and driveways so that accidents don't happen. People usually don't have so much sidewalk + driveway that a broom or something wouldn't do that job quickly. But then we have to blow the leaves off the lawn, too? I know that your HOA will kill you if you don't, but doesn't it seem silly to remove the leaves from a lawn, then buy and put down commercial fertilizer, when the leaves would have biodegraded into new topsoil? To spend so much time watering a lawn to keep it alive when the leaves would have shielded it from the sun? Why are we spending so much time, money, water, and effort to maintain sterile grass lawns? We can have beautiful outdoors spaces without being slaves to an HOA enforcing what plants we grow.

  I understand that it's really the HOAs these days that are a big part of the problem. A good number of people in my HOA-less neighborhood have diverse plants in front of their homes. They look fantastic, they seem to take way less maintenance (I never see them mowing, watering, weeding, fertilizing, etc), and ofc they're much better for the environment.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨YSK You don't need Teflon pans for nonstick⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I didn't know about this technique, thanks!

  You can also season the whole pan once and the nonstick effect will last a very long time.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Stop Internet Searching and Start Asking on Fediverse?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  What's quicker: searching bad info sources online or searching better info sources at the library?

  Also OP didn't say it had to be quick

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Stop Internet Searching and Start Asking on Fediverse?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  your local library is also a great option

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Tolerating them is a form of support. They make spaces unsafe for others.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Telepathy will be real once we master brain computer interface⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  So ready to have my brain messages harvested for ad targeting

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Fediverse Corporate Sabotage⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  They will try to fill instances with bots, propaganda accounts, etc. They'll DDOS them. They'll try to get them shut down at the hosting level or cut off their donations by having credit card companies blacklist them

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Decentralization Scoring System (v1.3)⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Very cool! For the user scores, are you using monthly active users, total registered users, or something else?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The Channel Directory - Discover new content!⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Thanks for this list! There are some fun suggestions here that'll help me get into peertube, but Russel Brand is a conspiracy theorist and far-right pundit, recently charged with rape & sexual assault. Suggesting you delete him from this list.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Should visitors to a country (tourist / visa-holders / people staying temporarily) have the right to criticize the government? When should an immigrant have the right to criticize the government?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  It's just an excuse. They want to get rid of him because they don't like his politics and he's an activist. Whether the state categorizes you as a citizen, resident, tourist, undocumented, etc. should have nothing to do with your right to speak out.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨You can add self-driving to non-Teslas via comma.ai's "openpilot": an open-source, LiDAR-based dashcam module⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  but please don't