@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

imwiththecats

@imwiththecats@mastodon.social

Hey! I'm one of those tech guys that goes for outdoorsy stuff when not doing smart home stuff, e.g.. It's fun to pick up badges through life. Ancient philosophy, full time rv'ing, 3D printing, family hangin', and mentoring, among other badges, are important on my vest.

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feditips, to random
@feditips@mstdn.social avatar

I don't think people are realising the danger the Fediverse is in.

The only thing stopping corporations and VCs taking over this place is that the Fediverse is spread out on many different servers, which makes it very difficult to purchase.

If most of the Fediverse ends up on mastodon.social, which is now a strong possibility, there will be nothing to stop most of it being sold to Musk or Zuckerberg or whoever.

The bigger mastodon.social becomes, the more likely a buyout is to happen.

(1/4)

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@foolishowl @philheppenstall @feditips I’ve been the guy that argued “let’s just explain it better” or “users just need better instruction”. But it doesn’t work that way for many people; they have (better) things to worry about in their lives, and choosing a social network instance to join may not sound as fun as just joining a social network to interact with people.

A proper goal IMO is to squash the learning curves rather than increase documentation.

shanselman, to random
@shanselman@hachyderm.io avatar

Crazy how some days I sit in my driveway in my car wondering how I even have a job at all, but then someone asks me a question on email that I actually know the answer to it and I realize that I will have a job this week. It’s been back-and-forth like that for 15 years

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@shanselman The smartest people either know the answer, or they know they don’t.

imwiththecats, to infosec
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

Small rant. I’m trying to sell my stuff online. I was immediately permabanned by and , most likely due to my active VPN connection and associated IP.

I’m glad I signed up for Mercari from my mobile, sans VPN.

I’m probably going to be exploring some VPN alternatives. Why is it so hard to have AND ? @mullvadnet

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@BarrenPlanet @mullvadnet Not in a serious way. I started with expressVPN a long while back, and left after they made some questionable decisions. If you use ProtonVPN, what is your experience with blocked IP ranges?

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@BarrenPlanet @mullvadnet Cheers. I’ll have to find my notes on why I chose Mullvad over Proton and others in my last round of VPN evals. IIRC, Mullvad had the edge on speed and their security measures tried.

Their email service is good, indeed. :-)

Thanks for the perspective!

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@jbjrkng @rob @mullvadnet Thanks for the tip! That might be helpful in some of these cases. I’ll have to set it up and try it against another service in the future.

Side note, you just brought back some rough memories on troubleshooting WPAD issues at a few client sites… :-)

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@rob @mullvadnet Perhaps it is because I signed up for the account while connected to the VPN, but existing accounts with credibility aren’t flagged?

I can only speculate based on the pattern because the platforms won’t disclose their reasons for suspending my seller accounts (and that makes sense from a security perspective).

I love so much about how Mullvad handles privacy (from the disposable account number as username, to their third party audits, etc.).

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@nikahverse @mullvadnet You just put words to the trend I am seeing. Testing UK locations, or even other US locations, has shown that my region/nearest node, Chicago, is a hotbed for suspected fraudulent activity.

Also applies to mob activity during prohibition. But that’s another story.

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@nikahverse @mullvadnet That’s a helpful link, thank you!!

And yeah, the fraud scores I’m getting would make Theranos and Enron want to stay away from me. 84-99 so far, depending on the IP.

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@nikahverse @mullvadnet That makes sense for the country. I see some big discrepancies between USA regions, for example Chicago (score in the 90s) vs Denver, Colorado (score in the 30s) vs New York City (score in 60s). Do you know if there advantages based on different regions in a country?

I keep debunking all my own theories to answer that question.

imwiththecats, to opensource
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

Question! I learned of @darktable from @FediFollows today. And I’m in need of a better system, so good timing. Any chance it can auto tag images?

Full disclosure: I only spent a few minutes Googling, but the results looked grim.

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@darktable Cheers. I was thinking a little of A and a little of B, so that is a good news reply. Thanks for the bump start with that info, excited to try things out!

Kickpedal, to random

Way things are going right now?

Drive thru assisted suicide coming soon.

“Fantastic idea!” said every tow truck driver and disappointed mother.

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@Kickpedal In order to curb increasing drive-thru-assisted-suicide rates, new laws make them dine-in only.

developerjustin, to fediverse
@developerjustin@mastodon.social avatar

I think has an enormous head start both in terms of features and community but it’s hard to deny that has done something better to attract larger profiles than we have here. BlueSky isn’t even publicly available and I’m already seeing more major/minor celebrities and public figures posting over there. Given the features that it’s lacking right now, you have to wonder if the lack of server choice (for now) really does simplify onboarding that much.

imwiththecats,
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@developerjustin Features aside, I still feel funny when I say to someone “I was on Mastodon and saw…”

I find myself posting here, but still checking the bird site for what’s happening. The utopia created here lacks the suffering we desire. (A bit Matrix-y, eh?)

imwiththecats, to random
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

All day,

imwiththecats, to random
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

I’m not a huge #AppleMusic fan, but #Spotify and their lack of movement on native #HomePod support is seriously making me consider dropping Spotify.

I don’t want to touch my phone while I’m doing dishes, please.

https://www.macrumors.com/2023/04/02/spotify-downplays-homepod-support/

imwiththecats, to random
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

It’s been a while, but today I’m doing some needed server hardware changes. I moved and off my RPi4. Scrypted moved to an add on in my deployment, and HB to an RPi Zero W I had sitting around.

Now I can finally make a proper Cat TV with the pi 4! Happy !

imwiththecats, to tech
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

Woohoo finally got my redone bookshelf and LEDs in! Here’s some various pics from along the way.

This started off as a bookshelf remodel. After the remodeling came the lights. I only had to backtrack a little on my remodel job (shame on me for a missed planning step 😂)

Project uses: LEDs, , / microcontroller + components, soldering iron, , and some doorbell wire to run the strips in series.

Bookshelf with lights and cables string around, mid project
pinecil soldering iron and box in background, against light colored wood panel wall
Breadboard and circuit for LED strip, with glow from LEDs in picture

imwiththecats, to random
@imwiththecats@mastodon.social avatar

@testman @rightsaidjames Y’all are right, I goofed. IM me on AIM or MSN (xx1mW1thT43Catzxx) and we can trade. I don’t have my ICQ anymore.

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