Was it mainly a hobbyist thing at the time

Yes, I'd say so. Lots of tech geeks were playing with it but no Normals. Getting audio running was not always pleasant....

When I was in the army the S1 desk jockeys were using dedicated word processors with 8" floppies. Get off my lawn! :-)

1. vasectomy
2. divorce
3. campervan

I once had a b2b customer (store owner) tell me that having different pricing for wholesale and retail customers was racist.

I'm pretty sure meant discriminatory but even that doesn't make much sense.

It's... inconceivable no one has said Princess Bride yet.

Have you ever created your own job perks?

No, but I had a small company and asked the worker bees to define their own perks.

There were four employees. Three of them played paintball together and wanted paintballs. So I brought a case of their favorite balls into the office before their outings. The fourth guy wanted to have baby carrots to snack on. He ate ~3 lbs a week. Dude would code for hours as long as he was crunching carrots.

I couldn't have guessed what any of them wanted but they were absolutely cranked by getting it. This was a huge lesson for me: ask people what they want.

Why doesn’t Lemmy implement this seemingly obvious feature?

It's so obvious I won't even mention it in the thread title

I was driving with a friend on in Louisiana about 3am one night in the late 90s. I thought I saw something ahead in the right lane so I moved into the left lane just in case.

As we got closer there was a giant shadow of some kind with only tiny reflectors at the edges. It was a HUGE matte black boat filling the lane on a matte black trailer with no plates. Closest comparison I can come up with would be one of those river patrol boats from the Vietnam war.

We were on cruise so it took a few seconds to pass them. The boat was being towed by a matte black F-550 (?) MDT with no plates and no lights other than headlights.

I did not look up at the driver when we passed. I have no idea if this was a drug thing, an intel thing, or what.

Given that it'd already killed someone, I'm going to nominate the second guy who thought he could cowboy criticality testing with the Demon Core at Los Alamos.

By coincidence, at this moment I am camped on a mountain overlooking the Los Alamos NL.

“Win stupid games, earn stupid prizes”?

BTW, I think it's play stupid games...

what controversial thing would the vettong process uncover about you?

Nice try, FBI!

:-)

No. My behavior is derived from ethics, not from law.

What is the most unhelpful advice you have received?

• "They're your family so you have to maintain a relationship with them'
• "man up"
• attend church

Why would you ever want to peel them?

I used to eat the skins until my kidney stone went to the lab. No more skins or spinach for me. :-( Kidney stone pain is an amazingly-effective incentive for dietary change.

gender-based dress codes, especially haircuts and earrings. WGAF.

why are companies trying so hard to have employees back in the office?

Managers generally don't know how to manage people, so point fingers at WFH (or anything else that's handy)

Downvotes = “I disagree” or “this is bad and you should feel bad”?

I withhold downvotes until it means "this is disinformation, or misinformation so wrong-headed it could mislead those new to the topic"

As Eisenhower said,

beware the engagement-wedding-genderreveal-kids-mortgage-divorce-childsupport-legal-industrial complex.

I may be mis-remembering exactly what he said. but I think that was the gist.

If there were a wire tied to the back of it. It's been done with rockets.

"Specialization is for insects. A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly." -- Heinlein

What would happen if caffeine was made illegal?

black market

Why do Americans torture themselves like this?

The finest crêpe I ever ate was peanut butter, banana, and honey from a street vendor in Baden-Wurttemberg at 2am. There may have been ethanol on board, but I stand by the claim.

Am I just old or is 4GB actually loads or RAM?

First stick I bought was 1MB of SIPP, used, for $50.

"When I was a boy we had to load HIMEM and EMM386 uphill in the snow"

I once decommissioned a hard drive with shotgun slugs. Yes, this was in Texas.

Can't find it now, but someone once made a vi [gVim?} version with a Clippy-style helper: "I see you've pressed ESC. Would you like to...."

He’s absolutely correct.

He said it was racist, so I'm gonna stick with he's not correct.

The mistake that you are making, is thinking that all forms of discrimination are bad.

I am aware of the formal and common uses of the word.

Tell us your definitive "I really should not do this" moment.

Standing on the JP's doorstep about to get married. I though "this is a terrible mistake" and did it anyhow.

I emerged from a blackout drunk sitting in a classroom; it was the last hour of the GRE (graduate record exam). I was reeking of alcohol and I remember feeling sorry for the poor bastards seated next to me. I finished and walked directly across the hallway to the bathroom and vomited a while.

I'd gone to a bar the night before for one dollar draft beer; I had $2, so 1 beer + tip. I don't know exactly what happened but later heard people thought it would be funny to buy me drinks before the exam and I was too young/dumb not to accept.

The most bizarre part of the story is I scored a dead-average score on the exam.

in terms of time I spend in it:

• linux

• firefox

• vi

I remember wishing AOL's free disks were on CD-RW :-)

It's a good excuse to install a bat house.

The book is better IMO (other than no Portman :-) and one of the most disturbing things I've ever read. Highly recommended.

build an offgrid house

Do you think bad weather is a good reason for moving?

I'm probably not your target demographic (I live in a campervan) but I move regularly to follow mild weather.

What's the closest you have ever been to actually dying?

There are a few stories. Since we are in public I'll pick one that won't freak out onlookers.

tldr

I was drawn down on by two soldiers from my own unit because I was unexpectedly left alone in a place where single actors were not allowed. Cold War stuff.

full version

I was working with a [redacted] which had a 2m "dead man zone" around it in this context, demarcated by a paint stripe. SOP was for the guards^1^ to shoot anyone who entered the zone solo; the assumption being someone would only do that for sabotage.

When maintenance or other operations were required, we would

• team up with another person of equal knowledge of the operation
• coordinate to enter the zone simultaneously
• perform the operation. maintaining line of sight with them and their hands
• coordinate to exit simultaneously

I got assigned to do some maint with a squadmate who was both highly intelligent and also a fscking idiot. We entered together, started the task, and then he unexpectedly walked out.^2^ I snapped my head around and saw him passing over the line. The idiot had left me alone in the Dead Man Zone and things were turning to shit. The guards chambered rounds and were yelling at me to get away from the [redacted].

I'd already put my arms up and had started backpedaling out. I don't remember the immediate aftermath clearly because my stressmeter was pegged at aneurysm / this isn't happening. Through some miracle I did not download into my drawers.

I never saw him working in the Zone again so I suppose he was blacklisted from that duty. And no one else ever got left alone in there AFAIK.

^1^ our unit were also providing the guard rotation; no one else had the clearance required to be that close to the [redacted]. So the guards in this story were my buddies and were abso-fscking-lutely willing to shoot. We all were; it was part of the job. We did have infantry support on the outer perimeter but they were so far outside the razorwire fences we never saw them working. Perhaps it was just as well; they told us they hated us every chance they got. They thought we were [insert homophobic slur here] and [insert MOS-specific slur here] because we rarely carried rifles and did not engage in recreational fistfighting. But we were grateful for their protection, however begrudgingly provided.

^2^ IIRC he walked out to get a torque wrench or similar

Once when I left a company they gave me a golf-themed inspirational poster. I hate golf and inspirational posters. I looked around the room to see if they were being ironic, but no.

Superpower: catching dropped objects in mid-air, including objects dropped by other people standing near me.

Unfortunately it's a function of hypervigilance, which is quite hard on my nerves.

He's on Mastodon, btw

I logged into my Usenet provider yesterday. I read groups related to my hobbies, so not sure my recommendations would do you much good.

Do you donate to Wikipedia? Why or why not?

I did and ever since have been rewarded with an endless barrage of "you gave once before so do it aga--a-a--aa-a-a-a-a-a-a-in" banners. Given the ecomonics of fundraising I wouldn't be surprised if donors were badgered more than non-donors.

everything everywhere all at once