#BooksOf2023 #1: #KeeperOfTheLosCities #3: Everblaze. My kids have enjoyed getting into a new series after we finished the #WingsOfFire books last year. These magical adventure books are perfect for our next series together. 📚 📕
@bookstadon#BooksOf2023#16: Robert E. Lee and Me by Ty Seidule. As someone born in the south and whose extended family still lives there, this book opened my eyes to some of the ways the “lost cause” is baked into southern culture. A must-read for anyone from the south or anyone who wants to learn more about the U.S.’s (particularly the South) continual struggle against racism.
@bookstadon#BooksOf2023#17: Fixit by Joe Ide. The 6th book in the IQ mystery series pulled together lots of threads from the previous books, but the story plodded along slower that I would have liked. I’ll keep reading the series, but the first two books remain the best.
Is there any real or serious conversation or work around the idea of a feature-full social media browser?
Basically something like a web browser but for “all the social media” along with useful organisation features too.
For locked down big social APIs, this makes less sense nowadays, but for open alt-social systems, it is likely the most valuable promise of such systems that they can become like the web, reachable through an awesome all-in-one app.
I don’t particularly understand the value of RSS readers at all
Notifications are the value for me. I don’t have to regularly check infrequently-updated sites if my RSS reader pings me whenever there’s a new post. Largely a different use-case to social media though.
For #RomanceReviews 16 I'll be reading A Power Unbound by Freya Marske.
I'm expecting this to be an Edwardian m/m romance with some kink, a light grumpy/bratting dynamic and some sexual healing, based on their connection in the previous book.
Background: I read A Restless Truth (#2 in series, f/f, great read.) but not the first one, because I don't usually go for m/m and also I do what I want. However, A Restless Truth made Jack Alston aka Lord Hawthorne sound hot in this tortured bisexual rake way, and Alan Ross was extremely entertaining. We love a scrappy porn dealer.
CW: disability, survivor's guilt, suicidal ideation, bdsm including consensual non-consent.
I finally finished A Power Unbound, time for the #RomanceReviews rundown.
TL;DR yes Jack and Alan, please sit with us.
I loved it.
This had the elements I think of as defining a true romance, both physical chemistry and emotional connection, but it was also definitely a concluding volume of a trilogy and wouldn't read well as a standalone.
I loved the way the author explored the implications of class difference and how Jack and Alan handled IRL power imbalance. A lot of romance authors use the rich character's money to simply fix the poorer character's everything, and this conclusion felt way better than that.
Glorious roleplay and dirty talk. The way they were mindful to keep their mutual mockery mutually enjoyable really warmed the cockles of my cold, dead heart. Just an awesome dynamic.
As a USian, the problems posed by living in a society in which gay sex was illegal seemed Quite Relevant.
Maybe now that traditional memes are well on the way to being drowned in a sea of low-quality propaganda made by idiots, the cool kids will move on to text posts.
Rechecks notes … rechecks notes again … rechecks notes some more … opens up some binders for more notes … goes into their filling cabinets for more notes … reviews their idea board with more notes and pictures … taps away on a computer to review their online databases … ??? …
… WAIT A MINUTE!!! … They were never there!!! There are no cool kids!!!
A couple of months ago, I read something on here that quite literally changed my life. It sent me on an unexpected journey of self-discovery that continues to this day. When you’re 54, you don’t expect too many surprises about who you are. But when I read a thread on here about being autistic, something just clicked. So I went down the rabbit hole, read a bunch of articles, did some self-evaluations, and came to the inescapable conclusion that I am autistic. #actuallyautistic
@selfhosted Have a commerical @wireguard vpn on my server. The problem i have is that if i use a docker, it does use the vpn interface with iptables, but if that goes down, the docker still goes through without the vpn interface. I have looked at iptables, but docker makes it own, and bit of a minefield. Any ideas? Thanks
What online multiplayer games play well over wifi/higher latency?
I'm thinking turn-based games may work okay in this respect, but which of those might you recommend besides Civ? Also what other types of games work better over wifi/higher latency than you might expect?
I know ideally you'd simply wire up your system to not have to fuss with either, but it's not always an option in some circumstances.
Ah, yeah, playing on official or public servers is definitely gonna be a mixed bag in terms of location. I’ll admit I didn’t really consider that as I’m lucky enough to have a good group of friends with similar gaming interests, and we’re all within about 100 KM of each other. I just ended up building a server and self-hosting out of my home.
I've been thinking about getting a hardware security key and have heard of yubikey before; but I want to see what my options are and if they are worth it in your opinion.
My current setup is a local KeePassXC database (that I sync between my PC and phone and also acts as TOTP authenticator app), I know that KeePass supports hardware keys for unlocking the database.
I am personally still of the belief that passwords are the safest when done right; but 2FA/MFA can greatly increase security on top of that (again, if done right).
The key work work together with already existing passwords, not replace them.
As I use linux as my primary OS I do expect it to support it and anything that doesn't I will have to pass on.
PS: what are the things I need to know about these hardware keys that's not being talked about too much, I am very much delving into new territory and want to make sure I'm properly educated before I delve in.
When I did some research on hardware keys I was between Yubikey and Nitrokey. I ended up going with Yubikey because KeepassXC supported it.
Something to keep in mind is purchasing a backup key. I bought one for my wife and we use each other’s as a backup.
For KeepassXC it does not support registering multiple keys (at least not that I have figured out), so I have a copy of my database where it uses my wife’s key as a backup.
#RomanceReviews 7 is some more #ChristmasSmut , Eat My Moon Dust by Etta Pierce. I'm going to keep reading these things until I get sick of 'em or it's 2024.
I'm hoping this will be a good palate cleanser. We have aliens, we have my favorite trope (grumpy & sunshine), and we have Christmas.. FFS, what else could one ask for!
I think this is going to be straight-ish with some creative anatomy nonsense. Here for it.
Eat My Moon Dust was the #ChristmasSmut I needed. We had found family, we had romance, we had hunky single dads (Hallmark, natch), and what Christmas romance would be complete without alien tentacle sex. Obviously.
I liked both of the main characters, which is no surprise because I. Love. Sunshine/grumpy. Grumpy quote of the book: "no one would ever measure up to my little cyclone of chaos and rainbows." D'aww.
Do recommend for those interested in consensual alien relationships and not averse to steamy creative anatomy scenes. I would read more by this author.
The author has content warnings here: https://www.ettapierceromance.com/content-notes and I would add that puberty is also a minor theme, there is an incident where a tween crosses touch boundaries with another tween but it is resolved, and somnophilia.
I appreciate you sharing the deal, and I’ve been watching for a sale, but I am really glad I saw all that before I paid. This game is gonna stay waaaaay away from anything I touch.
What's a good, cheap, no external power GPU to buy for VMs? Want to chuck a few in my Dell R730 server to make my desktop VMs more usable. Right now have an old K620 for a Windows VM, seems like 1030s are a good bet since I have a bunch of low profile slots I otherwise have no use for.
@TrenchcoatFullofBats I think this is the winning answer. Looks like it's about a 1060 6GB, which should be enough horsepower for several desktop VMs, and keeps open my full profile slots should I ever want to install something even more powerful in the future. vGPU support is also nice so I don't have to juggle which VM gets which GPU.
Any particular shows people here like watching? I've seen Renegades and a few others. I'm currently in the middle of Phase II. The special effects impress me for the budgets involved, and the writing/acting makes me appreciate the professionals more :^P I don't want to shit on any of them though. The effort is solid, and they're still an enjoyable watch.
There is an audio project called wolf 359, which is different; I don’t even think that is Star Trek related. That is the youtube page that comes up when you search wolf 359. Google carefully!
Actually this looks like another channel entirely. I’ll have to add it to my list. The short I remember watching had a very TOS type plot where some kind of radiation or energy caused the crew to become obsessed with the object in their own way. The tactical officer wanted to shoot it, the science officer wanted to study it, etc. It was hokey but still pretty neat. The effects were low budget 90s TV movie quality but had a charm about them.