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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 15th, 2023

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  • There’s a pronunciation guide in the original documentation, and that didn’t end the debate.

    Humans are even more horrible that this first glance suggests. Imagine, one day, the debate truly ends and a single pronunciation for GIF is universally established and recognized by everyone. A group of humans will start to intentionally mispronounce it (or misspell it) just for the aggravation it will generate in others or for their own amusement.

    This is where the meme-like behavior of deliberately misspelling the popular phrase (at the time) “all correct” as “oll korrect”. This was later abbreviated as “o.k.” and then eventually “ok”. A phrase we likely use dozens or hundreds of times a day is meme-speak from 1839. source


  • How much of the hardware and software you use must be registered, requires internet access to work, a proprietary app? You don’t actually own anything that fits in those categories and they can be taken away from you at the manufacturer’s whim.

    While there are certainly commercial versions of those that fall into those categories, there are many that don’t.

    • My 3D printer from Monoprice has a power plug and and SD card slot. No requirement to connect it to the internet at all for it to function.
    • Here are 7 FOSS CAD software packages that aren’t own by any company.
    • There are countless NFC and Wifi modules that don’t require a “call home” to the vendor that can’t be turned off. Cell modems may be a special case because you’re using a providers network.
    • There are lots of large format printers that, once the drivers are install, need zero network connections to operation. No vendor shutoff possible unless you allow it.
    • Same for CNC machine. Certainly at the high end industrial scale this may be different, but there are many of solutions for home and commercial users that don’t require an always-on connection.


  • Yes, you can definitely do all those things, but they’re far outside of the realm of a normal consumer, and unless you know, to look for those things. It’s a lot harder to find.

    I’m confused by your premise then. If you’re saying “Today’s consumer electronics can’t be tinkered because they require specialized knowledge.” I’d argue that was always the case. How much tinkering could be done to an Atari 2600 from 1977?

    How much tinkering would be done to a VHS VCR from 1989 without specialized knowledge?

    These are prime examples of prior generations of consumer electronics.


  • Thought of this the other day. I bet a lot of us are like this, because in today’s world a lot of things we used to tinker with are gone (electronics are made to be single use and unfixable, cars are proprietary and can rarely be modified or worked on without many many thousands of dollars now, etc).

    I feel the exact opposite. Today I can tinker in ways I never ever could before for two reasons:

    1. so many more technological solutions exist
    • 3D printing
    • CAD
    • wireless (near field, Wifi, and cell network)
    • large format printers for paper, vinyl, and fabric
    • CNC for wood and metal cutting
    1. components are so cheap relative to the past
    • single board computers (Arduino, ESP32, RaspberryPi, etc)
    • high quality optics and CCD cameras
    • mountains of cheap storage
    • small and large LCD displays, eink

    When I started out the cheapest computer was today’s equivalent of about $2000. To be able to buy a whole computer in a Raspberry Pi zero for $10 is insanely awesome! Electronic components from Radio Shack were few and very expensive. Test equipment like oscilloscopes were simply out-of-reach financially. Now I have a handheld one I bought for $200.

    This is an amazing time to be alive with tinkering!