thrawn

joined 2 years ago
[–] thrawn 2 points 3 days ago

Aight I haven’t seen those threads but I’m guessing it’s about how he resets to a day or two before he was given the power by the alpha?

That’s a very fair thing to wonder. I wouldn’t expect the power to work if the omega was dead. I assumed plot convenience but maybe others were more curious.

[–] thrawn 20 points 2 weeks ago

After some recent events I read Zero Fail: The Rise and Fall of the Secret Service. It includes bit on how well trained, extremely prepared USSS agents were unable to stop a single practice gunman whose identity they knew. All variables were in their favor and they were far more competent than hired security will be. I’ve included an excerpt at the end.

Corporate security will not stop someone willing to go to jail or die for it, such as someone terminally ill and fucked by their insurance. Media puff pieces overstating security effectiveness— spread through outlets owned by the ultra wealthy— would be far more effective in preventing another event like this. Presumably the more people that know, the more emboldened they would be to repeat this heartbreaking, earth-shattering tragedy. Which would just be terrible. Certainly I would be horrified and thus suggest suppressing this info. We should be spreading how corporate security is infallible to protect heroes like Mr. Thompson’s peers so they can continue to be upstanding members of society.

“In the wake of the Wallace shooting, the Service conducted more frequent and intensive drills on how to handle different kinds of attackers on a rope line. Agents and officers practiced over and over, playing the roles of detail agents and spectators on either side of the line. The drill instructor warned the agents ahead of time that a person in the crowd would play the role of the shooter and approach the principal with a gun. The drill instructor even pointed out who that person was.

“The agents were told who had a weapon,” said one former agent. “And the guys are working the rope line and they’re constantly looking at this guy waiting for the moment when he’s going to pull the gun. They know who it is.”

Agents swiveled their heads back and forth from the spectators in front of them to the mock gunman in the crowd. They tried to anticipate his move and readied themselves for the fastest dive or lunge. No matter how many times they did the drill, the result was the same. “They never once stopped him before two shots,” the former agent said.”

[–] thrawn 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I’ve heard it characterized that Japan has been in the early 2000s since the 80s. At first ahead, but now behind with less than expected development economically, societally, and in some ways technologically.

I’m just a foreigner and do not understand the culture well enough to be writing this comment, but reading “stagnant” didn’t surprise me much.

[–] thrawn 4 points 1 month ago

A lot of people like Kreia from KOTOR2 but Revan will always have my heart. My favorite SW character, though canon trilogy Thrawn probably ties.

I started reading some of the books again a couple years ago and every time Bane or Tenebrous think about Revan, I always smile a little inside. Greatest Sith Lord in my eyes.

[–] thrawn 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] thrawn 9 points 1 month ago

Yep. I love high quality food and spend a lot of time learning to copy from chefs I like. I’m very selective about ingredients (e.g. fish, only so much is flown in daily and accessible to normies), often make my own sauces, and have a pretty large collection of dinnerware and lacquerware for accurate plating.

Yet like clockwork, several times a year I will eat multiple McRib patties in a single sitting. That shit has presumably the worst ingredients, the same sauce as every other year slathered inconsistently, and is presented in a cardboard box that has definitely gotten thinner. It is in no way worth anywhere near the price but I do it anyway.

Sometimes slop hits the spot. Plus I can’t make my own heavily processed slabs of… whatever those things contain.

[–] thrawn 3 points 1 month ago

He wrote Fant4stic, XXX: State of the Union, and Dark Phoenix. I think there’s a higher chance of him getting this trilogy than we think.

[–] thrawn 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah, I’m very impressed. Which original movie btw, 84 or 07? I’ve heard both referred to as the first

[–] thrawn 25 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It’s not about winning Iowa so much as it is a reflection of national climate. Though Selzer is historically far more accurate than Emerson.

Here’s a comment about why Selzer is a standout in the context of Trump’s previous elections.

Here’s my comment on the same thread which includes [Nate Silver’s writeup] (https://www.natesilver.net/p/theres-more-herding-in-swing-state) on why other pollsters are less reliable right now due to herding. Emerson is the second worst herder on his list.

Now I agree, it seems rather unlikely she wins Iowa. Selzer’s numbers leave room for a narrow Harris loss. I just wanted to provide context on why this poll is vastly more significant than Emerson’s. If she hasn’t made a massive mistake, the national climate is much more Harris friendly than it feels. I won’t let myself be optimistic over this, but it makes it a lot harder to be pessimistic.

[–] thrawn 12 points 1 month ago

From Nate Silver’s write up on this poll:

Yesterday, I complained about how so many pollsters are “herding” by publishing results that are almost an exact tie in a way that is incredibly statistically improbable given the unavoidable sampling error from surveying a small number of voters. I also noted a handful of prominent exceptions — rouge pollsters like the New York Times/Siena College that practically exist in an entirely different universe and imply a much bigger political realignment.

Another such maverick is Ann Selzer of Selzer & Co. (Selzer and NYT/Siena are our two highest-rated pollsters.) As my former colleague Clare Malone wrote in 2016, Selzer — like NYT/Siena — has a long history of bucking the conventional wisdom and being right. In a world where most pollsters have a lot of egg on their faces, she has near-oracular status.

Emphasis mine. While polls were decently off in 2016 and 2020, Selzer’s were not, and reflected a significant underestimate of Trump by nearly every other pollster. This poll suggests Harris is being underestimated. If Selzer is correct, Harris wins very comfortably.

It’s hard to explain how unexpected this result is. Harris proponents like myself were hoping for Trump +8-9 or less, which would correlate to a Harris win in the electoral college. You can still see this on r/fivethirtyeight from the bad site. I’m not optimistic and my best hope was Trump +7. People misread this as Trump +3 and were still celebrating. Headlines aren’t exaggerating here: this is a truly shocking poll. If the real result is even Trump +5, he is likely to have lost handily. If this is as accurate as Selzer has been since 2012, he will have lost in a true landslide. (Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, of course.)

I’ll link again Silver’s article on herding because it makes a strong case that most polls are not currently reliable due to self-preservation. Selzer releasing these results is not a self preserving move and would be a large pockmark on her otherwise “near-oracular” record.

You can scroll through my history and see that I am not an optimistic person. I initially assumed a Harris loss before Biden dropped out because RFK was still polling too well, a traditional indicator of loss when dropping incumbent status. I was pleased with her upward momentum— and still am, she deserves a great deal of credit for an excellent campaign— but she has always been the underdog in my mind. This is the most positive sign I’ve seen all season. It helps that Siena’s most recent PA poll was also quite positive at Harris +4 if I recall.

I’m too worried to be hopeful, but this has made it harder to doom. It’s so unexpected that I take it with a grain of salt, but if she’s even half right, things are a lot better than they feel.

[–] thrawn 1 points 1 month ago

I’ve heard a few others say the same! Glad to see this movie bringing others in. Transformers has some great stories and visuals, and even at its worse, robot cars are cool so it can’t be that bad!

[–] thrawn 1 points 1 month ago

Glad to hear! It really is a struggle but it’ll be worth it.

22
submitted 3 months ago by thrawn to c/transformers
 

So I saw that first trailer and wrote the whole movie off.

Months later, amidst the shockingly positive reception, I was curious enough to see it for myself. And damn, it’s actually pretty great and I saw it twice. Being a Transformers fan can be hard with the inconsistent quality, and I’m still surprised they pulled off a great animated movie where the robots were the sole focus. It also had many lore elements I’d long wanted to see on the big screen, which I won’t spoil.

I think casual and longtime fans alike would enjoy it. Given the current underperformance, I’m not holding out for a sequel, but I’m damn pleased we got this one at all. I’ll forever be grateful to the cast and crew for bringing Orion Pax and D-16 into theaters.

149
Just some appreciation (self.voyagerapp)
submitted 3 months ago by thrawn to c/voyagerapp
 

It always brings happiness when I see a Voyager update. Thanks @[email protected] for continuing to work on the app. Couldn’t imagine Lemmy without it.

 

Clinton is a ready-made replacement. She possesses an unparalleled resume and an unmatched depth of experience. She has consistently redefined the roles she has served, from secretary of State and U.S. senator to first lady and Children’s Defense Fund attorney. Her extensive background in domestic and international affairs is not just impressive; at a time when global politics are increasingly volatile and complex, her experience is priceless. Her continued advocacy for children’s rights and health care—a topic of ever-increasing importance post-pandemic—adds another layer of appeal.

 

First, thanks again for making this app. It’s excellent and I’m always impressed when I use it.

I have an unusual and possibly niche feature request inspired by Alien Blue: swiping forwards and backwards from any edge. So from the left edge you can swipe right as if to go back, but reverse the motion and go forwards instead. And vice versa. It feels like using momentum to navigate either way with a single finger. Discord also had this feature until the mobile app redesign.

Video example here, it says it’ll expire in two days but I don’t know where else to put it. This allows for satisfying operation and one handed browsing, such as when vigorously masturbating to tech news.

I understand if this is too niche to add, it’s merely something I’ve wanted every app to have since AB. Thanks for reading!

Ps, I would also appreciate an option to put the vote buttons on the left. Years of AB then Apollo have gotten me quite used to that, and maybe left handed people would appreciate it. No rush on either of these if you choose to work on them, I’ve been meaning to ask for both of these since the days of web app only. I actually meant to ask Apollo’s dev for the swipe thing too, back when it released in the App Store, but didn’t interact much back on reddit and never got around to it.

 

So the Ahsoka show has come and gone and I didn’t much care for it. I rather forgot how little I cared for Thrawn’s characterization because the rest of the show was, in my opinion, somehow worse than even the butchering (again imo) of Thrawn.

Nonetheless I remain less than impressed at what they have done, and I am beginning to worry that Filoni’s film will be a solid stinker that joins the rest of Disney’s current critical and commercial slump. I also hope Zahn is unbothered out there and not disappointed that they threw out six books of characterization.

Equally I’m sad we’ll never get the Thrawn/Ezra ally dynamic against the Grysk, that the Asdendancy crisis is likely out the window, and about the chance that we do not ever get books again. Zahn’s current characterization of Thrawn is so removed from Filoni’s that more books would probably be seen as at odds with the TV version. Well, not that Lucasfilm leadership much cares about readers’ opinions.

A bleak post but those are some of my thoughts. It’s been a while since the show ended and it was (imo) so bad that I didn’t really care about what they did to Thrawn, but now that I’m reflecting on it, I’m not the biggest fan.

2
submitted 1 year ago by thrawn to c/thrawn
 

While this was resoundingly the expectation, I will admit some sadness that all of Zahn’s new characterization of Thrawn is being discarded in favor of an Heir redux. I’m glad Filoni is getting to live out his dream of Ahsoka’s story, I just wish it didn’t come at the expense of Zahn’s character, who he no doubt cared for much as Filoni cares for Ahsoka.

It was wise of Zahn to make his continuation of the story— Thrawn and Ezra teaming up— known. I imagine he knew what was coming.

The saddest part is that Thrawn’s entire characterization and purpose will likely never be completed, and the book series (where Thrawn truly lives, as film cannot delve into the thoughts of him and his crew) may end at Ascendancy.

Maybe I’m jumping the gun and they’ll get it right, but it doesn’t seem likely.

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