Notices by Nelson (skyfaller@jawns.club)

I'm half-Chinese; specifically, my mom is from Hong Kong. Obviously, my child has this heritage as well. I'd like her to have some connection to Hong Kong and its culture. Do you have any recommendations?

For numerous reasons it is hard to spend time with my mom and ask her directly; my Chinese family doesn't live nearby. Off the top of my head the main practices I can hand down are food, like miso soup and wontons, and utensils, like chopsticks and ceramic soup spoons.

#HongKong #Chinese

@robyn @mathowie Namecheap was bought out recently: https://webhosting.today/2025/09/12/cvc-acquires-majority-stake-in-namecheap-for-1-5-billion/

#Namecheap #registrars

@evan Is the World Wide Web no longer the Web because we are browsing HTML 5 instead of HTML 4? What about the brief XHTML / semantic web period? If the same people using the same software use a different protocol, why does the name for what they're doing need to change?

@evan No, I'm just using Mastodon as an example of a popular fedi software that used to run on a different protocol.

Do you think the OStatus predecessor network was meaningfully different in character than the present fediverse? It seems like the same idea, just not implemented as well, and more narrowly focused on microblogging.

Could you call the OStatus network an early fedi? Could a new protocol with similar values and goals still be meaningfully fedi?

@evan Yes, but Mastodon changed protocols once already. It may be that another protocol change happens in the future and this community we call fedi is still relatively intact after a shift in technology, and no longer tied to ActivityPub.

@silver_huskey Thanks for the reminder!

I think I'll generally follow my 9th Ward Dems ballot, except I'm not gonna vote for this chucklehead:

> Joseph Russo [...] did not run in the primary, but was granted a “magic seat” nomination for an open seat by the Democratic party. Russo declined to participate in the Philadelphia Bar Association’s judicial review process.

Magic seats are undemocratic, and he has the gall to further avoid accountability by blowing off the Bar's review.

@silver_huskey It's also interesting to learn of the existence of the Liberal Party:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Party_USA

It seems to be a splinter of the less shitty portion of the Libertarian Party after the fascists took over that party's apparatus. Having once been a left-leaning libertarian, I feel their pain. But since unlike the Working Families Party (and like every basically other 3rd party) they ignore the spoiler effect, even if I agreed with their platform I wouldn't vote for them.

The highlight of my Halloween: I was rushing to get some healthy treats out, and handed some fruit to a child behind me without looking at them. Their adult informed me gleefully, "You just gave a banana to a banana," and sure enough I turned around and a little girl was wearing a banana costume. I apologized for the bananas being green, and she said "I like green bananas!"

The lowlight of my Halloween: discovering that ska is dead.

@silver_huskey Yeah, if the goal is repairability, a bigger case should be better, more parts compatibility. You may be able to use a small part in a big case, but a big part won't fit in a small case.

Maggie went for a larger case (on the left), mine is a bit smaller (on the right).

@silver_huskey Depending on what your mom does with her computer, I think it's worth seriously considering Linux.

It's a relatively expensive brand, installing Linux on whatever old computer you have lying around is cheaper, but I've had good luck with System76: https://system76.com/

They're the Mac of the Linux world, because they make their own OS (flavor of Linux) and their own hardware, so they can make sure it "just works". Good support.

My less technical partner got one recently, too.

@silver_huskey And if you specifically like the Mac Mini form factor, well, they have that: https://system76.com/desktops/meerkat/

@evan No, but I miss when I was young and sharing that info on Facebook etc. seemed innocent and harmless. I don't see myself feeling that safe again, but I wish I did.

Every time I e.g. interact with the medical system, they use my date of birth to confirm my identity, and I'm like, any of my FB friends from back when could theoretically answer this question and access my medical data.

@evan Twisted my ankle really badly rushing out the door this morning, so no marching for me today

Suppose #iNaturalist fully enshittifies (and so do all other similar #wildlife ID apps), embracing LLMs to replace human IDs with slop text, or otherwise turning evil.

What trustworthy resources would you use to identify your favorite taxa instead?

I especially welcome book / field guide recommendations, since maintaining reality-based print libraries seems essential in this historical moment, but I'm open to whatever else you might suggest.

#SpeciesIdentification #taxonomy #nature #biology

Yesterday I biked across the rebuilt bridge by the art museum for the first time. Not as much fun as when it was closed to cars (and I maintain MLK Drive should be permanently open to pedestrians and cyclists), but the protected bike lane is a nice consolation prize for losing access to the road.

#Philly #MLKdrive

@skinnylatte But is the New York Aquarium up to your standards? ;-)

If I want a landline, should I pay Verizon for phone support over their fiber, or is there some indie SIP solution that would be equivalent? Like, Verizon would just be providing an Internet phone, right? Can't I get that anywhere on the Internet? Verizon doesn't provide Plain Old Telephone Service anymore in Philly, does it?
https://www.verizon.com/home/phone/

A crucial use case is calling emergency numbers, so I need to figure that out even if it's difficult.

#landlines #telephones #SIP #Verizon #Philly

@ajroach42 How can you *not* love a consistent yes-man who is available 24/7 to affirm even your weirdest cognitive distortions? How can you love humans who are capable of saying no and disagreeing with you?

I wonder if the rich and powerful only love sycophants. It would explain a lot.

@thomasfuchs Wow, that mourning dove looks much better at nest building than your average feral pigeon! I was under the impression that mourning doves are also lazy nest builders.

Finally, if you really need a full code forge, with issue tracking and everything, what is the simplest, most light-weight code forge you can self-host?

Is it Forgejo? "Lightweight: Forgejo can easily be hosted on nearly every machine. Running on a Raspberry? Small cloud instance? No problem!" https://codeberg.org/forgejo/forgejo

That sounds great to me, but is Forgejo simple enough that I won't regret taking on the maintenance burden? Is there something even faster?

#GiveUpGitHub #git #SelfHosting