I'm glad that it seems sufficiently different from Ghost of Tsushima. I kind of dislike how most sequels these days are almost the same game with some small improvements in graphics and gameplay (Horizon Forbidden West, Spider-man 2). With the new character and time period, this seems like a more substantial change!

I think he makes the mistake of assuming that every person has a similar life experience to his own. I've read his biography, and apparently he was extremely intelligent and acted like an adult from a very young age. It could be that he hated being seen as a child and saw himself as a fully functional adult in a transitioning body.

In everything he says and does there is an extreme single-mindedness: his extremely strict free software and privacy related ideas show this. I think he applies a similar single-mindedness to a clearly nuanced situation, namely that of conscent. The nuance of power dynamics and coercion probably don't play a role in his experience and therefore he ignores it. This results in the very wrong and dangerous opinions stated in the article.

I am not saying this to excuse any of his opinions, this is just my interpretation of where it might come from. It's sad that the people around him are seemingly unable to educate him on these topics, but I believe it might be the same stubbornness that made him the proponent of the Free Software movement that is causing him to not mentally grow on this specific topic. It's a truly unfortunate situation, but one that should not be ignored and people who oppose him because of these opinions are right to do so.

The headline feels a bit alarmist to me. The article itself is a bit better and more nuanced, but still I feel they are putting way to much drama around this device while almost all these issues already exist as small slabs of electronics that we wear all the time. Combined with smartwatches, smartphones do almost all the spying that is described here and add some GPS tracking wherever you go.

This is not to say that this is not a big issue, merely that this issue is not related to this new device. And also I believe Apple is in fact the only big tech provider that actually tries to be somewhat privacy conscious (Google and Microsoft don't give damn).

I'm glad you bring up the power imbalance. The "both sides have been doing horrible stuff" only works if both sides have equal footing, which they clearly do not. This does not negate the crimes commited by Hamas, but extremism doesn't come from nowhere and Israël has a responsibility in that.

Just to be clear, this phone:

• is the only smartphone available that uses fairtrade gold
• has a 100% recycled plastic back cover
• uses ASI certified fair aluminium
• is by far the most repairable smartphone currently on the market

The mainstream electronics supply chain is tainted with literal blood and slavery. The importance of what this company tries to prove and achieve cannot be understated.

The fact that they remove the headphone jack might be annoying and feel like counter to their main goal. As an electronics engineer I can say that removing this jack makes the full phone circuit board more simple, decreases the space used and allows them to make the phone lighter or put a better battery in. As most people are now used to not having this port in phones anymore, this seems like an easy concession to make to keep the design load as low as possible. Remember that they are trying to compete with companies that are way bigger and have way more design resources.

I am all for criticizing companies so that they can improve, but these accusations of greenwashing and them completely disregarding their goal are simply untrue. The difference between them and literally any other smartphone manufacturer in terms of supply chain fairness, repairability and warranty is night and day.

Please don't make us lose this great attempt at improving the smartphone industry by making perfect the enemy of already pretty fucking good.

Even if you know it's fiction you get the feeling that you are on the "good" side, which may colour your perception on the US military interventions.

Just look at issues in software you use.

Start with a simple project. Clone the code and try to build it (this is already a very big step in software development, so don't be angry with yourself if it takes a while). Poke around in the code, change some stuff, get a feel for the architecture. Then see if there is an issue that you could help with. Ask questions on the projects communication channel(s). Most developers will be kind if you ask for help or advice.

Good luck! 🤞

I personally like transparent enforcement of false information moderation. What I mean by that is something similar to beehaw where you have public mod logs. A quick check is enough to get a vibe of what is being filtered, and in Beehaw's case they're doing an amazing job.

Mod logs also allow for a clear record of what happened, useful in case a person does not agree with the action a moderator took.

In that case it doesn't really matter if the moderators work directly for big tech, misuse would be very clearly visible and discontent people could raise awareness or just leave the platform.

Bad actors are already commiting crimes, they will have no trouble "illegally" using encryption software to keep their message hidden. Encryption is just math, you cannot stop a computer from performing an encryption algorithm.

You can however "make it illegal" for software to do this, what just results in normal citizens having unencrypted communication, while people who are up to no good are still encrypting their stuff.

🤦

There is indeed no moral equivalence, but where does it come from?

This culture of extreme jihadist violence is not something that suddenly came to being.

He talks as if both sides are equal, except in the way they commit warcrimes, but that is not true. One is a massive state that has money and military power that eclipses that of the other. The other is a country that has been losing land, homes and dignity with every passing year.

Being disgusted by warcrimes is the privilege of an army that is able to still do war without commiting them. With the massive power imbalance comes a genuine desensitization of the underdog to violence, as they feel no other way to fight and have a chance at winning or making a difference.

I feel like the author is choosing exactly what part to compare in both groups (the morality of their war tactics) while silently hoping that the reader forgets any other differences between the two parties.

Bitcoin (as it uses proof of work) is incapable of handling all transaction of the world without creating insane amounts of wasted energy.

Updating the ledger (actually writing down transactions) is only a fraction of the total computing resources it consumes. Most of it is just spent doing random hashes over and over again (the proof of work part). This is computing power that does not actually do any of the money related tasks, it's just there to keep the ledger trusted.

This is an awesome idea in theory, but completely unscalable in reality.

Other Blockchain technologies like proof of stake don't have this issue of energy waste, but they have other hurdles.

But Bitcoin as it is implemented now can never be the money of the future in my opinion.

Well, not really as I'm European and have no connection to any side in the Vietnam war.

I just feel that if your game is based on real life wars than you should be very careful to give a nuanced view of the situation. Even allowing a campaign on both sides would be interesting if executed well.

PS5 can't even consistently give 4k60 on all titles. A tablet with a way lower power draw will not be able to do this for but a bare minimum of titles.

Why are you giving an example that is not based on a real war or context?

Of course this doesn't influence your opinion of real life as the subject doesn't refer to real life (as you so clearly describe with the "giant crime fighting amphibious creatures").

Are you saying that fiction has no influence on how we view the world?

I'm sorry, but that is just wrong. Using fictional works as propaganda is a thing, so it most certainly has an effect on the public.

Other research papers after a quick search, these indicate influence between fiction and beliefs/opinions of the consumers:

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1532673X12453758

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/abs/its-the-end-of-the-world-and-they-know-it-how-dystopian-fiction-shapes-political-attitudes/3853105561CB840EAB79258DC2575849

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/45847098_The_influence_of_television_fiction_on_political_attitudes

Sorry but I cannot agree with that take. The PS3 was difficult to develop for, sure, but it was immensely more capable than the PS2 architecture. See what naughty dog was able to produce on it in the last years of the console lifespan.

But I do agree that for developers, the PS3 was a step backwards in terms of ease of use and tooling. And luckily they fixed that by basing PS4 on PC architecture.

Still, I flippin' love the PS3 🥲

I remember playing this every day at the arcade. We were talking earlier about Tetris, but this was immersion on another level. I saw my life in those graphics and understood the universe. Sadly, after one month the machine must've broken down, because it was shipped away for repairs, never to return again...

I adore this series. I especially have very fond memories of the original. I did not play it on release (I was still a toddler then), but I got it through the Valve Bundle on Steam and played it through at least 5 times. I've had multiple times in my life were I didn't have access to a powerful computer, but similar to DOOM, Half-Life will run on about anything. I remember one of my playtroughs being on a horrible windows 8 tablet, and still it looked and played amazingly :).

Half-Life 2 then just perfected an already strong original. There is something just so satisfying about the environmental design and linearity of the levels. You just push through and know that you will find enough in your surroundings to make it. I find it strange that there haven't been that many clones since (first person exploration action games). Most games either are to linear (COD) or completely open world or become a full-on immersive sim.

If you have any recommendations, please share them. Dishonored gave me similar vibes, but I miss the simplicity of Half-Life.

Damn you didn't even make this stuff up! I hope you realize that in the best interpretation this "Magick" is just some Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and mindfulness in disguise. Worst case it's just another cult thing trying to push dogmas onto you. Stay safe and let real certified therapists help you if you feel the need for it, not this stuff.

Edit - apparently there is more to this Magick than I initially thought. If it works for people then of course that's a good thing. I've been in therapy for a long time myself and have also maybe seen to many ways that self help stuff exploited people who were in dire need of actual professional help. My issues are not related to gender so apparently this is clearly a gap in my knowledge. I hope that the helpful concepts and techniques from Magick find their way to professional health care and I'm glad it exist for the people who need it.

I think the issue is not wether it's sentient or not, it's how much agency you give it to control stuff.

Even before the AI craze this was an issue. Imagine if you were to create an automatic turret that kills living beings on sight, you would have to make sure you add a kill switch or you yourself wouldn't be able to turn it off anymore without getting shot.

The scary part is that the more complex and adaptive these systems become, the more difficult it can be to stop them once they are in autonomous mode. I think large language models are just another step in that complexity.

An atomic bomb doesn't pass a Turing test, but it's a fucking scary thing nonetheless.

I often find it a bit awkward when lawmakers join in on protests, like isn't a protest to make our voices heard by them in the first place?

Although of course there is only so much you can do, even as a prime minister, so it might still be important for her that she wants to see it better.

Isn't this just the Steam Deck?

It's been a while, but here is another "Let's discuss" post! I hope everybody is doing fine and these posts are still appreciated :).

I haven't played this myself, but I know so many people who are extremely passionate about it that it felt like a good candidate! Looking forward to all of your musings!

This might be the earliest game that is linked to my existence, as my mother bought a Game Boy and played this while pregnant :). Later on I played the same cartridge on my first gaming console: a green Game Boy Color. I cannot fathom the amount of hours I've played this game in my life.

When going to University, I found my Game Boy Color in a closet. After swapping out the batteries I realized that it still worked perfectly and I played it throughout Uni, sometimes even during lectures. I remember all my friends being excited when I got close to breaking my personal record, it was a really fun time.

Of the recent versions I really liked Tetris Effect (even if only for the phenomenal trailer). Tetris 99 is also pretty cool, but I'm really bad at competitive tetris so I never even got close to winning.

Maybe I should have changed the title of the post to something different from the one of the article. I see a lot of people responding to the title but there is a lot of stuff in the article that I find quite interesting (the lack of new first party exclusives, focus on cloud gaming).

For your last question: BioMedia Project, they have almost everything!

I really dig the Telltale formula. These games are really able to set a tone / mood and give you a great new world to escape to. I actually like the linearity, as it allows me to turn of my head and just be swept away in the story.

My favorites are The Wolf Among Us and The Walking Dead, both are such incredibly atmospheric masterpieces. In both cases the music is astonishing too!

Tales From The Borderlands might be the funniest game I've ever played. It came at the exact right moment in Telltale's run: a lot of tropes in their games were already established, giving them an ideal playing ground to subvert expectations and joke at their own expense.

I've heard decent things about their Batman games and still need to play the final season of The Walking Dead.

I really hope The Wolf Among Us 2 delivers and that the new team is able to survive and continue making these amazing experiences.

As I said in the post, this is my favorite game ever. I played it when I was a teenager and it completely blew me away. The start was interesting, but quickly I noticed it becoming more and more beautiful and moving. The moment when your sliding down and the camera turns sideways with the sun making the sand look gold is honestly one of the most beautiful things I've seen in my life. I played in 3 sittings, really savoring every moment. When you're walking slowly in the ice cold ending stretch I became really emotional and the feeling of catharsis when you start the actual final part was insane. I was silently crying the whole time during that section.

Love the multiplayer aspect also. And the music is insane. I saw it performed live in my city last year and was able to speak to Austin Wintory and get his autograph.

The "size" of 100 hot dogs is misleading. It is not a pile of 100 hot dogs to demonstrate the volume of the asteroid, but a line of 100 hot dogs to demonstrate the diameter, which is 16 meters. So in volume, this is a lot more than 100 hot dogs!

Is it underrated? I remember playing the game because of all the positive things I kept hearing about it. I loved it too, it has some really amazing scenes that stuck with me to this day. I just thought that this was the common opinion.

I've only played mass effect 1. I completed it around five years ago and absolutely loved it. I always have difficulty completing games, but for this one I read all the codex entries, completed all the quests I could find and really absorbed it all.

The opening is so memorable, it immediately gave me this epic sense of scale and importance and this lasted throughout the game.

I'm thinking of maybe playing it again as femshep and then continuing on with 2 and 3, although I'm not sure if it will match my original experience.

I think they were joking. As in actually submitting bugs (adding bugs to the code).

Age of empires II is one of my first experiences as a child playing games. I used to play it on a computer in the back of my mother's pharmacy. A friend of mine was a huge fan, but I truly sucked at it.

Later I bought Lord of the Rings: the Battle for Middle Earth II, and to this date this is the only RTS that I actually enjoy playing a lot (I later also played the first one which is also amazing).

Still, I played Age of Empires II a lot, mostly the tutorial levels and the early missions of Jeanne d'Arc. I think the micromanaging and constantly having to do multiple things at once (like constantly making new units, etc.) were to much for me (and it still is). Still, a classic in gaming history and a part of my childhood!

Could somebody explain this to me (I'm from Belgium, so we have proportional representation)? Is it similar to the USA with each state going to a single party?

Outer Wilds. Will probably stick with me for the rest of my life.

Death Stranding also had some moments that I remember fondly.

Slay the Spire still got an immense amount of attention from me, even though I started playing it longer ago than 365 days. I discovered how fun this game can be with a friend / a group. Building the deck together and making decisions really amplifies the emotions :D.

Demon Souls, first souls like I finished, on PS5. Just an incredibly polished experience.

Do you know any old people? Lots of them still have joyful and valuable lives. Also, quit talking about people in terms of "usefulness". Sick people aren't "useful", disabled people aren't "useful", but they most certainly have a fucking right to live.

I agree that artificially keeping a person alive while they no longer have any joy or value in their lives might be wrong, but this is a very difficult assertion to make and is certainty a lot more complex than your "just kill everyone at 65".

Also, the problem is not population, it's how consumer focused our society is, constantly throwing away sustainable and ecological solutions for the sake of more profit.

The early Arkham games are quite unique and important games I feel.

I am a bit unsure about LEGO these days. Prices are going up quite severely while the quality of the pieces (mold marks) seems to be going down. At the moment it's not yet a problem, but it could be that these are the first signs of a degrading quality. But I also believe that LEGO customers are quite picky, so hopefully the company will change their approach if the criticisms become to wide spread.

I really hope so, because LEGO is one of my favorite things in life!

The Precession To Calvery was hilarious from beginning to end.

I also love the humor in Portal 1 and 2.

Frog detective is also super cute and funny.

I love pits where everyone is helpful and just want to have a good time.

Like just having some wild fun, but once someone drops, everybody helps them up. Or immediately help someone who gets hurt or wants to leave the pit for some reason.

I also love it when someone drops something and this tiny circle gets created to help make space for the person searching. Or when you find something that looks important and lost you just hold it in the air and scream what your holding. I miraculously retrieved my glasses that way, that was the first and last time I wore my glasses in a pit :).