Posts by dandylover1@blob.cat
(DIR) Post #Autz5Bu0lbhtWQmk7s by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-07T23:13:55.547713Z
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Aside from being a crazy day weather wise here in New Jersey, it is also a wonderful day to celebrate. Today marks the 247th birthday of George Bryan (Beau) Brummell. This man has had a profound effect, not only on my life by changing it into something truly wonderful, but on the world and the entire history of fashion. He rose as high as a commoner could possibly go in society, even befriending royalty, then fell as low as anyone could possibly go, ending his life penniless in an assylum. Along the way, he touched the lives of an untold number of people in his own lifetime and billions who came after him. Sophistication, eloquence, wit, dry humour, talent in several fields, curiosity, and a drive to succeed were all his. He carved a name for himself, not due to the achievements of anyone else, but to his own unique characteristics that made him the consomite dandy, and for me personally, the ideal man upon whom I base my own desires fora partner. Even now, in 2025, his influence can be felt and seen everywhere and is appreciated by anyone who values cleanliness, proper dress, excellent speech, a biting tongue, and the confidence to enjoy life to the fullest, no matter what anyone else may think, do, or say.Below is a post from Dreamwidth related to dandies. In it, is an entire section devoted to The Beau.https://dandylover1.dreamwidth.org/181996.html#birthday #BeauBrummell #dandies #dandyism #fashion #history #Regency
(DIR) Post #Auu2Sagn4mP2v5S0Vk by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-07T23:51:47.149598Z
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Every time I go to the main Friendica site, I am reminded of why I joined Akkoma. They still have done nothing about accessibility. I know their team is very small, but some of these things shouldn't be that difficult to resolve. This site isn't perfect either, but it's a lot better with most things. Still, I mostly post to Reddit and Dreamwidth. The former is accessible with Reddit for Blind, and Luna for Reddit, and the latter is accessible with... Dreamwidth! Yes! A 100% accessible site can, and does, exist! Why it's so difficult for people to use semantic html and follow WCAG guidelines is beyond me. Likewise, why sites such as Facebook, GMail, and Youtube had perfectly working mobile versions (not apps, but websites) and then shut them down baffles me!#accessibility #Akkoma #blind #Dreamwidth #Facebook #Friendica #NVDA #ScreenReaders #Youtube
(DIR) Post #Auu6zkFYwwPdwemPEu by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-08T00:42:37.370435Z
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This is truly sad. It breaks my heart that such a beautiful man has to see something so ugly. I wish people would listen to him. We've already lost so much. It's not like me to be negative, but truth is truth. I'm just grateful for those who really are trying to change things for the better.https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/07/uk/david-attenborough-prince-william-ocean-documentary-intl#Earth #EcoSystem #environment #ocean
(DIR) Post #Auu8ACYgecmIamH6h6 by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-08T00:55:43.310933Z
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I just made a post, using TWBlue as usual, and I changed absolutely nothing in my settings, but it says "unlisted". Yet, my other posts from today say "public", as they should. Why is this?
(DIR) Post #AuuDDBCIfdyx0i2jOC by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-08T01:52:16.993855Z
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This is for my fellow NVDA users. I just saw this on Reddit and wanted to share it. This is a wonderful add-on. I used it when it was first created, but I stopped because the author was still working on models, apparently, and the one I was using was no longer available. (It was the only free one at the time.)Recent updates to AI Content Describerhttps://www.reddit.com/r/Blind/comments/1l605ex/recent_updates_to_ai_content_describer_for_nvda/#accessibility #add-ons #AI #AIContentDescriber #ArtificialIntelligence #blind #blindness #images #NVDA #Reddit #technology #Windows
(DIR) Post #AvCqmWzmPHobd12NgO by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-17T01:40:28.536190Z
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hahaha Are people really that insane that they need a content warning just because a post contains food/meat? Oh boy. I'm going back to my old opera recordings.
(DIR) Post #AvCrZvImpAPDCfTnQ8 by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-17T01:49:24.026914Z
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Okay now! I just heard of "entities with non-human identities" in a thesis proposal that was being shared online. I sincerely hope that this is about people who post as their pets, which is amusing and enjoyable, and not people who actually believe that they are animals and need mental help!
(DIR) Post #AvCskItS4CpbDk8w1Q by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-17T02:02:28.839397Z
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What an intriguing story! I love this site, as they always have interesting articles.https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/trinity-churchyard-charlotte-temple-grave#AtlasObscura #books #history #literature
(DIR) Post #AvD67FIctUNs8fBjXM by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-17T04:32:15.752139Z
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To make a very long story short, I am forty-one and became interested in opera in February of this year. I had been listening to operetta for several years by this point, with special attention to the works of Ivor Novello and Franz Lehar, always preferring original cast recordings, or at least older ones, when possible. Even now, all of the opera singers I like were born prior to 1923. I am interested in learning how to sing for pleasure, and possibly for performance, though not in full operas, as I am totally blind and I wouldn't feel comfortable doing that. I would most likely be singing Neapolitan songs, Italian art songs, a few English parlour songs, and some arias that I enjoy. I am untrained and my voice type has not yet been designated. However, , this is a post that I made reguarding my own discoveries about my vocal range. To summarise, I am a woman, but I feel most comfortable singing in the tenor range and would prefer to stay there. I don't like how high composers force contraltos to sing.https://www.reddit.com/r/opera/comments/1kic6cl/vocal_range/I adore the tenore di grazia voice type and also enjoy lyric tenors. My favourite singer is Tito Schipa, and I wish to learn what he taught, or at least, what he learned. I have the ten exercises that he recorded, including short narrations for each. I wrote about them here, with a transcription of the Italian and an English translation. This way, you will know the school of thought that I am attempting to follow. The one thing I cannot find is the booklet that came with said exercises, which offers more guidance than the record.https://www.reddit.com/r/opera/comments/1ku0n6g/schipas_exercises_with_translated_explanations/Since Schipa left little behind, I began researching his teacher, Alceste Gerunda. It is true that he technically started with Giovanni Albani, but hardly anything is written about him at all in Schipa's biography, and it seems that Gerunda was the one who gave him all of the exercises in any case.https://www.reddit.com/r/opera/comments/1ki4vkz/emilio_piccoli_frank_valentino_alceste_gerunda_etc/https://www.reddit.com/r/opera/comments/1kzobyv/making_progress_on_researching_teaching_method/I learned that Gerunda was born in 1847, and that his teacher was Saverio Mercadante. Neither left books, exercises, or published notes. But I found the school where Gerunda taught prior to opening a private one in his home. It has since become a library. They have two books on him that I want and that may shed light on some of his teaching practices. These are "ALCESTE GERUNDA E LA SCUOLA LECCESE DI CANTO" by Silvia Mandurino (ITES 1969) and "IN MEMORIA DEL MAESTRO ALCESTE GERUNDA NE L'AVVIVERSARIO PRIMO DE LA SUA MORTE" by Giulia) Lucrezi (Palumbo.https://biblioteche.regione.puglia.it/SebinaOpac/query/alceste%20gerunda?context=catalogoPerhaps, there are anecdotes within them that can help me. They may also have the books that he used to teach, assuming he used any. I have written to them asking if they could assist me, but haven't yet received a response.In the meantime, I am trying to find information about the pedigogs of his time, so that I can at least learn the ideas and methods that he may have passed down to Schipa. But, of course, there were as many schools of thought as there were teachers. To make matters worse, Gerunda and Schipa themselves appeared to differ in their teaching style. While the former would tell the latter when he made mistakes in exercises, Schipa seemed to just give them and play the piano without giving much commentary. Ironically, Mercadante is said to have taught like that. From what I understand, if I did follow the regular bel canto style, I would need to work on notes, then scales and arpegios, then ornamentation, then songs/arias, all of this taking many years. It seems that Schipa didn't work on breath control, individual notes, tone, tamber, and so on with his students but went straight to vowels and scales. I don't know if this is from his own teacher or if it was his personal philosophy. I have definitely heard of the breath-first and larynx-first schools of thought, so it could stem from there.People keep saying that i need to see a teacher, but most charge $100 or more per lesson, and at that rate, I can't afford more than two lessons per month. Plus, I want to find someone who knows the old ways, not modern ideas and terminology that I will need to unlearn. As it is, I am already studying harmony from "Harmony its theory and practice" by Ebenezer Prout, and Italian from "An Italian conversation grammar" by N Perini. It's just voice that is giving me a problem.#AlcesteGerunda #BelCanto #Italy #Lecce #MusicTheory #NineteenthCentury #opera #SaverioMercadante #singing #TitoSchipa #VocalPedigogy
(DIR) Post #AvD8LNqQ7VzkbSreC0 by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-17T04:57:15.611330Z
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Every time I come back to the Fediverse, I am reminded of why I mostly stay on Reddit and Dreamwidth.I mostly post to r/Opera, r/Blind (they have their own problems), r/BlindAndFine (my own subreddit, to avoid said problems), and read r/PromoteReddit, r/NasalSnuff, r/AudioBooksOnYoutube, r/PerplexityAI, r/DealsShoppingOnline, r/FrozenDinnerReviews (my own subreddit), r/HistoricReddit, r/CreativeMysteries, and r/Dreamwidth.1. Politics everywhere. While I'm sure Reddit has them, as you can tell, I avoid subreddits that contain them. But I can't filter out things on Akkoma. Even if I could, I'm not sure if TWBlue would respect my wishes. I may have been able to do so on Friendica. I don't remember. Regardless, I'm sick of everyone turning everything political, or my timeline being filled with who did what, when, why, and how. They take away from the posts that I actually want to read!2. Technology everywhere. I am not against technology. It's even interesting at times. But it's not my life. It's just something I use. The same is true of games. I like audio games, but being blind, most mainstream games are not accessible to me. Even if they were, again, it's not my life, just something to do for fun.3. Constant rivalry between platforms. I don't care if someone uses Facebook, Twitter, Bluesky, Akkoma, Friendica, Reddit, Lemmy, or something he just created yesterday. It's not my business. And no, I don't refuse to use a service just because it's not federated.4. Obscenities. This is a problem across the Internet. Hardly anyone, it seems, knows how to behave in public! This, of course, goes along with dressing like slobs everywhere. Private messages, gatherings with family, friends, partners,etc. are one thing. But when you're posting to a public group, have some respect! If you can't express your thoughts without vulgarity, they're probably not worth expressing or you're not smart enough to be using the Internet in the first place.There is probably more, but this is what comes to mind. It's really sad, too, because there are those posts and people whom I do like and who actually make me want to stay!As for Dreamwidth, this is my journal. Tomorrow, I really must update it.http://dandylover1.dreamwidth.org
(DIR) Post #AvE3bouSxFqIZ6jcHo by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-17T15:38:54.931479Z
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This is not my post. But I can't I am unable to share it normally due to compatibility issues with Akkoma and the original source.
(DIR) Post #AvE3itJ50NmcEHcSSe by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-17T15:40:11.621850Z
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This is not my post. However, I am unable to share it from the original source. But the information it contains is important."AI bots that scrape the internet for training data are hammering the servers of libraries, archives, museums, and galleries, and are in some cases knocking their collections offline"#AI is ruining our digital world(Original title: AI Scraping Bots Are Breaking Open Libraries, Archives, and Museums) https://www.404media.co/ai-scraping-bots-are-breaking-open-libraries-archives-and-museums/
(DIR) Post #AvF01DhzgWse3giWVU by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-18T02:33:20.495598Z
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I just wrote a huge entry about the Fediverse here. It is a guide with all sorts of tips and explanations, and links to many useful pages. Please feel free to share it with anyone who may be interested in joining. Note, though, that I am not the type to care if you're on a mainstream platform or not. Thi sis just meant as a guide for those who may need it, not as a way of bashing those who use non-Fediverse platforms. As a side note, Dreamwidth is one of my favourite sites on the Internet, precisely because of its wonderful accessibility.https://dandylover1.dreamwidth.org/248988.htmlIf you would rather read it on Reddit, here is the same post there.https://www.reddit.com/r/BlindAndFine/comments/1le5jqv/fediverse_explanations_and_guides/#accessibility #Akkoma #Android #blind #Dreamwidth #Fediverse #Friendica #guide #IOS #MacOS #Mastodon #Reddit #technology #tips #TWBlue #TweeseCake #Windows
(DIR) Post #AvG7oLai3nWVX4du1w by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-18T15:35:25.053064Z
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What my computer said: "What is the Area of the blue Rectangle?"What my mind heard: "What is the aria of the blue Rectangle?"Thinking... thinking.... Who composed that? Let's reread! Oh. Erm... More coffee, please!
(DIR) Post #AvGSc0YaXN45rHbkJc by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-18T19:28:29.823281Z
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I am copying this from a friend, because I can't share it the regular way. I have added a few extra tags so that both the blind and sighted community can be made aware of this wonderful project."Broadfork, Boosted from @KuJoe: For those of you on mobile (and desktop) who find it difficult to write alt text for images you upload, I’ve built a simple website to do it for you.It’s very basic right now, but it uses Google’s Gemini AI to write the alt text for images you upload.Current testing indicates I probably need to dial it back to make the alt text less detailed, but if you’d like to try it out and see if it works for you then feel free:https://alttexty.org/ "#AltText #Android #Accessibility #AccessibilityTesting #blind #developers #Gemini #GoogleGemini #IOS #images #NVDA #ScreenReaders #Talkback #Voiceover #Windows
(DIR) Post #AvGcsMzhsldLcbjVAm by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-18T21:23:30.290892Z
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tffp podcast, Boosted from @hyvon: @podcast Anyone willing to help me get my insulin? I'm down to my last pen and its pretty much close to being empty. Nt asking for a much, only need $370 rn to save my blood sugar. pls help me with a small donation or share, RT any help can save my life.Help/Donate/Boost pinned.💓 28 minutes ago. Public.
(DIR) Post #AvGoLVaM7QSK9zyKWW by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-18T23:32:02.030254Z
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Does anyone know what is happening with TWBlue? Every time I try to update it, it doesn't work. The old version works correctly. I just deleted it from my spare computer and downloaded the portable version, which is what I normally use. I ran it and told it to update. I authorised my account, but when I started it, it asked about donations, then quit. When I tried it on my primary computer, it kept saying that there was an error, to the point that I just deleted it and restored the old version. Is anyone else having this problem? While we're on the subject of accessible Fediverse clients, does anyone know if TweeseCake is receiving an update soon? It still doesn't work with Akkoma, though it does work with Friendica. I have no idea why.#accessibility #Akkoma #blind #Fediverse #Friendica #TWBlue #TweeseCake
(DIR) Post #AvHGcPf2CFx7QQ0eNk by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-19T04:48:47.882803Z
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Attention!If you have seen a follow request from dandylover1@someplace.social, it is from me. I am trying it out. I will not be deleting this account. But this was recommended to me at the Blind subreddit, so I know it is actually accessible! I just joined tonight, so I am learning the interface and haven't posted much yet. While the character limit for posts is 16,000, the limit for the biography is ridiculously low, so I directed people to dreamwidth and blob.cat.https://someplace.social/@dandylover1
(DIR) Post #AvLA9ishplv9XuBEzw by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-06-21T01:55:13.745164Z
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This site was, is, and I hope, always will be, 100% accessible, with no compromises ever. The developers truly care about their users and make the experience as positive as possible there. If you would like to keep a journal, or even write articles of any kind, make friends, join groups, and enjoy a slower pace, I strongly encourage you to try it. My own journal can be found here. Anyone may read and comment on public entries, whether or not he is a member.https://dandylover1.dreamwidth.org/If you would rather see my posts in a format similar to this one, I can also be found at the following site. Please note that I am keeping my Akkoma and Friendica accounts open, but I will be posting to Mastodon for the foreseeable future. If I did return to one of these, though, it would be Akkoma, as it'smore accessible.https://someplace.social/@dandylover1The original post that inspired this can be found here. It's longer, with an explanation of some of the problems I have seen related to accessibility over the many years I've been on the Internet.https://someplace.social/@dandylover1/114718803330220790#Dreamwidth #journal
(DIR) Post #AwpsHkYaLsTSeyp5gO by dandylover1@blob.cat
2025-08-04T19:23:07.900812Z
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After testing the features and accessibility for quite awhile, I have decided that my home on the Fediverse is at Mastodon. More specifically, it's at someplace.social. I mostly post there now, so if you wish to follow me, this is my address. You could also simply search for @dandylover1. It is so difficult to post here from the main page that I must use a third party client and am considering deleting my account. This is not the case with Mastodon.https://someplace.social/@dandylover1I am also still on Dreamwidth and will be updating it with new entries today.http://dandylover1.dreamwidth.orgFinally, if you use MSN/Windows Live Messenger via Escargot and wish to add me, I am dandylover1@escargot.chat. If you are curious about this wonderful revival of accessible software, go to the following site.http://www.escargot.chat