MoonMelon

u/MoonMelon@lemmy.ml
2 posts · 484 comments

Recent posts

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on We had it so good · c/Risa · 2 pts · 1d

Clencher of the holy ring of Betazed, holder of the Sacred Chalice of It Reeks.

on Hi :E · c/pareidolia · 1 pts · 7d

"Now repeat after me, 'Homosexuality is the best all-round cover an agent ever had.'"

I interacted with devs at several Zenimax studios and watching all the employees in other countries take long vacations, generous parental leave, etc. really threw into sharp relief how fucked the USA is. And Zenimax USA benefits were considered good by USA standards, but they were so obviously nothing compared to countries with worker protection enshrined in law. Surprise, despite all that time off, many of those international employees were still extremely valuable.

Across foreign and domestic employees, Id Software in particular seemed lean, talented, and just generally switched on. One of the best experiences of my career. Arkane Lyon, too. I was dumbfounded at the layoffs. It's like Microsoft excised the most creative and productive parts of the company on purpose.

on I Got You GTA 6 · c/lotrmemes · 18 pts · 13d

I gave up hope when Marc Laidlaw posted his story treatment years ago. It might come some day, but it will be something closer to a reboot or a remake, a totally new generation's take on an old franchise. Not saying that it will automatically be bad, it could be good, but it will also be different.

Damn, they still make them:

https://media.bradleycorp.com/mediamanager/view/6c6e6fba-4d8b-4df3-b88f-f2d1cce09626/3580_Shower-Design-Guide.pdf

Consult on privacy requirements with appropriate school representative prior to project starting. Gender differences may impact privacy needs — avoid providing too little, especially for girls. Properly positioned partitions add privacy within budget limitations

I had to use divider-less, communal showers in grade school before/after swimming. Not only was there no privacy but the showers were disgusting, and there were no showerheads so you got laserbeam'd by a high pressure, freezing icicle of water. Also you weren't in control of the water yourself. Everyone got in position and then stood there under the sword of Damocles waiting for the gym coach to turn some fucking valve in another room.

Many plants simply can't fix carbon in the extreme heat unless there's an abundance of water, the patterns of which are also changing. Some plants have evolved strategies to deal with this but most haven't had the need, including the trees of the boreal forest. Not only is that the largest land biome it's a shit ton of carbon, and shits on fire, yo.

These people pitching this never cared about truth. Pretty soon they'll hit the bedrock of "dying in the heat is noble" or some shit.

Next time they do damage less than $5000 (this threshold varies by location, so whatever it is), take them to small claims. It costs almost nothing to file and attorneys generally aren't allowed. If it's a bunch of retired folks someone will have the time to go down there. Even if you lose it will cost them a lot more than the damage.

You'll have to prove you tried contacting them normally and they ghosted you, so have a few emails or certified mail receipts.

Just got a $400 bill for the blood work for my yearly physical. Routine stuff, should be almost totally covered by my insurance (which isn't cheap). In the past, it has.

Naturally the bill is due within days of me receiving it, despite the visit being months ago. It just takes that long for anything to wind through the labyrinth-like entrails of coding, billing, and negotiation. Also I get the sense there's some high-pressure tactics here.

I waited until business hours then I spoke to an AI voice agent. These things now include small breathing sounds and "background noise" that sounds like they exist in a call center instead of the bowels of a data center that is deafening and poisoning everyone within a quarter mile. It still responds too quickly and too cheerfully to be human, though. This thing finally directs me to a person.

She sounds like she is in India. She also sounds terminally bored, which is good. That is the proper response and anything else puts me on guard. Turns out the bill was submitted with my middle initial, while the name on my insurance card is without my middle initial. This is a pretext, of course, the insurance company could easily make that connection (and hundreds of other services do). But they are hoping I would just pay the bill. She resubmits. Now I wait another two months for another bill, or perhaps nothing gets changed and the first bill is now overdue, with fines, or going to collections. Whatever.

What a fucking privilege to live in this system. I'm more insulted by how much of my doctor's time this wastes, since her time is so much more valuable than mine.

IMO it comes down to the actual clients and work. Like you said, there are legit reasons for digital forensics.

I assume in your country that there is some judicial process, including challenges and appeals, involved in searches and that those phones are allegedly being used in specific, articulated crimes. If that is the case then I think there's justification for trying to get into the phone. However if that judicial process is absent or a sham, there are no crimes being articulated beyond hand-waving like "terrorism" or "national security", or the entire apparatus is rotten to the core, then it becomes immoral.

I know people who have had similar jobs and when a bad job comes down they refuse. So far, they haven't been fired, but they were willing to be fired. If you were cracking the phones of child molesters and human traffickers then you're doing good work. If it's people protesting climate change you'd have an ethical duty to refuse, and be prepared to walk.

on KOReader · c/hackernews · 3 pts · 45d

I love it. I lost access to some old Amazon books when I went with a kobo and koreader + Calibre. Not because of the reader itself, but because decrypting DRM books with a Calibre plugin requires generating a key with some Adobe software (I don't remember what it's called) and that software is Windows only. I just "pirated" those books. I figured, fuck them, I already paid once.

Also using the koreader without an account required changing a field in a sqllite db on the device. It wasn't that big a deal, and I think there is a slicker way now, but it still shouldn't be necessary.

A shame it takes some hoops to just read books on e-ink in peace.