To add all the other good comments here…

As a recording artist, it’s nearly impossible to stand out unless you have a marketing machine behind you. That means a record label that can promote your work, get your songs placed on radio stations and streaming platforms, and (in the old days) manufacture and sell physical media through many different retailers.

As a touring performer, you also need a large crew of people working for you: booking venues, marketing your shows, ticketing, managing the logistics of set-up/tear-down/transportation, operating lights and sound during the show, etc.

In both of these scenarios, the musician is only one small cog in a large machine. And there are enough good musicians in the world that they are treated as largely interchangeable.

Good point. I will add that to the long list of reforms we need in the US criminal system.

Mandatory minimums are a problem. Judges lose discretion to tailor the punishment to the specifics of the case. Minimums may be pushed unreasonably high so politicians can claim to be “tough on crime.” (This happened big time in the US, starting with the War on Drugs in the 1970s and continuing through the 1990s.) Both of those lead to more people in prison longer than they should be.

Also, at least in the US, not all crimes carry mandatory minimum sentences. This gives prosecutors a new source of leverage:

The use of mandatory minimums effectively vests prosecutors with powerful sentencing discretion. The prosecutor controls the decision to charge a person with a mandatory-eligible crime and, in some states, the decision to apply the mandatory minimum to an eligible charge. Rather than eliminate discretion in sentencing, mandatory minimums therefore moved this power from judges to prosecutors. The threat of mandatory minimums also encourages defendants to plead to a different crime to avoid a stiff, mandatory sentence.

https://www.sentencingproject.org/fact-sheet/how-mandatory-minimums-perpetuate-mass-incarceration-and-what-to-do-about-it/

Mandatory minimums can also lead to significant racial disparities. The linked article cites an example of very different minimum sentences for different drug offenses, leading to a sharp rise in incarceration rates for blacks but much less so for whites.

[email protected] is leaking

“Everything will be better if we just feed a fifth of the population to the alligators!”

Absolutely insane.

Whatever the issue was, it was short-lived. It’s now back to normal and only a few minutes behind.

Do you mean in the very short term, or over the last few days or weeks?

At the moment It looks like programming.dev is suddenly falling behind reddthat.com. It’s currently ~40 minutes behind and getting worse. @[email protected] @[email protected], FYI.

I’m not savvy enough to know what causes this, but it has happened before between instances. @[email protected] might have some insight.

Lays me down

Depends how high into the triple digits, whether there’s shade and water available, how humid it is, whether air conditioning is an option, etc.

I would probably choose triple digits. I do love cold winters, but a dry 104F with a cool place to swim and big, shady trees is splendid. Beyond about 110F gets miserable, though.

The internet has always been a collection of social media platforms: bulletin boards, Usenet, IRC, people hosting little personal sites and making contact with each other via email, etc. It got bad when big money arrived and brought in the general public. First is was platforms like AOL’s chat rooms and forums, and later things like Facebook and Twitter. We are all living in eternal September now.

Exhibit A: this t-shirt from 1994

She might be dead

That’s the power of consent!

Side note: If worrying about climate isn’t enough, we can also worry about potential famine as we use up our fossil fuels.

We are able to feed the world because of the Haber-Bosch process. This process uses fossil fuels, usually natural gas, to produce synthetic ammonia for fertilizer. That fertilizer makes modern high-yield farming possible. “Without the Haber-Bosch process we would only be able to produce around two-thirds the amount of food we do today.”
https://www.thechemicalengineer.com/features/cewctw-fritz-haber-and-carl-bosch-feed-the-world/

In the US it’s roughly a tie between road transportation and energy generation (which lumps together both heat and electricity).

(Source: University of Michigan https://css.umich.edu/publications/factsheets/sustainability-indicators/carbon-footprint-factsheet)

The global breakdown is similar: https://www.wri.org/insights/4-charts-explain-greenhouse-gas-emissions-countries-and-sectors

The solutions? Build mass transit, live in temperate climates, buy less stuff, …? Honestly, I don’t think we’re not going to fix the problem with simple, local improvements (though by all means do what you can). There are global demographic forces to contend with. A century ago there were 2 billion people on earth. Now there are >8 billion, and in my lifetime we will surpass 9 billion. Many of those people are climbing out of poverty, and they want cars and air conditioners and all the other energy-intensive things that rich countries have enjoyed for a century. IMO we’re going to need massive technological changes (like powering much of the world with nuclear very soon) in concert with a major population reduction and/or major changes to how people expect to live.

If you like Photon, you might like Tesseract. It’s a Photon fork.

dubvee.org
tesh.itjust.works
tess.lemmy.ca
tes.leminal.space

I’ll mention some dead projects, in case anyone gets an itch to pick them up…

lotide/hitide is a minimalist, text-only platform. It has been abandoned.
https://sr.ht/~vpzom/lotide/. https://lotide.fbxl.net/

Sublinks was in the works, but it is on indefinite hiatus. As I understand it, the main dev became too busy IRL to continue work.
https://github.com/sublinks

Same here. Paper ballots that can be machine scanned and stored for manual audits seem like the best possible method.

Not my language, but I like the Dutch word “peperduur” for “very expensive.” I like that the meaning has both historical and emotional aspects: pepper was once very expensive, and a high price can be considered spicy.

In English, “crestfallen” is a good one. When I read it I immediately imagine someone hanging their head in dismay.

The trend toward subdued color palettes. Every new home is decorated in “millennial gray.” Most cars are black, white, gray, or silver. You have to go out of your way to find bright, colorful clothing or furniture. It’s incredibly boring and I can’t wait for the pendulum to swing back the other way.

often a really good option from a functional POV

This right here. Electronic devices are full of plastics because they are often the best, or only, way to make those devices function and remain safe. You’re not going to make a car that meets any modern crash safety standard without plastic materials. Your not going to replace medical tubing with paper or cloth. Etc., etc.

The world can certainly use less plastic, and should use less. But eliminating it completely will require either (a) developing some novel new replacement material, or (b) giving up a lot of useful things humans have developed in the past century.