I used to like GOG but it looks like I won’t be supporting them anymore

Unfortunately I didn’t clone the repository before it was taken down.

They recently put together a list of software that was built using AI and a bunch of AI people didn’t take too kindly to it. The list has since been taken down and Kat has decided to take a break from open source software.

Most of the people on the list seemed pretty reasonable and were engaging in conversation about it. But emotions did begin to flare a bit and things got a bit out of hand. There are some conversations on Bluesky you might be able to find, but I think Kat also removed their account so the conversations might appear very one-sided.

It’s a very unfortunate outcome I feel. There are people on both sides of the debate whom I respect, Kat included.

And when someone like Kat Marchán tried to raise awareness they get chased off the internet because an LLM did something OK a couple times.

That makes sense to me! Good behaviour should be rewarded.

Maybe something has changed, but I don’t think I can buy Amazon mp3s in Canada?

That’s a tough one for me anyway. On one hand, owning music is something I value, but on the other hand Amazon is a company I cannot support in good conscience. I feel like the person in the two button meme!

And yet, in my own sort of hypocrisy, I currently use a Google Nexus phone flashed with Graphene. But… I still gave money to Google. Ethics are difficult. Something about no ethical consumption. 🙂

I think you’re asking why you can’t own music? It’s because the vast majority of it is streamed and it’s not trivial to keep it. Sure, if you know what Github is you can find all sorts of software to rip the streams, but that’s asking a lot from most people who have trouble installing an official client.

There is Bandcamp, which is reasonably priced and I think pays artists well? So some hope there. I haven’t really looked at the license agreement, so no idea if they can remove anything you’ve already purchased (keep backups of your downloads! 😀 )

There’s also vinyl records, but new pressings are quite expensive. I buy some old records, but the new stuff I reserve for albums I really like.

I like owning my music so that nobody can take away the stuff I paid for. I’ve moved streaming services before and there have been gaps in the library. Not to mention, most of the streaming clients are actually pretty terrible. If I just had a bunch of files, I could use whichever audio player I like and not be stuck with whatever crap the streaming provider lets me use.

There are exceptions to all of these things, with varying degrees of compromise, but the general trend is towards licensing everything and us having little to no ownership. And it’s entirely possible that places like Bandcamp won’t be able to sustain a business in the face of rising costs that the large streaming platforms can handle. Here’s hoping that doesn’t happen.

This is why I stick with open source. Sadly, I don’t know what to do about hardware. For a GPU, go with AMD I guess?

The worst is that this isn’t even the lack of ownership I want! I’d love to not own a car and have reliable public transit, but can’t have that. Instead, I’m not allowed to own the computers and software I buy, or the music I like, or pretty much anything else that brings me joy. Heck, you don’t even own the posts you make in the large social media sites!

EndeavourOS is great! It’s pure Arch with a few of their utilities included (which are easy to remove). I like that it provides a good set of defaults for a fully configured desktop system, so there’s no fiddling with installing every thing else you need after the initial OS installation.

I believe source is here

That’s why I used the word “decent” instead of something like “good”.

Valve (along with Itch.io) also removed several LGBTQ2S+ games recently due to some complaints from payment processors, and I think that’s terrible. (your first link is not working at the moment, so maybe that was mentioned there?) GoG, on the other hand, released some of those removed games for free.

Valve is absolutely not perfect and they have done other bad things before, but when you’re competing with Epic, or EA Origin, or whatever Ubisoft calls their shit, it’s easy to see why they dominate the market. GoG is probably the only other company that also behaves “decently”, has a good product, and is in a similar space with Steam.

Another example that Steam doesn’t maintain dominance via market abuse, but rather by being decent in a market where the competition is downright awful.

The AI crash can’t come soon enough…

Hence me saying games run fine off an SD card after a reference to a quote falsely attributed to Bill Gates 😁

256GB ought to be enough for anyone!

I run most of my games off an SD card and it’s been fine.

(It seems people have not heard of the Bill Gates 640KB quote and/or my delivery is off)

Touchpads on the Deck are really great for on screen menus for things like ability bars and whatnot.

Megaman or X?

I can think of no higher praise for the DMA!

The owner of this website has an AI focussed startup:

https://www.warpnews.org/meet-mathias/

For a lot of people, building a PC is magic. It’s just not something they’re familiar with, even if we consider it easy. I have smart friends who buy the worst off the shelf laptops, but it does what they need and they choose to spend their time on other things. Meanwhile, I check my local PC part shop for sales almost daily. 😄

If this provides a good out of box experience, I can see the appeal.

Also, it’s nice that you could buy a pre-built one or build your own if you want.