The only time i tried online dating apps to the point of actually talking to another human i met a young woman and we exchanged a few messages then arranged a phone call. On the phone she wouldn't stop talking. It was pretty amazing, this flood of words pouring from her. I supposed it was because she was nervous, but still - being pretty pessimistic about the whole online dating thing to begin with - figured this would never work out because her non-stop talking was starting to weird me out a little. Not in a terrible way, just a little.

Anyway, she was going on and on about her job but was carefully avoiding any details that might identify where she worked, i guess so as to stay safe by not revealing too many personal details to a stranger. Somehow, though, I figured it out. She told me what area of the city she lived in, and i got enough details about the kind of work she did that i said something like: "Oh, you work at the Goodwill on blahblah street" and then there was dead silence. The flood of words stopped. We hung up soon after that. I felt really cool about guessing her workplace, like a detective, thinking i'd impressed her with my mind, but it wasn't until years later that it dawned on me that i'd weirded her out even more than she weirded me out. A double oblivious weird out.

Testing what they can get away with is my guess.

I just started using this one today: https://docs.searxng.org/ and it did a great job for what i needed. I never heard of it before, but found the link on an old Lemmy post.

I don't know how it would work for other people with other needs, but i needed to find graphic designers to help me with a project. DuckDuckGo kept giving me hundreds of results from a handful of big companies, but i wanted small companies and individuals. Found exactly what i needed on the first search using this engine.

I agree with this post. Move on and build your life your way.

I'd like to add, in case it's helpful, from my own experience the thinking about it never ends. My dad passed 40 years ago and i still have the same thoughts, feelings, arguments even (a little more one-sided now that he's gone, though). I mean the dynamic might last forever, but you can separate that emotional internal dynamic from how you live your life. And there's a kind of "this stops here" effect, because your own children will never have to deal with all that stuff, because you dealt with it and moved on. That's something to be proud of.

Just by coincidence i'm watching a gameranx video about the 10 worst AAA games, and Falcon says the same thing about games as a service (subscriptions, micro-transactions, etc.): "it seems like they're playing a game of chicken with the consumer to see what they can get away with".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8jDgkikylY

(start at 19:45)

Yeah i think we're in a golden age of indie games. When i want to find a new game, i search youtube for "best indie games of 2018" or 2017, 2021 or whatever. So much great stuff to play made in the last 5-10 years. And so much more affordable. And it feels great to give my money to these devs.

Me too. This video helped a lot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4Df5_cojAs

British panel (game) shows like Would I Lie to You and 8 out or 10 Cats Does Countdown. The game element is just an excuse for funny, interesting people to crack jokes and have a good time.

I got them on Firefox with Ublock Origin but only with my VPN on US or Canadian servers. Then a few days later, even on those servers they disappeared. Haven't seen one since those first few.

Good point. Sleepwalking into authoritarianism doesn't seem difficult these days.

Yeah i agree. For what it's worth, here are 2 ways i use to bypass captchas: Use this site: https://archive.fo/ Use a vpn and set the server site to a location that nixes the captchas (Denmark, Taiwan, etc.)

True. I once considered subscribing, some years ago, but customer reviews of OST convinced me not to. Looks like i made the right decision.