Things I do:

- about:preferences#general > Startup > restore previous session

- about:preferences#general > Tabs > uncheck Ctrl+Tab cycle ...

- about:preferences#general > Downloads > always ask where to save

- about:preferences#home > Firefox Home Content > disable all except Top Sites

- about:preferences#privacy > Permission > Notification Settings > Block new requests

- about:preferences#privacy > Firefox Data Collection and Use > disable

- Set in about:config extensions.pocket.enabled to false

- Install the addons: uBlock Origin, Gesturefy, Firefox Multi-Account Containers

- I remove the home button

- I remove the sidebar button

- I reject every Firefox pop-up that wants me to enable Sync or whatever

The result is a decent browser, which doesn't get in my way. But I can understand that those steps are too many for casual users and can understand why a lot of people don't like the Internet. I wouldn't like it too, if I had to use default browser settings without an ad-blocker.

The first snippet is a very good example:

    a := "wtf_walrus"

   (a := "wtf_walrus")

It's a fantastic design decision.

Python took a long time before getting this operator, because it's a language that favors being readable, easy to use, and above all, to learn.

But in many other languages, the very same operator is often misused as, or confused for, the operator for equality or assignation.

We, as a community, didn't want people to wonder why there are several ways to do assignation (we have this problem with string templating already). Instead, we wanted to be sure that people could ignore the existence of ":=" for some times during their learning process.

And so the decision has been taken to make is very easy to distinguish it from "=" and "==", forcing parenthesis when necessary to make it clear this is a completely different use case. Also to hint people at using it only when necessary.

If you like scripting in Python because it's so easy to go from an idea to code, it's not random luck. It's because the language is a collections of thousands of such decisions.

- If you aren't good at speaking in a captivating way, literally write out your best stories. People who are good at telling stories get this way from practice: introverts naturally get less practice and thus tend to be less talented at speaking. You can do a significant amount of practice on a story without a partner - develop a few 2-3 minute anecdotes about yourself that have a clear beginning, middle and punchline, and cut all extraneous information that doesn't enhance the listeners enjoyment or teach them something positive about your character. If the conversation with a new person touches on something from one of your anecdotes, you will be able to quickly go into your anecdote and be engaging. The process of editing a couple stories will teach you to revise future stories without writing them down explicitly.

- The Cube is a really great icebreaker when meeting new people and conversation is petering out. https://oliveremberton.com/2014/how-to-connect-deeply-with-a... A couple times, I've captivated groups of 4-6 strangers for about an hour with this. Everyone likes talking about themselves, and it gives people a framework to discuss their self perceptions in a fun way, and everyone learns some things about each other. (The mappings are somewhat arbitrary, I learned it with ladder as work and flowers as friends)

Criticism is good and useful and should be delivered in the most direct way possible. People should just toughen up. It's unbelievable to think that 80 years ago, people were killing each other with guns and bombs but today's people get offended if someone doesn't press the 'like' button on their Facebook photos. We are too weak; that's the real problem.

Being weak is bad. Political correctness poses a threat to our freedom of speech.

I can't stand this dystopian corporate rhetoric that 'being nice' and 'feeling safe' are important. They are not. Both of these things make us weaker.