Usually, my own thoughts are the only ones that matter to me. The exception is the rare occasion when I actually create a post or comment asking a question. That’s when I want to know about what you think. Otherwise, buzz off.

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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 12th, 2023

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  • Arch because it’s rolling release and customizable. I was using Nobara until a couple of weeks ago and switched to Arch because Nobara is basically a tweaked Fedora. The switch had nothing to do with the RedHat thing. It had to do with Fedora’s phasing out of X. I don’t need X for very much, just actually one little game that doesn’t work on Wayland (yet). I think I’m sticking with Arch forever now that I’ve realized how nice it is to not have to upgrade from whatever version number to the next. Gamers who don’t want a lot of hassle and like out-of-the-box functionality should consider Nobara, though. I love it as much as I am enjoying Arch.




  • Well, I actually got going on installing it last night and I’ve been using it for several hours now. Xpadneo comes with the distro, but for me it’s been a bust, even after troubleshooting, just like what happened to me on Fedora, so no xbox controller over bluetooth. However, the other driver that comes with the kernel (xow) allows me to use it with a USB cable, which I couldn’t do on Fedora. So, I’m sticking with Nobara and I will just figure out the bluetooth problem or buy a dongle and see if that works. As for the rest, it is the best and easiest linux installation I have ever used and I have been using linux since 1999. The installer connects to wifi and updates the system as it’s installing. On first startup you get a welcome screen telling you what to do next (this, for me, included installing the NVIDIA drivers). Installing NVIDIA drivers for me was basically just clicking “OK” and letting it do its thing, something I’ve never seen before. All the games I’ve tried work great and the installer installs Steam and Lutris automatically. All the features of my laptop work out of the box, including battery conservation mode (specific to Lenovo). Only caveat: read the website carefully and make sure your system can handle Nobara because, contrary to other Linux distros, this one does not support older NVIDIA cards. If your card can handle the newest NVIDIA driver, then that’s good. If not, you won’t get much out of installing it. Another thing: you can use flatpak on Nobara, but the web site specifically tells you that you should not use flatpak for key packages: steam, lutris, gamescope, mangohud, obs-studio, blender. The Nobara repositories are fully integrated in the software store so for the rest you can pick and choose where you want your other software to come from. I’m impressed and I’m sticking with this distro. I love it.


  • I’m actually going to try Nobara one day when I’m bored and don’t have any place to be. This is mainly because it seems to promise that Xbox One wireless controllers work with it out of the box. On Fedora 38 I’m having a hard time and I actually prefer this controller. I have had to use a different one because I still haven’t figured out what I’m missing. *edit: just read the web site for Nobara and saw it includes driver support for Lenovo Legion computers! I’m totally doing this tomorrow on a lazy Sunday!




  • He didn’t want to buy the company. So, he’s turning it into a pet project. The end. The oxymoron here of this story: The winners of the 44 billion Musk payed for it probably don’t care that their creation is being run into the ground while the users of the platform are obviously in an uproar. In the end, the creators and founders, etc. did it for the money, not the cultural impact they would have on the world. Twitter’s former CEO has allowed himself to be interviewed from time to time to say what he thinks Musk is doing wrong, but he doesn’t seem to have any hurt feelings or express any kind of extreme regrets for the company being sold. From what I’ve seen in the news, he’s pretty dry. The drama comes from the user end. This tells me something about how, in the end, it’s just rich people doing business and doing as they please with what they please. It’s kind of sad. Like, let’s say I made something really cool with my own two hands and my creation got turned into something monstrous. I’d be upset. The people who made twitter are happy with their riches. In the end, the outrage and scandal is kind of pointless because it’s just a thing that makes more money for big business rich tech people and it always was just that.


  • Any kind of paying for this kind of junk, whether it’s prepay or not, is a waste of money and people should just stop doing it. There are far better things to do with money than to buy some digital thing-a-ma-bob that is useless and can disappear any old time at the whim of the web site owner. I mean, I could make the same argument about knickknacks, because they’re silly and collect dust. However, a web site can’t remove them from your house. So, even a knickknack that collects dust is a better purchase than digital coins and awards and all that other bullshit.



  • It’s hard for me to identify with them because it’s just not very smart to pay money for that kind of crap. I don’t buy stuff that can be taken away like that. It is true that nothing lasts forever, but digital doo-dads only last as long as the web site you bought them on. I hope they learned their lesson. I doubt they did. People pay for this stuff every day on web sites. Cosmetic stuff for avatars, special edition avatars, little award thingies, blah blah blah. It’s all a waste. It’s very easy for people to say, “eh, it’s only a dollar” or “eh, it’s only 50 cents” or “meh, it’s only 5 bucks” but if you repeatedly spend money on those things it adds up. So, do I feel bad for these outraged people? No, I don’t. They should smarten up and stop wasting money.



  • It makes no sense but it makes sense to the general public. When it ceases to make sense to the general public, it will be seen as you and I see it. I’m not holding my breath until the general public figures this out. You really can’t fix dumb and uneducated. It’s what politicians count on. Your dumb and uneducated vote manipulated by key terms thrown out there and reproduced in whatever media you like and is willing to send to you.



  • A lot of them also restrict content. There are disadvantages to joining smaller instances, depending on the philosophy of the person who runs the instance. There’s even an instance that does not allow communities to be created on its own instance. It will accept applications from people who wish to create one, but they mostly reject applications on their own whim. I think the future of Lemmy as a Reddit alternative will rely on larger, freer instances to be supported well so they have room for growth and change. I have my personal preferences. I don’t want content from exploding-heads, but I also want to see the content I want to see. Some smaller instances are restricting that content, almost seeming to be like cults in the making. There are small instances from which it is impossible to find and subscribe to communities from lemmy.world. You have to search for them on a larger instance, then copy and paste in the address bar in your browser. I imagine on a dedicated phone app that would not be possible. So, you can advocate for “spreading out” all you want. In the end, if the goal is to have a strong alternative to Reddit, spreading out is kind of pointless for a lot of users.


  • I’m almost 48. My profession: foreign languages and literature. I have had a computer since I was 7 years old. I know how to use Linux and I have played video games all my life. I know a little code. I’m good with computers. A lot of people my age in my profession are not all that good with computers. They think they are because they can make a PowerPoint presentation or took a class on how to use a spread sheet as a grade book. So, I don’t know, I don’t think everyone on here are older tech nerds, so it’s not exclusive to them. They could be the majority, though. Am I a nerd? Yes. But a different type of nerd. I speak three languages and read six. I can diagram a sentence and correct peoples’ grammar and vocabulary in my sleep. I know all about literature from the 16th and 17th centuries. I play video games and I like technology enough, but it does not consume my life. Are there lots of people on here like me? I don’t know. I DO know that I’ve interacted with a lot of younger people on here. To understand how to use this new type of social media you have to understand technology pretty well. It isn’t for people who just want to tap or click on stuff that “just works.” You need a basic understanding of how decentralized social networks function to be able to navigate it and you have to have patience with things that might slow down or do strange things every once in a while. There are lots of people my age that would not have the patience to learn how to use this space on the internet. In a lot of ways, they are very similar to the stereotypes of “average twenty-somethings” I’ve seen mentioned in this thread. No worries about privacy. In some cases, perfectly happy with their privacy being invaded because they want to see ads related to products they would buy. I also enjoy shopping. It’s fun. I don’t like ads, though.


  • It’s just the way federations work. I think a lot of people are worried because it’s a new type of social media with a different structure. You don’t have to rely on one place anymore to socialize online, you can pick and choose what you want to connect to. If you don’t like one style, you can pick another style. The thing that worries me is whether or not there different styles will continue to exist or if one entity will monopolize everything. The nice thing is that most modern democratic countries have laws about monopolies and they do in fact work. Several monopolies have been avoided or eliminated in the past.



  • I think defederating from them is a no-brainer for the fediverse, but who am I? Just a user of the fediverse. I do not own an instance. I choose the fediverse over meta and its facebook crap, so for me it’s a no-brainer. For owners of instances, maybe it isn’t such an easy decision. It costs money to run an instance, for example. Federating with the Facebook corporate goons at first will seem useful to some instances, especially the big ones that want to stay big and general. When the big and general ones that fall for Meta’s scheme to take control of things, the smaller instances on the fediverse that chose to defederate will be there to join.