YSK that OverDrive (developer of Libby) is a private for-profit company that makes obscene amounts of money. Pretty much a prime example of private-public “partnership” taking taxpayer money.

• Before COVID, they made enough to pay each of their ~300 employees half a million dollars. This figure increased during COVID. Guess who got bonuses? Not regular employees.
• OverDrive charges 30% overhead on top of publisher prices (which are usually already up to 4x higher for libraries)
• They criticize some publishers, but publisher raising prices conveniently plays into their hand. Publishers’ abusive “borrowing” models, such as limited “digital copies” or “pay-per-borrow” still work for OverDrive (see above)
• They were one of the first to market and are vertically integrated: they own the marketplace to purchase titles from publishers, hosting of titles, and the application. This is easy for clients (libraries), but difficult to switch away from.
• They partner with LexisNexis, who has been collaborating with ICE for deportations.
• Many of their employees are former teachers, and with miserly teacher salaries in Ohio, it’s another convenience to hire knowledgeable people for cheap.

I am not too familiar with animism either, but as far as I understand from the book, it’s the belief-idea-philosophy that humans are a part of nature, including both living and non-living things. (Contrary to modern idea of separating the “human” and “natural” worlds). In addition to awareness and careful choices, it believes in reciprocity, giving back what was taken from the ecosystem. Similar to what was/is practiced by many native communities.

(Please correct me if I am wrong)

Not just about climate, but Less Is More by Jason Hinckel. It is anticapitalist and pro-animist (!), and I found the historical parts interesting, particularly the philosophical angle of how separating the human from the rest of nature happened (and how it played into abuse of both nature and humans)

Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid by Thor Hanson is about climate change, how animals adapt to it, how forests can migrate, and local climate anomalies.

The article matches my experiences.

I knew a guy, not MAGA, but a self-identified libertarian, with very bigoted and bad takes (racism, misogyny, general lack of empathy). His responses for being called out or criticized were:

• This is a joke
• You are too stupid to understand the joke
• The joke I made is supposed to be making fun of people who say the same offensive things seriously (except the joke has no hint of irony or self-awareness)
• You are too stupid to understand the point I am making
• You don’t know stuff about life
• You lack EQ to understand my situation
• General insults about intelligence
• Why are you being an asshole to me?

Eventually, I also figured out that the only way to win is not to play the game. Shame, we were good friends back in the day.

FYI Annihilation novel has the same premise and setup as the movie, but is quite different plot-wise. It’s more emotional, introspective, and has very vivid imagery. Much different from what I usually read, but I loved it.

Mailbox.org

Mailbox Standard compared to ProtonMail Plus:

• Cheaper (€30/yr vs ~€50/yr; if you don’t need custom domains, €1/mo)
• More aliases (25 on mailbox, 50 on own domain. Proton has 10 TOTAL - why custom domain aliases are counted against Proton ones does not make sense to me.)
• Support for any number of custom domains AFAICT (Proton Plus supports only one)
• Trial account is not allowed to send emails, so fewer issues with services blacklisting proton.me and protonmail.com for spam (hasn’t happened to me, but I have heard of some cases)
• Can use a regular email client (security tradeoff for E2EE messages - but there already were plenty of discussions on whether E2EE has benefits, especially sending mail to other services)

LCDs from older devices (DVD players, cheap picture frames, even off-brand tablets, as long as LCD has a ribbon connector) can be salvaged and used with any other device using a ~$15-20 LCD driver.

Some old digital cameras can be used as a webcam via USB.

Very old keyboards might have DIP chips that could be reused (if the rest of the keyboard is damaged and you’re into building your own keyboards that is)

Upgraded pick will save you time and energy, so absolutely.

You can get desert totems from the trader (in the desert), but I don’t remember what she wants for it. Not as much material as building one yourself.

TBH I don’t even understand why Android Auto needs to exist in the first place.

The same (or even better) functionality can be achieved by using a standard video output (DisplayPort, HDMI) from the device to the in-car screen, while the touches on the in-car screen can be translated into USB mouse position and clicks on the device (unless there is a better touch protocol).

I know there are regulations about live video on in-car screens, but 1. That does not stop people from watching videos on their phones while driving and 2. Somehow that does not apply to maps?

I haven’t really played since 2020, and have been waiting for 1.6 on the Switch to start again.

And holy cow, there is a whole other game’s worth of content! Island, mastery cave, new crops, new bundles, new characters, and new dialog for old characters, and variety in festivals.

Tried it on an older Pixel with GrapheneOS.

Can’t zoom, can’t switch to wide-angle lens. Camera does not balance brightness by the focus point. Otherwise pictures look pretty much the same.

I suppose this was made for specific devices in mind?

Series plug-in hybrids that can run on battery (Chevy Volt, Honda Clarity, Prius 2024) are IMO better than both. They effectively operate like electric vehicles (regenerative braking and all), and one can drive them for months without burning gas. Their batteries are about five times smaller (~30-50mi range vs full EV’s ~250mi range), and thus lighter, and the gasoline engine is usually a small, efficient one (~40ish mpg on gas)

Correction: Ohio added abortion rights to its constitution in 2023

Biktor and Lynxis will be working on OpenIMSd, which aims to bring VoLTE (4G voice calls) to Qualcomm based phones (like the PinePhone)

This is fantastic news, and I wish them all the best. Reliable VoLTE/WoWiFi calls was my main (but obviously major) issue with the PinePhone.