@samueljohnson @Stuck_Here @ChaosSpectre @rfc6919 @xssfox

That... seems very unlikely to me. If it's true, then something else is going on. Branding the tpaper is perhaps better than switching to a super-cheap version, but if I ran that company (or managed the building or whatever) I'd really want to understand what the motivation was...

Do some employees maybe not have enough time/energy for shopping? Maybe a small number of employees have hoarding tendencies, and could use some therapy or an alternative way to satisfy their hoarding compulsion?

@theseliminaldays What @malcircuit said. 🥀

That loss of feeling-safe-ness really goes deep.

@computerchronicles @jalefkowit

Wait... that cover isn't satire? I mean it kinda has to be -- Wikipedia says Tiger Beat folded in 2021.

(edit: I see your image description mentions that it is in fact satire -- which, to my mind, means that nobody is seriously endorsing this as a good way of relating to politicians. ...so maybe I missed your point somehow.)

@QuestForTori Andy Sturmer of Jellyfish? [checks Wikipedia] Why yes, apparently so.

Now I sorta want to listen to Puffy...

@CynAq @JeremyMallin

With that type, it's only "politics" if they disagree with it.

@researchbuzz I have to wonder if they have considered fedi...

@JackMexa4 @bich @susiemagoo @blogdiva

My initial point still stands: WTF is wrong with these people, OMG.

@JackMexa4 @bich @susiemagoo @blogdiva

Except it also makes everything worse for everyone -- including them, just not as much.

Also, anyone who would vote for something just because [they think] it's good for them even if they know it's terrible for everyone else is still f‼️cked up.

@bich @JackMexa4 @susiemagoo @blogdiva

I haven't seen the quotes, but he's probably the Mirror Universe version of my feelings: wtf is wrong with white people? Why would anyone vote for that authoritarian pondscum in the GOP??

@dockers @vantablack

We use an old GoogTV (hand-me-down) that's too old to connect to its original servers properly -- I just leave it disconnected from the network and plug a Linux PC (also a hand-me-down, rescued from the clutches of Win11) into it for actually watching stuff.

...but even a modern smart TV would work for this: just don't give it internet access. ...no matter how bitterly it pleads.

(Also please remember that the Algorithmic Companion Viewing Rectangle does not have feelings and cannot speak.)

@solane @impermanen_

There already is some cooperation between moderators on different servers, but mastodon.social has never been much involved in that as far as I know. They are also closely tied to the team that develops the software, which has historically been resistant to (or at least avoidant of) suggestions towards fixing these problems.

What other servers did you try previously? I'd be interested in hearing more about your experiences, and specifically any details about what went wrong.

@solane Best wishes to you in that endeavor! Yes, the fediverse does have some issues to address. Problems are being solved, over time, but we do need to be more effective.

@impermanen_

@impermanen_

I'm inclined to put a large part of the blame on the (too few) mods at masto social, though the software design also has a lot to answer for.

Here at TootCat, for example, we fediblock assholes* and defederate from instances that won't moderate them. There are many other well-moderated instances available, too (many of them substantially larger than ours).

I'm very sorry @solane got harassed off -- and this is hardly the first instance of this I've heard about; it happens a lot, which is too much.

* the idiomatic kind, I mean; no offense internded to donkeybutts

@JackMexa4 @bich @susiemagoo @blogdiva

That may be what I saw.

@Cassandra Hmm, yes -- definitely a possibility, there.

It does seem to bring out their nurturing mama-bear instincts... but also unfortunately their "my child is perfect, how dare you criticize them!" feels.

@bich @susiemagoo @blogdiva

Oh, I missed that! I thought I saw elsewhere that they were still voting red (by a small margin) in this election -- but maybe I had the context wrong or something.

(Can't access the full article, unfortch.)

Later thought: could it be that the AI Bro hype is basically just creativity-envy? Like "now I can be as creative and fluent as all you artsy dweebs out there -- worship my tech or get smoked in my silicon dust and datacenter heat-waste!!"

@saramg

Now my head is trying to rewrite Ernie's "Letter L" song so he's singing about how lyrical and lovely coding can be, while Bert keeps coming up with things like "linking", "linter", and "line number".

RE: https://isdream.ing/@mookie/117574042863960572

I think this parallels what I was saying earlier about #LLMs encouraging people's worst, most conformist tendencies.

The battle is hardly new, but "AI" makes it worse.

@denebeim I always find myself falling back on curiosity and creativity* -- but I guess that's more of a "how (to want to live)" than a "why (to live)".

(*in alignment with a certain Arthur C. Clarke quote)