cerebralhawks

@cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨One of the most detrimental things to a productive society is when people think their actions don't make a difference⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  After Trump lost the popular vote by about 3 million in 2016 and was still appointed by the Electoral College… probably not that bad

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨We should make some ai blocker working like sponsorblock⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  Until the database gets poisoned by pro AI groups. Like how some ad blockers block content because shitty websites flag content as ads.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Best Mastodon App?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  I used Ice Cubes on my iPhone, but lost interest in Mastodon. Don’t really like the microblog format.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Pet Peeves with Games?⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  I love when a game makes me think. To figure out how to progress, or just how to beat an enemy or solve a puzzle.

  What I don’t like is when you do the thing and it doesn’t click. Like you do it a second too fast or slow. Like come on, I did the thing, now let me move onto the next thing.

  I once played a game that let you skip a mission after failing it so many times. Seriously, why should the game just end because you don’t have perfect timing? That’s not entertaining for me. Keep the thing moving, somehow.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Pet Peeves with Games?⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  Nintendo is infamous for this. Animal Crossing is a great game on the Switch, but it’s meant for one person. You can join an island, but unless the island creator has everything unlocked, you can’t progress the game. And even if they have, there are certain recipes you can’t get without cheating (treasure islands) for some reason.

  Pokémon is the same way. They literally want you to buy a second Switch.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Pet Peeves with Games?⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  This is why mages are hard mode in RPGs. You’re limited by mana in how many fireballs you can cast. The sword does more damage and costs nothing to swing even though fatigue is a real thing.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Blackout curtains are awesome

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai are cowards - X’s deepfake porn feature clearly violates app store guidelines. Why won’t Apple and Google pull it?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Paywalls mostly (speaking for myself).

  That and, back in the day, they trashed Samsung for making big phones, then praised Apple for making objectively less functional ones (no stylus, no Note like features). We started calling them iVerge back then, for favoritism to Apple. Even as an Apple guy, I found it annoying.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai are cowards - X’s deepfake porn feature clearly violates app store guidelines. Why won’t Apple and Google pull it?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Funny how it’s the other way around when it comes to hardware. Headphone jack removal and fingerprint reader, Droid did both first.

  With software, copying Apple is everyone’s game. Samsung were caught red handed literally telling their designers where they could copy Apple more. They’re only just getting around to the important bits. Software updates, and synergy with a computer (which unfortunately is Windows, not Linux).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If Luigi Mangione is considered a "hero", then Punisher, Dexter Morgan and Jigsaw should be considered "heroes" too.⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  I’ve seen some of the Saw movies and I don’t agree about Jigsaw. Dude basically just captured people and tortured them for fun. Oh, but he was dying. Has been for decades. Just like all of us.

  Some people do think the Punisher and Dexter are heroes. Or anti-heroes as others have said. But still heroes. Just not heroes who are virtuous.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Microsoft CEO Begs Users to Stop Calling AI Content "Slop"⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  Right, the vast majority by volume.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If your 'friends' don't text you, then they aren't your friends.⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  “Don’t make someone a priority in your life if you’re not even an option in theirs.” Some pretty good advice I heard from my wife a long time ago.

  We’re both kinda socially awkward, but we’re just not gonna keep reaching out to someone who never reaches out to us. That’s not a friend, that’s a matter of convenience, and that’s fine from time to time. I have a good friend I almost never speak to, but when I have something to say, he generally picks up and we talk, then go another couple years without speaking. I wouldn’t call him a friend because we can go so long, but I’m not sure what else to call him. A brother? I mean, I don’t really keep up with my family, either. (And he came to my wedding from pretty far away, so that matters.)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If you truly had a problem with what I post, then block me, but you don't because I entertain you.⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Honestly, they never left.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If you truly had a problem with what I post, then block me, but you don't because I entertain you.⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  That would work on Reddit. OP could be like me and hide the numbers entirely. I see the arrows. I don’t see the net vote weight or any vote counts. I also sort comments by new, so lowly voted comments are literally not affected in any way.

  The only real benefit to mass downvoting someone is when someone makes a comment about how much it’s been downvoted. But that information would just age like milk, possibly even becoming untrue after a while (e.g. the Internet loves an underdog).

  On Lemmy, a site that gives a user like OP the ability to not be affected by your disdain, the best use of your energy is just to block.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨My apartment building gives me free water but I pay for electricity. What if I run the faucet nonstop and rig up a hydro turbine in my bathtub to generate my power from it?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Love this article, but they kinda bury the lede making the Coca-cola joke about bottling and selling water.

  Most bottled water you buy in stores is, in fact, tap water. If you think they’re getting it from a mountain spring, even if there’s a mountain on the label, you would be mistaken. You wouldn’t want mountain water (with bear piss) anyway, the water you buy bottled is filtered and treated. It’s good tap water, but it’s still tap water. So next time your water bottle runs out, just refill it from the tap. Assuming your tap water is potable and doesn’t taste like shit.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Most people who help others are doing it as a performance⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Here’s a showerthought: everyone complaining about Grimreaper has the option to block them and never see their posts, but they don’t do that because Grimreaper entertains them. Thus proving Grimreaper’s point, that people put their self interests first.

  I’ll be completely honest: I don’t agree with what Grimreaper says, but I don’t block them because they don’t reduce my enjoyment of this site/community. I don’t require an echo chamber to function.

  My self-interest here, in the interests of transparency, is just passing time. You are free to believe I’m lying when I say that, or that I generally do not lie (it requires more effort than I care to give).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I felt so betrayed when I found out Germany isn't called Germany in Germany⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  It’s interesting how countries have names that we just don’t use. To be fair, the UK calls it Germany, too, at least the BBC does. And not just their .com (American) site, which still uses English rather than American English (e.g. honour instead of “honor,” centre instead of “center,” and other minor spelling differences… to stranger ones like manoeuvre vs “maneuver” and so on), so that tells me they call Deutschland “Germany” in the UK as well. Even the English Wikipedia (which covers English and American English) says the official name of the country is “The Federal Republic of Germany”.

  We call Turkiye “Turkey”, I guess because the name of the bird is more familiar and easier to type?

  What we call Japan, people who live there say Nihon (or Nippon). But what they write is 日本, but I don’t know how to make my keyboard (or computer) produce those symbols without copying and pasting them. It’s easy to remember these symbols. One looks like a skyscraper (like in Tokyo) and the other looks like clouds around the peak of Mt Fuji, together representing the manmade and natural beauty of the country. It might be coincidence that those glyphs look like that, though.

  Let’s take it a step further, shall we? So we were talking about countries that call themselves something other than what you (I’m assuming American) call them. There are companies that do it, too, but other than having extra words and symbols at the end, it’s mostly pronunciation… and I only have two examples. There may be more. The first one is Nokia, which people try to pronounce like it’s Korean or Japanese. It’s not, it’s Finnish (from Finland, one of the places Vikings come from). That’s why they’re so sturdy. It’s not just a meme. Anyway, while it’s fine for you to call it “No-kia,” like you’re saying you don’t drive a Kia, the Finns pronounce it “Knock-ya.” Like, throw a Nokia at you and “knock-ya” TF out!

  Going back to Japan, the Japanese language is made up of glyphs which represent the syllables that make up the spoken language. Japanese is both simpler and more complex than you might think. So 日本 means Nihon, or Ni and Hon. Maybe you see where this is going… Hon isn’t pronounced like it rhymes with Don, it instead rhymes with “bone.” So to say 日本, you say “Ni” (knee) “hon” (hone). Those are the sounds represented by those glyphs. Now say “Honda.” You probably said it wrong. 本田 is pronounced “Hon” (hone) “da” (duh). Of course, if you say “Hone-duh” to car guys, they’ll look at you like you’re a fool, because no one outside of Japan pronounces it that way, even at the dealer. And you won’t score home field points by going to the dealer and pronouncing it correctly. (Of course, when they speak to leadership in Japan, if they ever do, you bet your ass they’re saying it right. But outside of Japanese corporate, they’re pronouncing it the way you always have.)

  Does any of this even matter? No, not really. It’s trivia, which means it’s fun to know but not exactly useful to know, in most situations. German people will likely tell you they are German, not that they are Deutsch. Then again, Germans are far nicer than their rough language would imply (you can thank Rammstein for making you think it’s rough in the first place, especially if you’re Gen X or Millennial). They would just as soon you say hello as hallo (German for hello), though I will almost always use “auf widersehen” over goodbye, because goodbye sounds more formal. “Auf widersehen” translates to “Until next time.” Compare that with the Japanese “さようなら” (sayonara), which means “farewell.” Three languages, the other two translate to “goodbye,” but they all actually mean different things. This is why learning some of your more common phrases in other languages helps. I’d much rather say “auf widersehen” to someone I’m going to see again tomorrow rather than “goodbye.” And as much as I’d love to tell my boss さようなら… well, it’s just not the appropriate parting phrase.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Stop checking. Your mental health is worth more than that. Forgive them, forgive yourself for worrying about it, and keep moving forward.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Social media sites often filter other social media sites. It’s crummy but that’s most likely why.

  Also, “goodbye” posts are banned on a lot of forums because they contribute nothing. They don’t even contribute discussion because either the person who made them has left, or they’re a liar and you don’t want their contributions anyway (attention seeking).

  No love for Reddit here — they banned me for saying the US should have stricter penalties for messing with kids. They took it as a threat to the President — this was around the time the Epstein files hit the news again. I thought they were a little overzealous, so I appealed and it was upheld. I decided to not continue to use a site that was supportive of paedophiles, and said as much when I closed my account and they asked why.

  So, welcome to Lemmy! Not all of us are here because we hate Reddit, though. But still, enough do that it’s kind of the revolution, in a sense. There’s also the open source element. Lots of FOSS fanatics here, Linux guys and whatnot. As a Mac user, I feel like Linux guys are our allies and we’re all against Microsoft, but a lot of Linux guys feel they stand alone and that Mac is just as corporate as Windows. I get that, but I don’t agree. Better to build a bridge than to burn it — unless a paedophile is the only thing on the other side of that bridge. Then burn it down.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨You rarely hear people get toungue-tied in scripted television or film⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  I like a lot of stuff Aaron Sorkin does (The West Wing, for example, but also The Newsroom) but damn, his dialogue is too perfect. Nobody talks that way IRL.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Harry Potter cafe reopens four years after devastating fire⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Real fire or the dumpster fire that is what JK Rowling said about trans people? (Sorry to anyone who was affected, I know what she said had longer lasting repercussions. Also apologies to anyone who was hurt in the fire, don’t mean to be insensitive to that, burns suck, but also, fuck JK Rowling.)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why didn't Venezuela move its capital further away from the ocean to make the government more resilliant to capitulation?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Washington is more or less centrally located given the scope of the original colonies. Not given the current scope of the United States.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Elon Musk’s AI Grok Goes Rogue with Posts Suggesting Trump Is a Pedophile and Erika Kirk Is JD Vance in Drag⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I mean, yeah, but my point is, a computer would know the difference and not have the emotional attachment to it. That it can associate a person with a wrong thing (even if they are morally equivalent), then it can associate a person with a wrong thing that is not morally equivalent. And that’s the problem.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Elon Musk’s AI Grok Goes Rogue with Posts Suggesting Trump Is a Pedophile and Erika Kirk Is JD Vance in Drag⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  This should show people how unreliable AI is.

  Okay, yes, Donald Trump is some kind of pervert and predator, and he made a comment about a ten-year-old girl one time (joking “I might be dating her in 10 years”), but he mostly preys upon teenage girls. So, not a pedophile — the word for that is ephebephile. Now, I might be splitting a hair here. Both types prefer underage partners. One is clearly more inflammatory. But the fact that the other is more accurate, and that a computer should know the difference, should tell you that AI can leverage the court of public opinion.

  Also, shaming a woman by calling her a man in drag is just ugly, I don’t care who she is. I may be just a bit left of centre, but I think even if you’re a lot further left than I am, you can understand that if you don’t want the sword of sexism swung at you, maybe you shouldn’t swing it at others. But in any case, a computer is jumping to this conclusion because these are unpopular figures.

  I don’t like these people either.

  But what happens when it’s you? Or someone you love? Or the fact that Grok has been used to create CSAM of a ten-year-old girl and a teenage girl? This was in the news the other day, someone got it to take a photo of a grade-school girl in a nice, conservative dress, and swap it for a skimpy bikini. Then they got a photo of a teenage girl (I think someone from Stranger Things?) and had it render her fully nude.

  So yeah, it’s funny when AI attacks fascist dictators and their supporters, but it’s also attacking children. It doesn’t know the difference, it doesn’t care, and it can’t be made to do either. It’s just a tool that is used by whoever wields it against whomever they do not like or want to see harmed.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Also because they most likely are not the truth…?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨YSK: If you're forced to use Microsoft 365 for whatever reason you can at-least get a cheaper plan that doesn't include the AI features⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  They didn’t give me this option when my upgrade came due, so I just cancelled. It may be a new thing that every user has the option, or it may be an A/B test, but I definitely looked around and there was no way to do it. One solution said to cancel and you’d be offered the lower tier. That didn’t work, either. They just let me leave.

  We don’t get Publisher on Mac, so that was annoying (I love using it at work), but otherwise Office was real good on macOS. So was OneDrive, in fact. I didn’t have much complaint other than not being able to use Publisher.

  I’m using iWork now, which is not great coming from Office (I think it has all the options, it’s just laid out differently). LibreOffice looks better than ever, but iWork is good enough for my use (and it’s free with whatever Apple product it’s compatible with). It’s always been there since I switched to Mac, but I have a couple decades of experience with Excel and closer to 30 years with Word, so I hung on for familiarity.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨AI-Induced RAM Crunch Could Push Next PlayStation and Xbox Past 2028⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Good. They can both run Cyberpunk. Games don’t need to look better than that. Let’s focus on porting older PC games that still have some life in them to existing consoles, and/or getting Steam running on them.

  At some point we gotta say “what can we do with the tech we have” rather than looking toward the next one. Look at the Switch 2, it only has a couple games the Switch 1 can’t play, and “Switch 2 Edition” of existing games… that update was completely unnecessary. But they’re gonna release a big update for the biggest Switch game (Animal Crossing) in a couple weeks. Making existing games have more value.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨World's Video Game Companies⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Microsoft is about $3.9B BTW… Per another chart.

  You can make the argument that they do not belong because their primary businesses are Windows, Office, and AI. But if you’re looking for them because of Xbox, Bethesda, Mojang, or their other brands, that is where they would rank. Between NCSoft and NetMarble, with a USA flag.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How Are You Guys Handling This?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Mac user as well. I have an M2 Pro mini on my desk, and a base M2 MacBook Air.

  To be fair, you didn’t specify in the OP why you bought the Mac. Their comment is fair, and this is coming from a guy who doesn’t like Windows. It’s also a bad recommendation: you’re not gonna get a good deal on the Mac that would get you a comparative PC. Your best bet would either be a used Switch or a used Xbox Series S, or maybe a PS4 (Xb1 sucks).

  That said, you can get a comparable PC for $575, but you won’t get $575 for a $575 Mac selling it secondhand. The fallacy with that suggestion is you’ll get about 2/3 what you paid at best and that’ll put you in a much worse spot. Now you might be able to get a Chinese PC with everything on the chip like the Mac mini is, with 16GB DDR4 and something like an i3 dual core that will do some of the things the Mac will do, but it won’t have a Windows license, you’ll need to pay for that or get Linux. Still a bad idea if your new Mac works and you’re happy with it.

  I made my comment entirely based on the picture, which is kinda my bad but I’m leaving it. I read the text after. I blame my autism.

  That being said, you didn’t buy the Mac for gaming. If you did that’s on you. Heroic is good for some Steam games. M2 Pro isn’t great for gaming. I suspect you have an M4 base with 16 or 24GB of RAM (doesn’t matter in most cases). That’s a more capable machine. Still not great. Macs are not gaming machines. GeForce Now is a decent way to go if you have Steam games. You only need to pay the $10/month price to get decent game streaming, but only if the latency is good enough based on your location. If it’s not, the $20/month tier isn’t going to help. It’s just better graphics.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How Are You Guys Handling This?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  That’s the old price. GamePass Ultimate went up briefly from $14.99 to $19.99 then doubled (from its original price) to $29.99 per month.

  I got locked in at the original price. Better yet, I got the GamePass All Access deal right before it went away. That gets you the $500 Xbox Series X and 2 years of GamePass Ultimate for about 35 bucks a month. If you consider GPU to be $15 a month, that pushes the Xbox down to $480. Not a bad deal at all! You get the Xbox and a 24-month code straight up and make payments (it’s a credit card with 0% interest for that purchase, so you have to qualify for it). That’s why I have an XSX and not a PS5 like I would have liked. I couldn’t come up with $500 straight up for a PS5, but I could make $35 a month for 2 years plus I got GamePass.

  I still game on my Xbox (I’m a Mac user on computers — we got Cyberpunk and Blue Prince last year, and I own both on Steam, but they play better on my Xbox). I just buy games on sale. I got the Mass Effect Legendary Edition (remaster of the Shepard trilogy) for $6. That sale is still on. They also have Mass Effect 4 for $3 (or $4 for Deluxe) and the first one (OG 360 version) for $5. Bought all of it. Love those games. I got Hogwarts Legacy for $10. That nasty trans-hating Harry Potter author didn’t have any input in the game and in fact it has a bunch of gay couples and a trans character to spite her. I really don’t like her views and avoided the game for a couple years, but I’m hooked. I love flying around and exploring the castle. I also play Switch games. Those tend to last longer than PC/Xbox games. My wife got Animal Crossing last year and burned out after a couple weeks. I still check in on my island a few times a week. It’s honestly a lovely game.