The TT creator, John Aravosis, said recently on his show that it took TT 3 days to figure out he is gay and he said he never interacted with it in any way that would convey that. On the other hand, it kept giving me animal snuff that utterly revulsed me, despite my reporting it, thumbs downing.
I deleted my account about a year ago. Although I loved a lot of content and was awed by the work of many creators, I got this weird anxiety when I had been scrolling for, say, an hour. It was like my brain was giving me a warning sign, though my consciousness did not perceive it. I came to a personal decision, unscientifically, and without any jingoism or conspiracies, that short-form scrolling is bad for my health.
A couple of weeks ago I signed up for Loops (the fediverse version of TT) and I scrolled a few videos. I had such a strong negative feeling that I closed it and uninstalled. I am so happy YouTube Shorts is so shit, because I watch one or two that catch my eye, then go back to the longer videos.
Afaict TT only cares about dwell time and maybe if you comment or something. These dislike buttons do nothing. In fact, since they increase dwell time using them makes it more likely for such content to reappear in your feed than if you simply scrolled.
When Zuck said on Jan 7th, 2025, that he wants to work with President Trump to oppose states threatening free speech, he wasn't talking about China. It was 100% the EU and its regulations. The quid pro quo starts to emerge.
When I was just starting my career around the late 1980s, I wrote a program on the Psion for a chain store in the UK that had 21 stores. Basically a person would walk the aisles and enter the stock codes and quantities. When they were done they would plug the device into a serial device. I wrote this other program in MS Basic (DOS) that dialed up all these Psions and downloaded the orders into an IBM S/38 Order and Inventory management system. I thought I was the dog's. I loved those devices.
It is poorly written, with some atrocious dialog. I watched it all because the story intrigued me, but all I kept thinking was, "The last season of GoT was shit for THIS?"
I always tell my gun-hoarding, go-box toting, bug-out planning prepper friends the same thing. You don't have enough guns and ammo to stop the masses coming for your canned pork'n'beans.
Is that true? I mean, I figure worst case, small rural midwest communities that band together and shoot trespassers on site will be the best off.
I guess an army of thousands could take it over but my hope is that me and my gun toting farming community won't put up with invaders and invaders won't want to take their chances
On the other hand, on a country level, countries generally do have enough guns and ammo to greatly limit any chaos coming over their border; uncontrolled immigration happens not because countries can't control it but because they effectively choose not to.
I wonder how long that strategy will work. Eventually society will reach a new "equilibrium" but how many less defended societies will succumb to the starving hordes before that happens.
I quote "equilibrium" because social structures never stop changing. What I mean is a relatively stable situation where most of the world is not invading the rest of the world. Our present situation is that the larger portion of the population is not invading the rest, though the present trend seems to be in the wrong direction.
I have been confused by Quantum Computing and have been reading and watching as much as possible on the topic. I can never seem to grasp the potential. I keep thinking about classical problems. Like what if I multiply a real number by a number consisting of qbits? Or what happens to bitwise operations with qbits?
Then, something I read to the effect that we need to stop thinking of QC as solving classical problems but solving different problems at least reassured me I wasn't too dumb to get it.
From what I understand, there is at least one problem that is basically impossible to solve (in a useful amount of time) on classical computers, but theoretically solvable on a quantum computer (in a useful amount of time). That problem is breaking modern asymmetric encryption with shores algorithm. So there is at least that one concrete problem they can (theoretically) solve.
The biggest application of quantum computers is simulating quantum processes - so physical and chemical simulations. Simulating superposition and entanglement on a classical computer is extremely demanding, on a QC it comes naturally.
It most probably will never replace classical computers.
I have always felt that the problem with the plastic recycling is that there is a lack of an economy. If you sell a yogurt for $1.99 I don’t care about what happens to the container, I t’s hardly surprising that most of it ends up overseas, in the ocean or a landfill. If the state levied a tax on the container, manufacturers would be motivated to gain a competitive advantage and use something exempt from the tax. Recyclers, who might want to taste of that tax money, could invest in better technologies for handling the material. In fact, you enable capitalistic forces to solve a problem. It’s only cheap to use virgin plastic because the manufacturer is absolved of cost of dealing with the waste.
For my own part, I have started to throw all my plastic in the garbage. It feels better to know it goes in the landfill versus the great Pacific garbage patch.
I deleted my account about a year ago. Although I loved a lot of content and was awed by the work of many creators, I got this weird anxiety when I had been scrolling for, say, an hour. It was like my brain was giving me a warning sign, though my consciousness did not perceive it. I came to a personal decision, unscientifically, and without any jingoism or conspiracies, that short-form scrolling is bad for my health.
A couple of weeks ago I signed up for Loops (the fediverse version of TT) and I scrolled a few videos. I had such a strong negative feeling that I closed it and uninstalled. I am so happy YouTube Shorts is so shit, because I watch one or two that catch my eye, then go back to the longer videos.