Late response, but there is BookBrainz, the book-equivalent of MusicBrainz. It’s catalogue isn’t as big as OpenLibrary but they’re doing way better on the front of keeping their data clean and without duplicates. I hope someday it will find more users and be the base for other apps to built upon.

A very particular type of prison too

Yes you name important reasons, also there’s migration both legal and illegal. Legal migration also from within Europe, for example there are quite a lot of Polish homeless people here. Often they came here to work, but they lost their job and the housing that was part of the job, and they stick around for a while, thinking to turn things round, but things get worse when they start drinking. Often their best chance is to go back to Poland, because there they have social security rights, which they don’t have here. But they feel shame to go back and face their defeat. It’s heartbreaking sometmes, not very proud of how my country treats foreign workers…

There are some schizophrenic homeless people, but even more people with bad tempers, anti social personality traits, that get themselves into fights all the time. I often need to remind myself and others, that it’s those people that often need help the most. Some people only want to help those that are very sympathetic, and greatfull. But those will make it any way, everyone is willing to help them. It’s the ones with the bad tempers and the short fuses that need your help most, because most people are unwilling to look beyond it.

Money can’t buy you happiness. But stress due to lack of money destroys people. Working as a volunteer at a homeless shelter has taught me that atleast here in the Netherlands quite some of them stay homeless not because there are no options to get of the street, but because with these options comes all the stress of having to pay the bills. That goes to show how rough it must be to live with financial stress, because living on the street itself is terribly rough, and still some prefer it.

Isn’t the whole idea of public broadcasting that it doesn’t need to be commercial, that it can go for quality over entertainment value?

What about the online food ordering market. I reckon that might be an easier first step than consumer products. Here in the Netherlands JustEatTakeaway has a market share of around 90% and requires restaurants to give them a 14% provision. Restaurants don’t have much of a choice, if they’re not on there they miss out on a huge part of the market, it’s like they don’t exist. Why don’t restaurants unite and develop a FOSS protocol that let’s them federate, so the consumer has a central place to browse the food delivery market, but simultaneously makes the providers independant because they can run their own instance if they please. Have these types of ideas been pitched to branche organizations? Restaurants have a clear interest to develop this to free themselves from the platforms with a monopolistic venture-capital-driven strategy.

People with a burn out

Yes, even when people copy eachother they don’t have the same output. And some individuals are mighty excentric, for instance Picasso. But most people stick almost entirely to what they see and only differentiate by means of the mistakes they make, not by intended originality. From the moment people are born they start copying everything they see. With a head full of mirror neurons we tend to live our lifes exactly the same, and the differences only stand out because they’re relative. From a distance we would all look, behave, be more or less the same. Copyright should be abolished. I’m all in favor of supporting artists and creators, support whoever you will out of free will, but don’t limit others freedom to copy you. If we can’t copy what others have done before us, then our culture is not free. It should be an honor to be copied, that means others like your idea and want to use it too. That’s how humans have always lived, that’s how we progress. it’s what has brought us this far. Let’s continue without bizarre copying limitations. If we can copy freely that means culture is free, it means we can learn from eachother, take eachothers ideas and creations, put them to use and expand upon them, sometimes inadvertently while trying to make an exact copy. This freedom will be to the benefit of us all, and the opposite is true aswel, intelectual property is to the detriment of us all.

If you don’t want your work to be used by others, keep it private. Don’t show it to anyone. Keep your invention in your cellar and let nobody enter. If you want to share your ideas and creations, please do so. But you can’t have your cake and eat it too. You can’t show what you’ve made and expect others to not use it as input and put it to use.

you’re choosing to interpret it negatively. you read to much into it. I tend to interpret ‘honestly, why do you care’ as someone who honestly wants to know why the other cares. Why would it not be that? It makes a lot of sense to me to ask this question, because I don’t see the relevance of something being AI or not in the context of a meme.

unpopular opinion: humans are a deeply mimetic species, copying is our very essence and every limitation to it is entirely unnatural and limiting human potential.

he asked why

So news only reports the news. How bizarre. This must be a conspiracy.

Well, you can say that, but of course people do. It’s not like it’s a completely bizarre movement of the arm. It happens now and then and people are demonized because of it. I really don’t mean to defend Elon Musk, because I really wouldn’t mind him being guillotined, but to claim that everyone that’s been accused of doing a nazi salute, has intentionally done a nazi salute, is rather bizarre. We really don’t need this, in order to hate on Musk, he’s got all the hateability checks. There are plenty reasons that are far beyond any debate that would make him one of the most hated people on earth, and he deserves all of that. But the ‘see, it’s a nazi, here’s the proof <shows salute clip>’ won’t convince anyone that’s not already on board on hating him. The argument that it’s immoral to have over 400 billion, and that if he was a reasonable person he would give some shares to his employees, or lower prices, or distribute his money in power in whatever way possible because only a power hungry narcisistic maniac would hoard all this power, or whatever, is, I think, far more convincing than focussing on this awkward hand gesture.

Ah someone level headed. That’s refreshing.

I thoroughly hate Musk, as so many of us, so I can understand the eagerness to misinterpret things in the worst way possible.

he means ‘is showing virtue’. And he’s right.

Villains all the more.

I use it sometimes. We also use an equivalent of the German one: het zou mij worst wezen.

I don’t know if in the case of all psychedelics this is true. I’ve often heard, and I think I agree, that having a good or bad trip is relatively independant of dose, rather it is based on set and setting. I’ve even heard it said that with for instance LSD it can be easier to have a somewhat higher dose, because with that you’ll have no control, and you’ll often be beyond even trying to control what’s happening in your head. While with a low dose you might be very aware, and precisely for this reason more susceptible to paranoia and fear, which could still spiral into massive proportions. You might want to control what’s happening in your head, and you’ll find that you’re unable to, which is conflicting. With ecstasy I certainly agree, I tend to think most people that use ecstasy use too high of a dose for their own good anyway. I go by the (max bodyweight in kg)x1,5mg total for 1 evening, and only do it once every 3 months or so.

Yes, you’re right I regretted NOT having a sitter present. I can understand that sitters can be an uncomfortable presence when all is well and I wouldn’t say you always need them there, but specifically when it’s peoples first time taking psychedlics I think it can be a wise precaution to take. Surely, most of the time everything will be fine, but it’s a safeguard for the occasion that it’s not. I think the sitter should probably bring a book or something and do his own thing, as you’re not on the same level you should probably not intervene in any way when it’s not needed. When you’re mind is doing strange things to you, it’s pleasant to know that the ones around you are in more or less the same situation, I guess it makes it easier to let go and be weird, without the gaze of a normal person. And letting go of control and inhibitions I think is crucial when doing psychedelic. Don’t control your mind but let it flow like a river.

When that person literally tells you to go away and not bother them while they make a bad trip for themself, how could I violate that.

I agree, if one does not want help, pushing help onto them is probably not the least bit helpfull. But it must be slightly uncomfortable knowing that if allowed, you could actually make things a bit better.

Sounds like what you needed was someone you trust, that’s sober, that would tell you: 'listen, you are currently under the influence of this drug, that effect will pass and you’ll go back to normal, nothing terrible has happened, you are just having a panic attack that’s being magnified by the drugs, but really, nothing bad has happened, none of this will last, the drugs will lose their effect soon, and there is nothing to worry about except for your panic attack right now, that must be very uncomfortable. so let’s try to calm down, let’s focus on breathing together for a bit so we can stop your panic reaction.

In my experience such words can make a world of difference, a moment of fear can be turned round, back into a pleasant experience. I’ve regretted not having a sitter present when I introduced LSD to some friends. One of them got a message on his phone, that got him very confused, and although we managed to calm him down eventually, he experienced some severe panic, that I feel I could’ve handled a lot better when I was sober, but unfortunately I was also under the influence. I myself having taken psychedelics monthly for over a decade now, I tend to underestimate the psychological risks for new users, that’s what I took from that experience, and I won’t let it happen again. Psychedelics always need proper set and setting, and new users should have an experienced, familair tripsitter present, always. My friend didn’t have lasting negative effects from the experience but your story proves that it’s definitely risky and measures should be taken to always take them with precaution.