I realize that Halloween is a commercial event, but I think there are other outlets for criticism of capitalism. Things where you can make a difference and at the same time let the children have fun. I don’t think you can change much if you dwell on trivialities that bring people together despite all the commerce. That doesn’t seem to me to be the right approach.
That sounds fun, I imagine it like this:
Dentist in tooth disguise and surrounded by tooth fairies: Please open your mouth.
Patient Jack Sparrow: Arr!
Thank you for your thoughtful reply. I myself worked for a social media company for some time (although more in IT, not in their core business). The success metrics for this company were exclusively followers, likes and so on. There were no other metrics whatsoever.
I think the so-called KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) are a major problem of our time, because they are often defined incorrectly or misunderstood. All too often, decision-makers seem to think that the pure number of followers, for example, or engagement metrics such as likes would indicate that an account or post is successful. However, this is often not the case when other important metrics are taken into account. In e-commerce, for example, a large number of followers or high engagement figures in themselves mean nothing at all: it is not uncommon for e-commerce companies to invest a lot of money in social media management and for the KPIs of their accounts to rise accordingly - but still not sell anything via this channel (that means that the investment is not worth it, of course, because the costs are disproportionate to the sales generated; the ROI is often not good at all). I think a similar situation can be assumed for many science accounts on Mastodon, for example. Although the number of followers maybe not very high here because there are less active useres, the quality of comments can still be a lot higher. But unfortunately this cannot be quantified, or at least not easily. I therefore think that everyone should first think about what they want to achieve with their social media accounts. It then makes sense to define suitable KPIs instead of being impressed by what can be considered an indicator of success elsewhere and in a completely different context.
Yes, Dali would have been great as the emperor.
But Jodorowsky’s unfinished Dune project still had a significant influence on several major science fiction films and media, despite never being completed:
Check out the documentary “Jodorowsky’s Dune” (2013). It explores how the pre-production work and assembled team for this unrealized film went on to influence much of modern science fiction cinema. It’s worth a watch.
Alien because of HR Giger’s iconic art style, among other things. Also Frank Herbert’s Dune, the first planned film adaptation of which Giger also worked on (sometimes considered as the best movie that was never made). In addition to the cultural influence that the book series already had, Dune also more or less spawned the real-time strategy computer game genre (with Westwood Studios’ Dune II).
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The linked post doesn’t seem to be available anymore - it was a few minutes ago, but not anymore. That seems strange.
You can find a lot of stuff over at hugging face - open source stuff as well. This for example for background removal.
This is presumably not a bad thing, as Google would most likely have benefited the most from this, especially as the so-called “privacy sandbox” that Google had planned as a replacement or server-side tracking are even more difficult to avoid. The “privacy sandbox” in particular would have been more of a competitive advantage for Google because, as the provider of Chrome, they are the only ones who have comprehensive access to aggregated user data that is collected directly via the browser.
Müller (Unternehmensgruppe Theo Müller), an unscrupulous European food company with ties to the radical right. There are plenty of alternatives, including regional ones.
Müller owns numerous prominent brands, especially in Germany and the UK, but also in other countries.
Oh, wow. Thanks for the in-depth explanation - very interesting. I had never really looked into the technical details. Well, I suppose I’m lucky that my reasonably new smartphone still has a 3.5mm audio jack, so I can continue to use my now rather old, but in my opinion still pretty good, headphones. It wasn’t that easy to find a new smartphone with an audio jack, but then it looks like I’ve actually done everything right when it comes to listening to music.
Hi-fi stereo systems with amplifiers, speakers and cables.
I could be wrong, but I think that old stereo systems generally have way better sound quality than Bluetooth systems, soundbars and the like. Physical media such as CDs or even Flac files (etc.) are of course impractical compared to streaming, but the audio quality is much higher.
However, since you can also stream audio without any problems, I would recommend every music fan to buy a used stereo system with high-quality speakers from the 2000s or even from the late 90s - in my opinion, excellent audio quality at a low price.
This doesn’t seem like an open question to me.
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I don’t think there’s much need to discuss the substance of this response, as it’s hardly anything but finger-pointing and fear-mongering. But I do find one thing quite telling: the fact that the GOP even made one of the few women in that party give her SOTU response from a kitchen.
As I said, I’m from Germany. In this country, unfortunately, we know from painful experience how fascists take power. Please be smarter than the Germans in 1933 - the circumstances are shockingly similar to those back then; not only in America. The Nazis were able to seize power in the Weimar Republic because the economy, conservatives and other opportunists played along with their game. Perhaps they thought they would be able to put a stop to them later if things got too bad. This plan did not work out and millions fell victim to an inhuman idology. I simply mean, take the opportunity to defend what is left of your democracy - if necessary, even together with those who are seemingly in the wrong camp. It is perhaps the last chance before you are no longer allowed to express your opinion freely.
That’s clear. But it doesn’t help much, does it? I don’t think you have to be a prophet of doom to foresee that another Trump presidency would very likely have catastrophic consequences for America and subsequently for the whole “democratic world”. I just think that you obviously can’t rely on your institutions. I’m just an observer without much interest in US politics. But even I can see from the news about your constitutional court, for example, that a lot of things are seriously wrong here. Nevertheless, I don’t have the impression that US civil society has too many objections. That surprises me, given that so much is at stake. Maybe I’m not well informed, but that’s how it seems to me anyway. I just think that the time for cynicism is over and it’s high time to actually do something about all this.
Yes, these tricks are old and familiar. Nevertheless, US (right wing) politics seems to be adopting a lot of the workings of cults these days. I’m just surprised that US civil society is allowing this to happen. I’m from Germany and here, too, there are openly fascist parties that are gaining strength again and using the same ol’ strategies. But we don’t just put up with it, we take to the streets. Why are there no massive protests in the USA against Trump, against his fascist ideas and the fact that he is still at large after an anti-democratic coup attempt and countless criminal activities? He is even a presidential candidate. You can’t be serious.
What do you mean by religion? Halloween is a pagan festival according to Christian standards. Of course, I’d be right there with you when it comes to the fun festivals of pagans, but is that what you mean?