KD's blag

What else were you expecting?

[nasturbate]

ahh yes the basketball. males 12+ only. nice

[sadgrl22-deactivated20150406]

Except there’s a difference between men’s basketballs and women’s basketballs because women have smaller hands women’s balls have a smaller diameter while men have larger hands and their basketballs have larger diameters

[nasturbate]

yo ok what she said my bad

[yh5-deactivated20200324]

That was the most mature dispute I have ever seen on the internet

[sittingatthetypewriter-deactiva]

Tumblr, you’ve done it.

[bcpk-deactivated20210131]

They have men’s basketballs, women’s basketballs, and youth sized basketballs. Just like they have different sized footballs for different ages.

[blueivysedges]

Equality does not mean everyone gets the same thing because we are all inherently different. Equality is recognizing differences and making sure everyone gets the same opportunity based on those differences, which isn’t always “equal”.

[zulubunsen]

A MATURE ARGUMENT ON TUMBLR

I LIKE IT

[prettybxybastard]

REBLOG THIS, YOU MAY NEVER SEE A DISPUTE THIS CALM AGAIN

[kazeshimad]

Reblogging for posterity. I was there the day a dispute was settled calmly on tumblr. And about gender equality no less!

[4-panel-life]

★ 4-Panel Life | Tumblr | Twitter | Tapastic | Facebook

[kazeshimad]

I’m nearly 30 and the haven’t quite finished the 3rd panel yet... :/

Though half this stuff is much harder for the current generation to do thanks to wages not keeping up with house prices. And who says you have to get married?! Live however the hell you want, if you find a cool person to live with, not being married isn’t going to stop them being cool nor is it going to stop them living with you.

Life is for living, not for ticking boxes!

[kazeshimad]

My 2 pence: TF2 vs Overwatch

I’ve had some time to sit down and have a decent look at some of the media for Overwatch, and considering there’s been quite a lot of “TF2 is dead, Overwatch will take over” talk around, I thought I’d throw my 2 pence in.

Communities surround games come and go. Some stay around forever, some disappear quite quickly. I used to play/be obsessed with an FPS called Urban Terror. The graphics were nothing to write home about and there wasn’t a system like VAC to keep out cheaters, but the core gameplay was great and there was a sizeable community around it. Then the developers released a new update that was incompatible with the prior version, that didn’t have all the options server operators wanted, and the community got fractured due to all the new players downloading the latest version and the majority of the existing community wanting to stay on the old version. It was around that time that I jumped ship and came over to TF2 - partially due to the dwindling number of servers and partly due to quitting my clan in disgust at the leader, but that’s a story for another day.

I was quite late to the game in coming over to TF2, I’ve only been playing it for a year or so now but I feel I’ve finally gotten used to the class-based aspect of it (Urban Terror wasn’t class based). Thinking about various playstyles, I think TF2′s nine classes have it about covered, with some variation through loadouts. Overwatch’s fourteen seems a tad excessive, especially when there are overlaps, such as between Mercy and Zenyatta’s healing abilities, or Torbjorn and Symmetra’s turrets. Now if it were me, I’d say just customise core classes with different items or weapons, but then you’re essentially recreating TF2 and increasing the number of configurations you need to balance. I don’t know yet if there will be different weapons for each class in Overwatch, but in some ways I hope not - sometimes I feel like weapon choice in TF2 can be irritating, such as when you switch to a weapon because it’s effective for the particular situation you’re struggling with. I generally prefer to use the stock weapons.

So what about visuals? In many ways Overwatch is similar in aesthetic to TF2 but obviously much more up to date in terms of graphical fidelity. Do I care? No. I usually drop textures quite low for the purpose of either framerate (I’m on a laptop at the moment because I’ll be travelling soon) or to make the player models stand out better against the background. I can see where Blizzard are going with the style of the characters but same as the rest of the graphics, it doesn’t really matter to me. Core gameplay is all I care about - is it fun to play? Will I want to play for hours on end?

I guess that’s what it comes down to in the whole “is TF2 dying and will Overwatch take over” debate - if TF2 is still fun to people, it won’t die. Not unless Overwatch manages to steal TF2′s playerbase by being more fun, or unless Valve do something stupid/let it rot.

That said, Valve could do with paying it a bit more attention in my opinion. I’d like to see some more quality core maps etc. I’ve heard rumblings about porting to Source 2, and if they do, they best beware the pitfalls of incompatible versions with differences in functionality like what happened with Urban Terror. Improve performance and leave the rest alone!

[kazeshimad]

Assembled a bit of flat-pack furniture today, it was oddly satisfying :P

Maybe because it’s like lego for adults?

(apologies for potato quality photo, I couldn’t be bothered to do anything more than snap a pic with my phone :P)

[kazeshimad]

5 posts!

Woo I am in a special club according to tumblr!

[kazeshimad]

The government thinks we’re all stupid... and they’re probably right.

I was out in the car today with the radio on - the actual radio as in FM, as opposed to my usual mix of MP3s (not my car so it was radio or nothing, personally I dislike commerical radio) - and an advert from a government department came on regarding motorcyclists and speed. The final line of it was “Motorcyclists - think. Don’t go too fast.”

Now if I’m honest I didn’t really catch the content of the ad prior to that final line as I wasn’t really paying attention to the radio, but that doesn’t really matter as even if it was addressing a specific issue, there are really only two ways to ride a bike on regular roads:

Like any other vehicle, in lane or overtaking

Lane splitting/filtering

For point 1, you should be within the speed limit (OK so most people go a bit over but you get the point) or overtaking in a safe manner. For point 2, unless you’re filtering in say, heavy/standstill traffic on the motorway where there is no chance of some idiot pedestrian dashing between cars or any side roads from which to be surprised, then you shouldn’t really be going very fast at all, and even in standstill motorway traffic you should still be proceeding with caution.

So in essence that advert is saying “Hey, don’t be a fucking idiot.”. Are people really that dumb that they need to be told that their speed is too high for a given situation, instead of using common sense? Apparently the government thinks so, and unfortunately they are more than likely right - adverts like that are usually a response to an issue that needs to be addressed or a statistic that’s gotten too bad. That, and some of the stupidity I witness even on my short trips in the local area make me nod in assent to the notion.

Maybe we should add a common sense test as a requirement to getting a license, as the current hazard perception test clearly isn’t enough!

[kazeshimad]

Why we need compulsory driving test retakes for the elderly

The ranting part

Today seems to be a fine day for a Sunday drive... except that it’s Friday. The roads seem to be full of incompetent elderly drivers. Well, there was a young incompetent driver who tried to pull out on me too (and got up my arse for a while after I made a hand gesture that he should look properly :D), but it’s mostly been elderly drivers that have been the source of frustration and worry for me today..

Don’t get me wrong though, I have nothing against older people being on the roads and I’m trying not to generalise but of numerous people who I spotted today having trouble with basic maneuvers, every single one of them had grey hair. :D

Here’s a quick rundown of some of the awesome skills on display today:

Turning really slowly onto a ramp in a multi-storey carpark because they didn’t position themselves correctly and were close to the wall.

Stopping at the top of the same ramp due to traffic coming from the right, causing me to have to stop on the middle of the ramp. Stupid of me, yes? No, the oncoming traffic from the right has to yield, as clearly marked with bright paint, so he should’ve kept going.

Turning against the arrows painted on the road surface in the same car park and looking confused when he came face-to-face with an understandably irate driver.

Drifting out from a side road onto the main heavily-trafficked road in front of me at the last moment, then slowing right down because he immediately wanted to pull over to go to the shop on the side of the road.

It’s just lack of awareness, and it’s not just annoying, it’s dangerous. That last point about drifting out in front of me - I actually had to brake quite hard to not run into the back of him. Not quite emergency stop levels of braking but the front of my car was dipping quite a bit - and I was only doing 30mph. I’d assumed he was pulling across the other lane as it was completely clear, and was going to pull in behind me, as again, it was completely clear behind me. But no, he was expecting me to yield. Good thing I had the brakes covered.

Now I’m not one for using my horn or flipping people off, in fact I can’t remember the last time I did that to another driver - instead I usually just chunter away to myself in the car about incompetent idiots - but this time I couldn’t help myself; I beeped my horn and flipped him off as I drove past. Why? Because the damn doddery old fool could’ve caused an accident. He’s lucky I was in a little hatchback and wasn’t one of the aggregate-carrying tens-of-tons lorries that use that road all day every day.

The “If it were down to me I’d make it a rule that...” part

Currently, drivers in the UK have to reapply for their driving licence every 3 years after they turn 70. However, the requirements don’t appear to be that stringent - you only have to "meet the minimum eyesight requirement“ - fair enough, we all do - and the only other proviso is “you aren’t prevented from driving for any reason“. Bear in mind, there is no actual test or assessment for this licence renewal - you can complete it online and there are plenty of drivers who don’t declare their medical conditions - conditions that may very well affect their fitness to operate a vehicle.

So if it were down to me, I’d make it compulsory for a hazard perception/reaction time test, a (perhaps reduced) driving theory test and a physical exam to be taken every couple of years for those over 60 or 65. Reaction times/general awareness are particularly important. In fact, my grandmother gave up driving voluntarily in her early seventies because she felt that there was too much going on on the roads and she didn’t feel safe driving as it was beginning to feel overwhelming. Good on her for doing this, it’s the absolutely right thing to do. It’s not like she’s getting “old” in the mental sense either - this is a lady who is approaching 80 yet still very sharp minded, who does her grocery shopping and banking online, and took to Windows 8.1 in a matter of weeks. (I know some people in their early-mid twenties whose understanding of computers and technology isn’t half as good)

Unfortunately though, there are far too many out there that believe it is their right to be on the road, and don’t give a damn about the safety of other road users. There are others for whom their car is their only way of getting out and about and I do feel sorry for them - losing your independence can’t be pleasant.

Self-driving cars can’t come fast enough.

[kazeshimad]

idk why but that little cloud of dust amuses me :3

[kazeshimad]

This is why you don’t cripple machines relying on integrated graphics with single channel RAM.

Performed on an i5-5200U.

[kazeshimad]

Modern laptops are fantasticrap

What do I mean by fantasticrap? Well, they’re simultaneously fantastic and crap at the same time. Example: I bought a new laptop - a Toshiba Satellite (L50-B-235 to be exact) a week or so ago.

What’s fantastic about it?

It has the latest Intel Broadwell i5 in it, so it sips power (the power brick is smaller than my mouse - the computer variety) whilst simultaneously being pretty quick and running fairly cool even under heavy load - such as gaming.

It has enough graphics oomph to cater to my light gaming needs (TF2, MC, ETS2, SpeedRunners etc).

It has plenty of storage and ports.

It has Miracast, Intel Wi-Di, 802.11ac and Bluetooth.

It’s pretty thin and light for a non-ultrabook class laptop.

So what about the “crap” part?

Well this is not so much a complaint about this specific laptop, but more about laptops in general. Yes, this is only a £450 laptop, so decidedly mid-range, but the following points are valid for the majority of laptops that aren’t super high-end. (ie: the laptops your average man/woman on the street buy)

The screen is still 1366x768. We’ve been stuck with this resolution forever. There are phones out there with quad HD. 1366x768 is NOT acceptable for a 15.6 inch screen in this day and age, but it’s really difficult to find a laptop with even 1920x1080.

Screens are almost always glossy. Seriously, fuck you. I hate glossy screens. If the light is bright, I can’t see shit. Some more expensive laptops have matte finish screens, but I can’t imagine a matte finish is more expensive than glossy.

5400RPM HDD. OK, so not everything is going to have an SSD in it, as they are much more expensive per GB than traditional spinning rust, but you can get a 2.5 inch 7200RPM drive for the same price as a 5400RPM one. GIVE ME 7200RPM AT LEAST! Data access speeds are what chokes a system these days. I remember going from a 5400RPM HDD to midrange Samsung SSD - it made a moderately fast-loading laptop (i5-2410M, 2x4GB RAM) have the ability to load multiple programs near-instantly. So 5400->7200 isn’t going to be as drastic an improvement, but it’s still an improvement in responsiveness nonetheless.

Single channel RAM. This last point really grinds my gears. Especially if you’re using integrated graphics like I am - having dual channel improves frame rates quite a bit. 2x4GB can’t really be that much more expensive than 1x8GB but it’s the latter that Toshiba deigned to install in my machine - and I see this practice rife elsewhere too. I upgraded my machine with another stick of identical RAM to what was in there before, and in a synthentic test (I know, I know, it’s not a real world example but it’s the easiest way to get reliably reproducible numbers) - Unigine Valley - there was a 36.25% increase in FPS.

Aside from the screen resolution, all of the above points seem like they could be resolved at little or no additional cost to the manufacturer. Why wouldn’t they put dual channel RAM in and a 7200RPM HDD? It’ll make their laptop faster than their competitors’ offerings that have the same CPU.

So yeah, modern laptops are fantastic because they’re light and thin and fast and have stacks of storage but parts of the spec sheet are from a decade ago.

Step your game up, manufacturers!