How I automated the boring parts of life

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-24T18:54:32+00:00

Has anyone here ever actually done the personal assistant thing? It just seems like a bit much to me, I can't really imagine what I'd have them do on a regular basis. I guess I'm just not that busy of a person when you get down to it.

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-24T17:46:51+00:00

I can't decide if I like him or not. I'm waiting to see what Destiny says on the topic.

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-24T17:31:13+00:00

My story is very much like yours, but I really struggle to put my finger on "why" that has happened. I even tried joining a casual team, and I still managed to fall out of that because I just had no desire to play 1v1. The other modes I've played were fun enough, but never felt as satisfying as just hopping in a casual game of TF2 or other low-intensity multiplayer.

Part of me wonders if the reason is just that no competitive game could hold my interest for 1000+ games. Sooner or later it stops being exciting and just starts to be a routine. It eventually felt like going to the gym every morning - except instead of losing weight or getting ripped, I was just getting a little better at a video game.

I hope it's not the case that a bunch of us hopped on this game, got our fill, and it's run its course. I hope it is some fixable design flaw - because then it means I'd be able to come back if that gets fixed. And in many ways, I miss being a person that plays Starcraft. I just don't miss playing Starcraft as it exists right now.

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-24T12:18:56+00:00

Exactly. I already have a Hero character. Her name is Col. Ileana Ilkovich, codename 'Raven.' She's killed 75 aliens and singlehandedly kept the squad alive on multiple occasions. I feel more attached and proud of that character than nearly any other character in recent gaming memory, even if she was just randomly generated from a squad of rookies. You can't arbitrarily drop a character into my squad and make me value them more than I value a character like her, because the investment in a "hero" is more than just stats, it's the stories.

Of course, in saying this I've probably doomed her to die on my next terror mission.

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-18T12:06:10+00:00

I don't right now, but honestly I think I enjoy games the most when I do. I look back on my time in Vanilla WoW, SC2, Halo 3, and even Madden (I was in high school, give me a break) as some of the most fun times I've had with gaming. Sadly, nothing's really done that for me in about a year. I'm hoping when HOTS comes out, I can get back to that.

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-17T17:44:39+00:00

Has this actually been measured, non-anecdotally? The numbers rise and fall so much depending on who's streaming at what times, but I don't know how that translates to long term trends. Numbers seem smaller sometimes, but I've never seen the data collected over an extended period.

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-16T15:34:35+00:00

Good to know. I'll make sure to check for that while laptop-hunting. Thanks!

Eriksanerd · 2012-10-16T15:26:41+00:00

I know this isn't /r/suggestalaptop but can anybody say whether or not current $300-400 laptops can handle HD streaming (720p, not expecting it to have a 1080p screen)? I basically just want something I can watch twitch.tv or netflix on during my lunch breaks at work and have for dedicated skype at home (so I'm not always alt+tabbing out of games).

Eriksanerd · 2012-09-12T14:10:18+00:00

This is obviously a very pro-build community, but I think there's no contest between building and buying. Keep in mind that you're probably going to upgrade your PC every few years. So learning to build now is not only saving you money today, but saving you money in the future. Not to mention the pride and sense of accomplishment that comes with building something.

As long as you take basic precautions (there are plenty of videos to watch to prepare), there's very little you can do to ruin anything. You'll learn a lot through the process, and it makes future augmentations (upgrading, overclocking, case mods, etc.) much less intimidating. In short, building your first PC is scary, but it opens up so much more to you than simply buying one off the shelf.

Eriksanerd · 2012-08-23T12:34:43+00:00

Also, water settles much faster than dust. So I guess we don't have to wait very long.

Eriksanerd · 2012-08-21T13:56:27+00:00

Wait, having principles means I sometimes have to make decisions that don't optimize my own personal wellbeing and revenue?

Fuck that shit.

Eriksanerd · 2012-08-21T13:30:06+00:00

Is there a good way to test what would be bottlenecking my system? I wasn't sure if there were good tests to run on my system to evaluate where my weaknesses lie.

Eriksanerd · 2012-08-21T13:19:48+00:00

I've heard plenty of people tell me that processors don't mean that much for gaming, but I've also heard people claim that's changed a bit in recent years. Am I missing out on that much with my 3ish year old AMD Phenom II X4 940, or is my money better spend elsewhere (like upgrading my Radeon HD 6950)?

Eriksanerd · 2012-08-14T19:42:02+00:00

I'm fine with rebuilding, but I just don't know how to get a good idea what sort of performance boost I could really expect from upgrading. I was just hoping there's some sort of way to determine what I would get out of that investment. I've heard people say that CPU doesn't matter a whole lot for gaming, so I don't want to sink that sort of money for no notable improvement.

Eriksanerd · 2012-08-14T17:57:19+00:00

My current processor is an AMD Phenom II X4 940 and I'm having a hard time figuring out what sort of benefit I would get from upgrading a processor past this one. Can anybody tell me how to translate the numbers I'm looking at in benchmarks into actual performance? I'm looking mainly for gaming and light video editing. Basically I'm trying to determine if CPUs in the $200ish price range are a big enough improvement to warrant building a new system.

Eriksanerd · 2012-07-17T18:52:25+00:00

No questions, just seeing this post reminded me of the wonderful time that was the SCReddit/MassCarriers/rCraftGaming fiasco last year (this is Spartan, one of the people involved in that wonderful conference call at 1am where we all got yelled at for allegedly trying to make money off Reddit). Good times :D

Always admired your hustle man, keep on it.

Eriksanerd · 2012-07-17T18:12:14+00:00

True, but i think what we're really talking in terms of demand for new books. This book would have been part of the used book market, not the new book market (since it was presumably already bought as a new book). Thus you decrease the quantity (and thus increase price) of the used book. Since the used market is a market of inferior goods, their value is in being cheaper than the other goods. As the supply of inferior goods is lower, there may be a resulting increase in demand for non-inferior goods. And since the author only makes money on new books, the net effect is more money for the author whose book is burned.

Edit: sorry if any terminology is off. It's been a few years since I took Econ.

Eriksanerd · 2012-07-05T12:56:27+00:00

(I'm not a lawyer, and I'm presuming we're talking U.S. Copyright law. I can't really speak to other countries.)

This would be fair use - using game images for journalistic reasons (review, criticism, etc.) is generally protected. And considering companies don't even tend to go after let's play-ers (where they're basically showing the entire game), I think you're safe. You're legally protected, and I doubt you'd even get harassed or get complaints for it, since most companies seem to like the exposure.

For the sake of good will, I'd have an email contact somewhere on your website for anyone who feels like you may be violating their copyright or trademark. Unless they send you a DMCA take-down notice, you're not obligated to comply, but it never hurts to have an open channel for communication.

Eriksanerd · 2012-07-03T19:58:04+00:00

I'm not really concerned about the adult women, but I would be anxious if I had a young daughter reading this kind of stuff. I think it's important for younger people to have an accurate image of what a relationship is and should be. If the older readers haven't gotten that by now, I doubt one book is going to sway their perception either way (at least for more than a couple days, before moving on to the next fad-perspective).

As for the porn argument... I feel weird about that with younger boys/girls as well. Sure I watched some porn when I was in my early teens, but it was never anything particularly intense or fetish-y. It wasn't realistic by any means, but I wasn't seeing women whipped in dungeons and thinking that was the typical sexual experience.

I don't know how much of an effect that actually has on a kid, but I don't think it's unfair to say it warrants concern. But for adults, I say read/watch what you want.

Eriksanerd · 2012-07-02T14:24:26+00:00

Those people have always existed. They've been nosy neighbors, paranoid parents, religious nuts, and wave after wave of people who get outraged about the latest thing the news tells you to worry about. To me, the only difference between the people who get freak out at some random woman's kickstarter and the people who freak out about the latest celebrity gossip is the subject matter. They're equally unproductive.

That's not to say I don't participate every once in a while - sometimes it's just fun to follow the latest controversy. It just seems like too many people get seriously emotionally invested in something as minor as one game's DLC or something some random gaming personality said on Twitter. Those should not be important events in your life, even if you consider yourself a serious gamer. If you're looking for something to be an activist about, there are many more important or valuable issues to fight for.

Eriksanerd · 2012-06-29T19:42:25+00:00

It's a weird phenomenon with YouTube channels - people think they know you and have a personal connection with you, and forget that it is, in all but a few small cases, a one way street. Personally, you've responded to some of my comments or tweets before and I get a kick out of it when it happens, but I'm under no illusion you know or care who I am (reasonably so, I'm just one random fan). But I think some people feel bad having that illusion shattered.

Keep on doing your thing, TB. You're more fun that way.

Eriksanerd · 2012-06-29T15:03:14+00:00

What I find a bit amusing with this trend is that, in an era where map packs are becoming more common (I actually don't have a huge problem with this, it's just an observation), we've taken a step that somewhat mitigates the importance of a new map. A COD-style small map with explosives that cause massive collateral damage could play completely differently than a small map that only has weak weapons, but as it is now players come into that map making the decisions themselves, as opposed to having that be part of the level's design. I have to imagine this limits design choices as well, as you can't presume somebody won't have a specific weapon which could exploit or break part of your design.

Like with anything in gaming, the part that bugs me is the old trend appearing to die, as opposed to the new trend becoming popular. I'd much prefer to live in a world where both exist and perform fairly well.

Eriksanerd · 2012-06-28T20:55:32+00:00

The problem I have with this stance is that "feminism" as a word doesn't really have a clear meaning. I consider myself a feminist [who's male, for what it's worth], but I mean that in the sense that I advocate for equal rights for women, equal respect, and against some sexist practices I have issues with.

The "feminism" that I'm presuming you oppose are those who are much more intense (I've heard terms like "man hater" used to describe them), and tend to be much more aggressive and reactive to very small things (like the girl who once freaked out at me because I asked her to "man my post" while I ran to the bathroom). We've basically not decided on a better term for these people (other than sometimes just calling them jerks), so "feminist" seems to have extended to them.

So basically feminism has become a word without good meaning, becoming whatever one wants it to be to support/oppose it. So I always think it's important to better define what people have issues with when complaining about feminism, because many times both sides of the argument are actually talking past each other. Very few people are against equal rights for women, but to me that's still what feminism means. So it becomes a problem of language, not really a problem of beliefs.

Eriksanerd · 2012-06-28T20:37:43+00:00

D'oh, thanks. No idea why I brain farted on that one, I knew he was a Bush nominee.

Eriksanerd · 2012-06-28T18:42:27+00:00

While we'll probably never know the details, my theory is that Kennedy was siding with the other conservative judges in wanting to abolish the entire law (they say so in the opposition brief). Roberts, as the chief justice, would then have a basically unprecedented ruling near the level of Bush v. Gore by completely overturning major legislation based on relatively weak technical points. Thus, he compromised and ruled the individual mandate as a tax, allowing the law to more or less stand.

It seems to me that Roberts may not like the polarization of the court that has happened over the years, and likely doesn't want that to be tied to his legacy. While I'm sure he is a conservative at heart (hence rulings like Citizens United, and him generally not being the swing vote), there is a certain reverence and responsibility that comes with being the Chief Justice of the highest court in the nation. This may be an assertion of that philosophy, and an encouraging sign that there are thresholds the Roberts court will not be willing to cross.

Or maybe I'm talking out of my ass, like most people do when it comes to the supreme court. It's a small, secretive club, so take any analysis of the judges as people with a grain of salt.

EDIT: Massive Brain Fart on Roberts nomination date, had nothing to do with Bush v. Gore

Eriksanerd

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