@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

Rycaut

@Rycaut@mastodon.social

Entrepreneur & Product Manager - currently looking for new opportunities. Likely starting a Fediverse related business to host, manage and extend instances for businesses and organizations. Writer and GM

https://calendly.com/rycaut to schedule meetings with me

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

anirvan, to random
@anirvan@mastodon.social avatar

I’m helping a friend write an obituary for a family member, and I’m trying to figure out what a good obituary would even look like. I’d appreciate suggestions, advice, or starting points.

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@anirvan I had to write an obituary and a memorial for my dad a few years ago. For the obit my first goal was to get all the details right (not misspell any of his siblings etc) but then I had to speak to the many different communities who knew my father most of which did not overlap. And keep in mind that today an online obituary often stays online for years after many other online traces of the deceased have gone I summarized his important activities and connections. The memorial was personal

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

To this I would add there is a deep danger to the idea that there is just one answer to any given search. Most searches I make I want MANY sources and I want to see lots of different takes. I don’t want one store for a given product - I want to know who carries it, their availability, price, perhaps for many things sizes, colors, condition etc. for many others I want many views. I don’t want one review of a restaurant (or book or film or app) I want many perspectives
https://mastodon.social/@elizayer/112522378127619110

coffeegeek, to AeroPress
@coffeegeek@flipboard.social avatar

Going over our AeroPress coverage, we forgot to do a followup on the AeroPress XL (I promised a second blog post covering the day to day use of the brewer). One thing that's interesting to note is, the XL version has dropped $10 in price since I wrote this article last year.

cc @coffee

https://coffeegeek.com/blog/new-products/the-aeropress-xl-is-here-worth-the-wait/

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@coffeegeek @coffee in your AeroPress clear review the link to your coverage the inverted brewing method seems to be broken (goes to a page that is clearly not that article but some version of a 404 type page). As I am unfamiliar with that method I was curious. I have two (older) Aeropress's but clearly do something wrong when using them as I find them just ok (and the rubber has gotten really sticky) - always find I have to add lots of water & never really get a vacuum as it flows thru quickly

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@coffeegeek (removing the group) - thanks! Great article - until I get a metal filter and am brave enough to try that method, do you have a guide to just how to use the AeroPress most effectively? I suspect that I've been doing something wrong for years when I use it as what I get from it is just ok, not bad, but inconsistent, definitely takes less time than the instructions suggest (as the water seems to come thru the filter very very quickly). I have an electric kettle and a burr grinder

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@coffeegeek thanks! I think my aeropresses are pre-2014 models but I have to check so might not work but may be time to replace them anyway.

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

Legit dream job for many people I know - designer for LEGO.

(Note this posting I think is for their “talent pool” so may not be an active opening)

I have no connection with LEGO other than as a lifelong customer (and now father of a serious fan - we have eh a lot. No probably more than you are envisioning of LEGOs - all mine from my childhood plus 10000’s more)

LEGO Group LinkedIn Posting. https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/3936109204

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

latest example of gmail failures amongst the usual false positives in my spam folder (about 5% of messages Gmail flags as spam are not, in fact, spam) was a rather annoying one to have been marked as spam - the confirmation/welcome email sent to me about my son's summer camp registration. Not a bulk mailing list (which gmail likes to flag as spam even for lists I've been subscribed to for literally decades) but a personalized email with time sensitive information. Sigh.

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

Learned today that someone I have met many times and many friends know well the writer Ellen Klages was on Jeopardy this week. Has anyone been both an answer (either directly or their work) on Jeopardy as well as being a contestant?

And yup Google is useless (decided I wanted to know who had been on both wheel of fortune and jeopardy. Why? No clue but every result it showed me was about wheel of fortune - something I did not ask about in the least.

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

Thinking about assumed context due to a post a friend shared (on FB). A meme like post about “two ways GenX counts” which assumes that all GenX kids grew up watching kids television shows so everyone counts to the tune of one or the other of the popular kids shows of the era (late 1970’s/early 1980’s)

Except I am GenX and don’t count in either way. In fact I heard one of the songs for the first time minutes ago having lived nearly 50 years without hearing the sesame st ladybug counting song

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

Indeed. The biggest donations my family makes every year are to food banks. I live in San Jose CA, one of the richest areas of the country. My local food bank, Second Harvest serves one in five people in their service areas - that’s over 500,000 people each month. And that is in one of the very wealthiest communities in the country.

(And here in CA public school meals are free for every student)
https://mefi.social/@MissConstrue/112493550147884531

bojo, to random
@bojo@mastodon.online avatar

does anyone have opinions on having your masto account on large, generalized instances vs. smaller, more niche instances?

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@bojo as long as both servers you are choosing beteeen have solid moderation (so are unlikely to be blocked by other servers for hosting bad actors/spam etc) your Mastadon experience will mostly be dictated by who you follow. Some servers might run either software other than Mastadon core or make changes to it (like allowing posts longer than 500 characters) which some people like/prefer.

For a great experience I recommend following a bunch of interesting people - and then watch who they boost

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

Many years ago before my father died he was working on a startup idea for a closed loop water cooling system for factories. It’s complex and he was a the engineer not I but it makes me curious when I read all these reports of the extreme water usage of many data centers for cooling (often at times of year when other uses of municipal water are high as well) and it makes me wonder why I don’t see anyone trying closed loop system that wouldn’t need to draw (or discharge) much water?

anirvan, to random
@anirvan@mastodon.social avatar

Kindle? Kobo? Apple Books?

What’s the best, or maybe most ethical, ebook platform?

(I rarely reread books, so long-term ownership isn’t a factor for me)

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@anirvan they have an active presence here - @libreture offers a drm free place to store ebooks onljne and they promote a lot of places to buy drm free ebooks. So they are a good option to explore whatever client you use to read the ebooks. Many libraries have one or more services they offer to anyone with a local card which can also be a great source for ebooks (and libraries pay often more than individuals for their ebooks)

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

So had an email this morning from one of my favorite bookstores anywheee. Seemed possibly ominous “A message from …”

But as a reminder of why they are an amazing bookstore - it was to announce the formation and recogniation of the booksellers union with the support of the management and board of directors of the bookstore (which is itself a non-profit and former co-op)

So congrats to the Seminary Co-op Booksellers Union) and I’m a proud former co-op member (http://semcoop.com)

Alex, to random
@Alex@vran.as avatar

So I noticed that the "now playing" info on the KEXP website comes from a paginated API endpoint that let's you see previously played songs as well as the currently playing track.

It was kinda neat to poke at it to see how far back I could go. You could just keep rewinding to see all the tracks that aired going pretty far back.

And just how far back was that? 2,650,000 tracks, all the way back to 2005.

I love finding little secret info holes like this. I scraped all that data up to play with.

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@Alex that’s awesome. I suspect that KCRW in LA has similarly deep digital archives but haven’t poked around. They have shows listed as available on demand that haven’t aired in many many years. (Really great public radio station with amazing streaming options and in the midst of a pledge drive)

inthehands, to random
@inthehands@hachyderm.io avatar

Windows Recall…just…good god.

The phrase “Microsoft jumped the shark” just doesn’t feel strong enough. Can we say Microsoft fucked the shark?

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@inthehands it’s so bizarrely dumb. All kinds of tech put to such a horrifically bad purpose. Even beyond now being the target for any external bad actor, anyone who shares your physical space, lawyers who now have an incredible target for discovery it serves next to no actual useful purpose. And when it does the actual value is minuscule compared to the risks it introduces.

And I can only imagine government agencies and corporations CTO and CISO’s looking at this and saying nope nope nope

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@capraobscura @inthehands exactly. The closest I’ve ever come to wanting some history is with FB being so eh “helpful” these days and refreshing the FB app to a random newsfeed of stuff they pushed at me days ago when I had clicked into a post a friend shared but hadn’t finished reading it… but it took me all of eh 2 mins to find that friend’s feed and find the link again and then open it into an external browser.

But on my laptop nope never had a need and MacOS actually has solid local search

Rycaut, to random
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

What tool(s) do other GMs or game designers/writers use to make the first draft of a new adventure? Especially for your prep to run it for a group for the first time?

(I’m about to shift from mostly running published adventures to likely largely running homebrew with occasional published content) for my 5e group that are all now level 10 (and functionally stronger than a typical 5 pc group)

Considering using Scrivener but open to other (MacOS compatible) suggestions

waldoj, to random
@waldoj@mastodon.social avatar

I just called Brightspeed (formerly CenturyLink) to cancel my voice service. They cancelled my entire Internet connection, which disconnected instantly. Can’t they turn it back on? Heavens, no. A technician will have to come out tomorrow and replace the modem and I have no phone or internet until then, just a wisp of a cell signal.

They’re just the worst damned company. And they’re a monopoly here! I have zero recourse. Argh.

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@waldoj and this is the type of stuff that companies had to be pushed and prodded into doing. But in the end having done it (and it being mandated for all providers) means they almost certainly have an easier sales cycle, happier customers, reduced customer service costs (from customer calling to cancel/complain about deceptive marketing/pricing) and it hopefully incentivizes investments in improving availability and quality of service vs marketing due to high churn

ajroach42, to random
@ajroach42@retro.social avatar

Dungeons and Dragons:

https://archive.org/details/dungeons-dragons-1983

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@ajroach42 that’s a show I have fond memories of when I caught it as a kid (we didn’t have a tv until I was practically in high school so missed out on a lot) but I’m almost afraid to watch it now - curious how well it holds up. In my memories the humor was fairly tame (funny but not full of stereotypes etc) but it was also the 1980’s when I watched it…

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@ajroach42 that’s good to hear. My memories are it was great but it’s also been probably over 30 years since I watched any of it.

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@ajroach42 I just might. Though I don’t have a lot of time for watching things. I’m probably going to watch some of the old dungeons and dragons cartoon in honor of it being the 50th year of D&D

futurebird, (edited ) to random
@futurebird@sauropods.win avatar

Hydroponic ultra ripe vertically farmed strawberries are very popular in NYC but flown in from Japan. Restaurants buy them at $2 per berry (not even big ones) they are very good— but do you know what’s more fancy than Japanese vertically farmed berries? LOCAL ONES. Why don’t we have a flouncy berry farm in NYC yet?

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@futurebird looks like NYC does have a bunch of vertical farms seems like strawberries would be a natural addition (One company Bowery seems to be NYC based and has sold vertically farmed berries in the past but unclear if from NYC based farms and doesn't seem like they have them currently - though their site may be searching for their products in California where I am) but Farm.One and Gotham Greens seem mostly greens focused.

Rycaut,
@Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

@futurebird seems like some (Bowery) have VC funding so might not be nimble enough, while others seem less focused on fruits. But yes, seems like a logical alternative if berries flown to NYC from Japan are selling at any volume for $2 a berry - surely a local verical farm could make a tidy profit...

jeff, to tesla
@jeff@newsie.social avatar

deleted_by_author

    •
    Rycaut,
    @Rycaut@mastodon.social avatar

    @jeff the "Note: Do not strike hard surfaces with CyberHammer. Intended for display or gym use." is kinda epic. The couldn't even make a hammer (well one that works vs one that looks shiny but doesn't actually do anything)

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