thecanine

twtxt.net

Czech IT doggo, tester, webdev, C# programmer and pixelart artist. k9.yote.me

Recent twts from thecanine
In-reply-to » @thecanine Can you recommend me some good pixelated fonts?

@adi@twtxt.net Depends on what youā€™re looking for. If you want something a little bigger, but still very pixelated and donā€™t mind it only supporting English.
You can take the one used on my site( https://thecanine.ueuo.com )

You should keep in mind, that itā€™s more or less ripped from ā€œHypnospace Outlawā€, so probably not good for commercial use.

A smaller, most languages supporting and more commercially usable pixelfont is ā€œuni05_53ā€ by Craig Kroeger.
Sadly the version of this font, listed on the vast majority (if not all) font sites, includes a small error, that makes it unusable, for some European languages.

A fix for that was made by me, after getting Craigs permission, so if you like this font, itā€™s better to download my version of it, from: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vEXYneABo6tAXdz2e0Er915uiiP5aFh-/

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » Can't wait until this site joins the trend and becomes "y.com" - the everything protocol.

@prologic@twtxt.net Twitter has ditched the bird logo, in favor of the uni code character ā€œš•ā€.

The company behind it is now called ā€œX Corp.ā€ and the site can also be accessed, by going to https://x.com .

Once the rebrand is finished, the site will just be called ā€œXā€, with ā€œthe everything appā€ as the new tagline/slogan.

Dumb (but related) shitpost, made by me: https://youtube.com/shorts/GxeYI7ZBdk4?feature=share

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » Opera browser: my final disavowal

@lyse@lyse.isobeef.org for sure, I also block ads wherever possible. What Opera does now (among other things), is sponsor creators/ā€œinfluencersā€ to talk about it, pays to show up, on top of browser-related Google searches and occupies the tiny amount of ad space, that I do not block, to help cover some projects server costs.
But to be transparent, some of that is surely targeted at me, only because I was researching it - and the Google spyware somehow noticed.

Now I want to give Pulse browser a fair try. Itā€™s still in alfa, but itā€™s one of the few forks of Firefox, that try to change and simplify things, offer a bit of a unique look and it comes with Ublock origin built-in.

ā¤‹ Read More

Opera browser: my final disavowal

While the Internet is being flooded by a record amount of Opera ads, affiliate program members and new hardcore defenders, while I - as someone, who has been using it without a break, for more than 10 years, have had enough and Iā€™ve finally decided to uninstall it.

Part of the reason for this decision, was the new Opera One UI update, that I not only found incredibly ugly and uninspired, but also worsening the already abysmal performance of the browser, as well as adding to the already gigantic pile of bugs within.

All of this, came after a few very frustrating weeks, where the browser constantly crashed, under the weight of its own AI bloat. Every time any text was selected, it was trying to load some ridiculous AI integrations on top, but always crashing and loosing all the opened tabs.
After the UI update, the whole browser somehow felt even more wonky and laggy.

Even for those, who might be fans of the new UI and all the added ā€œfeaturesā€, that now include a built in generic anime girl game and stupid cartoon noises, upon clicking almost anything, in the ā€œgaming versionā€ of this browser, the growing concerns about this browsers spyware-like connections, to all kinds of mysterious servers, should at least be considered and looked into further. Not to mention the extra problems, that come with them being a Chinese-ran company, storing this data in China.
Quick summary: https://youtu.be/NV8akIgfDqQ

Int the interest of brevity, I wonā€™t go further into the pointless social media arguments they engage in, their past promoting predatory loans, them inserting affiliate links (to the sites you visit through tiles), running a very questionable free VPN service, hidden extensions, that cannot be removed and god knows what else.

Either way Opera, you were an alright browser - many, many years ago. Sadly all I can say now, is ā€œrest in piss, you wonā€™t ever be missed!ā€.

Download

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » Looks like Google's using this blog post of mine without my permission. I hate this kind of tech company crap so much.

@abucci@anthony.buc.ci Like it or not (itā€™s also a ā€œnotā€ in my book), thatā€™s the direction, most search engine are heading. Itā€™s also heard to imagine it being illegal, because theyā€™ve been scraping and letting you search images for decades and won the lawsuit, they got into by scanning and scraping books.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » I've seen BlueSky referred to as BS (as in Blue Sky, but you know...), which seems apt.

@abucci@anthony.buc.ci Iā€™m 99% sure, that wonā€™t be the case. Iā€™d be really surprised, if the instances, willing to host illegal content, werenā€™t somehow blocked by default.

Even the sites hosting gore and archiving illegal shooting cams, always have an effective way to remove illegal pornography. If anyone made a site without that option, no-one would ever want to host it and the only users happy to stay on it, would be pedophiles.

There are a few Mastodon instances like that, made by and for pedophiles, hosted in places with loose laws, but theyā€™re completely defederated, even from those ran by ā€œfree speech absolutistsā€, as well as the few, straigh up advocating neo-nazism.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » So the news is telling me, Bluesky is the hottest new decentralized thing, with parole waiting month to join, or buying invite codes of ebay, for thousands of dollars.

@xuu@txt.sour.is Thank you for the info. I definitely wouldnā€™t mind one, despite originally wanting to join, through some other instance. Since theyā€™re also promising seamless instance switching, this should hopefully be a non-issue.

ā¤‹ Read More

So the news is telling me, Bluesky is the hottest new decentralized thing, with parole waiting month to join, or buying invite codes of ebay, for thousands of dollars.

Yet thereā€™s not one other instance out there, for people to join this decentralized paradise. Idk, just sounds a little sussy to me.

I know there was stems.social, but when people tried joining it, they cried ā€œabuseā€ and shut it down - so no, it doesnā€™t count.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » BlueSky is cosplaying decentralization

@abucci@anthony.buc.ci Iā€™ve looked into it myself and funnily enough, the best take might have been some random comment, saying itā€™s only popular, because itā€™s invite only and people are having trouble getting in.

Further, as there are not many actual users, people seem to be projecting all of their hopes and dreams onto it, while waiting in the endless joining line, or falling for ā€œpay for inviteā€ scams. Yes, those somehow exist and cost anywhere from 20 to 100$ - no refunds.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » I was listening to an Oā€™Reilly hosted event where they had the CEO of GitHub, Thomas Dohmke, talking about CoPilot. I asked about biased systems and copyright problems. He, Thomas Dohmke, said, that in the next iteration they will show name, repo and licence information next to the code snippets you see in CoPilot. This should give a bit more transparency. The developer still has to decide to adhere to the licence. On the other hand, I have to say he is right about the fact, that probably every one of us has used a code snippet from stack overflow (where 99% no licence or copyright is mentioned) or GitHub repos or some tutorial website without mentioning where the code came from. Of course, CoPilot has trained with a lot of code from public repos. It is a more or less a much faster and better search engine that the existing tools have been because how much code has been used from public GitHub repos without adding the source to code you pasted it into?

Sure, itā€™s still not exactly ethical and probably not even legal, in some cases, but at the end of the day, itā€™s at the very least something.

Something, that makes me think, that there could have been a scenario, where it was a voluntary community project, developers would gladly contribute some of their code and advise to - like some of them are already doing elsewhere.
Even with ā€œart generationā€, if credit was properly given and the thing showed all the artists, the final peace was inspired by and where to find and support them, it might have had a way warmer welcome.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » Quite predictably, the introduction of Chat GPT, has led to even more browser bloat. šŸŽ‰

@abucci@anthony.buc.ci Hard to say when exactly the downfall started, but there were many strange moments, in the last few years. There was the new ownership, some developers jumping ship and starting Vivaldi Browser, the whole company getting caught, for offering predatory loans, to Android users in poorer countries, in 2020 (https://www.engadget.com/2020-01-19-opera-accused-of-predatory-loan-apps.html),...

But at last, they found some success, with their gimmicky Opera GX ā€œgaming browserā€, they still pay youtubers to promote and I guess the promoted content within.

They also came up with a free VPN integration, that they later monetized and started taking pretty much every partner, willing to pay them, to get integrated into their main browser - an offer most appealing to small crypto/web 3.0 projects, trying to appear more promising, by having a browser company on board.

ā¤‹ Read More

Quite predictably, the introduction of Chat GPT, has led to even more browser bloat. šŸŽ‰

Download


Download

Also since Iā€™m already bringing up opera - I have genuinely no idea, what their dev team is smoking, as all their additions this year, have been this desperate:

Download


From some cashback scam and TikTok integrationā€¦

Download


ā€¦all the way to some ā€œlonely men baitā€ and adding NFTs - a full year, after everyone stopped caring.

ā¤‹ Read More

My twtxt fork will only include nicknames, profile pictures, a thing that livestreams you whenever you open it and the upvote and downvote buttons - under every stream.

Iā€™ll call it ā€œYarn.Anti-socialā€ or ā€œBlog TVā€, since we all remember, how great this idea, worked the first time around. šŸ˜…

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » Special Report: Tesla workers shared sensitive images recorded by customer cars | Reuters

@abucci@anthony.buc.ci I think it recording the outside of the car, was known for a long time. Likely since they came up with that not so great self-driving project, that led to the need for a lot more data to improve it.

Sadly, people in tech, talking shit about their customers, doesnā€™t surprise me either. Not saying itā€™s excusable, Iā€™ve just seen it happen, at many places, in the past.

The one thing, that surprises me, is it recording the inside. Even I, with all me skepticism, would still expect some bare minimum of privacy, when it comes to the things Iā€™m doing and conversations Iā€™m having, inside my own car.

ā¤‹ Read More

I still have great memories, of playing Club Penguin as a child, or even playing it on a few private servers, at times, as a nostalgia-filled adult, after Disney destroyed and took down the original. Sadly most of those servers were either too obscure, broken, or not obscure enough, to avoid Disneys lawyers.

I was mildly excited, when I heard about a 3D sequel, made by some of the people, behind the original game (before Disney bought it), but this is suspicious at best.

Even if you made the funny penguin game from my childhood, I will not give you my social security number, nor my credit card info, to play the new one and I hope not many others will either.

Download

*The sequel is called ā€œParty Parrot Worldā€ and requires a ā€œverified Hideaway accountā€, if you want to play it, or try some other two game things, that they are currently working on.

ā¤‹ Read More

I said, I donā€™t want to hear any more Trump news, but seeing heā€™s still seething in all caps and some invalid characters, on his isolated bootleg site, made me chuckle.

Download

The only way, this could get more pathetic, is if he starts spamming 5 emojis, after every word. šŸ˜‚

ā¤‹ Read More

To my surprise, some AI companies, might have to face the consequences of their art theft afterall. While the legal and corporate world, still couldnā€™t give less of a shit about the small artists, stability ai made the critical mistake, of using the ever so precious bland and generic stock images. Those are owned by companies, who for obvious reasons, hate AI, have extremely deep pockets and access to the right kind of lawyers.

They also have one other key advantage, that could win them the case. By slapping their watermark on millions of images, in the exact same place, the AI will start putting distorted versions of it, onto some images. Therefore, they can argue damage to their reputation, with evidence, to back it up.

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/66788385/getty-images-us-inc-v-stability-ai-inc/

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » I have some exciting news to share! Celebrate the 3000 days of Canine anniversary, with this limited time offer. The ore-orders will launch soon, so get your wallets ready everyone!

@prologic@twtxt.net Thank you, this is itā€™s april fools version - still itā€™s really nice to hear this, since the regular version, is now somewhat in danger, thanks to the unwillingness of Czech ISPs, to provide IPv6 addresses, to their clients.

If you mean the illustration here, I have to disappoint you and admit, that the bottle was generated by AI, before being edited by me.

ā¤‹ Read More

Another month, another pixelart! This time itā€™s actually not a canine, but a strange scenery, made using the PICO 8 color palette.

The only thing shared between this and the last art, is both being ā€œslightly YIIK inspiredā€.

Download

ā¤‹ Read More

Microsoft really couldnā€™t stand their browser, for the first time ever, being ever so slightly better than Chrome, so theyā€™re already working hard, to find new ways to ruin it.

ā¤‹ Read More

My hot take, adding to the banks vs crypto debate, happening here:

While banks in most countries, can be trusted, what I find more alarming, is there being only two companies (MaserCard a Visa), who handle international money transfers - both having ToS, that allow them to blacklist you, without even giving you the reason, why that decision was made. They are also both ran out of the same country.

Iā€™m not saying crypto is the solution, competition is! Anything even close to a monopoly, in any field, should make people worried. There should also be no second chances, for the companies, institutions, or governments, cough mishandling peoples money.

PayPal withheld funds for unreasonably long and charged illegal and unjustifiable random fines, that earned them a class action lawsuit. No-one should do business, with a company this scummy and I immediately demanded, that they delete my account, when I found out this was happening.

Lastly, say what you will, about the protests of Canadian truckers. I donā€™t fully endorse, what they did (both sides made mistakes, in this conflict), but if my government withheld money, from anyone, over protests, Iā€™d definitely not feel safe, knowing people like that, can touch all my money.

ā¤‹ Read More

Just days after @prologic@twtxt.net integrates ActivityPub into Yarn, Facebook comes out with plans to do the same (at least according to Twitter jurnos): https://www.platformer.news/p/meta-is-building-a-decentralized

Thereā€™s no escape Prologic, Facebook will find you in the endā€¦
Donā€™t be sad, I know you will
But donā€™t give up until
Facebook will find you in the end

*Help, I canā€™t stop with the stupid lyrics gimmick, while posting here. šŸ˜…

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » (#j7ukhba) @prologic The people who wanted to rely on Visa, Mastercard or any other giant company with already too much control over peoples finances and ability to do business, completely missed the whole point of crypto, to begin with.

@bender@twtxt.net Yeah, I fully understand Mastercards and Visas decision on this. Iā€™m just saying, that the people invested in crypto, who want it to become mainstream, shouldnā€™t forget, that the main reason it got popular, was people wanting a financial system, that governments and big companies wouldnā€™t be able to monitor, rule over, manipulate or ban anyone from. So why do some of them cry, over these big companies like Visa or Mastercard, not wanting to be involved now?

There were even those, who tried pushing crypto, as one of the main currencies in their countries - and that just ainā€™t it either. Just look at what happen to El Salvador, after they tried doing this, with Bitcoin.

These things might sound nice on paper, to cryptobros and holders, but I think they go against, what crypto was meant to be.

ā¤‹ Read More

@prologic@twtxt.net The people who wanted to rely on Visa, Mastercard or any other giant company with already too much control over peoples finances and ability to do business, completely missed the whole point of crypto, to begin with.

Or at least the point, that sadly became secondary, to ā€œextracting money from gullible idiots, to overall benefit the already wealthyā€.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » Good news, for those who miss the cursed canine sticker collection - here's a bonus one. As always, there's a reference there, to be guessed. :) Media

@prologic@twtxt.net Thank you. The reference is really obscure, to the point that no-one, in any of the places I posted it to, guessed it. Excluding the place, where I found about the thing from myself - but one can hardly count that as a guess. šŸ˜‚

So I guess, I might as well say it. Itā€™s Alex Eagleston, one of the most unlikable video-game protagonists, from the game ā€œYIIK: A Post-Modern RPGā€. A game, that most would agree, isnā€™t very good either.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » getting a new phone soon. Ill go for a iphone 14 this time. I have always had android, but Im a bit tired of it now to be honest, want something else. I will get the standard model. the others are way too expensive. I use it mostly for photos, so I hope its good (either way it'll be better then what I have now).

@prologic@twtxt.net New app? What? Where? When??!

Give me!!!

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » šŸ‘‹ Hello @davishiz, welcome to Buccipod, a Yarn.social Pod! To get started you may want to check out the pod's Discover feed to find users to follow and interact with. To follow new users, use the ā؁ Follow button on their profile page or use the Follow form and enter a Twtxt URL. You may also find other feeds of interest via Feeds. Welcome! šŸ¤—

@prologic@twtxt.net Yeah, this is probably the best option, especially if the e-mail isnā€™t kept anywhere, after the verification.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » šŸ‘‹ Hello @davishiz, welcome to Buccipod, a Yarn.social Pod! To get started you may want to check out the pod's Discover feed to find users to follow and interact with. To follow new users, use the ā؁ Follow button on their profile page or use the Follow form and enter a Twtxt URL. You may also find other feeds of interest via Feeds. Welcome! šŸ¤—

@prologic@twtxt.net Iā€™m pretty sure itā€™s still possible to mass-register accounts, through some tempmail services. - It just makes doing so harder.

In this case, despite hating captchas, they still seem like a best solution to this. Especially if thereā€™s still ones, thatā€™d work, while being well made, not too annoying and made with accessibility in mind. šŸ¤”

ā¤‹ Read More

The social media of old, are so desperate for money, theyā€™re now copying Twitters widely mocked decision, to charge monthly, for a verification badge.
https://youtu.be/6t3eiNHL2Zo

In the days of old, jannies were widely mocked for moderating (often very profitable) sites, for free, just to feel some kind of power.

Now even more pathetic creatures emerge, willing to cough up a monthly payment, as well as a copy of their government ID, for this feeling.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » I'm not an art investor myself, know a fair bit about it, but had no idea missing JPEGs, is where the money at. Media

@prologic@twtxt.net I got an ad, for this strange site, that claims to be the only way, to invest in parts of some famous paintings.

I decided, to check it out, because it presents more questions, than it does answers, like if and how do they even own them. Itā€™s also been advertised for quite some time, yet it tries to look, like some hot new thing, you have to be invited to join.

Canā€™t really say, how much of a scam it is, but the fact some of the paintings listed have their image links broken now, doesnā€™t add much credibility - not like the site itself had any, to begin with.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » They say AI is now filling up the content of the Internet with gaslighting posts from humans who do not exist and tweets from machines who make up stuff. Nowadays we discuss things with bots, not humans.

@off_grid_living@twtxt.net Opera is on almost everything, Iā€™m using it on Windows. There are probably way better options on Linux, Mac, phones and the rest of things.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » @abucci Hmm maybe let's be a little more gentle šŸ¤— -- @thecanine I'm not completely sure of your background or what you mean by "protected from humor" when that humor involves or targets a group of people, individuals or events. But...

Hmmā€¦ my background, now Iā€™m obligated to make that joke - hope itā€™s not too far. Oh no, here comes the Big Bang Theory music.

ā™« Our whole universe was just some shitty meme groups on Facebook, Then nearly ten whole years ago, expansion started, when Z** ***n slept with 5 game jurnosā€¦ Wait.
Discord, ā€œchat for gamesā€ started,
A tone of stupid drama happened,
Then a server called Wolf Den was formed,
Went from a chipmunk, to wolf, to canine,
Drama and constant infighting, let to changes in many things,
But it all started with Gamergate! ā™«

*Censored the name, not to spread stupid rumors, nor did I have anything to do with the mentioned movement, other than it changing a lot of things on the internet - most of them for worse, just by it happening simultaneously.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » @abucci @movq I for ones was just silently confused, I'm not in the IRC, so whatever it was - therefore I didn't see it. I also think it's important to add, that no group, event or action, should be considered "protected from humor".

@bender@twtxt.net @abucci@anthony.buc.ci Iā€™m not trying to be hostile, or spread misinformation. I was there, on the Fediverse, back when it happened. If anyone wants more information about this part of Fediverse history, they can watch this short video about it: https://youtu.be/yZoASOyfvGQ

Even this video is in favor of this kind of instance-based moderation and so am I - to some, but much lesser extent. There are instances, that unfortunately became the home of mostly pedophiles or animal abusers and Iā€™m sure no-one else, wants to see that, unless ā€œthatā€ means seeing these kinds of people in jail.

What I have a problem with, is circulating blocklists, including many instances, because of some political ideology or offensive/dark sense of humor - or worst case scenario, the actions of only few of its members.

An ideal implementation of the Fediverse, would in my opinion, warn users, when theyā€™re about to interact with one of these instances, but still give them the options, to accept the risks and go forward with it.

I think this decision being left purely to instance administrators, can in some cases further the divide, between groups and opinions and lead to more extreme versions of those opinions eventually.

We can argue about the other topics too, but thatā€™s probably less important, as Iā€™ll always be of the opinion, that when it comes to humor, anything (me included) can be a target - to the point where I even think itā€™s ok, to make fun of tragedies, as soon as they happened, even if I usually donā€™t do that myself.

The sanitization only applies to some sites, like YouTube - removing the dislike button and making their rules way stricter, when it comes to some topics. There are other examples, but I donā€™t want to make this textwall infinite, so Iā€™ll let go of this, for now.

Lastly and probably most importantly, it was pretty stupid of me, to add these other frustrations of mine, onto this thread about transphobia. Even if we disagree about what is, or isnā€™t too far, when it comes to humor, Iā€™m obviously in favor, of keeping this place free of any kind of discrimination.

ā¤‹ Read More
In-reply-to » @prologic I mean, I wouldn't want a Russian server to ensure my free speech, but some of the free speech absolutists will take it anywhere they can get it.

Itā€™s absolutely laughable, how some people see Russia as a free-speech utopia. Iā€™m sure those thrown in jail, for as little as suggesting, that what Russia is doing to Ukraine, might be a war, are really glad, to live in such a free country.

Even when it comes to hosting, you get more restrictions, than you do in the US (or the before mentioned Ukraine), unless your controversial thing, is either convenient for their government, or youā€™re willing to play ball.

ā¤‹ Read More