Been playing MOUSE: PI For Hire

Pretty decent game. I like the combination of noir detective story with steamboat willie era cartoon artstyle, along with it being a nice mixture of serious and parody. There's also some leftist undertones to it, especially with a lot of the bad stuff going on seeming to be connected to the in universe fascist/nazi party.

The gameplay's a bit underwhelming though ngl. Haven't figured out exactly why, but something about it just doesn't feel as tight as other games in the "boomer shooter" category. Though arguably it should maybe be grouped in more with something like Bioshock rather than Doom or DUSK, so maybe I'm just coming in with the wrong expectations.

@Mabbz@hexbear.net @vertexarray@hexbear.net @plantifa@hexbear.net @wtypstanaccount04@hexbear.net @notthenameiwant@hexbear.net @Zoift@hexbear.net @Octofad@hexbear.net @MolotovHalfEmpty@hexbear.net @ThePokeYen@hexbear.net @nabana@hexbear.net @LesserCacodemon@hexbear.net @PaX@hexbear.net @dj_voight_kampff@hexbear.net

Got an actually new mix this time. Trying to go for a backrooms/liminal space type vibe. Hope y'all enjoy!

@Mabbz@hexbear.net @vertexarray@hexbear.net @plantifa@hexbear.net @wtypstanaccount04@hexbear.net @notthenameiwant@hexbear.net @Zoift@hexbear.net @Octofad@hexbear.net @MolotovHalfEmpty@hexbear.net @ThePokeYen@hexbear.net @nabana@hexbear.net @LesserCacodemon@hexbear.net @PaX@hexbear.net @dj_voight_kampff@hexbear.net

Back with a new(-ish) mix, hope y'all enjoy!

This conflict has gotten me interested in learning more about the early history of Islam & how it expanded to become the dominant religious force in the middle east, but one thing I've inadvertently learned along the way is that Amman, the capitol city of Jordan, used to be named Philadelphia until the 630s AD. The city was originally the capitol city of the Ammonite Kingdom, but was renamed to Philadelphia after the Macedonians conquered the region, and then renamed again to Amman once the Muslims conquered it.

(I guess this is all just to say that I never really realized that Philadelphia was a Greek name and/or that I never realized that there were other cities named Philadelphia before the one in the US lol)

I just noticed that at around 34 seconds into the video, the dust finally clears enough to reveal another Merkava that's facing almost directly at the bomb guy. Imagine how insane it would be to have an enemy tank just appear right in front of you like that.

Was made aware today that Israel has been working on a new Merkava model, the Merkava Mk.5 "Barak," which at a glance seems to best be described by an overconfidence & over-reliance on technology.

Article: https://www.edrmagazine.eu/israel-starts-delivering-the-5th-gen-merkava-barak-tank-to-its-armoured-units

A first major improvement came from sights; the commander got a new panoramic sight while the gunner’s sight is also brand new, Idan Tavor underlining that these are one or even more generation ahead of previous ones. Improvements came in electro-optic performances, which provide better imaging, “but the main step forward is that they have integrated AI into those sight that have now autonomous behaviours, and are capable to identify targets and objects by themselves.”

I seriously doubt that current AI technology is going to be better at identifying targets than a well trained crew working in conjunction with infantry support who can function as additional eyes for the tank (granted Israel's target acquisition only need be as sophisticated as to be able to determine whether someone is Palestinian or not). Best case scenario, it occasionally manages to pick out threats faster than the crew can, but I imagine the average experience using AI target acquisition is going to sifting though a lot of false positives.

The Fire Control System (FCS) has also been entirely upgraded. “The new version is faster and has better performances,” we were told, adding that the Merkava Barak is able to shoot on the move, day and night, with increased accuracy.

Being able to accurately fire on the move at both day & night has already been standard for most tanks made in the past few decades, so while it is probably an improvement over current FCS systems, I'm willing to bet it's not significant enough to really be notable.

Human-machine interface has also be completely reviews, adapting it to the young conscripts experience, multi-touchscreens with smartphone-like interface being now adopted. “We worked on it pretty hard for the last two years in order to make it very approachable for young soldiers who are used to their cell phones and playstations and now need to fight in a tank and we developed for them a very nice and new HMI.”

It's like a vibeo game!!!

But seriously, what's the obsession with making everything touch screens nowadays? Especially in a military context where you'd think it'd be useful to have tactile controls that can be operated on muscle memory during high stress situations.

There's probably more stuff to pick apart, but overall it just feels like they're trying to use technology to compensate for the fact that they're frequently having to use their tanks in situations that tanks really shouldn't be used in, namely that they're being operated by under-trained conscripts to fight in urban guerilla warfare.

Yeah, I think at this point if Iran attacks Israel directly (or even indirectly), then things could very quickly snowball into something that normal people will recognize as a world war. So I'd say that we're very close to the brink, but as has already been mentioned, if WW3 comes to pass then historians in the future will probably say that it's already ongoing and we just haven't recognized it yet.

I'm assuming it's Syrian and/or Iraqi militias, which are largely backed up by Iran afaik.

I know Iraqi resistance groups have previously said that they'd start attacking US assets in the region if the US gets involved, and the hospital bombing seems to have prompted them to start attacking US bases in Iraq, so they could also be the one launching attacks if the US bases in Syria are close enough to the border.

Yeah. In a just world, the second paragraph on it's own should probably be more than enough to get this guy executed for being an accomplice to war crimes, when placed in context with all the absolute monsters the US government has given arms to over the 11 years this guy was in his position.

Idk if anyone's posted it here yet, but Josh Paul, a senior US State Department official who was in change of arms transfers, just resigned in protest over what's going been going on in Gaza. He put up a letter on his LinkedIn page, which you can read here. It's obviously coming from a lib perspective, but it is still pretty remarkable that the top gun runner for the the US empire is taking more issue with the situation than the vast majority of mainstream media or "progressive" politicians.

Honestly probably doesn't matter if they're using Huawei or not, 'cause Egyptian intelligence new this was coming and warned Israel that something big was gonna happen in Gaza, and they chose to ignore it and focus on suppressing the West Bank instead.

I think part of the problem is that being read to by your parents at a young age and having books in the home that you are encouraged to read does so much for literacy

That probably helps on some level, but from listening to the first two episodes of the podcast, the problem seems to be that a lot of kids are being taught a fundamentally incorrect method of how to decode written language that's making it much harder for them to read that it otherwise should be, and often leaves them completely unable to parse new words. Like, if you gave them a word they'd never seen written down before (especially if the word is by itself, devoid of any context), they wouldn't know how to pronounce it, even if they've heard the word spoken before.

So simply having books available won't actually help (most of) them, because they just don't have the skills necessary to figure out how to decode written language, or how to connect written language to spoken language. They need to be taught the correct way of reading first.

(Of course, once kids finally have an understanding of the fundamentals of how to decode written language, having tons of books available to read so that they can further practice those skills would definitely be a massive help for improving literacy.)