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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 16th, 2023

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  • What a bizarre take. The EU council is backing down - they do want chat control but each time they propose it they meet resistance and back down. Then they come back again and try again.

    To suggest the public reaction is overblown and media manipulation is bizarre. This is the 3rd or 4th time the EU has attempted to get this through. Just because they chickened out of a vote doesn’t mean the politicians don’t want this.

    In a democracy votes happen. In the EU they keep resurrecting this terrible idea hoping to get it through but then backing away if they don’t think they can win. They know if there was an actual vote it likely would put an end to his.

    Also the EU council is the antithesis of a democracy. It is not directly elected - instead it’s a club of the heads of states of all the countries in the EU. It just represents who happens to be in charge of each country, and gives equal weights to all those countries regardless of their population size. The EU has a Parliament but it’s a fig leaf of democracy as so much power is held in bodies like the Council and the Commission (which is 1 post per state and horse traded not elected).

    So please don’t make this out as a sign that EU democracy works. If EI democracy was working properly they would have listened the first time, and they’d have moved to a directly elected system for the executive Council and commission years ago.

    The EU gets too much of a free pass for “not being America” but it’s got huge problems that need fixing to make it an actual democracy.


  • This may or may not be the right role for you but should it not be that does not mean going back to your old job is the right way out. You got this role quickly on searching - it sounds like you do not know your own value and worth?

    You wanted growth and change, but that is always anxiety inducing and will make you question your choice and decision. You will learn how your new role works and you will develop new skills to make it work. I’d stick it through for a good period and see how you feel.

    But if it ends up being thay you really don’t like this job, it doesn’t then mean going back is or was the right decision. Nothing from your old job will be fixed or improved and you will feel the same again in a year. It feels like the safe option because it is familiar but rhwy didn’t value you enough to give you a salary your deserve. Your old manager obviously values you enough to want you back but mot enough to tell you that for your career to progress you do need to move forward.

    You should look to move forward - if this new job isn’t a good fit in 6 months, work out what you really do want and look again. Don’t run back to familiar - you left for a reason but just becuase you haven’t found what you wanted yet downs mean give up.


  • I used to use Homeplug to get network from my router front downstairs of the house to the my office upstairs and back. It’s a small house, and I thought the homeplug was ok - I was getting about 150-200mbps of my 900mbps; not great but I thought it was a good as I could get. The electrics are about 10 years old but I could see there was a lot of noise and error correction when I looked at the software that came with the plugs. Simple direct wifi connection was atrocious as the walls are largely solid brick.

    Then a couple of years later I read about how good they Mesh systems could be so I decided to try a cheap one. I was skeptical as wifi hadn’t worked for me. I got a Google Wifi system (not a fan of google but it was a cheap system compared to other mesh networks); it has no backhaul connection, just 3 wifi points (one in front room, one in hallway and one in office), and my speed jumped to 500mbps and low latency. I also hadn’t realised how bad the latency had been on my homeplug set up - it was night and day.

    I have since upgraded to an ASUS XT8 system; 2 units only and I now get close to 800mbps on a good day, and 600-700mbps floor. My PC in my office is where I work (which involves high data transfers) and also game and chill, it’s been a huge boon.

    So yeah, Homeplug does the job but it’s not great in my experience. It was cheap compared to a mesh network, but you get what you pay for. You can get some of the cheaper and older mesh systems 2nd hand on ebay - but unfortunately a good system is pricey. In my experience it was totally worth it.


  • I’ve not seen Euphoria, but drugs, drinking and sex plus underage clubbing were all things that happened at my schools between 15-18.

    A drama like Euphoria is of course going to be way over the top regardless of setting.

    I do agree casting 25year olds (zendaya is 29 years old) feels bizarre but that is what American TV has always done. Presumably it’s to do with experience given these are expensive shows that need to work to strict production schedules given how expensive these shows are. Its understandable they’d want a cast who have been proven to be reliable and experienced, and also are not restricted in the hours they can work. Also age consistency matrers - once you have one 25 year old cast member all of them need to be the same age or it looks disturbing with a mixed age cast set in a high school.

    I suppose profile may matter too - Zendaya was already famous; the pool.of famous 18 year old actors is smaller than the pool of 25 year old actors. Certainly regardless of fame the pool of 18 year old actors with a big CV is going to be small. It’s risky to cast an unproven 17 year old but less risky to cast a 25 year old who has done plays, and maybe TV or movies, or completed acting training.

    I agree they could just not set it in a high school but then the specific dynamics and stories they want to tell would not be available. High school is a strange time - in the US but also globally - where people are on the cusp of adulthood (16 in many places, 18 in the US), yet totally restricted by the law, family and school. It’s a perfect setting for conflict, which makes drama, and it is universally relatable as almost everyone went to school.

    Meanwhile if you set something 19-25, it is no longer universal. About 50-60% of people in rich countries go to university / college. And those institutions massively vary from community colleagues, poorer universities, up to elite places. Meanwhile 40-50% do other things.

    So yeah, I get that it feels bizarre that shows set in high schools are all 25 year old actors but I think it makes sense why, and setting things in high schools make sense too. These shows obviously make money and have a wide audience, even if it’s not really my personal taste.


  • If you want to try Pop OS, go ahead. The most important thing is back up data you want to keep - it’s not a bad idea to have a dedicated partition for your home folder and another for the OS to help with fixing problems or moving to another distro, but backups off your laptop are critically important. Then if you don’t like a particular distro, or you fuck up, you can install another and restore your data from backup.

    Personally I use OpenSuSE Tumbleweed, I’ve tried quite a few distros and I think generally for gaming they’re much the same. OpenSuSE has a good user interface in YaST for tweaking and keeping the system how I want it. I like being on a distro with a big install base and linked into an enterprise distro as there is an incentive to test rigorously and also fix things when they break. But Tumbleweed is a rolling release so there will still occasionally be problems.

    If you want stability and no headaches then I’d go for a decent point release distro with a big install base overall. I’d suggest OpenSuSE Leap or Fedora KDE over smaller niche/community distros. Go for Gnome equivalents if that’s your thing. I have gone off Mint in recent months as I think too much support out on the Web is out of date and provides bad solutions to problems (such as adding random ubuntu repos to install software). Mint itself.Is a decent distro.

    I’d avoid Ubuntu due to Snap, I’d avoid Debian due to its slow upgrade cycle (very stable distro but may not be the best for high end gaming and tweaking), and I’d avoid Arch due to the complexity of set up (unless you want your system exactly right and are prepared to problem solve your way to what you want; it can be a very powerful and efficient set up of you’re willing to out he work in). I’d also personally avoid atomic distros as it can be a headache to tweak and run custom software although there are ways if you enjoy leaning new things.






  • I dunno, it’s good it wasn’t in the headline? It’d have been clickbait - the article makes it clear this is suspected suicide but that the police / FBI are keeping open minds because of the obvious connotations.

    Suicide by hanging is unfortunately a common method taken by young men. The lack of any other signs makes foul play unlikely - without going into too much detail, unless he was drugged there would be signs of a struggle or injuries related to being restrained if it had been foul play. It sounds like there weren’t obvious signs of either and the toxicology results are awaited.


  • Great to see another person moving to Linux and OpenSuSE. My only caution if this is your first time with Linux is that a point release like OpenSuSE Leap is probably a better place to start than Tumbleweed. I’m on Tumbleweed and it’s generally good but I have had a few things break over the last couple of years, often fixed at next update in fairness but it is frustrating even as an experienced user. I have also had to reinstall Tumbleweed on one occasion; it wasn’t a big deal as I’d set up a separate Home and System partition. Tumbleweed is great but it is a rolling release and even though it’s a well tested one rolling releases are always riskier in terms of things breaking.


  • Agree, a USB stick live install is a good way to test - users should just bear in mind it is slower than a real install as USB drives are not as fast as internal hard drives. Once the OS is loaded fully it will feel reasonably snappy but still every piece of software you launch will take longer to load than a real install, and the bigger the software the longer it will take to load.

    I also tended to recommend Linux Mint for beginners although I think I’m moving more towards recommending OpenSuSE Leap. The reason being it ships with KDE which is a slick interface with a Windows like set up by default (although very customisable - users can create MacOS or Gnome like interfaces with relative ease if they prefer) and gives a better idea of what modern Linux is capable of than Cinnamon in my opinion. Also KDE’s Discover app makes it easy to install software, comparable to Mint’s software store. Mint still has many more guides online but they’re often around terminal use and APT based solutions, and I’m beginning to think that is actually a bad thing. Most stuff for mainstream users can be done via the GUI, and KDE offer’s a great GUI. Plus Flatpak is a far better way of installing custom software than the APT recommendations I still see widely shared, so I think it’s actually better to move people away from Mint. Personally I think OpenSuSE Leap is the better option (and possible Fedora KDE Plasma edition although I am less familiar with it).



  • I do get the discomfort but what are you “moral” objections? Is it that she too immature to make a decision? Or is it that you think your dad is taking advantage of her?

    It’s worth working through why this is a moral issue for you, you’re a bit vague about it. In Europe the age of consent is variable but 16 is common, and it can be a bit jarring when you see the reactions of Americans to anyone under 18.

    But in Europe adulthood has generally begun at 16, including being able to leave school and work in many places. The voting age is even being extended down to 16 from 18 in some places. So it’s not as clear cut that someone at 16 is not able to make independent decisions as American users sometimes make it seem.

    Having said that, I personally don’t like the idea but more pragmatically for the age difference and the maturity difference. She can consent but there is a very significant change in maturity from 17 to 25, and I’m not sure how viable a relationship someone who is 48 can have with someone who is 17.

    I think they are both adults and of the age of consent. You can express your concerns to your dad but ultimately it is both of their decisions and you should stay out of it beyond that (unless there are other issues that arise). I wouldn’t go too far judging him beyond that - he will be your dad for the rest of your life. If you had a best friend who was 17 and in a relationship with a 48 year old, you might express your opinion but would you interfere beyond that? Probably not - this should probably be the same.



  • I wonder why they’re making a Linux native version? It is one of the ironies of Proton that windows native games are so easy to install it seems a bit pointless? But also making games for Linux is ironically difficult as it’s difficult to support long term as they can break as libraries change over time.

    It feels like we need a Flatpak style set up for Linux native games which may help games launch stable long term versions that won’t “break” if newer libraries don’t work with them. Flatpaks “bring your own dependencies” approach is more similar to how windows games often work with their own dlls (even to the point of installing old versions of directx when needed) except without windows annoying set up of spraying dlls all over your hard drive making them difficult to clean up when you uninstall a game.

    Although arguably Steam already deals with that on both Linux and Windows currently. But it is proprietary. And maybe Flatpak is already that solution? Maybe Appimage too although not sure how well a 30gb would run from a single file virtual file system? Is it native speeds or have some overhead?


  • It will depend on the drivers that Audeze Maxwell supply? I can’t see any USB drivers for Linux beyond the dongle but they may exist.

    However if they have a 3.5mm port then I’d use that. I have a Sony headset and while I don’t have any issues with Bluetooth, I do like to use 3.5mm analogue conenctions to save battery (even with noise cancelling on the battery lasts way longer off Bluetooth). I bought a long 3.5mm cable online and plug it into the front of my PC. No USB or Bluetooth faff, it just works, and at high quality.

    However note that if you want the mic to work too it will depend on whether the headset’s 3.5mm jack is set up for both audio and mic (if it’s good quality it should be), plus you will need a 4pin 3.5mm plug and cable to pick up the mic from the headset and cable instead of the common 3pin audio only plug. At the other end if your pc has separate 3.5mm audio and mic jacks you will need an adaptor that splits the audio/mic into two cables to plug in to both jacks. If it’s a desktop there will be separate jacks around the back although sometimes the front jack may be a combined mic/audio jack, or you may also have one joint jack if it’s a laptop. If you do need to split the audio and mic then you can find these adaptors and also 4pin 3.5mm cables on ebay or amazon.

    Edit: Just in case you’re not aware - an audio only 3.5mm cable has 2 coloured bands on the plug (splitting it into 3 metal rings or pins). An audio + mic 3.5mm cable has 3 coloured bands on the plug (splitting it into 4 metal rings or pins).

    Edit 2: sorry look for 4 pole 3.5mm rather than 4 pin; you’ll see the better quality stuff when searching as pole is the correct term!



  • No, there are other priorities. I want to see reform of the railways for sure, including renationalisation and a proper long term plan. HS2 should have been completed but now it’s too far beyond the scrapping to resurrect. But there are still lines that need electrifying and Northern Power House Rail makes economic sense.

    I think renationalisation and increased subsidy for the railways is good but not free - people who use the railways should be paying to support it more than other tax payers, and international visitors also use the railways and should be contributing.

    If we had a 1% tax rise it’d quickly disappear as we have a national deficit including a large amount of interest going to pay for the national debt.

    Rather than income tax rises (which hit ypunger working people more than any other group) I want to see asset taxes that actually hit wealthy people, including the wealthier asset rich elderly who want to pass on their money to their children rather than pay for the expensive services they use (like the NHS). So I’d favour a property tax (that would also encourage people to downsize to houses they need instead of sitting in big family homes), and taxes on shares and other assets. It doesn’t have to be punitive, just fair.

    Instead younger working people are subsiding the elderly in this country - the elderly are the wealthiest group, who got all the benefits of free university, free Healthcare, cheap housing etc which the younger generation have it tough, paid for university, pay exorbitant prices for rent or home buying. The wealthy elderly hide behind the sympathy people show for the poorer elderly; people who won’t be hit by an asset tax as they are asset poor and deserve to be subsidised and supported.