If you are thinking in terms of building a widget or making an industrial process, it makes perfect sense. Something like a wristwatch is the kind of innovation a LOT of people more or less simultaneously made and it is just impossible to definitively prove what country the first watch was made in. Even figuring out who was the first to file becomes a mess. Same with factory processes where the players who would even have the ability to iterate are often counted on fingers and toes.

But software (and research) in a global society is a real mother fucker. Because now the entire world can more or less see everything and reproducing things is fairly trivial. And… it isn’t like the patents actually matter all that much when so much gets done overseas. China Don’t Care but also the EU doesn’t really either and so forth. Sure there are avenues to try to pursue a studio using the patented Nemesis System but… at best you are going to be tied up in courts for years trying to get a judge to insist that a company in Germany needs to send you a check.

For the exact same reason that “fair use” is still so incredibly nebulous and twitch streaming/let’s plays still exist.

NOBODY is crazy enough to want to take that to the courts. Because maybe you get a judge who has “common sense”. Maybe you get an old white guy who thinks Pong was too complicated and decides that you are wrong. At which point you have now made a bunch of legal precedent for REALLY stupid stuff.

Its also kind of why so much stuff about video games actually never gets patented. It is playing with fire.

I ANAL and am not a lawyer.

The verbiage on this is RIDICULOUSLY specific (as patents generally should be) to the point that I refused to even pass the PDF through an OCR system and instead will trust that site’s transcription

    (1) There must be a PC, console or other computing device and the game is stored on a drive or similar storage medium.

    (2) You can move a character in a virtual space.

    (3) You must be able to summon a character. They call it a “sub character” by which they mean it’s not the player character, but, for example, a little monster such as a Pokémon that the player character has at its disposal.

    Then the logic branches out, with items (4) and (5) being mutually exclusive scenarios, before reuniting again in item (6):

    (4) This is about summoning the “sub character” in a place where there already is another character that it will then (when instructed to do so) fight.

    (5) This alternative scenario is about summoning the “sub character” at a position where there is no other character to fight immediately.

    (6) This final step is about sending the “sub character” in a direction and then letting an automatic battle ensue with another character. It is not clear whether this is even needed if one previously executed step (4) where the “sub character” will basically be thrown at another character.

All of those criteria must be met for this trap card to be triggered (shit… Yugioh lawyers getting revved up now).

Step 4 specifically covers the case where you summon your little guy to fight someone else. As worded, that actually would impact a Summon in every JRPG and Final Fantasy just got sweaty. Step 5 summons a character as an assist or to replace the main character in a fight (so… Pokemon).

What I find most interesting is that step 6 specifically says “automatic battle”. Which… to my Not A Lawyer brain, means this doesn’t even cover Pokemon since you specifically give your mons battle commands. Err, aside from S01E01 Pikachu who did not give a fuck. And then Charizard. And probably a dozen more pokemons after I stopped watching The Son Of Mr Mime’s Adventures. But, from what little I saw of it, it DOES cover Palworld where you just summon your pals to do work for you or fight for you. And it potentially covers Final Fantasy and Ichiban’s Like a Dragons (the Poundmates, not the Sujimon)…

Which is probably the most interesting thing and why I think Pokemon Co is going to be ridiculously selective of who they try to sue. Because any of the big hitters can just say “Dumbfucks, we were doing this before Game Freak even existed”. Whereas indie devs are small enough they don’t want to risk it.

It might be worth keeping an eye on MinnMax as Haley MacLean IS a lawyer who actually specializes in video game IP but I suspect this is too close to her day job for her to publicly speak about it even with the “not legal advice” disclaimers. Which hopefully guarantees she actually talked about it on one of the podcasts this week and I just haven’t looked yet.

Because the EU has a lot of fascist chuds in it who stand for what fuckface stood for.

The US is speedrunning christofacism. But we aren’t the only ones with a major infection.

They were just karma farming by posting whatever would get the drive by up-buttons.

That said: I don’t know if these are special Swedish cops or normal Swedish cops, but the gear is more or less the same as our “normal” patrol cops. Bullet/stab resistant vest, pistol, and quasi-military uniform. Ours tend to only wear the high visibility vests when they are newbies disrupting all traffic because they want to play traffic cop rather than just control the lights at an intersection.

Again, I don’t know what the baseline in Sweden is, but most civilized countries tend to have a distinction between patrol cops and the ones that have special training to handle armed suspects and the like. Ours… we theoretically have that but also basically every patrol car has an AR-15 and a shotgun in it and our cops love to grab those any time they can even half attempt to justify it.

That said, I assume your special response cops more or less look the same (full tactical gear). You just tend to not see those unless there is an actual meaningful threat.

Yeah… people tend to forget that modern artillery is actually in the 10-20 mile range to begin with. But that is really no different than “begin the invasion”. It isn’t like South Korea (and North Korea) aren’t watching the other side 24/7.

It is just that people usually use nukes as the exigent circumstances in a time like this. And I am going to specifically not speculate as to whether a nuclear bomb could be launched from behind the DMZ.

Your politics mod is batshit insane “pro military” and I’ve increasingly noticed political topics on dot world and the like getting shared around your /c/conservative and so forth mostly lining up with swarms of pro military rightwing jackasses.

Very much seeming like it is a right wing dot ml. Not everyone is part of that crowd but… yeah.

No I didn’t. Because I don’t think that has been a significant source of recruits for… probably closer to two decades than not now. Kids know the military is a joke. They know they are going to be deployed to fight Wars For Oil ™. NOBODY believes we did any meaningful good in Iraq/Afghanistan (which is actually a much more complicated discussion but…).

So the kids who genuinely think they can change their lives with a college degree? They aren’t the kids spending years of their lives killing other kids for a chance. If they are “smart” enough to think that then they are “smart” enough to realize all the consequences and how likely it is that the recruiter is going to lie to them.

“I joined the military to go to college” is very much a Desert Storm and MAYBE early 2000s “trope”. As we continued what was closer to a two decade forever war than not, the vast majority of people who would have come down on that thought process realized why it was a bad one.

Which gets back to “I joined the military so I can learn to be a mechanic” and all the implications of that. Or “the army made my father the man he is today” and so forth.

That said: I have worked with a few “skilled workers” who went the military route. And one or two of them are genuinely geniuses. They are also fucking terrifying the moment topics get even slightly “political” and it is very clear they fell into category 1 and 2 if you catch my drift.

And just before (probably the shit.justworks crowd…) come in to say this was an important thing to do and the reward outweighs the risk and blah blah blah:

What actionable intel would have come out of this? North Korea is already a nuclear power. Any attempt to “remove that capability” is going to trigger China and Russia and World War 3. Seoul is only 15 miles from the DMZ, so about 17 or 18 miles from where North Korea can do whatever the hell they want. Finding out about a dirty bomb or even plans to rush the DMZ and lob a proper nuke isn’t going to change anything.

Which is a recurring theme in recorded history when it comes to Intelligence. I forget the phrase experts use, but it is the idea that, consistently, the highest risk and most “daring” efforts tend to provide the least actionable intel. Whereas just slipping someone a couple thousand bucks to tell you what they know is consistently the most effective method.

Its just the reality of a modern standing military. The people who are going to sign up are a mixture of:

1. Just looking for an excuse to kill, generally brown, people
2. Rabidly patriotic
3. I am trying to find a polite and non-ableist way to say this but… not good at learning?

And “real” special forces (so not Rangers which are mostly just a badge they give anyone dumb enough to volunteer for an infantry combat role) kinda inherently have to be long term contracts/lifers. So not even the “I am gonna shoot a brown kid to get my college paid for” crowd.

One of my guilty pleasures are the Insider “military expert rates BLAH” videos. And most are complete and utter bullshit from what is obviously a larper who had a desk job. But the more legit people consistently say insane shit like “Full Metal Jacket made me want to join the marines” or “The moment I watched that shower scene in The Rock, I knew I had to be a Navy Seal”.

Pilots were one of the last holdouts where it genuinely made sense for the best and brightest to do a tour or two to get the hours they need to get licensed. But even that is long gone as people realize the good jobs are still going to go to nepotism and the best they can hope for is to haul cargo to places nobody wants to actually go.

But the military still insists on doing these high risk super low night flights with pilots who are inadequate and maintenance crews who “learn by doing” and so forth. Like, you know that mechanic who forgot to put the cap back on your buddy’s oil filter? These are the people who didn’t even think they could get a job doing that.

And he won’t. And in another six months judges will rule he was in violation of the court order saying he had to. And then he still won’t.

Which puts you ahead of the curve. But you are still depending on enough other people to be watching every update and so forth.

I am not saying I am much better. But it is one of those things where anyone considering the selfhosted Fun should REALLY spend some time dealing with software supply chains and the like. Too many people just figure “it is open source so it is safe” or, even in this thread, assume something is more or less safe based upon what app pulls it.

If anything it is easier to self audit the script.

But nobody ever actually audits the stuff they run so…

Look… we all go through our LTT phase.

I would strongly recommend ACTUALLY looking at what modding a Framework or a Steam Deck would mean. The latter has a decent number of controller mods and varying levels of jank regarding their cooling or storage.

But, at their core, both are more SOC than not. Theoretically, you can replace a USB controller if you break the port but they aren’t devices where you are making heavy changes and the Framework upgrade model is to literally buy a whole new motherboard (and, depending on the model, you have to do that for RAM too…). I think the Level 1 Techs review was probably the best where Wendell acknowledged that he would configure his laptop (basically what USB dongles and keyboard layout) once and the rest was just an excuse for him to goof off during a meeting.

Regarding security, you do have a point, although I could always bring my current laptop with me alongside the Steam Deck - I’d just prefer not to because of increasing the weight in the backpack I have to lug around each day.

You know you. But my experience from back in uni is that carrying a gaming handheld was pointless. if I have free time between classes I am going to do my homework or hang out with friends. And once classes are over? I am going home (or to hang out with friends again). And I commuted. For folk who actually live on campus there is even less reason to carry a gameboy around.

Few questions here:

First, “I want a Framework”. Framework is REALLY overpriced for what it is. I haven’t run the math since Liberation Day but generally the following shows that Framework actually doesn’t make sense for a consumer:

Let N be the price of a brand new Framework laptop, M the price of just the motherboard of the same quality tier, and P be the price of a similarly specced laptop at Best Buy or whatever.

For upgrading a Framework to be cheaper than just buying another laptop in however many years, N+M < 2*P. And the math usually comes out as it being a few bucks cheaper, at best. Which ALSO assumes that your keyboard, monitor, etc all remain in good condition and that Framework don’t change their form factors or anything.

Frameworks only make sense if you are in an environment where you burn through laptops quite quickly. So… a corporate environment (where they still have fairly shite support) where you will just give Fred a new laptop and then repair the one he ran over with his car later. And from when I actually ran the numbers for a company… the existing solutions were MUCH cheaper and the better ones actually have strong policies towards how they recycle e-waste. I could imagine a very small business threading the needle and making it work but… yeah.

Second is “Can I use a Steam Deck as a conventional laptop?”. Conceptually, yes. Desktop mode is just KDE Plasma (best desktop!). That said, the Steam Deck is built, first and foremost, as a gaming device so your lock screen is basically a shitty version of a phone lock screen with a touch screen that you probably only use when entering your passcode. It is also a high profile distro to attack. So… do yourself a favor and do not put any secrets (other than your Steam and GoG and whatever credentials) into that. I am not sure if the other Handheld Form Factor Gaming PCs have better security but I doubt it.

I definitely use my Steam Deck for a LOT of around the house debugging and even when I visit family or less tech savvy folk. When I don’t need to enter data and just need to be able to test a network connection or see a log? It is actually really nice. But I wouldn’t write any code or check my accounts on one.

So lastly we have “What should I do?” or, more accurately, “What would you do?”.

Personally? Get a cheap beater laptop (which it sounds like you already have) as your daily driver. Unless you are doing heavy local workloads (video editing or, I guess, compiling LLVM constantly) you don’t actually need all that much oomph in a laptop. And most of those workloads are best done on remote systems (of which you should have lots of access to as a college student).

As for gaming? The Steam Deck is an excellent choice and is what I would recommend since you’ll probably actually come out ahead on buying a Deck+Laptop versus a Gaming Laptop AND you won’t have to schlep that monstrocity around just to toast your crotch while you use it.

But… depending on how much gaming you do and how ideological you are… nVidia Geforce Now is actually REALLY REALLY REALLY good if you have even a decent internet connection (and you are at uni so you will have a good one). 10 bucks a month isn’t cheap, but considering a Deck starts at 400 USD for the LCD… 40 months or so to break even.

We are a numbers species

And we only have power when we act in numbers towards a focused goal.

This is why we (should) have (more) Unions instead of just “Negotiate for yourself and everyone will benefit”. And that, inherently, needs leaders who know how to work towards a shared purpose.

Everyone should work towards making the world a better place. But we also need to understand what we are actually working towards and what those “somethings” actually can accomplish.

The issue is what this even accomplishes.

Traction is indeed important. But people also get exhausted (how many folk were whinging about “first I needed to make my avatar a rainbow and now it needs to be black? Oh, you mean a black box. Whoopsie” back in 2020?). It is why “just do something, it doesn’t matter what” is such a stupid fucking mentality because you waste the general good will towards pointless slacktivism and then people stop caring by the time you have an idea of how to utilize them.

Which… is where the Rossman comes in. I have a lot of issues with him as a human being but as an activist he is REALLY effective… for Right to Repair… for repair shops. But he has also made his career on convincing everyday people that he is fighting for them when he is really using them as ammunition for making sure his repair shop (that totally doesn’t violate any labor laws…) can stay running because OBVIOUSLY this lobbyist movement to support activity that requires a full hotplate and high powered microscope is something that everyday consumers care about (sort of in the sense of having options, but at this scale the poison pill apple compliance is actually probably just as good, if not better, for consumers)

I haven’t been able to even find a good explanation of what this is even supposed to accomplish. But, dime to a dollar, it is Rossman et al demonstrating how quickly he can mobilize The Internet as a negotiating tactic for whatever he and his lobbyist buddies are pushing on right now.

PM->DM was a mix of making it more obvious that those were NOT private in the slightest and to better align with marketing (“send a Direct Message to the celebrity you are stalking!”)

I am not sure when “pfp” took over but I’ve noticed over the past 3 or 4 months a LOT of random requests for a DM on discord of people asking where I got my pfp… which is literally a screenshot from a cartoon in the 00s. So I assume this is related to selling avatars to people on the game social networks?

Even then. My general experience is that all of those “please don’t share this outside of our private tracker” style stuff is the same crap as everywhere else: They just want to feel special or encourage people to pay for ultra premium and so forth.

As for the actual truly sensitive stuff: If you are posting that to a “community” you are already the equivalent of a War Thunder player. And, quite frankly, there is zero reason that stuff like that should only be shared with a select few randos. Either it is evil shit (at which point I hope they DO get caught) or it is something that should be given to responsible journalists to share to the world at large.

And said multibillion dollar company doesn’t give a shit. It is just the local store that has to deal with shrinkage. Which mostly just equates to profit numbers, likelihood to get their share of hot items, and so forth. Which, medium term, leads to even more shit going behind the locked doors and said store shutting down because nobody wants to find a sales associate so that they can buy toothpaste.

Like almost all things, the “I am morally righteous because I target this” just ignores that you are still fucking with individuals. Which is one of the biggest “strengths” of capitalism: The people taking the abuse aren’t the oligarchs. It is your neighbors. And they are also the face of inconvenience when they actually try to advocate for their own rights.

So… how about you drop the “Doing X to A is righteous but doing it to B is bad” and consider growing up a bit and understanding that you are fucking people over either way. And decide how you feel about that. And, to be clear, nobody cares: You do you. Just understand what you are doing rather than focusing your energy on mental gymnastics because you can’t stand to think you might do a bad/“bad”.