Erikatharsis

Erikatharsis, 10 months ago

It's a parody of Dr. Breen's "Welcome to City 17" speech from the start of Half-Life 2. If you've never played Half-Life 2, then it's a very, very, very strong recommend from me.

Erikatharsis, 10 months ago

I wanted to request my data before doing that, but ended up procrastinating on that until today. I'm assuming that I should only power delete after I've got all my data downloaded, and it seems unlikely that'll be ready before the API changes go into effect. C'est la vie.

Erikatharsis, 10 months ago

Good to know!

Erikatharsis, 10 months ago

What exactly makes Odysee a better YouTube alternative than Peertube?

Erikatharsis, 10 months ago (edited 10 months ago)

I was thinking earlier today about Invidious, an open-source alternative front-end to YouTube. And I was struck with a thought: would it ever be possible for something like that to simultaneously serve as an alternative front-end to a (※federated) YouTube competitor? Because I could only imagine that if such a thing were to happen, that audiences would have plenty of reasons to move to the alternative front-end (wrt. ads and data harvesting, access to exclusive content on both platforms from one location, being able to download videos...), at the cost of being able to like and comment on YouTube videos; and then once a significant audience has moved to the alternative front-end, creators could transition to the competing platform without much fear of losing their audiences, and regain likes and comments.

I mean, I don't know what I'm talking about so there's probably a reason this hasn't already happened. It just feels like it should be possible with enough time and resources.

Erikatharsis, 10 months ago

This was a very short-lived flag, however, as France-Albert René would take power in a bloodless coup the next year, replacing the flag of Seychelles with a new flag based on that of the Seychelles People's United Party founded by René.

René is a very interesting and often overlooked historical figure.

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

Wow, I didn't know Google was planning to start a war (start a nuclear war)

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

This is maybe a bit of an obscure reference, but it's based on the "DO NOT FORGET TO TURN OFF YOUR TELEVISION" message that Soviet Central Television used in the Perestroika days.

This is also the first post I'm making to a community not based in the same instance as my account. Hope it works!

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago)

It's pretty cool to see that the rainbow flag is now such an entrenched symbol in Norway that they make variants of it adapted to Norwegian flag traditions. It reminds me of how you'll actually see square rainbow flags in Switzerland, just because it looks nicer next to the national and regional flags.

Pictured: square rainbow flag next to the flag of Winterthur, Zürich Canton. Photo by Marc Dahinden.

Edit: A bit disappointing that this post got a downvote almost immediately. Is it because it's a rainbow flag? Sigh.

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

...Breast?

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

Kbin.social with the Reddit blackout is my first time using any fediverse platform. What's helped me understand how all this stuff works is the e-mail analogy that some people like to make: you register an e-mail address on a specific website that you use to read/write e-mail to/from addresses registered on any number of different websites, right? And with fediverse platforms, you register an account on a specific website that you use to comment on posts or follow profiles registered on any number of different websites.

You can imagine that in another timeline, this would've been the norm for social media all along, and it would feel completely natural to use for most people, especially as widespread adoption means greater ease of use. You can also imagine that if e-mail had only been invented just a few years ago, that its early adopters would rave about how it's "way better than instant messaging", while showing you confusing graphs filled with meaningless acronyms like "MIME", "SMTP", and "DKIM" that only end up scaring off most people.

Erikatharsis, 10 months ago

I'd say that I started watching anime in 2019, and there are just so many great 1990s anime series. Just to name a few that haven't already been mentioned in this thread, I've really been enjoying Cardcaptor Sakura and You're Under Arrest.

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

How do we feel about numbers or text on flags? In my opinion it gets a bad rap because a lot of people never think about it any deeper than the basic principles of vexillology, and yet even most people who are otherwise anti-text agree that Colorado's flag is among the best of the best.

I once came up with five basic questions to ask oneself before putting text on a flag. Here's how Colorado's flag holds up to these standards:

1. Is the text symbolic? The "C" is a "conduit" of sorts for the color symbolism of the red and yellow, so yes.
2. Can the symbolism be conveyed better through other means? I would argue that the "C" makes the flag more distinctive and memorable.
3. Does the text need to be legible for the flag to be recognizable? The Colorado flag remains recognizable at rest.
4. If necessary, is the text legible in various conditions? The "C" is recognizable at a distance, in reverse, and when displayed vertically.
5. Is the text stylish? In my own opinion: yes, definitely, absolutely.

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

I know that you can see content from other instances, but is it possible to moderate a magazine from a different instance as well? And when I sign up to a new instance, is there a way to transfer my post history and so forth from this instance?

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

I had seen Quasar's Progress flag last year at a Pride event in Aurskog-Høland. It struck me when seeing both that flag and the Vecchietti flag how un-busy the Progress Pride flags look in real life. Speaking from experience moderating /r/vexillology on Reddit, the Progress Pride flags are highly controversial among flag enthusiasts. My own verdict, especially now that I've seen the flag IRL, is that I'm fond of Vecchietti's Progress flag. But I'm just as glad to commemorate Pride with my plain six-stripe rainbow flag.

Erikatharsis, 11 months ago

A wimpel is a type of pennant most often found in the Nordic countries. Wimpels are flown in place of a proper flag essentially to avoid needing to follow flag code. Seeing a Ukrainian wimpel was pretty surprising for me since Ukraine obviously isn't a country where wimpels see much use, so this is essentially an adaptation of a foreign flag to local flag traditions, simply because city hall doesn't want to raise and lower the flag every day.

Incidentally, one variant of the Swedish wimpel that I've often seen when on the road to Charlottenberg looks a lot like this: blue stripe over yellow, only a lot longer and thinner.