Installers deal with more than just unpacking files into a folder. There are often prerequisite shared libraries that are included in the installer that AREN’T in the game directory, which may or may not need to be installed along with the game depending on if your system already has it.

So just double-clicking the .exe after copying the folder to a new computer is not reliable in the same way GOG’s installers are.

I’m pretty sure that’s what you said last time.

The best thing about it was all the functions that existed for string manipulation, since every data record was just a big string with demarcations for columns (and values and subvalues, making it technically a 4D database). You could use it to consume nearly any data format and throw together a quick-and-dirty parser in minutes. Really good for rapid proof-of-concepts, but occasionally challenging to maintain data integrity when you have all the rope in the world to hang yourself with.

I miss working with it, compared to SQL which is stupidly rigid and obnoxiously fragile in comparison.

Anticompetitive behavior is tolerated much more from companies that aren’t the market leader, and Apple Books is far from the market leader.

ffs, you do not own the games you bought.

You haven’t owned the games you buy since software licenses became ubiquitous.

Any business that has over 4% market rate should be forcibly split.

My dude, 4% is insanity. If you did that, there would be - at absolute bare minimum - 26 different companies for any given market, including distribution. No one would be able to scale to serve global demand in any way, shape, or form. You’d have to route packages through three different companies in order to get a product to your friend in Switzerland. Any product that got popular would see its parent company split. If someone wrote an OS that was too good and everyone decided it was fantastic, the company would somehow have to split in such a way as to divide the OS share between two companies, which would then negate the point of having the same OS as your buddy.

The problem isn’t market share, it’s enforced market share. Anti-competitive practices. Lobbying. Buying out competition. These are places that Steam demonstrably is more ethical than its competition.

All Epic had to do in order to capitalize on Fortnite was to make a launcher that was better than (or at least approaching the quality of) Valve’s. Instead, when the starting gun went off, they started walking backwards.

The problem is that, allegedly, there are threatening emails from Valve to developers who tried to sell for lower prices on other platforms (NOT Steam keys). If this is true, then there is actual ammunition against Valve.

You still lose the internal state between each token in the database output. It would let it plan, but it would still be externalizing that planning, one token at a time. Condensing all of the internal state into a single token at a time still means huge losses in detail as well as fragmentation of responses, resulting in all the problems that you see with LLMs.

Somehow the actual internal state needs to not only be preserved, but fed back into itself. That’s how brains work. Condensing it into tokens isn’t enough.

Whuff. And GenX’s collective opinion is unlikely to have changed in the meantime.

A bit absurd that for all the anti-establishment sentiment, they largely uphold gender norms.

Goddam, Minnesota. Huge props to your work. You have my admiration.

For it to be data rather than anecdotes, you need to gather the data. Survey not just the examples you have, but the people outside of the demographics you work with. Form the questions in a way that gathers the data you really want - split it out to give you granularity. Are you a member of gen X? Are you LGBT+ yourself? Do you consider yourself an ally? Do you support the gay community? Do you support the lesbian community? Do you support the trans community?

Right now, the cohort you have the most experience with is the people who have suffered, which will skew your conclusions. However, this is the anecdotal evidence that tells you something is fishy. The next step is to get actual statistics.

So there are a lot of allies, but this guy’s asshole family isn’t actually one. Just because this is common doesn’t negate the existence of actual allies. Remember, anecdotes are not statistics. It can be a reason to be cautious, but it is not a reason to deny the existence of a group.

It is frustratingly common, but very much not okay. Responding to rejection like that shows a lack of maturity and respect.

Ah. My mistake! Learn something new every day…

You don’t need tons of money, until you get an Expensive Disease and all of a sudden you need a LOT of money.

The number one cause of bankruptcy in the USA is medical debt. Unless you have insurance, in which case the number one cause among THOSE people is … actually still medical debt.

If you’re the kind of person who worries, the idea of not ever being able to get ahead far enough to guarantee anything really, really sucks.

Except that we’re going to start asking for more pay to clean up after AI slop.

God, I wish life could go back to boring in the USA.

That’s because having tons of money is the only proven way to not have a crappy life in the USA. All the public services and citizen protections are undergoing rapid disassembly, without which one wrong move can put you on the street.

It’s mirrored. You can tell because the US flag patches are backwards. So it’s actually U.RA.LHY

…yeah okay, it’s slop.

Does a bear shit in the woods?

I’ve done what you told me to do for half of my life, and like I said before - I have not noticed withdrawal symptoms whatsoever.

Then you are exceptionally resistant. Congrats. Caffeine withdrawal is super common.

lower cost alternatives

lol

Once you have the wherewithal to grind your own coffee and acquire a percolator or a French press, a cup of coffee is dirt cheap and only takes like five minutes. Doesn’t take -that- long to recoup the costs, either, if you’re a regular drinker.

Buying coffee from Starbucks every morning is for suckers.