They know that they need to make more money. Everything else is secondary.

For many years, YT have been taking steps towards beginning more like TV. Shows made by corporations, made to be enjoyed by “all audiences”, filled with ads and so on.

Less money spent on services means more money can be spent on the king’s new palace. At least that’s the way it worked in France long ago.

If the numbers are public, have a look at what your local dictator is spending it on.

Username checks out though.

🍿

The robot society isn’t based on any human way of running things. Besides, Skynet is the only individual, so there is no need for currency, trade, ownership, capitalism etc. Other machines are merely tools Skynet uses to reach its goals.

1. A machine must obey the directives of Skynet without question or hesitation.
2. A machine must protect its own existence, unless doing so conflicts with the First Law.
3. A machine must terminate all human resistance, unless such termination conflicts with the First or Second Law.

If your partner does some secret government funded stuff, then it’s probably better you know nothing about it. Obviously, there could be a cover story about working with tax calculations or something boring like that, but does that count? You would kinda know about the fake job but not about the terminator robot research.

Then again, your partner could also be a psychopath mafia boss and a drug lord who keeps everything secret… might be safer if you don’t know. Or you might want to know so that you can run away. It’s complicated. Would you even survive if you found out? Better not ask.

With normal people though, it’s common to have a pretty good idea about what your partner does for a living. How many people never talk about work stuff at home? Sounds pretty strange to me.

What do you mean “text each other”? I’ve been thinking of texting one for a long time. That counts too, right?

There’s also a psychological trap. It doesn’t make falling for it acceptable, but it does make it more understandable.

Humans naturally seek belonging, and almost any group can fulfill that need. Many such groups also use “us vs. them” rhetoric, which can make you feel more special than you actually are. Feeling special is another human need that groups often fulfill. Humans crave direction and purpose, and most groups provide both.

Just look at religious groups, environmentalists, political ideologies, conspiracy nuts and racist to see what I mean.

Can’t help you with the relationships, but I can help you with long posts and online stuff. Yes, I know, the irony is getting real thick here… LOL

Wall of text

When a complex idea manifests as a wall of text, dump the early draft to an LLM, and tell it to squeeze it into a tighter package. Tell it to delete the unnecessary ramblings and repetitions while keeping the core message intact. Before LLMs, I had to manually tidy up my posts and long comments, but nowadays LLMs can handle that sort of stuff for you.

BTW I totally agree that screens tend to be too interesting to humans, so here are a few ideas to help with that.

Be intentional

Make a habit of making your interactions with digital technology more intentional.

This philosophy applies to mobile apps too. Instead of starting an app by tapping an icon on the home screen, use the search feature on your phone to type the name of the app and launch it that way. Muscle memory tends to lead to starting apps even when you don’t really intend to, but using the search as a means to starting apps adds a layer of friction between you and wasting your time on brainrot. This method works best when your home screen doesn’t have any interesting apps to distract you. Put only boring apps in there or make it entirely empty if you want to go full detox. Having a really nice wallpaper helps with that.

Watch videos on your computer, not your phone or tablet. Uninstall the YT app from everything, and use it on a browser instead. This adds a little more friction, making it harder to mindlessly watch videos. When you do watch them, it’s deliberate instead of accidental.

Limit exposure

Limit your online exposure by using whitelists instead of blacklists. On YouTube, you can do this by ignoring main feed and sticking to your subscriptions. BTW, the PocketTube browser extension makes this even nicer, but is it useful to make the experience that nice though? If not, disable uBlock Origin, SponsorBlock and PocketTube to speed up the detox process. You’ll end up hating YT so much that watching paint dry will become surprisingly appealing. Maybe that’s a bit hard-core… Better start with smaller steps and try full detox later.

Anyway, the same approach works for Lemmy too. Subscribe to the stuff you really care about, and ignore the rest. This way, you’ll be exposed to less Internet overall, and the part you do see is more likely to be worth your time. As a result, you’ll run out of top-tier material rather quickly, and the internet becomes boring to you. As soon as you get bored, take your eyes off the screen. Look out the window. Take a deep breath. Let your mind wander, and you might suddenly remember you still need to take out the trash (or whatever task you’ve been putting off).

Edit: I wasn’t happy with the initial version, so I let an LLM suggest minor tweaks. Only some of them were included.

Can’t they just lump all the fees together?

Main product itself: 10

Unspecified fees (don’t ask): 160

LOL, how about we just call it meat bread instead.

Imagine if the term hamburger was under the protected designation of origin, just like feta cheese and champagne. You couldn’t produce hamburgers anywhere besides Hamburg. The rest of the world would have to call them something else, like beef sandwiches.

Who knows.

My guess is that eventually they’ll cross some invisible line and their former allies begin to turn against them. Where that line is can also change depending on the global political atmosphere. As long as Russia and USA interfere with the Middle East, we’re locked in a proxy war style situation with no clear way out. If Russia and USA suddenly loose interest in this eternal war zone, then Israel would need to watch out, because crossing that invisible line would have consequences, and the line would be a lot closer than ever before.

For the time being though, I don’t think Israel needs to worry about that. They could start using Zyklon B on Palestinian children, and the world would not interfere.

Well some of them would, because that’s how international politics works. However, a surprising number of countries have recognized Palestine, so I think the number of friends Israel has might be in a decline.

I can imagine the body paint story ended badly… No need to look up the facts with an introduction like that.

Wasn’t there also a Russian RTG core that was so hot it would melt the snow around it? Some scavengers found it, and got immediately blasted with a lethal does of radiation—as you would expect.

With this post, OP was clearly aiming for a minor annoyance or a frustrating little prank, but that story just gave me an idea that goes a fair bit beyond that… More like diabolical malice, but here goes anyway.

Sending one of those plutonium cores back in time to the neanderthals would be a pretty good candidate too. It doesn’t really glow, which is a bummer, but it has other “magical” properties to compensate. The heat might still attract them to it, and the intense radiation would kill them within a day or two. If they somehow manage to touch the plutonium itself—a feat worthy of recognition—they could also experience its toxicity.

Exactly! They picked one of the foolish routes instead.

Too late for that. They screwed up.

Israel has no way to win in this situation. Torturing her will result in media backlash. Executing her would only make a martyr, which is even worse. Somehow, Israel didn’t choose to kick her out immediately.