#RASP - Rant Around Several Paragraphs #4: Facebook Feeds

I have a like/hate relationship with Facebook.

I like it because it helps me keep tabs on my friends, brothers, and geographically distant family. It helps me to get to know people I don't see fairly regularly a little better.

On this point, my hate comes out as well: Facebook likes to cater my feed to those with whom I've had relatively frequent or recent contact on Facebook or Messenger. This angers me.

I want to get to know all my friends, and to know what's going on in their heads or hearts. Biasing my feed to only those with whom I actually click a like or something occludes the posts of those who don't post very often. Facebook does this intentionally, of course, because they want your eyeballs, thumbs, and ears on Facebook (and hopefully some of your money, too) 24/7, if they can help it.
Enticing, one, therefore, to stay on there with things they know you'll continue to like and see out makes it worth their while to a have the feeds display that way.

I want, though, to see everyone's stuff. I want the "Most Recent" feed to be something I can default to. I want, when the Facebook app updates, to have the "Sound Off" on the feed option remain off!

I remember the good old days of "The Facebook" with virtual flinging of sheep and various little apps that included national flags of one's heritage, and when one could really connect with one's schoolmates. Then they'd rolled out neighborhoods, and I'd reluctantly had to have Miami as my secondary to FIU. That's still an option in Facebook, actually, a grandfathered thing.

As they've grown more commercial, more ubiquitous, and people are using Facebook for things that had fallen to other places to fill (Messenger for WhatsApp, even though WhatsApp is now a Facebook property anyway; Marketplace for Craig's List; Jobs for pretty much any job board; Memories for TimeHop or just going over one's feed nostalgically; Reviews for Yelp). It's gotten insane. I was on reddit the other day and someone was complaining about the Facebook app size, and all I had to say was, in more creative wording, think about how Facebook has become more than just a social network.

It's become a life draw for some people,

I just want to be able to have "Most Recent" be default so I can know what's going on in all my friends' lives and not just whomever Facebook determines is "worth" my time.

Kris' Vocabulary and Style

Sometimes people have called me out on it, but there seem to be certain words I use relatively frequently. These aren't words one would use all the time, but I do notice them when I do. Partly because people have brought them to my attention.

vacillate /ˈvæ.sə.leɪt/, /ˈvæ.sɪ.leɪt/

1. (intransitive) To sway unsteadily from one side to the other; oscillate. 
2. (intransitive) To swing indecisively from one course of action or opinion to another. 

I'd used this just today in an e-mail to one of my co-workers, and it was then I'd decided this would be today's blog topic.


simultaneously (UK): /ˌsɪməlˈteɪnɪəsli/; (US) /ˌsaɪməlˈteɪnɪəsli/

This is the one on which people usually remark, partly because I've grown up -- and continue to -- pronouncing/pronounce it the UK way rather than the US/American way.

Other words people tend to notice because I don't sound quite American saying them:

• process  /ˈpɹoʊ̯.sɛs/ as if I were Canadian;
• Internet (and pretty much a lot of words with "nt" between vowels): I pronounce the "t", so it's  /ˈɪntɚˌnɛt/ rather than /ˈɪɾ̃ɚˌnɛt/.

iteration /ɪɾəɹˈeɪʃən/

1. Recital or performance a second time; repetition.
2. A variation or version.
3. (computing) The use of repetition in a computer program, especially in the form of a loop.
4. (computing) A single repetition of the code within such a repetitive process.

Especially the second definition.

Well, I suppose those are the only few that really come to mind right now.

My pronunciation is pretty all over the place, generally. It happens in my Spanish, too.

As far as my style, I've unfortunately embraced the lots-of-thoughts-in-a-short-stream method. My French teacher would comment frequently that I try to say too much too quickly. I use parenthetical asides a lot in even semi-professional writing. I also use hyphenate thought streams (like in my first sentence) quite a bit.

I tend to be passive voice-averse; this is my English teachers' faults. I remember reading an article about passive voice structures fairly recently and have been even more conscious about it. It may be partly because one of my co-workers is a serial passive voice user in writing and speech; it annoys me a little because I come across her writings every day (but it's just a personal choice of mine that I try to avoid passive voice).

I rarely have short sentences, and connect my clauses fairly frequently in the most grammatical ways I can. It may be another symptom of my expressing multiple thoughts in a single stream. Equally symptomatic, it seems, is my trying to use a word in every iteration (there I go again).

I suppose that's just another part of being me, exploring what it is to be human even though I really dislike being human a good deal of the time.

BBC News: 'Justin Bieber impostor' on 931 child sex-related charges

'Justin Bieber impostor' on 931 child sex-related charges

The man posed as the singer online to gain explicit material from children, Australian police say.

Noooooo…

Seriously, this is probably the most amazing thing I've seen or heard this week.

Predation is something some people pride themselves on. "Oh, I'm an Alpha Male", even though they're really just annoying, boorish, and often ill-mannered. They pride themselves on getting the one-up on someone, or feel they can do whatever they please. I've seen posts of guys online who seem like predators, and they feel they're invincible, that no one else's feelings matter than their own satisfaction.

Then this guy decides to use the identity of another to further his goals.

It's… unfortunately a sadder side of humanity.

Expected Sensationalism?

Okay, so I'm going through my tweet stream today and saw this, a re-tweet someone I follow had done of someone he follows, who in turn had quote tweeted a news station's tweet.

Seeing this, I really wanted to reply to her. The way I'd interpreted what she'd said was that the article doesn't mention the fact the couple had arms during their campaign. I read the article and midway down it was explicit to that they did have arms.

I decided to not reply because I'd thought about it and reinterpreted it to probably mean the actual tweet contents before the link. I read what others replied and some had the same initial interpretation I did, some the second, and the rest had some other interesting things to say.

There were, of course, those who applauded the fact the couple got a conviction. This I can understand. Being passionate about a cause is something, but possibly endangering others is definitely controversial.

Some derided the couple's racism. Yes, race more than likely factored into this ("more than likely" because it's just the one article, and I haven't taken in enough information, nor was I there, for me to say "this is racist", even though it does have hallmarks of it).

Some called the ABC affiliate racist for a few reasons. The one that seemed to peek out was the headline seeming to indicate "racial slurs" as the motivating factor for the conviction. It very well could have been, and the fact the couple had arms was an aggravating factor in the severity of the conviction. They thought the station should have put the "armed" part first, or instead of, "racial slurs". I'm just receiving these facts third-hand, so I can't make that kind of judgment. Some cite the reasoning as clickbait. Either way, people are going to click on it.

There are even some who say the station is racist and is enabling others the repliers call racist to use this as ammunition for their own messages.

Some, naturally, blamed Donald Trump, because that's apparently what people do: no matter who's the president there's blame on the president. I didn't vote for him, but he's the president, and God's sovereign. I leave it up to God.

In my mind racial slurs or Confederate flags sound less sensational than guns. Maybe the birthday party part is more sensational? I don't even know. Lately I've been more taking in things without really reacting to them.

But some can't.

Stitcher Down

Sometimes it takes not having one thing to shed light on another.

I remember back when Apple first debrided their podcasts from the main iTunes app and made the separate Podcasts app.

I was a little miffed. This was back when I'd had my iPhone 3GS with limited screen space, and so one extra app would mean I would more than likely have to get rid of another app so everything would be even (I'm also very OCD in some things).

I did like its design, though, because it had this recorder reel theme under the hood that struck me as quirky and likable. The social media aspects of it, though, weren't what I was expecting. This is because I was already using Stitcher.

I'd decided to start using Stitcher on April 10, 2010 shortly after I'd moved to Georgia. This app did streaming podcasts, which meant that with my limited storage capacity (and unlimited data plan), I didn't have to worry about much and still could enjoy podcasts and my voracious appetite (especially) for news.

Sticher added more features as they went on, and so I'd put the Podcasts app to the side because it didn't do streaming of podcasts especially well under enhanced 3G conditions. I'd known Apple kept adding little things to the Podcasts app as they'd updated iOS, but I'd still not paid it an incredible amount of attention.

Then the last few days came.

Stitcher has been down for an unknown maintenance they've been doing, and to satiate my podcast thirst I've been playing around with the latest iteration of the Podcasts app on my iPhone 6 Plus (which by now ships with the Podcasts app inbuilt to iOS), and it's been pretty all right, actually. Aside from the insanely long links that occur when you want to share a podcast to social media, it's been pretty nice.

As I play around with it more, I wonder about Stitcher. I mean, I've had almost 6 years with it now, and the history function is certainly one thing I like,

Now I wait to see what Stitcher is doing with themselves.

RE: Google/Reddit Tightening Their Belts on The Explicit

Google and Reddit Tighten Their Policies Regarding Explicit Photos
http://petapixel.com/2015/02/24/google-and-reddit-tighten-their-policies-regarding-explicit-photos/

I suppose it had to happen sometime. People had long been abandoning their blogs on Blogger, or migrating them to Wordpress.

It might be partly the pornography community clamoring to the masses to stop infringing on their copyrights, sharing their "pay-for-play" content freely across the Internets. It might be partly just the users racking up immense amounts of bandwidth costs in sharing the content on these free services.

Either way, it's a "whoa boy" time for the Internet community, even though some like @cyberczar and the likes have long predicted this doom.

Grab Your Big Pouch

http://youtu.be/_-fOJgsUEPU

I had seen this commercial on live TV maybe only twice, but on Internet streaming it's popped up a little more. 

Every time I see it, I think a few things:

1) This Big Pouch Man character is quirky and pretty attractive. When he's upside-down you don't see it, but the moment he uprights himself in the back seat, you can see it, especially in the eyes.

2) His character is also kind of creepy. It almost seems they're making double-entendres with the product. This is fine, and I'd giggled. Simultaneously, is the character of the driving test guy supposed to be a teenager or an adult still living with mum? Perhaps it's that California's driving test age is

18, in which case it's "fine"?

3) The creepiness is kind of hot. 

Because the commercial is just barely kind of edgy, that might be why it's not gotten as much airtime, seemingly, on live television, but I'm glad for the Internet and it's archival of human creation, destruction, and weirdness.

2008 Vice-Presidential Candidate Debate Thoughts

I caught it a little late because my computer was defragmenting, but when I did, I was glad I stayed to watch it. It's the first thing I watched as a person newly without cable!

I liked this one better than the Presidential Candidate debate #1 because they actually interacted. They weren't (completely) hostile, though Sarah Palin sounded scripted. Glad to see she doesn't change very much, eh?

The only thing about Joe Biden is that he kept pronouncing things really... interestingly. On pronunciations, Sarah Palin says "nucular" instead of "nuclear."

I liked that they were rather light-hearted. They both smiled, and took strides with it. There were a few jabs, and even a low blow that had me going "OOOOOOOOOHHHHHHH" out loud, but it was good.

During the debate I was drawing Sarah Palin's U.S. flag pin because I liked the design. I'm a horrible artist, but it gave me a chance to test out my new (and by new I mean second-hand) graphics tablet. I like it so far. Hopefully I can develop another side of my creativity.

So, there's my horrible artwork up above! Toodles!

Ditch Your Cable Company With Free, Legal Alternatives

MakeUseOf.com: Just in case you hadn't heard of any of these...

6 alternatives to help you ditch cable television

Floppyhead - Digital Media and Home Theater Computers: I'm seriously considering it, and it comes more each day. I've been thinking about it for a while, actually. I thought about it when I'd gone to North Carolina for a weekend and realised that I'd not turned on the television once.

I realise that every weekend, when Saturdays and Sundays generally happen with the TV off. The only thing I think about now is Stargate, and it's probable I can get that on the Internet somehow as well. The Internet is the way of the future, is it not? I mean, the moment that we decide to give up our consumerism and develop ourselves instead for the sake of human improvement, we'll progress, right?

I think I'm going to do it. Sorry, Comcast. You've just lost a little revenue.

Japan's online social scene isn't so social

Yahoo! News: So I'm a rarity, then, I guess.

"Study says many dial-up users don't want broadband"

Yahoo! News: "A new study suggests that attitude rather than availability may be the key reason why more Americans don't have high-speed Internet access."

It reminds me of a delicate situation at work. The majority of those on our payroll has direct-deposit into their respective bank accounts. There are the last few hold-outs, including one of the managers, who just don't want it for one reason or another, whether traditionalism, distrust of a proven steady system, or dodging banks because they fear discovery of some debt.

I still say the Dark Ages should be left as something to recollect as a part of history, but should be left as such.

The Rather Difficult Font Game

The Rather Difficult Font Game

For those typographers who get kicks out of testing their knowledge. I didn't do that well, becauase I haven't a clue on most of the fonts listed. Seriously, it's hard.

Edible

Edible

A "weird stuff to eat" Internet shop based in London. This is seriously... interesting.

Vandalism on online epilepsy forum triggers convulsions

Wikinews: "An internet forum, run by the non-profit Epilepsy Foundation, was attacked last week by a group of vandals. The attack, first reported by Wired News, exploited a function of the forums to post JavaScript code. The code injected by the vandals flashed two images repeatedly and tried to lead users off to external websites showing flashing lights and shapes intended to trigger off epileptic fits."

Sex offenders face website bans

BBC NEWS UK : "Sex offenders' e-mail addresses are to be passed to social networking sites like Facebook and Bebo to prevent them contacting children."