I just updated to the newest Ubuntu LTS, which puts pip into system managed mode so you can’t easily install packages outside of a virtual environment anymore.

If you (or anyone who stumbles upon this comment in the future) run into this problem, the new recommended way to install yt-dlp through pip and keep it in your path and up to date is via pipx (sudo apt install pipx). The syntax is a bit gnarly for pre-releases, so I figured I’d post an update:

To install the nightly: pipx install --pip-args '\--pre' yt-dlp

To update the nightly: pipx upgrade --pip-args '\--pre' yt-dlp

I alias the update command and run it before every download session.

I’ve never asked, but I believe medical issues cropped up and their reduced retirement funds wouldn’t have been enough, forcing them to keep working, and the situation spiraled from there.

The main problem with Java (or garbage collected languages in general) as a first language is needing to unlearn the bad habits it ingrains when you move to a systems programming language with manual memory management. Other than that it’s a pretty good first language, though I’d suggest learning a bit of C at the same time just to get a basic grip on things like pointers and stack vs heap.

Edit: it occurs to me that C# would be the perfect learning language. It’s very similar to Java and an easy first language, but you’d also learn about stack allocation through structs, and can teach pointers using unsafe (though I think unsafe code is still GCed, so this wouldn’t help with the memory management side of things. Haven’t touched C# in fifteen years so I’m not sure how it works anymore).

Magneto hates Beast?

It was lapsed for years at a time, multiple times.

I can’t run Doom, but I can run Level 9, “Fuel Station Launch”, from Dark Forces 2, down to which extra enemies spawn and what items are removed when playing on each difficulty level.

It was on an old demo disc and I must have played that level a hundred times as a kid.

Yeah, I remember my parents talking about how badly they were hit in the late 00s. They were considering retirement just as the recession struck, and they lost a huge chunk of what they’d hoped to retire on.

They still haven’t retired fifteen years later despite declining health.

I’ve owned my personal domain for five of the last fifteen years. Should I be happy or embarrassed that no squatters grabbed it during any of the several times I let it go unrenewed?

They don’t have it for the same reason Sony later removed it from the PS3: letting users run arbitrary code on your console provides a massive attack surface for piracy and jailbreaking exploits.

That could take a lifetime!

I’ve seen code with binary data (such as icons) baked into constants. I can’t wait for the three hour narration of base64 encoded pngs.

They canceled the GTA V story DLC after seeing the success of GTA Online, and their long-time head writer and producer resigned. I have little faith that GTA6 will capture the same spark that their earlier games had.

It’s fixed in the development versions. If you installed yt-dlp using pip, update with the prerelease flag: pip install --upgrade --pre yt-dlp. If you manually installed it, run yt-dlp --update-to nightly or grab the latest dev from their nightly repo.

In pog dog form!

Metro also comes to mind. The highest difficulty level made both you and the enemies squishier, while also making ammo (which doubled as currency) much rarer. It played so much better that the community even recommended that difficulty level to complete newcomers.

… And then they made the Ranger difficulty a paid DLC in the sequel…

Genie was locked up at 20 months old. I don’t think they locked her up because of her mental illness. They locked her up because of their mental illness. I reference Genie because she’s the most documented “wild child,” which is a completely disgusting term.

I was going off old college memories - after looking it up, it sounds like her father thought she was mentally disabled and began/increased his neglect because of it, despite her only outward health issue being delayed walking due to a hip problem.

Also re: “wild child”. I agree, and thanks for pointing it out. That’s what they were called in my books, but catchy rhyme aside it’s a horrible way to refer to a victim of such abuse. I’ll edit my original comment.

Language is universal to all humans, even though it is multifaceted. Humans also have massive brains that require extra care to bring to fruition in comparison to other animals. Language is one of those things. You can learn other languages at any age, but you first need learn a language.

It would be fascinating to know what inner thoughts look like without the construct of language to frame them in. Unfortunately there’s no ethical way to find out, short of uplifting a non-sapient species and asking them.

There was an old study showing that London taxi drivers develop enlarged hippocampi, the part of the brain used for navigation, to deal with the labyrinthian London streets. The growth continued over several years even in mature adults as they used those navigation and memorization abilities. I’d like to see a study of the brain of an adult prospective language learner over a long period to see if any similar plasticity exists for the brain’s language centers.

(I’ll admit I’m horribly biased. I was exceptional at picking up new languages as a teen, but let that knowledge decay into nothingness as an adult. I’d hate to have wasted such a useful talent.)

Given the success of foreign exchange students, I’m willing to bet the age factor is much less important than people claim.

People bring up the abused or abandoned children that had trouble learning to speak when introduced to society later in life, but usually fail to mention the reason they were neglected/abandoned as children was due to mental disabilities, so they aren’t really a viable data point.

Only 99¢ to recollect your blood echoes remotely, or $20 to never lose them again! Pay $5.99/month to unlock an extra co-op slot!

People focus on the bears thing, and not that most of the libertarians who joined the Free Town Project were men (wonder why women didn’t feel safe joining; it’s a mystery), and many (surprise surprise) turned out to be sexual predators or even murderers. They also quickly (and deliberately) bankrupted the town through budget cuts and spurious lawsuits, making life worse for everyone who lived there. The whole thing was a shitshow. Who knew that a philosophy of self-centeredness would attract the worst sort of people?

Libertarianism. Not even once.