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Joined 3 years ago
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Cake day: July 5th, 2023

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  • So I agree with the overall sentiment, but I feel like the reason I dislike “microblogging”, which is to say Mastodon, Threads, Twitter, etc is highlighted as a positive in the first post.

    something that signals “I am more than just a content creation machine for a corporation!”

    It could be a status symbol for all the right reasons.

    I care about talking to people, not a person. The Lemmy/Piefed/Mbin/Reddit style of conversation (forum?) is just a better way to get people together to talk about things. You don’t have to be someone special with a “status symbol”, you don’t have to be “content creation machine” for anyone.

    I say this because while conceptually I’m glad that the whole Fediverse and ActivityPub can talk to each other, we’re just not having the same conversation.




  • It’s possibly from people trying to help, but don’t understand AI hallucinations.

    For example a Wikipedia article might say, “John Smith spent a year Oxford University before moving to London.[Citation Needed]” So the article already contains information, but lacks proper citation.

    Someone comes along and says, "Ah ha! AI can solve this and asks AI, ‘Did John Smith spend a year at Oxford before moving to London, please provide citations.’ and the AI returns, “Yes of course he did according to the book ‘John Smith: Biography of a Man’ ISBN 123456789”

    So someone adds that as a citation and now Wikipedia has been improved.

    Or… has it? The ISBN 123456789 is invalid. No book could possibly have that number. If the ISBN is invalid, then the book is also likely invalid, and the citation is also invalid.

    So the satisfaction was someone who couldn’t previously help Wikipedia, now thinking they can help Wikipedia. At face value that’s a good thing, someone who wants to help Wikipedia. The problem is that they think they’re helping, but they’re actually harming.



  • I have to disagree that the stakes are never raised. Season 1 the big bad is a Demogorgon who is just a scary monster. Then we add multiple Demodogs to the Demogorgon. Then we add an intelligent creature with the Mind Flayer who controls the above creatures, but he still mostly a monster. Then we add an intelligent human who does all of the above, but hunts children. And now finally in the finale it’s all of the above trying to bring the upside down into the real world (technically the plan for season 4, but he won and then “died”, so he’s doing it again but properly.)

    So Demogorgons go from the big bad to just bring minions in the current season. Our main characters are fighting off a dozen whereas one used to be impossible.


  • I can’t think of any terribly done characters either

    I would say Johnathan is underwhelming. He had character in season 1, but after that it’s been pretty sparse. I wouldn’t get rid of him because I think it’s interesting in the context of other characters… But in terms of what he wants, I don’t really know.

    Spoilers up to season 5 volume 1

    He has a ring and is probably going to ask Nancy to marry him, but what makes that interesting is what will Nancy say? How will Steve react? I don’t really care if Johnathan gets married because I don’t know if he wants that.

    It’s possible season 5 volume 2 will give him more to do, so I won’t say he’s a complete waste, but even looking at previous seasons it’s been little for his character.



  • I don’t know how many seasons are planned, but I assume the past scene was just a small tease. Assuming 4 seasons as a complete guess, would think season 3 will have 2-3 past scenes right after a character learns something, then season 4 would have an episode of parallel scenes or one full past episode.

    Ultimately leading to a past scene that says “And hopefully, years from now, the human race can rebuild, having learned to treat Mother Nature more kindly”, jump to Solo people starting a new world and the the audience, knowing why, but the Solo people not, if they can rebuild.


  • I went into the show knowing nothing and really enjoyed season 1. I thought season 2 had good elements, but didn’t work overall. I’ll probably still watch (or at least start) season 3.

    For me season 2 felt like a show trying at adapt a book, if that makes sense. Parts of it didn’t feel believable, but I could convince myself it made sense if someone took time to explain it, but the show didn’t. Or the opposite where a subtle reveal would beat you over the head because instead of slowly hinting, they just very clearly make odd decisions that have to have meaning.



  • Breaking Bad was just a two season show, Walt either wins or he loses.

    Better Call Saul should have just been a one season show, we already know he’s Saul Goodman.

    /s

    Breaking Bad was interesting because we watched Walt go from a mild mannered high school chemistry teacher to murderous meth kingpin.

    Better Call Saul was interesting because we saw a screw up little brother turn into a huge drug lawyer. (It’s more than that, but I’ll keep it light on the details for now.)

    And Carol? Look at episode 1 Carol versus this past episode Carol. How will the new episode/finale change her again? There is a lot of ways the story could go, and I’m excited to see what happens.






  • Pluribus spoilers

    Why’s she gotta be so goddamn fuckable?

    This episode was probably my favorite after the first episode. I could watch more episodes just like this as we grow to understand who these characters are and what they’re up to.

    I understand the feedback of the show being slow, because we should have already had this scene and many like it. But I do think the build up is important. Really what it means is I want more episodes. But I’m still happy with what we have.