I took some time off from the job hunt. I needed that and had a lovely holiday break.

“You’d think military officials would be delighted to find a contractor that isn’t trying to stiff them raw.”

That elicited a sensible chuckle.

This is my opinion alone. From trying hard to connect to resources. I’ve learned that elite actors like Mr. Reich, Ralph Nader, and others of similar ilk simply aren’t effective anymore. Their voices don’t carry. They are out of touch with reality. They are not effective in bringing meaningful change. I surmise they don’t truly grasp the reality of connecting with struggling Americans anymore. Their hearts and minds are in the right place, still, but they have not effectively evolved their work to the modern world. Nor have they transferred their work, advocacy, and knowledge to a new generation of activists.

A video from Berkley about wealth inequality is great. However, it does not go far enough. It pains me to say this, but Mr. Reich is just one of many tabletop activisits who publish, print, and stream advice and profit from it. We need less of that. We need more actionable items, resource and network sharing, and out on the streets work in this moment.

Highway Companion.

Its not Tom Petty’s finest. Noted. But that doesn’t matter for me. I was going through alot at the time. I came back from tour 2 in Afghanistan, was struggling to cope with what I’d been through and just lost. I would get in my wrangler, take the doors and top off, and just drive. For hours. The album had released for about a year but times were so messesld up for me that I missed releases or concerts for most music I used to listen to. I was just checked out from the things I loved. So one day when I saw this at the PX I grabbed it. It just hit me at the right time.

It was the only thing I’d play on those drives. Things got better for me and this was the album that was part of that experience. First to recognizing the ills I’d been a part of. Then to healing and buddhism. To trying to be a better human, accepting my past, and building a now that was beyond my self. 20 years later, I still use this when I’m needing to reconnect with the world and myself. Now it’s while I am biking or walking, but its the mood and the lack of a destination that make the setting. It really and truly lived up to its name for me, a highway companion on l the freeway that is my life.

I’m not a sudo apt master. I don’t know shit about terminal or making Linux do stuff beyond wanting to point and click. Yes, it can run a sea worthy version of Photoshop.

Let me break it down. I use a program called Lutris, installed from the software manager. Its technically a game launcher to collect all your games in one convenient area, letting me launch steam, gog, etc from one library. I install plenty of windows programs and obscure ones if I need them for my research. MaxQDA, SPSS for instance.

There are few, if any, normal day-to-day use cases where Windows is better. Gaming, thanks to Proton, is not a problem. Drivers? Got those too. But what about x software? There’s a less bloated FOSS or low cost version out there.

Just go for it.

The issue I have with the responses are that forking or running lite browsers is not a solution but a work around. A work around that requires vigilance in the rapidly changing tech space. Most people can’t do that. It won’t result in systematic change that we need to stop enshitification. I’m not downplaying your work and a counter movement, far from it, but its simply not enough without more resources to stop the deluge of nonsense.

I dont have answers, and there are too many challenges to count to list here. From politics to how business schools teach. So we are stuck with a domineering overlord with both the resources to make it all look simple and fluid and to make the work of innovators increasingly difficult.

Its my last finals week and I’m grading. Next week I’ll be unemployed. I’ve had three interviews and got close. So I’m keeping at it but thinking long and hard about what to do next. You can view my post history for that, I’ll spare you here. Anyone want a researcher/disaster scholar/history nerd for stuff? I can bring cookies. :-)

Noting that, doing ok. Hit a PR on dead lift -150kg- that given my age I am super happy about. My short children’s story I threw out with no marketing via self publishing just to do it sold a copy. It was an organic sale to a stranger. I made a wonderful gluten free artisan bread.

All the little things added up and I don’t have a caas of the Mondays.

Directness is appreciated. As an aside, it is absolutely mind blowing how far and fast Project 2025 swept through society. Higher ed is the obvious example but everything from nonprofits to your local farmers market. In about a year, people of all walks of life except the wealthiest simply hit hard. It is, indeed, a challenging world.

The Roberts’ Court has entered the chat

Hell. I feel this so hard and empathize. Admin at my former university are asking everyone to write qualitative summaries of why their programs add value to the school. Then they cut funding based on abstract metrics. The only people left are the muppets. They will be administrating themselves soon as all the professors and students will be gone.

In solidarity, feel free to vent any time via DM.

Yeah. I’d even say we went beyond late stage capitalism. We are now on the cusp of a feudalistic society more akin to the corporate dominance in Blade Runner or Eve Online, maybe The Expanse, then anything resembling capitalism. Corporations are more powerful than nation states, many people are indentured to their workplace via healthcare needs or non competes, etc. So there’s that. This is an entirely new thread though so I’ll stop it there. TL;DR - This shit sucks.

Kevin, if thats even a real person at this point in media, is just pushing stories and discourse aligned with corporate speak. Let’s consider it less stupid and more complicit, which I argue, is even worse.

I bought an older Samsung and only use it for doom scrolling, 2FA, and podcasts. Its fine stripped down to nothingness. My next purchase, once the cracks from me dropping it spread, will be an older Pixel so I can run GraphineOS. I’m hopeful that like my Linux experience, it’ll extend the devices life given my use case. Like buying old laptops and kicking windows to the curb in favor of Linux buys you tons of time and product life.

I am not an economist. I am not an expert on anything consumer. It is, however, plainly obvious that companies are trying to squeeze blood from a stone at this point. They can’t make money anymore with pay to own and innovation like they used to for a variety of reasons. From greed to enshitification. If you look at it with a different view, everyone is poorer because they are greedy, they’ve ruined everyone’s lives but must make numbers go up. So they find new and terrifying ways of screwing you over for diminishing returns. Like this. Relying on turnover sales and nothing else.

sensible chuckle

Doing OK. Have an interview coming up. Fingers crossed.

Been getting into Enshrouded with friends and really enjoying the social connection and fun. Needed the brain break, as I feel burned out from the application treadmill.

Finally, want to spend the time to learn a new skill. Mid life so was thinking R and getting further into Python to enhance my data science chops. Recommendations welcome on that front.

Oh man, she was an awesome human! What a great gamer and person. She’s featured in the Netflix documentary “High Score” which I highly recommend if you want to learn about the early days of video game development.

Academic. 50+ applications to universities across the EU and UK. Finally got an interview but did not get the job. Inching closer! Its an insanely bad job market for academics, and an insanely bad job market generally. I’m going to keep at it but looking at alternatives. I am lucky to have my job through December.

I’ve started working with a career coach to help me deal with defeatism. I’m also tired of the rat race - publish or die. Grant competition. Favoritism. AI everywhere and metric tracking everything. I’ve done everything right and am looking at finding new meaning that doesn’t involve so much free labor and struggle.

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Academic. 50+ applications to universities across the EU and UK. Finally got an interview but did not get the job. Inching closer! Its an insanely bad job market for academics, and an insanely bad job market generally. I’m going to keep at it but looking at alternatives. I am lucky to have my job through December.

I’ve started working with a career coach to help me deal with defeatism. I’m also tired of the rat race - publish or die. Grant competition. Favoritism. AI everywhere and metric tracking everything. I’ve done everything right and am looking at finding new meaning that doesn’t involve so much free labor and struggle.