Gemini* and Gopher

• Personal/Opinions

  • Tarrifs [sic] and luxuries

    I’ve been exposed to a lot of liberal discourse about tarrifs [sic] lately. Without getting into a whole digression about nations and borders, I want to articulate more specific points of disagreement with some of the (often implicit) arguments I’ve seen: [...]

    Many folks seem unable to conceive of a life where they consume less while not living under conditions of miserable austerity. This ideological blind spot is going to wind up thrusting us all into miserable austerity.

    I would much rather spend half as much time engaged in compulsory labor than drive a fancier fucking car, or spend a couple years on sabbatical — so that I could meander around the globe — than take more frequent jet trips to some resort (where poor people wait on me). Wouldn’t you? If not, I hope you can at least see that nearly everyone benefits if we’re given these options.

  • don't panic until it's time to panic

    the project i'd been working for was paused, but i was able to bounce back onto another job. thankfully. don't know when the project will be un-paused, but hopefully it'll be soon.

    the world feels dreary, but i've got a date tomorrow, i've got friends to hang out with, my grandmother gave me some mangos and i'll start work next week. sometimes, you just have to take it one day at a time.

  • LQ’s account of the end

• Science

  • News and Links Digest

• Technology and Free Software

  • Internet/Gemini

    • IndieWeb Carnival April 2025: (book) renewal

      The post at the link talks about spring as a time of renewal. As a librarian, though, the word "renewal" immediately makes me think about book renewals. The thing where you haven't finished reading a book yet (or maybe haven't even started), but said book is about to be overdue, so you re-borrow it for another term.

      I love when students renew books. It tells me that they haven't given up on reading this book. Maybe they haven't finished; maybe they haven't even started, but they're still sufficiently interested to give themselves that additional three-week chance. I dig that. Read on, you crazy diamonds!

      I have the opposite problem (if it is a problem): As the person responsible for acquisitions around here and also a professional reviewer, I read 2-3 books per week on average.

    • Tinylog RFC update - call for contribution

      Edit: I did a mistake and instead of creating a merge request, I actually already pushed the new commit… I’ve linked the diff anyway and depending on the discussion I may revert some of it… But it does mean that there is no merge request to say to comment, instead, I’ve created an issue on codeberg for discussion.

    • Focus, the Web and Gemini

      Imagine the following: You're trying to find a specific information. And of course you start searching for it on the internet. It is convenient, quick, and can be done whenever, wherever you are. Nobody wants to spend their time looking through dozens of books, just to find out the local library doesn't have what you need today.

      The Experience

      You open Google, enter your search query, and boom, there you have it: Your information. Well, almost...

      Between your search query and the information you are looking for is a long way: Bad or incomplete information, subjective opinions without any base, an ad for a mysterious health trick that doctors hate, even more ads for things you've already acquired and last but not least a funny cat meme that tricks you into a doom scrolling session.

      And while you are trying to find out if there is any useful information in between all this junk on the website you are currently looking at, you are interrupted again by some sketchy pop-ups.

      I guess you know what I am talking about: The pain of filtering out all of these things you didn't ask for in the first place.