So, you can’t see the woods for the trees. You honed in on the anecdotal example of industry trend, but didn’t refute the trend.

At PAX 2017, I was disappointed by the overwhelming number of battle royale games. There were a handful of games that stood out for story or in-person party play, but the biggest booths were all for MMOs and battle royale games.

I’ve long said that MMO games are so common because storytelling and world-building are hard. Also, Sturgeon’s Law: 90% of everything is shit.

I’m guessing the downvotes are because people fail to see or deliberately ignore the generalization. Of course there are stellar story-driven, single player games still coming out, but 90% shit is to be expected.

My only shred of disagreement here (more of a qualification) is time-wasting. Of course games are for sucking down time. It’s one of the circuses in “Bread and Circuses.” But the same applies to novels, hobbies, and lush green lawns. :D

Another qualification I’ll add: I think we’re just getting more of everything with better coverage and more ubiquitous advertising, so it’s easier to see the shit games. It’s easier than ever to build a game, so of course the tide of garbage rises. But so do the standouts, unfortunately in roughly equal proportions. :D There have some great story-driven games recently as one other commenter noted. For me, “The Expanse,” “Cyberpunk,” and “Become Human” leap to mind (yes, I’m a very late adopter). Two of those are basically visual novels with choices, but the stories hit hard and get into complex moral and social issues.

When you’re ready, I’ll be out on the retirement home patio with a cold one waitin’ for ya. We’ll gripe about it some more.

Thanks for the info!

You might notice some artifacts on the left of the frame

I didn’t, but you went and made me look! You totally could have gotten away with that! :D

scan it with my olympus OM-1

Oh! Can you you share or show what your setup is for that? I have a bunch of negatives and chrome I would love to digitize. I bought a 1200dpi film scanner some years ago but I’m unhappy with the results. Also, it doesn’t have 120 carrier, only 35mm.

And heeeelllll YES Darktable!

Do you know any EMTs? I do, and it sounds like you might also. In the US at least, this seems the opposite direction of what OP is asking. Long hours, low pay when amortized over hours on call, high stress, but potentially great personal satisfaction. Also potential career track to other first responder/medical roles, which can be another plus, e.g. wilderness SAR, marine emergency SAR, trauma nurse*, etc.

If I have any of that wrong, I sincerely would enjoy additional context and discourse.

*A close friend from high school went the EMT->trauma nurse route. He has the temperament for it and absolutely rocks it. He is doing waaaaay better financially and spiritually than most of our social circle. His hours aren’t consistent per se, 3 days on, 3 days off plus any additional shifts he wants. He could have retired about 5 years ago, but loves the work too much.

Gawd, I miss 120 6x6. What was your printing and scan process?

Know people.

This aspect cannot be overstated. I landed my biggest* jobs because of my professional network. Moreover, I landed those roles during some serious labor market carnage: Dotcom Bust, Great Recession, and the current knowledge career uncertainty.

*Highest salary, longest running, best environment, most career growth, or some combination thereof.

The fundamentals are always going to be the same:

• Develop marketable skills
• Build out your professional network
• Develop ace communication skills, written and verbal; this pays dividends everywhere in life
• Strive to be either in the top ~15%* of what you do or bring a diverse set of skills to the table so that you can perform multiple roles; however, the latter tends to be an entirely different kind of job
• Be punctual
• Always continue with your professional development
• Be the kind of person with whom you would like to work

*This is not as hard as it sounds. Consider Sturgeon’s Law (“90% of everything is shit”) and how much people phone it in; it’s pretty easy to stand out in most fields.

More specifically, I suggest “durable” career fields such as the trades (plumber, electrician, lineperson, crane operator, cement truck operator, etc). I mentor and tutor some high school and college students. There’s a lot of career uncertainty for the the foreseeable future, and the trades are not going anywhere. I generally suggest “do what pays the most and chaps your ass the least;” this is just a guideline and the kind of thing you need to figure out what your inflection point is. Whatever the fuck you do, avoid debt like it’s the plague.

Unless you land a proper apprenticeship, expect some serious long days for a few years, e.g. working full time and schooling/studying full time. Maybe you’ll get away with a less arduous journey, but if you’re mentally prepared to go full-tilt then you’ll be pleasantly surprised if the journey is easier.

Empathy by way of anecdote: I was a DJ and nightclub manager. I was surprised when I hit 25 and was somehow still alive. I decided to take this life stuff seriously and saw that there was most likely no path towards serious financial security. I went back to college for audio engineering, working full time and going to school full time. I did audio engineering for about five years. While audio engineering was cool, I thought it would be even cooler to write the software tools for audio. So I poured myself into independent study, using my nights and weekends to learn programming. And once I was comfortable with programming, I went back to college again for software engineering, again full time school + work. The journey was hard, but I was a senior software engineer within 8 years, manager and principal roles another 4 years after that. However, I never got a job writing audio software; it’s been all medical and financial software. “How do you make the gods laugh? Make plans.” So have a vision, but be flexible and open to opportunities.

Honestly, if I could have another go at it, I would have chosen marine electrician. Travel, boats + ships, technical + creative field, and get to pick and choose jobs I want to do.

Woo warning ahead: there are qualitative aspects to the journey. Know what you want, rather than what you are avoiding. If you don’t know where you want to go, you are going to end up somewhere else. But something cool happens when you know what you want, know it in your bones, and commit to taking the steps. The universe delivers. Maybe not the exact thing you wanted, but some form of it.

*Bike cargo gear has always been the part of cycling that nobody really gets excited about. *

Speak for yourself, buddy. I obsess over this stuff.

Racks, panniers, and baskets exist to haul things, and most of them look exactly like what they are, brackets and platforms bolted on as an afterthought.

That is the consequence of careless planning and sloppy installation. Even when things need to be fabricobbled on with adapters, the overall design can be sexy if done with intention and attention.

I love a good modular cargo system, but this system falls down on so many levels.

• Overpriced, but fine, whatever. That is to be expected when putting form over function. This overall system is redolent of cheap headphones that come with cat ears glued on top, stick-on faux hood scoops, and those stupid eyelashes over headlights.
• The front light is passing through a lens and is enclosed in a housing. There is going to be spill and backscatter of the light, reducing the efficacy of the light and affecting the rider’s night vision. Also, passing light through an additional lens for aesthetic purposes only? I highly doubt they used optical glass for that front lens. Also, good modern bicycle headlights have side illumination. This system blocks that.
• The exigence they are pushing is that bicycle cargo is some kind of afterthought. You know what really makes it look like an afterthought? Using clamp-on adapters for everything instead of braze-ons. And even then, systems such as Old Man Mountain and BarYak can still look like they belong there.
• What’s with the width of the mirrors? Those are almost as narrow as my head. My mirror is mounted on my glasses. In order see the car lane, my mirror is set about 1.5 inches outboard of my head. Those mirrors? Most people will be looking at their torso or too far to the sides.
• i didn’t even complete the video because I just couldn’t take any more. But modular racks… Cool. Except there are a ton of modular standards already out there. MIK and Rixen+Kaul leap to mind. These have years of real-world testing and a ton of products. But go ahead, guys. Go your own way.

“The revolution is waitin’ for a spark.”

Ah, yes, the kink-shaming of… being wheelchair bound? What? This has to be one of the weirdest straw man fallacies I’ve ever heard. Care to give that another try?

Which happens to be where Matt Inman (the artist) lives.

Absolutely don’t kink shame. But when a person’s political affiliation actively kink shames and marginalizes all people not cis heteronormative, the gloves are off.

I have a minor hand washing compulsion, but it’s not a germophobia thing. While I would prefer everyone wash their hands after using the bathroom, it doesn’t gross me out like some other things, like nose-picking.

Lots of excreta aerosolize or otherwise get everywhere. While hand washing is a low bar to improving hygiene, shit is literally everywhere. Want to see something scary (depending on your squeamishness)? Get a 350nm UV flashlight and check out your home. Hell, try it right after you do a deep clean.

My guess it’s even older than that. My bullshitspiration is that peristalsis enabled more complex digestion when our quadruped ancestors needed more nutrition options.

I’m secure enough to know when I’ve been properly one-upped.

“DEFCON-4” leaps to mind (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087130/).

I feel like this says more about neuroscience than it does about LLMs. :D

But seriously, my teams’ and individual experiences with LLMs have been mixed, at best. Even with advanced prompt training, the tools are just not there yet for our work.

That wasn’t my point. But thank you for the contribution of your wisdom.

My offering: SubSpace (now SubSpace Continuum), 1997 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SubSpace_(video_game)

I’m sure there’s gotta be some MUD still running on a forgotten mainframe.

Carrying 50kg and only burned 2600 calories. Is anyone else annoyed by how few calories seem to get burned? “WHAT?! That had to be a 10,000 calorie ride!”