Hiker, software engineer (primarily C++, Java, and Python), Minecraft modder, hunter (of the Hunt Showdown variety), biker, adoptive Akronite, and general doer of assorted things.
Yeah, IDK about that. Nobody in Ohio cares about NYC’s layout anyways.
Well those are all historically guys names AFAIK.
Can’t comment on the DOCSIS, I don’t know enough about it to not be making stuff up.
Regarding WiFi though… The simple answer is if you’re not having trouble accessing the WiFi in the places you use the WiFi and you’re getting the full speed that you’re paying for, there’s not a ton of a reason to upgrade the router.
The exception to this is that most routers only get a few years of security updates like most phones… That can potentially leave your network more vulnerable as the router might not properly block unsolicited traffic from making it to your devices. There’s a solid argument that you should just have your devices secured via their own firewalls though.
The Google routers are nice for the average Joe because they just kind of work and keep themselves updated (and Google tends to keep the hardware they sell under the Nest name receiving security updates a VERY long time compared to the competition). Netgear has been my go to for years but their update mechanism is … fairly manual in my experience.
I’ve since moved to having a pfSense box for the firewall and routing side of things and using my old negate router in access point mode (I’m much less concerned about this setup).
I’ll add that I don’t recommend WiFi for gaming… And that most people have more download speed than they really “need.” Files really haven’t gone up in size much (sure games have) but evening else… meh (?). Video streaming is more popular but unless you’ve got a lot of people in your home or you stream at 4k, it’s really not going to be that noticable between 30Mbps and 1Gbps. So like, by all means if you don’t want to spend money, don’t… you’re probably fine.
Honestly it just feels like so much stuff is car hostile at this point… Like I went to leave a store the other day and I couldn’t clearly see oncoming traffic because the shrubs were too high and right next to the road.
I wish I could say that was a really uncommon experience.
Honestly a huge portion of the problem is asshole drivers that just don’t turn off their brights and their fog lights or that tailgate the vehicle right in front of them while their headlights are mirror level.
I’ve seen brand new trucks with LEDs that were so easy on my eyes then I’ve seen the exact same model of truck via rearview mirror only after I passed it because the lights were beyond blinding.
They need to enforce maximum luminosity laws with an iron first; it’s ridiculous that people get away with this stuff.
Just did a refresher per your request… We did not ever to my knowledge use civics tests. We used literacy tests and what made them particularly offensive was they had various exemptions for white people or simplified variants for white people.
I am very icy to the idea of tests in general due to the effects having a “test” to vote could have. However, having a very low bar test of some sort administered without exceptions … it might make sense.
We don’t let people drive whose eyes fail a safety test. Maybe we shouldn’t let people vote if they don’t even have a surface level understanding of what they’re voting for.
I’m not saying do it, but maybe we shouldn’t totally write it off because of some bad behavior without any safeguards to prevent bad behavior.
Maybe, but also maybe not. A test that’s targeted specifically at “do you understand how the government functions” is actually quite different from a lot of other tests and less likely to be subjective.
Like, if there was a question, what part of the government writes laws:
if you get that wrong, you probably shouldn’t be voting.
The bigger issue is monetization. YouTube is popular in no small part because creators are trying to make money.
Yeah… Even as a third party, I definitely have not been enjoying the smell when I’ve bumped into it. I don’t think it should be a criminal offense, but I hope we can move past “I need to light a thing on fire and just screw up the air for everyone in my vicinity.”
That’s really not even close to the optimistic scenario. It’s arguably not even in the pessimistic scenario if you’re not just in the “make stuff up club.”
We’re talking at most half a meter of rise by 2050, at most 2 meters by 2100, at most 4 meters by 2150. The intermediate projection is a third of a meter by 2050. The optimistic projection (which we’re not going to hit) is 3/20th of a meter.
Climate change is real. The risk of famine is real. The risk of global conflict is real. The risk of trying storms is real. However, “doomsday everybody dies” is not really on any serious projections. The worst case is “a lot of people in a lot of poor nations die and rich nations have more wars and more immigration.”
I’ve never met a single human that I know of that feels this strongly about Twitter. Most everyone I know was lukewarm on it at best.
It was best for keeping up with news on organizations more than it was keeping up with people.
For my grandfather… The issue wasn’t the shows, but he specifically wants a few news programs and will not under any circumstances go without them.
This was a problem for even going to Internet based streaming options because he just will not accept anything without those shows for more than a few months.
Meanwhile he also complains he doesn’t have enough to watch and says he can’t afford it (he can, he just doesn’t like what it cost)… But those dang news channels… and just his outlook on TV in general.
Basically TikTok has been proven to serve the Chinese Communist Party (via influence over what users see and data collection). Additionally, the Atlantic article goes on to explain how the United States has a long history of protecting its citizens from foreign influence campaigns going back to the early radio days (and trying to ban TikTok is not a divergence from the status quo or an attack of free speech, rather the continuing of policies that have largely worked and served the public good).
Here’s the big difference. Automated assembly lines do a job better than the average human can. LLMs do the job consistently worse than the average human would.
EILIF: TikTok is like that “friend” that says they’re your buddy, but you have a lot of reasons to doubt they actually have your best interest at heart.
From my notes:
By integrating everything into it, it has become a good enough medium of communication for almost everything.
Except that’s not at all what we’ve done.
The only reason English dominates is because it’s the dominant language of the world super powers following world war II. It’s not because of some special design, principle, or properties.
English isn’t just “make up whatever rules and put them wherever”, particularly formal English which is what we’re talking about in the context of education.
Really, a better argument against changing the spelling is the classic “standards” xkcd, where now you’re just making another dialect of English where they spell words differently again, and now it needs to be adopted, fracturing the language further.
Language will evolve with or without direction. We have the structure in the form of schools to actually evolve it with direction in the name of making things more consistent and intuitive. We should use it, that’s all.
The old “why try to do anything because it will never be perfect” argument never holds water.
I echo the suggestion to support local shops, but I do occasionally go with a larger chain… It’s not better pizza than the local shops it’s just a different pizza.
I tend to prefer Domino’s over Pizza Hut and especially over Papa John’s (something about their formulation tends to upset my stomach way more than any other pizza… Plus the former CEO is very active in politics and not in a way I approve of).
To my Domino’s tastes significantly better … Pizza Hut used to be great, but I’ve been thoroughly unimpressed every time I’ve tried it in recent memory.
There’s also local variance in these chains; some towns have a better Pizza Hut than Domino’s 🤷♂️