Choo choo! All aboard the Complain Train!

Xprimentyl

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It's cold, snowy and icy in North Texas, and for some reason, they decided to interrupt regularly scheduled programming for HOURS on several channels to constantly remind us. I had to miss Let's Make A Deal and The Price Is Right (my pick-me-up for the morning) to be told over and over, by the same people, that roads are bad and stay home. They ran out of material after about 8 minutes hours ago, and have been repeating themselves ever since. Oh, one field reporter took the time to wipe off a picnic table to show us how deep the snow was. That IS breaking news. Thanks for repeatedly telling me what one glance out my window did at 7am.
 
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Dalisclock

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It's cold, snowy and icy in North Texas, and for some reason, they decided to interrupt regularly scheduled programming for HOURS on several channels to constantly remind us. I had to miss Let's Make A Deal and The Price Is Right (my pick-me-up for the morning) to be told over and over, by the same people, that roads are bad and stay home. They ran out of material after about 8 minutes hours ago, and have been repeating themselves ever since. Oh, one field reporter took the time to wipe off a picnic table to show us how deep the snow was. That IS breaking news. Thanks for repeatedly telling me what one glance out my window did at 7am.
Hope you guys don't lose power and heat again.
 

Xprimentyl

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Hope you guys don't lose power and heat again.
Thanks, friend. *Knock on wood* (pun intended,) we've got plenty of wood this time, so in the the event of an outage, we'll at least be warm, and temps aren't supposed to stay this low for as long as last time.
 

Dirty Hipsters

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I have been trying to get my new house painted for several weeks now.

The company told me that they were going to send out a crew of 3 last Wednesday and told me that the painting would be done in 3 days. On Wednesday I went over to the house to let them in (I haven't moved in yet because I was waiting for all of the repairs to be done, including painting). I waited for an hour on Wednesday with no one showing up, call the company and am told that they rescheduled for Friday.

Rescheduled with who? I'M THE OWNER OF THE HOUSE AND THE ONLY CONTACT YOU HAVE.

Fine, they get there on Friday, I let them in and they do their thing covering the floor, sanding the walls and baseboards, etc. Then they ask me where the paint is. They were supposed to buy the paint. I had paid for them to buy the paint and had sent over the color codes 2 weeks prior. The paint was supposed to have been bought on Wednesday. Welp, can't paint will be back on Monday.

They arrive on Monday and get to work. I don't have time to babysit them. I give them the door code (my door has electronic locks) and tell them to lock up after themselves and to let themselves in the next morning. I show up on Wednesday night and it looks like all they've done is paint the primer. It's already been 3 days, everything was supposed to be done, but they've barely started. I show up on Thursday in the middle of the day and find the house only half painted and only one guy working. I ask him where the other 2 workers are. He doesn't know, he tells me he worked alone all day Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday. There are things he cannot do on his own, like paint behind the fridge.

I call the company and ask what the fuck. They tell me a bunch of their workers came down with COVID. I ask why they didn't tell me OR THEIR SINGLE EMPLOYEE WORKING AT MY HOUSE. Either they're lying and just using COVID as an excuse for their bad planning and management or they really don't give enough of a shit about their employees to inform them that they may have been exposed. The poor guy working at my house didn't know until I told him, and he went to get tested. They promised they would send more people over. My house currently only has 1 coat of paint, they still need to do an entire second coat. I was planning on moving in on Saturday and they still have to paint THE ENTIRE HOUSE AGAIN.

I have now made 2 mortgage payments on a house I still haven't moved into yet. None of these were supposed to be major repairs. What was supposed to take a week total is going to take a month. Everyone is incompetent, I want to scream.
 

Baffle

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I have been trying to get my new house painted for several weeks now.

The company told me that they were going to send out a crew of 3 last Wednesday and told me that the painting would be done in 3 days. On Wednesday I went over to the house to let them in (I haven't moved in yet because I was waiting for all of the repairs to be done, including painting). I waited for an hour on Wednesday with no one showing up, call the company and am told that they rescheduled for Friday.

Rescheduled with who? I'M THE OWNER OF THE HOUSE AND THE ONLY CONTACT YOU HAVE.

Fine, they get there on Friday, I let them in and they do their thing covering the floor, sanding the walls and baseboards, etc. Then they ask me where the paint is. They were supposed to buy the paint. I had paid for them to buy the paint and had sent over the color codes 2 weeks prior. The paint was supposed to have been bought on Wednesday. Welp, can't paint will be back on Monday.

They arrive on Monday and get to work. I don't have time to babysit them. I give them the door code (my door has electronic locks) and tell them to lock up after themselves and to let themselves in the next morning. I show up on Wednesday night and it looks like all they've done is paint the primer. It's already been 3 days, everything was supposed to be done, but they've barely started. I show up on Thursday in the middle of the day and find the house only half painted and only one guy working. I ask him where the other 2 workers are. He doesn't know, he tells me he worked alone all day Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday. There are things he cannot do on his own, like paint behind the fridge.

I call the company and ask what the fuck. They tell me a bunch of their workers came down with COVID. I ask why they didn't tell me OR THEIR SINGLE EMPLOYEE WORKING AT MY HOUSE. Either they're lying and just using COVID as an excuse for their bad planning and management or they really don't give enough of a shit about their employees to inform them that they may have been exposed. The poor guy working at my house didn't know until I told him, and he went to get tested. They promised they would send more people over. My house currently only has 1 coat of paint, they still need to do an entire second coat. I was planning on moving in on Saturday and they still have to paint THE ENTIRE HOUSE AGAIN.

I have now made 2 mortgage payments on a house I still haven't moved into yet. None of these were supposed to be major repairs. What was supposed to take a week total is going to take a month. Everyone is incompetent, I want to scream.
Yeah, this is a pretty good summary of why I do all the work myself. I might cut corners and I might fuck stuff up, but I know what those bits are, why I did it, and what the effect might be. You just can't rely on people when there's no repercussions of failure for them.
 
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Dirty Hipsters

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Yeah, this is a pretty good summary of why I do all the work myself. I might cut corners and I might fuck stuff up, but I know what those bits are, why I did it, and what the effect might be. You just can't rely on people when there's no repercussions of failure for them.
A lot of the work that had to be done was fixing issues that the previous owner created when he DIYed it. He thought of himself as quite the handyman but he fucked up everything he touched.

I would have just done the painting myself, however my house has high ceilings. REALLY high ceilings. Like 18 feet. So it's actually really hard to do the painting myself. Basically the only part I'm doing myself is the bathrooms because the ceilings are of a reasonable height.
 
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Xprimentyl

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Maybe you could start a fire and defrost... oh, wait.
I see the irony was not lost on you either. I was I able to chisel a few logs free, but in typical Texas fashion, we're supposed to be back in the 70s by Friday, and our full cord of wood will go largely unused for months. Murphey's law: the more prepared we get, the less severe the reality we have to deal with. Maybe I'll give up receiving blowjobs for Lent since that's the game the gods want to play...
 

EvilRoy

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Where I live the weather has been swinging wildly from about 5 C above to 25 C below 0, with a significant windchill taking it to nearly 40 below. This has been happening week to week with the worst swing having taken place in one day, starting at -27 and ending at +5.5.

You would think this would be nice, average low temps here hold steady at around -25 this time of year, but the swing is destroying everyone. Going from warm to cold coats everything in several cm of ice and it feels horrible because you got used to the warm weather. Going cold to warm soaks everything and everyone with even mild allergies to pollen or mold experiences symptoms like a day flu.

This used to happen like once a year, but this is our third or fourth swing and Feb has only just started.
 

The Rogue Wolf

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I've been suffering from what feels like tendonitis in my right hand for the last three weeks, and as both my job and my primary hobby require the use of a mouse and keyboard, it's both an ongoing annoyance and a difficult issue to solve.

Where I live the weather has been swinging wildly from about 5 C above to 25 C below 0, with a significant windchill taking it to nearly 40 below. This has been happening week to week with the worst swing having taken place in one day, starting at -27 and ending at +5.5.

You would think this would be nice, average low temps here hold steady at around -25 this time of year, but the swing is destroying everyone. Going from warm to cold coats everything in several cm of ice and it feels horrible because you got used to the warm weather. Going cold to warm soaks everything and everyone with even mild allergies to pollen or mold experiences symptoms like a day flu.

This used to happen like once a year, but this is our third or fourth swing and Feb has only just started.
I know this feel. We've been swinging between 38 and -7 degrees F over this week, and wild swings like that absolutely obliterate me.
 

Gergar12

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Even if I think it's healthy for our democracy, I am somewhat annoyed that congress can't trade stocks(edit: in the future) right as there were stock trading bots that tell you which member of congress traded which stock.

Disclaimer I have brought a little bit of the Roblox right around when Pelosi brought it, but this will absolutely make our democracy healthier.
 
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Kyrian007

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I've been suffering from what feels like tendonitis in my right hand for the last three weeks, and as both my job and my primary hobby require the use of a mouse and keyboard, it's both an ongoing annoyance and a difficult issue to solve.


I know this feel. We've been swinging between 38 and -7 degrees F over this week, and wild swings like that absolutely obliterate me.
Yeah, we went last week from lows around 5 to highs around 25... to this week with lows around 35 and highs around 60. And I have a deformed foot, a little luckier than complete club foot... but not particularly normal bone structure. And as much scar tissue as skin covering it. The changes in temps make the bones ache, changes in humidity (not to mention all the salt sand melt getting into it) causes the scar tissue to dry and crack.

And the tendonitis, I've only come up with immobility as helping it to clear up. For gaming, I switch to something turn based or slower and less repetitive button pressing... and definitely a controller rather than mouse and keyboard. As for work, using up vacation is the only thing I can do. As a bonus though, any kind of travel lessens my gaming too.
 
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Gordon_4

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That'd be much appreciated; thank you. Just looked it up; I've seen a few touring car races, so am definitely interested.

Unfortunately, here in the states, if you're not some stereotypically "good ol' boy, redneck" motorsport like NASCAR or drag racing, you don't get much broadcast love. I think I've seen maybe one or two F2 race broadcasts over the years, and it's frustrating because the lower Formula tiers are where drivers graduate from when they enter F1, and I'd like to be able to follow their careers. As it stands for me, new guys just "show up" one day in F1, and I hear the commentators talk about how well they did in F2 and F3, and I'm none the wiser; I get the likes of Yuki Tsunoda who often seems like he doesn't know what he's doing in an F1 car, and it's not fair to him that I hadn't seen his body of work that earned him his F1 seat.
A bit late on the reply, but I think it is possible for you to stream the Australian V8 Supercar races outside the country. Instructions here: https://www.supercars.com/superview/
 

Bob_McMillan

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I've been working towards saving up for a PC since I entered high school, now I more or less have enough money and and will be starting my career soon. And yet I feel like there are no games I even care about anymore. The FPS games I would play with my friends have crawled into their graves. I see other groups of friends maintaining their friendships over gaming, but all they play are F2P crap or MMOs or MOBAs. Most Triple A games these days look like boring carbon copies with monetization crammed into them till they're bursting.

Maybe indie games will be my savior. I mostly stay away from them since I don't really see them as worth my measly funds, but with a job I hope spending indie game money won't be that big of a deal anymore.
 
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Drathnoxis

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International Copyright law sucks big time and all anime reviews on youtube could be taken down at any time now. Suede's Pokemon reviews was just shut down, and he has no recourse.

 

Xprimentyl

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I've been working towards saving up for a PC since I entered high school, now I more or less have enough money and and will be starting my career soon. And yet I feel like there are no games I even care about anymore. The FPS games I would play with my friends have crawled into their graves. I see other groups of friends maintaining their friendships over gaming, but all they play are F2P crap or MMOs or MOBAs. Most Triple A games these days look like boring carbon copies with monetization crammed into them till they're bursting.

Maybe indie games will be my savior. I mostly stay away from them since I don't really see them as worth my measly funds, but with a job I hope spending indie game money won't be that big of a deal anymore.
I feel you there. Going back to the launch of the Xbox One, I was really excited, even made the midnight launch and had my One plugged in by 1am that evening. Then the whole generation happened, and to say I've lost interest is a bit of an understatement. 1.) I've got less time to play games, and 2.) very little of them even interest me anymore, at least not enough to break my back trying to hunt down a $500 console that still isn't readily available almost a year and a half after it's launch. My girlfriend's ex-husband somehow managed to track down an Xbox Series X a few weeks ago for their son, and I couldn't care less. I haven't even SEEN it. I bought him Halo Infinite for Christmas; do you know that is the first Halo title I've not gotten for myself on launch day since Halo 3? I haven't even watched their son play it; I care that little.

And it's sad, because gaming used to be a huge part of my life, and now, I almost resent it. For the investment, I shouldn't have to dig through miles of shit to find reasons that justify the purchase. I'll probably get an Series X or PS5 at some point when they're available and cheaper than $500, but if that doesn't happen, I won't be mad.
 
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Dirty Hipsters

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I'm having the painters come back again to fix their splotchy paint job from last week. What was supposed to take 3 days of painting is 3 weeks at this point.

I've moved in now though, and will actually be there to watch them work this time, and they aren't leaving until the job is finished to my liking. I'm sick of dealing with them and them bouncing before I've had a chance to inspect their work and having to call them back constantly.

It's going to be annoying for them to work with the furniture there now but that's their problem. They had all the time in the world to finish the work while the house was empty. I delayed moving in to make it easier for them under the assumption they'd be able to get the work done quicker, but I'm out of courtesy now.
 
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Bob_McMillan

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I'm having the painters come back again to fix their splotchy paint job from last week. What was supposed to take 3 days of painting is 3 weeks at this point.

I've moved in now though, and will actually be there to watch them work this time, and they aren't leaving until the job is finished to my liking. I'm sick of dealing with them and them bouncing before I've had a chance to inspect their work and having to call them back constantly.

It's going to be annoying for them to work with the furniture there now but that's their problem. They had all the time in the world to finish the work while the house was empty. I delayed moving in to make it easier for them under the assumption they'd be able to get the work done quicker, but I'm out of courtesy now.
When I was a kid and our family was moving into the first house we built, we moved in maybe a month before the construction was actually finished. We'd wake up in the morning to go to school surrounded by workers. Apparently its a common tactic by homeowners to pressure the contractor into finishing up, since "delays" are far too common. Hope it works out for you like it did for us.
 

XsjadoBlayde

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AI making people more trustworthy than actual people


Artificial intelligence can create such realistic human faces that people can’t distinguish them from real faces – and they actually trust the fake faces more.

Fictional, computer-generated human faces are so convincing they can fool even trained observers. They can be easily downloaded online and used for internet scams and fake social media profiles.

“We should be concerned because these synthetic faces are incredibly effective for nefarious purposes, for things like revenge porn or fraud, for example,” says Sophie Nightingale at Lancaster University in the UK.


AI programs called generative adversarial networks, or GANs, can learn to create fake images that are less and less distinguishable from real images, by pitting two neural networks against each other.

Nightingale and her colleague Hany Farid at the University of California, Berkeley, asked 315 participants, recruited on a crowdsourcing website, to say whether they could distinguish a selection of 400 fake photos from 400 photographs of real people. Each set consisted of 100 people from each of four ethnic groups: white, Black, East Asian and South Asian.

This group had an accuracy rate of 48.2 per cent – slightly worse than chance. A second group of 219 participants were given training to recognise computer-generated faces. This group had an accuracy rate of 59 per cent, but this difference is negligible, says Nightingale.

White faces were the hardest for people to distinguish between real and fake, perhaps because the synthesis software was trained on disproportionally more white faces.

The researchers also asked a separate group of 223 participants to rate a selection of the same faces on their level of trustworthiness, on a scale of 1 to 7. They rated the fake faces as 8 per cent more trustworthy, on average, than the real faces – a small yet significant difference, according to Nightingale. That might be because synthetic faces look more like “average” human faces, and people are more likely to trust typical-looking faces, she says.

Looking at the extremes, the four faces rated most untrustworthy were real, whereas the three most trustworthy faces were fake.

“We need stricter ethical guidelines and more legal frameworks in place because, inevitably, there are going to be people out there who want to use [these images] to do harm, and that’s worrying,” says Nightingale.

To reduce these risks, developers could add watermarks to their images to flag them as fake, she says. “In my opinion, this is bad enough. It’s just going to get worse if we don’t do something to stop it.”


Journal reference: PNAS, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2120481119
ezgif.com-gif-maker-138.jpg

And if you wanna play around with a face randomiser, here's a link that generates one every time it's loaded. Once in a while it messes up with frightening Cronenbergian results too...

 
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