oxjox

The community around buying and selling gear and just watching awesome stuff pop up for sale regularly is one of the reasons I've stuck with the site for so long.

Other than FredMiranda, e$ay, Craigslist, I'm not sure what other options there are (I'm not on FB).

Is there any chance something like photomarket could pop up in the fediverse? What other sites are you trading on?

This is a rant.

It stems from the recent Joe Rogan comment about Biden which turned out to be Trump. I'm an indie-leaning "progressive" who found this to be an important moment to call out for everyone.

The video, summarized:
Joe Rogan is proved wrong when claiming Biden said "one of the problems about the Revolutionary War was that we didn't have enough airports". Rogan goes on, "If you had any other job, and you were talking like that, they'd go, 'you're done'". "It's just the media narrative..." Then the actual Biden video is pulled up for him showing that Biden is quoting Trump, "This is the same stable genius who said the biggest problem we had in the Revolutionary War was that we didn't have enough airports". "Is that fake?", Rogan says. Producer, "It's not fake, here's the video..." Trump, "our army manned the airports, it ran the ramparts, it took over the airports, it did everything it had to do." Rogan, "Oh, he fucked up.." His guest, "that's the thing about the media today, you gotta look into it."

My comment:

Is there a sub for instances like this where people say something about "the other side" only to be immediately shown that it was their "side" who said it?
This post is iconic should be pinned to the top of every social site.

Soon after, I received a message from r/JusticeServed (a sub I don't actively participate in) saying,

Hello, You have been permanently banned from participating in r/JusticeServed because you broke this community's rules. You won't be able to post or comment, but you can still view and subscribe to it.
Note from the moderators:
You have been banned for participating in a subreddit that has consistently shown to provide refuge for users to promote hate, violence and misinformation (joerogan).
This fully automated ban has been performed by a bot that cannot determine context. Appeals will be provided for good-faith users upon request. You can reply to this message and ask for an appeal. Any other messages will be ignored. More information on the appeal process here: https://www.reddit.com/r/JusticeServed/wiki/botbanned

My appeal did not include kind words. I called them out for being fascists and being part of the reason why Reddit has become a shithole. My appeal closed with asking not to be un-banned. Then I received this message,

We are willing to reverse the ban only if you plan to stop supporting the target subreddit. Regardless of context, contributions you provide to the target subreddit is a material form of support.
Posting, Commenting, and Voting in a subreddit or on an item is a signal to Reddit and their advertisers that the participant believes that the community or comment or post has a legitimate reason for existing and serves a purpose for them.
There is no place for hate, violence and purposeful disinformation on Reddit. Those sub's advertisers should not be rewarded for the traffic metrics you and your peers provide to them by showing up and inflating those numbers.
They don't care what you say. They are just happy to have you continue to show up and refresh the page.
If this is something you can accept, to stop participating in the target subreddit, then please reply. If the bot hits you again for the same subreddit, you will not be unbanned a second time.
If you don't want to stop helping the target sub and their advertisers, then you can just ignore this message.

I responded, in part, with a full throated 'you can go fuck yourself'. This lead to a harassment warning from Reddit. I also noted the sub's 'motto' - "Too many times justice fails to prevail. These are not those times." For fucking real. I had also pointed out that what they're doing is analogous to DeSantis banning me from entering Florida just because I live in Philadelphia.

Dear JusticeServed, this is called cutting off your nose to spite your face.

I mean, this is the kind of shit that makes people more sympathetic to Musk and Rogan. I am not in support of nationalism or racism or misinformation. What I am in support of is common fucking sense.

It's very likely that had I maintained my composure I would have had a successful appeal. I didn't want to appeal to be unbanned though, I wanted to bring attention to their hypocrisy.

https://www.reddit.com/r/JusticeServed/comments/10jxlfk/justiceserveds_2_million_subscriber_extravaganza/

With the overturning of Roe v Wade, we saw a couple of subreddits pinning mod endorsed celebration threads. Why anyone would want to celebrate people losing rights is beyond me.

Rights? What rights are you supporting, JusticeServed? Certainly not Freedom of Speech. Spying on people and censoring them for actions they take in other communities sounds a lot like fascism to me.

The take away here is that we shouldn't put so much emotional weight on stupid shit like this that ultimately doesn't matter in our real lives. And in our real lives, we should be more cautious with judging people. Your current mood and state of mind can easily cause you to misinterpret someone else's words and (re)actions. We should all be more mindful to take a breath before reacting to something emotionally triggering. And, of course, fuck Reddit.

For well over a week, I've been unable to sign into Lemmy.ml with Lemmios. I'm not having an issue with other apps like Memmy.

Without naming names, there's a well advertised grammar editing tool that's available either as an app download or browser extension. This is something I'd value for a number of reasons (good grammar is important!) but I'm super cautious about anything I'm giving permission to watch what I'm typing.

Ideally, I'd prefer to select text and have it analyzed on-demand using on-device intelligence. I'm on a Mac and it seems like Pages isn't cut out to check grammar. Also, there's no way in heck I'm paying $30 a month for a subscription.

Edit: I just want to acknowledge my request for something I'd value and then saying I don't want to pay for it. I would certainly pay for something if it met my needs but this function isn't something I'd personally value at $30 a month or any monthly subscription ($30 a year sounds reasonable). Moreover, if there's any suspicion of an application using my data for their own profit, they are not getting my money. So, in this case, for the sake of data privacy, I would prefer to pay for something (preferably once - grammar shouldn't need updating).

I was just watching some Headbangers Ball on Archive.org when the lyrics to this video by Queensryche struck me. I don't know that I ever heard this song before but I was around back then and recall plenty of "protest" / anti-government, anti-capitalist, anti-coldwar songs on the radio and MTV. It has me reflecting on the state of politics today and how things have shifted and twisted.

From 1988...

For a price I'd do about anything
Except pull the trigger
For that I'd need a pretty good cause
Then I heard of Dr. X
The man with the cure
Just watch the television
Yeah, you'll see there's something going on

Got no love for politicians
Or that crazy scene in D.C.
It's just a power mad town
But the time is ripe for changes
There's a growing feeling
That taking a chance on a new kind of vision is due

I used to trust the media
To tell me the truth, tell us the truth
But now I've seen the payoffs
Everywhere I look
Who do you trust when everyone's a crook?

Revolution calling
Revolution calling
Revolution calling you
Revolution calling
Revolution calling
Gotta make a change
Gotta push, gotta push it on through

I'm tired of all this bullshit
They keep selling me on T.V.
About the communist plan
And all the shady preachers
Begging for my cash
Swiss bank accounts while giving their
Secretaries the slam

They're all in Penthouse now
Or Playboy magazine, million dollar stories to tell
I guess Warhol wasn't wrong
Fame fifteen minutes long
Everyone's using everybody, making the sale

I used to think
That only America's way, way was right
But now the holy dollar rules everybody's lives
Gotta make a million doesn't matter who dies

Revolution calling
Revolution calling
Revolution calling you
Revolution calling
Revolution calling
Gotta make a change
Gotta push, gotta push it on through

I used to trust the media
To tell me the truth, tell us the truth
But now I've seen the payoffs
Everywhere I look
Who do you trust when everyone's a crook?

Revolution calling
Revolution calling
Revolution calling you
Revolution calling
Revolution calling
Gotta make a change
Gotta push, gotta push it on through

Gotta love the top comment, “If sincere, what a great move, and a great recognition of the need for preserving historical truth and solidarity.”

This might be the wrong place to ask this question but, as someone who has owned more Apple products that I could count, I'm interested in reducing my dependency on them (and tech, in general) moving forward.

A significant portion of my life has included spending time and money on devices and applications to "make my life easier / more productive". It's becoming all too apparent though that this has created a reliance on technology that can become difficult to separate from if a company, such as Apple, makes changes that are displeasurable or disruptive to the habits I've adopted my daily life.

I mean, my bluetooth trackpad is acting wonky right now, so that's not fun. Wired always works. Is there too much technology?

I am not a fan of having to keep a phone on me at all times. It's always in silent mode and visual notifications are kept to a minimum. I can and do sometimes go two to three days without even knowing where my phone is. If I leave the house, I more often just take my Apple Watch and a note pad. (However, with the realization that Apple is changing the Watch UX with OS10, I'm not so sure I'll be using it much longer.)

I'll go through my phone once in a while and delete apps I rarely use. If I need something, I can easily reinstall it. The only things I really need a phone for are Maps for navigation, Safari to open a restaurant's menu, to manage my Apple Wallet, to get a Lyft, to view my Fitness / Health info, and to access an MFA Authenticator app.

After my Apple TV, my iPad is probably my most used device, closely followed by my Mac mini. (I have a MacBook for work - I don't consider that part of this conversation.) Thinking about it though, I could probably eliminate the iPad in favor of the desktop experience. Since there is not Finder replacement on iPad, I need a MacOS computer to mange my music, photos, files, etc. Although, I hate sitting at a desk more than I need to already for work. If ~~MacOS~~ Finder were available on an iPad, I might be able to ditch a desktop computer.

I just checked Screen Time on my phone - I'm averaging about 1 Hour / Week. My iPad is about 4 Hours / Week. Why do I even have these devices?

So, my problem is that I need(?) each of these devices for just a small handful of tasks. Stepping back from it, it feels stupid that I have all this crap. It's a lot of money spent and it's a lot of opportunity for something to break my daily habits. Although, speaking of habits, I have to admit I feel an addiction to these things that prevents me from getting rid of them.

Aren't we all addicted to out devices? Are we actively encouraging or reducing our dependency on technology and what affect does this have on our mental well being?

I'm wondering if anyone has taken steps to replace or eliminate devices or experiences. How are you living a minimalist technology life?

For example, I'm on Lemmy.ml and I've joined [email protected], [email protected], and [email protected]. In this example, it's not very different from the number of similar groups on Flickr but, in comparison to Reddit, it seems like the decentralized platform can be a little unruly.

How are you going about joining different communities and managing your engagement? Are you only participating on the community on your instance? Are you joining and posting in as many instances that seem relevant?

When I followed the instructions shown when selecting "Set up 2-factor authentication", there's a pop-up that says to reload the page. When I did that I was immediately signed out and was unable to log back in without a 2FA key.

Click 'Save', then manually reload this page, scroll down and use the '2FA installation link' to obtain the oath URL for your authenticator.

I admit to spending too much time on Reddit during my work day as a distraction. It's a problem. What's worse is that Reddit has become so full of uninteresting content that I spend most of my time downvoting things that aren't at all relevant to the sub they're posted in. And with a lot of the front page subs being offline, the experience is dreadfully worse.

Reddit is barely any different from any other social media platform now. People just want to argue for the sake of arguing and getting hive mind support without any interest in the relevance or context of the original post (ie., no one reads the articles). Reddit has an algorithm just like any other social media platform to push engaging content to the top so they can get more ad revenue. I've been saying it for years now, Reddit is trash. But damn is it addictive.

I'm thankful for Lemmy and KBin and Mastodon (and my RSS reader) for providing interesting, relevant, chronologically posted content with a minimal amount of dilution. I don't spend as much time here but it serves the purpose of informing and entertaining me for a five minute work break without the frustration of "being social media".