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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 10th, 2023

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  • I work in an area where it’s impossible to record their behavior, and since there were so many people doing it snitching wasn’t an option. They were smart enough to only “joke” when management was within earshot and resume actual harassment when they left.

    I still work with that same group, funny enough they went back to being buddy-buddy once I got vaccinated and was able to drop the mask.

    I have forgiven them in the sense that I don’t think about it when I interact with them, but now I know how selfish they are and how they’d happily push me into a wood chipper if it meant they could avoid having to wear a small piece of fabric on their face.


  • Honestly, therapy. I basically had the same reaction when my coworkers, who i thought were pretty alright, would cough in my general direction and say survival of the fittest because I was wearing a mask during peak covid. I had a lung condition that put me at high risk, and I told them that… And that lead them to be even more hostile to me, openly saying they hoped I’d get covid and die off quickly.

    I struggled with the fact that people can turn on you so fast, and that people couldn’t do the minimum effort to prevent someone they know from dying. We used to be cool, pretty often we went out to eat and hung out outside of work hours, then in the span of a couple months they were practically verbally assaulting me every day. I talked to a therapist and it really helped. I barely remember what they told me since it was years ago now, but it got me through it and I rarely think about it now.





  • I think it’s important to consider why you think this. Try and explain what makes someone stupid.

    I do tend to agree with the general statement that most people are pretty fucking stupid. If IQ were a meaningful number of intelligence, I’d wager that it’s heavily skewed left. Meaning that the common saying of “think of how stupid the average person and realize half of all people are below that” is even worse when you use the median.

    For me, what makes someone stupid is lack of curiosity, lack of drive to learn, and lack of critical thinking. I think stupidity is a learned trait, and our modern society is doing its damnedest to make sure children learn it as soon as possible. Never question authority, you only need to memorize so you can pass the test, and you will be spoon fed the information.

    Then soon as you get out of school, you have to get a job and occupy most of your time with work or sleep, you’ll likely get only two-three hours of time to yourself each day, meaning you’ll lack the time to break out of the cycle. And the system compounds at most jobs. Your manager is likely stupid, meaning they want you to never question authority, just do what they tell you, and ask them very little questions.

    I also think the trillions of dollars that are spent on advertising strongly influences this. And being constantly bombarded with psychological manipulation encourages stupidity.

    I also think stupidity is compounding in and of itself. The less you know, the more you can just make hasty assumptions, then use those assumptions as fact for your next set of assumptions.

    It’s also contagious. Being around people who are less stupid than yourself makes you feel bad, so you aren’t around them much or encourage them to join you in being stupid.

    There is a massive difference between not knowing something, and choosing to not know something. Just about every person in the world has access to the greatest source of information that has ever been created. There are free courses on just about every topic you could ever desire to learn, fingertips away.

    There is also a massive difference between knowing something and rote memorization. Being able to follow the logical chain of facts is very important, so is being able to critically think about a topic. I think being “bored” is great at combatting stupidity in this way. Spending time with no stimulation is great for engaging your brain in actual thoughts. Consider dedicating time to just thinking: no audiobooks, music, podcasts, video games, movies, TV shows, social media, books etc. Just sit and be bored for a while. Meditation is a great entry into this.



  • This is a good tool for visualizing your raid needs from your capacity and total number of drives.

    https://www.seagate.com/products/nas-drives/raid-calculator/

    I’ll preface that I’m no raid expert, just a nerd that uses it occasionally.

    The main benefit of most raid configurations is the redundancy they provide. If you lose one drive, you do not lose any data. It’s kinda obvious how you can have 1:1 redundancy, you just have an exact copy of the drive. But there are ways to split data into three chunks so that you can rebuild the data from any two chunks, and 5 chunks so that you can loose and two chunks. Truly understand how raid does this could easily be an entire college course.

    Raid 0 is the exception. All it does is “join together” a bunch of drives into one disk. And if you lose an individual disk you likely will lose most of your data.

    Another big difference is read/write speed. From my understanding, every raid configuration is slower to read and write than if you were using a single drive. Each raid configuration is varying levels of slower than the “base speed”

    I typically use raid 5 or 6, since that gives some redundancy, but I can keep most of my total storage space.

    The main thing in all of this is to keep an eye on drive health. If you lose more drives than your array can handle, all of your data is gone. From my understanding, there is no easy way to get the data off a broken raid array.






  • I’d double check that language you need isn’t already on iPhone. They’ve added pretty much every language spoken by at least 100k people.

    iPhone is really the only choice for the computer/smartphone illiterate. You can’t easily put the device in an unrecognizable state, you can’t install a launcher that drastically changes the GUI from the app store. iPhone justifiably gets tons of shit, but this is the exact use case it’s designed for. They also have really good accessibility features, and they actually work in apps.

    Android has tons of benefits, and I’ve had only android for the last 14 years. I think if you are planning on removing the settings app all together, you know it’s not a great choice for them.


  • It really depends on what you buy. Some stuff is crazy cheap, others are pretty much the same price. If you’re buying a single shirt from Sam’s you’re probably better off going to Walmart. Always check the per-unit price, and only buy what you’re sure you will use. My favorite brand of yogurt is cheaper per unit than the great value brand at Walmart, and is almost 50% lower compared to buying it in packs of 4… But it takes up half a shelf in the fridge. But generally meat is just as expensive at Walmart/Kroger, often you can get it cheaper on sale at Walmart/Kroger than you can get at Sam’s, and it’s already in packages that you can just toss in a freezer.

    Also, I don’t know if Costco has it, but the Sam’s app lets you scan and pay with your phone, so there’s no lines for checkout or anything. That doesn’t work to use the gift card trick though.


  • Excluding variable energy pricing, it’s much more energy efficient to only heat and cool your home while you’re actually at home.

    Think of it like a tea kettle. It’s definitely not energy efficient to keep the water boiling for the hours when you’re not home just because you might want a cuppa when you get home. The only benefit keeping the water hot is to brew your next cup quicker. The water is cooling off at the same rate it would if the heater was off, but energy is being pumped into it to keep it hot and therefore it is constantly losing energy.

    This is also assuming your HVAC’s coefficient of performance is constant, which it’s not, but it still generally is way better to avoid heating and cooling while you’re away from home, especially if you live in an older less insulated home.

    If you do have variable energy pricing, that can change things, and that’s when a smart thermostat can really save you money. Instead of heating and cooling around your schedule, you do it around the pricing treating your house like a battery. See: https://youtu.be/0f9GpMWdvWI?si=LjiAjNf6t8cU8OZ2

    This video really only really works if your home is relatively well insulated (as he points out). If it’s not well insulated, you’ll be uncomfortable basically all the time.

    Generally if you’re on a variable rate it’s better to set the thermostat closer to the outside temperature when you’re gone for more than 5 hours. If you’re not on a variable rate, that break even point is like 30 minutes.



  • Toss your incandescent and fluorescent lights. Get LED bulbs (not smart lights, just white LEDs). Where applicable, install timer switches.

    It’s crazy how efficient LEDs are. They are a little bit more expensive but you’ll save it on your energy bill over time and you’ll have to replace them less.

    People also don’t realize how much of their energy bill is heat & air conditioning. If you don’t have pets, turn your heat off or way down while you’re at work. Just make sure it stays above freezing and above the dewpoint. If you can get any smart thermostat for cheap, they’ll save you a ton of money over the long run if you’re like me and constantly forget to set the temperature before you leave for work.

    Also, thick drapes work wonders at keeping the cold out of cheap windows. You can get them and the hardware to hang them pretty cheap from goodwill. You can also wrap them in Saran wrap if you really want to keep the cold out. They sell kits, but painters tape and a cling film are way cheaper if you can hide them behind some drapes.

    https://youtu.be/tbq6uZ9Y0nQ?si=m1Z9kp21PTQFhGnx


  • If you have a Sam’s or Costco in your area, you can get past the membership by using a gift card. You can also buy a gift card without a membership. Sometimes they’re sticklers about it if you’re there super early, because that’s apparently “special members hour” or some shit, but the worst that happens is they tell you to leave.

    If you can save up $15-20 for a 25lb sack of rice, it’ll last about 100-150 meals, which means it’s about 10-20¢ per meal. Just keep it in a plastic container to keep bugs out.

    Get some cheap frozen vegetables and bulk, dried beans and you can eat pretty good for like a dollar per day.

    Honestly it’s kinda cruel that buying in bulk saves a ton of money, but the people that need it most can’t afford to.


  • It’s irrelevant if it’s in the terms or not if Sony knows for a fact that most people will not check the terms. It doesn’t matter if people should read the terms, it doesn’t matter how the terms are specified. That information is buried in a 10,000 word contract no one is going to read (the PSN Store terms and conditions is actually about 10,000 words, over an hour to read)

    Customers could “buy” a product with the understanding that they owned the product in perpetuity. Sony then removed the product from the customer after the purchase without providing a refund.

    You’re not even trying to understand the opposing view, so I’m kinda done with this conversation.


  • The fact that it’s video or a game is irrelevant to the argument, but I have amended my comment.

    Second, I specifically said how they “understand the terms” because like .01% of customers read the terms and conditions before buying, even for super large purchases like cars and houses most people don’t read the entire contract. It’s a flaw in the legal system that allows companies to hide shady practices like what Sony is doing and force customers to just take it. Even if you read it, you’d need a law degree to properly understand what the document is conveying.

    Most people understand the process of buying media as “I give you money, you give me content” not “I give you money, you give me a license to watch the content” it’s not explicit about the lack of ownership. If someone asked you "what movies do you own, hopefully you’re not going to be a smart ass and say “technically production studios are the only ones who own movies anymore”

    You’re still jumping the moral argument and going straight to the legal one. I’m not arguing the legal one because it’s clear that privacy is not legal (by definition)

    However if you sell someone a movie and hide a clever contract (that you know for a fact the customer will not read) in the deal so that you can invalidate the content at any time you feel like it, Don’t expect me to cry you a river when your customer bypasses your asinine contract by making a local copy for personal use.

    If the terms are not explicitly explained in understandable language, then morally terms are non-existent and the deal should be revoked with both parties receiving their property back.