Mikina

I highly recommend reading Digital Minimalism, which deals with exactly what you are talking about. It's a great and inspiring read, even if you don't actually go through with it.

From what I remember, it mostly talks about how to approach any kind of technology as a tool, though a pretty simple process - honestly think about what your goal is (networking, getting information about new topics, keeping up to date on events...), and properly decide whether the technology is actually The Best way how to do it, while minimalizing any drawbacks.

Some examples I remember are:

• I have to use social networks to stay in touch with my friends and family. - Is that really the best way? Isn't it better to make sure to visit or call them regularly, so they can tell you what they have been up to, instead of you passively seeing it from soulless posts? If your goal is to have a meaningful connection with them, is chatting in a group-chat the best way and better than talking less often, but in person?
• I have to stay up-to-date on news. - Is endlessly scrolling through clickbait articles for hours the best use of your time? Wouldn't just subscribing to a physical newspaper/journal, that you get to read every day/week/month, accomplish the same thing while also saving you an immense amount of time?
• I need to have a smartphone so I can be reached at any time. - Do you need to have a smartphone for that? Isn't dumb phone way better, since you don't get distracted with other stuff? And are you sure that you have to reply immediately, and it won't wait until the evening? Will setting up regular 30 minutes per day, to check and answer your personal mails/IMs be sufficient, and if someone needs to reach you immediately, they can always call you.

Most of the arguments in the book were thought-provoking, and from what I've tried implementing, it has made my life a lot better. For example, switching my phone to a dumb phone (and carrying a powered off smarthphone that I can make a hotpost for, if I really need an app for something) made my away-from-computer life a lot better and peacful, and it was really easy to get used to that. Once you start considering anything you do on a computer from the pragmatic point of view, and ask yourself what your goal is, and if there isn't a better way - the answer usually is yes, there is.

If I ever wanted to fight against my local regime, it would definitely not be through US and CIA, lol.

This puts to words something I was recently thinking about pretty well, especially the part about being an "advice seeker" and not really being able to solve stuff on your own, which is something I've always attributed to just being a field where you are driven to, especially in school, to have The Correct Solution, and that one always exists.

I mostly struggled with this when I tried getting into art, especially music or drawing. Suddenly, there's no algorothm or The Solution, and you have to figure out something based only on your creativity and judgement, and there's no-one who will tell you "this is the correct answer", which for someone being used to there mostly being one, was something I never managed to get over to this day, because it simply stresses me to the point of creative paralysis.

Thankfully, due to enshitiffication of most of the services I was following, which basically forced me to drop them due to invasive privacy rules, AI integration, or not working in privacy focused browsers or over a VPN, it's getting better. I'm kind of looking forward to OpenAI, Google and Meta finally killing most of the internet, so I can let go when 90% of content is AI generated, 60% of websites wont work without chrome, and the rest is just porn.

I find that kind of unlikely. If they wanted to frame someone just to have a killer, they wouldn't be talking about a "3D printed ghost gun", but just use a regular gun. I, for one, haven't known that it's possible to 3D print a pretty well working, and silenced, gun. And that might inspire someone - acquiring weapons is the harder part of any such murder, assuming you don't want to get caught, and the fact that you can get it without anyone knowing about it makes it way easier.

I admit I'm kinda disappointed. He pulled out almost perfect assassination that looked well thought out, managed to get away with only a few hickups in his plan as far as his face is considered, and then walks around with a murder weapon and a manifesto in his bag? Shame, really. All he needed was to lay low for a while, grow a beard and he'd probably be OK.

I mean, that's literally how research works. You make small discoveries and use them to move forward.

I shudder at the thought of "Programming Inquisition", that would drive around doing PRs and exterminating anyone whose code shows signs of heresy against The One SOLID God.

None of us would make it :D

Oh, I totally forgot about this bit. Maan, I really want to write "a practical guide for programming with the Omnissiah.", a book of fun rituals and litanies to support your software development. I always felt like computers are kind of really literally magical, and adopting a more spiritualistic approach to programming sounds like a lot of fun. Unfortunately, I didn't find any existing spiritualism that would match this, Tech Priests being really close to what I was going for.

I need to add more litanies and copious amounts of censer into my programming workflow.

It took me a long time to realize the worth of having a CS degree. When I was leaving the school, I felt like it hasn't tought me much. I was already a pretty ok programmer, since I was programming most of my highschool, and it felt like I've wasted a lot of time on languages I'll never see in my entire life. Which is kind of true - I'm still pretty confident that I'll never use Lisp, Prolog, Lambda Calcul, base assembly or Pharo ever again, but after a few years I've realized something important that I was missing - the school wasn't trying to teach me how to be a "pharo/lisp/prolog programmer", but to be "a programmer".

I noticed it on my pentesting colleagues who didn't have formal programming education, how they mostly spoke about programming in relation to languages - "I know a little bit of python, but wouldn't call myself a programmer. What programmer are you?". That question felt wierd, and I eventualy realized that's because the lines between languages eventually blured for me naturally, and I paid no mind to the language of choice - I was simply able to naturally pick up any language, and write anything I needed in it pretty quickly.

Only then it occured to me that I have my education to thank for that. Sure, I might never use Lisp again, but I do vaguely remember the concepts and workflow the language has, so now I can more naturally pick up any lisp-like language. Same goes for the prolog-style of languages, or the more OOP-focused languages, like Pharo. Since I had to drag myself through hell to pass an exam in most of the flavours of languages, it made me a versatile programmer that can just naturally pick up anything I see, to the point where I don't have to think about it - I just subconsciously detect what kind of basic workflow style is it going for, google the basic syntax and standard libraries, and I can write whatever I need in whatever language is available in a reasonable amount of time.

I don't see this "ascendance" mentioned in the post, and I think that it's a really important point in learning to be a programmer. It's also a piece of advice I try to give anyone unsure about whether his degree is worth it, because it feels like you're learning useless stuff. I have no idea how to teach it, though. It kind of happened naturally for me, and I can't identify the point when it happened or why, or how would I go in teaching it to someone else.

It's important to keep a wide field of view when learning programming, and not just lock yourself into one language. You can always google for syntax pretty quickly, but seeing the wide array of workflows and flavours different languages use to accomplish the same thing will go a long way in making you a better programmer.

Thanks for this, it actually made me realize that there is another MMO I spent more of my childhood with - Stat Wars Galaxies, and more importantly, that I can still play it on private servers. Which also extends to WoW, playing on a private server might acually be a good compromise, when I get the urge again.

But so far, I'm falling for FFXIV. Hopefully Square Enix isn't as bad as Blizz. I remember hearing some NFT writings on the wall, but so far it doesn't sound too bad.

I just got through whole of ARR and started HW, so I should be past that point. Haven't really noticed it too much, but the difference in pacing is kind of apparent in the hindsight. The story is interesting enough and the game never ceases to amaze me with variety of side activities or QoL things that I don't mind a slower pace and am greatful for the game as is. Especially comparing it to WoW, its such a breath of fresh air. So far it feels like the game SWTOR wished to be, and it's great.

I also think that they heavily cut through the amount of slog required for ARR, judging by the list of removed mandatory MSQ quests on wiki.

I don't think so. If people leave and the only reputation you'd hear about the platform is that it's full of shit like that, you won't have any reason to start an account in the first place, since there's no "normal" content with which they'd first hook you in, before they can slowly start changing your views.

If the serious content remains, you'll get people signing up for that content, only to be slowly manipulated into whatever The Algorithm feels will drive the engagement (which is probably fascism). If there's nothing in the first place, you don't have that hook.

Let it die.