Steve

I’m currently on Arch, but my first distro was Linux Mint. Linux Mint eased my transition into the Linux world, as it looked and behaved almost the same as Windows. You can avoid terminal commands completely thanks to the GUI apps that the Mint team includes for updating, installing, and removing packages.

I switched to Arch because one of the benefits of Arch is that it forces you to become familiar with the various different components that make up a Linux distro. When you install Mint, pretty much everything is included out of the box. You may have to install a few proprietary drivers here and there, depending on your HW config, but overall, you get everything you need to start using your computer. You don’t have to concern yourself with a lot of things. Arch is different. Even with the archinstall command that you can use to simplify the installation process, you still have much to do post-install. Audio drivers, package manager, Bluetooth, productivity apps, customization options, WiFi drivers, to name a few. And even after that, when you start daily driving Arch, you still may encounter issues that would require you to do some troubleshooting via reading the Arch Wiki or looking for similar problems on Arch forums. It can be a headache at times, but I personally feel it’s worth it.

I don’t think this should surprise anyone, given the new CEO they got and the announcement that was made immediately afterwards, followed by the layoffs. Fortunately, there are Firefox forks that we can switch to as a form of protest, provided that the forks keep these changes out of their codebases.

One thing I predict happening is that this move by Mozilla could spur more activities for the Firefox Forks. It would be a good opportunity for the developers of Mull, Librewolf, and Waterfox to think of ways to make their respective browsers stand out or be unique. Maybe we can one day see an Android version of Librewolf or a new web engine get developed in response to all this mess. Just a thought, of course.

I have been using Librewolf for several months now, and I am quite happy with it. In terms of user privacy, Librewolf by default has some strict settings enabled, like Resist Fingerprinting. Resist Fingerprinting does cause some minor problems, like incorrect timezones, but there is a workaround, as stated on the Librewolf website.

According to the Librewolf documentation, fingerprinting can be turned off, but they recommend adding the Canvas Blocker extension in its place. That is my current setup, as I didn’t like that websites in Librewolf couldn’t get the correct time and time zone for me.

Here’s the direct quote from the Librewolf documentation:

If you don’t like the downsides of RFP, or you are not concerned about fingerprinting, you can disable RFP in the LibreWolf settings, or in your overrides. In that case consider using an extension like CanvasBlocker to retain at least a minimum amount of fingerprinting protection.

Can they just focus on the browser? I really don’t need the AI stuff.

I think I’ll just stick with Mastodon and Lemmy.

Um…really? I don’t think so!

This doesn’t surprise me, given how messy Facebook has become. What does disturb me is people not being able to recognize that they are AI-generated. Now, this could be due to the AI becoming so sophisticated that it can actually generate life-like images, or it could be due to humanity’s inability to question what they’re viewing and whether it is true or not. Either way, this is very concerning, and if it can happen on Facebook, I’m sure it’s also happening on other social media sites as well.

Speaking of which, how can we stop something like this from happening on Lemmy and other federated sites?

Sigh…alright, they can give it a shot. Personally, I see no reason to do a reboot of this series. Things ended quite well in Season 2 of the original, and I’m happy with what I got.

Indeed. Olrox may have his reasons for aligning with the Vampire Hunters against Erzebet, but I doubt he will do something, even indirectly, that will give them more power. He needs their help, but only to fulfill his purpose…whatever that is.

And speaking of what Maria and Richter have to go through to even stand a chance against Erzebet, I can think of one thing that might give them a chance: Item Crush.

Yes! Maria was also the character I wanted to see the most. I don’t recall the Castlevania games ever explaining how she controls her animal familiars, but Nocturne gave a pretty good explanation of it. The animal familiars are mystical beings summoned from a magical dimension, and Maria has the ability to conjure portals that lead from the magical dimension into her dimension. But, how she actually formed the relationship with those animal familiars in the first place would be an interesting story. Plus, there’s one animal familiar that did not show up in Season 1. I think you know which one it is, given your experience with Rondo and Symphony, and I think the reason why it didn’t show up is quite obvious. Perhaps this is the growth that we will see with Maria in Season 2.

I liked the series so far, and as someone who played Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night, I think they did a good job in portraying Richter and Maria. I did not find Maria annoying, but I do agree that more could have been done with her. I also agree that a little more time could have been dedicated to showing how Richter and Maria grew up. One complaint I do have is how Season 1 appears slightly rushed, and as Richter and Maria are two of my favorite characters from the game, seeing how their relationship and skills developed would’ve been awesome. The games don’t go into much about their relationship, other than stating that they are distantly related and have special skills for fighting night creatures and vampires.

However, as this is only Season 1, I am going to wait and see how the story pans out.

Another thing I like about Nocturne is that they went in their own direction with the story, rather than taking the story that was presented in Rondo of Blood. I doubt they would get very far with the whole “hero & heroine team up to rescue damsels in distress” story that was in Rondo of Blood. That might also explain how they took characters like Annette and Tera in a whole new direction. Annette and Tera were two women you had to rescue in Rondo of Blood, with Annette being Richter’s girlfriend. Their roles were so minor in the game that you really didn’t care much about them except as an objective to complete in the game. In Nocturne, they were given pretty important roles, with new backstories and personalities that made you care for them.