juris

i read on mister RMS's website that he refuses to use phones except for the most basic things, preferring a laptop for aught else, mostly because phones are computers and 'software on computers should be free'

ngl, that is the most charming darn thing to hear in 2026-- and it lowers the bar considerably here. like if all you need to have is a computer, sky's the limit on how you want to run this.

sooo with a little help from Claude I have a xmpp server running from home base+jmp for calling / sms, a portable router and a cute construction grade wp836 grandstream phone (annoyingly I can't seem to route SMS to it yet, but they route fine through xmpp on a terminal).

if you're voiping, you really don't need a voip phone though.

i have zero compunction so my computer of choice is a macbook neo... which acts as a dumb terminal for aforementioned xmpp server / wasteful videogame computer / claude butler (open the floodgates ladies and gentlemen); if i wanted cred sometimes i carry the old thinkpad around instead.

i can't say that it's any more secure than Android (using claude == i don't know what I'm doing), but it's fun? expensive fun though. JMP is a subscription, proton (for MFA and everything else) is a subscription, you need a domain for your xmpp server, ...this 'homelabbing' thing is expensive, using a map is awful (so wife is navigator...with her phone). There are many failure points, me included. but god, so fun!

i usually leave the actual cell phone at home. i do still have one. that's a hard thing to drop... but not impossible! the only holdover is learning how to use a proper camera and setting up the media server.

nahaha

probably the -worst- thing I ever did as a kid was take my parents' (mostly ripped) collection of VHS tapes and drop them into the 80 gallon fish tank to raise the fish up so I CoUlD ToUCh the FiBsCH. ah, then i blamed my brother... yup that memory still hurts!

i soo can't wait for my karmic come-uppance with my... exceedingly large retro video game collection.

exactly this. no throne is more fit for Claude!

reminds me of the pixel c! that thing was pretty neat. this thing has the same "glowbar"... i bet it's old stock for them now since the pixel c didn't see many sales; that was from an era where google at least pretended to be a 'good guy.'

i have always liked netbooks more than chromebooks (but I really only ever had the samsung NC10, specifically for the keyboard). i really miss that thing. these days i am wary of the gewgly eyes on my digital person, so i'ma pass on this til someone less on the radar makes another platform pop.

where to next! linux on risc-v? steamOS on ARM? screenless lozenge wirelessly coupled to an EEG that makes me hallucinate images?

it is not beneficial to us to ever have been quiet about these issues.

I hate everything about this guy, arrrgh!

i think anyone who feels dispossessed from the advance of technology should rekindle that spirit of hands-on adventure by looking at clay pots at the museum.

the souls of a thousand hours sit there behind glass and valued for their richness and simplicity, against all odds, and people to this day carry on those traditions to improve the art.

did the soul of pottery die with the industrial revolution? will your hand code? it won’t be for everyone, but it’s there for you.

find a book by Soetsu Yanagi on the subject of “min gei” and it will help you.

Anecdotally and somewhat related: as blade fighting was common in those days, Chinese surgeons (pre-cultural revolution) would allegedly wrap severed tendons with the leaves of some herb to some effect. Not sure if it was bletilla striata.

so as to not hold the liability bag, devs will publish the majority of their apps as 18+ (we're back to the 2000s with porn banner ads everywhere), and children will ask their parents to use their computer (orly owl).

haha here's the irony on ad tracking-- what's safer to direct traffic to: the eff or 404media.co?

funny. i actually woke up this morning fairly early and bustling alive with ideas (oh you know, nonsense 5am ones like what i should do if the petrodollar collapses... trade eggs and make a fiat cryptocurrency internal to my company (not subject to oversight) based on favors? wax tokens melted after favors met... something or another.

and i noted that urge to check my phone to validate those (later midday: embarrassing) ideas. it occurred to me then that it's precisely that urge to check the phone that usually kills them. and if it isn't that, it's the missed smses and emails and the latest gripe on hn. i wondered how many good ideas were strangled with the mundanity/viciousness (depending on your algorithm) of this device

"is it really so bad to sit alone with my thoughts, without having an immediate answer to put them to rest?"

yeah, i hear you.

you flip on the news and you see the fat red faced wal-mart alcoholics raving about the latest ice raid and iran bombing. it's a pretty disgusting thing, isn't it? but count that number of people you see on the news and compare it to the number represented by 49.81 percent of people who are duped into leaning right in a two party system. then what you see on the news is an insipid and vocal minority by comparison.

they seem loud because they were born and raised in a 4chan cesspool, and relative to our ears (as we see them online), the 'enemies' are everywhere (ie overrepresented by our algorithms, since our outrage makes them money).

meanwhile both parties (in various states and layers of government) have made ranked voting either illegal or impossible to implement.

both parties (as well throughout the world) have pushed for greater government surveillance technologies and laws.

both parties have gone to the island, shot kids in sarajevo, staged military coups throughout the world, destroyed democracies, left migrant children starving at night in detention centers, sleeping on mattresses thrown into the mud. you think biden was blameless in that? i've seen those kids.

i hear you, and i am just as angry. but remember that there are a variety of reasons why people vote in the way that they do. they may come to regret those decisions when they send their kids to war, and perhaps that is some apt and just punishment.

however, don't fall into the trap of mistaking those people in your relative socioeconomic group from having entirely different needs and wants as yourself and your family.

if you vilify them, you will have aided and abetted in our dividing. the people needing to be put in jail are outliers in our system by far. they corrupt the islands, stage sarajevos, trade diamonds in war torn villages, and laugh their way to the bank while we squabble with ourselves as to 'whodunnit'. don't fall for it.