cerebralhawks

@cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨new Star Trek Voyager videogame: Across the Unknown⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  My first Star Trek game was on the Amiga, and it used the TOS crew/ship. I couldn’t get anywhere in it. Maybe I wasn’t old/smart enough for it.

  I agree that a Star Trek game shouldn’t be all action, that’s just the kind of game I want to play.

  I really don’t care for the Call of Duty games, but one set in a Starfleet combat situation would be awesome.

  Starfield could have been a good Star Trek game without the branding, but it mostly sucked.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is "AI" the end of truth?⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  Maybe I worded that poorly. Yeah, we generally trusted the news, but for the most part the TV was the “idiot box” and was not to be trusted. At some point, the news — I think, largely, FOX News at first, but the others weren’t far behind — became “news entertainment” in the same way WWE was “sports entertainment.” It was either not real, or at the very least it was heavily biased. Whenever The Newsroom came out — what a lot of people know for a 3 minute YouTube edit about why “America is no longer the greatest country in the world anymore” but was really more of a love letter to the way the news used to be. They told real news in a way that was entertaining, but through a character (portrayed by Jeff Daniels) who was trying to tell the news the old way. Give people the facts and let them make up their own mind. But by that point, I think most news on TV was fake/heavily biased.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Make America Consoom Again⁩ ⁨⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  Can’t tell what they are, but they don’t appear to be waifus. That would be funnier.

  Or if it was all kid characters… e.g. Eleven and Max from Stranger Things, Anya from SPYxFAMILY, Wednesday from… Wednesday… I dunno, I’m sure there are others.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is "AI" the end of truth?⁩ ⁨⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  End of trust, not truth.

  Back in my day, we assumed that if it was on TV, it was a lie or likely not the whole truth. When the Internet began to rise up, we extended that mistrust to the Web.

  Lately, people have become too trusting of the Internet and I’m glad that trust is starting to roll back.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is the amount of Lemmy activity declining?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Thanks! I went and followed the discussion link the other guy posted. I saw one concern — the handling of voting. But someone/some people are going behind a lot of those comments and saying they fixed it based on user feedback. So that’s good. I also feel I understand the two (Lemmy and Piefed) and their relationship a bit more.

  If it sounds like I’m a bit eager to learn, it’s because I like to help others, but to do that I have to understand things first.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is the amount of Lemmy activity declining?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  So let me see if I understand you correctly. The “one I’m on now” you refer to in the third paragraph, meaning dbzer0, is an instance of Lemmy (along with others) that are federated (loosely united) together in the same feed.

  You’re on piefed.social, so you’re federated with dbzer0 and the other Lemmy feeds. So it’s not like you’re on a whole other federated social network like Bluesky (which is more like Twitter whereas Lemmy is more like Reddit). But it has different programming, so you can access more/different features from your end than I can on mine, but we still have access to the same communities?

  Still kinda struggling to understand how fediverse stuff works.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is the amount of Lemmy activity declining?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Thank you! Subscribed to both and found a few things to sub to in the second one.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is the amount of Lemmy activity declining?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Thank you! I’m mostly treating it like “Reddit but for left leaning people” and enjoying learning the differences.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is the amount of Lemmy activity declining?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m doing my part! Just joined a couple days ago. Thought I could stick with Reddit but it got too far to the right for me. They crossed a line I can’t ignore, but I like the format, so I’m here. I knew Reddit was going to be winding down soon so I didn’t put as much effort in. I’d like to start a couple communities here, whereas I wouldn’t have tried over there. I just hope the toxic people who run the communities there don’t see what I’m doing and try to invade. I mean we could use the numbers but not the toxicity — though I feel that that comes with any influx of new users.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨new Star Trek Voyager videogame: Across the Unknown⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Loved Voyager but feel like Elite Force was about the only good Trek game. I also don’t feel like the games I like are conductive to what Star Trek is about. Starfield came close and could have been that game. Constellation has a lot of similar ideals to the Federation but they’re so generically good, that you get into situations like, pirates have taken over a ship, you have to disable the shields, dock — no transporters here — and board, and you can shoot the pirates and you’re fine, but shoot their leader and they all hate you for some reason? There’s no diplomatic solution, the leader is trying to kill you just like the rest. Easy solution, don’t travel with Constellation but then what’s the point? Maybe with mods… but that excludes something like 90% of the players.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Report: Microsoft's latest Windows 11 24H2 update breaks SSDs/HDDs, may corrupt your data⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Thanks I guess? Surely Mac and Linux users can be friends or at least allies against Windows. Linux comes from UNIX which macOS is based on so they’re very similar, only one is FOSS — which I suppose is the point — and the other is not. But another commonality — Macs and PCs can both run Linux.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Report: Microsoft's latest Windows 11 24H2 update breaks SSDs/HDDs, may corrupt your data⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  I switched to Mac after my old Asus laptop went out. I figure why bother with a PC laptop, it’s not gonna game and let’s see what the fuss is about. Love my MacBook Air. So then our desktop dies and I give my wife 3 options. A Mac, a cheaper PC, and a more expensive PC. She’s Android, figured she’d want to stick with Windows, but she picked the Mac! So happy. I mostly game on Switch and Xbox these days so that’s fine.

  I keep feeling like I left Windows at the right time.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Neil Young Leaves Facebook & Instagram Over “Unconscionable” Policies for AI Chatbot Conversations With Children⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Facts

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨It's Time We Talked about Disco Elysium, Again - People Make Games⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Disco Elysium is the kind of game I’d love to sit down with the developers/producers and try to play it, and ask them questions about it.

  I own it on Steam, but I can’t remember if I bought it because it was on Mac, or if I bought it before I switched. Either way, I’ve tried to start it a few times and I just don’t get anywhere. It’s the kind of game I should like, but I don’t have the patience to learn it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Change your profile to Clippy (call to action)⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  I just replaced my dying Windows machines (a laptop and later, a desktop) with Macs. Still closed source, but they’re UNIX certified. I know FOSS folks love to hate on macOS, but even being smart enough to use Linux, and having used it off and on for 20-25 years, I just didn’t want to. I did get away from Microsoft stuff, at least at home, except for Xbox. That was my wife’s choice and we have a bunch of games for it. I’m more of a PlayStation guy, but I kinda got outvoted on that one. These days I mostly just game on the Switch anyway. And the cool thing about new Macs? They can basically run Switch games, with a bit of help (but same-ish architecture). And a lot of games going to Switch(/2) can also go to Mac (e.g. Cyberpunk).

  It’s a great time to get away from Microsoft. Their browser hasn’t been good enough in decades. Their office suite is probably their biggest strength, followed by Xbox. Their cloud would be third, I’d say — OneDrive is underrated. I use iWork on my Macs and it’s fine. And it can read/write the docx formats. For cloud I guess iCloud is fine on the Mac side, I just wish the pricing were more competitive. Don’t really have a good answer for cloud. And for gaming… if you were starting from zero, I’d say look at the Steam Deck, Steam sales are unbeatable, the thing runs Linux, it emulates PC games pretty well (there’s a whole certification thing), and you can do GeForce Now as well if you’re near their CDN. Microsoft is arguably the easiest of the big three (vs Apple and Google) to drop.

  I don’t even need to know why people are going against Microsoft all of a sudden. I have my reasons. I don’t hate them, and I would have stuck with Office + OneDrive (MS 365) if they didn’t double the price to add AI to Office with no way to stick with the old product. They were getting $60 a year from me, now they’re not getting anything.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If your happiness is derived from your enjoyment of a false (i.e. fictional) stories, is that truely happiness, or is that technically a delusion?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  I would say there is a case to argue it can be a delusion. I would say you don’t have the authority to determine to what extent someone enjoys or relates to this delusion.

  I saw a conversation on another site and I didn’t reply the way I wanted because it would have been insensitive. But that point of view has greater context here. People were talking about the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s. I don’t know anyone who died from AIDS, or really felt connected to any celebrities who had it. However (especially since you bring up anime in the OP), there is an anime that is generally disliked for a few reasons, some of them valid. Since I am introducing it in this context, I cannot say what the anime is, because the “AIDS angle” is a huge spoiler, and I really don’t do spoilers. But it introduces this character near the end of the second season, and this character is all kinds of awesome and inspirational. You find out that what they’re doing is due to their time being short… due to AIDS. Or, if we’re going off the book those episodes are based on (light novel, not manga), it’s actually AIDS and cancer because, like, eff this character in particular, I guess. I don’t think I have to tell you how this arc ends. I will say if it were its own thing, if it were adapted separately from that anime with all the baggage, it would stand as one of the great drama series out there, it would have a lot more fans and attention on it.

  So now we circle back to the OP’s question. If happiness coming from anime (or the other media) is invalid, what about sadness from anime? What if it’s an anime character with purple hair who really makes you care about a real-life social issue that doesn’t affect anyone you know? Does that make it any less real?

  It’s not up to me to decide for you. I personally believe those feelings are valid. How you feel, I suppose, depends on factors that matter to you. For example, you might personally know someone who died from AIDS, and you’re like “well screw that fictional character, because that disease claimed millions of lives and I’m more affected.” But I would argue the story brings awareness. I would not argue that such a person is wrong for feeling that way, though.

  If you know what anime I’m talking about, I’d ask that you follow my lead on the spoiler thing and not mention it. But I’m no one’s boss here.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why It's OK to Block Ads (2015)⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Here’s why it’s okay to block ads in pretty simple terms:

  Ads can contain ransomware; that is to say, a seemingly innocent ad can deliver a payload which will run on your computer, lock your files, and demand you pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars anonymously.

  Now if you go to the website that served the ad and tell them, “I allowed ads on your site because I support your right to monetise your content, and now I have to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars, will you help me pay that” or “will you pay that for me since your site served the ransomware,” you know what they will tell you, every single time, without fail? Whether they actually answer you, or more likely, just delete your email. They’re telling you that it’s your problem. That you should have secured your computer better.

  So secure your computer better now. Block all the ads.

  Getting a little more technical, use Firefox or a fork of it. Use Linux if you can. Use a Mac if you can’t. If you really must use Windows, know how to secure it. I use Windows 11 at work, I’d never use it at home, but I had a talk with the IT guy, and he let me do a few things to it. I know more than he does, but he’s the one with the job, so I told him what I’d do before I did it, I did exactly what I said I was going to do, nothing more nothing less, and I still think my home computer is more secure, but I’m a lot less worried about using the work machine. I think it’s wild that so many companies just use Windows. I’m not trying to hate on Windows. It’s good for gaming and it’s accessible. I’d love to see more companies roll their own *nix or just use Macs (which run macOS which is UNIX certified).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Neil Young Leaves Facebook & Instagram Over “Unconscionable” Policies for AI Chatbot Conversations With Children⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  I feel like more people should know what’s going on. Facebook has done some scummy stuff in the past. Now Zuck is openly defending his AI grooming children. In and of itself it doesn’t make a lot of sense — what’s the upshot for Meta here? But outside the bubble of logic, it sets kids up to be groomed by real predators. It’s unacceptable.

  People say the problem is that all the people they know are on Facebook. Two issues: most of those people would forget you exist if you leave Facebook. Also, you’re the reason they’re there. The second reason is that you are literally the product. You being on Facebook is part of the reason those people are, too, so be the change you want to see in the world.