Once again I go back to the Exiled Lands (Savage Wilds this time, actually), and once again I can't help editing ".../Conan Exiles/ConanSandbox/Config/DefaultGame.ini" to strip away the opening credits that I can't really skip otherwise or automatically. Not everyone is bothered by it and the wait time is the same, but I'm happier this way.

Do you have some quirk like that in your gaming life? Something that takes at least a bit of effort or research to make your setup just nice? Give me all your most silly and trivial examples. All praise mods that automate doors.

"Plan to follow, look to overtake". That's quite a simple rule that should be taught to everyone. It's a nice instructional video they won't put drivers in the defensive.

It’s really a question. I was going to comment how the term sounds one-sided to me, decided to do a quick search and realized there’s some controversy to the idea. I’m from Brazil and we don’t have a term for that as far as I know, so there might be a linguistic component to the sentiment I have as well.

If I say someone is my ally, I’m automatically their ally. Right? We have a common cause, even if the specifics may differ. Or we have a single goal, mission, vision, desire, and so on. We are allies, we are together. Then we have this concept of ally that seems to exist to denote a separation. I’m an ally because I’m other. Or, I’m an ally because I don’t have the same experiences, therefore I can’t speak from the same place you stand.

The idea we have to understand we speak from different places is important, but drawing a line in the cause and putting allies to one side is weird. Let me put it this way. Instead of sounding like “understand your situation is different than my own”, it sounds more like “know your place”.

How do you feel about that? Am I missing something?

I was watching a video by Georgia Dow in which she talked about a study showing how fear drives people to be more conservative. What that reminded me of was the rationalization I keep stumbling upon almost every day lately: "the alternative is worse".

We are mostly not revolutionaries willing to die for a cause. We just want to live our quiet lives, so we pay the thugs that offer us protection from themselves. The alternative is worse.

I can't criticise people for trying to survive, but I think it's important to be honest with ourselves. It's all bad and the good option is really hard and a scary risk with too many sacrifices.

And let me get personal to drive the point home. Anxiety and depression are just my reality. I'm very isolated and avoid interactions as much as I can. I'm in a bad place and would totally tell you with great conviction that out there somewhere is worse. I also believe it could be amazing, but the chances of me suffering, actually, the certainty, makes me think it's not worth it even trying.

Anyway. Be kind kind to yourselves, be kind to all the others, but be honest.

I was watching a video from two years ago about different social norms and this showed up. Found someone questioning the same eight years ago on reddit (when it seemed less normalized). It feels so weird not being aware of this shift, even as a foreigner.

It's an article in Portuguese, so I thought it'd better not to link directly: https://www.uol.com.br/tilt/noticias/redacao/2023/11/15/erro-camera-reconhecimento-facial.htm

It's talks about how a woman was misidentified at a festival in Brazil by the use of cameras and AI. Twice. First time she was approached by plainclothes officers that informed what was happening, said they were following protocol and asked for an ID (that she wasn't carrying). She was let go after they were satisfied. Hours later she was approached again, in a violent manner this time, treated in the manner they would typically treat criminals here (or most of the civilized world). She wetted her pants in fear. After being let go again, she decided to go home.

The way I understand it, she didn't do anything wrong. She had nothing to hide showing her face and being judged my the state surveillance. She got lucky by being mistreated in a nice way once. She also got lucky the second time for her brutal mistreatment not ending with her imprisoned and unable to leave because that happens to innocent people much more frequently than people imagine.

Everything you say can be used against you. Every information they have can be used against you. Don't give them ammunition.

I think there was an effort in the past to make sure it's a family show and disconnect The Doctor from the more mature parts of the whoniverse. Maybe the changes in production and, maybe, the realization adults are too obsessed with it create new avenues for money making creativity.

As far back as 2010, in a piece titled “Little Brother is Watching,” author Walter Kirn wrote for the New York Times: “As the internet proves every day, it isn’t some stern and monolithic Big Brother that we have to reckon with as we go about our daily lives, it’s a vast cohort of prankish Little Brothers equipped with devices that Orwell, writing 60 years ago, never dreamed of and who are loyal to no organized authority. The invasion of privacy — of others’ privacy but also our own, as we turn our lenses on ourselves in the quest for attention by any means — has been democratized.”

The article is paywalled: https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/magazine/17FOB-WWLN-t.html

Another one from 2004: https://www.wired.com/2004/07/little-brother-is-watching/

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I had never heard the concept before, but it certainly serves to stop me from considering the state we are now as non horrifying. Bookmarked the podcast for later, but I’m sharing it right now anyway.

Something to keep in mind and that you realize after a while is that the history you know without much research or certainty is most likely the history of the ruling class, told to make they look as great as they believe to be.

I have just read Three by Kieron Gillen, the intentional Spiritual Antithesis to 300 by Frank Miller. I knew 300 is propaganda that only values the importance of a small portion of the people who fought. Spartans were the real soldiers, the superior people, the only that mattered. Then you have a class of people whose job is to do whatever they don't deem dignified, and fight their battles as well if needed. A class they rightfully feared for outnumbering their oppressors and revolting whenever the opportunity arose. A class they openly mistreated.

It's been two decades since I left school, but I'm pretty sure there was no mention of them in my history lessons. I recall the wars, but omitting the detail that most of the soldiers (in the practical sense) were not who you'd assume to be is huge.

If for nothing else, I needed this movie just for how the camera moved. It followed the characters and the action without dozens of jump cuts. I thought the long take during the opening was just a nice way of presenting the players and the incident that would affect their lives, but it became the norm throughout.

Anyway, it's a movie about a day in the lives of black people, queer people, favela people, young people that are kinda lost. It's an incomplete work with a strong first act that stumbles transitioning to the second and doesn't find its footing anymore.

It's nice to see such a positive depiction of groups that so often only fuel tragedy porn. They can show their honest lives, have fun, be flawed, be absurd, be beautiful and sexy, tell a story that reflects a culture that I myself am not all that familiar with.

The rest of the article (not translated) is an interview with Cathcart.

I guess the hopes of a mass migration to another app are not good. On the other side, Brazil's policies will have a great influence in the future development of whatsapp.