That's really the only right answer. If we're looking at the impact of a single species, as opposed to a genus, family, or order (like most of the other answers are doing, e.g., "spiders"), humans are the only single species whose absence would cause vast changes in the biosphere. We have no other close taxonomic relatives that could step into our "niche" and continue doing what we're doing. Losing one species of mosquito (instead of the whole genus) or one species of plankton (instead of the entire.. god, what, order? Clade?) wouldn't produce any significant effect by itself.
I miss what it was. But it's dead now, and there's a corpse walking around in its skin, and when I'm away from here and among others who haven't made the switch, I feel like the only person at the party who noticed there's a slimy CEO in an ill-fitting snoo suit pretending to be our friend (sometimes).
Like any other dead thing, I can't bring it back, so I have to move on.
I was in a similar boat last year and went back to counselling for some coping strategies. The most helpful things for me were constantly reminding myself not to worry about things out of my control, remembering that I couldn't possibly be inadequate because all the evidence said I was doing fine (good reviews, good feedback, not fired!), and keeping a thought diary. Every time I felt down or overwhelmed or frustrated, I'd write about the situation, list my thoughts/feelings/behaviours, and then run a critical eye over them to try and rationalise them and work out where I was being unfair on myself. The more you do that, the more you can notice negative thoughts in the moment and put a stop to them, which stops the bad mood before it even starts. YMMV but as someone with a serious self-hate problem, that worked well for me.
It also helped keeping in regular contact with management and stakeholders to update them on delays. I'm prone to blaming things on myself and keeping everyone else informed takes the edge off of that, makes me feel less like I'm...I don't know, hiding my poor performance, and more like everything is a group decision. "Okay, XYZ is late, but I told them PM it would be and they didn't do anything to help so that's on them..."
Kept me sane for an extra six months, until I got to a place where I felt able to look for other jobs. Hope things get better for you, or that you're able to get the hell out of there soon.
I've never seriously kept a thought diary. I've kept a "thought dump" but I might try to write down more thoughtful notes and later try to go over them more critically.
I especially like your idea of keeping regular contact with management about delays. It reminded me that I've actually done that a couple of times and it really felt liberating. Like... taking actual responsibility and not hiding it, but at the same time... somehow sharing the responsibility because you obviously can't handle the task at hand alone.
I’m not sure if this information is helpful- but to tack onto what the previous commenter said one day I realized the work wouldn’t end and that was the point of my job. I know that’s sounds kind of obvious.
I have a bad habit of sort of racing towards an end goal and never stopping to be present. I do this at work as well and realizing the above has made it easier to enjoy the aspects of my position I do like, and get past the ones I don’t. All you can do is what you can do and what’s left will be there tomorrow.
And a note on hobbies- is there a way to portablize yours more? For example I love drawing, so I got an iPad and I’m able to pull it out and draw wherever. Similar story with my boyfriend buying a laptop has really increased his ability to make music. I’m not sure what your hobbies are but it may be worth treating yourself to whatever makes it easier to fit them in the pockets of time you do have.
I do try to remind myself that work is always there waiting for me. Even with the unmet weekly goals the work just transfers to the next week.
As for hobbies - I love drawing as well. I used to do it regularly. I do have unfinished sketchbooks but my workplace isn't somewhere I can really draw. I probably should actively try to pursue that again. It's somewhat therapeutic and takes my mind off of things.
The UI/UX on iOS has improved dramatically in the last few years (especially for springboard, which was what I most hated). Coming from Android to iOS, my phone looks so different from everyone else I know who uses iOS, since their home screens have evolved over years and mine was, “how can I, in 2022, make an iPhone look as much like my Android Home Screen as possible?”
I have one screen with a giant weather widget, and some folders for my most-used apps, plus I have four on my dock.
To the left of the main screen is the “Today View” where I have a number of useful widgets that get me quick access to specific things.
To the right of the main screen is the app drawer equivalent, whatever they call it. To be honest I never use it.
Most of the time when I want to launch an app I just swipe down and type the first few letters. That’s usually sufficient. I find having used this phone for a little over a year I’m now as efficient or more efficient than I was on Android, at least for the task of getting from the home screen to whatever app I want.
This was huge for me, because in my previous experience springboard was TERRIBLE unless the device was jailbroken. Now it’s really nice.
I would still love the level of customization Android has. Major feature I’d like would be for the home screen not to push all widgets and icons to the front and left. I wish it would let me put stuff wherever I want so I could have a larger amount of my wallpaper visible while still having the icons closer to my thumbs.
I know there are widget solutions to this problem, but that’s clunky.
But it’s SO MUCH BETTER now than it used to be. Old springboard, that was basically just the Android app drawer, was terrible.
I am glad the instance of Mastodon I use will defederate from meta.
The two biggest instances at the moment as far as I know is kbin social and lemmy world if one allows meta I will just use the other one. Though I recommend any instance that has signed the anti meta pact. This shows a list of instances that signed it I would pick one of those.
It’s true in Kbin in the sense that you can block instances as a user preference. You can also block any other domain as well, which means what a post links to. Theoretically you can block Facebook itself, Instagram, Imgur, etc.
Blocking a domain through kbin only blocks threads from appearing on your feed. You still see users from that domain and their comments, and they see you and anything you post since it gets sent to their server. It is also a feature only available on kbin so tough luck for lemmies.
You can stop your comments from being sent to specific instances? Client-side filters just hide incoming traffic but AP is still doing its own thing in the background afaik, but do correct me if I'm wrong. At least I couldn't find anything to suggest otherwise, and client-side does kinda imply that it's just a visual alteration on the client's side.
But I was mostly talking about kbin/lemmy, sorry about that. I dont have that much experience with mastodon yet.
Owners of an instance can do whatever they want. That's the whole point of the fediverse. If you don't like it, then change to an instance that does what you like or create your own. It's that simple.
Being allowed to do what you want doesn't mean it justified. That's not what I said. Move to an instance with nicer mods or make your own. Really, that's all there is to it. You're looking for something to be annoyed with.
in this case we don't talk about users who want to block users of another instance. The problem is not the users of meta. The problem is meta itself and all the problems it will bring to the federated network. Whoever cannot see that their intentions are not to promote federated networks but to exploit and extinguish them, is just naive.
it depends what you consider as consequence. For me, setting up a clear boundary between what is now known as fediverse and whatever it is this that meta will create is not consequence but choice.
Yeah, it seems like their idea of consequences is the fediverse not becoming mainstream. But, the draw of the fediverse to me is that it can be an anti corporate space where power is more in the hands of individuals than corporations. A huge community of millions like Facebook or Reddit isn't the reason I'm here. Seems like centralization is what they really want, which doesn't need the fediverse to begin with.
I agree. The mass influx of users from reddit have brought here people who are not familiar with the core principles behind such projects. They literally see it as a free social media that could potentially be in the place of lets say facebook. They don't understand that the mainstream social media are what they are today because of decisions that have been taken based only on their profit. And this is something that we don't want to copy here
Isn't the whole draw of the fediverse that people aren't stuck to being in one instance and can leave for one that matches their own? Each instance having the autonomy to do what they want while choosing how much they stay connected or not is a pro to me. This isn't reddit or facebook. You can even run your own instance for those who don't want decisions to be made on their behalf.
First if all, you're not wrong. Depending on the financial risk in play, the anxiety and trust get tossed into a tizzy.
When I say financial risk, if I'm buying a car, we all already know that that's a whole racket. Buying a house, even bigger $$$$ involved. Buying a staple commodity, like a loaf of bread? Meh, it's no biggie.
One big factor in play is our emotional side.
I'll make a suggestion here. Feel free to ignore.
There's a book by Dr Robert Cialdini on persuasion. From what I recall, he got into learning how humans react to certain things, because he felt that he himself was duped into doing/buying things that he later realized he wished he hadn't done/bought. He wanted to better understand the process so that he could be more aware and less vulnerable to the grift. He ended up going into psychology and... well, specializing in the subject.
One sec, there's a website that gives a nice intro to this:
Influence by Cialdini is really good and reasonably deep. Presuasion (also him) is more accessible and focused a lot more specifically on manipulative sales tactics.
If you read both of those and still want more, Nudge by Richard Thaler is pretty good as well.
Edit: one extra that's not about in person manipulation, but how you're manipulated before the interaction by branding: Brandwashed by Martin Lindstrom.
I mean, you have the right attitude. I also feel like everything these days is a scam. It used to be that someone was just trying to get a fair shake for the value of their labor. Buy a refrigerator you get a quality, supported, and long term product worth the money. Now, it feels like I am getting something specifically designed to squeeze as much money from me as possible.
My two cents on ways to avoid the swindle.
Abandon brand loyalty of any kind. A good brand will become a hollowed out shell only focused on profit
Buy tech that is relatively new. The first few years of a new production product are usually the best engineered. The best VHS tapes were made when the tech was new. Same thing for new laptop designs, or M.2 Ssd, etc. Later in tech cycle they cheapen everything to make more profit and design in failure to keep you buying.
Assume money and greed is the reason for company behavior above all else. That will properly contextualize and answer most questions you have for why things are the way they are.
This is a great point but just to add, if its a brand product you can get common issues that don't crop up for 6 months (e.g. xbox 360's red ring of death). So buy new but not on 1st day release, and do a quick research on issues people often have.
Consumer Reports is also a great source for good info on product reliability.
If you're making a large purchase like a car or if you have a handful of smaller purchases to make, a month or a year subscription is a drop in the bucket.
As of the last time I purchased a car, it seems to be the one holdout that realizes if you sell out to ads and corporate interests, you undermine your own reputation.
Right like I was searching around reviews for emergency generators and I see apopular mechanics site. A magazine I used to enjoy when I was younger, I thought I might find some insight. It had zero real breakdown of products it was straight ad push for amazon. It seemed to just be their product descriptions copy and pasted.
Def subscribe to /m/ArtemisApp magazine. We’re just starting our staged rollout to beta testers who signed up. With a public beta aimed for end of month.
I love making efficient systems and the freedom to do things the way I want to, such as by using the game's alternate recipe system.
The exploration and movement systems in the game are also to notch. It's not quite Titanfall, but I struggle to think of any other game where simply moving around is so fun. That's on top of how pretty the actual environment is to explore.
Titanfall 2 is the most fun I've had with a video game. The movement is so amazingly fluid, it's like Quake or Unreal Tournament but with more verticality, and then there's the Titans themselves, which feel like awesome weapons of war, yet not insurmountable to a skilled pilot on foot. Everything from the gameplay balance to the mechanics to the visuals and sound design is incredible, and the single-player story was very touching and exactly long enough to satisfy you without overstaying its welcome. I'm gutted that we're probably never getting a Titanfall 3.
That game is like the gold standard of fps for me. There isn't a better game yet. That level, you know the one, the first time you play it is something kind of magic.
Final Fantasy 6 for me. The bad (mad) guy TRULY winning was just the coolest as a kid. It definitely tore apart my expectations for what a good game was ever since.
I don't think I've played a game more than FF7 (well, Warhammer 40K Dark Crusade might have it beaten by now, not sure, along with the original Star Wars Battlefront games as a distant third), some things I did:
Omnislash on the first CD
Mastered all the Huge Materia until they split to new ones
Bred my golden chocobos until I had a superfast one that effortlessly won every race with a huge margin
Had a save where everyone was level 99 despite not needing it
Defeated all the Weapons of course
I feel I did even more things but it's been like 20 years, don't remember more...
@GeekFTW@Ragnell I wish I had the link handy… this is referencing the person who asked ChatGPT to write an article about why Tetris is racist right? And the article is unsurprisingly terrible. I think all in response to Kotaku moving toward AI journalism.
Doesnt seem possible yet, but hope it gets added.
Having a handful of specific subreddits pinned at the top with RES is the thing Ive missed the most since moving over.
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