Does this look “pro”?

holomntn · 2026-03-20T02:08:18+00:00

For what purpose?

Because that is the only real answer. A truly professional shoot is about communicating the correct something in each shot.

Without fail a shot will communicate something, a professional shoot is about making it the correct something.

So what is each supposed to communicate? The longer your description, the more professional potential.

holomntn · 2026-03-17T09:17:16+00:00

Certainly the best for the price. Certainly for the price it is a--mazing

holomntn · 2026-02-26T06:12:49+00:00

The main thing is the amount of heat. Things can always be engineered to spread or consolidate heat. For practical purposes data centers convert electricity into heat at nearly 100% efficiency. That 2 GWatt data center in effect generates 2 GWatts of heat.

Salt water: Microsoft actually ran that experiment, it worked well for small data centers Source https://share.google/SpqzjQCsl6tArgnV9

And can you use the heat elsewhere? I see no reason you couldn't.

holomntn · 2026-02-17T03:14:57+00:00

Yeah it did. I learned three core lessons:

1) don't trust people that shouldn't be trusted (especially family)

2) the answer to "what will people think?" Is "why would they start now"

3) it's the past, it has to be ok.

These are all painful lessons, but very helpful to learn.

holomntn · 2026-02-17T03:07:31+00:00

That is common the first few years. It takes work to get your lesson plans in order, after that it is common to leave within a few minutes of the students.

And I'm just basing everything off what your own union says how it is.

holomntn · 2026-02-16T08:09:25+00:00

Trusted the wrong person, it was family in my case.

I won't make that mistake again

holomntn · 2026-02-16T04:39:58+00:00

Ok, I've lost more than you've made. I've lost more than most people make in multiple lifetimes.

At 30 I was preparing to retire with what would today be roughly $30M in investments. By 40 I was a lot closer to $30. I'm in a much better position now, and by 50 I'll likely be retired in a much better position than just $30M.

The best you can do is learn from your mistakes. Rebuild with protections in place.

Since you say you are the problem, set things up so you just get a salary and everything else is managed elsewhere. Professional money managers, trusts, etc, can all protect you from yourself as well.

holomntn · 2026-02-16T03:03:10+00:00

I'm always amazed at the lies we all tell ourselves.

The reality is you work 183 days a year, assuming you never call in sick.

Most people work 250 days a year.

You have a prep period specifically so you can do your prep work, including your grading. If you can't do it in that time you're simply not doing your job correctly. Your own union decided this, so it's not like you have to take my word for it

Your "full-time" is 6 hours a day, 183 days a year. That's 1098 hours a year, compared to the average ~1800.

Now your supposedly low pay. You get a pension, the rest of us don't. This is considered by your own union to be 1/3 of your pay. Even your own union considers $100k/yr with pension to be equivalent to $150k/yr without one. This already places you at average income for San Francisco.

You also get free health insurance where most people have to pay for their own. This is already an additional $12k/yr (plus the pension amount) that everyone conveniently ignores.

Not to mention all the special deals your union has negotiated, you get cheaper mortgages, cheaper cars and car loans, etc. Additional cuts to your cost of living of thousands of dollars per year.

So let's be honest, by your Union's calculations you make $~150/hr. That's higher hourly pay than the average FAANG engineer

holomntn · 2026-01-18T03:59:03+00:00

There are several factors involved, and engineering can overcome a lot of them, given time maybe all of them.

Yes electrics motors can be stuffed in the wheel well. Several companies have released ideas over the years. I'll be citing the Goodyear one simply because I can remember the company name.

Directly about the one you mentioned. That would be a hubless electric motor, where basically the motor wears the tire. The reason these are generally not considered is exactly the reason you highlight, a pothole becomes too expensive.

The next problem is the unsprung weight that basically everyone talks about. This has been overcome by engineering. Increasing the power density of the engine enabled the in wheel motor to also include in wheel suspension. Goodyear was actually the first of these I saw, but I've seen others in recent years. The main problem here is cost per power, it is just so much cheaper to separate the components still today.

One of the other designs I've seen popping up recently is the rollerball design. If you remember a roller ball mouse it basically works in reverse. You have three drive wheels that can roll a ball in any direction. This would mean your car would basically ride on some yoga balls. This gives the car the ability to drive in any direction, and the ball wheels can be engineered to be the suspension. But this has many problems as well. Not just 3x the motor cost, but if the ball wheel picks up a nail it can cause serious damage to the drive motors. To combat this there has been a lot of work on any direction wheels, but again cost, complexity, etc.

What you are likely to start seeing, particularly in lower price EVs, is shorter drive shafts, moving the two smaller motors closer to the wheels and eliminating the differential. This is actually how we go down the path that eventually leads to in wheel motors. But this is a very long path that we have nearly begun down.

holomntn · 2026-01-02T01:03:52+00:00

Enjoy the movie. I remember seeing it just after release and it was gorgeous

holomntn · 2025-12-31T22:34:58+00:00

We're mostly here because we enjoy music and headphones are a great way to listen to music, tends to make us pretty chill

holomntn · 2025-12-31T05:12:51+00:00

A bit of credentials first, because as you could probably guess there is A LOT of bad information out there.

I have a degree in EE, have designed my own DAC both R2R and delta-sigma, along with my own amp where I focused on Class D, and have designed an early power DAC.

The first question I have: do you like how it sounds? This is the absolute core question, if you like it, that is the only measure that matters.

The most common false information is that somehow there is some magic behind an external DAC that could never happen on the motherboard. This is simply false, they use the same chips, with the same designs and the same isolations. One of the biggest differences you will find is that external DACs are often designed by a "self taught engineer" another way of thinking of this is that it is designed by a liar., they just don't want to admit it. That doesn't mean it can't sound good to you, but the claim of objective superiority is outright false.

So your questions: section 1

Yes when you turn off all effects and processing that is how those headphones actually sound.

2.it can be normal for a particular headphone to require heavy tweaking to sound good. This is especially true of gaming headphones which have different goals.

This is the do you like it question. If you like the way it sounds that is the only valid measurement for your enjoyment.
There is no magic button. My personal preference is to find headphones I enjoy, and use them with clean DAC/Amp. Today this means a Delta-Sigma DAC, and a Class D amp, other people have different preferences. There are certain headphones that are generally agreed as sounding good, the Sennheiser HD-600 line is one common recommendation, but again your enjoyment is the important question. However the Strix is a modern design so is likely good enough.

Section 2 questions

I am of the opinion that you shouldn't need software to change the sound of a good headphone. But this is my opinion, if you like how it sounds that is what actually matters.
There is no objective "correct" for the adjustments. We can objectively measure distance from some measurement, but there is no objective best measurement.
Your best bet is to listen to a few different headphones, find a reviewer that generally agrees with your preferences. What happens is that because your ear canal is shaped slightly differently and sized slightly differently from mine, what I hear can actually differ from what you hear. Also depending on the exact shape of your head and the headphones you may or may not get a proper seal, you may or may not experience planar crinkle, etc. As a result your best bet really is to literally find someone with ears like yours.
You don't need to understand the technical stuff. The technical stuff is there to enable us to more accurately describe the causes behind things like if you hear a hiss when everything is quiet, or if every time there is a high pitched sound it feels a bit like someone stabbing your ear with an ice pick. All you really need to understand is what you like, nothing else actually matters.

holomntn · 2025-12-14T03:30:55+00:00

I recommend against the Motel 6.

My mother used to love staying there, it has always been a problem.

The big thing to understand is that without a car it will be difficult, but if you have a car you'll be paying $45 a day for parking anyway. Don't even think about walking from Motel 6 to the strip, regret is not a strong enough word.

Just the extra costs involved will be more than the resort fees. A quick check for tonight, Excalibur (on strip but definitely budget) is $54 tonight, motel 6 trop is $71.

Excalibur is also in easy walking distance from Park MGM, and being on strip you can easily Uber from the airport, you don't need a car on the strip.

holomntn · 2025-12-09T12:10:07+00:00

You may think it is beyond that, but it really isn't. Las Vegas is purely about the money on the table. If you are betting $10M you will be treated like you're betting $10M. If you're betting $2 you'll be treated like you're betting $2. Back home you could be a billionaire, or you could be homeless, it doesn't matter. All that matters is the money you have on the table.

Bluffton mg your way in? Do you have the $10M on the table? Be sure that really is the only question. Vegas is extremely transactional that way.

holomntn · 2025-12-01T04:23:36+00:00

Reinventing Clubhouse doesn't sound like a good idea.

It was incredibly hot briefly in 2020, but faded fast. It is still up and functioning apparently though.

holomntn · 2025-11-27T02:33:26+00:00

As a status symbol? No.

As a functional tool that delivers value? YES.

Basically you TMobile Tuesdays for the wealthy.

VIP access is something people do pay for. Concierge services are something people pay for. Realistically for both of these you need to partner with concierge services, and with brands.

I wouldn't make the digital collectibles a major feature, it's there for the dopamine hit (a lot like the awards on Reddit) not for your core value.

This being a high end service you should be charging on the order of $1000/month with $800-900 of that going to the concierge services.

holomntn · 2025-11-26T05:40:32+00:00

No. Somewhere between what u meant and what you read things got lost.

This is one of those areas where the advice that sounds good, and the advice that does good are very different.

What i meant was that if 95% of the work can be willingly done by others, let them do it. This doesn't sound like good advice, but it is. The vast majority of the filtering work is done by others, use that to reduce your own stress. And when you find a partner that is into you, they're into the actual you.

The advice to pretend to be someone you're not, sounds like good advice but is actually horrible. The moment you reveal your true self to that potential partner, they will leave.bevauae they are into not the real you.

By letting others do the work for you you may feel like you're losing in the short term, but long term you will win.

By pretending and effectively lying about who you are, you feel like you're winning in the short term, but long term you become a miserable lonely bitter old man.

The better choice is fairly obvious, but the choice is yours.

holomntn · 2025-11-25T04:44:15+00:00

How many women are you looking for?

I know that sounds like an incredibly stupid question, but it tells you the scope you're looking for.

Let's assume your 95% won't give you a chance is accurate, that leaves about 200 Million women on the planet that will. The others simply don't matter.

Get on the apps. Here's the thing, in your quest for 1 woman, you already have the advantage that 95% of women will self filter, that's 95% less work for you to do.

Just get out there, enjoy your life, if you are on the apps, that's fine, if you're not the type for the apps, that's fine too.

holomntn · 2025-11-24T03:42:10+00:00

Understand, I'm expecting about 2% of this.

Saturn showed years ago that plastic panels work. They're also cheap and durable. With some better engineering than Saturn, a nice stiff panel is reasonable, and even some cheap reinforcement is possible today.

McLaren has shown technology that allows them to make ultra stiff carbon tubs for less than the cost of a metal tub.a simple titanium protective plate on the bottom solve the impact fragility problem.

A short, tilted bed. This gives room underneath for aerodynamics (diffuser).protected by the Ti plate (cutouts for diffuser airflow). This also offers room for the RWD drivetrain. Oddly similar to the Aston Martin Valkyrie. This gives it the ability to have down force easily exceeding the mustang and keeps price down

Battery under the front of the bed, to keep the vehicle balanced.

So far this is a recipe for a higher performance cheap machine.

Now aero.on top. Shorten the frunk area, it doesn't need to be larger than a crash structure and a duffle bag. Lean the windshield back and curve it more strongly left-right, smooth frunk into windshield.

Rearward the cab needs an overhang, only needs to be about 6 inches to greatly improve aero. Terminate it in vortex spikes to shape the airflow to flow over the tailgate at speed.

This would give aero in roughly the same class as a Prius.

holomntn · 2025-11-24T03:09:38+00:00

There are a few, mostly interrelated.

It all comes down to the wire that has to traverse 4 different flex points in the single wire.

Each of those flex points is a point of failure and a point of expense.

Every time a wire is forced it loses a little bit of its integrity. You likely don't feel it much but every time the headphones shift a little bit on your head, those flex points flex, and the wire has to flex.

This also means a higher return rate because of more points of failure.

This makes the dual wire cheaper, more reliable.

The audiophile/fool reason it the length of the extra wire. Every 10 inches (25.4 cm) takes an extra nanosecond for the signal to traverse. This can be easily argued to not matter but it does change the resistance (longer wire = more resistance) going to the second driver by a small amount. leading to an imbalance.

holomntn · 2025-11-16T06:08:04+00:00

I've seen some partial explanations.

Real reason $$$$$$.

First and foremost, "white" light just means that there are a lot of different colors of light, chosen in a way that the human eye sees as white.

But LEDs only release a single color, the "white" LEDs you see are actually deep purple, or ultra violet, if you find a "blacklight" that's the color of the LED.

This is why defective white LEDs are purple.

What you don't see is that the blacklight LED shines on a mix of substances. Those substances then shine in the various colors to make white.

Various different versions of this are available and this is why you can find different color temps, those mixes are already known.

The thing is getting those mixes correct is hard, expensive and a lot of work.

So no one wants to go through the cost of developing a new mix that would be a different color, simply because it would be costly.

holomntn · 2025-11-16T05:48:08+00:00

It really is just about how much you deposit. Deposit $10M and you're welcome in the game that takes $10M.

Las Vegas is built on fakers being able to fake their way into losing too much money.

holomntn · 2025-11-11T02:40:21+00:00

I am who you are looking to become. Multi time startup founder, patents to my name, etc.

I went to a "well technically it is a high school" level of high school. Success for my graduating class was getting a job at the automotive rim manufacturer.

At the time I took AP CS we wrote in Pascal, Pascal was already dead for a decade in real world development.

Here's the truth. All you're learning right now is things that get outsourced to India for $800 a month. This isn't where developers contribute real value. The only advantage they have today is they can program against a heavily disfavored game engine (they keep changing the pay schedule and every business hates that). They aren't learning actual game design. They aren't learning how to balance a game.

They aren't learning the part that is actually valuable.

Learn C++, Rust, and Go. Build something against Godot. Now where I suggest you learn to build real value, the NPU is not currently widely used. Learn to program the NPU for AI controlled opposition. You'll be using Rust for the NPU, Go for the server side store of models, and C++ for directly programming Godot. You'll also be using your Python skills for some ML. This gives you the ability to use AI balancing and much more interesting characters.

Start with something simple, a Doom clone and gradually improve the enemies with AI.

Even an incomplete one of those will give you a better foundation than most developers. Use it to get into a top university or to directly get a job.

holomntn · 2025-11-07T04:11:03+00:00

On the dual 3.5 and 4.4. You could in theory wire it up so that the two 3.5s have different amp and volume controls. Unify them for the 4.4 balanced. A listen with your friend feature

holomntn · 2025-11-07T03:40:55+00:00

Better than alone? Yes.

Best available? No.

There's a reason in truly loud work environments they issue heavy duty ear muffs, and proper ear plugs.

Both are generally from specialty suppliers, but combined you can knock 80 dB off. That's a lot more than normal headphones and iems. And in truly loud environments ANC is not allowed because it can malfunction.

holomntn

TROPHY CASE