This picture gave me PTSD.

I could teach her
But she was killed by tar

Yes and this is what Starfield doesn’t do. Starfield doesn’t actually have whole planets generated by a shared seed. Planets in Starfield are just unlimited sources of randomly generated playboxes. Since the planets don’t actually exist, they can’t properly be said to be explorable.

For anyone interested in this topic, there is a super great video that explains the difference between procedural generation and random generation and how a tiny amount of data can be used to generate extremely complex things.

But I don’t think they can grab that explorer fanbase again, they are just against procedural generation in general, they probably wanted Outer Worlds but bigger.

I don’t think that’s true. Elite Dangerous is one of my favorite games and it’s procedurally generated. I think the issue is that that’s not exactly what Starfield is.

When you “land” in Starfield (outside a handcrafted city or similar), you land in a procedurally generated box made just for you. It isn’t repeatable by anybody but you. Other people who “land” in the same spot will not see what you saw, they get their own procedurally generated box. The contents of the box are similar (the terrain is the right color, the flora and fauna are the same). If you were to see something particularly cool in your box (although I never did when I was playing the game) - ie: “unusually tall mountain range” or “unusually deep valley” - you can’t tell someone “hey go to coordinates x,y and check this out!” You CAN do this in Elite Dangerous. All worlds, all settlements - everything is the same for everyone, and if you explore through it all and you find something interesting, you can share it with people.

In Starfield, your box always contains an uninteresting/unremarkable patch of terrain and magically, literally everywhere you land, there are structures and ships within walking distance - none of which anyone can get to but you.

There is literally no WAY to explore. Everywhere you land, it’s just another box and it will always contain the same variation on the same things. That isn’t exploration. Exploration implies things that exist whether you are there or not and which can be found by someone if they look long enough.

I hate an open catbox. I also don’t want to directly pick it up, bag or not. So I had to unclip the top and use a scoop, and I had three cats so I did it every day and I just effing hated it.

Did you have the large one? I have a 17lb long-haired Maine Coon and he has no issues with it, but I do have the large one.

This is going to sound like hyperbole, but this thing changed my life and I always love it when I get a chance to share it with somebody. It requires no electricity, it has no moving parts and in the 11 years I’ve been using one, it’s never broken. I give you: Omega Paw.

It requires clumping cat litter, so if you use that you’re golden. When it’s time to clean, you roll it - and as you roll, the loose litter flows through a grate, but the clumps and waste stay on top of the grate. As you continue to roll it, the waste falls to the ceiling. When you roll it back, the waste all falls into the drawer, which you pull out and dump. Cleaning the litter box takes literally 10 seconds. It’s awesome.

I will never understand why all the sheep who goddamn hate socialism so much defend it to their last breath when its corporations getting it so they can turn around and fuck the country sideways.

Chick-Fil-A has been around more than my whole life. I remember going there as a kid in the mall. I remember going there as an adult in the mall.

At no time eating at Chick-Fil-A do I once recall thinking to myself “goddamn, this is exceptional!” It’s a chicken sandwich. It’s not particularly good or bad, and I am not into waffle fries.

At no time eating at Chick-Fil-A did I once think “this line is too long, I will eat elsewhere.” I don’t recall ever seeing a line at all.

Long about 1986 they started making standalone locations, but I never saw any until the 2000s. I never went, because I had long since decided that mediocre chicken sandwiches weren’t really my thing. However, since I first noticed the standalone locations I have also noticed that their lines have consistently gotten longer and longer. It’s interesting that the growth of these lines seem to have coincided with the rise of social media, but I won’t get too tinfoil-hatty here.

So anyway. One day, I decided I should give them a try - obviously, they’re getting something right, right? Let’s see what all the hype is about.

Yeah no, it’s the exact same mediocre shit. It’s fine. It’s not great, it’s OK for fast food, maybe even slightly above average. But is it good enough to wait in a line like this that wraps around the building twice? No, thank you.

So I guess what I am saying is, I’m with you. I have to figure it’s the power of marketing, because the only thing they’ve done that I can see is increase their marketing. Also their marketing - at least the public marketing (who knows what guerilla shit they do on social media to keep those lines growing) - is super weird. Cows exhorting you to eat chicken, because they don’t want to die. I suppose given that cows have no messiah, this is a perfectly reasonable position for them to hold in the eyes of the Chick-Fil-A Illuminati, but idk.

Want a chicken sandwich? I can name half a dozen local shops that will hook you up with better. Is it fast? Jesus Christ, no. The apologists say yes, given the size of the lines, but I say no, given the size of the lines. I guess that’s a matter of perspective.

What’s not disputable is that this is fast food that, like all fast food - you can honestly live better without.

It’s worse than that even. Most of those ads are for “Medicare Advantage,” a criminal scam that Congressional members of a particular political persuasion cooked up to allow corporations to be a middleman between you and your Medicare benefits. When clueless people call and sign up because they think they’re going to get free money, they end up getting fucked out of as much of their benefits as the company can extract, up to 20% according to the rules, but who pays attention to if they play by the rules? You probably guessed it. Oh and just as a cherry on top, once you sign up, you can’t change your mind and go back, you’re off Medicare for good.

An excellent looking plate! This was our plate.

Clockwise from the cranberry sauce (at 12:00): stuffing/gravy, deviled egg, green bean casserole, maque choux, bourbon glazed carrots, mashed potatoes/gravy, dinner roll, turkey/gravy.

equivalent to the energy of a golf ball travelling at 95mph

So I am curious about this comparison. If this particle had hit you square on the top of your head, rather than the array they built to detect it… would you even know it? Would it kill you? Make you uncomfortable? What?

No, dynamic content should absolutely be able to be delivered through the open Web, not just through walled gardens. Apps are almost universally shit.

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I feel like I’m taking crazy pills. Chinese buffet sheet cake? On what planet?

I’ve found this to be kind of subjective. Bing/Bard is more current than ChatGPT but yet I just find ChatGPT to be better. It’s snappier and more conversant with context. It seems to understand you when you chide it for not quite doing what you asked it to do, and it responds in kind. I mostly use it for programming to be fair, but even for other stuff, ChatGPT just somehow feels more… real? I can’t quite put my finger on it.

There was a short time where Bing chat was kind of frighteningly real. Took them five seconds to nerf that shit and it’s never been anywhere near the same.

Edit: I expect this answer to be out of date within 3 months. Things keep moving.

I use ChatGPT every day too. Because Google is being such a shit about YouTube I am in the process of moving away from Google altogether. I use DuckDuckGo for search, which indirectly uses Bing. It’s mostly OK. Sometimes I’m forced to try Google, it usually doesn’t help. But for programming, yeah, StackOverflow feels downright regressive now.

I’m honestly kind of surprised about this news, considering how horrible Google’s results are now.

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Their attention is your lifeblood, and you’re actively giving them reasons to look elsewhere.

👍

My attention is all the currency YouTube will ever get from me - and it should be enough. If I post videos to YouTube (for nothing in return) and I talk to people about videos I saw on YouTube or link them to videos - then I am a net gain for Google and they should treat me as such. If anything, they should be working (nicely) to try to get me to want to pay (or view ads) and just be thankful I’m there if I don’t pay (or view ads). Instead they’ve chosen to work at ensuring everyone is so goddamn pissed off at their bullshit that they’d rather make it their full-time job to never give them another dime. Good job, Google! Smart!

Edit: Oh look, half a dozen lectures about how Google has to make money somehow. Hi there YouTube shills, I thought I would see you here.

I’ve been doing this with LibRedirect, but for some reason this past week, both Invidious and Piped are having problems showing video for me.