First thing? Probably panic. Second thing? Probably try to wake myself up. Third thing? Probably try to find some rational way that I just got isekai’ed as a billionaire.

After it finally sank in, I’d probably consider lobbying for things before I lose touch with where I used to be. Right to repair, universal healthcare, UBI, etc…

Yes, it includes things like a TOTP manager, text file storage, family sharing, etc… Nothing super groundbreaking, but it’s some quality of life stuff that plenty of people have been happy to pay less than a dollar per month for.

Pretty much this. Cloud storage isn’t perfect, but it sure does make proper 3-2-1 backup hygiene easier. 3 backups, on 2 different mediums, 1 of them off site. Cloud storage accomplishes both the 2 and 1, because it is both a different medium and off site.

The fact that you can automatically sync remotely is a big bonus too, because off-site backups historically have a problem where they fall out of date without active attention. For instance, if you have a tape backup system stored in a warehouse across town, those tapes are only as up-to-date as the last time you took the time to drive across town and update them. But with cloud storage, you can automatically sync your folders to keep things up to date in near real time. Plus, your traditional off-site backup is only as secured from things like natural disasters if you’re willing to travel fairly long distances to make them. Those tapes in a warehouse across town won’t survive if the entire town is hit by a natural disaster like a wildfire or flood.

For instance, maybe I make an update on my laptop, and then want to access it on my phone. Even with SyncThing, my laptop and phone won’t sync with each other unless they’re able to find each other on the same network. If I’m not on a trusted network at the time, (e.g. I’m at work on my employer’s WiFi, or traveling and using hotel WiFi) that makes syncing difficult. But with cloud storage, they can both essentially use that as a relay. My laptop updates the cloud, and then my phone pulls that update. Now both devices are up-to-date without actually needing to discover each other on a trusted network.

Yeah, it actually gives me an idea for a stamp… Sort of like those “where is George” stamps that people put on $1 bills.

Believe it or not, there were actually several notable “Jews for Hitler” types of movements in Germany. They were conservative Jews who supported Hitler’s conservative views more than they feared his antisemitism. They hand-waved away the antisemitism, believing that it was over-exaggerated to garner votes.

People are dumb, and many will naturally want to believe that persecution is something that happens to immoral people. If someone is being persecuted, it’s obviously because they did something to deserve it. It can’t happen to me, because I am moral and have done nothing to deserve it! Because if I accept that persecution can happen to moral people, then that would conflict with my established worldview that the world is inherently just. I am successful, and therefore I am just. And unjust things don’t happen to just people. Because accepting that the world is unjust means accepting that things like disasters, disabilities, diseases, and systemic persecution could happen to me. And that is scary, so I choose to reject that possibility and insist that the world is inherently just!

Yeah. That really jumped out at me. My very first thought was “Americans have privacy protections?”

$3M to a single person. The real headline should be that this opens the door for hundreds of thousands of similar lawsuits, which will use this case as precedent.

FUCK CLASS ACTIONS! Those are made to cater to the defendant, by consolidating a ton of independent lawsuits into a single one. It only makes the defendant’s job easier, while the individuals who were directly affected get pennies. Sue them directly, and make them defend every. Single. Individual. Case. You want to really make them hurt? The best way to do that is with a million individual lawsuits, not one big lawsuit.

Yeah, a “torrented” cassette? That’s called bootlegging or ripping, depending on how you recorded it onto the cassette.

Bootlegging is setting the recorder up against the radio and hoping your parents/siblings stayed quiet long enough for you to record the whole song. Or maybe you simply abandoned the idea of getting a clean bootleg, and recorded a mixtape where you added your own commentary/sang along/etc.

Ripping was running the audio signal directly from the radio into a cassette recorder, bypassing the whole “room noise” issue entirely.

Of course, every radio recording (regardless of whether it was bootlegged or ripped) would always have a few seconds of the goddamned DJ talking over the beginning/end of the track.

And CD piracy was a big deal back when consumer-grade CD burners first hit the market. I remember my dad checking CD albums out at the library and using his dedicated burning setup to copy the albums. He built an entire desktop with the express purpose of ripping CDs for himself and his friends. It had one CD drive, and like five or six burner drives right below it. So he could make five or six copies at the same time. He’d keep two copies (one for the house, one for his truck) and then the rest would get passed around to his friends. He even made custom CD labels with printable CD-shaped adhesive stickers, so he could peel the album art off of the page and stick it directly to the CD. He had a template saved that let him print out like four labels at once.

It really depends on what you’re planning on using it for. If you’re going strictly for accuracy, (and by that, I simply mean that the sound waves being produced by the headphones are as close as possible to the electrical signals being sent from your computer), I would suggest splitting your mic and headphones apart into two different devices. It’s worth noting that lots of users don’t actually want accuracy from their headphones. That’s why the debate is such a personal thing. Lots of gaming headsets will be decent enough for gaming… But that’s largely due to convenience (having a mic built into the headset makes playing with friends easy) and it severely limits your options in regards to audio accuracy. Most gaming headsets will be tuned for what companies think the average gamer wants, not what is accurate. Going from a set of gaming cans to a nice set of reference headphones will likely feel like they have less “punch” in the bass, (most gaming headsets are tuned to be very bass heavy) but you’ll likely notice more clarity in the mids and highs.

The best accuracy is generally going to come from something like a set of studio monitor headphones. Something like the Audio Technica ATH M or ATH R series, or the Beyer Dynamics DT990 Pros will be solid and have good audio quality. Some companies (like the Beyer Dynamics I mentioned) even use easily replaceable head/ear cushions, which can help move them from “buying for my current setup” to “buying for life” status.

For monitor headphones, they’re basically split into two different types - Closed, and open backed. Closed back is what you’re probably used to, with the solid ear cups. Open backed are going to have an open/mesh cup instead. The point of an open-backed headphone is that it more naturally emulates a live listening experience where you’re hearing a performance in a room, not just hearing a speaker recreating those sounds. If you can tolerate room noise, (or at least have your desk set up in a quiet area), an open backed pair will likely be more appealing. They’ll also likely be more comfortable for long-term wear, as they won’t trap as much heat and moisture.

If you’re really considering a pair of monitor headphones, you’ll likely want an amp to go along with it. Your computer’s output will likely be underpowered for driving the bigger cones in a pair of decent headphones. Your computer’s output may be audible without an amp, but it likely won’t be very loud. And you’ll likely miss lots of the lower end, as the bigger cones take more voltage to move. Headphones are rated in ohms, and a higher rating means it takes more power to get the same volume level. There are plenty of audiophiles who will argue about which headphone and amp combos are the best, but it likely won’t make a huge difference for the average user. A basic amp rated at (or at least near) whatever your headphone’s ohm rating is will likely be fine.

Monitor headphones won’t have a lot of the bells and whistles that you’d expect from a gaming headset, like an included mic, surround sound, noise canceling, etc… They do one thing, and one thing only: Make noise as accurately as possible. The expectation is that you’re going to be using them in a treated room meant for monitoring audio. For example, in a recording studio. So they ditch things like noise cancellation, because they expect you’ll have that built directly into your infrastructure instead. They won’t have an included mic, because they assume you’ll have a dedicated talkback system. They won’t have surround sound (unless you’re specifically using a pair made for mixing surround sound) because music is typically mixed in stereo.

In regards to a mic, I’m going to say something potentially controversial: You probably don’t need a nice one. Believe it or not, most gaming headsets have good enough mics for the average user. A basic dynamic mic on a boom arm will likely be fine. There’s nothing wrong with something like a Shure SM58S, except for the fact that you’ll need an audio interface (like a Scarlet 2i2) to plug it in. But if you’re already in the market for a headphone amp, you can probably just get an interface that does both. Unless you’re streaming for a living and the quality of your vocal input really matters, you can use a basic USB mic or whatever cheap dynamic mic floats your boat. Your friends on Discord won’t notice the difference between a $50 USB mic and a $2500 condenser mic.

Personally? I do enough audio at work. I don’t want to think about it at home. I use a Corsair gaming headset when I want a mic+surround sound, or Sennheiser HD 280 Pros (or my IEMs, if I’m feeling fancy) for listening to music. They’re comfortable enough for daily use, and I honestly couldn’t be bothered to set up a bunch of audio gear at home. My desk setup is already complicated enough as it is; I don’t need to complicate it even more with an audio interface or mic boom just to enjoy playing my games. Audio gear is a world of diminishing returns, where going from “bad” to “good” is usually pretty easy, but going from “good” to “great” quickly gets expensive, and you start stumbling across all of that snake oil I originally mentioned. Personally, at my own desk, I’m fine with just “good enough” quality gear. If I want to mess around with the really nice stuff, I’ll do it at work where the employer is footing the bill.

This was basically the concept behind Cost Plus Drugs. Mark Cuban realized he could sell generic drugs at a basic 15% markup and $10 pharmacy+shipping, and drastically undercut the competition. Their drug prices literally list the breakdown of manufacturing cost, 15% markup, $5 pharmacy labor, and the $5 shipping on each page.

He has been blunt that the business isn’t really about lowering drug prices. That is certainly a bonus, but he’s not doing it to be magnanimous. He simply realized that the markup on drug prices was so mind-bogglingly absurd (oftentimes over 2500% markup) that he could undercut the market by thousands of dollars and still make a tidy 15% profit.

Patient drug prices in the US are insane, and he is simply exploiting that fact to undercut everyone else on the market.

That’s a shame, because KH2 is pretty widely regarded as the best in the series. If you stopped with Chain of Memories, I wouldn’t blame you. The gameplay for that one is definitely… Uhh… Divisive. But KH2 was when the series really hit its stride.

It’s the author’s profile picture. Not sure why the article chose that as the thumbnail, but it definitely got a chuckle from me.

This somehow answers very few of my questions, and raises a lot more.

Fair warning, Bowflex dumbbells are under an active recall. You should check and see which model you have.

There’s a weird phenomenon where subs get homogenized and less accurate as they get popular. It’s because posts and comments are ranked by user votes, not accuracy. So as subs get popular, pandering to the average user works more and more.

I work in professional audio, and there is a lot of misinformation, disinformation, and snake oil in the audiophile world. And I was fairly active on a few audio related subs back when they were niche. But as they grew, the snake oil inevitably ended up at the top of the comments more frequently.

It’s because someone peddling snake oil can get upvoted by the masses if they make it sound believable, and stroke the average reader’s ego just a little bit. If a situation requires in-depth technical knowledge about how something works, that post likely won’t appeal to the average user on a popular sub. But someone offering snake oil in an easily digestible format will get upvoted just because the masses believe it.

Let’s say someone posts a troubleshooting question on a technical topic. The problem isn’t something the average user would encounter, and just using surface-level knowledge will get you nowhere. Now let’s say there are two answers: One is correct, but highly technical. It flies over the average user’s head. The other is incorrect, but is presented in a way that the average user feels like they learned something from it. On a niche sub, the first answer (correct) would be upvoted. On a popular sub, the second (incorrect) would be upvoted.

People want to feel smart, not be smart. If you’re reading a highly technical post that you don’t understand, you don’t feel smart. Because if it’s too technical, it’s all just going right over your head. And that doesn’t feel good. But if someone posts something that seems technical but is really just surface-level stuff that anyone can understand, it will get upvoted by the average user. On a niche sub, there are enough experts to bury the incorrect/surface-level posts. But on a popular sub, those experts get buried by the masses.

Weird how every time Trump says that he’s in secret talks with someone, the other party denies it. It’s like everyone is lying all the time, or just one person is lying all the time.

“Lawyers Press Conference at Four Seasons, Philadelphia. 11:00 A.M.”
He says things, and expects people to just go along with it because they want the clout. And his narcissism refuses to let him accept that his name isn’t worth any clout anymore.

And yet he is in possession of those paper ballots. So he can do plenty of nefarious things with them, and then claim that the official count is wrong. And it won’t matter if he’s obviously lying, because ~30% of the country will believe him. And that 30% votes more consistently than any other demographic, so they’ll be over-represented.

Yeah, Japan was actually surprised when American game devs started using X for confirm. They never even anticipated that it would happen, because the X/O symbolism is so heavily engrained in their society that it was glaringly obvious to them that O was confirm. Their original intent was always to use the Nintendo layout for confirm/cancel, but then western devs misunderstood the buttons and swapped them.

To them, an O is like a checkmark or thumbs up emoji. Imagine if an American console maker developed a console with a thumbs up button, and Asian devs started using the thumbs up button as Cancel. You’d probably be pretty fucking confused too.

Out of curiosity, how does it compare to EmuDeck? I haven’t personally used RetroDeck, so I was wondering if it had anything that would make me switch from EmuDeck.