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A Pre-History of Slashdot

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Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#251
post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd look into youtube-dl. I tried all the parental controls on Youtube, Netflix, Amazon and devices only to finally realize that my idea of what's suitable doesn't have an equivalent rating. There are so many safe for any age videos that have a bunch of kids with the worst, most cynical attitudes and no respect for authority and then wholesome shows with "intense emotion" or whatever that get rated tv-14. So I downlo…

I've got an Intel NUC I could do this with. Is there a video player app for iOS that kids could use (i.e. Interface isn't super complex), that'd play remote media? Edit: Looked into this myself just now. VLC Streamer looks decent, as does Infuse by Firecore.

Safari should work well enough with a webserver file listing of MP4s.

You could drag an icon to the desktop for an HTML page with thumbnails if it was necessary to get fancy.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#252
post #107

I remember getting my house's cable modem slashdotted in 2001 when i launched a community site (half-empty.org) I built -- what a wild ride that was. (If you are reading, thanks to Tim Wilde and the rest of the DynDNS crew for all the memories helping me, a young kid, get that site into an actual DC :)) I remember always rolling my eyes at the Linux and Free Software crowd on /. and the anti-Microsoft zeitgeist that…

Open source is the main thing that prevented cyberpunk dystopias that many authors imagined. This community deserves some love.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#253
post #107

I remember getting my house's cable modem slashdotted in 2001 when i launched a community site (half-empty.org) I built -- what a wild ride that was. (If you are reading, thanks to Tim Wilde and the rest of the DynDNS crew for all the memories helping me, a young kid, get that site into an actual DC :)) I remember always rolling my eyes at the Linux and Free Software crowd on /. and the anti-Microsoft zeitgeist that…

HN is like the california gold rush. Nobody is going to stop to think of ethical concerns and if forced to will make the appropriate posturing noises but the focus is completely different.

The irony is inspite of all the posturing about freedom and liberty seen at places like Slashdot its software folks who are currently neck deep in building surveillance infrastructure and selling out the world, of course qualified with suitable hand waving and apologism.

For the same commentators to reflect in a different context you need a more laid back venue like Slashdot. The problem with sites like Slashdot is to retain authenticity they cannot be profit driven. But there appears to be little room for that kind of thinking in the software ecosystem currently.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#254
post #198
post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not owning a TV is pushing my kid to watch a lot of YouTube. I'm seriously considering buying a TV, after living for 30 years without one, just so that I can have a quality entertainment feed that doesn't bend to the new media's idea of what my kid should watch, because what that ends up being is endless advertisements ("open this egg! What's inside? A Ken doll!! Wow!!") and videos of pandas killing each other with c…

I've limited it to Netflix on the big screen. I don't want the constant jumping from video to video either, pick one and then be stuck with it 'til it's done (or turn it off). I am considering Amazon FreeTime Unlimited as well, I would recommend trying that before a TV though I would appreciate any anecdata on it. Also, a shout out to https://dnslearning.org/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14913547 (Aug 2017) >…

DnsLearning.org now says it is free until January 2018.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#255
post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

context is everything. you were lucky to be doing an online gig. the rest of /. audience was probably in desktop software. most of the people there were ruthlessly crushed by Microsoft business tactics. they mostly had a very good reason to attack Microsoft.

most of the people there were ruthlessly crushed by Microsoft business tactics That has to be hyperbole. Even at the height of Microsoft's aggression, there were many professional software devs left uncrushed.

"Most of the people there". Not "most of the people".

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#256
post #107

I remember getting my house's cable modem slashdotted in 2001 when i launched a community site (half-empty.org) I built -- what a wild ride that was. (If you are reading, thanks to Tim Wilde and the rest of the DynDNS crew for all the memories helping me, a young kid, get that site into an actual DC :)) I remember always rolling my eyes at the Linux and Free Software crowd on /. and the anti-Microsoft zeitgeist that…

In today's world we need to call out people who do the job for these spy machines. Developers working for Google & Facebook should be ashamed of themselves. Money talks, I guess.

I don't have the vitriol towards the devs you do, but I will admit it's a bit disheartening that some of the greatest minds of our time are figuring out ways to trick your brain into clicking advertisements.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#257
post #182
post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are you managing "total curation"? Are you always there with them when they're on YouTube, or are you whitelisting specific channels in some way?

Not the OP, but there is no way that I'm aware of to whitelist (or blacklist!) specific channels on youtube. And thanks to HTTPS, I can't even intercept + modify youtube pages at the network level. Thank you, privacy folks, hope you're happy! Alternatively, there is always kids.youtube.com which is weirdly just an app for Ios/Android. I haven't tried it, and myself have actively disabled/removed all Youtube from bein…

The inability to blacklist channels is a major PITA.

The Power of Block is powerful, and denial of it a major Internet dysfunction.

I do believe you can hack at Squid to intercept HTTPS and terminate if for you, as well as run filtering (Squidguard), also possibly Dansguardian. Though I've not fully researched this yet.

http://squidguard.org

http://www.squid-cache.org

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#258
post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, man, Kuro5hin! That was such a great, diverse, welcoming site for a couple of years. So sad what it descended into.

For anyone who wonders why HN mods are overly strict, then note that Kuro5hin tolerated trolls and they utterly destroyed the site. It doesn't exist any more.

It had limped along until a year or so back when the server finally fell over.

The domain is parked now.

But yeah, the trolls pretty much ruined it, life lesson. Rusty turned up running a Mastodon instance, though I haven't seen him for a few months.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In today's world we need to call out people who do the job for these spy machines. Developers working for Google & Facebook should be ashamed of themselves. Money talks, I guess.

I don't have the vitriol towards the devs you do, but I will admit it's a bit disheartening that some of the greatest minds of our time are figuring out ways to trick your brain into clicking advertisements.

Somewhat relevant to my comment on another thread. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15413217

"...education sites are competing with very powerful algorithms that are designed to keep users watching video after video. If youtube starts encouraging users to do a few Khan Academy problems before watching the next video, I will consider our project, DnsLearning.org, a total success"

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hear, hear. I had a conversation last week where I mentioned that 20 years ago, on Usenet of all places, people were saying that due to the growing size of corporate databases, privacy had already been dead for a long time.

22 years ago: "You could sit at home, and do like absolutely nothing, and your name goes through like 17 computers a day. 1984? Yeah right, man. That's a typo. Orwell is here now. He's livin' large. We have no names, man. No names. We are nameless!"

Not a great movie in the traditional sense, but they hit on some important stuff. I loved when the one fed was reading from the Hacker Manifesto...

    This is our world now... the world of the electron and 
    the switch, the beauty of the baud.  We make use of a 
    service already existing without paying for what could 
    be dirt-cheap if it wasn't run by profiteering gluttons, 
    and you call us criminals.  We explore... and you call 
    us criminals.  We seek after knowledge... and you call 
    us criminals.  We exist without skin color, without 
    nationality, without religious bias... and you call us 
    criminals.

    You build atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder, 
    cheat, and lie to us and try to make us believe it's for 
    our own good, yet we're the criminals.

    Yes, I am a criminal.  My crime is that of curiosity.  
    My crime is that of judging people by what they say and 
    think, not what they look like. My crime is that of 
    outsmarting you, something that you will never forgive 
    me for.

    I am a hacker, and this is my manifesto.
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