@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

ptz

@[email protected]

Ask me anything.

I also develop Tesseract UI for Lemmy/Sublinks

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ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

My aunt did.

She got suspicious when her online companion kept asking her to buy stuff and ship it. She didn't catch on immediately, and the family had to explain to her she was doing something illegal and that it was a scam (even though he was reimbursing her).

(She later did remarry a non-scammer, so happy ending I guess).

ptz ,
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I think it was to get around embargoes? This was probably late 90s, early 2000s so she was buying stuff at like Circuit City/Walmart/etc and shipping it off.

ptz ,
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Yes, and The Wilhelm Scream (has an audio example)

ptz ,
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Definitely fits here, IMO. Classifying truck drivers based on the cargo they're hauling is kind of crazy (unless the company has its own freight division).

Also, is it poor form to post both here and ...

If it fits both, then post to both. Most UIs will roll up crossposts now, and usually only one is shown directly in the feed. That said, at least in my opinion, posting to two communities back to back is plenty. Any more, and it starts to feel a bit spammy (regardless of whether they're rolled up into the crossposts). I'm sure you'll get different answers based on who you ask, but that's my take on it.

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/woman-who-didn-t-get-raptured-demands-a-refund-on-her-generous-tips/ar-BB1lBtQ1

There was at least one lady who thought it was the rapture.

ptz ,
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Assuming it still allows community edits, some brave soul is probably going to go all [Citation needed] on it and probably end up in a gulag.

Can we all agree that whatever version of predictive text we have nowadays is crap, and has been for a long time?

I'm sick of random capitalisations mid sentence. I'm sick of common words being replaced by less common ones or even downright nonsense. I'm sick of it taking three attempts to successfully get the word I want. I swear it's been like this for five years or more. Can we have a better version yet, or at least the old one back?

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

I miss T-9 and physical buttons. I could type out War and Peace with maybe one typo without looking at my phone once. The on-screen keyboards we've had the last ~17 years have been a huge downgrade, IMO.

Keurig's new K-Rounds coffee pods are plastic-free and could finally make single-serve coffee-making sustainable ( www.techradar.com )

This is quite exciting in that it removes plastic waste. I see no reason why different companies can't make different shape ones to maintain their lock-in. I expect a knock-off market to pop-up, but that exists with plastic pods too. It's a step in the right direction at least.

ptz ,
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I just use the resuable pods. Can throw any coffee grounds in them, dump them in the compost when done, rinse, and use again. Have used these for at least 5 years.

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

Definitely not burning it, but pyrolysis has been suggested (basically "burn" it in an oxygen-free environment).

The plastics are heated to about 500 °C in the absence of oxygen. The longer molecules break into liquid fractions like naphtha and diesel, solid cuts like waxes, and lower-molecular-weight gases. In most plants, roughly 10% of the product is char, a by-product.

It's not without its drawbacks. Some gases are produced, and those are either burned to (partially?) power the pyrolysis process or are flared off. About 10% is reduced to char and would have to be disposed of conventionally (unsure of the environmental impact of that).

I don't have time right now to dive deep into the topic (just throwing off what I do know plus a link that explains it), but it's possible it's less harmful overall than just throwing it in a landfill forever. (Assuming the input energy for the reaction chamber comes from clean sources.)

https://cen.acs.org/environment/recycling/Amid-controversy-industry-goes-plastics-pyrolysis/100/i36

ptz ,
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I don't care for short form videos, but this is still really cool. Hopefully it provides an embed URL for the videos so the ones that get posted to Lemmy can be embedded (which is how Peertube links work).

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

And I'll sleep better knowing how well we handled the last pandemic (nervous laughter).

But serious question time: now that it's made it's way to humans, does that mean we can start working on a vaccine?

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

Now, you'll notice it's very hot in here, and it will get one degree hotter every time you think about how hot it is

ptz ,
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I don't think that it's a prerequisite but it's definitely a catalyst.

Another catalyst is one company buying another. I cannot think of one example where the acquired company's product/services got better after a M and A. OTOH, I can think of many examples of it getting worse. Confirmation bias? Absolutely. But still makes you go "hmm..."

ptz ,
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Also Microsoft.....

Microsoft warns deepfake election subversion is disturbingly easy

I know the genie's out of the bottle, but goddamn.

ptz ,
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Should we edit down all the courtroom episodes as well? /s

ptz ,
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I mean, credit where it's due. If not for him, I'd probably be browsing Reddit right now instead of Lemmy. So, there's that.

ptz ,
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Sounds like fun.

Last year I picked up one of those cheap DVB-T receivers and played around with RTL-SDR a bit.

Was able to pick up a lot of ADS-B traffic (I live near an airport) which was really cool to throw on a map.

Was able to get readings from this little temp/humidity sensor that came with the house (base station is long gone). Also was able to detect when my wireless doorbell button was pressed as well as a few other odd wireless gadgets.

Got readings from every water meter in the area except mine. Either it wasn't being decodes properly, or almost everyone has a leak. Lol. Still trying to figure that out.

The only thing I failed at was getting a reading from my electric meter. Nothing seems to support it, and online resources came up dry for that model.

I did all that just for fun, but the next step, when I get around to it, is putting together some scripts to reconfigure the radio in a loop to read devices that worked and MQTT the data to HomeAssistant.

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

👏👏👏👏👏

Well said. I don't disagree with a single point you made, and some of it echos concerns I've had since day 1. And extra points for calling out .ml as lemmygrad-lite. I think I've called it exactly that as well.

The only thing I really have to add is on the topic of toxicity. Like you, I'm an instance admin and have a bird's eye view of a lot of behavior patterns. I've recently started wondering how many people are here because they're too toxic for regular social media rather than because they want to be here. I won't guess an actual number, but I would say it's not insignificant.

I'm firmly the latter case: I want to be here, I want this to succeed, and I'm trying to put in the work toward that result. And I've interacted with lots and lots of people in the same boat. But, like you, I'm also growing disillusioned for many of the same reasons.

On the bright side, I've gotten much less rusty as a developer after having to write scrips and tools to fill in the massive gaps in moderation features.

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

I'm on LineageOS, rooted, and RCS is working for me. Is the block tied to the device safety attestation?

My device (somehow?) passes safety check, and I've had no problems with my banking app, Pay, or other annoying apps that insist you don't own your own device.

Sewer smell in bathroom only when temperature outside below freezing

I've been noticing an occasional sewer smell in my bathroom, and finally realized it's only present when it's below freezing outside. As soon as the weather warms up, the smell goes away. For reference, my house was built in '55 and the toilet is plumbed into the original steel sewer line. There are no leaks (everything below...

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

Self-hosting apps / homelab

Getting used enterprise gear is not prohibitively expensive, but the electric bills balloon very quickly.

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