Valve are well within their rights here. This isn’t new content or transformative. It’s literally trying to remake the same game using the same engine. These devs knew they were playing with fire. Never come between GabeN and his hats.
Black Mesa is a remake of a single player game that Valve wasn’t planning on remaking any time soon, more profitable to make it official and take a cut
TF2 actively still makes them sht tons of money, no profit in splitting the fan base
Imo, Trademark. Black Mesa is a concept from Half-Life, but “Black Mesa” to the best of my knowledge wasn’t a registered trademark. “Team Fortress/Team Fortress 2” are registered trademarks however, and that significantly changes the value and functionality of the specific terms.
Yes, but it’s easier to give permission to use concepts that don’t infringe on trademark than it is to give permission on something that could be argued in court as muddying a trademark.
I know they require permission either way, but what permission they’re actually asking for changes based on what terminology they use
Well my point is that since the content is directly related, it actually doesn’t matter what they called it. It would’ve been exactly the same amount of infringement if they called it, “happy fun times at the science lab”.
The only differnce is it would’ve been less obvious to identify.
I get your point, my point is the infringement would be less egregious without trademark and thus easier for Valve to turn a blind eye to, or even potentially officially endorse via some potential deal à la Black Mesa.
But hey, I am fully willing to concede that I am just a layman with enormous distance from this topic and no specific expertise or insider knowledge, so the possibility of me being wrong is high
My thinking is that it was hot garbage that was trying to milk the TF2 name to grow their own fanbase. And valve didn’t want to be associated with that.
My guess is that Black Mesa looks great, had passionate people who were really communicating and engaging with Valve/community, didn’t infringe on the Half-Life trademark and it felt like a step forward, which is why it was allowed to continue AND even be brought to market.
Unfortunately it’s not just well within their rights, it’s their legal obligation. The stupid situation that is America means that for them to be able to maintain their claim of ownership on the IP trademark, they have to both actively use the trademark and actively police unauthorized use of the trademark by others. If they don’t, they risk losing the right to claim the trademark, which wouldn’t just mean independents running servers for the game, but also would mean unscrupulous entities could produce and sell merchandise featuring the trademark en masse without having to seek permission from or pay any commissions to Valve.
It’s shitty, but it’s more shitty because of the stupid system we’ve built than because of any intentional malevolence on Valve’s part, imo.
Important caveat: I am not a legal professional and it is entirely possible my understanding of trademark law is flawed, but this is my earnest understanding of the situation.
It is hardly incumbent on copyright owners, however, to challenge each and every actionable infringement. And there is nothing untoward about waiting to see whether an infringer’s exploitation undercuts the value of the copyrighted work, has no effect on the original work, or even complements it. Fan sites prompted by a book or film, for example, may benefit the copyright owner. See Wu, Tolerated Use, 31 Colum. J. L. & Arts 617, 619–620 (2008).
Mtg. A lot of posts and articles use it for Marjory Taylor Green an it always confuses me, I keep trying to figure out what Magic the Gathering has to do with Jewish space lasers.
Nothing. Linus doesn’t personally do coding on the kernel, he has a team who do that and he oversees it and makes the hard decisions.
There are others who will take his place and the work will continue.
If somehow the entire kernel team shut down, Google, Samsung or some other large corporation would take it over and continue development because at this point many, many, many servers, phones, smart devices, iot, and other appliances rely on the Linux kernel to function.
“Today here at Microsoft we are celebrating the legacy of the late Linus Torvalds by releasing a new kernel, re-written entirely in Golang using Copilot. No GPL code was touched, merely re-written, and we will offer ISOs to the coding community for free! Stay tuned for more updates, as we will be exclusively developing on this kernel going forward! This is a great day for open source!”
Nothing. Linus doesn’t personally do coding on the kernel, he has a team who do that and he oversees it and makes the hard decisions.
Even that is not really the truth. There are dozens and dozens of teams that actually do the development, then there are people who coordinate and maintain certain parts of the kernel, merge in patches and make decisions. And then there’s Linus who does coordinate these people.
There are others who will take his place and the work will continue.
And most likely Greg K-H will take over the position that Linus has right now. He has been one of the most active maintainers and is probably “the number 2” behind Linus.
I haven’t been back to Reddit since the first day of protests.
Not gonna lie though, I miss it. The niche stuff I went to Reddit for in the first place came here during the drama, but despite an initial push to get some replacement communities going here, they’ve gone almost completely inactive now.
I didn’t visit reddit on purpose for two full months. I still don’t have the app installed.
I have to admit though I am visiting for game threads now that the NFL has started up. Sports is non-existent on Lemmy. I’m participating in the communities for my teams, but there’s like half a dozen of us in each one. It just isn’t the same thing and I realized that dicking around in comment sections is a big part of how I enjoy sports these days.
They’re still not getting content from me, I’m not going to use their app. But it’s hard to keep completely away when there is simply nothing even closer on lemmy or anywhere else.
Yeah I love Lemmy but I don’t see it taking off. The separation of federation instances is confusing for new users. There are plenty of communities but they all feel isolated due to the same community existing on multiple instances. There’s a reason why the biggest communities are all Linux/Programming related.
I feel like development of Lemmy has slowed the past few weeks too. I’ve been following plenty of issues on GitHub both on the front-end and back-end, and there just hasn’t been any progress on them. It’s a shame because Lemmy has so much potential, but I’m with you I just don’t think it will take off. With that said, obviously I will keep using it, and I’m not going back to reddit. It’s a shame because I really do miss the smaller niche communities on reddit but reddit is dead to me now because the CEO is really quite the dickhead and I refuse to go back.
Yeah, reddit is dead to me just like Twitter is dead to me. Lemmy will grow over time, it will take years but eventually people will realize ad-free and privacy are very important long-term
I’m going to get crucified for this but without monetary incentive I don’t see improvements coming anytime soon. I respect the Lemmy creators but they’re running on donations and goodwill. Reddit/Digg had a team of dedicated employees working on the user experience because it was their livelihood.
This is true but aren’t the two main Lemmy devs paid to work on this full-time? That’s something at least, it’s better than being truly unpaid to work on this.
Devs do get donations but instances are not able to host advertisements. This means that if any hobbyists hosts a popular server instance they have to pay out of pocket to keep it going.
Instances could in principle run on ad revenue but I rather doubt that will happen given that enough users are willing to donate. Injecting some code into the frontend you serve isn’t rocket science.
Without actually having looked at the issue track but knowing how such things go down: Less visible progress should be expected right about now even presuming constant development efforts.
The great migration brought many users and uncovered various bugs and requirements for new features and devs have been scrambling to address as much of it as fast as possible – which means going for low-hanging fruit first and if it’s not low-hanging, hack around the issue to produce a quick fix. Now that the worst is over proper software development practice dictates that you should worry more about addressing technical debt you just incurred as well as refactor and redesign until high-hanging fruit are hanging lower so you can pluck them. Doesn’t make sense to build 100 ladders when you can take an axe to the tree and fix everything with three very well-planned and executed strikes.
I feel exactly the same about that. I’m always browsing all but I’m never joining any of those communities. I’ve join 3 so far but still I’m browsing all by default.
R/ASOIAF knew about Lemmy and debated internally whether to migrate. I honestly can’t believe they didn’t. They were among the more passionate holdouts
They could have just made a post after setting up a lemmy community and people would have made the move
Also, can mods not delete subreddits? I’m surprised this didn’t happen
Yep. I really wish more had migrated over here from Reddit. Seems like it’s almost business as usual over there according to my friend who still uses it frequently.
Early 30s. Outside is a scam. Everything there involves spending money and dealing with people. I'll talk and play games with my friends online but don't see people unless I am at work or forced to go out.
Which i get, finding and keeping workers to work those odd hours can be hard and it is nice to get out of work at decent times if you do work at one of those places… besides bars if ur over 21or movies, i cant think of annother place to go when it gets late
Late 30’s. I don’t always spend money when I go out and if I do have to spend its usually on cheap public transit to get somewhere else. I often leave the house and just walk around town. Good exercise and I’m not always stuck at home driving my cat bonkers.
Some are, and some aren’t. 100 dollars with bg3 gets you 100 plus hours of enjoyment. That is 1 dollar / hour. That is value. I am still playing Skyrim after 10+ years and it was 60 bucks. I have 1000+ hours in it. Worth.
If you buy the ones with paid dlc/season passes/microtransactions, yes. You have to use your powers of observation and critical thinking and buy the complete games instead.
Not trying to be a contrarian (it just happens!) but boredom will not kill you. In fact, I challenge you to sit and be bored for a good few minutes. It's good for you. I'm terrible at it myself, but that's what being a dopamine crack addict will do, I guess.
If you're out of ideas for things to do, try mindfulness meditation (Waking Up is an app with a bunch of free lessons to get you started) - very little woowoo, just pay cursory attention to something, then when your mind inevitably wanders off, just "notice" and be, well, mindful. It's like an antidote for boredom, in a weird way, and studies have shown that for whatever reason, it's good for you.
Myself, I read books for any "random short term downtime".
Well, meditation can help you to get better at telling your brain to shut up. Imagine it like training a muscle: in the beginning you won’t be able to lift anything, but as you train it, it gets easier and easier to lift heavy weights.
Don't worry about it. You will get distracted, and it's fine. In mindfulness the clue is to just "notice" whatever the intrusive thought (or whatever) is, then resume whatever you were doing. I found it helpful to do the "breath focus" thing and counting them - lost count all the time because that isn't really the point, it's just something to do while essentially waiting for your brain to do something. Noticing is the point, both whatever you're doing and what your brain does when it veers off.
I always said that too but I really just wanted to continue being stimulated.
What has helped me is to realize that my brain keeps working at night when.
Recently I was working on a project with my son involving some engineering and construction and I came up with an idea at like 9:00 pm and thought about it until 11:30 pm while I tinkered with it but I could not make it work right. The next morning it was like my hands knew exactly what to do and I built it immediately and it worked the first try.
Try acting like your brain’s boss or its commanding officer. Tell it what to do. If you’re having trouble shutting down your brain when it’s coming up in bed time, give it a direct order: “okay conscious brain, it is time for you to stop what you are doing and go to sleep now. Unconscious brain is going to take over on this problem while you are resting.”
For real, your brain needs to sleep. It uses night time to assimilate the days memories so you can recall them later, and it uses that time to process and understand concepts and make predictions.
Try audio books for sleeping. TV didn’t work at all but audio books work great. And I really enjoy then as well. Typically just set a timer so they shut down and if I wake and can’t turn off the brain, just start listening again.
Yes, all the time. It's a crucial part of the whole thing, as far as I know. (Not an expert, barely do it, have been meaning to get back into some kind of habit)
Before this, I thought of meditation as the whole "still mind" thing, but if it's how anyone works, it sure isn't me. Mindfulness is more about realizing when a new thought "arises", looking at it sort of dispassionately, and gently refocusing yourself. There's no real "failure state", you will get distracted and that is fine, just get back into it.
There’s a lot of ways to meditate (a lot of ways to quiet the voice). Have to practice them.
The advantage is that the next time you are being distracted by those thoughts at a time when distraction is unhelpful, you will more naturally and easily quiet your mind and resume your focus.
It’s like practicing to control your thoughts. Think of it like walking the dog. It’s going to pull at first. Gotta keep walking.
That’s part of the point, you aren’t necessarily supposed to have an empty mind the whole time. I mean, if you can do that, great, but you aren’t failing if that’s not the case.
Imagine that your thoughts are buses, and your job is to sit at the bus stop and not get on any of them. Just notice them and let them go by. Like a bus stop, you don’t really control what comes by, but you do control which ones you get on board and follow. If you notice that you’ve gotten on a bus, that’s fine, just get off of it and go back to watching. Interesting things can happen if you just watch and notice which thoughts go by, and it’s good practice for noticing what you’re thinking and where you’re going and taking control of it yourself when it’s somewhere you don’t want to go.
Having thoughts isn’t an issue. The issue is engaging with the thought.
You’re sitting there meditating. Then your head goes “hey, I gotta pay my insurance bill”
And then you go, “oh yeah, the insurance bill. For my car. Do I need to change the oil yet? Oh no, I have another like 800 miles to go. What’s 800 miles from here? Cleveland? Man, that LeBron really has some longevity”
Or instead, you could go “I’m meditating”. No judgment though, just point it out. Just note that a thought occurred and redirect your attention to the fact that you’re meditating and to your breath or whatever else. Another thought will come up shortly thereafter. You can just redirect again.
Can confirm. The longest train I ever rode was a 44h long train. The first 12-24 hours push on your nerves: you’ve listened to music, read a book, eaten, slept, and haven’t much left to do. But slowly you come to understanding:“you don’t HAVE to do something”. This is when the therapy starts.
And it really does seem therapeutical. I scoffed a bit the first time I read about dopamine detoxes and stuff, but I've also, since then, caught myself being very nearly literally afraid of getting bored. That is insane.
Sleeper cars on Amtrak were my saving grace when I was regularly traveling between Chicago and upstate NY.
It’s not nearly as long of a trip, and Chicago is a decent station to hang out in, buy being horizontal, getting actual sleep, and having a bathroom not shared by 4.100 other folks made it bearable and feel pretty quick.
30 minutes is generous. I’ve watched the aisle get trashed in 5 minutes when I took my son shoe shopping for school last year. We were the only ones who put things back.
My wife works at Target and usually the managers take turns with the gross cleanups. That can include vomit, piss and shit but sometimes creative stuff you wouldn’t think of like a customer put a package of meat back behind a shelf so no one knew it was there until it was rancid, started leaking and smelling like a dead body.
That’s awful nice of the managers to take that on. I honestly think that anything that involves biohazard should not be handled by store employees at all.
Honestly? You can take those bad feelings and shove them, messes like this will be made regardless of how you feel so instead of feeling bad for us maybe you should suck it up or shop somewhere else. We don’t want your pity, we just wanna work and go home.
Nah, I haven’t seen a mess like this in any of the stores in Belgium.
Almost like normal customers will clean up after themselves instead of behaving like a spoiled toddler and claiming people like you are getting paid to clean it anyway.
Feel free to do so and run your own server. Blackmailing is childish and non productive by the way. I’m sure most instances will defederate from threads over time but they are looking to federate with mastadon instances more than lemmy/kbin.
The entire point of the fediverse is that there is no “we”. Or rather, you can decide which “we” you want to engage with. Look at behaw. When world started exploding with growth, the beehaw instance defederated because they wanted to preserve a smaller community.
I will never sign up for Threads or any other Meta service. However, if the fediverse allows me to interact with my friends and colleagues who have without having to give up all my data to do so, that’s a win in my book.
So feel free to go start or join an instance that defederates from Threads. Just stop expecting everyone else to do so.
You don’t give much thought to what Threads wants to do to the fediverse, and your concern is only what benefits yourself in the short term.
Just be aware of that. Many of us older folks have seen this process happen over and over. Threads will start to dictate what activitypub will be, and once it has many millions of users, it gives them power to influence the entire protocol.
And if people don’t like that, they will have to come up with a new protocol and start over again. Which is exactly the cycle we are constantly experiencing.
I think we should not let them into our instances. Keep them as a corporate funded version of the fediverse, separate from the ones run by individuals.
But since each instance owner is free to do what they want, I estimate that many will federate with threads and suffer the consequences in the future.
I support defederating from threads too, I despise FB and anything they touch but blackmailing is not going to do anything in the case of OP and it is the wrong way to go about it . I’m on lemmy.world myself and when the time comes I will have the choice to make depending on what this instance does. We all have that choice, that is the benefit of federation.
Almost no matter how you do it, it’s going to be a horrible waste of good drinking water to try to extract cooling from the temperature of the water. If you are in a dry climate, make a DIY swamp cooler. Otherwise shell out for a small AC unit.
Also; using your free lease-included water for stuff like that, is probably the quickest way to no longer have water included in your lease…
I don’t think that’s realistic. Even the guy at the local market shouting “get your potatoes here” is technically advertisement.
What could work instead is to make both the company that advertises and the one that displays the ad liable for the ad itself. If it’s inappropriate, contains malware or is in any way malicious, the company displaying it should also be liable for endangering the customers. Also outlaw tracking for advertisement purposes altogether
São Paolo in Brazil and Grenoble in France completely banned outdoor advertising, various other cities and regions (Amsterdam, Bristol, Vermont) have heavily restricted them. Dare to dream bigger than policies which have already existed for decades 😝
This one is pretty location specific but I agree that US law doesn’t make any sense. Like, physician and pharmacist spend 10 years at university to learn all the details about prescription medication and then have to get yearly retraining, so how do you even do ad’s for that
Two ways: first, you go to doctors offices and hospitals and give gifts to the person responsible for picking which version of this medicine to buy/prescribe.
Second, convince patients to ask for your version when they see their doctor by telling them on tv that it will make their life better or whatever
I left the US to work overseas and when I came back the law changed and everyone was hooked on viagra, the “little purple pill” and everything else…it was VERY obvious what happened…after we sttled down we went to establish care woth a GP & I walked out of my initial appointment with 6 prescriptions.
I’m actually shocked to find how many people agree with the OPs sentiment, but maybe there’s something about the demographics of who’s using a FOSS Reddit alternative or something. I’m not saying everyone is wrong or has something wrong with them or whatever, but I entirely agree with people finding this valuable, so maybe I can answer the OPs question here.
I’ve been working remotely long since before the pandemic. I’ve worked remotely for multiple companies and in different environments. I am extremely introverted and arguably anti social. I tend to want to hang out with many of my friends online over in person. But that doesn’t mean I think there’s no advantage at all. To be honest, when I first started remote work, I thought the in person thing was total bullshit. After a few meetings my opinions drastically changed.
I’ve pushed (with other employees, of course) to get remote employees flown in at least a few times a year at multiple companies. There are vastly different social dynamics in person than over video. Honestly, I don’t understand how people feel otherwise, especially if they’ve experienced it. I’ve worked with many remote employees over the years and asked about this, and most people have agreed with me. Many of these people are also introverted.
I think one of the big things here is people harping on the “face” thing. Humans communicate in large part through body language - it’s not just faces. There’s also a lot of communication in microexpressions that aren’t always captured by compressed, badly lit video. So much of communication just isn’t captured in video.
Secondly, in my experience, online meetings are extremely transactional. You meet at the scheduled time, you talk about the thing, then you close the meeting and move on. In person, people slowly mosy over to meetings. And after the meeting ends, they tend to hang around a bit and chat. When you’re working in an office, you tend to grab lunch with people. Or bump into them by the kitchen. There’s a TON more socializing happening in person where you actually bump into other people and talk them as people and not just cogs in the machine to get your work done.
I find in person interactions drastically change my relationships with people. Some people come off entirely different online and it’s not until meeting them in person that I really feel like I know them. And then I understand their issues and blockers or miscommunications better and feel more understanding of their experiences.
Maybe things are different if you work jobs with less interdepencies or are more solo. I’ve always worked jobs that take a lot of cooperation between multiple different people in different roles. And those relationships are just way more functional with people I’ve met and have a real relationship with. And that comes from things that just don’t happen online.
Im honestly really curious how anyone could feel differently. The other comments just seem mad at being required to and stating the same stuff happens online, but it just doesn’t. I do wonder if maybe it has to do with being younger and entering the workplace more online or something. But I’ve worked with hundreds of remote employees and never heard a single one say the in person stuff to be useless. And I’ve heard many say exactly the opposite.
I’ve worked service jobs for 20 years and have been doing an office job from home for just over a year and even if I’m not an introvert, getting to choose who I see in person and who I don’t feels wonderful, but I’m also very good at socializing online so I guess I don’t feel the need to see my colleagues in person for this reason…
You’re correct in that it’s a higher quality of getting to know people in person.
However, I don’t want to get to know anyone at my work because I hate the place and I can’t create a honest relationship with my coworkers because of that, if I’d be honest I’d likely be reported or whatever.
I want to spend more time with people I do care about, not more time with people I don’t care at all about.
Sliding off topic here, but I would seriously suggest you change jobs. Spending half of your waking time in an environment you hate is one way to die early. Life’s way too short for that!
have you had a job with a strong union or even outright as a co-operative? i figure the fundamental problem is that normal jobs are inherently exploitative and if you don’t have that bit it might become actually enjoyable
In the end, every job that is not a co-op is inherently exploitative, since if it doesn’t return profit to employ someone, employment will not happen.
But really the problem is that I have a very low resiliency, I’m mentally weak and can’t work as much as many other people or in the usual way with semi-fixed hours etc. So I can only get bad jobs, because the good jobs are very competitive and I lose to other applicants.
Why wouldn’t you be able to create relationships with your colleagues just because you hate your workplace? The worst places I’ve worked at, have had the absolute strongest relationships between the people working there. Because it’s basically been a necessity to survive the workday.
Your colleagues might hate it as much as you do. That can be something to find comfort in. And you’ll obviously never care about someone you don’t know. Perhaps you might actually start caring about a colleague or two, if you do get to know them.
I think you’re missing the point a wee bit. No one (introverted or otherwise) is arguing against in-person socialising in general. They are arguing against forced in-person socialising with co-workers.
online meetings are extremely transactional
Exactly. You know what else is transactional? Jobs. The employer and employee exchange work for currency. Employees don’t owe their employer any meaningful relationships with their co-workers. I’m sure that means less efficient business. I also don’t give a flying fuck.
I felt like this a couple of years ago, then I went and changed both job and career. Suddenly I find myself actually enjoying what I do, as well as my colleagues.
A job is definitely transactional, but seeing as most of us spend 8h a day on them. I’d urge ya’ll to - if possible - try and find one where you can find some pride and value in what you do, other than the paycheck you receive.
It has improved all parts of my life in all honesty.
Sure. But regardless, I used to work as a teacher. 15 weeks of vacation yearly, great pay (for Sweden at least). Worked about 32h every week.
I’m much happier today with much less vacation, longer hours and a bit worse pay (though it’ll get much better with time). Because I actually like my job. And I get to work on skills that I have use for in my free time as well.
It does not have to be all about getting paid as much and working as little as possible. Finding a good employer and a career you like is also an option.
In your intro paragraph you say meetings. I think people who still think of meetings as being a worthwhile way to spend company time probably are demographically preoccupied with the alleged value of “in person”.
Yep, well put. I love working remotely, but would appreciate once/twice a year having an off-site to get to know some people in the company on a more human level, or so I know who has a dog, so they can send me pics. As you said, during work hours it’s hard to get away from the transactional nature of the conversation.
The other thing I’m always worried about, is when grads join the company. A lot are coming from an environment where they’ve been interacting in person on a daily basis, and now their only interaction is online.
Totally agree. I’m on restricted duties at the moment so meet all of my clients on teams. I hate it. The audio is terrible so one or both of us is always mishearing, my desk is in front of a window so I have to keep my curtains closed for them to see me. I don’t get to build the same rapport with them and their responses to my questions are more stilted because of it. A large part of my job is judging body language and reading non-verbal cues, which is next to impossible on teams.
And on monday, my computer decided to do a mandatory, 3 hour update, so I missed an appointment and couldn’t access the client’s number to apologise or explain. So I had to text a colleague to run over to the client’s office let them know I wasn’t going to make it
So what’s the benefit for me, letting the corporation employees and managers study my body language and micro facial expressions?
For me, it’s just a huge hassle getting to work, getting up earlier and paying for transport and lunch just to be there, for seemingly no reason that benefits myself at all.
So much time and energy wasted while also harming the environment.
I don’t plan to be at the same company more than a few years anyway.
The question and response you’re responding to aren’t about working in the office on a regular basis, just about the occasional in-person gathering. Your response comes across as complaints about working in the office daily.
I cannot imagine going back to an office job that isn’t WFH, but I agree strongly with the commenter here acknowledging the value of the occasional in-person socializing.
Even before 2020, I worked in a small remote office far from my thousands of coworkers at our corporate office. The relationships I was able to build spending 3-4 days at HQ every quarter or so greatly impacted my day-to-day work for the better. I have a specific example of someone I was having trouble working with for months, but after a single face-to-face interaction, for no reason I could name, we were suddenly great partners. She even left the company for a few years then came back a couple months ago and reached out to me, excited we’d get to work together again.
I don’t see value in working day-to-day in person. The company gets significantly more value from me by allowing me to work from home. But interstitial socializing of the occasional in-person event makes a significant difference in the relationships I have with my coworkers, which makes the team stronger and the work more enjoyable.
Further to that, I have found that in-person training sessions are much more effective than training over Teams/Zoom/Skype.
Not specifically because you are in the room with the instructor, but rather because you are in the room with the other students.
The opportunity to chat casually with the others during breaks is often where much of the learning and deepening of understanding happens. You can learn about their different approaches to the same problems you have. You can discover that you share confusion about something the instructor had briefly touched on , which can lead to a deeper discussion in class.(far too often during online training nobody asks what they assume is not a common question)
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