Who could have imagined that antagonizing your user base by disabling password sharing during financially hard times while also forcing every new production to pander to the worst of DEI/ESG tropes would turn out poorly?
An actual good episode. I'm shocked. Nothing annoyed me, no canon was disrespected, the jokes landed, there was a sci fi premise, an new alien planet. I could actually rewatch this and not hate my life for doing so. I am super surprised. They nailed it with this one. Of course they are going throw away all this good will with an awful musical episide next week so I'm not getting used to enjoying SNW.
Regardless of whether people are upload ID's to websites or some government created system this is some nefarious shit being pushed under the guise of protecting kids online. It will lead to the removal of privacy from the internet entirely, hyper-charging corporate or government data harvesting, and opening a massive attack vector for identity theft. Been in the works for a minute and I'm super pissed to only be learning about it just now.
If you're the type to write your senator, now would be a good time.
Also here's an article from the Electronic Frontier Foundation laying out the censorship and surveillance concerns with KOSA:
A dramatic rumination on the scars of war which questions whether someone can ever be absolved of their most heinous sins. At least that's what the episode is aiming for. It gets there better than I would ever have expected the SNW writers to be capable of but there's still much to be desired. The ultimate note this ends on isn't one of hope or optimism but pessimism. Mbenga just gets away with premeditated murder for reasons the episode wants us to believe were, if not noble, then at least acceptable.
MBenga's victim was a war criminal, one seeking to reform himself in the aftermath of his crimes by becoming a respected ambassador for peace. Mbenga, a field medic during the war directly effected by the former's actions, left mentally scarred by acts he did in response. It's all good set up. However the ending is ultimately anti-Trek in nature. This is an ending Gene Rodenberry would have cut and replaced with an aspirational note showing MBenga struggling but ultimately rising above his petty desire for "justice" in the form of vengeance. Maybe he does still stab him but then he'd follow that by using every medical trick in his arsenal to save the Klingon's life. He'd throw himself on the mercy of his captain and plead forgiveness for his transgression and be given punishment but still a second chance for fixing his grievous mistake. The episode could have ended with Mbenga and the Klingon having some deep, bedside conversation in the med bay that left it ambivalent as to the moral quandary but hopeful that this is a world where even these mortal enemies can resolve their differences.
Instead Mbenga shanks the dude and gets away with it, with Nurse Chapel strait up lying to Pike that she saw the whole thing when all she saw were blurry silhouettes through frosted glass. Even worse we have an epilogue where Mbenga presents his vigilante style reasoning as if he was morally right to kill the ambassador. If this were some other IP this would have been a good episode however it fails as a Star Trek episode because it doesn't even try to present an attempt at aspirational resolution. The message is killing someone you believe to be evil is acceptable, due process and redemption be damned. That's just not what Star Trek is supposed to be about.
All in all a competent episode but it's DNA is just not Star Trek.
LK-99 is the supposed room temperature ambient pressure super conductor that's Nobel-Prize-worthy big if true. The race is on to replicate the original experiment and fully verify the claims that LK-99 is a true room temperature superconductor. If LK-99 holds up, expect some futuristic tech to emerge afterwards along with lossless power grids, levitating trains that put current maglev to shame, faster, smaller and more efficient computers and more accurate medical imaging tech. Could even be the key to fully unlock fusion energy. So y'know, no biggie.
More Gorn crap. This was advertised as being an actiony episode and 90% of it involved talking and hiding. Nothing wrong with talky Trek episodes, some of the best Trek episodes have been mostly talking in rooms. Here though it was pretty boring. Really hard to believe this is supposed to be a season finale. Really annoying too since this cliff-hanger means we get more boring Gorn story when season 3 starts.
Wealthy porn producer would be my actual jam (producer not star as I'd rather get the money and access to hot, loose women who'll indulge any kink than be the one banging on camera).
But, since that's not on the list I picked Nobel Prize winning Scientist since I love physics and always wished I understood it enough to work on breakthroughs in advanced, sci-fi level stuff like warp drives or time travel.
The infosec world is full of activity. It hasn't slowed down in the least. The mainstream news orgs cover it less but you can check out sites like https://thehackernews.com or https://cybersecuritynews.com and see that the blackhats are always up to something.
Just enjoying the vanlife. Me and my dog rocking up to scenic vistas and staying a while 'til it's time to move on to the next. Note: The pic isn't my rig, my dog's a Rottie and my van's a shuttle bus.
Not a whole lot to say. This was a really boilerplate episode. The ship having a room full of dangerous memberberries doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Otherwise all the characters are pretty on-schtick, thankfully this doesn't include Mariner being stupid and breaking protocol for once. The ringworld concept is woefully unexplored and underutilized. So I'd call this one a filler episode at best.
It also doesn't stick, I mod subs set to sort by New that still default to Hot regardless.
Like clockwork
Who could have imagined that antagonizing your user base by disabling password sharing during financially hard times while also forcing every new production to pander to the worst of DEI/ESG tropes would turn out poorly?
An actual good episode. I'm shocked. Nothing annoyed me, no canon was disrespected, the jokes landed, there was a sci fi premise, an new alien planet. I could actually rewatch this and not hate my life for doing so. I am super surprised. They nailed it with this one. Of course they are going throw away all this good will with an awful musical episide next week so I'm not getting used to enjoying SNW.
Here's the bill itself:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/3663
Here's a Verify article fact-checking the age verification measures:
https://www.verifythis.com/article/news/verify/social-media/kids-online-safety-act-does-not-require-people-upload-drivers-licenses/536-df0b9009-43bf-4253-8986-090cfdda05a5
Regardless of whether people are upload ID's to websites or some government created system this is some nefarious shit being pushed under the guise of protecting kids online. It will lead to the removal of privacy from the internet entirely, hyper-charging corporate or government data harvesting, and opening a massive attack vector for identity theft. Been in the works for a minute and I'm super pissed to only be learning about it just now.
If you're the type to write your senator, now would be a good time.
Also here's an article from the Electronic Frontier Foundation laying out the censorship and surveillance concerns with KOSA:
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/07/young-people-should-oppose-kids-online-safety-act
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman
A dramatic rumination on the scars of war which questions whether someone can ever be absolved of their most heinous sins. At least that's what the episode is aiming for. It gets there better than I would ever have expected the SNW writers to be capable of but there's still much to be desired. The ultimate note this ends on isn't one of hope or optimism but pessimism. Mbenga just gets away with premeditated murder for reasons the episode wants us to believe were, if not noble, then at least acceptable.
MBenga's victim was a war criminal, one seeking to reform himself in the aftermath of his crimes by becoming a respected ambassador for peace. Mbenga, a field medic during the war directly effected by the former's actions, left mentally scarred by acts he did in response. It's all good set up. However the ending is ultimately anti-Trek in nature. This is an ending Gene Rodenberry would have cut and replaced with an aspirational note showing MBenga struggling but ultimately rising above his petty desire for "justice" in the form of vengeance. Maybe he does still stab him but then he'd follow that by using every medical trick in his arsenal to save the Klingon's life. He'd throw himself on the mercy of his captain and plead forgiveness for his transgression and be given punishment but still a second chance for fixing his grievous mistake. The episode could have ended with Mbenga and the Klingon having some deep, bedside conversation in the med bay that left it ambivalent as to the moral quandary but hopeful that this is a world where even these mortal enemies can resolve their differences.
Instead Mbenga shanks the dude and gets away with it, with Nurse Chapel strait up lying to Pike that she saw the whole thing when all she saw were blurry silhouettes through frosted glass. Even worse we have an epilogue where Mbenga presents his vigilante style reasoning as if he was morally right to kill the ambassador. If this were some other IP this would have been a good episode however it fails as a Star Trek episode because it doesn't even try to present an attempt at aspirational resolution. The message is killing someone you believe to be evil is acceptable, due process and redemption be damned. That's just not what Star Trek is supposed to be about.
All in all a competent episode but it's DNA is just not Star Trek.
Good luck attracting investment mate.
According to the last time my doctor gave me grief I'm about 743 years old.
The front page is missing both a link to the Discord and a link to the list of subchans. Bet a lot of folks don't know either exist.
LK-99 is the supposed room temperature ambient pressure super conductor that's Nobel-Prize-worthy big if true. The race is on to replicate the original experiment and fully verify the claims that LK-99 is a true room temperature superconductor. If LK-99 holds up, expect some futuristic tech to emerge afterwards along with lossless power grids, levitating trains that put current maglev to shame, faster, smaller and more efficient computers and more accurate medical imaging tech. Could even be the key to fully unlock fusion energy. So y'know, no biggie.
The study above is one of the first to successfully reproduce a portion of the original findings and they expect more to come. A great article on LK-99 here: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/scramble-to-validate-superconductor-breakthrough-confirms-zero-resistance-with-a-catch
If true then yeah. All the future tech stuff would be years down the line though.
More Gorn crap. This was advertised as being an actiony episode and 90% of it involved talking and hiding. Nothing wrong with talky Trek episodes, some of the best Trek episodes have been mostly talking in rooms. Here though it was pretty boring. Really hard to believe this is supposed to be a season finale. Really annoying too since this cliff-hanger means we get more boring Gorn story when season 3 starts.
Going by the YT comments this is a song set in the world of the Goblin Slayer book series from Japan? Obscure AF, but I'm here for it.
LOTR-like? So just sorta vaguely having similar sword and sorcery elements? Hmm. Ok.
Isn't that how most relationships end? Heartbreak and shitting?
Wealthy porn producer would be my actual jam (producer not star as I'd rather get the money and access to hot, loose women who'll indulge any kink than be the one banging on camera).
But, since that's not on the list I picked Nobel Prize winning Scientist since I love physics and always wished I understood it enough to work on breakthroughs in advanced, sci-fi level stuff like warp drives or time travel.
Turns out Cicero is ballin'.
*Eats another forkfull of Ramen....
Classic Barker moment from Happy Gilmore: https://youtu.be/8QJiAK-s5a0?si=aq9uZ0M8iNupN7Ew&t=41
The infosec world is full of activity. It hasn't slowed down in the least. The mainstream news orgs cover it less but you can check out sites like https://thehackernews.com or https://cybersecuritynews.com and see that the blackhats are always up to something.
Just enjoying the vanlife. Me and my dog rocking up to scenic vistas and staying a while 'til it's time to move on to the next. Note: The pic isn't my rig, my dog's a Rottie and my van's a shuttle bus.
My mother and aunt are teachers. I feel this one.
Some s/aww or s/cats material. s/Random is soaking up all the posts. In other news now I want a Cheetah.
Not a whole lot to say. This was a really boilerplate episode. The ship having a room full of dangerous memberberries doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Otherwise all the characters are pretty on-schtick, thankfully this doesn't include Mariner being stupid and breaking protocol for once. The ringworld concept is woefully unexplored and underutilized. So I'd call this one a filler episode at best.