cubano

Well there is always the coming threat of gene-editing that almost surely will start being used by the world's wealthiest to secure a permanent advantage over the rest of humanity.

Its almost like the game has become watching the devs keep making the game, and to be honest that part seems much more interesting and fun then trying the learn and play the thing.

Long ago I lost the ability to find mindless enjoyment, what I look for in games, in management-type sims such as this. They stress me out too much with the endless options and tweakings.

With all the current collabs in hip-hop, house, and pop, to be honest it almost seems totally played-out these days...if such a good idea about cross-pollinating music genres could be bad thing that is.

Absolutely...you have kinda nailed it here with both comments.

My best "customers" were actually people who had a good deal of "income" (remember...there are many millionaires in prisons all over the world) who really didn't mind losing $1 a game 1. to get better and 2. for a safe social interaction with someone like myself who has a sparkling wit and overall interesting things to say (so I've heard :)

Prison isn't really that much different then life, but the sociopaths you meet there are far more likely to be violent then the ones running your company.

I was busted selling MDMA in a nightclub.

You should remember that prison is way different then jail.

In prison, you have people totally isolated from society, many for a long damn time, and some are actually interested in doing things that improve their lives and of course pass the time.

Becoming the best chess player, or the best basketballer, or whatever, on the "yard" is something to aspire to, and if you have something of value to offer these convicts that helps them achieve these goals, they will respect that and pretty much leave you alone since you are helping them.

This is how my chess playing helps me...it makes them better. The only way to get better in chess is to either study hard via puzzles and books (boring) or play someone better then you (fun).

But the same thing happens in the law libraries or even the computer labs...in the music rooms and on the football fields. Talent is always recognized and smarts are in short supply in general.

Not much different from the tech world huh?

On lichess I rate about a 1740 or so.

Yeah it sure isn't immediately obvious that this would be so, but without a doubt it is true because the same experience has occurred several times since.

So I have an escape charge in Florida (escape, not absconding) for not returning to a county work release center in Orlando many years ago. This was a really dumb thing to do because now, whenever I'm jailed I often get thrown in with the "high-security" inmates whom are also known as the murderers and anyone looking at over 20-years if convicted.

My last time through the system in Florida, I must have spent 4-5 hours a day playing chess with an alleged murderer whom was infatuated with the game and trying very hard to get better. I was in for some possession charges...bullshit really but because the old escape charge there I was.

This man had deep respect in the jail as his brother was at FSP/Raiford actually on death row for an execution-style murder committed about a decade earlier. The alleged murder this man committed was related to that very incident.

Anyway, I had played his brother for several months back "in the day" and was the only person in the jail who could beat him, and to be honest, I became somewhat a legend in C-block for my game. Remember, these people in this block often sit in county jail for 3-5 years waiting for trial and such, so the "institutional memory" actually lasts a long time in such a dismal place.

Long story somewhat short: By spending so many hours teaching this man to play much much better, he put the word out that no one was to fuck with me, and I was not only really safe, but was fed and taken care of by the group.

Very odd experience, but every word true.

I have a deep affinity for chess for economic reasons.

In 2002 when I went to prison in Florida for 22 months, playing chess for $1/game was my "hustle", and it allowed me to eat really well at a panhandle camp that was well known for its terrible chow.

Also, a rather odd but very beneficial side effect of my play came into focus...my chess ability seemed to convey a certain status to me by old timers on the yard, and assigned to me a certain "respect" level that basically kept me rather safe during my entire stay.

I'll admit...I wasn't always totally virtuous while hustling. I often lost to players in the beginning as to set the hook for future games and profitability.

The most interesting part is that, in reality, I kinda suck at chess in the real world by my own demanding standards.

I seriously doubt that assertion as testosterone is liberally prescribed to people my age (50s) to help with a wide variety of issues.

It really doesn't hurt much with the ladies at the local base bars as well, I'm sure.

...and PEDs of course.

It's interesting to wonder if government special ops teams are encouraged or even required to follow doctor-prescribed PED cycles these days.

Wouldn't the optimal solution be to hire the most qualified regardless of background?

I believe many in the military would simple say that Total War doctrine, present since perhaps the US Civil War and definitely by World War I, would argue bombing patents to get at command-and-control would be acceptable during times of war.

Now before everyone buries me, total war is a rather rare military state, and probably only present a select few times in the 20th century.

Waste of money?

To have a constant high speed IoT-like connection to the web for real-time updating and such?

I am sure some sort of volume discounts could be negotiated as well.

Tesla's don't connect to LTE networks by default?

If not, I find it shortsighted and rather cheap that each car doesn't have it's own $50/month data plan (or whatever) to phone home important data.

I understand your sentiment, but what exactly is the military to do when the enemy specifically uses hospitals to house command bunkers?

Point well taken, and of course you are correct...what is more subjective then musical taste?

I think Rihanna's Umbrella takes repetitiveness to its endgame pretty thoroughly...

I wouldn't immediately blame artist dumbing-down for this phenomenon, if it exists at all, but I think it's more a producer thing where looping and morphing cool lyrical snippets, along with deep rhythmic beats, creates a satisfying modern musical experience.

lampdeveloperforhire@yahoo.com

I removed the link.

So yeah my conundrum...how in the hell can you be taken seriously enough to get hired and still remain basically anonymous?

I'll without a doubt admit that I'm flying pretty much blind these days trying to juggle being homeless, having terrible tech, and trying to find a way out, and I am almost surely making mistakes that may someday really come back to bite me.

I spent a great deal of time pondering this very thing, and always conclude that due to my very frank nature of admitting arrests and drug use, that including it would surely do more harm then good.

[edit] Ok so I created a generic yahoo email account and added it to my profile...you were right I should at least try.

Thanks for the reminder.

I can't for the life of me see why I would ever want such a monstrosity on my desktop...perhaps certain help-desk and locked down corporate configurations could benefit slightly from a walled-off version of Windows, but much of this is already available using Group Policies and such, so I just don't get it.

Please don't tell me they are trying to androidize the desktop, because that could possible be the most hairbrained idea MS has ever had, esp. this late in the game.

Oh man, is this a subject I'm currently experiencing first hand. Two months ago I was illegally searched during a jaywalking stop and lost everything I owned, including my much-loved remote webdev job, all my tech and clothes, and pretty much all of my societal self-worth.

For the last two months I've been living on-and-off at a shelter, and the problems are legion as far as working my way out of it.

Finding a decent paying job while navigating the shelter minefields? I battle it everyday, but when someone steals your charging cords and toiletries while you sleep and you lose all connections to the net for a week while you figure out how to get a new USB-C charging cord with no income and miss a week's worth of trying to find work, it's easy to be discouraged and wonder if you will ever make it.

I'm 52yo and I'm exhausted all the time, except for a couple of hours in the morning after I wake and work on trying to find work. According to the health app in my phone, I'm walking 6-8 miles a day just getting between the local Starbucks where I "work", the shelter, and places where I can find some crap to eat.

What I find most odd is that there is absolutely no tech whatsoever at the shelter...no public wifi, very minimal computer access (30min a day after hours wait). Don't get me wrong I am incredibly grateful that the shelter exists, and the kind folks working there are doing God's work, but too many people "living" there are making no efforts to move on and just see the place as a free flop-house.

Lately I've been sleeping in an empty lot near downtown because I've twice now caught fairly serious illnesses sleeping at the shelter, and it's ridiculous that you are expected to bunk-up at 3p everyday at a place with no public wifi so someone like me can't work in the afternoon and evening..

Yes yes, I get it...I made the choices that put me in my shit-sandwich situation, but doesn't everyone, even the "blameless" people depicted in this story? Couldn't most have made better choices somewhere along their lives to prevent themselves from having to live in low-income situations?

Much of the article discusses how the rich developers, in Florida at least, are gaming the tax-credit side of building low-cost housing in order to enrich themselves illegally.

Same old same old. I’ve known many building contractors in my life and almost all employ various sorts of schemes to make extra money during the construction phases.

What about the inevitable growth in telecommuting? Surely owning a home with plenty of space for a semi-isolated home office would be a good thing?

I believe we are all "pirates" at heart, which is why they so easily assimilate into society and why we usually ignore them around us as long as they no longer overtly act in that manner.

Obviously, the magnitude of our decent in piratehood varies from person to person, and at some level (murder being obviously a issue) we stop accepting them post-haste.

I find a close analogy to doing drugs and drug dealers in modern society. A lot of upstanding citizens enjoy doing drugs and actually like and feel safe around their drug dealers, but rarely if ever does popular culture show that side of reality.

I don't think its any coincidence that TV and movies show the murderous and thieving side of piracy as to condition us to be appalled by them, in general.

Gaining skills is just a matter of effort nowadays as everything anyone needs to learn to do pretty much anything is of course just clicks away.

I think that's the real change that needs to be addressed...self directed learning should be the future, and the need for formal education is dying

There is so much statistical noise in any short series of 5 to 7 events that any coach whom thinks they have some magical eye at picking the "right" players is simply delusional.

Yes it worked out for Brooks this time and god-bless-his-success, but really...the whole idea behind Moneyball is that people totally suck at it.

Ahhh sure very nice...of course a "meta-selecting" system would almost surely outperform over time, but my experience seems to tell me that employers aren't really into "ebb-and-flow" productivity...they want consistency and dependable "X done in y time" workers.

Is running a simple rsync cron backup really that tough?

Sure I understand it's suboptimal but I've always had pretty good luck with it.