DragonofKnowledge

joined 8 months ago
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DefundFascism
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Important question in c/memes@lemmy.world
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 weeks ago

Sweet potato Onion Rings Curly Tots Shoestrings Wedges Waffle Zigzag.

Tots might be lower on the list, but I found they can work surprizingly well in some lazy microwave meals I make, so they get extra points for ease and dependability.

Discussion - Potential piefed instance in the future? in c/div0_governance@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 weeks ago

Ah. In that case, why not?

Thank you, Thor! 🥳 in c/games@lemmy.world
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

That's a pretty interesting idea. Unfortunately it depends on being somewhere where copyrights ever actually end.

Discussion - Potential piefed instance in the future? in c/div0_governance@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Seems like it would be a lot more work and potential attack surface for what's essentially redundant.

Also seeing other comments, I'm out of the loop. What's so bad about the lemmy devs?

Thank you, Thor! 🥳 in c/games@lemmy.world
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 26 points 2 weeks ago (5 children)

I know it's not going to happen, but I would love it if legislation could go as far as requiring companies to open-source their engines and servers after maybe a period of time, or on ending support for the game. It could be done ID-style where the company retains full rights of the content and trademarks, which would still require players to buy the game to legally play it.

I'm aware there are a lot of cases where games include middleware that's licensed from 3rd parties that complicate preservation efforts. But if open-sourcing the code is the path taken, there's a simple solution for that: just release what you can, even if what's released is in an unplayable state without the middleware. It then becomes the responsibility of any volunteers to take that code and bring it back to a usable state however they choose.

This drama highlights that there's still a great need for better computer literacy. Anyone with even a basic education in how software, source-code, and software licensing works can tell PirateSoftware is full of shit pretty much immediately. That is, anyone educated who are themselves not grifters.

Minnesota police search for suspect after Democratic lawmaker shot dead and another wounded in c/news@lemmy.world
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 points 1 month ago

I hope this guy is caught, arrested, and prosecuted. I have no doubts his mind is full of the whole spectrum of maga christofascist psychosis, and I hope we get to see all of that on full display.

The more awareness the country has of how deeply disturbed, and corrupt, Christian fundamentalism is, the better.

218
It's the Gulf of Mexico. (lemmy.dbzer0.com)
 
Is anyone planning on doing anything about trump creating a concentration camp at guantanamo bay? in c/nostupidquestions@lemmy.world
1
It won't be enough alone, but we can start learning how to stop letting our funds go to Trump and his supporters. (lemmy.dbzer0.com)
 

As a start, here's the companies known to have supported Trump's presidential campaign.

https://www.opensecrets.org/2024-presidential-race/donald-trump/contributors?id=N00023864

I'm sure there are more. Let's start figuring out who all we need to stop supporting. We need to also identify alternatives, and then put this all together so that everyone possible has a comprehensive guide for boycotting everyone who is supporting this administration.

1
Tech’s shift to Trump: all the companies and execs kissing the ring (www.theverge.com)
What you rather? in c/linuxmemes@lemmy.world
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 8 months ago

I have a PC with a version of Ameliorated Windows 10 on it. At a glance the project seemed promising, but then after install it did this thing where the lockscreen background is supposedly a blurred picture of the guy who made it. No matter how much I dug through the settings apparently I, as the owner of my PC, do not have high enough admin privileges to get rid of that despite my account being the administrator...? Pretty sus.

On top of that the update process takes more effort, so I haven't updated the system in literally years. The whole situation overall leaves me unable to trust my own computer, but even that feels more trustworthy than the default Windows-is-malware experience.

Next time I turn that PC on will be to install Debian.

What should we expect will be censored or banned under Trump? Should archives of these things be put together to protect access? in c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
[–] DragonofKnowledge@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 8 months ago (2 children)

This is a good point. I was also thinking that alternatives to the internet itself might become more important. We need more meshnets.

159
A Short List of Links to Remind that Free File Sharing, Including Piracy, is Good (lemmy.dbzer0.com)
 

Tl;dr: skip to the bottom for links.

I originally posted this here, and linked to it in a subreddit where evidently a community of pirates hates piracy.

This post is intended specifically for the retro gaming communities, though it's applicable for anything related to information sharing. In these spaces there's a strange kind of self-harm going on circa 2024, in which a nontrivial amount of people(sock puppets?) are fomenting anti-piracy sentiment, and defending aggressive industry juggernauts, as if these corporations aren't actively harming and seeking to eliminate these very same communities.

This is strange since retro gaming is all but founded and completely dependent on the free sharing of information and culture, which often includes piracy for better or worse. The word 'retrogaming' is nearly synonymous with emulation. It used to be that older games would rarely, if ever, be preserved on new systems. Even to this day there are still many games considered to be "abandonware". It's arguable that the growth of emulation - and piracy that most often accompanies it - played and plays a critical role in the renaissance of both indie retro-styled games, as well as the plethora of classic games which have officially had re-releases.

Ironically even as these behemoths are actively trying to destroy emulation, many companies have chosen the lazy route of using emulators to re-release their classic games, rather than making the extra effort to either open-source the classic engines or port the source material themselves.

As a sidenote, here is a list of legal video game engine recreations and source ports, however many of these do require you to own a copy of the original game to make use of them.

What it comes down to is that they don't want to compete. With a retro handheld I can suddenly have access to thousands of games either through native ports, emulation, or open projects like PortMaster. What's even better is that I can trust that whatever other computer hardware I decide to use in the future - whether PC, single-board computers, Android devices, or the plethora of retro console and handhelds flooding the markets these days - I can preserve and bring all of the content I already own into all of these devices and keep playing without a hitch.

Importantly, these communities enable the wonderful world of romhacking - free sharing of info, whether legally sanctioned or not - is a benefit for creators as well as consumers, and can easily be a gateway for the latter to grow into the former.

By contrast what the game console racket wants is to scam you into buying the same games you've already purchased over, and over again, through planned obsolescence, ignoring the environmental impact of these awful business models.

They want to leverage proprietary software and weaponize copyright law to eliminate competition and keep their users in a walled garden, where the entire experience is controlled from top to bottom by them. Their business strategies are dependent on the de-legitimization and elimination of the free sharing of information and culture.

Piracy is only bad for those who want to horde wealth and build monopolies.

If you're a content creator or someone who aspires to create, you might feel like piracy is a danger to you. My hope is that if you read everything linked in this post, you might come to recognize that the free sharing of information can do the opposite - it can be an asset to your career. At a glance the Free and Open-Source Software movements are living proof of this. There is no need to remain attached to a Faustian pact.