Posts by MudMan@mas.to
(DIR) Post #AX9RTCIYrjEhamn19M by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:22:17Z
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@boilingsteam Well, yeah. No ads, so where does the money come from? If you are actively supporting a billion dollar corporation and feature no ads I have to assume you work for them, right? If you can't see the ads, then the content IS the ad, right?Only, to be clear, I don't actually think that. I'm pretty sure you're just a fan with a creative streak. Just like everybody else is. In my experience, being a critic often involves being WAY harsher than you'd be otherwise.
(DIR) Post #AX9Rq4Dz3A7pDDYNsm by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:26:17Z
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@boilingsteam It's neither ridiculous nor up for discussion, it's a well established fact. I pulled the shot below completely at random, and it's anecdotal, but you're free to check with a proper sample of real data. I have, because again, did this for a living. User scores are more extreme by a LOT, to the point where many places just switch to thumbs up/down, because the scale is so underused in the middle.
(DIR) Post #AX9S9VZxZSh5YK6Rvs by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:29:54Z
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@boilingsteam Yeah, but I don't need to believe that, do I?You *could* be a paid shill for Valve, just like I *could* have been taking money from publishers to write positive reviews. If your assumption is that people who disagree with you are corrupt and that's the default for a whole field of professionals, regardless of the actual situation, then there is no real bottom to the barrel of conspiracy and paranoia.
(DIR) Post #AX9SMYR4GHH6B1AGtE by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:32:18Z
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@boilingsteam I have scraped data from publications and users. Again, did this for a living.Won't share that data, for a number of professional reasons but I assure you I'm not lying. I do invite you to pull whatever amount of it you think is relevant, because the great thing about data is that it says the same thing no matter who collects it.It's not that hard to pull chunks of data from most aggregators, even manually. Just go, pull 30 or 40 games and put the numbers on a spreadsheet.
(DIR) Post #AX9SXYxaeSWQzNcsGe by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:34:15Z
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@boilingsteam Of course they do it for money That's what being a professional at something means.What I'm trying to impress here is that the money comes from you being a trusted source, if your business is reviews, so selling out is *bad for business*. Like, really bad. Like, lose your shit at PR guys implying you're biased bad because it threatens your source of revenue bad.The money comes from your reviews being useful, and useful means not being an ad.
(DIR) Post #AX9SpJayW3cwY4VrNI by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:37:28Z
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@boilingsteam Mostly that user reviews are largely extreme scores, that they are very time-specific (which is why Steam has one rating for all-time and a different rating for recent reviews) and that they tend to overreact to technical issues regadless of how major or widespread (so, if your game runs poorly in your PC you'll go there and give it a zero even if you're the only one with the problem or it's a relatively minor issue).Which all tracks, it's not like any of that is surprising.
(DIR) Post #AX9T2sh5KdDpAYq79s by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:39:55Z
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@boilingsteam Right. So if you can't trust anybody, then you can't trust *anybody*, you inclulded.So I have to assume you're a paid shill. Maybe you weren't at first but they just got to you, right? I mean, I don't even know if the original guy does all their discloures properly. I do know that I don't accuse people of that unless I *know*, because I don't hurt just that guy, I hurt everybody by perpetuating the assuption that disagreement equals corruption. Which sucks.
(DIR) Post #AX9TfLAbuFN2UUzMA4 by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:46:52Z
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@boilingsteam I'm not sure what your point is supposed to be there, but a) neither review scores nor user scores are independent, identically distributed random variables, and b) if you actually do plot them they don't tend to a bell curve, because see a)Again, won't share the specifics, but I don't know anything you can't see by copy/pasting a bunch of review scores onto an Excel sheet. You can even use a ROG Ally for it if you want.
(DIR) Post #AX9TyC5NuCn1ooXBoW by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T13:50:14Z
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@boilingsteam From what I know about him his schtick is getting access to review units of tons of handhelds and churning out lots of videos about whatever is the latest entry on the scene, but he will call out the negatives.Paying influencers is a real issue and disclosures are needed for that reason, which is why Youtube (and others) have rules about it, leat alone different advertising supervisors.So if you don't know you shouldn't accuse him of it unless you want the same done to you.
(DIR) Post #AX9UwgEExq3egDWDFQ by MudMan@mas.to
2023-06-28T14:01:05Z
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@boilingsteam Alright, I'm not gonna talk in circles about this. My point was that the guy discloses his affiliate links, so it'd be weird to not disclose a sponsorship just in this case. I've explained why accusing baselessly is irresponsible and self-defeating.It's up to you if that makes enough sense to adjust your perspective. I have no horse in the race, I don't write reviews, either professionally or for fun at this point.
(DIR) Post #AXQ2gqhImOKHUA5qsa by MudMan@mas.to
2023-07-06T13:34:41Z
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@boilingsteam Hi, everybody. Here to remind you all to enjoy the stuff you enjoy freely and let others do the same.On that note, if you like the idea of the Ally, don't mind going a bit pricier but are thrown off by the issues with Widnows navigation, the GPD Win 4 is a thing and there's some stock on Amazon sellers these days.But also, the Steam Deck is on sale if you're budget-minded and/or don't want to deal with Windows on a handheld.Just be cool to each other. Console wars suck.
(DIR) Post #AXQ2vJ79vFOffp59Zw by MudMan@mas.to
2023-07-06T13:37:20Z
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@boilingsteam They all are. Turns out crunching down a gaming PC into a handheld makes for a hefty handheld.My puny wrists do prefer all that heft in a nice little center-balanced package than spread out over a big wide area, but like always on ergonomics mileage will vary significantly.Can't fault the inclusion of a physical keyboard and a mouse pad over the dual touchpads on the Deck and the... nothing on the Ally, though.
(DIR) Post #AYLQfB42ghAT6KlxJo by MudMan@mas.to
2023-08-03T06:01:52Z
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@boilingsteam I raise the exception of the GPD Win 4 and the upcoming 2023 model, which is a handheld PC that is actually comfortable to use and has no need to be a console.Turns out the missing feature in handheld Windows PCs isn't SteamOS, it's a built in keyboard and a functional pointer device. It's a bummer more people aren't stealing that solution, although it's definitely not cheap.
(DIR) Post #AaRyvBdXiz7L1MS6iW by MudMan@mas.to
2023-10-04T20:28:40Z
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@mitchmarq42xyz Deus Ex protag JC Denton.I feel like I'm being baited into something.I mean, I just searched for a picture for reference and this seems to be a screencap of the picture on his wiki page, so... https://deusex.fandom.com/wiki/JC_Denton
(DIR) Post #AbCIxjePN1jWNrVdtQ by MudMan@mas.to
2023-10-27T13:51:30Z
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@simon I don't know how any of it fits into current regulatory models at all. Common law systems may be able to stretch into best guesses from judges, but regulation is needed.Unfortunately the level of public debate is atrocious at the moment, so my trust on solid regulation at the moment is low.
(DIR) Post #AboG9cWVvZe3JlUEQS by MudMan@mas.to
2023-11-14T21:25:18Z
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@simon Speak for yourself, you just justified the entire computer science branch, as far as I'm concerned.
(DIR) Post #AboOYfrPSOQQXYiZYO by MudMan@mas.to
2023-11-14T22:57:44Z
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@simon People keep worrying about Moore's law slowing down for processing power, but storage has been stuck for a while. Speeds go up, capacity does not.It's starting to become a signfiicant, expensive bottleneck.
(DIR) Post #AcTKulhYWs467lLVJ2 by MudMan@mas.to
2023-12-04T17:01:40Z
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@simon Heh. That's a fairly static view of human behaviour, I think. I don't know about you, but I'm already deep into paranoia mode, where even fairly straightforward LLM statements immediately prompt deep fact-checking. I actively *distrust* LLM speech now, and by extension things that sound like it.
(DIR) Post #AcTmCFlWhcLf3FlUNU by MudMan@mas.to
2023-12-04T22:07:29Z
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@simon I think those are very good conversations and they need deep analysis.The bit that gives me pause on them is that the requests for regulation based on "trust" and the assumptions that deliberate and accidental bias is inherently more dangerous when presented in natural speech seems to be at odds with open, transparent models. If I'm gonna run an AI personal assistant, as you say, I want it open sourced and ran in-house, which requires free, affordable access to FOSS AI devs.
(DIR) Post #AcpbG4IWSqokiIUWoq by MudMan@mas.to
2023-12-14T12:34:19Z
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@jaruzel Wait, isn't #retrocomputing the hashtag for it? If that's not the place to talk about old Wordperfect ports and old chunky terminals then where is it?