Hello, my name is Cris. :)

I like being nice to people on the internet and looking at cool art stuff

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Cake day: July 6th, 2023

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  • Cris@lemmy.worldtoLinux@lemmy.mlMy experience with Arch
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    2 days ago

    For general users, updates changing things is pretty much never an issue, which is why typical end users always use the word “stable” to convey it’s more colloquial meaning of “not going to break on me”, rather than the technical definition sys admins use it to describe.

    If arch didn’t have breaking changes I don’t think users would ever really mind it being rolling release, which is how you get the term “stable rolling release” for rolling distros that hold updates for long enough to generally prevent breakage, like void or tumbleweed

    To the original commenter’s point, as a more design and ux person I think being able to do unattended upgrades and not get any errors or stuff you have to fix is kinda important. Which is why I find it a tad irksome when technical folks act like everyone and their grandma should run arch cause it’s never given them issues. It is awesome that it sounds like it’s improved so much though!

    Maybe I’ll try arch some time and see if I’ve progressed enough to not find managing my system a bit more bothersome



  • Yeah, I mostly just meant in terms of how much I directly relate with the perspectives of the protesters, it seemed at the time of my comment like most of the commenters looked at things somewhat differently to them (which is fine)

    I do think you might really be underestimating how deeply addictive tech can be for many people. For people who grew up on platforms like facebook, Instagram, and twitter, and spent enough time there before reflecting on that pattern, those deeply engrained habits can be difficult to shake to the extent of causing not insignificant anxiety

    I had social anxiety as a kid (still do) and so used those platforms almost none because they stressed me out (until I joined reddit in highschool), and even I really struggle with some amount of technology addiction I’m working really hard to replace with better patterns.

    I pick my phone up and check all the apps for no reason. I feel a bit anxious if my phone isn’t near by. I run out of time in one app I have a time limit set for and immediately jump to another one. I feel a bit stressed when I have to put it down. Not intensely so, but the more I pay attention the more I can tell it’s there and see how it’s molded my behavioral patterns over time.

    I have pretty good solutions to those problems, and think I’m making decent progress, but technology absolutely 1000% has warped my life to be about it. With me often serving it rather than it serving me. I can only imagine how difficult it might be for folks who spent lots of time on those platforms, and are less inclined to tinker with their tech and play with open source stuff, and take alternative technological routes




  • I might be one of the few in this thread who really empathizes with the perspectives of the protesters here

    I’m not in a position to cut tech out of my life, but for people who are and dont need or depend on it for something important, it may do a lot of harm for little benefit.

    But whether there’s important benefit will vary from person to person. I have a very isolating sleep disorder, and the internet allows me a little bit more connection than I would get otherwise. And home automation helps shoulder some of the load of managing environmental variables that impact my sleep. And there are also technological things that bring me joy.

    But not everyone is in a position where their only connection to others is through the internet (if you’re queer in a small town, maybe it is, if you’re queer in a big city or you’re straight that probably isn’t an issue)

    There are ofcourse benefits to technology, some of which you can better access through FOSS software, or community projects, or self hosting. But not everyone needs those things, and even those things can have harmful downsides. I think the hyper convenience that much of tech provides is not exactly great for us. Even the fediverse platforms can be addicting, can prioritize stuff that makes you angry, etc, because they copy the underlying design of proprietary social media (even without recommendation algorithms). I struggle to manage how much time I spend engaging with these platforms. Not as much as with reddit, but I still do, and am now creating structure around engaging more in moderation.

    I don’t love creating e-waste though. I get that it’s symbolic, I still think it’s wasteful and has no meaningful upsides. It feels deeply privileged to not grasp how that could be a lifeline for poor people who need a way to connect, keep up with work, handle digital tasks like banking and telemedicine, etc, and to smash it on the ground instead of donating it to someone who couldn’t afford a reliable device.









  • If you’re picking a distro for someone else I would not recommend a small project distro or something incredibly niche 😅

    Any of the big projects should be decent. Fedora, maybe fedora silverblue or whatever their imutable variant is called, opensuse, Mint, Ubuntu, debian. (Personally I don’t like some of the choices Ubuntu makes but it may still be a very good option for less technical folks)

    Others can tell you which of those have the best security defaults, but to be honest it doesn’t sound like you actually have particularly exceptional security needs relative to what any distro will provide. I’d prioritize something stable and user friendly- which, again, your best bet is NOT picking a niche small project or something most people have never heard of




  • I think it’s unfair to say that’s the point of the rule on a foss project’s discussion forum

    Political discourse online gets really fucking toxic really quickly 😅 often driven by entirely legitimate anger and hurt over the state of the world, but we can’t just pretend it’s all an evil conspiracy by big Ubuntu to silence us.

    Folks on the internet consistently demonstrate through behaviour why “no politics” is almost always a rule anywhere where folks might perceive it to be off topic, whether one thinks it’s the correct ruling or not (it’s entirely valid to feel it should be allowed even though it brings out the worst in people, though I’m sure that would put incredible strain on moderators given the internet baseline of interpersonal compassion)

    And the places online where folks do discuss it? Can quickly get extremely unpleasant, or develop an inescapable undercurrent of hostility that starts to permeate all other interactions on the platform.

    Personally I think actually productive political conversation is almost always emotionally laborious, and it’s important to be able to step away from the political aspects of things and catch your breath, even though everything is political. But everything being political doesn’t mean it’s healthy for every conversation to be political, that’s a recipe for burnout and people acting like their worst selves, which is counter productive to pretty much any meaningful political goal.