What about the online food ordering market. I reckon that might be an easier first step than consumer products. Here in the Netherlands JustEatTakeaway has a market share of around 90% and requires restaurants to give them a 14% provision. Restaurants don’t have much of a choice, if they’re not on there they miss out on a huge part of the market, it’s like they don’t exist. Why don’t restaurants unite and develop a FOSS protocol that let’s them federate, so the consumer has a central place to browse the food delivery market, but simultaneously makes the providers independant because they can run their own instance if they please. Have these types of ideas been pitched to branche organizations? Restaurants have a clear interest to develop this to free themselves from the platforms with a monopolistic venture-capital-driven strategy.

People with a burn out

After decades long alliannce-building, the US don’t seem to value them anymore. It’s a strange phenomenon where someone works so hard for such a long time, only to throw it all away some day. Trump frames it all as if the US is being taken advantage of. The truth is that the US gets tremendous benefits from it’s central position of power. If the US breaks away from their alliances, they risk the tides turning against them. If the US is being taken advantage of by appararently all others countries in the world, isn’t it remarkable how it’s doing so well economically? That normal folks aren’t doing well is not a consequence of the economy as a whole not doing well, because by comparison it’s doing phenomenal. It’s because all the money goes to companies and shareholders.

TIL: Abdullah Gül

Though I find the predecesor before Gül even more interesting: Ahmet Necdet Sezer. Apparently he was the last secular president of Turkey. “During receptions at the presidential palace, Sezer refused to allow women wearing the headscarf to attend citing the laws on the separation of religion and state at the time; this resulted in the wives of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan, Hayrünnisa Gül and Emine Erdoğan respectively, being barred from attendance. Erdoğan later said in public that he had ‘suffered a lot’ from Sezer.[3]” So he refused the wives of who would be his successors.

“During the 2014 presidential election, won by Erdoğan, Sezer openly refused to vote, citing the lack of a secularist candidate as his reason” Turkey has a strong secularist tradition and I really hope it returns sometime. Atatürk is still being celebrated, but do people still believe in his secular ideals?

Yes, even when people copy eachother they don’t have the same output. And some individuals are mighty excentric, for instance Picasso. But most people stick almost entirely to what they see and only differentiate by means of the mistakes they make, not by intended originality. From the moment people are born they start copying everything they see. With a head full of mirror neurons we tend to live our lifes exactly the same, and the differences only stand out because they’re relative. From a distance we would all look, behave, be more or less the same. Copyright should be abolished. I’m all in favor of supporting artists and creators, support whoever you will out of free will, but don’t limit others freedom to copy you. If we can’t copy what others have done before us, then our culture is not free. It should be an honor to be copied, that means others like your idea and want to use it too. That’s how humans have always lived, that’s how we progress. it’s what has brought us this far. Let’s continue without bizarre copying limitations. If we can copy freely that means culture is free, it means we can learn from eachother, take eachothers ideas and creations, put them to use and expand upon them, sometimes inadvertently while trying to make an exact copy. This freedom will be to the benefit of us all, and the opposite is true aswel, intelectual property is to the detriment of us all.

If you don’t want your work to be used by others, keep it private. Don’t show it to anyone. Keep your invention in your cellar and let nobody enter. If you want to share your ideas and creations, please do so. But you can’t have your cake and eat it too. You can’t show what you’ve made and expect others to not use it as input and put it to use.

unpopular opinion: humans are a deeply mimetic species, copying is our very essence and every limitation to it is entirely unnatural and limiting human potential.

What about the least essential?

1. Tax consultants - helping companies avoid contributing to society
2. Marketeers - manipulating people into buying worse products for higher prices
3. Middle management - causing a lot of fuzz while doing nothing of significance.

Just to name a few. An artists contribution may be abstract but it’s certainly there. There are others that actively sabotage society and very often they make a lot of money.

Ah someone level headed. That’s refreshing.

I thoroughly hate Musk, as so many of us, so I can understand the eagerness to misinterpret things in the worst way possible.

The darkest bread there is, is usually bread that is articifially dark. Here in the Netherlands we have bread colored as chocolate, that would actually be white but is made to look dark so people think it’s healthier.

he means ‘is showing virtue’. And he’s right.

Our Anarchy who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.

Villains all the more.

I don’t know if in the case of all psychedelics this is true. I’ve often heard, and I think I agree, that having a good or bad trip is relatively independant of dose, rather it is based on set and setting. I’ve even heard it said that with for instance LSD it can be easier to have a somewhat higher dose, because with that you’ll have no control, and you’ll often be beyond even trying to control what’s happening in your head. While with a low dose you might be very aware, and precisely for this reason more susceptible to paranoia and fear, which could still spiral into massive proportions. You might want to control what’s happening in your head, and you’ll find that you’re unable to, which is conflicting. With ecstasy I certainly agree, I tend to think most people that use ecstasy use too high of a dose for their own good anyway. I go by the (max bodyweight in kg)x1,5mg total for 1 evening, and only do it once every 3 months or so.

Yes, you’re right I regretted NOT having a sitter present. I can understand that sitters can be an uncomfortable presence when all is well and I wouldn’t say you always need them there, but specifically when it’s peoples first time taking psychedlics I think it can be a wise precaution to take. Surely, most of the time everything will be fine, but it’s a safeguard for the occasion that it’s not. I think the sitter should probably bring a book or something and do his own thing, as you’re not on the same level you should probably not intervene in any way when it’s not needed. When you’re mind is doing strange things to you, it’s pleasant to know that the ones around you are in more or less the same situation, I guess it makes it easier to let go and be weird, without the gaze of a normal person. And letting go of control and inhibitions I think is crucial when doing psychedelic. Don’t control your mind but let it flow like a river.

When that person literally tells you to go away and not bother them while they make a bad trip for themself, how could I violate that.

I agree, if one does not want help, pushing help onto them is probably not the least bit helpfull. But it must be slightly uncomfortable knowing that if allowed, you could actually make things a bit better.

Sounds like what you needed was someone you trust, that’s sober, that would tell you: 'listen, you are currently under the influence of this drug, that effect will pass and you’ll go back to normal, nothing terrible has happened, you are just having a panic attack that’s being magnified by the drugs, but really, nothing bad has happened, none of this will last, the drugs will lose their effect soon, and there is nothing to worry about except for your panic attack right now, that must be very uncomfortable. so let’s try to calm down, let’s focus on breathing together for a bit so we can stop your panic reaction.

In my experience such words can make a world of difference, a moment of fear can be turned round, back into a pleasant experience. I’ve regretted not having a sitter present when I introduced LSD to some friends. One of them got a message on his phone, that got him very confused, and although we managed to calm him down eventually, he experienced some severe panic, that I feel I could’ve handled a lot better when I was sober, but unfortunately I was also under the influence. I myself having taken psychedelics monthly for over a decade now, I tend to underestimate the psychological risks for new users, that’s what I took from that experience, and I won’t let it happen again. Psychedelics always need proper set and setting, and new users should have an experienced, familair tripsitter present, always. My friend didn’t have lasting negative effects from the experience but your story proves that it’s definitely risky and measures should be taken to always take them with precaution.

Sorry to hear that, regular shrooms user myself. It’s often been said it all depends on (mind)set and setting. Do you reckon your bad trip could’ve been prevented in any way? Was there an experienced user present that could’ve calmed you down? OR do you reckon you were just prone to panic attacks and the shrooms would’ve magnified that no matter what?

I don’t know about spotify recommendations, but given the incredible amount of user data they have it makes a lot of sense that they have the best recommendations. I love LB for providing a FOSS alternative, and though they steadily grow, they are still comparatively tiny. But I think they are our best shot at noncorporate automated music recommendations.

For your questions, I have no idea. I’m not tech savvy at all myself.

the Elon head with Trump face

yes please

I’m very much in favor of people supporting artists, but I don’t feel like people should be obliged to do so. I don’t believe copyright is doing society any good, and I think everyone should be free to download/listen to whatever they please. If you make music and set it free in the world, let the world listen. If they like it, they might support you, and if they don’t that’s too bad. Feel free to disagree, but that’s my point of view. If I pay for music it’s mostly by going to concerts. I’ve also donated to artists, for instance to Cardiacs when their lead singer got ill. And Major Parkinson through their kickstarter campaigns.

yes, you can connect them and you can import from last.fm. I was in the same situation as you, first I had both simultaneously running for some time, because I needed to get comfortable with the idea of removing last.fm. I also have data since 2008 so I felt a bit insecure ‘risking’ that. But after a while I concluded there was really no need for me to keep last.fm so I removed it. Haven’t had any regrets. ListenBrainz isn’t perfect but, despite it’s small development team, it’s sgnificantly improving every year.

https://listenbrainz.org/settings/music-services/details/ Here you can “Connect to your Last.FM account to import your entire listening history and automatically add your new scrobbles to ListenBrainz.”