I never played BG1 or BG2 or any of the Divinity games. I have played DND a lot. This feels like medieval fantasy Fallout 1 & 2 with AAA flourishes. I really like it. It’s very unforgiving. There are a lot of creative ways to finish quests. You can miss entire bits of the game based on choices. There’s a character you literally cannot recruit based on your morality choices, and with them entire subplots. The game is DEEP
My only complaint is how horny everyone is. I act nice to people and they wanna jump on my dick. Literally had a mind flayer try to smash my pelvis and I’m like DUDE MELLOW OUT
Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar has announced that the Ukrainian army has liberated the village of Urozhaine in the Donetsk region of the country. “Our defenders are fortifying their new positions. The offensive is continuing,” Maliar wrote on Telegram.
While it was clear many players were looking forward to the release of Baldur’s Gate 3, what’s happening now has to be far above and beyond what developer Larian could have hoped for.
I picked it up and played a little today. There are some really, really bad bugs in this game. Needs a patch asap. Maybe it's a problem with multiplayer but I basically convinced a guard to let us through and my buddy walked into a room, immediately got another encounter and failed it, and then we were all murdered.
Then there was a time when I couldn't even exit the game, the esc key wouldn't work and I had to quit through task manager.
Ran into another bug last night when fighting the Gnolls. I snuck up on the "leader Gnoll" and hit him. This is the cave near to where you find Karlach. It suddenly, briefly, triggered a conversation which immediately cancelled, and then the fight order was stuck on the leader Gnoll who just stood there, doing nothing, until I reloaded a save
Absolutely awesome find. Thanks for the input. My stomach sank when I read that article this morning on CNN. Couldn't believe we would give up our support so quickly
Ah yes, because programming and critical thinking do not go hand in hand. We are going to have so many software vulnerabilities in the coming years. Better learn to hack, ladies and lads.
The Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) would censor the internet and would make government officials the arbiters of what young people can see online. It will likely lead to age verification, handing more power, and private data, to third-party identity verification companies like Clear or ID.me. The government should not have the...
Nothing really jumps out as problematic for me. It’s preventing harmful content from being advertised to via social media to children, but not stopping kids from independently researching things.
**> (a) Prevention Of Harm To Minors.—A covered platform shall act in the best interests of a user that the platform knows or reasonably should know is a minor by taking reasonable measures in its design and operation of products and services to prevent and mitigate the following:
(1) Consistent with evidence-informed medical information, the following mental health disorders: anxiety, depression, eating disorders, substance use disorders, and suicidal behaviors.**
I think we can agree that evidence informed medical information to prevent these mental health issues is a positive thing.
>(2) Patterns of use that indicate or encourage addiction-like behaviors.
This could lead to a reduction in serotonin hacking apps that are worthless to the consumer, doomscrolling, etc.
>(3) Physical violence, online bullying, and harassment of the minor.
Good
>(4) Sexual exploitation and abuse.
The definition of sexual exploitation and abuse is probably the thing that has the LGBTQ community concerned. What is their definition?
Taking a detour, we can find what the definition is earlier in the bill:
_>(10) SEXUAL EXPLOITATION AND ABUSE.—The term “sexual exploitation and abuse” means any of the following:
(A) Coercion and enticement, as described in section 2422 of title 18, United States Code._
Title 18 Section 2422
(a)Whoever knowingly persuades, induces, entices, or coerces any individual to travel in interstate or foreign commerce, or in any Territory or Possession of the United States, to engage in prostitution, or in any sexual activity for which any person can be charged with a criminal offense, or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.
(b)Whoever, using the mail or any facility or means of interstate or foreign commerce, or within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States knowingly persuades, induces, entices, or coerces any individual who has not attained the age of 18 years, to engage in prostitution or any sexual activity for which any person can be charged with a criminal offense, or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title and imprisoned not less than 10 years or for life.
Okay, so, grooming minors and encouraging them to come visit you, or to kidnap them and force them into prostitution.
>(B) Child sexual abuse material, as described in sections 2251, 2252, 2252A, and 2260 of title 18, United States Code.
Child pornography.
>(C) Trafficking for the production of images, as described in section 2251A of title 18, United States Code.
Distributing said pornography.
>(D) Sex trafficking of children, as described in section 1591 of title 18, United States Code.
Coercion, force and fraud for commercial sex acts with minors.
(5) Promotion and marketing of narcotic drugs (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 802)), tobacco products, gambling, or alcohol.
Besides the obvious of not trying to advertise to kids to use vapes or drink boiled nyquil, this could lead to the end of lootboxes with the gambling provision.
(6) Predatory, unfair, or deceptive marketing practices, or other financial harms.
This can only be a good thing. No more helping John Wick by sharing your parents credit card number.
The bill continues:
(b) Limitation.—Nothing in subsection (a) shall be construed to require a covered platform to prevent or preclude—
(1) any minor from deliberately and independently searching for, or specifically requesting, content; or
(2) the covered platform or individuals on the platform from providing resources for the prevention or mitigation of suicidal behaviors, substance use, and other harms, including evidence-informed information and clinical resources.
This says to me that the social media platforms cannot actively advertise this stuff to people they deem minors, not that the content needs to be completely scrubbed from the web. So long as the subject matter isn't ending up on a 14 year old's FYP, they're good to go.
I ran out of characters so I had to delete like half my post. But yeah, TLDR the bill prevents advertising of harmful material, not a full on block of content.
“Platforms will still have to age-verify users, violating their First Amendment right to speak and access content anonymously,”
“The revisions made to KOSA just trade an explicit mandate for a vague one. Uncertainty about when knowledge of a user’s age will be implied leads to the same result as before: the only way a platform can be confident it is in compliance is by age-verifying every user. At best, language purporting not to require such verification ignores this practical reality. At worst, it is a deliberate obfuscation of the bill’s intended effect.”
Yeah, that was part of what I originally wrote and then had to delete. In retrospect I should have just split it and made replies. Oh well.
The bill mentions:
SEC. 9. AGE VERIFICATION STUDY AND REPORT.
(a) Study.—The Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, in coordination with the Federal Communications Commission, Federal Trade Commission, and the Secretary of Commerce, shall conduct a study evaluating the most technologically feasible methods and options for developing systems to verify age at the device or operating system level.
(b) Contents.—Such study shall consider —
(1) the benefits of creating a device or operating system level age verification system;
(2) what information may need to be collected to create this type of age verification system;
(3) the accuracy of such systems and their impact or steps to improve accessibility, including for individuals with disabilities;
(4) how such a system or systems could verify age while mitigating risks to user privacy and data security and safeguarding minors' personal data, emphasizing minimizing the amount of data collected and processed by covered platforms and age verification providers for such a system; and
(5) the technical feasibility, including the need for potential hardware and software changes, including for devices currently in commerce and owned by consumers.
(c) Report.—Not later than 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, the agencies described in subsection (a) shall submit a report containing the results of the study conducted under such subsection to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation of the Senate and the Committee on Energy and Commerce of the House of Representatives.
So there isn't necessarily a plan for Real ID out of the box, the study would have to be conducted to determine feasibility of what age verification method would be best. I understand the concerns about sharing your personal ID online. It could very well come to a conclusion that the algorithms already in place are plenty good enough to determine what age someone is likely, how my FYP on TikTok is filled with Millenial content just based on what content I liked. But sure, the possibility of having to register your personal ID with every social media company doesn't sound too appetizing.
“KOSA’s duty of care is an unfixable idea that is impossible to satisfy and a violation of the First Amendment,” Cohn continued. “Minors are not a monolith, and what hurts one may help another. Requiring platforms to protect the vague, nonexistent best interests of minors as a whole will limit minors to only the blandest material safe for the most sensitive individual. This chilling effect is the precise reason courts have consistently held for decades that imposing a duty to protect listeners from harmful reactions to speech is unconstitutional.”
I think it's pretty clear what content is unsuitable, it doesn't seem very vague to me. You can't realistically specify everything. As an example, 10 years ago I would have never predicted Mukbang, but it's insanely popular. Watching someone eat themselves into health issues and inspiring other people to do the same? There's no benefit. It's gross, it's wasteful, it's unhealthy, but it grabs people's attention. With KOSA, that content can still exist, but they won't be telling kids "just eat a bunch of crap food and you can be famous like Niko Avocado". I think I'm OK with that.
“State attorneys general of all persuasions will find KOSA a useful tool in purging the Internet of content they disfavor,” Cohn concluded. “From hateful speech to LGBTQ content, KOSA’s duty of care provides the kind of ready-made censorship tool that ambitious attorneys general could only dream of. The burden and expense of a state investigation alone may be sufficient to pressure platforms to take down or restrict access to protected expression. Handing a weapon to politically motivated actors who have demonstrated that they will use any tools at their disposal to silence speech they disagree with is grossly irresponsible.”
The content of this bill says to me that it prevents advertising specific content, not completely removing that content. Is there evidence informed medical information that says LGBTQ content causes any of the listed mental health issues? I don't think so. Nothing in the sexual exploitation section seems to even give wiggle room to it saying LGBTQ content could be considered. Asshole conservatives in power will twist laws in crazy ways. However, we shouldn't stop legislating things just because a small potential exists. The internet is a cesspool and it should be made a little bit safer for people who can't reason out they are being exploited.
I think the conversation should be preventing abuse of laws in general. The letter of this bill doesn't seem bad, but I absolutely can see how it could be manipulated, such as a backdoor for Real ID. But the bill couldn't be used to completely remove content from the internet, only reducing things being recommended. It specifically says on the bill that the bill does not allow the complete removal of content, it's just to prevent advertising some content to kids.
I'm happy to continue the dialogue, if you are @MiscreantMouse
I'll do a little more reading a little later regarding your link, I do want to say however it is incredibly frustrating to try to navigate an article such as the one shared from techdirt that only links to itself and no outside sources. It makes verifying their claims harder than it should be.
Every hyperlink in that article just links back to it's own website, which makes it hard to verify the claims it is making.
The letter you provided from the ACLU, et al is a response to an older version of the bill, located here:
I do not have time to review the older bill and compare it to the newer bill, but I think it's safe to say that because the previous bill was met with dissatisfaction that it was rewritten to address their concerns.
The bill's authors are elected Senators who has a 96% Progressive Lifetime Score, and lawyers misrepresent the truth. It's their job. Politicians do the same. Which is why it's important for conversations like these to be talking about the text of the bill, instead of just linking to what other people have to say. I'm not gonna tell you how to conduct yourself but it's hard to take you seriously when all you've contributed is what other people have said. Not to mention the sources of the articles that you've shared so far could be problematic.
TechDirt and TechFreedom are think tanks. These articles are agenda-based reporting. TechFreedom gets money from Google and Meta according to Influence Watch. Take a look at TechDirt's sponsors, search for their portfolios. Automattic literally owns tumblr. Ask if they have a financial incentive to amplify this. The people who stand to lose the most here are the tech companies. The content is not going away, just the ability to drive the content to people who probably shouldn't be seeing it anyway.
I dunno about you, but I think we are at an impasse. I'm not going to convince you to tHiNk CrItIcAlLy (god I sound like a flat earther), and I'm really losing interest in your condescending remarks. So, until we meet again, DubiousRat
Nothing really jumps out as problematic for me. It’s preventing harmful content from being advertised to via social media to children, but not stopping kids from independently researching things. They even go as far as to mention gambling, so KOSA could kill loot boxes in gaming.
Nothing really seems like it’s targeting 🏳️🌈, but I didn’t do follow ups on:
(10) SEXUAL EXPLOITATION AND ABUSE.—The term “sexual exploitation and abuse” means any of the following:
(A) Coercion and enticement, as described in section 2422 of title 18, United States Code.
(B) Child sexual abuse material, as described in sections 2251, 2252, 2252A, and 2260 of title 18, United States Code.
(C) Trafficking for the production of images, as described in section 2251A of title 18, United States Code.
(D) Sex trafficking of children, as described in section 1591 of title 18, United States Code.
Not sure if something is hiding there. But again, it’s just preventing targeted content that could be harmful.
(b) Limitation.—Nothing in subsection (a) shall be construed to require a covered platform to prevent or preclude—
(1) any minor from deliberately and independently searching for, or specifically requesting, content; or
(2) the covered platform or individuals on the platform from providing resources for the prevention or mitigation of suicidal behaviors, substance use, and other harms, including evidence-informed information and clinical resources.
'We owe them a huge debt': Baldur's Gate 3 lead writer hopes they did '90s BioWare proud (www.pcgamer.com)
‘Fargo’ Season 5 Gets Premiere Date; Plot Details & First Images Unveiled (deadline.com)
Ukraine’s breakthrough at Urozhaine pushes Russian positions further towards Mariupol — Meduza (meduza.io)
Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar has announced that the Ukrainian army has liberated the village of Urozhaine in the Donetsk region of the country. “Our defenders are fortifying their new positions. The offensive is continuing,” Maliar wrote on Telegram.
‘Baldur’s Gate 3’ Stuns With Nearly Half A Million Concurrent Steam Players (www.forbes.com)
While it was clear many players were looking forward to the release of Baldur’s Gate 3, what’s happening now has to be far above and beyond what developer Larian could have hoped for.
CNN Poll: Majority of Americans oppose more US aid for Ukraine in war with Russia | CNN Politics (edition.cnn.com)
Incandescent lightbulbs are now banned in the US (qz.com)
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Musk says Twitter will no longer have a light mode, making dark mode the default option (9to5mac.com)
Since Elon Musk became Twitter’s CEO, he’s been pushing through a lot of changes to the social network. But perhaps...
What are your opinions on this?
African Union calls on Russia to reinstate Ukrainian grain deal (www.politico.eu)
‘We will discuss it with Putin to see how we can restart this agreement,’ AU chairman says.
Help tell the Senate: KOSA Will Censor the Internet But Won't Help Kids (act.eff.org)
The Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) would censor the internet and would make government officials the arbiters of what young people can see online. It will likely lead to age verification, handing more power, and private data, to third-party identity verification companies like Clear or ID.me. The government should not have the...
Niger soldiers announce coup on national TV (www.bbc.co.uk)
‘Pass It, Pass It, Pass It, Pass It, Pass It,’ President Biden Says About A Bill The GOP Says Will Be Useful To Silence LGBTQ Voices (www.techdirt.com)
The bill is KOSA, the Kids Online Safety Act – which has support from plenty of Democrats as well as Republicans....
Russia raises the maximum age of conscription as it seeks to replenish Ukraine forces (www.theguardian.com)
From 2024, anyone aged 18 to 30 will be called up for a year of military service, with those served draft notices banned from leaving the country
Like a hot tub: Water temperatures off Florida soar over 100 degrees (www.nbcnews.com)
A buoy near Manatee Bay recorded an astounding 101.1-degree water temperature Monday, a temperature common for hot tubs.
Inside Trump’s Fascist Plan to Control All Federal Agencies if He Wins (newrepublic.com)