Bonum Certa Men Certa

Gemini Links 17/09/2023: PineTime Six Months Later and Sympathy for the Copyright Devil



  • Gemini* and Gopher

    • Personal/Opinions

      • The term is almost here

        Ten days till my first full-time faculty term starts.

        I'm not going to lie I'm scared shitless that I'm going to fuck all of this up.

        I mean that's a normal feeling, right, when you've got a new job that's potentially a Big Career, right?

        Like I can get tenure in just a couple of years if I'm not terribly bad at my job, at which point I'm going to have stability for the first time, well, ever.

      • September 16: Fall

        Tastes of fall: orange custardy persimmons, sweet slick muscadine grapes plucked from among pine needles where they fell in the Georgia hills, rich meaty pecans from my aunt's house in the North Carolina piedmont. Soon persimmons will fall here, too, in Kentucky.

        Sound of fall: rain that fell in puffs of cool in Georgia, rain falling steady outside my window.

        Turkeys are getting bigger and bolder. On a social ride last week I spotted four of them by the unfinished bypass road, still used only by bicycles. I thought they were deer in tall grass til we got closer.

      • 7 🔤SpellBinding: ACDFHUN Wordo: TEMPI
    • Games

      • Rules-light, prep-heavy

        Often we see rules-light RPGs (like Fudge, Risus, the Window, Everway, or Cthulhu Dark) coupled with an improv-heavy, “hold your ideas loosely”, “build on your players ideas” super quantum-y GMing style.

      • How to Shuffle a Gamebook

        Most people say CYOA when they mean gamebook. Some say solo adventures (hello fans of Tunnels & Trolls). Swedes call them soloäventyr. Numbered sections that you read and then follow references to other sections. A game in the shape of a book. If they are digital only they are often referred to as choice-based interactive fiction (hello Twine fans) and usually do away with the section numbers.

      • Thank you, Wizardry

        I didn’t know there was a remake, so thank you for both the posts on the original and for letting us know about the new one.

        I never got very far in these games (I’m like three floors into a game inspired by it, The Dark Spire, but my DS is broken) but they’ve had a huge impact on tabletop RPGs.

        D&D 5e’s spell casting system goes away from the Dying Earth “vancian” mechanics and instead uses a system 100 isomorphic with Wizardry’s spell points, confusingly renamed “spell slots”. Maybe the exact distribution of slots per level is changed but it’s the same mechanic where the different point levels aren’t exactly interchangable—wizards can’t use two level 1 slots to make one level 2 slot.

    • The States

      • The Land of the Free, the Home of the Brave

        I am now back in The States, for the first time in three years. It is currently 42 minutes past 1 in the morning and I woke up a little over an hour ago. I see lights slowing blinking on top of the tall buildings in the distance, and the city is silent.

        The flight was very unpleasant, for reasons I will explain another time.

    • Technology and Free Software

      • PineTime Six Months Later

        Figured I'd write a quick update about my PineTime since I still refer people to my older posts about it and there are some things that have changed since then.



        [...]

        At first I was worried that getting phone notifications on my wrist would be a distraction, but over time I've actually noticed that it helps me get distracted by my phone less often. A quick glance at my wrist is all it takes to see if a notification is worth unlocking my phone for. When it isn't, it saves me a phone unlock and the potential to get distracted by something I see on it.

        [...]

        I've been wearing my PineTime every day since I got it over six months ago. It's a really neat gadget that's frankly a steal at the price it's sold at. The fact that it's open source and so easy to tinker on is just a cherry on top.
      • Sympathy for the Copyright Devil

        Someone replied railing against the movement (or “brigade”) of artists opposed to ML art, as if they were the only problem, ignoring both the two problems I had just brought up, so I elaborated and it got a li’l long:

        As a writer and painter, I’ve long been opposed to copyright and have been releasing stuff under Creative Commons licenses for over a decade. So don’t misinterpret me as agreeing with the brigade.

        Livelyhood for artists is important but so is a livelyhood for everyone, and I’ve been arguing against the flawed “copyright is good for artists” position for decades—we’ve been having this exact same fight against copyright since Napster or even the cassette era. Gates’ infamous “Open letter to hobbyists” was in 1976, and that hasn’t changed.

      • Hardware accelerated playback on PineTab 2 (RK3566)

        Want to quickly document how I got my PineTab 2 to play 1080p videos smooth(-ish) with hardware acceleration.

        Enabling hardware acceleration


        With the defaul DanctNIX image, it was quite easy. Simply install `mpv` and ` ffmpeg-v4l2-request-git` from the AUR. Then, pass pass `--hwdec=drm` to `mpv` and you're good to go. This will replace replace the system's `ffmpeg` with your custom build. If you run into ABI issues (random crashes), you can try building MPV from source.

      • Programming

        • Consistent Handling of Git Repositories With Different Default Branches

          Typically, I develop on a feature branch, and when the feature is ready, there is an obvious branch into which I want to merge the branch. This branch is often called `master',`main' or `develop'. During development, I will occasionally rebase my feature branch on top of this branch, to reduce future merge conflicts, and to avoid falling behind on changes merged by other developers. I will call this branch the default branch from here on.

          To make common operations consistent across repositories, I want to use a `git default-branch' command that returns the name of the default branch, so that I can use commands like


* Gemini (Primer) links can be opened using Gemini software. It's like the World Wide Web but a lot lighter.



Recent Techrights' Posts

Linux is Already Dominant (Android), Let's Make GNU/Linux Dominant in Desktops/Laptops as Well
"Dr. Stallman recently warned everybody about Microsoft."
 
Say the Truth, the Rest Will Follow
There's no guarantee that writing the truth will result in an audience (or readership), but over time - in the long run - people generally gravitate towards what they know or feel to be crude truth, not just what's comforting (albeit false or self-deluding, usually groupthink dictated from above)
How to Expose High-Level Corruption Without Getting in (Too Much) Trouble
Democracy depends on free press and freedom of the press depends on being able to safely publish (and keep available) material that bad people don't want to be known to anybody
In-Depth EPO Coverage at Techrights Turns Eleven
11 years is a very long time
Windows Measured Below 10% in Afghanistan, GNU/Linux Gaining a Lot
about 80% are Android (Linux) users, compared to only about 10% for Windows
Poland's Political Predicament and Social Control Media
Democracy and fake "tech" don't mix well; the latter tends to interfere with the former and that's why we get more "Putins" out there
EPO: Taking Away From the Staff to Give More to the Rich
The Central Staff Committee (CSC) wrote to EPO staff earlier this week
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, June 03, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, June 03, 2025
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part I: It's a Lot Like the EPO
we can commence a series soon
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Inescapable Questions and Quitting All "Oligarch Tech"
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Linux FUD From Slopfarms, Blaming Linux for Microsoft Issues; Even WebProNews Has Become a Slopfarm (Googlebombing "Linux" With Slop Images and Fake/Plagiarised Text)
The Web is really getting bad; it's also overwhelmed by fake material or plagiarised material, wherein the plagiarism gets disguised/hidden by LLM sausage factories
Links 03/06/2025: Tiananmen Square Massacre Censorship and Growing Military Activities Around Taiwan
Links for the day
The Loyalty to Microsoft and the Salaries From Microsoft (Funding SLAPPs Against Techrights and Tux Machines)
Garrett always knows better. He knows everything best.
Windows Falls in Italy as GNU/Linux Jumps to 5%
Italy knows a thing or two about digital autonomy
Nigeria is All Android and Google
Windows down to almost nothing in Africa's largest population
Mass Layoffs at Microsoft (Second Wave) Not Limited to Redmond
"More layoffs at Microsoft as axe falls in Washington and California"
Gemini Links 03/06/2025: Forth System and "Common Lisp is a Dumpster"
Links for the day
The Leaks Were Right: Mass Layoffs at Microsoft in May, Then Another Wave in June
Just as we've been saying for over a month
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, June 02, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, June 02, 2025
Last Article From Australia's Sam Varghese Was a Year Ago and It Covered the Release of Julian Assange, Who Will Apparently Come Back as 'Politician'
It'll soon be exactly 12 months
Hungary Seems Hungry for Linux
Windows down by a lot
Like in Europe, Bad News for Microsoft in US and Canada
If it loses those "regions", then what's left?
About 8 Waves of Mass Layoffs at Microsoft in 2025 (in Less Than 5 Months), Now Vista 11 "Market Share" Decreases
Really bad news for shareholders of Microsoft
statCounter Sees Bing "Share" Falling Over 0.5% in One Month, Now Lower Than Before the ChatGPT/Bing Chat Hype
Bing has been part of the mass layoffs for quite some time
After Microsoft's Bankruptcy in Russia Android (Linux) Will Dominate Asia Completely
Windows probably peaked in "XP" or "2000"
Microsoft's Demise is a Global Phenomenon
mass layoffs justified using mindless buzzwords
All-Time Highs for GNU/Linux in EU and the UK, All-Time Lows for Microsoft
Combining ChromeOS and GNU/Linux, it adds up to and almost reaches 6%
India: Windows Falls to 50% in Desktops/Laptops and 8% Overall
laptops/desktops fell to 16% of the whole
statCounter: GNU/Linux Up to 4.7% "Market Share" This Month
30,000 Microsoft jobs may be eliminated by year's end
Microsoft is in Trouble and Microsofters Know It
"I've been happy on Win 3.11 for years."
[Video] New Introduction to Richard Stallman's Contributions Including GNU Emacs, GNU/Linux, and Software Freedom
from the channel previously bullied for supporting RMS
Links 02/06/2025: South Korea to Vote, Russia Blitzed From Within
Links for the day
Links 02/06/2025: Political Leftovers, DRM, and Patents
Links for the day
Links 02/06/2025: Microsoft Spins Layoffs as "Slop", Frontier Settles Lawsuit
Links for the day
When You Publicly Boast About Wanting to Violently Attack People (Even Colleagues) Finding a Job Will Prove Difficult
there's a lesson to be learned here
The Web We Lost, the Information Lost Due to Microsoft's Attacks on Companies Like Yahoo! (Before the LLM Slop Frenzy)
When it comes to news sites, what can we say?
Covering Corruption in Poland, Including a War on Science (Due to Bad Politicians)
What we're about to show is that skilled and experienced scientists in Poland are besieged by bureaucrats
Gemini Links 02/06/2025: "Star Wars Day" and "Security Day"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, June 01, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, June 01, 2025