BananaTrifleViolin

@BananaTrifleViolin@piefed.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The U.S. spent $30 billion to ditch textbooks for laptops and tablets: The result is the first generation less cognitively capable than their parents⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  So who benefits from $30bn in spending on Laptops and Tablets? Oh Apple and Microsoft. Not students. Surprise surprise.

  As with many of these articles there is a big caveat - Gen Z in the USA. It does not follow that this research applies across the world. It’d be interesting to see how other rich countries outcomes are different with their differing approaches to this. For example here in the UK I don’t believe there has been a wholesale move to laptops/tablets for every student in schools. Technology is certainly used but it’s not solely about students using laptops and tablets. Its things like smart wide boards, and the use of digital content to engage attention and so forth. Spending billions on laptops for all would be a scandal when school buildings need renewing for example.

  I would hazard to suggest that the US education system is being corrupted in a similar way to other parts of the US state, with big expensive projects decided at state level by the Republicans and Democrats thanks to lobbying, benefiting big companies but not citizens. This is instead of money going to areas of proven benefit such as more teachers, school infrastructure renewal, or funding of homework clubs, after school activities, breakfast clubs or free school meals. Things proven to make a difference across the world but things that don’t benefit big US corporations.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Firefox is ending support for Windows 7, 8 and 8.1⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  In fairness to Mozilla, Firefox and Thunderbird are platform agnostic. It’s not really for them to tell users what OS to use. It’d cause them more aggro than its worth from all the people who have differing opinions on what the best OS is or the best distro to use. It’s already a tightrope act keeping their users happy when they announce things like AI in the browser. I think they’re right to focus on their own areas of interest.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tune a fish⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  tuna steak is fish, so why isn’t it tuna fish steak?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tune a fish⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Americans do love redundancies. e.g Just barely, only just, just a bit, true facts, free gift, end result, advance warning etc.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Google criticizes Europe's plan to adopt free software⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Nah that’s it. Their logic is seemingly if you don’t give the money to Google it’s not contributing to economic growth.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Im curious what they will come up with⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I seem to be the only one confused by this - what leak? Is it just a typo?

  A leak is when something is released without authorisation? So far the only information is authorised releases of the files with lots of stuff redacted, and allegations there is more being held back. Has there been a leak too?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is Wikipedia's Volunteer Model Facing a Generational Crisis?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  The article is very biased - it basically suggests young people are unwilling to read, that AI is a good thing and that the wikipedia contributors are being unreasonable. It goes on to talk about how AI has “extracted value” from Wikipedia in an unquestioning way - no mention of compensation to the project, just talking about what a triumph Wikipedia is a source for AI to train on.

  The “Simple Summaries” situation is less to do with the summaries and more to do with the risk of AI slop being introduced into Wikipedia unquestioned. The summaries were unchecked and unverified, which add a real chance that wikipedia started serving up inaccurate summaries and undermined it’s own reputation.

  In addition that idea that younger generations don’t have the concentration span to “read a wall of text” is pernicious and patronising nonsense part of a general media bias against Gen Z and Gen Alpha. There seems to be this barely questioned narrative that they have short attention spans and are unwilling or even unable to read, just because they grew up in the era of social media like Instagram and latterly Tik Tok.

  I’ll give a better hypothesis for why younger generations spend less time on wikipedia: the big tech giants like Google have stolen all the information people have put on there and serve it up in their own summaries on the search engine (preventing click throughs) or through their own AI slop engines. They don’t want people clicking through to Wikipedia, they want them clicking through to an ad. The problem is not Wikipedia, and the problem is not Gen Z or Gen Alpha; the problem - as is frequently the case - is the tech mega-corporations who steal everything (including wikipedia) and sell it back to us with ads or via AI slop.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The $100 Billion Megadeal Between OpenAI and Nvidia Is on Ice⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Both sides announced this to boost their share prices as they’re both growth stocks. Growth stocks are a trap - no company can keep on growing forever.

  This announcement is a sign the AI boom is probably soon to end. Nvidia quietly announcing the $100bn deal isn’t going to happen, is Nvidia trying to reduce it’s exposure to the bubble popping. Unfortunately for Nvidia, it’s already way way too far and the vast majority of it’s value is speculative. The question is have they damaged their core business by chasing the AI bubble, and what liabilities will they be left with if their customers go bankrupt and don’t pay them for their product.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I’d totally forgotten this trick - I used to use this when I was a kid after I heard about it. Was never quite sure if it was real because I remember being told to use it in Win 98 too and it didn’t do anything afaik.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨AI boom could falter without wider adoption, Microsoft chief Satya Nadella warns⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Wow it really is heading towards crisis point when you have people saying “keep feeding the beast or it’ll eat us”.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨He must be a great guy⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Only the healthiest of relationships use whatsapp to accuse your partner of theft

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Wine 11 runs Windows apps in Linux and macOS better than ever⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  The Microsoft strategy often seems to be “It worked well, but we completely redid it because we need to justify out existence. Now it barely works with new bugs”

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Never understood why they were always pink⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Apparently cost - made from recycled paper which looked grey as poor quality, so they added a little red dye to make it look better. Then it became a standard, partially as it easily stood out from white and yellow paper in offices. TMYK

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Cities: Skylines upheaval: Developer and publisher announce “mutual” breakup⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I loved CS1 and have had CS2 since launch. I just can't get into CS2 - it's just not fun.

  A large part of that is Paradox Mods in CS2. When CS1 launched from day one you could go onto the steam workshop and download player made models - houses, offices, train stations, roads etc. It grew rapidly and continuously, and it meant every city you made you could customise and change. The game was constantly refreshing and fun, and you could make whatever you wanted.

  For CS2, 2 years on and you still can't add custom assets to the game. Paradox/CO have released themed region based asset packs that they have made and the mods are there, but the player made assets remain largely missing. And I suspect the reason is Paradox Mods and the upcoming console version - the PC version seems to have been held back from being good so Paradox can get it's console launch. There seems to be a fundamental lack of understanding that the player made content was what made CS1 so great. I suspect CO get that, while Paradox only cares about DLC.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Cities: Skylines upheaval: Developer and publisher announce “mutual” breakup⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Wow this is terrible news. Basically Paradox owns the IP to Cities Skylines and Colossal Order seemingly want out.

  I'd say a large reason CS2 has been such a mess is because it was rushed out, the paradox mod system is just not fit for purpose and there remains a ridiculous focus on getting the console version released + move on to DLCs rather than fixing the main game. I'd put most of the blame on Paradox's shoulders to be honest.

  It'll be interesting to see what CO does next. CS1 was a great game, CS2 could have been a great game. Will they do another city sim or more onto something else? Seems a shame if they move on as they have grown so much expertise in the genre. I'm hoping they're cutting free to do a game with their own vision, which was how CS1 came to be.