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Joined 10 months ago
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Cake day: January 6th, 2024

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  • So many people trying to say it is normal in the US, but it is the US the one with the rule of having a paper bag to cover alcohol anywhere public. Sure at home it might also be more normal but that is already indicative of a certain point of view which I’m guessing is what OP was talking about.




  • Ha, interesting question, really cool answers all around.

    For me, it was many years ago when I went with a friend to visit a common friend that was studying in Vermont (we 3 are from Europe), and using the occasion we went to visit new York as well. One night we went to have a walk around Times Square and took the subway to get there. I was just standing there checking out the map to keep myself busy when this huge black guy wearing an even bigger fur coat that was sitting started talking to me and asking where I was going and if I needed help.

    At first I awkwardly said that I didn’t need any help, I was just looking at the map to keep busy. He insisted asking where I was going, to which I answered to have a stroll around times square. He got quite cheerful and said he was going in the same direction and he knew a shortcut. At that point I got a bit suspicious but the guy said changing the train we would get there faster, I confirmed that indeed the other train was going in that direction and he told us to follow him. Despite my suspicion as long as there was plenty of people around I decided to trust him and go with him.

    After the change of train he told me he knew another trick about that station, everyone was going to the normal stairs but he told us if we go a bit further we can avoid those stairs. He took us to an escalator that took us into an exit straight at Times square.

    In the meantime we started talking with him, he told us he was going that night to have a guy’s night out with his friends and they were going to Atlantic City. He started telling us about his life, he was a music editor, and was married, and loved to help people visiting new York. By the time we got out into the street it felt like we were quite close friends and we stayed there a bit still talking, he was one of the nicest random people I have ever met, we took a photo together and he gave me his contact card in case I ever returned to NY (which I didn’t).

    I’ve thought about him ever since and wondered how he was doing. It’s a great memory I have of such a simple random encounter.


  • Most likely I’m too specific about it, but I see quite some shows mentioned that I’d not really consider underrated or unrecognised. Firefly is one of my all time favourites but not really underrated or unrecognised. Or Fringe, possibly not even From (of which I’ll just say I very much hope they have an ending planned because I don’t want it to end lost like Lost).

    Perfect examples of underrated or unrecognised shows are Galavant and Utopia, mentioned by others, they are brilliant.

    In a similar direction I’d say Dead Set, a UK show that really surprised me ages ago but never see mentioned. https://imdb.com/title/tt1285482/

    Maybe I should include also Dr Horrible’s Sing Along Blog, but that may be a lot less underrated and it’s a minishow only.






  • I think no one has mentioned “the man from earth”, it is a great movie that got a lot of success thanks to piracy, enough that it allowed it to even get a sequel (I haven’t watched it it seems to be far less recommended).

    I recommend to just watch it without looking too much at the theme or plot. I’ll just say that it’s a movie with a lot of conversations and basically no action at all. You could compare it in that sense to the classic “12 angry men”, not in plot or theme, but style, mostly something that happens between a small cast of actors through dialogue.

    Edit: and just a few minutes before me someone did actually share it…





  • The thing is that “excellent” is something they are not… Look I enjoyed the movies too, they can be quite fun. Some aspects are great, the action and stunt work is in my opinion flawless for the time. Some other things were great too and some others not so much. But in general, really they are not good movies if we try to be a bit neutral, and at the very least they can’t follow the complexity of the theme from the first movie while making it look so simple like that one did. It may just be the case of standing too close to the sun, the movies as part of the trilogy just can’t compare. So people have a feeling of rejection to them. And probably the one thing people find it tough to come to grips with is the fact that the first movie had great action, that helped the movie go forward, while the others just seem to have random action scenes that are just not part of the story. It’s just about how they are added into the story.

    But don’t let that bother you, enjoy the movies, I still do, they are just not the masterpieces the first one was.

    And no, its not about wanting the first one again, in essence, I wish the movies would have managed to expand the story in a refreshing way like the Animatrix did. But they just fall flat instead, simple mindless fun that kinda finish the storyline quite OK for me.

    Now the fourth part… That was brilliant, a brilliant crap, but brilliant nonetheless. If my guess is not wrong, it was a great middle finger to the movie execs that wanted to squeeze more money out of the movies.



  • Ah the false implication that if we don’t pay then things won’t get done. That’s a fallacy. People will always make content, they only stop if they need to work to survive and have no time. If they are paid for creating, they will create even more. If they are paid to create what they are told they won’t be able to create what they would want to.

    When content is controlled and a company has the right to decide what and when and how something is created that’s when content and services get worse over time. Disney is a huge money making machine based on monopolistically controlling content, stories, characters… Disney’s services and products will only get worse no matter who pays or doesn’t, despite the love and effort put by the workers, because decisions are made based on corporate greed and maximising revenue. No one but Disney can create a marvel movie, if I would, I’d get sued into oblivion.


  • The only mental gymnastics are yours.

    There is a ton of arguments against supporting these shitty corps milking their customers. However, there is no argument for piracy.

    How do you propose to stop supporting Disney? Without eventually hurting the employees of Disney?

    Streaming or buying a blueray or paying for a movie ticket (which is prohibitively expensive and can only be done in some occasions when I know I will enjoy it and then they fill you up in ads), it won’t matter, it all supports Disney and their shitty behaviour. I love buying my favourite movies and shows but I don’t want to buy all the movies and shows I want to watch, that’s why streaming is so much better in many ways and set as the main example. Even movies I bought in BR I will end up downloading for the comfort of watching them, I want to watch them on whatever screen I want wherever I want, not when I have a blue ray reader.

    And others have already told you, sometimes there’s no legal way to enjoy some content, if some company doesn’t want me to get something, why would I listen to them and not find my own way?

    The fact that it all works for you doesn’t mean others don’t want it in a different way.

    If your kids want to watch a disney movie they spend their time enjoying it. You need to compensate whoever is providing for that. If they enjoy their time in Disneyland they also need to pay the ticket, eventhough the rides will work without them paying for the ticket.

    No, I don’t need to do anything, they don’t set the rules. If my kids enjoy watching a movie but Disney won’t allow them to watch it without first swallowing 30 minutes of ads selling them other stuff you bet your own ass I will find a way to allow them to watch the movie without whatever random shit a corporation comes up with. I want to compensate the workers but I don’t. I pay Disney and they choose how employees are paid. And I won’t do whatever they say just because they “own” the movie. Should I still compensate the employees of Disney and the corporation for I don’t know, watching Fantasia done over 80 years ago? Stop sucking the corporations ass. They are abusing everyone, including their own employees.

    If you say we have reasons to stop supporting Disney then you are saying either no one can watch their content or we can watch it the only way it hurts them. There’s no middle ground.


  • I can understand that some people don’t want to deal with changing keyboards even if they don’t want to be tracked. But you are literally here asking about keyboards. If this is not the place to talk about this then what is? Anyone interested enough to wonder about what keyboard they use should consider their privacy as the main aspect for a keyboard, as it is an app that can see everything you write, including passwords.

    but the reality is most foss apps are far inferior user experiences to corporate apps

    This is absolutely wrong and too often repeated as a mantra, and not because they have actually good UX, but because the corporate apps have it worse even (but they set the standard so anything that isn’t like theirs is bad). From all keyboards I have tried (many, including corporate ones, closed source, etc) the closed source ones have usually the worse UX. They start better and then worsen over time. You said you like the personalisation options, but often there’s less options in any closed source corporate keyboard. It took them years for gboard to actually let users have the number row always on top. I could have that in other keyboards long before gboard. Swiftkey was wonderful, but over the years it got so bloated that it lagged when used. There’s unfortunately not a perfect keyboard, but through all the posts in this thread there were a lot of good recommendations that allow you to choose good customisability, respect of user privacy, and also fringe use cases not often supported. And in general, the worse options are the closed source ones.

    The only real downside of Foss keyboards is that as they have more options they usually require a bit more set up time which puts many people off.

    I’m currently using Heliboard, lots of customisability, Foss, good language support and a must for me, multi language support. So far I am making less typos than with many other keyboards. The downside is no swipe support right in the app, but you can get it to work too if interested using 3rd party libraries.

    In the past I’ve been using gboard which was OK for a while but started making more and more typos and wrong corrections over time, that plus trying to degoogle myself pushed me away.

    Also anysoft keyboard, pretty nice, and was quite happy with it but again started getting tired of some typos I kept making.

    I am keeping an eye on futo keyboard too, which at the moment doesn’t support multi language support, maybe in the future when implemented I’ll try it.