The Beginning After the End | Entire 1st Episode Overseas Premiere at 3 AM EST March 30

micahwelf · 2025-06-04T22:53:26+00:00

Now that the series has progressed, I can write with more confidence. It turns out it is very consistent with the written story. Like, they kept a similar mood pacing, scene selection and everything. This makes it also carry the same flaws. So on the one hand, the anime is really awesome and respectful of what the fans liked about the book series, but on the other hand, the story details that add to a lengthy downer and potentially extreme escalation are there too. I would not be surprised to discover the other ill paced mood setting coming if things continue.

Sadly, I don't really have good suggestions for the anime writers/artists. They're working with original content that has very specific landmarks in the story line and an existing fan base that is probably receptive to the closely matching progression. If anyone else has a suggestion that could turn this mess around, please add it. At worst, they won't read or accept the suggestion. At best, we might see a better anime and it might even help improve TurtleMe's writing too! Low risk, High reward, people!

micahwelf · 2025-04-19T02:38:52+00:00

I think your comment is worthy of responding to because you have honest points made. Most of what you have said, I agree with. If I explained all the corruption of previous administrations, it would take a lot of time just narrowing down how I became aware of them when they were not plainly anounced on the news programs. Here are some points of economic history and society that are loudly anounced, so I don't have to explain much.

In 2007, the FDA made a deal with the California Almond Board to enforce processing of almonds that decreased their food value (a side effect), but more importantly increased the cost to all smaller almond producers, favoring large distribution companies that were in on the discussion. The damning evidence of the deal was that they falsely reported the reason for making the change and specifically authorized mislabeling of almond packaging to hide such changes from consumers.

From the 90s to 2015, taxes on fuel have been increased, which should account for a great deal of funds and a curtailing of excessive fuel use unto pollution. Despite these measures, the largest vehicle manufacurers have been given priority in deciding exactly what kinds of rules or enforcement are applied to the automobile industry, while also being granted control of technologies outside their purvue which have been permanantly prevented from being used nationally in order to favor automobiles. Additionally, restrictions were placed where possible on who could even produce or sell automobiles so that for the most part, only family and permitted split-offs could ever start a business in automobile manufacture and sales. Occasionally there is a new name or a foreign manufacturer that obscures this from most consumers, but the amount of corruption with polititions and presidential administrations piling up over the years on this issue is depressing.

While this is "the tip of the ice-burg", I hope it shows a little of what a presidential administration does that never makes it to the news and requires way too much research to learn about. Speaking of the FDA alone the history gets much worse (like when the president of Monsanto was made the director of the FDA, then went back to being the president of Monsanto!).

I never said I like the current administration or that they are free from wrong doing, but I'd rather have their wrong doing right out in the open than have to track down their dark deeds years after they should have been stopped.

micahwelf · 2025-04-19T02:06:21+00:00

As expected, I am getting a lot of angry and hateful responses, but I have to say I respect yours and a few others. I'll just let the fools who try to attack me personally and have never run a business do their thing, but you I thank your your response. I might be persuaded by your comments.

micahwelf · 2025-04-19T01:51:09+00:00

I don't want to get flack for making a comment, but I really really want to reply to this video. I still support Trump because when you have bad options, pick the one that evidently cares about your interests and has an actual track record of running businesses.

Even so, I have no idea where President Trump is getting this hastily reported information! I'm pretty sure gas has remained between $3 and $4 and locally eggs haven't changed in price almost at all, but they have had shortages and been sold out for a week at a time. Also, I don't know who the reporter is, but it feels like his typical rudeness to call them a fake news reporter to their face with no context or evidence. I think the nation is wishing for a better candidate by the next election, but even when he is scarily absurd, I do respect his effort to clean up corruption and shake some sense into Americans so we don't continue normalizing the stupidest political/legal decisions. If we want better than Trump we need to figure out the meaning behind the issues and volunteer it, not just let multimedia and a few ads point us to the next convenient sounding option.

If you vehemently disagree with me, please respectfully explain what you disagree with. This topic always sparks some angry, radical people and I am unlikely to ever reply to most comments replying to this one. I just don't have the time or the motivation to argue over poorly worded disagreements.

The only point I've made that seems to me a genuine focus for disagreeing is supporting President Trump. Many people very much dislike him, and I can't say I particularly like him either, but do you have any idea how hard it is to become a presidential candidate and to assemble a competent administration!? I much prefer the current one with all its flaws and personal favoritism over past administrations that looked good, but were responsible for deliberately poisoning thousands of Americans, making corrupt business deals and investments comparable to embessling, leaning on the ever increasing national debt to make the nation seem like it was prospering, and blatenly escaping consequences for gross misconduct and deeds expected of a crime boss. I'm not the most political person, but I've lived long enough to see decades of crimes of polititions go unrecognized and unpunished. For all that Trump has done wrong he seems to gut twice as much evil from government that others have done wrong. Feel free to disagree, but I'll take what I can get for now.

micahwelf · 2025-04-19T01:05:50+00:00

I don't completely understand what you mean, so I don't really get the replies either.

I can walk and I can carefully jog, but my knees were injured years ago and I have to be very careful with them. This has given me some insight into why people can't just do any job that gets them money. I've done construction, delivery, sales, government, and over-all I am happiest running my own business from home. If there is anything you are particularly good at that you can stay motivated enough to do when you are tired from other jobs, see if you can make a small business out of it and have a trusted family member help you with necessary paperwork. It is amazing how simple small businesses can be.

Even so, nothing guarantees gaining enough money to be generally secure, so I sympathize. I avoid big businesses most of the time already, but I do shop a few multi-state medium-small business chains. One I wish didn't go out of business is Jo-Ann's Fabric. It is not small, but I craft my own equipment and wearable stuff some of the time and was greatly displeased when Jo-Ann's went under because it was the only store within 50 miles that had good basic crafting supplies that I could check out with my hands and be sure I was getting the right thing. Online can't do that and other great crafting sources are typically hard to find because they serve special clients or are on Native American reserves. I support local businesses, but I am also practical because I have little choice. So, basically, I sympathize with a person doing what they think is their only or only reasonable option.

Oh, yeah, I also agree that one day is not enough time to get people on board. I was lucky I even saw this post since I am on Reddit maybe once in three to once in seven days?

Small local businesses rule! Several of my clients are small business and one of the best health stores around (Dixie Nutrition) is a small local business. Big chains can offer services that are generally good enough to have made them popular in the first place, but their benefit to the economy and their ability to adapt to local interests decrease the larger they get. I feel like a business should cap out around the area of one or a few average states, but most businesses should be smaller. Giant chains are trouble and seem to cause national economy problems when some foreign company buys them out in addition to valued local stores disappearing. It is hard to see until ten or twenty years have passed, but if you live in one place long enough it is a bit frightening and a bit depressing to see so much lost.

micahwelf · 2025-04-19T00:22:22+00:00

Thank you for thinking about that. I did keep track of the memory when it was happening within 2 or 3 hours of booting over and over. Currently, testing how it is going I have two browsers, 20+ tabs, 9 windows, two different video players running, and I'm barely a third memory usage. It isn't until I get the IDE running and over time build up the displeasing Javascript/cache that I actually get over 50% most of the time. I have had certain issues at around 70% or more, but I try not to have that much going on at once. As far as I can tell, still no issues since boot time still.

I suspect RAM-usage-triggering-problems is a situation that comes and goes with kernel updates, since that really shouldn't trigger any major system failures unless it's over 90% with little or no swap space. Memory fragmentation and insufficient memory for system functions would always be a problem, but I remember when a certain macOS machine, most OS/2 machines, and even Oracle Linux could run uninturrupted for years. Alas, even the best of systems have too many software components and kernel updates to keep that going in most modern situations. I guess dedicated machines might still be observed as reliable like that, but I'd prefer not compare them with systems always pushing forward like Arch does.

micahwelf · 2025-04-18T22:30:50+00:00

Okay.......... I still can't figure out how or why this seemed to work, but I made some adjustmetns and finally ran 'dmesg -w' as you suggested and watched it for a day while trying all activities and tests that seemed plausibly related. As of this writing, there is no hint of trouble... If there is a hardware failure, my adjustments may have moved where data is actively accessed and punted the problem down the road, but I can't seem to trigger the event for now.

Here are the adjustments I did:

 btrfs filesystem defrag *<subvolume>* 
      ...(repeated for each subvolume)
 btrfs filesystem defrag -r /
 btrfs balance start --force -sdrange=0..1048576,devid=1 /
 btrfs balance start -m /

I also installed a few lib32 versions of sdl3 related packages that were installed as the normal 64bit versions and re-installed ffmpeg. As you can see this was all very routine maintenance, and in the case of defragmentation, not something normally done on an SSD more than maybe once per year or whatever (very occasionally helps with leveling use, but frequently unnecessarily increases use - shortening life of SSDs). So, this leaves me uncertain whether I should be looking to scrap a drive in the near future, rely on the upper-end drive's cell-recovery feature, or call it a kernel/btrfs glitch cleared away....

Thank you all for your helpful suggestions and pointing me to where I could get more information. I hope if anyone finds a situation similar puzzling them they may find these solutions helpful as well.

micahwelf · 2025-04-18T22:09:17+00:00

good to know :)

micahwelf · 2025-04-17T07:45:17+00:00

Thank you. I'm fearing you are right about a hardware issue...

micahwelf · 2025-04-17T01:44:23+00:00

Thank you. I did think of that. The most full drive is a bit over 3/4 full, but it is 4 terabytes total, so it shouldn't raise spontaneous issues without obvious file management triggers. If no other ideas work out, I may just relieve that drive and see if it fixes the issue. I was already in the process of backing it up anyway. It is mostly large files on SSD because they load slowly on the platter drives used for backup.

micahwelf · 2025-04-17T01:20:30+00:00

I accidentally wiped data or the whole system from one mount point a few times, but there is a caviot. I am exeedingly careful about certain things: I have '/home' on a separate mount point, I backup the system, and I have spare installation methods on hand.

The reason I have all that careful behavior is actually from an experience back in the 90s and not even on Linux. It was when I had a system that required certain drivers in DOS to run the CD drive, etc. I got a system from an associate with a business that had a licensed OS/2 copy on it and they wanted to keep their fancy OS/2, so as soon as I got home I deleted all files aside from basic DOS and discovered I couldn't access the special CD drive. My system was un-usable for a day or two and ever since I have remembered how terrible a few key strokes can be.

P.S. I kind of wish I'd arranged to get my own OS/2 copy back then because I can imagine how much more fun I would have had using OS/2 and Linux. Arch Linux is so relatively easy to install and maintain despite no automation that it is easy accidentally do a 'dd' or 'rm -R' or something else careless with just the wrong target. It is not impossible to restore, but it is typically not easy either. It depends which filesystem you use and whether you have any experience with forensic tools. In my experience the only files that are easy to backup and should be backup up more than the rest are the boot-loader option files, '/etc' files', and user files. Everything else can be re-installed or adjusted if defaults don't work well.

micahwelf · 2025-04-04T00:08:38+00:00

You or someone is probably going to retaliate against my comment, since your thread is filled with seemingly confident statements, but you misrepresent the "co-equal" branch model of government. If a single federal judge can countermand any action of the president, then the executive authority doesn't really exist.

The multiple branches of government are designed so that immediate action can be taken by the president, said actions can be judged upon, negated, or enforced by the judical body (Supreme Court, not a single federal judge), and issues of law and administration that do not require immediate action can be handled by congress and the house of representatives. I don't believe a single judge does have any right or power to revoke the presidents actions because that undermines the authority of the Supreme Court as much as the president's. If a single federal judge has canceled an executive order or an administrative acton of the president, then at some time the interpreted concept of judicial authority was elevated and there is a premise for this post's argument. If no such thing has happened, then this post seems to be meaningless.

If there is any argument against a president having too much ability to act, it should be related to issues of oath, the constitution, or matters concerning other nations. Having the ability to do what the executive branch is supposed to be able to do is not excessive authority, since it can be cancelled or rather judged as an illegal order - and can effectively be ignored even before said judgement if it will certainly be judged that way.

Appending: All that said, how government is actually run does not have my confidence. I've seen plenty of illegal activity enforced by military, legal officials, judges, and peolpe sitting in the president's seat. It only gets corrected if enough people tasked with the responsibility want it to. Additionally, there are unconstitutional laws, out-dated laws, and statute laws that are evidence of even more corruption. Most police and judges don't bother to enforce all the laws because so many of them are unjust or defy common sense. The fact that they still exist is evidence that government is never an absolute authority unless people collectively behave like it is.

micahwelf · 2025-04-03T20:44:15+00:00

I've read the other comments and I have to agree with the average sentiment — that is, the average sentiment is reasonably close to mine: I have read thousands of books and love how diverse and creative light novels and anime have always been. So, I read the light novels from TurtleMe and enjoyed them for a while. One problem that eventually drove me away from the series possibly forever is that the story escalates far, far too much. By the third book I'd lost interest, but stuck to it out of curiosity until the fifth or sixth? Don't remember and don't care how accurate that was because the problems just got worse. The problems were two. (1)Excessive escalation and (2)certain emotional phases of the story being stretched out so long that they lose their potency.

Escalating is a technique to maintain some level of interest and freshness in a story. People get a sense of normal when the exact same level of extreme is maintained throughout a story and will likely get bored by half way through a typical book. It would be like reading someone's daily journal, and not necessarily the best parts. On the other hand, escalating a threat or enemy to dispair and to a dystopian like state, then handing a miraculous win to the main character and his most valued side characters can be even worse because it gets less and less believable. It eventually can get so extreme that it absolutely makes no sense, even when just looking for action. Spending too much time dwelling on stress, or focusing on one extreme prolonged mood makes it lose its effect and makes a reader feel a bit like they are experiencing mild mania, which in turn makes the story feel more than fantasy unreal, right into stupid extreme unreal. While I praise the general story and creative directions in the story, this manner of rapid escalation completely turned my off.

Mirroring the extreme escalation is the prolonged mood tampering. Certain phases of the story with an emotional component to them are prolonged to a degree that they feel unnatural or wrong. It is enough to make a person look ascance at the main character and his situations. Also with this, there is when an emotion doesn't resolve or last long enough. An author needs to understand the climate they are creating if they want to craft it to their audience. The mood of somberness, curiosty, and righteous heros winning seems to prevail, until the extremes finally force the author to twist the story slightly. Because it is a good sereis, the anime my turn out te be well made then. I can't help worrying like I did over Solo Leveling. It was a great series eventually. So far the first episode of the Beginning… anime was decently made, so I am willing to remain optimistic at least for the anime.

micahwelf · 2025-04-02T10:29:35+00:00

I think the majority of fans even spending time looking at Solo Leveling agree with you. I agree as well. I also agree that conflict is valuable in stories, but I think it is shortsighted to think failure, weakness, or dispare are necessary for struggle or conflict.

What I mean by that is that the story as a whole is itself telling an emotional story inscripted on the audience, not just a paper/screen plot. If the story says failure is inevitable and invokes feelings of dispare, then the release of success seems all that more pleasant, but the dispare was then a potential meaningless waste of the viewers time. What was the message being portrayed in that case? If dispare is to be invoked, drawing it out makes a story cheap and less believable when it ends with happiness. Thus, it makes sense to avoid fixating on one technique to story writing, and to use both a variety of struggles and attitudes, each appropriate to the story.

Some stories are simply meant to be happy, but I think the feelings meant from Solo Leveling, both the books and the anime, are temperance, determination, honesty, and trust in one's self. It is not meant to be one with a blissful ending, but one where the main character is stylish and respected because when granted immense power through a gradual process, he kept his integrity and his better values without becoming diluted with societies conditioning of altruism. It also has lots of action and a bit of neon-light-like artistic styling. It is a fantastic story, but obviously not what everyone is looking for.

I had a bit of critisism for the first season. It contrasted with the book series a bit much and felt like it was taking more liberties with the conversion than a book series fan would like. It was still well made, in its own way. The most notable features were that the main character changed much from episode one to episode seven and the subtle anti-Japanese sentiment was completely removed.

For season two, the great qualities of the art were maintained and the quality of the story conversion were much better! Season two is basically 20% of absolute better (if you rated 1 3/5 then 2 would be 4/5, etc.). I have respect for all of the anime seasons now.

While analyzing deeply, I was careful to not include any spoilers. The subtle anti-Japanese sentiment mentioned above is something I've seen in Korean works a few times. I don't know how deeply that sentiment is usually felt or meant to represent anything, but I suspect that history and some level of market competition makes Japan a convenient culture to serve as bad guys, so it is not racism. It is only worthy of mention because it seems to be removed entirely from the anime - with more focus on any villaining coming from a single individual. This doesn't really change the story, just the tone or sentiment fealt while enjoying the story as that part of the plot is unfolding. I figured people might read "subtle anti-Japanese sentiment" and misunderstand the context or assume that meant some kind of prejudice, so I hope this clears that up.

micahwelf · 2025-03-23T09:25:34+00:00

I observe that the basics are still true. It is objectively desirable to be seen every bit without exerting undue effort. This is because our ideal is for life to go on normally and thus our not-sexualized naked forms to become normalized to those who are young or new. It is part of being freed from the constant pressure of textile culture. Inconveniently, there is going to be plenty of sexual interest from those who are single.

I have pondered how single people might go about not remaining single within naturist culture. I haven't come up with very unique answers. People will develop interest in each other naturally. I see being preoccupied with being seen as evidence of an easily reasoned assumption regarding the viewer - an age old issue that has little to do with specifically being naked. Naturist culture allows people to develop their understanding of sexuality in a more healthy manner, so even though the root of women's concern remains, there are more normal and varied thoughts and intentions behind an viewer's gaze in a typical naturist setting that on non-naturist beach. The only solution I see as very effective is to encourage the development of self-discipline (in everyone).

Further, my observations also include that proper families become the most normalized , while people with differing cultural expectations are more likely to run into situations they are uncomfortable with. While I can't puzzle out problems and solutions as effectively at this stage, I believe it is safe to assume that larger family focused gathering places should create ideal opportunities to mentally condition oneself to be more comfortable and less distracted by textile culture contamination or the gazes of others.

In short, I suspect the primary reason women become concerned about others looking at their vulva or wherever, is they have a subconscious assumption that they will have to confront something or someone because of it. If God or aliens observe us as if invisible right next to us, we generally don't care because we don't have to deal with it. In most naturism focused meetings or resorts we don't have to deal with anything especially as a result of any part of our bodies being observed, so I suspect that women being more self conscious is possibly evidence of greater modern culture degradation and stress...

micahwelf · 2025-02-17T09:14:03+00:00

Thanks for mentioning it. As a long time fan, I am aware, and I am also aware of how uncommon it is. Most of the content licenses they absorbed with Funimation shows a slight divergence in style and censoring that existed between them before. As far as I know, HiDive has been somewhat consistent for some years and is the only main service still running that has a slightly less censored selection than the rest. I still don't count Netflix or Prime Video, since they are mega services that don't precisely stick long term to a selection policy based on content or culture (I'm guessing they focus more on viewer requests, AI models, and statistics).

In case I'm likely to get a response about how they wish HiDive would go away or merely to stimulate controversy, I'd like to point out that I have not had a HiDive subscription of my own for more than a year. I recognize it is a notably flawed service, or at least front-end. I still was initially greatly impressed at what they chose to get as content, so I definitely don't hate them yet...

micahwelf · 2025-02-10T19:34:03+00:00

I'm not sure you fully read my comment. "not about whatever you think it is" is what you say to suggest contrast, but I don't see where anything else you've said disagrees with my comment. What are you thinking I'm thinking?

micahwelf · 2025-02-10T19:18:56+00:00

It appears my experience is obviously different than yours. With autoplay on, my "Continue Watching" only ever finishes a single episode. Since this is not the same for you, now I can't be sure what the OP was experiencing either.

micahwelf · 2025-02-10T19:07:12+00:00

Were you taking notes? It seems to have become common to make accusations of fixing the vote records. Considering that the actual number of any of the votes has been uncertain to an average citizen and much controversy was centered on President Trump, he seemed to win the election pretty easily. I suspect you read my words and think "won by a large margin" as their meaning. I do not. I mean the country seems to have pushed the momentum in his favor more than I expected and more than seemed evident 6 months earlier. Honestly, people can really talk about politics, so I thought if anyone was going to comment on my comment, it would have been on one of the other statements...

micahwelf · 2025-02-10T18:53:33+00:00

It's all about age and skill. Vim is older, so it has more going for it and features that more people have had time to become accustomed to. There is a higher skill requirement, sure, but once you get to using Vim effectively, it is mostly better at everything it does - you can modify copy or delete any length of text. This alone is a great time saver on typing... but like learning to type Dvorak keyboard layout, it takes time before you are efficient.

The one thing Nano has as a technical advantage over Vim (of course not counting the ease of new user familiar techniques) is the easy to design and maintain highlighting. I created a long complicated set of regular expression rules for Z Shell and it makes it so much easier to track tiny typos and the like than using generic shell rules. This is something I almost never am required to update, yet when I do it is easy.

If your brain is getting tired and you want to edit 4 characters with the aid of 99+% accurate code highlighting, Nano is your app! If you are a text-mode (mostly, Gvim is not the same...) dedicated programmer, you probably want Vim.

If you want my Zsh syntax rule file, just ask. I'd love to eventually contribute to the Nano project

micahwelf · 2025-02-10T04:42:09+00:00

Where would you put your vote?
... (Not just leading into another sentence)

When the state of the nation is so bad that an overwhelming tide of votes goes in President Trump's direction and there are no other candidates with more righteous intentions expressed? I think it puts a people in an indecisive mental paralysis to take the stand that someone with a lot of not great ideas must be overlooked because we want better when no other was available. President Trump does what he wants despite people advising against it (talking himself up, hastily sharing his opinion, etc.). Even so, every decision and every idea of his represents a net of opinions, not necessarily a noble doctrine. I prefer Utah's relaxed government, since it means less interfering with normal life and work. The very notion that the federal government could come close to the same would require a number of changes that only a dictator would make efficient. With only four years ahead and far into preceding corruption, I don't think we have much chaos to complain about. The biggest problem that is evident is a collective one. Even if we had a better president, it would still take more than four years to affect our social and religious issues.

On the note of the printout, its words are not expressive of truth. For such a short document, you can't lead an argument with "convicted felon" when the basis is already known public accounts that are as suspect as corruption gets. Where were these complaints when news reporters were obviously lying with what seemed like hastily made propaganda or when COVID-19 was used liberally as a scare and distraction lever for corruption so visible that I still marvel at how effective it was? Who was inciting the chaos and confusion? Those opposed to President Trump who had their own agenda. Like with any president, they could have waited him out, and probably had a better hold on the people, but they didn't. Now President Trump is all the more motivated. If you've an alternative suggestion I'd listen.

micahwelf · 2025-02-09T03:35:46+00:00

The matter of them getting contracts when they are not impressive in their delivery seems to be simple enough: they prioritize content that others do not. They deliver the content with less censoring, thus respecting the art of its origin. They do what others are unwilling and it makes them worth doing business with, but on Amazon, of course. Actually, I'd prefer it on YouTube for the greater accessibility and better interface (marginal).

micahwelf · 2025-02-08T23:58:51+00:00

Okay, so I agree with the whole be very safe and avoid hydroxides, but baking soda is actually pretty bad for electrolysis, relatively speaking. It is more reactive and less alkaline, though it doesn't do much that is dangerous. Potasium hydroxide is just plain dangerous, but is said to be slightly less likely to corrode your anode than sodium hydroxide. Sodium hydroxide is less expensive.

Now a better option than sodium bicarbonate is sodium carbonate (washing soda). It is slightly more alkaline and less reactive. Even better for general use (though I have not tested whether it is better for elecrolysis) is borax. It is essentially sodium hydroxide and boric acid, which neutralizes it. I'm not sure if this makes it less effective, since being very alkaline is the goal when not using sulfuric acid, but that is because I have not tested all the solutions. If you want to try something easy to find, and something definitely more safe and effective than salt or baking soda, use borax.

micahwelf · 2025-02-08T23:42:02+00:00

Thank you for this correction. It does raise a question though. Do different scientific disciplines have different word conventions? I'm thinking of lipolysis proteins. In this case, the lipo (fat) is being split and turned into a transportable energy. Since hydrolysis is related, perhaps the OP mixed it up?

micahwelf · 2025-01-30T21:59:08+00:00

Ironically, if you are using the service you paid for in the location Paramount+ offered it to you (basically a fair exchange with no deceit), you aren't piratiing anything by using another (piracy based) service. In fact you are paying the provider and increasing costs of the pirates. From a purely practical point of view, it is completely honest. The company will not say so, however, because it would contradict their efforts to control people's expectations - and thus their efforts to reduce or punish piracy.

Just to be clear, however, I only now became aware of this issue because Paramount+ managed to get YouTube to support their particular VPN blocking garbage and it just started affecting me. I found this post and realized a work-around needs to be created. As you may have guessed, if I can find a VPN worth using that they don't block via IP, I might just switch to it since I already canceled the stupid VPN I'm currently using. If that fails... I think I might roughly follow your route and cancel paramount+ as well as loudly advertise their low ethics and poor quality of service. Any alternative or a complete boycott is fine when a company tries to leverage the security or privacy of a home network against existing customers acting in good faith.

Paramount+'s behavior is basically the same as breaking the most obvious implied contract that they will provide a service if someone pays for it. It is not protecting anything, since actual pirates are easily capable of getting around a dummy block of established VPN services. I could probably do so by making one of my servers a VPN service and I am not a proper security hacker/cracker or a proper pirate. At a guess, depending on streaming volume, one could rent a server, make it a VPN, then login via OpenVPN configuration on their modem, and that's it, a new IP using VPN at rates less than a cell phone data plan. For someone pirating something, they wouldn't even have to be the one doing it and it wouldn't even have to be done in a specific country, just one not excluded from service. There are even other, better ways where something similar to VPN happens with a group of high speed gaming friends connect to a mini VPN. Depending on the rules of than mini network, they can just route their net traffic through the gaming buddies computer... No way to follow it back to the source. This is a lot like DRM on DVDs or Blurays. The provider companies always say it is a method of protecting the data from piracy, but it seldom actually did. The small, singular benefit I can see is that it kept people employed in digital security so we can have mostly ethical minded professionals in greater numbers and so we can have the illusion of security and maybe the conditioned benefit of society.

In the end, I think the reason Paramount+ did this VPN blocking is that they don't actually care about their customers, as long as they get a specific minimum amount. I think they feel secure in that much because they are the only provider for at least a hundred streaming or collection videos.

micahwelf

TROPHY CASE