What Now?
Updated:
Todo Around Here
- Setting up a login system for the site.
- Considering making something fun for the people who keep probing my site's API. (Pro tip, it's not in python. I take performance way too seriously for that.)
- Working on ideas to refresh my recommended games page.
- Adding a <dialog> modal to my carousel component to let you view large images on the same page if you have JavaScript enabled.
- Working on a tool to bake static CSS
var()andcalc()calls during my site build to better support NetSurf and Dillo. - Going through the back catalogue of old programmer talks now in my TIL page to add my usual commentary on why I think they're worth watching and/or what I learned from them.
Create sitemap web page.You can now view the sitemap as a webpage. It's not great. It's mostly just the raw XML reformulated as HTML. Later I'll look at making it more of a tree to help visualize it better. It'll do for now though.Finding a few more webrings that seem like a good fit for the Hyperport.Lined up The 1.44MB Webring, XXIIVV, and nownownow.com. We'll see if the feeling is mutual.Checking out twtxt.Meh. I don't use social media. Don't see why I'd start now.
Media
This Time Is Different: There were a couple conclusions that seemed to skip looking at counterfactuals, but I wasn't reading deeply enough to check (you should be able to go verify given their dataset's open). It's unfortunately not the type of book I can digest in one sitting on one day at my local library. Still, some good models for oncoming financial crisis with backtesting across a few hundred years. Things like banking liberalization being strongly correlated with a crisis in the following decade. Not exactly sure if crypto currencies would count since they didn't rigidly define what constituted innovation or liberalizations in banking. They also noted strongly correlating factors include rising asset prises, slowing real economic activity (i.e. increasing speculation), large current account deficits (i.e. rising imports and/or falling exports), and sustained debt buildups. For debt, they found it didn't really matter if it was government or private. They both seem to feed each other in a leader-laggards sort of model. That last one they note is essentially they key to crisis. It's tied to confidence, which isn't something we've figured out how to accurately model. But the bigger the debt, the more likely the confidence collapse. It's also tied not only to reputation of the borrower, but the lender's confidence in the circumstances of the borrower. They found crisis often precipitate prior to political events like elections or the end of wars. It's got a lot of post-2008 influences, so our next crisis will make a good test of the indicators presented, because next time won't really be different. We just always think crisis will never happen to us.Until Dawn: If you ever wished a teen slasher film could slash the teens over and over again for your own twisted enjoyment, this is your movie. Pretty fun. Not too scary by my standards. Lots of fun gore and effects.Shrek: Yep, still a great movie. No clue how many times I've watched it. The stories behind the scenes making this film are all just as great as the final product if you ask me. All the sequels are pretty meh. Puss in Boots: The Last Wish is great despite having the Shrek franchise tied around its neck. Nothing beats the original though. Real, team with a dream, type stuff. You know, art, not content.Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: I'm still not sure what to make of this. It was interesting to watch, kept my attention. All the movement and angles used in the cinematography did a really great job capturing that essence of being right there with them. Would I recommend it? I mean, it's described as a dark comedy, and I'm not really sure it was ever funny. It was mostly absurd (as in absurdist humour). Jokes about people being lizards and traumatizing a hitchhiker. Like a less funny and much darker It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.The Flintstones (2016 comic): It's blunt at times, but it's also incredible work having only twenty some pages for any topic. The first issue had me in tears right at the end. Completely caught off guard. It's this surreal blend of whimsy and introspection. It's hard for me to describe what each issue is about without over simplifying. They're already so simple, it's all about the execution. Sometimes they're sublime, sometimes they're pretty heavy handed. Overall, they're a fantastic aberration. One of the biggest things holding it back is honestly that first issue. Many of the issues that follow can't give up how great that one was. It kept going back through motif and outright reference. Reminding me that I'm reading something not as good. Why?My Dress-Up Darling: It's so incredibly cute. There's so many incredible things about this anime. The animation is absolutely breathtaking. The use of various styles, even simultaneously to truly capture the character's emotional state is a trend I've really enjoyed in modern anime. The story is beautiful and heartwarming while dripping with dramatic irony. The author expertly plays the audience like a fish on a hook, constantly drawing you in to the duo's love dynamic. The second season leans heavily into more fluid character expressions and is something really exciting to see in the world of anime. It really gives me hope and happiness to experience the pure joy. Just incredible work from everyone involved.A Man Without a Country: Kurt's up in heaven now. ;^P On a more serious reflective note, the work is technically a collection of essays, but reads more like a few blog entries. One essay is just summaries of letters from fans and his responses. Another narrates his inner thoughts while heading out to buy an envelop and mail something. There's definitely some thoughts in there worth pondering though. One bright thing was getting to relive thoughts from the George W. Bush administration of the USA in ways that mirror and contrast their current administration. I normally only get these sorts of perspective reflections outside context when reading much older if not ancient texts. It always really helps you get more perspective outside our modern total echo chamber.How to Fly a Horse: Reread it after I was asked what book I'd suggest for my /now directory entry. Not a huge read, something small, yet packed with loads of studies, stories, and aphorisms to help you really grasp how creativity isn't something special. How creativity to humans is what flying is to birds. Highly recommend reading it. If you're not already sold, I'd suggest watching the GDC talk Practical Creativity which covers a lot of the very simple steps anyone can take to be creative.Dandadan: The animation is incredible! The story is cute. The drama is palpable. From the very first scene you know you're in for something amazing. The use of smear frames again! It's delightful in the age of cheap rigid computer models. I've never enjoyed aliens, ghost, and kaiju this much.Cyberpunk 2077: It's so bad. 100 hours and nothing1 interesting to say about the world or do in the game (like game system, form of play). It's like nobody had any idea why they were making a game in the first place besides marketability. Just a bunch of press F to pay respects set-piece nonsense. I finally quit hoping it would get better when I was tasked to save the president of the New United States of America after Space Force One crashes. 🙄The Nightmare Before Christmas: I love when you think about it in the context of '93. How this would have been a completely insane idea for a movie. Now it's just seen as normal among the milieu of Gen X cynicism and modernist abstraction. For the time though, this was both transgressive yet endearing. Think about how it fits alongside the tradition of stop motion Videocraft Christmas specials.
1I lied, there is one quest I really enjoyed. Sacrum Profanum, aka Losing My Religion. I won't gush or explain, but my thanks to whomever wrote or was otherwise involved in designing and creating it. You created something very human and memorable. Not just the story, but the little mechanic of meeting them later for no reason other than a thank you. Great stuff!