Episode 2 is the one where I had to tell myself that George Lucas just sucks at deep romance plots but that’s not why I was watching. Because yeah, those “romance” scenes were awkward af when they didn’t have action adding to the intensity. Plus Anakin was waving red flags right from Ep 2 and it took some suspension of disbelief to even accept them as a couple even before the dynamic caused by their age difference (and Anakin acting like a child because Padme treats him as a child) and somehow she ends up even more attracted to him?

But the overall plot was still coherent (though maybe I was more forgiving because I knew it had to check off certain boxes to fit and it did) and not just going for that reaction in a live audience sitcom when one of the main characters first enters the stage like Ep 7 (though it did have potential still IMO) or an “ok, I’ll make the next star wars movie, but I actually hate everything about star wars and want to show that through my Episode”, or “ah fuck, the last guy really made a mess out of this, can you fix it? Or just make something, anything to finish this trilogy and we’ll try to recover on other stories in the franchise”.

For some of us the ship has already sailed. Episode 8 fundamentally changed the way I think about Star Wars. Before that, I’d already come to the realization that, despite leaning SW in the Star Wars vs Star Trek rivalry, I actually liked ST better. But I still had a love for SW that meant I would be in the theatre to see whatever SW movie was there.

Ep 8 killed that. For the better IMO because it was a stupid obsession, even if it wasn’t as strong as it previously was.

I saw Ep 9 in the theatre, but it was more of a symbolic finishing what I started many years prior. My viewing was somehow full of contempt and there was much that fed it. I’ve watched a bit of the other stuff Disney has put out and it wasn’t bad like eps 8 and 9 were, but I just don’t care as much anymore.

Like I understand Andor was well done. I might get around to watching it eventually, but I’m in no rush.

Star Wars has gone from an automatic “yes!” to just another franchise, for me at least.

I would love if this attitude caught on with enough people to make the marketing industry implode.

I am aware of when I have a vague familiarity with a product or brand and know that that familiarity doesn’t equal good. These days it could mean anything from best in class to absolute shit. The only thing they have in common is that a lot of money was spent on marketing.

Other than that, I need to either take a gamble or do deep research into the thing I want to do (though I’m learning that the real thing I want to look into is the result I want because I might be starting with the wrong process to get there, but after that will still be research on the process and tools to do it, followed by what materials and features are good for that).

Funny thing is that in the end, I do want advertising. Only difference is I want advertising that can be trusted when marketing is often either pushing outright lies when it thinks it can get away with it or has flipped around their message so much so that they can talk their product up without outright lying. I want a reviewer that will call garbage garbage (or even better, go into detail about why they think it is garbage) and not have to worry about whether that means some producers won’t want to send them free shit to review.

Yeah, which is why the “if minimum wage increases, so will prices” aregument is BS. They were going to charge the highest price they thought they could either way, the difference is that they are forced to increase the amount that goes to the people they are trying to pay the least.

It’s because so much of corporate security is based on whether a user trusts a piece of code in an environment where they’ve gotten used to trusting new pieces of code. At my job, so many things ask for the one password that protects my full account that I wouldn’t be surprised if someone sneaks in something that both legitimately uses it to log in to something but also saves the user/pass combo and it would likely succeed completely at getting a bunch of credentials.

I pretty much boycotted subway over this but ate there a lot before Quiznos and would always get my sub toasted. They might have upgraded the ovens/toasters, though.

I think they are faster, like they used to have enough time to build a friend’s sub while the first sub was toasting but now they don’t.

They have developed technology that allows data centres to track people even more effectively than covid vaccines.

I have a feeling he would be very opposed to losing privacy on all of his sources of income and/or gifts.

Fair enough, I thought we were talking about the heat lol.

Thought your request to back it up was in response to the parent comment saying that condensing the water defeats the purpose rather than the first paragraph.

The laws of thermodynamics? Can’t create or destroy energy and overall entropy increases over time. A closed loop (or any cooling system) just moves heat away from the hot thing. So yes, they can be used as much as any other cooling system but it won’t stop the issue of “generating lots of heat”. That heat still needs to go somewhere. Dumping it into the atmosphere might be the best option if there’s nothing in the area that needs heat. Should probably build them next to steel plants or something like that. Then a closed loop would be better.

Agreed except I don’t recall a time that subway didn’t toast their sandwiches, though you had to ask specifically of you wanted the veggies toasted since they usually just did the meats and cheese.

One of my usuals was a prime rib with this sauce that I can’t even remember other than it was delicious. I think the other one I used to get was a phily cheesesteak, though can’t remember for sure. They were very popular around that time, I remember McDonald’s actually had the best philly cheasesteak sauce at the time from the ones I tried, but Quiznos would have had a better overall sandwich if they did do one.

Interesting, steam charges taxes on my purchases. Though I believe it is due to Canada doing digital sales tax laws a while back.

Under skies so smoky blue grey.

Quiznos had amazing quality when they first opened but it dropped when they tried to compete with the subway $5 footlong deal. They should have differentiated themselves as the premium sandwich brand because while subway is pretty good, Quiznos early on was a whole other level. Me and my housemate at the time used to go there and order 2 subs, one for now and one for later (that often worked out to be right after the first one was done, in practice).

There were some locations that stayed open around here for a like a decade after, but it was always disappointing going there. They were still better than subway but only marginally.

I like Firehouse Subs these days. Not quite as good as Quiznos at its peak, but closer to that than Subway (which was always better than Mr Sub).

And the fundamental weaknesses, like the disconnect between the game world you’re playing in and the physical world your body needs to play from. You can still run into things in the physical world and pass through things in the virtual world. No physical touch interaction at all from the VR world back to ours, other than vibrations. Still limited by gravity as well as the input devices being used. Can’t really experience non-human shaped things. Hell, even driving around in a vehicle, something VR is relatively good at, isn’t the same because you don’t feel the acceleration and g-forces.

Games like beat saber are the only ones it’s strong at, though I’m sure I’ve done many cuts that would have taken my arm or fatally wounded my legs.

Too bad I can’t trust either the competence or intent of those with resources to create brain chips. Sorry teenaged me that desperately wanted true VR, but I’ll probably decline it even if it becomes a thing.

Thank you, this is very helpful information, too. Lucky for me, I like to reinvent the wheel from time to time for fun, so the more open option isn’t scary, though it does sound like there’s a decent chance my 3d printer will just be a dust collector what with all the other wheels I started reinventing but never finished. But I think I will add another hobby to the collection.

Thanks for the quick replies! That snapmaker U1 looks great, but I do see that page referencing their app, so it could go either way, depending on whether their app is a mandatory part of the pathway.

The other one sounds like it might be a great way to get my daughter into more techy stuff, since she loves 3d printed stuff, so modifying it and needing to also modify the firmware might even be a plus for that.