ToucanLoucan (u/ToucanLoucan)

ToucanLoucan commented on Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options arstechnica.com/gadgets/2... · Posted by u/fleahunter

kotaKat · 2 days ago

That one I’m starting to lean on getting closer to happening because we now have 5G RedCap out there for the ‘cheaper’ moderate-speed IoT data market.

https://about.att.com/blogs/2025/5g-redcap.html https://www.t-mobile.com/news/network/5g-redcap-powering-sma...

Wouldn’t surprise me to see modems and eSIMs and embedded PCB antennas some day down the line.

ToucanLoucan · 2 days ago

Imagine if we could put this kind of innovation to work to solve actual problems and not find ways to bypass people attempting to not have capitalism screaming at them 24/7 to buy things.

ToucanLoucan commented on Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options arstechnica.com/gadgets/2... · Posted by u/fleahunter

dr_coffee · 2 days ago

The article lists several manufacturers of 4k dumb tv’s

ToucanLoucan · 2 days ago

The article also says why they suck:

> Dumb TVs sold today have serious image and sound quality tradeoffs, simply because companies don’t make dumb versions of their high-end models. On the image side, you can expect lower resolutions, sizes, and brightness levels and poorer viewing angles. You also won’t find premium panel technologies like OLED. If you want premium image quality or sound, you’re better off using a smart TV offline. Dumb TVs also usually have shorter (one-year) warranties.

ToucanLoucan commented on Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options arstechnica.com/gadgets/2... · Posted by u/fleahunter

deafpolygon · 2 days ago

tl;dr: don’t connect it to a network, and/or use a computer monitor.

ToucanLoucan · 2 days ago

Yup. Works great. All things equal I'd prefer just not buying a damn Smart TV to begin with, but absent that as a realistic option (every 4K TV I've ever seen is smart) I'll happily settle with them never seeing one byte of Internet.

ToucanLoucan commented on Meta shuts down global accounts linked to abortion advice and queer content theguardian.com/global-de... · Posted by u/ta988

rtp4me · 3 days ago

Erases your existence? Would your existence be threatened if Meta was not a company? What about the countless number of other companies who are not pushing your content? Do you feel threatened by them? Now I see why you chose the word "hate"...

ToucanLoucan · 3 days ago

No, my existence isn’t contingent on Meta existing. But when a platform with billions of users decides queer content is unwelcome, it erases us from one of the largest public squares in the world, at a time when public squares are at a premium. That’s not the same as "some random company doesn’t carry my stuff."

There's also a difference between not amplifying something and actively suppressing it. Neutral omission is one thing; deliberate censorship is another. When queer content is singled out for removal, it sends a message: you don’t belong here. That's erasure.

History shows us that erasure is rarely neutral. It's part of a continuum: silence leads to exclusion leads to violence. Pretending censorship is harmless ignores the fact that queer people have lived through this cycle many times before, and we're far from alone.

ToucanLoucan commented on Meta shuts down global accounts linked to abortion advice and queer content theguardian.com/global-de... · Posted by u/ta988

rtp4me · 3 days ago

And by your own logic, how does censoring content actively suppress your way of life? Did someone from Meta go to your place of residence and actively threaten to harm you? Sure, maybe you don’t like the censorship, but how does that make them your enemy? Have you openly declared war on them? If you don’t like their content, simply move along.

ToucanLoucan · 3 days ago

> And by your own logic, how does censoring content actively suppress your way of life?

Because it erases our existence, which is what a substantial slice of straight society wants. Queer content and spaces are important for queer adults, because it gives us places to comfortably be ourselves without feeling subject to leering or judgement from bigots, and safety in numbers in case someone starts something. It gives us people to be among who we can talk to, form community with, and support one another. And for people just coming up, it's literally lifesaving. Numerous studies have shown that queer-leaning teens and kids are MUCH safer when they have access to safe places to explore who they are, even if they don't "turn out" that way, prevents awful, irreversible things. [1,2,3] Not to mention it can be lifesaving also when their parents are bigots themselves and they need a way out.

> Sure, maybe you don’t like the censorship, but how does that make them your enemy?

The bridge between "they suppress expressions of who I am" and "they participate in my extermination" has been proven to be quite short and easily traversed for queers many times, and for racial groups, and for religious groups too. [4]

By your definition they may not be my enemy today, but they may be in a short period of time.

> If you don’t like their content, simply move along.

This is actually great advice for people who keep trying to take down queer content.

Edit: And this is exactly what figures like Breitbart have been openly trying to do for over a decade. And it isn't just him either, you have the Family Research Council, Fox News hosts, Daily Wire personalities like Matt Walsh, and Libs of TikTok have all made careers out of normalizing queer erasure. For them, "winning the culture war" is not only their stated, in-text goal, it's a means of pushing us out of public life: sometimes just running us out of town, other times things too ugly to say aloud.

1. AFSP – LGBTQ youth face higher suicide risk, but affirming spaces cut that risk significantly. https://afsp.org/preventing-suicide-in-lgbtq-communities/ 2. Springer (2025) – Queer teens are 5–8× more likely to attempt suicide; supportive spaces reduce risk. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12310-025-09797-4 3. Trevor Project (2020) – Having even one affirming space lowers suicide attempts by 35%. https://www.thetrevorproject.org/research-briefs/lgbtq-gende... 4. Oxford Research Encyclopedia (2019) – History shows censorship of queer spaces often escalates into violence and erasure. https://oxfordre.com/politics/politics/view/10.1093/acrefore...

ToucanLoucan commented on McDonald's pulls AI Christmas ad after backlash bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c... · Posted by u/mindracer

macintux · 4 days ago

It seems like a statement from The Sweetshop, who made the ad, has also been pulled.

This piece links to a Futurism article[0], which in turn links to "an incredibly defensive statement"[1] from the ad agency.

> “For seven weeks, we hardly slept, with up to 10 of our in-house AI and post specialists at The Gardening Club [our in-house AI engine] working in lockstep with the directors,” Sweetshop’s CEO wrote.

(Sounds more like sweatshop than sweetshop, but I digress.)

However, that "defensive statement" link is broken, and I see no sign of it on the linked site, but I did find this older lamentation[2] from The Sweetshop regarding AI, or more specifically regarding the attitude that AI should allow you to cut costs and fire people.

> Being asked to cut 20–30% of creative costs and labour under the banner of ‘AI’ is unimaginative at best, and corrosive at worst. It drains the value of human creativity and concentrates it in fewer and fewer hands, hollowing out the very industry it claims to improve.

[0] https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/mcdonalds-ai-ge...

[1] https://lbbonline.com/news/melanie-bridge-sweetshop-the-gard... (missing page, and the Wayback Machine doesn't have a copy)

[2] https://lbbonline.com/news/Damn-The-Race-to-the-Bottom-AI-Sh...

ToucanLoucan · 4 days ago

The attempts by both this outfit and the one that did the Coke ad to walk the line of simultaneously touting what a labor saving device these models are while also trying desperately to make it seem like they did some actual work somewhere so they can also be respected as creatives is honestly hilarious.

Like I thought the whole point of these stupid things was that any John Q off the street could make awesome videos? If that's the case, then what in the utter hell is the point of a making of video featuring people playing at being creative?

ToucanLoucan commented on Horses: AI progress is steady. Human equivalence is sudden andyljones.com/posts/hors... · Posted by u/pbui

bambax · 5 days ago

In this analogy, horses are jobs, not humans; you could argue there's not much of a difference between the two, because people without jobs will starve, etc., but still, they're not the same.

ToucanLoucan · 5 days ago

One would argue in a capitalist society like ours, fucking with someone's job at industrial scale isn't awfully dissimilar from threatening their life, it's just less direct. Plenty more people currently are feeling the effects of worsening job markets than have been involved in a hostage situation, but the negative end results are still the same.

One would argue also if you don't see this, it's because you'd prefer not to.

If we had at least a somewhat functioning safety net, or UBI, or both, you'd at least have an argument to be made, but we don't. AI and it's associated companies' business model is, if not killing people, certainly attempting to make lots of lives worse at scale. I wouldn't work for one for all the money in the world.

ToucanLoucan commented on Netflix to Acquire Warner Bros about.netflix.com/en/news... · Posted by u/meetpateltech

afavour · 9 days ago

The Crown is absolutely a prestige TV show. Stranger Things is also high quality and high budget. You could probably include Bridgerton in there too, it's not my kind of show but I can still recognize that it's a well put together one.

ToucanLoucan · 9 days ago

The problem is all the crap kills the prestige. HBO remains what HBO is because they don't put out 600 other shows besides Game of Thrones that are utter garbage.

Netflix is the Walmart of entertainment at this point. Yeah you can find basically anything there- and VERY occasionally, you'll find something damn good- but you're wading through a sea of mediocre shit to do so.

And like, personally I unsubbed forever ago because I'm not interested in subsidizing all the garbage to get the occasional Frankenstein. Meanwhile I've maintained an HBO subscription for that entire time.

Obviously I am but one data point here and I know my opinion is in the minority, but yeah. I don't pay attention much to Netflix.

ToucanLoucan commented on Transparent leadership beats servant leadership entropicthoughts.com/tran... · Posted by u/ibobev

Royce-CMR · 9 days ago

From Ira Glass:

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste.

But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you.

A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions.

And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

ToucanLoucan · 9 days ago

I tell this to everyone who will listen. This... paragraph? Statement? Whatever is pure gold.

Quit watching YouTube videos, quit reading tutorials, quit listening to podcasts. The only way you learn is by doing something, and by doing something I mean fucking up doing something. Over, and over, and over.

Just do the thing. That's how you learn. And after you make a whole ton of things that suck, you'll start making a few things that don't.

There's no way around it.