Ubuntu had a thing for a while where they would send you a CD if you asked for it. Friend of mine from school gave me one.

I appreciate them trying to set expectations. But then I also think a statement like this throws fuel on the fire, making more people want to scalp it.

Nice! I’ve been hopeful about this one since I saw that first trailer, glad to see it being generally well received.

Mastodon, but I’ve largely dropped it for Bluesky. I’m no purist about full decentralization, and I think it’s enough that the latter both has users, and isn’t currently awful.

I’ve used Bookwyrm a bit. I kinda like it. But it had some UX issues imo, and didn’t keep me hooked.

Also tried Pixelfed. It’s pretty slick, but I just can’t see the point. Like Instagram, seeing a feed of just pictures wasn’t all that interesting to me… though I probably just haven’t followed the right accounts.

Even after reading the article, I still struggle a bit to understand what they mean by “go the way of newspapers”.

In my mind, traditional cable or antenna television has already gone the way of newspapers - still around and used by many people, but largely a memory supplanted by online stuff.

They talk all about how ad spendng may go down, and this is Yahoo Finance, so I guess they mean that TV companies/studios/whatever will not be a very profitable investment option and many may close?

I had bats a couple years ago too. Was near mating season when we realized, so had to move fast. Found out because we’d hear them flying around inside the walls upstairs.

We had to get one way doors installed as well, though ours were temporary and they just did their best to seal up the roof areas where they got in. Came back a while later to make sure all the bats were gone and clean out guano.

すみません！

Japanese. I’m still trying to just attach a general meaning to each (common) Kanji, so when I see it I think “oh, there’s the character for [whatever]”. It’s only a start - still then have to learn actual words and pronunciations and all, but I feel like it’s a step worth taking.

Each time the card comes up with the keyword, I write down the charcter. Being able to write from memory really helps me with recognition. Since I’ve been out with no pen or pad, I’ve just been tracing the characters with my finger on my other hand or leg - gotta stay flexible!

Mainly focused on those flashcards (in Kanji Kohii web app), but I also have Anki decks and cards in jpdb with vocab.

For all the tough parts of Japanese, at least I don’t have to worry about declension

Was on vacation most of the week, but I still kept up in flashcards. Didn’t add any new ones, so it was nice to get the number of daily reviews down a bit.

Also had time to enjoy some relaxing reading practice.

It’s zero effort to turn on the signal. I say do it every time you’re planning to turn or merge. Why not?

I guess sometimes if I’m behind a bunch of cars in a turn lane, I’ll wait until I’m up near the front and about to actually turn.

Far from perfect, but I think it’s good to have a layer that very visibly shows ‘yes, this is the account you want’.

Domains are a worthwhile addition, but they run into almost the same problem as usernames and handles. Can be made misleading easily - sure, I could often go to the web address and verify it (if they don’t put up a convincing fake site), but that’s much lower visibilty.

Eg, you can probably register nintendo@nintendoamerico.com or similar and get it by some folks just as easily as registering the Twitter handle. There’s a payment step to get the domain, but that’s about it.

The centralization problem you mention is a good point though. It was a fine system, if you felt like you could trust Twitter as a verifier. Today obviously, one could not. But Bsky seems to at least theoretically have a ‘choose your verification provider’ idea in mind, which would (again theoretically) resolve a lot of that issue.

This is really neat!

Though a lot of it is like, monochrome pixel art using shaded rectangles. Which is not really where my mind goes when thinking of text art.

I do not see anything to be angry or disappointed about?

Verification badge was good, the dumb thing Twitter did was throw it away by letting anyone pay for it.

Counting books? Sure would be nice to use the kanji for book… but nope, that’s for hot dogs or something.

And even if you figure out the right counter word, the numbers are often prounced different ways depending on what follows. Whether it be rendaku or just irregular readings.

https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/68426/~/nintendo-switch-and-nintendo-switch%26nbsp%3B2-accessory-compatibility

Here’s how Nintendo’s support site lays it out.

That’s exactly the feeling I had about the handful of (maybe a dozen?) episodes I watched a couple years ago. First reaction: “I am so intrigued”, followed up with a heavy “I am so depressed”.

I’m still curious about the rest of it… but it’s so explicit and dark and just a drag… as interesting as it is, I don’t think (for me) watching the rest is worth it.

More useful IMO will be regular good games that you want to play anyway, just set to your target language. Can be tough to find just the right level, but the more you learn the better your options will be.

I think it really depends. If you’re replacing your language study times with video games where you barely read the text, probably not helpful.

If you’re replacing time you would have spent playing games in English with games in your target language? That’s a win. Even if you barely need to read anything, games can get repetitive and expose you to the same words over and again in a way that builds up.

Dedicated games just for language are interesting. I think they can be too heavy handed about teaching, where they should be about using simple language and creating context that makes words obvious. Still, they make me curious and I’ll try out some examples from the comments here.

I just tried the Wagotabi demo since @HotChickenFeet@sopuli.xyz mentioned it here a week or two ago. It’s a game to learn Japanese specifically. Only the demo is on Steam, but it seems like a pretty cool thing. It’s like a top-down RPG where you travel to Japan and learn a few words at a time. The demo has you going through an airport and talking to people, and you need to understand a few words to do some tasks. The beginning is maybe too basic (since I’m not quite a beginner), but I’m sure it gets more involved in the full game.

I also tried out Influent this week. I couldn’t really figure out how to add words or show mastery. But it has you run around your small apartment and point at things to read/hear how to say them. So far I’m not a big fan, but maybe I’m missing something.

I also mentioned this in the weekly thread, but slightly off-topic shoutouts to Chants of Sennaar. Deals a lot with translating a made up language, and is super fun.

I have one of the Galaxy Flip phones.

I really hate the idea of my phone just being a glass rectangle touch screen. I don’t like the current options for physical keyboards, so flip is at least some weird tactile hardware gimmick I can go for.