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Fondots

@ Fondots @lemmy.world

Posts
2
Comments
671
Joined
3 yr. ago

  • DNA testing firm 23andMe files for bankruptcy

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  • Ah, you mean the original "razor and blades" business model that ensures repeat customers.

    (Yes, I'm aware that many people who use safety razors these days are not necessarily buying from brands that make both the razor and the blades, I am such a person myself, I'm somewhat joking on that)

    But even in the realm of "buy it for life" items, you can still end up with repeat customers. Maybe you want a second razor for your travel toiletry bag, or to keep in your second bathroom. Maybe you just see one that looks cooler, or the handle is more ergonomic, or the way you change the blade seems more convenient.

    And BIFL items still do sometimes get lost, stolen, given away, thrown out, or sometimes even broken and need to be replaced.

    And unless the world's population starts shrinking, there will always be new shavers hitting puberty who will eventually need their own razor.

    With a DNA test, unless you're questioning paternity or testing for specific genetic traits like cancer risk and such, once your parents have taken a test, you and your siblings don't really need to, you know what your parents are so you know what you are.

  • Looking to build a basic media-center PC

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  • As far as being a media center PC, you can probably stick just about any reasonably modern components you can find in a case and call it fine as long as you have HDMI on your motherboard you probably don't even really need a graphics card, a half decent processor with integrated graphics is probably more than sufficient.

    As far as Linux software and compatibility I'm out of my element there. I know KODI is kind of the standard recommendation for HTPC software, but that's pretty much all I got for you.

    Same with video/photo editing, not my thing especially on Linux, but I get the overall impression that those are very broad categories that range from "you could probably do that on a $5 thrift store toaster if you could figure out how to hook a monitor and keyboard up to it" up to needing a truly beefy computer with all the bells and whistles (and you can probably still make toast with it if you skimp on the cooling a bit)

    The case you have picked out is definitely an attractive option if you want to have your PC sitting out in the open next to your TV in the living room. Personally I built my PC in a Silverstone GD09 and it fits nicely in my entertainment center and pretty much looks like any other piece of AV equipment. It's a little cramped to build in, but it does the job just fine, I was worried about airflow and cooling with how cramped it is and since it's living in an enclosed entertainment center, but I filled up all the fan spaces and even using it as a gaming PC it seems to stay cool enough. They have a couple other cases that are geared towards HTPC usage, I went with this one in particular because of the optical drive because I want to be able to stick a DVD or Blu ray disk in it, because it's a media PC, but that's not important to everyone.

    IMO, just taking a quick look at what bundles are currently available at microcenter, something like this is probably sufficient for a basic media PC. That + a power supply and hard drive/SSD/m.2 drive and you're pretty much set. You'd need to talk to someone else about Linux compatibility or suitability for video/photo editing.

    I'm personally of the opinion that some sort of small handheld keyboard with a touchpad is borderline necessarily for a HTPC, the one I use is a Rii i4, no complaints about it, maybe some nicer options out there but it does what I need it to do and was cheap.

    If you might want to sit back on the couch with a full keyboard and mouse on your lap, unless you want to shell out for something like a couchmaster, I think a wireless trackball mouse is a good option since you probably won't have a lot of "desk" space to move your mouse around.

  • TIL Gaslight (1944) is a real movie

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  • I work in 911 dispatch, I had a call once upon a time, just an open line from a cell phone. Couldn't make any contact, just heard what sounded like a male and female arguing, it was hard to make out, sounded a little muffled. It didn't sound super heated but just enough enough that for liability reasons I felt like it should be checked out as a possible disturbance/domestic.

    The cellular location was decent but not pinpoint accurate, and it dropped in the middle of a fairly densely populated area, so it could have been any of potentially a few dozen or so houses, apartments, or businesses. No answer when I called them back.

    Entered the call with whatever information I had, and checked where the location was dropping on Google maps.

    It was dropping at a small local playhouse. Out of curiosity I checked what shows they were doing.

    It was Gaslight.

    Police checked the area and didn't find anything. So I'm pretty sure I was just listening to them rehearsing from inside of an actor's pocket or something.

  • Trump plan to fund Musk’s Starlink over fiber called “betrayal” of rural US

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  • We've already ran power and phone lines damn-near everywhere, it's not that much harder to run fiber.

    No, it can't be done overnight, but this is something the government has thrown billions at telecom companies in various way for them to do starting decades ago. We should just about be at the point by now where everyone who wants fiber has it if the telecoms had done what they were supposed to do.

    It's not the first time we've had this kind of infrastructure rollout either. In the mid 30s, 9/10 rural areas had no electrical service, by 1953 that had flipped and more than 90% of rural areas were electrified, so about 20 years give or take to build out electrical infrastructure almost from scratch.

    Now yes, there's more people, more homes, etc filling up all of that empty space, but like I said, a lot of the necessary infrastructure is already in place, and we've come a long way technologically since the 50s, I'm sure the linemen and laborers setting up the grid almost 100 years ago would've killed to have a modern bucket truck and digger derrick at their disposal.

    There's a whole lot of issues you can use the "the us is a big country" for, but it doesn't hold water on this one for me.

  • Trump plan to fund Musk’s Starlink over fiber called “betrayal” of rural US

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  • I think that's kind of the point they're making

    There's no good reason why they can't run fiber to your home if you already have power lines and such going to your house. The utility poles, roads, and all the other infrastructure is there already, they mostly just need to send some guys in cherry pickers out to actually go run the fiber and hook it up to your home, and odds are they even already have guys out in the area servicing the old phone and/or cable lines that are probably also running to your house. They just don't want to spend the money (that the government gave them years ago to do specifically that)

    The only good reason not to have at least the option of running fiber to your house is if you're otherwise off the grid.

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  • I do 12 hour shifts on a 2-2-3 schedule (one week I work Monday & Tuesday, then I'm off Wednesday & Thursday, then work Friday, Saturday, & Sunday, then the next week I do the opposite)

    So technically I guess on average I work 6 hours a day/42 hours per week if we want to get mathematical about it.

    I guess it technically gets even weirder since my shift is 3pm-3am, so I guess on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays I actually only work 9 hours, and then on the ones where I "don't" work I actually technically work 3 hours

    But that's all obviously kind of a stupid way to think of it.

    There's also the difference between how I think about it and how payroll thinks about it.

    To me, I'd tend to say that the week starts on Monday, so I'd say that I either work 5 or 2 days a week for a total of 60 or 24 hour

    But to payroll the week starts on Sunday, so they say either 4 or 3 days for a total of 48 or 36 hours.

    Which is a bit of a bummer. 8 hours of "overtime" in my paycheck is pretty nice, but 20 hours would be even nicer.

  • E-waste or Linux? Charities face tough choices as Windows 10 support ends

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  • Yeah, steam has definitely done a lot to improve the situation and I'm very impressed with the current state of things.

    I just have a bit of a mental block from the last time I seriously tried to use Linux (circa 2009 probably) that I need to get over. A lot has changed since then

  • E-waste or Linux? Charities face tough choices as Windows 10 support ends

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  • Lol, I'll keep that in mind, internet stranger. I do have a lot of techy friends who I'll probably offer it up to first, and I haven't quite ruled out running Linux myself either to keep as my main PC or to use as a media server or something, but I'll keep you in mind if I'm looking to get rid of it in a few months.

    If it does come to that, pay for shipping (or pick it up if you happen to be local) and it's yours. Feel free to hit me up to ask about it come november-ish if I don't reach out first. No guarantees it will be available, but I'd rather it go to someone who's going to use it than be waste

  • E-waste or Linux? Charities face tough choices as Windows 10 support ends

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  • My PC isn't compatible with Windows 11.

    I cobbled it together from spare parts as my wife has upgraded over the years. It was a pretty beefy computer when she first built it, and it's gotten a couple upgrades along the way, but the CPU and MoBo are probably about 10 years old if not older (it's an AMD FX-something, I'm unsure of the exact specs, it's whatever parts were in her bin of cast-offs stuck with a new case and hard drive)

    And I'm happily gaming on it. I may not be maxing out the latest AAA titles in glorious 8k epic quality 120hz HDR VR yadda yadda yadda, but I can still run pretty much any game out there on some acceptable mid-to-high quality settings and decent performance.

    I'm probably going to have to either upgrade the MoBo and processor come October, or make the jump to Linux (which I'm not exactly opposed to, but I do like not having to fuck with wine and proton to run my games)

    It's a perfectly serviceable board, still doing just fine by me, and there's no reason it can't give someone at least a few more good years of use, even as a gaming computer if you're not a graphics snob.

    But if I decide to upgrade, unless I find someone who wants to run Linux on it, or understands the risk of running win10 with no security updates, it's probably going to become e waste.

  • Why is it that you can't buy a 2 Liter container of beer or coffee?

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  • Try looking for "cold brew concentrate" it's not really syrupy because there's usually no sugar, but it's meant to be diluted.

    I don't think I've seen 2L containers specifically, I think I normally see it in 1qt bottles (which is roughly the same as a liter) but since you're diluting it it works out to about the same or even more (some brands are stronger than others, and personal preference of course comes into play, but usually I think I've seen them call for a 1:1 ratio of concentrate to water/milk, others might be 1:3 and maybe even higher, so that 1qt might be roughly equivalent to a 2l bottle, or even a gallon (roughly 4l) jug.

    And if you add hot water, most of them make for a pretty decent cup of Joe, you don't have to drink it cold.

    I remember one time I bought some, and my wife didn't realize it was meant to be diluted and had been drinking it straight and was wondering why she was so jittery until I caught her pouring a full glass of it. Also solved the mystery of why we were going through it so fast.

    Chameleon cold brew is a pretty common (and I think pretty decent, though I'm no coffee snob) brand at least in my part of the states.

  • What is a specific fear you have?

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  • That while I'm driving I'll have to sneeze while driving across a bridge and during that split second while my eyes are closed and I'm distracted by the sneeze I'm going to drive off the edge.

  • TIL canned bananas are a thing. (And that it's very risky to try doing so yourself.)

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  • They make canned hard boiled quail eggs. I like to get them for cocktail garnishes for Bloody Marys and such.

  • Ten Senate Democrats cave to avert government shutdown

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  • Yes, it's not all black and white, but the MAGA agenda is a big bucket of black paint with a couple tiny drops of white mixed in. You can split hairs about how that technically makes it a very dark shade of charcoal grey, but for all practical purposes it's fucking black.

  • TIL Mirror's Edge (2008) was written by Rhianna Pratchett, daughter of Sir Terry Pratchett

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  • I have a few friends who used to go to game jams, events where you get a bunch of people together, split them up into groups, and give them a set amount of time (usually a day or a weekend) to make a video game.

    Most of the people who went to these were programmers of course, and there were a couple in my friend group who were techy people as well, but mostly they were writers, artists, and musicians.

    And the groups they ended up in usually handed up doing pretty well. Having the whole team there and involved from the get-go helped them make a pretty polished game, where a lot of the groups that didn't have that ended up with music, writing, or visuals that felt kind of tacked-on as an afterthought.

  • Measles has spread to where I am at. Other than a mask/Vaccine, what else can help protect against it?

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  • If you got 2 doses of the MMR vaccine as a child, you're probably fine. The vaccine is like 97% effective at preventing measles, and if you're part of that 3% your symptoms will probably be milder that if you weren't vaccinated. It's a damn good vaccine. Even if you got only 1 dose that's still considered to be 90-something percent effective.

    Talk to your doctor, people with certain autoimmune conditions, the elderly, people born when they were only giving 1 dose of the vaccine or who received older vaccine formulas may need a booster. The rest of us who are vaccinated are almost certain to be fine.

    The real risk is to children who haven't been vaccinated yet because they're too young, people who can't receive the vaccine for health reasons like allergies or other unvaccinated adults, and people with compromised immune systems.

    I can't really find good numbers of what percent of the US overall is vaccinated, but if the current rates of children being vaccinated are anything to go by, it's most of them. Even with all of the anti vax talk, it seems like somewhere north of 80% of children in the US are still getting their recommended vaccines from what I can find. This is mostly going to hit that 10-20-ish percent who aren't vaccinated.

    And the real tragedy that a good amount of the anti vax parents were actually vaccinated themselves as children and so get to enjoy that 97% immunity. They won't be in much danger of catching measles but their children will be.

    Otherwise, all of the usual advice applies, wash your hands, disinfect shared surfaces and equipment, cover your mouth when you cough, maybe wear a mask in public, do what you can to encourage your friends and family to get vaccinated if they aren't.

  • Lemmy users across the world, what is your favourite local dish ?

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  • Meant to reply a couple days ago but forgot

    Yeah, unfortunately he's a trump supporting, union busting asshole.

    I've heard, but have been unable to verify, that his daughters who are set to take the company over someday, may have their heads on straight. I hope so. There are absolutely far better beers in and around Philly (I'm happy to give a long list of recommendations,) and Yuengling isn't anything too special as a beer. But it's special for being America's oldest brewery, and it's certainly carved out a special place for itself in this area. Like I said, I've drank a lot of Yuengling in my life, odds are I have a few cans in my beer fridge right now because there's a good chance that it's what my friends grab out of habit whenever they bring beer over for a party, I've been to more than a few bars with "Yuengs and Wings" specials (which rhymes for those who aren't familiar with it) and it does it's job adequately of being a beer that tastes like beer for when you just want to have a beer, so I do hope that when Dick retires or dies his daughters make up for some of his bullshit. I'd like to have my old standby cheap beer option back in the rotation someday.

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  • Longer leg moisture wicking boxer briefs, I particularly like Duluth trading co's armachillo bullpen boxer brief.

  • Next Canadian PM Mark Carney to Trump: 'Canada Never, Ever, Will Be Part of America'

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  • I'm admittedly biased being a US American, but the only time I ever see anyone refer to any part of the Americas except the US as "America" is when they're trying to make this point. It never comes up in conversation otherwise.

    I'm not saying that some people/places don't use it that way, but those people have never made it to the same parts of the internet that I inhabit.

  • Lemmy users across the world, what is your favourite local dish ?

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  • I have a really complicated relationship with coconut, because I really like the flavor, but hate the texture. The flavor wins out for me but not by much.

    And come to think of it, I think a lot of the commercially made ones use some sort of coconut creme filling instead of cream cheese so it's more shelf stable and doesn't require refrigeration. I like the cream cheese ones slightly more.