maltyr

I think the other thing is the older generation are of the opinion that a steady paycheck is somehow safer than owning your own company, mostly because most of them never sat in the other side of the table.

This leads to them pushing their kids to be employees even though that's...really contradictory to their actual lived experience.

This is the business model for most of the large gaming companies at this point.

Activision had three or four studios dedicated to Call of Duty leapfrogging each other to release one every year. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty)

Their last (2022, pre-acquisition) annual reports literally spell that out.

For example, in 2022, revenues associated with our three franchises—Call of Duty, Warcraft, and Candy Crush —collectively accounted for approximately 79% of our net revenues—and a significantly higher percentage of our operating income. We expect that a relatively limited number of popular franchises will continue to produce a disproportionately high percentage of our revenues and profits. - https://investor.activision.com/annual-reports

How, then, do contrails stack up in terms of total warming? They contribute roughly 2% to the world’s effective radiative forcing; tackling them would reduce that by a similar amount.

Perfect time to revisit the Futurama episode where Fry realizes he's rich. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JwkaLt9pf8

If we're only in the realm of video games, Nintendo has some of the highest prices for their games, and rarely drop below half price. This does factor in somewhat, since their games (assuming you get a physical version) maintain their value better.

I think Nintendo should include a few months of free online play for their flagship titles with Nintendo Online service. The fact that all online activity is basically gated to a monthly subscription is one of the few things I dislike as a consumer about Nintendo's product strategy.

If we're going across different "entertainment" forms, I would argue the cheapest form of entertainment is probably football, aka soccer, or something similar as that just requires a ball.

Small correction - Switch 2 MSRP is $449.99. 80/450 = 17.77%

Also, the SNES and N64 both cost $200 on launch. SNES and N64 games cost $60 on launch. 60/200 = 30%.

In the last 3 lines on the right-side of the graphic.

Fig. 2: Environmental architecture of mortality in the UKB.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-024-03483-9/figures/2

I'm pretty surprised they found *correlations between mortality and supplementation. I wonder how they can separate that from socioeconomic status.

Also, I understand why they tested multi-vitamins and fish oil, but I wonder why they asked about glucosamine?

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10346535/

Numerous studies have concluded that honey does have a better effect on health than the same amount of simple syrup, at least.

It has been demonstrated that honey consumption can influence plasma lipid, glucose, and insulin levels through different biochemical mechanisms. The decrease in blood glucose may be due to the fact that honey has a stimulatory effect on insulin secretion and improves insulin sensitivity

The article addresses this.

My first thought was to work remotely and use the 90 days permitted by the tourist visa. Yet working in Japan on this visa is a gray zone at best and a practice I would stay away from. In fact, the US Embassy in Japan strictly advises against this:

Persons found working illegally are subject to arrest and deportation.

Persons believed to be entering Japan without a working visa but who intend to work here can be denied entry into Japan. This means that you will not exit the airport and will be required to return directly to the U.S.

In my experience, ONE thing will cause a game to trend towards toxicity - higher stakes. The more "important" the win or loss feels to the player, the more toxicity shows up.

It's pretty easy to filter out "toxic" games if you filter out anything which has a ranked mode and is not designed to be played infinitely.

Unfortunately, games in the online era have trended in that direction, because they are the most profitable.

For example, some variables that affect toxicity: - competitiveness, often implemented by sort of ranked system, but also just any sort of head-to-head competition. Tournaments and betting will do this as well. - longer investment (via playtimes, either of a single "run" or in total) - people won't get mad at a 5-10 minute game as much as a 1 hour game. Games as a service like MMOs where people have 1000s of hours of playtime are the extreme end of this. - punishing gameplay, where a mistake can cause you to lose a lot of progress (Hardcore modes where dying means you have to restart your character, for example) - tone (casual vs serious tone, e.g. Fall Guys vs Call of Duty) - More serious generally results in more toxicity.

Adjusting these variables can even turn a single player game into a toxic one (e.g. self-imposed challenges/achievements, Dark Souls, Jump King or Getting Over It).

Similarly, you can lower the stakes so that the gameplay doesn't devolve into toxicity, even with multiplayer (e.g. Animal Crossing)

I have wondered if the act of passing personal accountability for retirement to individuals is part of the cause of the housing affordability crisis.

I'm basing this on the assumption that, when given the option of "making ends meet" today and saving for retirement, most people put off retirement savings. If enough people do this, prices will stabilize on a 0% savings rate - basically paycheck-to-paycheck.

This assumption combined with the American mentality of treating homeownership as an investment means that people often take on as much housing costs as they can.

A quick search led me to this review, which has a number of studies linked in references, including a few that studied humans.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9885170/

Quote from the abstract: The direct consequences of MPs and NPs on the thyroid, testis, and ovaries are documented. Still, studies need to be carried out to identify the direct effects of MPs and NPs on the hypothalamus, pituitary, and adrenal glands.

I'm already getting personalized spam mail that's probably powered by AI ("use this API" type marketing in my work email.) I'm okay with this, even if I find it a little unsettling.

I think the dystopian future we're heading towards is personalized phishing and/or scams that sends to your hijacked accounts' contacts that you're going through a hard time and requesting donations, using training data from crowdfunding sites.

Or, one-level more dystopian, hijacking social media accounts and advertising AI-generated Patreon-style content using the actual account owner's likeness.

Other hormones don't get the same treatment. I'm not sure why only melatonin is treated as a dietary supplement when the other hormones are not.

For example, you can't get testosterone or epinephrine, over the counter. Maybe the only other hormones that are as readily available as melatonin are birth control pills, but those are considered pharmaceuticals, and regulated as such.

And those studies suggest that melatonin plays a critical part in your circadian rhythm, which kind of implies that adding it to your food would also screw with your circadian rhythm. That alone seems like a good enough reason to caution against adding it into the food supply.

Additionally, there are receptors for melatonin in a number of systems in the body, and we don't have much knowledge on what those receptors do.

I'm not sure we should cover our food in melatonin. People would recoil at the thought of pretty much any other hormone being added to our food supply.

It's strange to me how Melatonin is so uncontrolled in usage, dosage, etc., despite being a hormone.

The article suggests it's safer than current food additives, but I find that statement questionable. We don't understand the full effect of Melatonin on the human body, so I don't know how you can make that conclusion.

I'm not convinced on this - with a large enough student base (e.g. most state schools), I think it's possible to find peers that would have excelled even at top 5 universities. Similarly, at top tier colleges, you can find people who don't really perform to the expected level and coast along.

You stand out by being a top performer, and will attract other top performers as long as you search them out. Also, in those scenarios, professors will give you more attention, because you are a better student and more enthusiastic than most of your peers.

Perhaps if you are a true prodigy, you might need a top-tier program to reach your full potential... at that point your peers are the professors and high-performing graduate students, but for most students, I think there are pros and cons for being in a top 5 vs a top 50 program.

Games actively train a player's "skill". I define the player's skill as the player's ability to use the mechanics in the game to meet the challenge the game is presenting.

The way to make a game more replayable, then, boils down to 3 things:

1) Make the game more challenging. This forces the player to change their approach to problems (because their old solution no longer works)

Multi-agent games do this by having a variety of opponents.

Single-player games do this by ramping up the difficulty, generally by making the execution requirements tighter. More complexity, or less leeway for mistakes.

Leaderboard-type games do this by using a "best score" as the goal. (e.g. Rhythm games, racing games, etc.)

2) Adding and/or removing mechanics that force the player to change their approach to problems. Again, this is either because the old solution doesn't work, or you must use the new mechanic in the solution.

3) Add randomness, mimicking either of the above. (e.g. Roguelikes/lites, deckbuilders, etc.)

There's also the possibility of extending play-ability by "creating new content". I think this isn't really "re"playability, since the generated content hasn't been "played" before, but procedurally-generated content and sandbox games have this sort of code-generated-novelty-as-replayability.

I rarely use absolutes, but I don't think "tough love" is the solution to anything, if your goal is to truly help the person you are applying "tough love" to.

As long as there's a thread of trust between the caregiver and the shut-in, you have access/influence with them, and they can be rehabilitated, under the right circumstances.

A safer option might be to completely change their environment, but stay supportive, in order to break any entrained behavior connected to being a shut-in. Might be difficult to achieve this in Japan, though.

If you delete that remaining thread of trust by applying "tough love," they will be forced to face the trauma that they could not before, but without any support.

Perhaps some small fraction might "survive" that ordeal, but it's not exactly setting them up for long-term success.

I do think many parents have no idea how to handle a dependent in that situation. The worst case scenario is when parents have also "given up" on their child ever recovering/improving - those situations need intervention from an outside party.

EDIT: I'd define "tough love" as actions done with the intent of "helping" someone, but with wanton disregard to that someone's health.

This is pretty much my take on it as well.

Once you hit adulthood, most able-bodied, able-minded people are expected to be "contributing members of society". But that definition is pretty nebulous - it doesn't have to be society's definition - whatever you set to be your own expectations for success. If you repeatedly fail to meet those standards you set for yourself, it can cause you to turn this feeling of pain and frustration from failure inwards, towards yourself.

At some point, you simply withdraw entirely, because you are afraid of feeling the pain of failure that you trained yourself to associate with attempting to meet your goals.

This is often compounded by well-meaning people trying to shame you into doing something: "You can't live like this! You HAVE to get a job!" - sort of "support" from family members or friends.

Or, they might throw blame: "Why don't you work harder? Stop wasting your time doing nothing!"

I think this may be a significant factor on why this symptom appears much more common in Japan, a mono-cultural society with very high expectations to conform. Also perhaps why it's growing overall, as the general prospects for younger people seem to be worse than the previous generation across most developed countries.

However, I don't think you can treat the chemistry to "fix" social withdrawal. I believe it's linked to other mental health issues, like depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem. Treating those issues, primarily through therapy, is required first, before working on fixing social withdrawal, which at that point should be straightforward.

I might be reading into the previous poster's comment more than originally intended, but basically, most US textbooks, are basically written for use by US public schools. They are effectively being paid for by public money, because the only customer buying those textbooks are public schools funded by public money.

For the years ended March 31, 2020 and 2019, K-12 traditional print represented 59% ($353 million) and 63% ($357 million) of total K-12 revenue, respectively.

In the K-12 market in the United States,...We sell our learning solutions directly to school districts across the United States.

This is less true at the university level, since students typically have to pay for their own textbooks, but scholarships, grants, and loans, and other public money sources that go to students are used to cover those costs.

Source: McGraw Hill's 2020 Annual Report https://www.annualreports.com/HostedData/AnnualReports/PDF/N...

I recommend starting with reading The Body Keeps Score by Bessel van der Kolk. It gives a good "state of the field" with regards to therapy. See if any of the forms of therapy described there resonates with you

It may take a few therapists before you come across someone you feel you can build a good relationship with. You also need to fully commit to the therapy - a therapist can only take you so far, otherwise.

Personally, I did not find CBT all that helpful for dealing with known traumas. I did find Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy resonated with me, which I discovered through that book.

For me, the common usage of the terms "training" and "working" are not the same. In most jobs, we perform a lot of "working," or applying known patterns, and very little "training," or learning new patterns.

Pro sports is flipped, and often each week the athletes are learning new tactics/counter-tactics based on their opponent, or adjusting their existing patterns to perfection, or grinding out exercise routines to be able to demand more from their body. Drills are required to "train" their body into being able to do these routines reliably on-demand, and new exercise routines are often the best at forcing your body to adapt and grow.

That said, even pro-athletes have rest periods once the season is over. Also, many of them incorporate rest into training routines as well. An NFL player usually will rest after game day for 1 or 2 days.

They're a part of the affiliate program, and they are price tracking, so I would say they have implicit permission, or else they would have been long kicked off of the affiliate program.

I recall reading that the reason CamelCamelCamel is permitted is because they ONLY price track Amazon (vs tracking multiple retailers), but I can't recall where that came from.

just a total guess on my part, but they are basically inserting themselves in between a game and a stream.

the product might also be targeted to be acquired by any of the market players, but i can't see anyone outside of twitch and mixer (being a microsoft product) would be interested.

maybe they will have access to their own set of gaming stream content, which allows them to be an streaming platform in general, which would allow them to be a competitor to twitch/mixer.

also... "selling" access streamers (i.e. the streamers are the content and advertisers/publishers can reach them through rainway), so more of a complementary product to the streaming sites.

there's also the alternative of having premium services on a subscription model. most likely idea here would be some sort of premium model that bumps you higher up in content discovery somehow, or just free games.