Tech you miss/ new tech trends you hate - ok boomers

[Blamo]

Console gamer are now feeling the pain of PC gaming when steam was first becoming popular.

I am surprised Scott didn't mention the Collectors edition of Wolfenstein the New Order, it didn't even come with the game at all, no digital code or anything.

Heh, even if I would release my cool JRPG for the PC on Disk most gaming Desktop cases doesn't even have a place for an optical drive.
It is good to consider how the price didn't drop when they removed the box and disk from the equation... (forget about the cool manual, fam)

At least they could have the physical copy with the collectors edition. Don't tell me they can't put a blue ray disk or two in a 100 dollar package. It would be better than the crappy plastic statue.

 

[Ginger Piglet]

Heh, even if I would release my cool JRPG for the PC on Disk most gaming Desktop cases doesn't even have a place for an optical drive.
It is good to consider how the price didn't drop when they removed the box and disk from the equation... (forget about the cool manual, fam)

At least they could have the physical copy with the collectors edition. Don't tell me they can't put a blue ray disk or two in a 100 dollar package. It would be better than the crappy plastic statue.

Release it on USB drive that's read only at the firmware level to prevent accidental erasure. A Kingston 32GB USB drive costs about £5 retail, which means bulk purchase of duplicator grade drives will be a significant reduction on that. Yes, more expensive than stamping optical disks to duplicate but with people not having optical drives nowadays, is it really such a big deal. I'm pretty sure there exists a PCIe mass duplicator card which allows for copying data to a stick of USB drives at the max speed allowed for by USB 3.0 so it wouldn't be that slow really.

 

[AnOminous]

I attended an ACM presentation in college featuring someone who worked at Sun. The person gave a presentation on Unix/Sun-OS. I still remember him saying something to the effect that the OS was based on a collection of utilities that did one thing only and did it well.

SunOS/Solaris was one of the cleanest OSes I've ever seen. I miss when things like this were the standard and not bloated shit. Their servers and workstations were also ridiculously epic, among the most pleasant to use technology ever manufactured.

 

[Blamo]

Release it on USB drive that's read only at the firmware level to prevent accidental erasure. A Kingston 32GB USB drive costs about £5 retail, which means bulk purchase of duplicator grade drives will be a significant reduction on that. Yes, more expensive than stamping optical disks to duplicate but with people not having optical drives nowadays, is it really such a big deal. I'm pretty sure there exists a PCIe mass duplicator card which allows for copying data to a stick of USB drives at the max speed allowed for by USB 3.0 so it wouldn't be that slow really.

That actually sounds like a cozy solution.

 

[Some Badger]

Earlier in the pandemic, a lot of places -- especially schools -- were using QR codes for people to scan so that they could fill out a COVID survey prior to being allowed entry. One of the biggest problems was people, especially seniors, who didn't have the smartphones necessary for those apps. Some places claimed those people could be accommodated in an alternative way which raised the question, "Why not keep things simple for everyone then?"

My work was doing this for a couple months last fall/winter for covid screenings. Perhaps to better service older employees who may not have been as tech savvy or as you noted might not have a smartphone at all, they very quickly started to provide a print form as an alternative, which eventually culminated to just leaving out a single sheet of paper for everyone who comes in to sign off on, which stated that you haven't felt any covid symptoms and that the company is not legally liable if you happen to be an asymptomatic spreader.

A very textbook example of the saying "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

I absolutely hate QR codes for being superfluous in the first place, especially since most of the situations in which I've had to scan one in order to access a webpage, I'm not doing so on a wifi network and have to use cellular data to load the page instead, which adds up and is usually slower. If you're gonna make me scan a QR code, you better give me the wifi password first.

 

[TenMilesWide]

I miss Gameboys, the lot of them. The 1st was damn near unbreakable, I think nintendo has one that survived an explosion in the Gulf War and it still plays Tetris.
The name flows (or maybe that's just because it was what it was), and how ever many bits it had it was perfect for the time. You had a SNES in your pocket with the GBA.
Good library of older games, mixed with some new.
I don't own a switch, and I realize it's light years past Gb's, but to me they still hold up.
If the 1st GBA had a backlight I'd still carry it around today for SMW.

There's cheap kits out on ebay and alibaba these days to put a backlit IPS panel in the original GBA, I've installed a couple and can say with confidence that they're pretty good.

If you don't get a pre-formed aftermarket housing with the kit, there's a bit of shaving down the original plastic to fit the new screen, and you can either set it up as plug & play with 1 brightness setting or with some wires soldered from the ribbon cable adapter to the buttons to be able to change the brightness.

 

[seri0us]

most gaming Desktop cases doesn't even have a place for an optical drive

No, (ATX) desktop cases have been around longer when discs were popular than not.

 

[Blamo]

No, (ATX) desktop cases have been around longer when discs were popular than not.

True. But I talked about the stupid transparent sided gaming cases people buy nowadays. Those literally lack an opening in the front a lot of times.

 

[Full Race Replay]

And how all consoles besides XBOX/Playstation are Android boxes. Don't they understand why the OUYA was really a failure?

i have not heard any legitimate reason to prefer buying a modern-day console to building a pc for games, besides retards who say stupid shit like they like controllers better even though you can still use a controller on pc, or they like exclusives on a particular console. And even some reasons of the past, like not using CPU power on background applications, have been nullified by consoles modern innovations.

 

[stupidpieceofshit]

Release it on USB drive that's read only at the firmware level to prevent accidental erasure. A Kingston 32GB USB drive costs about £5 retail, which means bulk purchase of duplicator grade drives will be a significant reduction on that. Yes, more expensive than stamping optical disks to duplicate but with people not having optical drives nowadays, is it really such a big deal. I'm pretty sure there exists a PCIe mass duplicator card which allows for copying data to a stick of USB drives at the max speed allowed for by USB 3.0 so it wouldn't be that slow really.

That reminds me, the first USB drive I had which was like 16 or 32 MBs had a physical toggle for turning writing on/off.
I wish that was still a thing, there are times in my IT job I need to put USB drives in a computer for some software or something (such as some special software that needs to be installed before the computer can join a domain because vendors are morons) and I always worry about malware being spread by the USB drives.

 

[ToroidalBoat]

That reminds me, the first USB drive I had which was like 16 or 32 MBs had a physical toggle for turning writing on/off.

I have 2 from the '00s that are 256 MB. They each have a write-protect switch too.

Also back in the day they were overpriced, but now they're likely worth only pocket change (lol).

 

[Kiwi Lime Pie]

A very textbook example of the saying "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

I almost wonder if the QR codes and web app forms being used for COVID screening were, are, or will be used for data mining purposes. Sure, the stated purpose is contact tracing, but the personal information being required of and collected from people (name, phone number or e-mail address, date and time of submission, etc.) is data that has to be tempting for those that want to analyze it and learn more about who specifically is entering school or business buildings, when, and what for.

I also wonder if or when this data may be ultimately breached since data stored in the cloud seems more tempting to hackers and seems easier to compromise given how easy it was for hackers to get into celebs online photo accounts and post all their lewd photos that had been uploaded from their phones to the cloud.

As cheesy as it was for a commercial to claim "nobody has ever hacked a cork board", there's still truth in the idea that low tech solutions are easier to manage and are less susceptible to online attacks.
(Edited for spelling.)

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

i have not heard any legitimate reason to prefer buying a modern-day console to building a pc for games, besides retards who say stupid shit like they like controllers better even though you can still use a controller on pc, or they like exclusives on a particular console. And even some reasons of the past, like not using CPU power on background applications, have been nullified by consoles modern innovations.

If you like to play online multiplayer with a controller then console is the way to go. You can play multiplayer with a controller on PC but it wouldn't be great in an ocean of M+KB players.

 

[AnOminous]

I almost wonder if the QR codes and web app forms being used for COVID screening were, are, or will be used for data minning purposes.

When is anything that could be used for datamining not used these days?

 

[Some Badger]

I almost wonder if the QR codes and web app forms being used for COVID screening were, are, or will be used for data minning purposes. Sure, the stated purpose is contact tracing, but the personal information being required of and collected from people (name, phone number or e-mail address, date and time of submission, etc.) is a collection of data that has to be tempting for those that want to analyze it and learn more about who specifically is entering school or business buildings, when, and what for.

I also wonder if or when this data may be ultimately breached since data stored in the cloud seems more tempting to hackers and seems easier to compromise given how easy it was for hackers to get into celebs online photo accounts and post all their lewd photos that had been uploaded from their phones to the cloud.

I hadn't actually considered the possibility of this at the risk of overheating my tinfoil hat, but it sounds pretty plausible when you consider that the links you access by QR codes redirect you to a form that requires you to enter personal information. Thankfully for the two or three instances I was using them for work, all it asked of me was my employee ID.

As cheesy as it was for a commerical to claim "nobody has ever hacked a cork board", there's still truth in the idea that low tech solutions are easier to manage and are less suceptible to online attacks.

How do I rate you twice?

 

[Blamo]

As cheesy as it was for a commerical to claim "nobody has ever hacked a cork board", there's still truth in the idea that low tech solutions are easier to manage and are less suceptible to online attacks.

It is also difficult to hack a computer that is not not connected to the Internet. Just pack a few USB drives or Micro SD cards with you and not even the NSA can find what you delivered between two computers. Make post pigeon network where they carry memory cards, not even the police can find your data. jk

I almost wonder if the QR codes and web app forms being used for COVID screening were, are, or will be used for data minning purposes. Sure, the stated purpose is contact tracing, but the personal information being required of and collected from people (name, phone number or e-mail address, date and time of submission, etc.) is a collection of data that has to be tempting for those that want to analyze it and learn more about who specifically is entering school or business buildings, when, and what for.

I also wonder if or when this data may be ultimately breached since data stored in the cloud seems more tempting to hackers and seems easier to compromise given how easy it was for hackers to get into celebs online photo accounts and post all their lewd photos that had been uploaded from their phones to the cloud.

As a rule of thumb, yes, everybody steals your data and meta-data. Also contact tracing is creepy as fuck.

 

[Ginger Piglet]

I almost wonder if the QR codes and web app forms being used for COVID screening were, are, or will be used for data minning purposes. Sure, the stated purpose is contact tracing, but the personal information being required of and collected from people (name, phone number or e-mail address, date and time of submission, etc.) is a collection of data that has to be tempting for those that want to analyze it and learn more about who specifically is entering school or business buildings, when, and what for.

I also wonder if or when this data may be ultimately breached since data stored in the cloud seems more tempting to hackers and seems easier to compromise given how easy it was for hackers to get into celebs online photo accounts and post all their lewd photos that had been uploaded from their phones to the cloud.

As cheesy as it was for a commerical to claim "nobody has ever hacked a cork board", there's still truth in the idea that low tech solutions are easier to manage and are less suceptible to online attacks.

Yes.

Also, vaccine passports? More like compulsory ID cards by the back door. I'll happily have the vaccine (I have in fact already had my first) but I'm not having to show a covipass to do anything. Ihre Papieren, bitte? Fuck off.

Thankfully in the UK there is this site which, if you save it to your home screen as a bookmark, will show an ersatz version of NHS Track and Trace which will scan QR codes and display the entry and show a "you've checked in" screen but not actually log your presence on to any network or similar. It can also procedurally generate an ersatz version of the covipass:

http://hack-and-trace.xyz

 

[Kiwi Lime Pie]

I hadn't actually considered the possibility of this at the risk of overheating my tinfoil hat, but it sounds pretty plausible when you consider that the links you access by QR codes redirect you to a form that requires you to enter personal information. Thankfully for the two or three instances I was using them for work, all it asked of me was my employee ID.

I didn't want to sound too conspiracy theorist either. However, I couldn't help wondering what metadata was being stored by these COVID screening webforms -- metadata such as a device ID or IP address. As part of my paying side hobby, I had to go to the same site multiple times and fill out a QR code-based COVID form. After the first time I filled it out, I noticed that subsequent visits already had my contact information pre-populated. Auto-fill/complete is disabled on my mobile browser, so I couldn't help wondering if something unique to me was being stored without my knowledge to identify me easier when I checked into that location in the future.

Most people understand the reason for contact tracing, but stuff like that is enough to make any normie wonder what's all being saved and what else is the data being used for (and perhaps what kind of data retention policy is in place).

Also contact tracing is creepy as fuck.

I think collecting and storing the information electronically is the creepy part because of the potential for additional metadata to be collected, mined, or analyzed without one's knowledge or consent.

That's why I maintained a paper log that collected the bare minimum of information required for contact tracing when I was still working my long-time job from an office and I plan to shred the forms as soon as I'm legally allowed to do so.

 

[Some Badger]

Also, vaccine passports? More like compulsory ID cards by the back door. I'll happily have the vaccine (I have in fact already had my first) but I'm not having to show a covipass to do anything. Ihre Papieren, bitte? Fuck off.

This is what scares the shit out of me and one of the bigger reasons I haven't gotten the jab yet. I don't trust whoever administers the vaccine to not store my information on a database without my consent, only to later hand over the data for the government and/or private interests. I also just can't get behind trying to restructure society around covid passes and QR codes because it presupposes that everyone has a working phone with a functioning camera and don't have any underlying medical problems that would prevent them from getting the vaccine.

While the US government in particular has no plans to create a digital vaccine passport system, Biden stated back in March that private companies are free to pursue it. What scares me most is how okay the normies are with this potential arrangement.

Anyway yeah, QR codes are sussy and shit and I neither like nor trust them.

 

[Ron Jeremy Stan Account]

I have 2 from the '00s that are 256 MB. They each have a write-protect switch too.

Also back in the day they were overpriced, but now they're likely worth only pocket change (lol).

Oh Jesus Christ, I remember getting a SanDisk USB drive in the 2000s and paying like $50 for 1GB. Just a few months ago I bought one at Walgreen's: $20 for 32GB.