There was an interesting video I saw online that was saying the final boss’s theme is interesting because it’s a piano piece for two players. The boss’s theme in it is very static, and the other, presumably yours, is more dynamic. Fits with the hollowing static world

I remember ICQ being better in every way I cared about, except I couldn’t get people to use it. (offline messaging, you could change your display name without making a new account, other stuff I forget). Kind of like trying to get people to use fediverse stuff now, I guess.

Who has money to spend on a subscription?

Also even when I had money, I don’t want to keep buying the game every month. It’s stressful, and sometimes I like playing other things.

Many people are just scared all the time. No one’s smart when they’re scared. The body doesn’t let you. They think the police will protect them.

Right wing media is largely to blame. And segregation and under funded education, public spaces. And suburbs + car culture isolating everyone.

Pretty much every right wing idea is bad.

Apparently about 40% of adults get insufficient sleep, if the CDC is to be trusted. That’s pretty bad.

I started setting an alarm for myself to go to bed. Now I have better sleep habits. I used to stay up too late, but then I’d be in a brain fog the next day and it sucked. An extra hour of video game isn’t worth the following day and its video games sucking.

When people talk about their income they usually talk about gross, which is pre-tax. When someone says “I make $100k a year” they don’t typically mean they take home net $100k.

Investments are typically also only taxed when you realize the gains, so if you have $3mm and “earn” $300k, you only pay taxes if you sell some of that. Other interest, like from a high yield savings, is taxed as income.

Health insurance is a nightmare, but there are options in this hellscape for buying it. Many poor people are also just uninsured, so you’re not much worse off than them in this scenario.

Did you have any details you wanted to talk about, or did you just want to try to be pithy?

It is kind of fucked up that if you’re even mildly rich, you essentially get basic income.

If you have $1 million, a fairly conservative investment strategy will get you $100k per year. That’s about the median income for NYC. You’ll probably get closer to $150k, since vanguard usually gets about 15% returns. That’s just sticking the money in Vanguard and doing nothing else. Sit at home playing final fantasy and “earn” more than a teacher.

If you’re richer, but not even mega-rich, say $3 million, you can put it in an *insured high yield savings and take home $135,000 a year. Or diversify, put some in vanguard, some in bonds, and some in high yield savings. You’ll “earn” more than many people do at their jobs.

You could then just do what you want with your days. Write a book. Finish your backlog of games. Start a band. Whatever you want. You’d be free.

I want everyone to have basic income, not just the rich.

People are emotional creatures. Some people are almost exclusively driven by emotions. Amusingly, it’s usually the right wing saying “facts don’t care about your feelings”, because everything from them is projection

Nice! I installed Mint on someone’s old MacBook recently and so far so good. No complaints.

When Facebook or openai or whoever is like “oh we didn’t mean for this consequence of our decisions” is that supposed to be an acquittal? If you make a machine that shoots rusty nails out sometimes, and you know this, and it kills people, that’s still some sort of crime or civil suit.

If I’m out of my home for a day my cat comes running to the door meowing when I return. Then he paces around for a while, but if I sit on the couch he’ll join me.

It’s not equating it with Auschwitz! You said, quote, There is no line in finding a job. No line! That’s a bold claim! So I picked a very extreme example to demonstrate that there, hopefully, is a line. It’s not equating AI to Auschwitz. It’s saying that your claim, that there is no line and you should work any job for money, is false. Once we establish that, we can then go into details about AI and where that falls. Please. Please understand how this line of reasoning works. We weren’t even talking about AI specifically yet in this sub-thread.

Your entire group’s reaction to my post was one of attack and derision, so I am well aware of where you all stand wrt to empathy.

This is funny because your opening here was calling us idiots in an echo chamber.

That wasn’t the argument nor the question. The question is where do you draw the line. I gave an extreme example I assumed is on the far side of your line. Once we have that, we can do like a binary search and try to find it. Come on, man.

Usually when I see traffic, I’m on the train looking out the windows feeling very smug

There is no line in finding a job, it’s an existential need

There is no line? Absolutely nothing? You would work at an Auschwitz styled concentration camp for food money?

So anything, no matter how foolish or evil, is acceptable so long as “the market” desires it? Complaining about it makes you a dumbass?

Or are there things that should be pushed back on? What is the line?

Also, is it “sheer stubbornness” is a collection of concerns and objections grounded in facts and experience?

I think some people will reject criticism by calling someone a hater. Like, if you point out legitimate concerns about their favorite game or movie they’ll say “you’re just a hater” so they don’t have to do the emotionally challenging work of considering flaws in their favored things.

We’re all emotional creatures and things like the backfire effect affect us all, but some people seem exclusively emotion driven

You are breaking the internet with this non sense.

I think that’s their goal. Conservative types benefit when people have limited access to information

When I was a cashier they recommended we not do this kind of thing, because there are some fast-talk scams people will do to get more money. Like they’ll give you more money, say something confusing, take the money back, and then you give them the extra change, except more sophisticated than that.

Could be, but that’s immature and unattractive. You’re better off not throwing in with someone who’s unwilling to be vulnerable