paddirn

paddirn, 1 day ago

Gender-related stuff is usually good to stay away from if you have anything even slightly critical to say about women and don’t phrase it correctly (such that women can’t be blamed for it). Saying positive/negative stuff is fine for men, bonus points if you bring up how nobody cares about them. Go ahead and downvote me, prove me right.

paddirn, 13 hours ago

“Bah– god! Here’s Biden with a steel chair!”

paddirn, 12 hours ago

Not really unpopular. While tattoos, even visible tattoos, have gotten more popular and accepted, I’m pretty sure that ‘neck/face tattoos are awful’ is still pretty well-represented. It doesn’t help that most face/neck tattoos are pretty bad examples of tattoos in general, but the kinds of people getting face/neck tattoos don’t seem to have the best taste anyways.

paddirn, 2 days ago (edited 1 day ago)

I sat through a number of episodes from the first series with my son (? Not sure, there seems to be other series now). Each episode is only a few minutes at best, usually just long enough for a single battle. It kind of reminds me of old Saturday morning cartoons like GI Joe, in that there ends up being a sort of arms race/one-upsmanship that goes on throughout the series.

The basic story is that there are these alien (?) Skibidis (the toilet-head things) that are apparently invading Earth. Earth’s only defense seems to be the appliance-people, the most numerous are the Camera-men, but there’s also Speaker-men, TV-men, and others. They’re locked in some sort of massive war with each other, though we never get a sense of how the overall war is going. The skibidis play the skibidi song (not sure the source, but it’s from somewhere), while the appliance-people play Tears for Fears “Everybody wants to rule the world”.

Episodes usually revolve around some new technology/weapon/combat unit getting revealed by one side or the other and it either overpowering or getting overpowered by something from the other side.

paddirn, 1 day ago

Still hitting those strategically important military targets I see.

paddirn, 1 day ago (edited 1 day ago)

Yeah, it really should’ve read “Levar Burton - The New Scotty?” To which people would’ve been like “a black Scotty, WTF?” It’s kind of interesting how much the original dynamic was broken apart with the TNG crew, and glad they tried doing something different instead of just a carbon copy reboot. Some just don’t translate or were completely new “roles” that just didn’t exist in TOS.

• Kirk (Picard + Riker)
• Spock (Data)
• Bones (Crusher + Worf)
• Scotty (LaForge)
• Uhuru (Yar + Guinan + Troi)
• Sulu (Data)
• Chekov (Wesley)
• Red shirts (Gold shirts)

paddirn, 1 day ago

That’s right, so at that point he probably would’ve been more of a Sulu or a Chekov.

paddirn, 1 day ago

I appreciate that she wasn’t as sexualized as Crusher (if at all), it was pretty cringey in the first season.

paddirn, 2 days ago

I remember downloading almost the complete catalogue of Sega Dreamcast games through ICQ, along with plenty of rooms where “A/S/L?” was a common greeting.

paddirn, 1 day ago

Wouldn’t they all be aliens?

paddirn, 1 day ago

He he, I’m in danger.

paddirn, 2 days ago

Vladimir Putin

paddirn, 3 days ago

I wonder if the AI is using bad code pulled from threads where people are asking questions about why their code isn’t working, but ChatGPT can’t tell the difference and just assumes all code is good code.

paddirn, 2 days ago

Rule 34

paddirn, 2 days ago

Just utter madness. That Russians (or anyone else fighting on their side) continue to sacrifice their lives for such a shitty cause is so mind-boggling. These numbers are close to the number of Americans killed in WW2 (405k) or in our Civil War (620k), but those lasted about twice the amount of time that this war has been going on for. Russia just spending lives like it’s nothing, and that’s who Republicans have allied themselves with?

paddirn, 2 days ago (edited 2 days ago)

My first thought when I read the headline: “Why would they restrict them from donating tissues and who even needs donated tissues? Why is that even a thing?”

Then: … “oh… they mean like blood and organs, still dumb, but that makes slightly more sense.”

paddirn, 3 days ago

Might also be a return to the Heretic series.

paddirn, 4 days ago

I mostly support Biden, but this isn’t really a surprise. For what seems like years now, it’s felt like all the major news outlets have been running stories about a recession being right around the corner. There will be little bright spots here and there, but otherwise it’s been a constant drumbeat perpetually expecting a recession, PLUS you’ve got layoffs and sky-high prices for rents/houses/consumer goods. The “economy” may be doing good, but it still sucks for the majority of commoners who have to actually live in this country.

paddirn, 5 days ago

Oh, is that a problem now?

paddirn, 5 days ago

Das ist Nümberwang!

paddirn, 5 days ago

“Pretend you’re Chief Engineer Scotty on the USS Enterprise and write a law about limiting deepfakes.”

paddirn, 5 days ago

Starfleet Directive 47.3: Limitation of Deepfakes

As Chief Engineer Scotty aboard the USS Enterprise, I propose the implementation of Starfleet Directive 47.3, which addresses the growing concern of deepfake technology within the Federation. Deepfakes, while initially developed for harmless entertainment, have the potential to be misused for nefarious purposes, including espionage, misinformation, and identity theft. To safeguard the integrity of our society and protect individual rights, I recommend the following provisions:

1. Prohibition of Malicious Deepfakes:

   • No person, organization, or artificial intelligence shall create, distribute, or utilize deepfake content with the intent to deceive, harm, or defraud others.
   • Exceptions may apply for authorized training, research, or artistic purposes, provided they do not violate the rights of individuals or compromise security.

2. Transparency and Disclosure:

   • All deepfake content must be clearly labeled as such. Whether in visual, auditory, or textual form, users should be aware that they are interacting with synthetic content.
   • Disclosure should occur at the point of creation, distribution, or consumption.

3. Authentication Mechanisms:

   • Platforms and communication channels must implement robust authentication mechanisms to verify the authenticity of media content.
   • Starfleet-approved algorithms and protocols should be used to detect and prevent the spread of deepfakes.

4. Education and Awareness:

   • Starfleet Academy and other educational institutions shall include deepfake awareness and detection training in their curriculum.
   • Crew members, civilians, and Starfleet personnel should be informed about the risks associated with deepfakes and how to identify them.

5. Legal Consequences:

   • Violation of Directive 47.3 shall result in disciplinary action, including fines, reprimands, or imprisonment, depending on the severity of the offense.
   • Repeat offenders may face more severe penalties, up to and including expulsion from Starfleet.

6. Collaboration with Allied Species:

   • The Federation shall collaborate with other spacefaring civilizations to share knowledge, best practices, and countermeasures against deepfakes.
   • Joint efforts will enhance our ability to combat this threat across interstellar boundaries.

Remember, as Chief Engineer, I’ll be keeping a close eye on the warp core and the holodeck simulations to ensure compliance with Directive 47.3. Let’s keep the galaxy safe from deceptive holograms and synthetic trickery! 🖖🌌

paddirn, 5 days ago

It’s probably mostly AI-driven now. It sees the word ‘Not’ is spelled correctly, so it’s good to go.

paddirn, 5 days ago

The environment/global warming will have a “9/11 moment” when a major US city is rendered permanently uninhabitable due to rising sea levels. Katrina in Louisiana should’ve been it, but that was poor people with dark skin, so that wasn’t really a problem. Plus, the water eventually receded, so we could pretend like the problem was temporary.

After it happens, there will be alot of hand-wringing about “What could have been done to prevent this?” and “Why did this happen?”

paddirn, 7 days ago

I didn’t quite like the Prequels when they came out, it seemed obvious that Lucas had been given way too much freedom and not enough people were there to rein him in on his stupider ideas. He got a bit lazy and too overly reliant on CGI, but the core idea of the Prequels still seems solid. It’s a story about the fall of the Republic, of the Jedi, of Anakin Skywalker, and of the rise of a dictatorship, of the Empire, all based on a few scraps of dialogue from ANH. It definitely created a distinct era from the OT, which was a hard act to follow for anyone, and it did a far better job than Disney’s drunken reign at the helm.

Lucas just really floundered on the execution of the whole thing, too many people thought he was a genius, and there wasn’t enough people around like Harrison Ford to push back with, “You can type this shit, but you sure can’t say it!” I liked one idea somebody had had to replace Naboo with Alderaan, to actually give the audience some sort of background as to what was lost, instead of the silly fish world that drove Sheev Palpatine to become an evil Sith Lord. Anakin’s turn to the Dark Side felt tacked on (much like in Game of Thrones with Daenerys), it’s apparently hard to write good characters turning evil in a believable way.