MudMan
@MudMan@kbin.social
- Comment on I'm a US citizen, people in other countries, what do you think when you read stories like these about the US health care system? 8 months ago:
Yeah, I keep hearing the "you don't get how big it is" thing, too.
I get how big it is.
European agriculture workers just reversed EU-wide policy as recently as last week by blocking major roads throughout the continent with tractors. They didn't even agree with each other (half those guys are pissed at the other guys for being too competitive), and the regulations they opposed were climate protection regulations, among other more reasonable things, so this isn't necessarily a feel-good story.
But they won.
They didn't even have to try that hard, honestly. Besides mild traffic jams and some tense standoffs with police it was all pretty mild. And yet politicians across the entire continent, over multiple countries, were terrified of the optics of working class people protesting in loose coordination, especially with right wing parties trying to co-opt their anger.
I get how big it is. The size is not the reason.
- Comment on I'm a US citizen, people in other countries, what do you think when you read stories like these about the US health care system? 8 months ago:
Yeah, ok.
I don't want to speak for the OP, but... I'm guessing that's what they're saying.
I mean, this issue is not on the ballot elsewhere. Even conservatives who are actively trying to dismantle public health care won't DARE suggest that they want less public health care. At most they'll tell you they found ways to invest more and then turn around and give that money to private managers. You certainly broke through the propaganda. I don't think I've spoken to an American anywhere who has made a case for the current health care system. Polls suggest this issue, among other "aren't Americans weird" stuff are wildly impopular with the actual population.
But I also constantly hear from Americans that it's impossible to turn it around, that candidates who support these common sense moves are unelectable and that there is nothing they could ever do about it.
That part is what I don't get. I mean, I'm familiar with elections not going my way, it happens to everybody, but holy crap. There's a reason why this is not on the ballot elsewhere. You wouldn't need an election to figure this out. Even in countries with the bare minimum of democratic guarantees and no money you would have the mother of all endless riots under these circumstances.
Me, personally, I'm not so much judgemental of the American public, I'm baffled at their defeatism and conformism, though.
- Comment on I'm a US citizen, people in other countries, what do you think when you read stories like these about the US health care system? 8 months ago:
Honestly? The real feeling I get from this is being scared for the future. I do know that there are powerful forces seeing a business opportunity in that status quo that can be exported. And you can see the impetus towards eroding the safety nets here following marching orders from the far right, anarchocapitalist mothership all throughout the world. In some of the countries I've lived in there is already a push towards this model, just moderated by the existence of some sort of universal health care. Sure, even the bare minimum of public service care takes a TON of the edge off. Those ER bills are what some of my friends in those places paid for, say, having major surgery or good care while having a baby... but it's a slippery slope.
- Comment on I'm a US citizen, people in other countries, what do you think when you read stories like these about the US health care system? 8 months ago:
Best guess, the left of the democrats in the primaries, for a start.
It's not that you lack politicians who agree with the changes that are needed, it's that they are seen as less electable than the guy who did tons of fraud and at least one confirmed rape, somehow. I don't know that Americans are "bad people", but the fact that these common sense positions aren't the default, centrist view across both major parties is baffling.
It's a clumsy way to put it, but it's not wrong that the lack of universal consensus around these things in the US is confusing and unreasonable.
- Comment on Bluesky and Mastodon users are having a fight that could shape the next generation of social media 9 months ago:
Hi, yes, I'm here. The user. Of both, in fact.
Both Bluesky and Mastodon have their quirks and their different cultures. The feature sets of their protocols may also be different, but they sure aren't relevant to the experience at all, because federation is not a user-facing feature for the vast majority of the social media experience.
Stop cheerleading for social networks. Social networks are not your friends, including Mastodon or the rest of the "fediverse".
- Comment on How did China get so good at chips and AI? Congressional investigation blames American venture capitalists 9 months ago:
Right, but that's my point, compute is compute is compute. There are tensor acceleration cores in commercially available hardware dating back five years. They capped things above a specific performance threshold, is my understanding, but that just means you need more of the less powerful hardware, so all you've done is make things more expensive/less energy-efficient, but not block any specific application. Not in cheap, portable chips, not in huge industrial data center processors.
So not particularly useful to stop cyberwarfare, not particularly useful to stop military applications. The only use I see is making commercial applications less competitive. Specifically on the training side of things.
- Comment on How did China get so good at chips and AI? Congressional investigation blames American venture capitalists 9 months ago:
None of that makes any sense. "Western chips" all come from Taiwan in the first place. "Western designed chips" are also in laptops and mobile phones, including tons of Chinese devices, and that's assuming you mean to include South Korea as "Western", which is a bit of a stretch. Those are fundamentally interchangeable with military hardware. Nobody is putting 4090s and A100s in ICBMs.
Make it make sense. What specific hardware is this stopping from getting to China and for what application?
- Comment on How did China get so good at chips and AI? Congressional investigation blames American venture capitalists 9 months ago:
I am very confused about this ongoing thing regarding "stifling China's access to AI models". Does the US government think GPUs are magic? All you need to make a ML model is some tensor math and a web crawler, maybe some human processing on the later bits. You're not gonna stop China from making them. You're not gonna stop college kids with gaming rigs making them.
I'm guessing the endgame here is to make it slightly more expensive to do this in China to get American companies to have slightly better versions in the market and prevent a TikTok situation, rather than any legitimate strategic goal. Right? I mean, besides commercial protectionism I don't see how this type of language makes sense.
- Comment on WhatsApp Chats Will Soon Work With Other Encrypted Messaging Apps 9 months ago:
It's not lip service if I can send messages and other people can receive them.
Again, the status quo is you can't do that. Hell, in the spectrum of being dragged into reasonableness by the EU kicking and screaming, Meta is orders of magnitude below Apple here.
I mean, we can debate the finer points of the implementation once it's live, but for now this is nothing but positive movement. If people got over rejecting cookies they can get over dismissing warnings regarding interoperability, and if they don't, the same regulators have a history of re-spanking unruly malicious compliers.
- Comment on WhatsApp Chats Will Soon Work With Other Encrypted Messaging Apps 9 months ago:
But what would be the point?
I swear, people have all these weird conspiracy theories around supposed "EEE" tactics, but Whatsapp already dominates the instant messaging space. It's pretty much a monopoly. The simplest solution to continue to dominate basically the entire landscape is do nothing.
Somebody explain to me how literally having the entire market to themselves in exclusive is somehow worse than any interoperability at all. You can't tank the use rate lower than zero.
- Comment on WhatsApp Chats Will Soon Work With Other Encrypted Messaging Apps 9 months ago:
Yeah, but you do realize all that you're describing is still more open than "this is a closed app that interops with nobody and also is permanently tied to your phone number", right?
I mean, I don't like the guys and I avoid their services whenever possible, but... man, as an unwilling Whatsapp user the ability to migrate without having to convince all my social circles to do anything but check a checkbox sounds like a huge step forward. I literally surfaced the idea of migrating to the WhatsApp group I thought would be most willing today and got nothing but crickets.
- Comment on How bad are search results? Let's compare Google, Bing, Marginalia, Kagi, Mwmbl, and ChatGPT 9 months ago:
Well, yeah. So much of this conversation has gotten really dumb, with both advocates and detractors misrepresenting the tech and its capabilities and applying it to the wrong uses and applications as a result.
Honestly, early on I did think as a summary service for search queries it'd be more useful than it ended up being. It quickly became obvious that without the search results onscreen you basically have to fact check every piece of info you get, so it's only really useful to find answers you already know but had forgotten or that you need a source for.
But hey, at least I noticed that it kinda isn't before I built it as a key part of Windows. At this point if I was going to build a search app around this tech I'd use it for a short summary to replace Google's little blurb cards and still give you the raw results immediately below. It's only really good at parsing a wonky search prompt into a more accurate query. That's why when I have to use one of these I go to Perplexity instead of raw ChatGPT or Bing or whatever, it's the one that's built the most like that, although you still end up having to argue with it when it insists on being wrong and gets sidetracked by its own mistakes.
- Comment on How bad are search results? Let's compare Google, Bing, Marginalia, Kagi, Mwmbl, and ChatGPT 9 months ago:
It depends. Chatbots are terrible at broad queries or parsing very detailed information, but they're surprisingly good with very fuzzy searches. If I want a link to a specific website I go to a search engine. If I want to ask "hey, what's that 80s horror comedy that's kinda like Gremlins but not Gremlins and it has one of the monsters coming out of the toilet in the poster?" I go to a chatbot.
- Comment on Running my Sega Saturn. 9 months ago:
OK, I had to look this up, VF1 was model 1, like Virtua Racing, but the did ship a backport of Remix that did run on ST-V. More likely you remember people being excited about the idea that Saturn would just be arcade hardware at home and we'd get arcade perfect ports of Daytona and VF, which was extremely not the case.
I mostly remember the arcade being pin-sharp, which it was, but once you got the upgraded textures nobody was complaining. And we got both at once in VF2, so...
- Comment on Running my Sega Saturn. 9 months ago:
Oh, no, I had my entire world redefined at the sight of the first 3D fighting game... when I played it in arcades the year prior.
The launch version for the Saturn was... a different story. Again, by the time I was able to get my hands on a Saturn the version they were bundling was VF Remix instead, which again, mind blown, entire path in life significantly impacted, so I've always been morbidly curious about vanilla.
- Comment on Running my Sega Saturn. 9 months ago:
That's vanilla VF1, right? So... disappointed and mildly concerned?
- Comment on Running my Sega Saturn. 9 months ago:
I very specifically remember it not being very fun at all, but then at the time they were pushing it as a FF7 competitor and it is extremely not that.
Silver was on the Dreamcast, though. And PC, which is where I got disappointed with it.
- Comment on Running my Sega Saturn. 9 months ago:
Yeah, fortunately softmodding acts as a backdoor to make that part of the system have a healthy afterrmarket replacement. Which is useful because man, that thing had less storage than I remembered.
- Comment on ‘Baldur’s Gate 3’ Studio CEO Refutes Ubisoft’s Subscription Model Comments 9 months ago:
I agree that dev to user is best, and I agree that the current greenlight processes for game publishers are pretty busted, no arguments there. I also have bigger issues with the sub model he's not even mentioning.
In fairness, though, I think for majors with that busted greenlight process the sub model does enable some games to get made that wouldn't otherwise. Some games just don't work at full price and just can't stack up to the major productions but they do get checked out in a sub. For smaller games and devs the sub money can guarantee survival.
But that doesn't take away that a subscription-dominated market is poorer, the preservation issues or any of the other problems with that being the primary thrust. Tech guys tend to be all-in on things and think they should be THE way because more money is more optimal and if they dominate then that's more money. In reality for a content ecosystem to thrive a multi-window ecosystem is probably best. Also, I want to buy games I can own, and the less they let me do that the more I want it, so... there's that.
- Comment on Microsoft Confirms Plans To Release Xbox First Party Games “Across All Platforms”, Including PlayStation 10 months ago:
I'm not sure if you read my comment backwards or you're just agreeing with it?
Anyway, yeah, I think hte big problem gaming subs have is that unless you have first party ownership over every game in existence you can't do the Netflix thing of pretending to be selling the only expense you're ever gonna need. The way games work you engage with them too long and they cycle around too fast, so even if there is a big pool of games they offer it's just a big fat pit of FOMO and feeling bad for seeing that game you're mildly interested in come and go without actually having played it. I already have a stressful backlog without adding the pain point of monetizing my not getting around to all the games I'd like to play.
- Comment on Microsoft Confirms Plans To Release Xbox First Party Games “Across All Platforms”, Including PlayStation 10 months ago:
Kinda. This is the exact opposite of that, in that they control the IP and went out to find an external dev with lots of subject matter expertise to make it.
On paper I'd say that's better than them buying Relic off of Sega, but then Sega fired a bunch of people at Relic this year, like everybody else, so what would have been better is very much up for debate.
- Comment on xkcd #2882: Net Rotations 10 months ago:
Hm. You should try doing it weekly instead and you probably get fewer spins.
Unless you don't commute the same way both ways or always go around the office in the same direction, you'd get very dizzy then.
- Comment on Microsoft Confirms Plans To Release Xbox First Party Games “Across All Platforms”, Including PlayStation 10 months ago:
I'm not sure who "they" is in this scenario. If it's Microsoft Games Studios... well, yeah, they're a publisher. You just described what a publisher is.
I think if we're talking about their recent publishing strategy they've certainly been on a bit of a rut. There's still some interesting stuff happening with their IP. They got Relic to make a surprsiingly faithful Age of Empires, people do like Microsoft Flight Sim, that type of thing. But still, yeah, they've made a lot of purchases and we haven't seen new games coming out from most of those to justify those purchases, which does speak to a bit of a struggle to find a direction. That Hellblade sequel looks intriguing, but for a publisher with a lot of fully owned studios that has been fighting claims of monopolistic practices for their high profile acquisitions their output from that stable hasn't picked up pace yet.
I get it, games take forever to make now. That Hellblade game has been marketed for as long as the Xbox Series has, and that came out in 2020. Still, that itself is a problem. If the big oil tanker is hard to steer you have to plan your turns before you get to the icebergs. I do genuinely hope they get it together, though. That's a lot of talent, IP and potential to let run on idle for too long. Or worse, to fail in the context of a major corporation and stop getting support.
- Comment on Microsoft Confirms Plans To Release Xbox First Party Games “Across All Platforms”, Including PlayStation 10 months ago:
OK, but that's not how reality works, you're making up offenses that nobody has committed because you've decided a particular brand is "bad" while ignoring actual offenses from brands you like and so have decided are "good".
So no, I'm gonna have to say your hypotheticals don't make their offerings any worse (or better) than Microsoft's or Valve's. Now, the pricing and lack of content? Yeah, we can talk about those. But those don't have anything to do with preservation concerns, lack of ownership or content churn, which are all legit issues with all digital distribution and subscriptions.
- Comment on Veteran Videogame Analyst: Subscription growth has flattened [in video games] 10 months ago:
There are valid criticisms, for sure. I was not in the original thread, though, so I don't know how willing to address those he is, but it's a valid point that it's not an all or nothing proposition. You can point out that subs aren't overtaking the market in gaming without implying that they should.
I'd be more interesting in debating whehter subs are additive or not. I do know of anecdotal mentions of stunted sales on sub-forward releases, but I'd love to see more data about it (and what that means about revenue eventually, too).
But none of that influences the concerns on preservation one way or the other.
Honestly, I don't think you're right about the reasons growth has flatlined. I think the sub model just doesn't fit gaming best. The content just doesn't work well with the rotating carrousel of new and new-ish games most subscriptions have. I think Nintendo could be onto something, in the way Netflix was early on, in that you may be more willing to pay a fee to just have access to every single game before a certain point and from the beginning of time, but nobody is gonna figure that one out anytime soon.
- Comment on Microsoft Confirms Plans To Release Xbox First Party Games “Across All Platforms”, Including PlayStation 10 months ago:
Sure, it has its uses. So do the subscriptions from Ubisoft or EA, though.
All I'm saying is that the digital distribution outlets that people like and have a good reputation (Game Pass, Steam) still have all the downsides that people love to get mad about in the alternatives they dislike. That doesn't mean you should refuse to use the ones you like, but you should probably keep an eye on the effects it has on the art form and the industry.
- Comment on Veteran Videogame Analyst: Subscription growth has flattened [in video games] 10 months ago:
I mean... yeah. Turns out that having models and looking at the actual data and analyzing the market tends to land on lukewarm takes. The hot takes are for the press and the trolls.
FWIW, I don't have visibility on subscription growth at all, so I'll have to take his word for it, but none of that sounds unreasonable.... except maybe for the fact that the hype may make people make bad moves and double down in ways that are harmful, so a degree of fearmongering can be useful, if only as a deterrent.
- Comment on The Self-Checkout Nightmare May Finally Be Ending 10 months ago:
I get it, I do. I've been a migrant in a place with a language barrier on top of sharing that general feeling, so... yeah, sure. In principle.
But the times I've used it it's twice the anxiety, in that I keep fearing I'll mess up and need help, which is orders of magnitude worse than having to go through the register. Just the potential of issues is enough to deter me, but the times I've had the scales mess up or the payment method not go through were excruciating.
- Comment on Microsoft Confirms Plans To Release Xbox First Party Games “Across All Platforms”, Including PlayStation 10 months ago:
Admittedly, that's helped by them doing terribly at selling hardware.
But also, screw gamepass and the subscription model overall. If we're gonna crap on Ubisoft for their recent foot-in-mouth episode let's be consistent and call all of it out. I'm cool with this as long as I can keep buying these in boxes.
- Comment on Employees Say ‘Sizable Portion’ Of Gearbox-Owned Studio Has Been Laid Off 10 months ago:
You absolutely did not, but keep guessing.