Using full names like that might be fine for explaining a physical rule, or stating the final result of some calculation - but it certainly would be cumbersome and difficult for actually carrying out the calculations. In many cases we already fill pages with algebra showing how things can be related and rearranged to arrive at new results. That kind of work would be intractable with full word names for the variables, partially because you’d be constantly spilling off the end of the page trying to write the steps; but also because having all that stuff would actually obfuscate what you are trying to do - which is algebra. And during that process, the meanings and values of the pronumerals is not as important has how they interact with each other. So the names are just a distraction.

For setting up an equation, and for stating the final result, the meanings of the variables are very important; but during the process of manipulating the equations to get the result you want the meanings of the letters are often ignored. You only need to know that it is something that can be multiplied, or inverted, or subtracted, or whatever. Eg. suppose I want to rearrange to get the velocity. I don’t care that I’m dividing both sides by the air density times the drag coefficient and the area… I’m just dividing ρCA, which is an algebraic blob whose interpretation can be saved for some other time.

Is this because they used “he” instead of “they” in the build instructions? … They changed that and acknowledged the mistake. Surely that’s enough. It’s the fucking build instructions. I think we can probably find it in our hearts to forgive them.

[edit] Just in case people think I’m joking. I’m not. As far as I’m aware, the critical incident that that has resulted in people calling Ladybird devs anti-trans is that they wrote ‘he’ instead of ‘they’ in the build instructions. That’s what caused the original outrage. And as far as I’m aware, there have been no other incidents. But please, if there is something of substance that I’m not aware of, post about it here.

Isn’t Homer meant to be an illustration of privilege? Like, he’s pretty useless, but still gets essentially everything he wants.

We could study what various apes do, and try to use that to guess at possible human behaviour - or we could literally just look at human behaviour directly. Surely the direct observations of what humans do is going to give us a more accurate and useful model of human behaviour compared to observations of other species.

I first tried Linux around two decades ago, and it felt clunky to me - so I didn’t stick with it. I tried again around one decade ago; and it was a lot better, but I still didn’t quite have enough reason to keep using it yet. … But now, finally, I tried again several months ago - and I’m definitely sticking with it. I’m currently using Mint.

There are still some thing that I think are worse in Mint compared to Windows. But there is a lot of stuff that’s much better. It’s more than enough that I don’t expect to ever switch back to Windows again. The main thing is avoiding all the anti-features of Windows, such as the constant nagging to switch to Edge or activate their search bar; and the ads & other cruft in the start menu; and the constant little popups and ‘reminders’ about new stuff; and the lack of control in when updates are installed; and the ubiquitous harvesting of personal information, including ‘telemetry’ of which apps you run and when.

For me, one of the last straws was when I clicked on a help link from Windows settings, and it automatically opened in Edge, and Edge then automatically imported my browsing history and bookmarks from Firefox and automatically uploaded it to my Microsoft account. I was horrified that it would do something like that without any interaction whatsoever. I didn’t even think Edge had access to my Microsoft account until then, because I deliberately avoid using one to sign in, or for any other reason - the only reason it exists is because I used OneNote. I wanted the account to be isolated to just the app I used it for; not to automatically be grabbed by the whole OS and then used to collect my browsing history.

So yeah. I’d spent years of maintaining an ever-growing list of little system tweaks that I used to keep as junk off Windows as possible. But I’ve had enough. It’s too much. It’s not even close to being worth it. Linux has some minor problems, and some things take a bit of getting use to. But at least it isn’t systematically hostile.

I think the high popularity of Trump is very damaging for all of the USA.

What in particular do you feel like is missing? I mean, there’s a lot of stuff on Linux already. There’s no shortage of apps or games. But there might be some specific thing that you want that linux doesn’t have.

I use RSS a lot too. It’s particularly useful for things that update only sporadically, like a personal blog or a slow-running webcomic. The updates show up in the RSS reader, and so you don’t have to spend time checking low-traffic sites (or abandon them). You can also use RSS to get updates from youTube channels if you want, without needing an account.

I use theoldreader.com as my RSS reader. But I’m thinking that I might just switch to using Thunderbird instead at some point. I’m happy with theoldreader, but I figure that if Thunderbird works just as well, then that might be better for reducing information leakage. (Which isn’t a big deal in this case, but it’s just a good general principle to minimise it.)

I do that too… but sometimes its hard to tell which email I should use.

For example, if I create a patreon account to pay people - I’m giving financial info and accessing stuff that I actually care about - which suggests I use my ‘real’ email address. But on the other hand, the email address is shown to people I’m paying, and I don’t necessarily want them contacting me in that way, or even know that that email address exists. As in, I might want to support them - but that doesn’t mean I trust them to respect my privacy. So then maybe the spam email address is the way?

I notice that 3 looks like a sideways ω, which is the symbol used to represent an ordinal number larger than all finite ordinal numbers.

In other words Valve might see 3 as essentially meaning infinity, and is thus unreachable. No matter how many new versions they make, they can never get to 3.

Terms like that matters more for some services than for others. For something like Spotify or Netflix, if they terminate the agreement it doesn’t matter much. You lose access, but there was no accumulated value. So you can just go somewhere with only minor inconvenience. Whereas on Steam, if they terminate the agreement then you could lose decades worth of accumulated games from your library - which could be very valuable. So that’s a big difference.

Now, it’s unlikely that Steam will just press delete on everyone’s account. But we can imagine a very profit-hungry leader taking over Steam and deciding to put the squeeze on their vast user-base. There are many things they could do; such as adding ads, requiring ‘consent’ to include spyware on your computer, or charging additional fees. Long term users would not be in a position to refuse these things, because their Steam library is being held as collateral.

If you trust that Steam is never going to give you up, and never going to let you down, etc. Then there is no problem. Things are currently going fine, and they may continue to be fine for a very long time. It’s just a matter of trust, and power, and hedging.

Yeah. That’s the difference. GOG can withdraw their services, but not the software that you’ve downloaded. Whereas Steam explicitly states that using the software may require their services (and it usually does).

I don’t know how you can be pleased by anything. Isn’t your life tiring living the life of a zealot? Or do you have just an unsatisfiable need to complain?

wtf man. Did someone shit in your breakfast cereal or something?

Yesterday I bought something on Steam for the first time in many years. (I have a large Steam library, but in recent years I’ve been getting games from gog and itch instead.)

Since I hadn’t bought from Steam in a long time I figured I should read the “Steam Subscriber agreement” that you have to click to accept when you buy something. Let me just say now, the agreement is a very very bad deal for customers.

It goes to great lengths to make it very clear that you don’t own anything. You aren’t buying anything, you have no essentially rights. You are simply paying for a license subscription to use software with various conditions. Valve is able to end your subscription with no refund if you break the agreement. And the best bit:

Furthermore, Valve may amend this Agreement (including any Subscription Terms or Rules of Use) unilaterally at any time in its sole discretion.

So by using Steam we’re putting a lot of trust in Valve; because the ‘agreement’ basically says they can do whatever they want, any time they want, for any reason they want.

Steam is quite good. I particularly appreciate their Linux support. But they are clearly using their position of dominance to make people agree to unfavourable terms. At the moment, things are fine. But make no mistake - when you use Steam, Valve has all the power. They can screw people over whenever they choose to.

With all that in mind, buying DRM free is better if you want to still have access to the software when a company decides to change direction for whatever reason.

I just focus on not making it worse myself.

Why would AI made by some company bother searching website or fliers when they could instead show you products from businesses who pay them to show you products?

When the AI made by a company, running on their company’s servers, with no way for you to know what it is basing its decisions on… you’d probably best assume that it is acting for the company’s benefit rather than yours.

It could be that the characters in the movie thought it was about energy, but were mistaken. (But to be honest, having a group of people believe that to be the reason is just as implausible as it actually being the reason - either way it makes no sense and we just have to suspend disbelief.)

I remember in the early days of the internet Alta Vista search worked quite well. It was easy to find what you wanted, and find new things relevant to your interests - and so it became very popular. Unfortunately, Alta Vista only worked well if people made their websites in good faith. It was searching meta-tags and text on the page; and so when greedy people wanted to get more traffic on their website, they found it easy to exploit Alta Vista’s search. As more and more people started exploiting the system, the search got worse and worse.

I remember the day I switched to using Google. I was searching for some C programming stuff on Alta Vista with technical words - and the results had more porn sites than programming sites. Like, wtf. Obviously that search doesn’t work anymore. It stopped working because arseholes were exploiting it.

And now, pretty much the same thing is happening to Google. Their algorithm worked better for longer than what Alta Vista was doing, but it seems that self-interested people have kind of cracked the system, and now the results are mostly just junk instead of useful stuff. (Note, I stopped using Google several years ago. I’ve been using Duck Duck Go. But you’re right that the problem is more widespread than just Google.)

Alternatively, you could be this guy.

Look, I can see where you’re coming from about the over-emphasis on winning; but it just sound like you’re talking about an entirely different issue to what Valve is trying to address.

Your suggestion, if I understand it correctly, is to have the game automatically make a judgement about every player’s individual skill during the match itself, and apply some buff or penalty if it detects a major discrepancy between players. Is that what you are suggesting?

I suspect that the existence of mechanics like that would lead to a lot of angst, regardless of whether it ‘works’. People already have a tendency to blame their team and blame match-making for making them lose. Imagine if they could also blame the game itself for holding them back. … It could be a perfect system that never gets it wrong, and it would still cause a lot of people to get upset. And I don’t see how it could fix the problem of smurfing anyway unless it is a seriously over-zealous system that erases basically any skill advantage.

Also, I don’t think such auto-detection would be reliable. But although we could could discuss the technicalities of what might or might not work… I just don’t think it’s worth pursuing in dota anyway. Perhaps it would be better suited to some other game.