Me: Please don't use Chromium-based browsers, use Firefox instead. Google has way too much control over the web because of Chromium and they'll be sure to leverage that in order to benefit themselves.

Chromium: Hey all, we're getting rid of ad-blockers because it's cutting into our record-breaking revenue! I mean, uh, we're deprecating Manifest V2 for, uh, security. Yeah.

Me: See? Please use Firefox. :blobfoxmeltsob:​

Mozilla: Hey friends, AI is really cool! *steps on rake* Hey friends, we're making an ads business! *steps on rake* Hey friends, we have a ToS with either the most nefarious or the most incompetent language ever! *steps on rake* Also AI is cool!!!

Me: ... :corgi_wtf1:​ I hate it here.

#Mozilla #Firefox #Google #Chrome #Chromium #FOSS

got an idea for a meditation and wellness app

it just crashes your phone

Entering year 6 of the #COVID19 pandemic, to the best of your knowledge, you have been infected:

(please boost for reach)
#CovidIsNotOver

Seems like lots of people are interested in a different kind of social web experience.
https://www.theverge.com/press-room/617654/internet-community-future-research

@Impossible_PhD Deescalate all conflict not with the enemy. <3

“Historians have a word for Germans who joined the Nazi party, not because they hated Jews, but out of a hope for restored patriotism, or a sense of economic anxiety, or a hope to preserve their religious values, or dislike of their opponents, or raw political opportunism, or convenience, or ignorance, or greed.

That word is 'Nazi.' Nobody cares about their motives anymore."

― A.R. Moxon

How To Move Forward In Moments of Crisis

I do not feel well. But I can share this since some folks are confused and despairing about what can be done. NOTE: Choose which ones you wish to focus on. Do Not Think You Must Do All Of This as that will burn you out. This post is comprehensive, but it's not meant as a 'do it all' post. It's meant to give you ideas to consider.

http://reshapingreality.org/2024/11/09/how-to-move-forward-in-moments-of-crisis/

@terraboops laser can work okay for people with light skin and dark hairs. It's similar to epilation in that the hair will fall out but probably regrow after its dormancy period. It is not considered a permanent hair removal method by the FDA and thus inappropriate for presurgical work. But it can affect a very large area quickly.

Electrolysis works on individual hairs. A probe is inserted into each hair follicle, and then a combination of electricity and heat is used to kill the follicle, below the skin. This shouldn't result in any surface damage to the skin other than some temporary reddening. The hair is removed after being zapped, and the electrologist moves on to the next follicle. It's more painful and takes longer, but a typical electrologist will have a follicle kill rate over 95%, much higher than laser, so you only have to treat the hair follicle once in most cases. And for anyone with even slightly brown skin or with light colored hair, this is the only option.

Either way, it's going to take a while. Hairs have a dormancy period where they just won't produce a hair for weeks or months and then start a new one, so it can take a long time to know if you're getting permanent results or not. It's a marathon, not a sprint. It's uncomfortable and expensive. I've been getting electrolysis on my face for 3 years and I'm not done, and I'm adding surgery prep work to the mix which is going to slow down my face even further. But when I do have to shave, the process is so much easier, and there's no shadow in the areas that have been zapped.

Weird to live in an era where rats are about to have more secure access to birth control than human women do

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/10/nyregion/nyc-rat-contraception-birth-control.html

@james I love how trans men can revel in masculinity. It was never the right fit for me, but so many transmasc folk are just so rapturous about it because it fits them and is right and wonderful. I love seeing them embrace their masculinity and show me so clearly that masculinity isn't bad, it just wasn't me. 🥰

@nickythehero Functioning labels are definitely bad, agreed. However, the top example still has the problem of being a generalization of an individual's entire experience. When I go to the dentist, I have significant need of support. Going to the doctor for a routine physical, I don't need any assistance at all. Better to say "this person needs more support in this context/moment" so that it's clear that it's the situation that is creating the need for additional support, and not something inherent to the individual.

Also I like your post but I cannot boost it because the image does not have alt text.

@CriticalAI https://www.404media.co/google-books-is-indexing-ai-generated-garbage/ ?

@ryanrandall It sounds like you have encountered the mastodon stampede effect! Building complex distributed systems is hard, but it sounds like there are some mitigation options being developed. As the fediverse continues to expand, I hope this will become a solved problem.

@Aurin_the_classtraitor I wish that too, but to make that viable here we'd first have to make the streets safer to stand in/next to. Right now, if someone passing by wanted to get a book out of a little free library in my front yard, they'd probably be hit by a lorry.

@GreenRoc Autism was first introduced into the DSM in 1968. If we take that as the start of diagnosable autism, it's only been around for 56 years, so it seems like it wouldn't be possible to have reliable longevity values for ages older than that even though people can be diagnosed after birth. There isn't a set age that autistic people reach and then die. The number skews lower than the general population because of the frequent occurrence of other medical issues and increased likelihood of dying from trauma (more likely to drawn or be struck by a car crossing the street, for example). https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanepe/article/PIIS2666-7762(23)00195-3/fulltext is the best data I could find on it, from 2023, suggests autistics die anywhere from 6 to 15 years earlier on average, but notes that the study has some significant limitations and that actual values may be significantly different.

@james Wandering yet further off topic, I am really excited for a class I'm taking in the fall called Community Building Through Libraries. It's obviously focused on libraries, mostly public libraries, but the community building aspects I expect to be generalizable the same way that Library Management and Library Marketing and Information Ethics have been. I hope to use it to improve my community building skills for my volunteer group and the FLOSS projects I contribute to.

@james Maybe that's the direction to go: browser extension. Like RES for reddit to make it actually usable. It could add functionality like displaying alt text in the feed, better filtering options, etc.

@james Wandering off topic, open source projects are often run by coders rather than community builders. When the projects get popular, they attract contributions from new developers. Projects that pivot to be community-based, where the maintainers expend energy on code reviews and encouragement of new contributors over doing their own coding on the project, will thrive and expand. Projects where bug filers are criticized, accessibility and diversity concerns are dismissed, and PRs are left without comment for months in favor of the maintainers continuing to do their own thing, will eventually die. I'd like to see mastodon make that pivot, but my experience to date matches yours, "pretty shit." Thankfully activitypub is an open standard, and maybe the next client that catches my eye will be better at this.

@james That seems like it would be a pretty straightforward code change. A checkbox in user preferences that says "display alt text below images" and then does that in the feed column. Unfortunately, the PRs I've made to mastodon and glitch often sit weeks or months without any interaction from the maintainers, and I'm not willing to maintain my own fork, so I don't see much value in doing that work. 😑