Videos andrew_bidlaw • 3 days ago • 83%

I've stumbled upon that in my feed.

Ask Lemmy andrew_bidlaw • 5 days ago • 94%

As I always move fast I have a problem with feeling like I loosely strapped a brick onto myself when I put my phone in my pockets, including waist and knee ones. It chaotically moves at each step and I'm tired of that. To the point I take it in my hand when I'm in a real hurry. I guess, Lemmy has a lot of people who either run or do outdoors activities and labor. What are the best positions on the body to make it move less when you walk or run? Are there some great smartphone holders, straps that you can recommend? Can I use it with casual clothes without it looking weird? I suppose the ones you place on the belt are obvious to suggest first, but I haven't seen them since the death of small button phones and current smartphones are kinda big for that to work. And no, putting it into a bag, a suitcase or a backpack wouldn't work for me for I prefer not to be dependent on carrying them on me.

Lemmy Shitpost andrew_bidlaw • 2 weeks ago • 68%

::: spoiler alt text A picture of a group of first Christians praying in a circle. They are in the roman Coliseum. A lion slowly approaches them. The text added over the picture reads 'VEGAN DIET'. :::

FundMECFSResearch@lemmy.blahaj.zone posted it around a lot, and it sounds legit due to it being on the .gov site. I wanted to dig into the original version since I'm a native and have some edge in using it over my homies. Even some rewards at that, kek. Welp. Mostly it's an easily translateable basic vocab including media-specific words. I suspect it's an american or a russian-american person writing in Russian and sometimes\always using an automatic translator. And they are stupid at that, as they don't know how complex punctuation works or don't read what they post. The punctuation is kinda confusing, sometimes hinting that it's a copy paste from a translator. + *отличается от **таковой*** - is a rare turn of words that many russians fail at, just like americans fail at *they're*. I don't know many persons who can correctly put it into a sentence. That's probably a translated text since they can't handle the right placement of commas. + *ставленником* - is a weird archaic word that's sometimes used by nerds of polisci or other humane arts weirdos, it isn't used anywhere else. That's maybe a clue to who wrote it. + *нового глобалистского социализма* - sounds weird, like a direct translation from English. + Next, there is a division between the elephant and the donkey, both lowercase, without any punctuation to tell them they are referencing parties, not animals. It's fucking stupid. And not stupid as a result from an AI prompt that can produce a correct phrase, but from a literal translation of a literal translation that lost any indication of what it refers to. That's just the first picture. All of that sounds weird to my ear, and my assumption, clouded by the US gov's decision to put it onto display, is that it can be legit, but it is written by a person with a political\media background, creating a draft in English, that they lazily translated into Russian. That may be on RT employes, especially international ones. There are a handful of russian-speaking users on fediverse who can tell I'm wrong. Ah, yeah, and it really mentions 'manga' although it doesn't make any sense.

Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ andrew_bidlaw • 3 weeks ago • 100%

Since Russia started to use DPI to block YouTube and other stuff, there arised a couple of solutions to fuck with it. I've come around this repository or, even better, the end of it's page for many cross-platform tools that may let you avoid DPI, and I've used some of them to prove they are working. https://github.com/ValdikSS/GoodbyeDPI They don't work for resources that are explicitely banned, it only undoes this one layer of blocking. As Russia didn't block YT (like Twitter) that's enough for that one usecase. It's no private VPN or something, but it may become useful in the future.

Showerthoughts andrew_bidlaw • 3 weeks ago • 25%

+ Babylon is in modern Iraq, one of the countries invaded by the US in the aftermath of 9\11 + Both claimed to be the highest towers in the world + Both are in populated influential trade centers + The Babylon myth with different languages VS the War on Terror, affecting policies worldwide, growing tensions and fear in the post-USSR world, now - post 9\11 world + The pronounced reasoning behind the 9\11, told as a fatwa by Osama, starts as follows: *All these American crimes and sins are a clear proclamation of war against God, his Messenger, and the Muslims.* Not that far from what caused the abrahamic god to prank Babylon. This connection is loose, lacks context and mixes very different things together, but I haven't got a pleasure to shower any longer than that to think things out. How BS is it?

Ask Lemmy andrew_bidlaw • 1 month ago • 91%

Making it 17+, changing cast and visuals don't count. Let's say it's live action with heavy CGI. What would be here for the main attraction, the plot, the cast of characters?

Ask Lemmy andrew_bidlaw • 1 month ago • 92%

Durability-wise? Pain-wise? Covering or showing-wise? Where did you inked your first one?

No Stupid Questions andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 80%

I'd assume we want everyone to survive and carry on with their lives equally. Yet, if we can't, there's a choice of distributing our doctors' time and equipments towards some of patients rather than others. Policies deciding that choice in general, if implemented, naturally smell like death. That'd organically lead to some marks for a cut-off, the obvious one is the age - like excluding 70+ patients from active treatment and supporting them as they are instead, while prefering younger folks, because they have more projected lifespan ahead of them (AND MORE VALUE TO THE REGIIIIME!). Then, there is a game of chances for recovery. Then there are biases against lung, stomack or skin cancer patients who neglected their bodies themselves etc etc etc. And we don't even touch the problem of these policies being sexist, racist or otherwise based on unscientific grounds. But if not over-generalized policies that can mark some categories as not-worthy patients, we'd then assume the power to decide is in the hands of individual doctors who do have the problems in the last paragraph, but with individual power to decide as well as individual responsibility for that (but they can ask patients themselves if they want it?). My question is: should we even seek a universal answer to that dillema? What is the beacon to navigate us here, balancing general policies and individual responsibilities? How'd we personally judge a party who'd make such decision (+ if we are their patient and we don't want to die)? I've tried my best not to suggest any answer and not to instigate any sort of an infight, but if it's not ok, please delete it.

Dude is cringe himself most of the time, but he does justice to... ehm... whatever the flying duck it really is.

Connect for Lemmy App andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 100%

Today I've visited TechCrunch from a posted link https://techcrunch.com/2024/07/24/crowdstrike-offers-a-10-apology-gift-card-to-say-sorry-for-outage/ and after some reading couldn't exit it at all tapping both my back key and the back arrow on the top. Due to how inconvenient the arrow on top is, I suggest to make it the exit button that closes the browser and returns user to Lemmy at once, while usual back buttons keep acting like they are now.

Casual Conversation andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 93%

What are your stories? I'm sad I haven't had such parties for a long time, and a lack of PC games with co-op doesn't help it too. But I still treasure these times me and my friends wasted whole nights playing high on cola and doritos, and I wonder if me, now an adult, can reproduce a bit of that with my current non-playing friends, their spouses, children, etc. Just a general nostalgia and 'what-to-play-now' thread. --- I unintentionally deleted the original post, sorry.

Casual Conversation andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 100%

What are your stories? I'm sad I haven't had such parties for a long time, and a lack of PC games with co-op doesn't help it too. But I still treasure these times me and my friends wasted whole nights playing high on cola and doritos, and I wonder if me, now an adult, can reproduce a bit of that with my current non-playing friends, their spouses, children, etc. Just a general nostalgia and 'what-to-play-now' thread.

196 andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 100%

I'm ~~not~~ making rules

> Nobody's perfect, > > Gotta find a way to get through this > > For another day. > > Make the pain go away. > If you could make it hurt less > > Wouldn't you take what was needed > > To make it easier? > Yeah, I know sometimes > > I'm not all that I can be. > > It's a temporary consequence > > Of my self-medication. > Make it hurt less! > > Don't hurt less! > > Be hurt less!

Lemmy Shitpost andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 33%

neurolinguistical programming with a catchy tune

Art Share🎨 andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 93%

some would say, and I'd picture them just like that toys in a ufo catcher lacking any will or intent facing death as another round of gamble.


and its' drivers work only under Windows ME for no apparent reason.

Lemmy Shitpost andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 92%

Trade offer meme I receive: Stupid prompts that can be fun to draw and post without CP, small fandoms I don't know, bigotry and shit we don't want on Lemmy You receive: Arts based on your promts drawn by a russian alcoholic, b\w, 200x200px, with a mouse, eternally posted on the lemmyverse under your prompt ED: I'm too sleepy-eepy so I'd continue tomorrow. ED: Slowly working on my backlog. I've not thought there would be more than 3-5 anons seeing that thread, lol. ED: Seems like I resolved all recs. Thank you all. That was fun.

Although many of us have MW ovens, I can name like one Saw movie and one DIY channel that showed it's potential to melt things, and I watch\read a lot of gore and torture on the web. It won't be used in a military context due to how power consumption and short distance make it useless. But in a Home Alone situation it seems promising, especially as a trap because you won't stop anyone with that immidiately. My qustions are: 1. How a breaf exposure is dangerous, and can it be used not to harm but to scare off? 2. How it'd be treated legally due to it's weirdness? 3. What are general downsides of that, like reflecting it back to the sender or dealing irreversible fatal damage etc? I'm stupid at basic physics so I'm sure I miss something.

Showerthoughts andrew_bidlaw • 2 months ago • 96%

But I'm sure a daily 8hr sleep in water isn't something our bodies are ready for. What are probable effects? Can we mitigate them?

Linux Gaming andrew_bidlaw • 3 months ago • 92%

I use a cheap BT stick to connect my Dual Shock-alike to Proton-driven games via Steam. The first thing I've noticed is that it doesn't connect automatically, but that's okay. Then I was surprised it LEDs' colors are changeable via Steam, but just like other DS4 it can't output sound not via itself nor via a dedicated 3,5mm hole, but it's a given. Sony are spooks, that's okay too. What troubles me most rn is that it lags, a lot. I can press a joystic one way and release, and it would still move a character for seconds in one direction. A fix? Just plugging it into a charger (not connected to this PC) solves it. As long as it is charged via a wall socket, it works. When it's disconnected, it starts to lag after some time. I can't comprehend why a fully charged controller behaves like that. Does it have some faulty battery or something? I don't have much experience with BT controllers, thus I ask you for an advice.

Lemmy Shitpost andrew_bidlaw • 3 months ago • 93%

they are a significant part of their characters

Lemmy Shitpost andrew_bidlaw • 3 months ago • 98%

he is a visionary and that's what he saw

Lemmy Shitpost andrew_bidlaw • 3 months ago • 97%

p̸͔͗a̸̢͌y̴̼̆ ̵̰̊s̷̹̿o̴̪̔c̸̠̍k̸͍̔

Linux andrew_bidlaw • 3 months ago • 95%

After I launched some program I need from an app image, it starts every time I log into system. Going by Windows logic, there may be some menu or a queue that lists all apps that start after logining in with an option to disable it. I'm struggling to find anything like that.

Patient Gamers andrew_bidlaw • 4 months ago • 97%

One of the weird realization for me as I learnt English and listened to authors who contributed to these games, is that many remastered their tracks to exclude swear words and obvious mentions of drugs, or was it EA specialists? NFS Underground and Most Wanted games were filled with rap and metal, but still got rated for teens because of that. When I've heard some of these songs in their album versions for the first time and there were actual lines or even paragraphs I've not heard before it was very weird. I applaud whoever did this and still kept these songs bangers as they are, intact, hard hitting whenever you hard them back then or now like I do. That was probably never talked about, but here it is: someone did a very good job. You'd probably never notice that until you hear the original. If you happen to not believe me, check the first verse from Dilated People's Who is Who. That's the worst edit of the bunch, although it's one of my favorite tracks in the game. This flow is fucking tight, DPs are Erik B and Rakim for millenials, fight me. Either way, here are these tracks: Original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndEvdwIPTU4 Choppy NFSU version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om0PvVJjkgY That didn't occured to me in the early 00s, but you can hear the MC cut being half-word in. I'm puzzled how it got into production if it wasn't a fuck you from the artists leaving a clue about the whole text, kek. I don't know why I dumped that on you, but now you know there are specially created versions of songs for some old games that wanted to sound all gangsta but still keep themselves teen-friendly. You are welcome.

Since the COVID and the war with Ukraine I drink regularly. I manage it somehow, doing hobbies, work, stuff. I don't put my anger off on others, even ones who I hate. I keep it inside, and I drink. But I find out there's one unnerving thing. I can't feel that I reek of alcohol. And I turn subconsciously suspective of others if they hear the smell. Nearly combatative at times. Everyone knows that I smell like vodka, I start to see it in their words, gestures. I become paranoid. They all know what I don't, and I hate them. And my partner doesn't help it. They want me to be sober, but they only ask if I've bought booze on the end of the day. Either way if I did or didn't, I feel shame and want to drink myself to not feeling anything anyway. They care about me, but I don't feel like caring about myself. Why they even got to me, of all people, a fucking piece of shit going mental? I feel sorry for them and that many things that they do, I don't deserve them at all. I'm sitting on the attic with a bottle of vodka, there are four spiders I came across and a hidden hole that some bird picked as her nest. I heard the sounds of nervous moving and I wonder if they got her. I can't access her location, and I wonder if four little spiders can take a bird. The closest date I'd discover her is the next spring. She'd either leave or die there. One of the subjects jumped onto my leg so I shoved it off. I wish this bird best. I wish myself worst, for I'm useless.

As most of us play games, we sometimes encounter elements or routines that suck all the fun from a shipped product. They can be a dealbreaker, so it's better to be aware of them. I'd exclude platinum challenges and MTX as they are their own beasts, and start with a couple of examples I hated in older titles: + NFS: Hot Pursuit (2010). Before and after you enter a race, there are motivational unskippable cutscenes about your rating and unlocked vehicles. Instead of inspiring me to play more, it felt like visiting the web without an adblocker. Although it plays nice on Linux and I liked how vehicles drive, I deleted it after a couple of hours. + NFS: Underground. Besides a difficulty slider you have before every track, there's a trend to make every other race longer. 6+ 1.5 minute laps become a chore and make you notice how broken and random it is under the hood. The strenght of the game in the short flashy arcade runs, but as devs couldn't find any way to make it more difficult, they make it a useless test of endurance. + TES: Skyrim. Lots of quests are built on a premise of making you explore the global map more without any means of transportation, unlike Morrowind. They probably assumed there'd be some, or that fast travel would solve this, but I remember this one time I was to take the head from the witch and this region was completely unexplored at that time, and there was no obvious way but going there by foot. + CoD 2+. Replenishing health is a cool mechanic, but it isn't followed by a repercussion for sitting and recharging. Finite number of enemies makes it trivial. I feel like something akin to WW2 southern front could've used the mechanic of endless onslaught before you complete the objective. + FarCry. It've began as a tacticool shooter where you can choose where to start your infiltration, and it was good at that, but after introducing aliens it went weird. The latter levels are close-quarter skirmishes where only savescumming is a viable strategy. Game loses it's primal value to scale the difficulty in a wrong way once again. What's your examples of wrong decisions?

Linux Gaming andrew_bidlaw • 4 months ago • 96%

I guess the meta is installing them via Lutris\Bottles and then launching them via Steam to have a modern controller support and overlay, is that's so? Does emulation make it better in any way (it seems easier)? What would you use playing them now? I've watched a couple of vids on games from NFSU to Pro Street forming some kind of a saga, and felt nostalgic enough to once again jump in this cringe pool. I won't spoil my own opinion on these games besides one point: Pro Street was probably the last one to have a decent, influential OST. Won't lie, they've introduced me to my current favs and made me research their genres further. For that I can excuse EA, or rather BlackBox from crticizing too much, although wanting to play their older games instead of new ones says it all.

I watch an episode of a series, and then it randomly starts to heat up my CPU. The most reproducible case is when the episode ended while I'm not looking at it, then the PC get locked and the screen gets turned off, and VLC then, on a pause, starts to use 20%+ percents of my CPU and get completely unresponsive before I kill the process of it. If it was in fullscreen before, it'd show just a dark screen before I alt+f4 out from it. It doesn't use as much resources when it plays videos, so I guess it's VLC not reacting right to some system conditions? I'm a noob so it's just a guess. As a side note, what do you use for watching shows? I still can't find a player that I'm 100% comfortable with. MPC-HC is what I used on Windows for years and I'm too used to how it works it seems, but I'm open to try something lightweight with simple controls to choose languages on the go.

Patient Gamers andrew_bidlaw • 5 months ago • 93%

After writing a lot about it referencing my last playthroughs, I started it once again via OpenMW with official expansions and nude mode only, for it became kind of a habit. So, initially it looks like an RPG, and we see these stacks of numbers in a character sheet affecting our speaking capabilities or our impotency to kill a crab, okay. If we dive more into it, we'd learn our ways not only around that, but also to become the most potent mass killer Nirn ever had. Alchemy loops to boost your intelligence and brew a better potion of intelligence are known for 20 years already, even in Skyrim, and the ways this game is completely broken are meta-knowledge making us love it even more. But is it only an RPG? More, than in other TES games, I encountered a lot of NSFL content. No, I don't talk about Suran's harlots, but about customs of danmers and the Sixth House. We can go back to the Planescape: Torment, the game that starts in a morgue that people don't play these days (sorrely), russian Pathologic that hbomberguy praised and where kids with dog heads exchange stuff for razors and drugs, or that cringe project called Hatred, but non of them combined have the same amount of what is now considered non-publishable. Besides encountering racism and cop's attention at any step (even if you are a dunmer, because you are still not a native), we have stories of imperials coming from Ilunibi and dying horribly due to corprus, that seems like a radiation poisoning. We have a cult that eats flesh and is one second from overthrowing the government, killing everyone who doesn't meet their criteria. We have all dunmers having dreams that make them insane and irrate, one step from starting a murder spree. We have gods, who by a treachery took their powers, and the center of the island being guarded by their weakening powers and literal bone ash from local funerals. We have a real gestapo from local officials, and we can participate in glory kills that are a custom of this wicked land, with us still be a member of churches and guilds. And don't even start talkimg about Fyr cloning himself into daughers, fucking them, and having a whole dungeon for adventurers to find either their award or a sudden death. Or that one quest when you search for a sex slave. And that all continues in a completely corrupt world where a duel or a bribe can significantly change the political landscape. There's so much I can put Horror, Thriller, Grindhouse lables on, or those I don't even know. I'm glad it happened in my life and I can replay it now on any system, even on mobile phone. But it's even more vile than Fallout and it's one of the reasons it clicked with me. Morrowind is very russian, and it's popularity on our 4chan clones cements this. If your friend ever get vocal about moving here, get them Morrowind as a testing experience and then ask, if they still want that. Guess, they wouldn't, for their own good. I would love to hear your stories about how beautiful or grim this game is.

Technology andrew_bidlaw • 5 months ago • 96%

(Sorry if it's a miss, this community looked the most fitting) After mentioning them somewhere in comments, I actually bought Shokz after years of sitting curious. There are a few brands that do them, so it doesn't matter what's the brand is. I bought what I've heard of and the cheapest model I could find at that. So, what's the trick? As I'm cycling, walking and running a lot, I needed a headphone solution to be aware of my surroundings. They don't cover ears and don't actually emmit sound - they vibrate and make your bones serve as a membrane. The obvious minus is that in a bus or other loud setting you can't hear shit. That's by design. And, logically but somehow absurdly, by shutting your ear with a finger, you can make yourself hear it okay. I did a full circle here, returning to the old headphones isolation problem, heh. But what impressed me more, they do feel like some kind of a cyberpunk prosthetic. You can wear them all day and even the cheapest one that promises 6hr of activity lasts days on the idle. But as you call someone or watch a vid – here they are, with a little to no latency. Honestly, I feel like if there'd be implants, that's one of the basic ones we can try first. It's hands-free device with a bonus of being more stealthy and not isolating you from the world. As a cheapskate audiophile who stayed with cords for a long time, I can say that the sound is okay. Keeping in mind that producers can't control the skull of a wearer, they can't nail the ideal sound, but I'm impressed with how nice IDM and metal plays on them - something akin to budget Senh, AKG and Audiotechnica. And unlike cheap Sony, they don't put up low freqs, that's a plus. BUT when I shared it with others, people in body reported less effectiveness due to thickness of skin and under-dermal stuff, so it's better to test it if you aren't skinny as a skeleton. After being so open about plus sides, I'm to talk minuses. Since the software is proprietary, it doesn't have many controls and is very weird sometimes. As I bought a model that was for internal chinese market originally, it talked to me in Chinese, and it can only be switched to another language before any pairing, so only after unpairing I could've chosen English – and the same combination of button presses when paired was reserved to calling the last called number, so I fucked up a lazy weekend morning for a friend of mine calling them 4-5 times, damn it. Ah, and it supports dual pairing with a PC and a smartphone, but as I tested it this function worked weird and I sometimes manually disconnected them. Walking&working distance from a source device is around the second or third room, that fits most office and home listening cases. I could've probably wished for it to have an option to pick lesser distance since I don't usually have even a meter between my smartphones and them. Ah, and going back to the bus problem - the obvious downside that you want to turn them to 100% volume that you don't feel, but your ears do. After the first day when I needed to move a lot in loud contexts and thus put them on max, I had a headache, because although I didn't register the volume, my head had a first row concert experience. So if you use these, keep that in mind too. Have you tried them, is there a topic I haven't covered? As you can tell, I'm happy with them, so I would be biased. It's just with VR stuff, even from Apple, I feel like we underlook existing tech that already serves us as expander of our life experiences and powers.

Two Sentence Horror andrew_bidlaw • 6 months ago • 55%

Said a terrorist, securing a black plastic bag over one's head for their transportation.

Lemmy Shitpost andrew_bidlaw • 7 months ago • 66%

200% not a jolitical jopaganda

Connect for Lemmy App andrew_bidlaw • 7 months ago • 0%

I've encountered two problems. How to reproduce them? Here: 1. I post a comment. Then I go back to it via my post history. I edit it and post it. Connect then can't find a comment and shows error. Pressing back returns me first to my cached unedited comment, then to my post history. After a refresh it appears edited. 2. I had answered to a comment that was later removed by a mod. Someone replied to me. I tap either on that notification or on that comment in my history and connect returns a post without any comments at all. It's that comment with Grozev's interview: https://sh.itjust.works/comment/9158971 v1.0.171