Yeah, legislation needs passed that any software on any device purchased or leased must be removable without voiding warranties or service contracts. That would go a long way towards making phones, computers, and other devices less invasive and actually privacy protected.

Luckily I already don’t trust the internet already and don’t go anywhere online without script blockers and I don’t open emails as a rule of thumb. I am sure it will be dangerous, but I am not relying on passive security already.

Ditto. They are stopping support, but I highly doubt they will just brick all Windows 10 machines. If they do, I will just throw Linux on a flash drive and boot from that to recover my data ahead of switching fully to Linux.

I remember seeing a leaked paper about them putting an omnipresent advertising ticket at the top of the screen that will be displayed regardless of full screen status. The only reason I can think that they are forcing this so hard is that a lot of their forced ad servicing plans are not possible to implement in earlier versions of Windows due to root level functionality that cannot be changed. I’m guessing things like direct injection of ads in running processes or that ticker.

Ads have no place in an OS, especially not as kernel level processes. If ads on the internet have taught us anything, it is that bad actors can inject malicious code directly into them without content servers or hosts knowing and compromise untold numbers of machines who just, let me check, rendered the ad.

Between the aggressive plans for in OS advertising and the privacy abolishing actions and policies with AI datascraping, I am done with MS. Windows 10 will be the last one of theit OS’s I run. If work needs me to do something on Windows, it will be on a virtual machine that I remote into.

This is a future proofing measure. With the enshittification of Windows there is a reasonably sizable share that is looking to migrate. Making an API/front end functional on the platform is just good business. I for one will be switching 95% to Linux the instant Microsoft acts on their patant for putting a mandatory advertising ticket on the screen. Literally the only thing I will use it for is programming things for work.

Reminds me of Rimworld and the fact that, if there is no other accessible entities on the map with a nutrition stat, children and animals will b-line for booze that raiders drop and get hammered. I can’t count the number of Muffalo, dogs, and cats that I have had which end up with an alcohol tolerance hedif out of nowhere.

I haven’t seen anyone mention Dark Cloud. Love that game.

My Steam Deck doesn’t even pass the benchmark. I play Rise on it at the best settings. I was kinda disappointed.

This is a momentous event. I only wish it had Red Alert 2 in it.

Thank you. All of these things are actually very well defined. Nazism, Fascism, Authoritarianism. These are not words that are just thrown around haphazardly and have no meaning. The ones who DO use them inappropriately are those whom they describe. It is a concerted effort to redefine or undefine them so there is no longer a word to describe them.

And this is the crux of the statement. Social contracts are group moral codes. The Nazis do not adhere to the terms of the contracts and thus are not protected by them.

By definition a legal framework is not a social contract. Technically there IS a social contract that we will agree to follow the laws, but not everyone does that one either. We violate speed limits, download media, burn crosses in front yards.

There are also many cases where laws do not cover the violations of a social contract. Slurs are protected speech under most circumstances, but that does not mean that there are no consequences to utilizing them in your vocabulary in public. You will never go to jail for it, but in using them you violate a social contract of tolerance, and thus the members of society around you should not tolerate your presence. If you pull a gun while using those slurs, that is a clear indicator that you intend harm, specifically on the people to whom the slurs refer. This violates the social contract of safety, which means that you are open to being harmed yourself by the members of the contract around you. They protect the safety of the members by preventing you from harming them. It is actually covered in the US laws and has been condoned by society. The “murder is wrong” tautology fails very quickly in the face of reality. Is it OK to kill someone who is actively raping an infant? How about if they have a knife to your partner’s or child’s throat? What about if they point a loaded gun at a crowd of unarmed protestors and are not a legally recognized peace officer? Your moral code determines where that line is, but everyone has a line. Do you condone Israel’s actions against the Palestinians? Let’s go for the good ole trolley problem. Do you pull the lever? Is that OK?

That would be “safety”. Just to be clear. And we do condone the harming and killing of those who mean to harm or kill us. Self defense laws, castle doctrine, capital punishment, etc.

I can see that point. I get the same thing sometimes when I casually defend social media companies censoring speech. That is why I usually do it like I did here; direct, verbose, and overtly unambiguous.

People do need to have an understanding that applying an ideal to all people does not mean that you condne the behavior of anyone in specific. I do, personally, hold the philosophy that social contracts need to be mutual and by nature cannot be applied ubiquitously. That is the essence and source of the Tolerance Paradox. That is the most easily digested version, but all social contracts hold the same paradox. Tolerance, compassion, inclusion, safety, etc. The only reason any of of them function is because we all agree on them. It is safe to drive becuse we all agree that that yellow line means we don’t cross it. We are safe standing on a subway platform because we all agree not to push each other onto the tracks. We are able to lead peaceful lives because we agree not to accost each other in public spaces. We are confident we can shop in stores, attend churches, spend time in parks, and move about in life because we include each other in our spaces.

Those who do not do these things forfeit the confidence they hold in those contracts. If you own a store or business and exclude some group, you should expect to be unwelcomed in the spaces of others. If you express hateful commentary or accost people, you should expect to be accosted and to not lead a life of peace. If you openly declare yourself as a threat to the health, wellbeing, and/or safety of other members of society, you are not owed any of those things. Period. That is the solution to the Social Contract Paradoxes. Those who are not party to them are not protected by them. It would be like if I signed a contract with a roofer to replace my roof and my neighbor started demanding they replace his roof too under my contract. They are not a party to the contract so they derive no benefit from the contract.

No, he is right. The only people ‘cosplaying’ Nazis are Nazis. If you are an actor on stage or film cast to play a Nazi then you are doing your job. If you don a SS pin and a swastika armband you are a fascist and actively advertising yourself as a threat to those around you (unless they look like you). This is “hate speech” which means that it is “free speech” and thus should be protected from government interference. It, on the other hand, can also fall under “fighting words” which are not protected. It all depends on context. In the context of a fascist wannabe dictator taking office who is openly promoting violence against minorities and showing blatant support of white supremacist groups like proud boys and KKK, it falls under the latter. It is also speech that removes ones self from the social contracts of “tolerance”, “compassion”, and “safety”. Just like any contract, the privileges and protections are only afforded to those who are a party to the contract. If someone goes out in a Nazi ‘cosplay’ and gets gunned down, beaten, savaged, spat on, or verbally assaulted they have no room to complain since they wore “speech” that said “I support or intend to do harm to those in my community and I am a threat.”

Send them a check? Money always helps.

Oh god, I “love” those people. Same as the guy who was pissed about how woke Rage Against the Machine had become. Like bruh… Seriously?!?

That first paragraph put me off from the article because it positioned the research on gaming violence as if there were a positive correlation instead of reporting that it is actually negatively correlated. It also did not mention the positive research that came from the studies on game playing and eye hand coordination and the many other benefits video games have been proven to have. The author made it sound like this was the first positive thing about video games.

And this is precicely why I mostly play indie titles made by individuals or small teams that are sold for under 10 bucks. Fuck this noise.