I’m an American who just started my first year of undergraduate studies at the National University of Singapore last month. I chose Singapore over the US because I wanted to live abroad, and Singapore checked pretty much every box for me: it’s in Asia, tropical, safe, developed, and English is the medium of instruction.

Now, even though NUS is a great university by global standards, the reaction I’ve gotten from many of my family members and friends is that choosing to study abroad as an American is inherently a downgrade, regardless of the university or country. That’s where my question comes from.

I’ve heard from my gamer friends who reside in Australia that any game that’s 18+ on steam is hit with a barrier of AV (mainly adding a CC, not a debit card) before they can even view the page despite them owning the title. The real solution to overcome this hurdle is: region change, as from Australia > (other country) which is only applicable if you’re an expat gamer having a valid payment method & billing address from (that country).

spoiler

I obtained this screenshot from a friend of mine who lives in Australia, this came up for any "adult" (non-pornographic) game like Doom or Resident Evil. I can view those games as normal as someone from abroad.

The alternative is using a premium VPN for region change but you’ll still require both a valid payment method & billing address from abroad finalizing steam “migration” to another nation’s storefront. However, this carries its own risks relating to account termination if caught. I’m a foreigner, so it doesn’t affect me personally but I feel them, the frustrations on having to submit CC just to gain access otherwise the page is inaccessible.

Hi. It's my first time posting here. I still couldn't find alternatives for the following subreddits. r/prettygirls r/soccer r/rklb r/leagueoflegends to say the least. Could you help me?

My adhd means I end up collecting ideas for games and books, but I can never manage to have the motivation for long enough to make them real.

I'm also considering making a community for this sort of thing, just not sure how used it will be

A unpopular opinion I often hear is "I actually like [insert usually dislike stuff]" and vice versa. I think this kind of take is way more common than most people believe for the sole fact that people in general have various taste.

I can't imagine It's over 9000 ever dying.

My last 2 weeks have been a bit rough:

first there was an insurance issue I am still dealing with because my employer failed to submit relevant information on time. Payment will be effective only after employer submits correct information.

Then my employer claimed that someone had seen me using my cell phone while at work (theoretically, that’s not allowed, but everyone checks the time now and then, and normally it doesn’t affect the quality of the work). They claimed this happened eight weeks ago. I simply replied that I couldn’t remember anything like that.

This week I received a ticket from the transportation authority, where they claim I boarded a ship without a valid ticket, something I am appealing. I’ve never done this before but my friends are helping me. It's not so much about the amount as it is about the feeling of being trampled on. I even showed the employee a copy of my ticket I had on my phone with my whole name, address and price I paid, but he ignored it. I already sent my side of the story to the authority and I’m waiting for an answer.

The thought of being forced to pay for a ticket I paid and showed as a copy of weighs heavily on me. I know I shouldn’t give it more importance that it deserves, but they way that employee treated me, the employee ignoring me, my explanations and the copy I had on my phone gives me an eerie feeling of injustice, that something is broken. I’ve been using that boat for 5 years and never had such an issue before.

If you are more resilient than me, how? I feel lost and as much as I’d like to forget about it I flash back to it, I cannot concentrate and I’m not sleeping very well.

I'd like to be stronger but I'm not.

Seriously, who needs to record someone without the knowledge of the person being recorded? That's a big red flag, a perverted character, there's no other explanation. Creepy Mark Zuckerberg allowed other creepy characters to share personal moments with him.

Basically the title. If someone can point me to a list of Lemmy and/or Piefed instances, that would be great! I’m looking for instances that forbid training AI on posts, use some kind of technology that makes AI training harder, or have at least promised to never train AI on users’ posts themselves. Or if you’re on an instance that has taken a stance like that, I’d love to hear about it.

Do you read to the bottom, or is two or three deep enough?

Tried four separate search engines. Was looking for news articles or any other statements regarding trump’s activity and statemnts after 9/11. I distinctly remember him commenting about how he now had the “tallest building in Manhattan” or some such arrogant and callous lies rather quickly following the event.

But it seems pretty difficult to find ways to bracket dates on search engines, and even the ones that I could do so, the search results were partially “poisoned” by sites deliberately returning current information post-dated to the date range I was looking for. But all the results that would have been readily returned say a decade or more ago are gone. They don’t even show up.

Where did it all go?

All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary. In no case would it have been possible, once the deed was done, to prove that any falsification had taken place. - Orwell: 1984

Edit: not trying to be unthankful for the help, I know there are plenty of current articles referencing what he said 25 years ago, but I was looking for the actual article from a first-hand source in 2001-2 when he actually said it.

If the original movement in the 70s was in response to political stagnation in the UK and the Vietnam war in the US. And the revival in the 00s in response to the US wars in the Middle East. Between Black Lives Matters, No Kings protests, and far right political parties recent win across the globe, where is the Punk movement? Where is the disenfranchised youth grinding out their anger on an electric guitar in an abandoned industrial building?

Edit: Thank you to everyone who suggested various artists. I’m going to check them all out!

Maybe there is a tool that does that? Maybe I'm doing this all wrong and there is a different way I should browse?

it's getting to the point where I notice people say it a lot, especially IRL now for whatever reason recently.

And for clarity I'm not in research or anything, so these people just mean 'LLM/image gen', not utilities like OCR or (usually not) transcription.

Some have argued it's just more efficient (which I can kind of get), while others think you're actively hindering your intelligence somehow.

On the first point:

I've tried it occasionally to see how it compares to my own skill, and while it produces a functional result, it's always very derivative work to the point where you can find things with the exact same names of other 'public' (but not libre) works, and often isn't the ideal solution to what it targets. So I can see how you can get things out of it, but it never felt really that profound to me.

But for the second... isn't this supposed to be the tool for people to do things they aren't experienced in? If anything, you probably need to be able to understand how to write pertaining to the task so the token probabilities are biased toward writing from that area.

And even then, if all you end up doing is prompting AI, then wouldn't you ultimately serve no purpose outside of being glorified QA?

I guess I'm trying to figure out what exactly non-users would be 'falling behind' in that affects them more than those who use AI?

https://youtu.be/wuFfiTEr2yc

I’m 90% I’m about to be laid off from my job tomorrow and this is my first time being laid off and this was my first dev job. I’ve worked here for over 7 years which is a long time at a dev job I know.

I’m just wondering what I should do in the meeting, what should I ask for? I’m having a range of emotions from fear of losing my house and health insurance (thanks usa) to relief and hope that I’m going to find something better and more fulfilling.

Thanks for reading

Edit: it’s confirmed I am getting laid off. Thanks everyone for the advice and well wishes. It really helped and means a lot.

Growing up and even now, I have a problem of going into extremes. In my early teens, I was so obsessed with religion that it started to become a problematic part for those around me. Now, I am kinda "anti-theist" (in secret though, I wanna be safe). I used to be very homophobic. When I discovered that I fall in love with a guy, I have became so scared. Now, I am comfortable with my bisexuality though but will be in rage if the word "gay" is used as a joke. I also rush to take a label for me that I am this, this and this, and get myself limited to that specific identity. Although I am now on my way to develop the acceptance of the fact that I can be wrong, I still feel that I have not gotten rid of my extremism. How to be a person who does not rush to take labels?

For me, if I ask for an unpopular opinion and you say something about pineapple on pizza I'm going to assume you have no personality.

Psionics involve the use of the mind to alter or command reality, typically through some understanding of a deeper truth about the universe or command over a fundamental law of reality.

It's pretty cool, but I have trouble thinking of media where it takes a prominent role. The few examples that come to mind are:

Star Wars - The Force Mass Effect - Biotics/Element Zero technology Stellaris - Spiritualist Ethos Warhammer 40k - Psykers/Orks

What are some other examples of psionics in Sci-Fi?

Today I was in a part of town I never have before.

I saw a store JUST for badminton.

I've lost 3 men in my life to suicide, 1 very close and very recently. What resources can I engage with to help. Literally what can I do, outside of generic advice, what's an action I can proactively take. Are suicide hotlines still a thing? Is being an operator on there possible and what qualifications are there.

I am contemplaying moving to poland for my career. It is still very theoretical at this point, but if I chose to live there, what are some things to keep in mind? If it helps, I am German. Do I need to learn Polish or can I communicate with many people there in English?

What are some cultural things to maybe brace yourself for, as a vegan, woman or queer person?