Welcome to December. Have some links - Late November 02024

Let us begin with the understanding that the legalization of marijuana and the subsequent chasing of dollars has meant the concentration of THC available in many marijuana products has gotten stronger. Which makes a certain amount of sense - when it was forbidden-forbidden, weak strains went for high amounts of cash, because the supply was restricted. Now that it isn't, the people who are spending significant amount of money on marijuana are the ones who are looking to stay baked for longer and bake harder. The market chases the money, after all.

We continue with a request to survey creators to think really hard about whether you actually need demographic data, and what data you need, because sloppy questions make it easy to re-identify people.

We mourn the passing of Thomas E. Kurtz at 96 years of age, responsible for the BASIC programming language and probably a lot of people getting into computer science from the hobbyist perspective before the professional one.

We also have lost Elwood Edwards at 74 years of age, best known for the various memetic phrases stuck in our heads from the people who used or heard the advertisements for America On-Line.

( The rest of this is inside the cut. )

Last for tonight, armaina linked to some things that are likely to be deep dives of their own: A science fiction encyclopedia, a museum of previous website designs of various services and brands, a list of forums that are still active, and their general topics (although some of the links will be to places that are closer to the cesspool line, if not in it),

And, the one that gets a little bit of special treatment, the Library of Babel, which theoretically contains everything that has been written and ever will be written, if only you happen to come across the correct page in the correct volume in the correct shelf on the correct wall in the correct hex. Which is to say, expect to find a lot of things you could feed your random number generator.

(Materials via adrian_turtle, azurelunatic, boxofdelights, cmcmck, conuly, cosmolinguist, elf, finch, firecat, jadelennox, jenett, jjhunter, kaberett, lilysea, oursin, rydra_wong, snowynight, sonia, the_future_modernes, thewayne, umadoshi, vass, the meta_warehouse community, little_details, and anyone else I've neglected to mention or who I suspect would rather not be on the list. If you want to know where I get the neat stuff, my reading list has most of it.)

December Days 02024 #3: Community: the [blank]-adjacent

[This Year's December Days Theme is Community, and all the forms that it takes. If you have some suggestions about what communities I'm part of (or that you think I'm part of) that would be worth a look, let me know in the comments.]

One of the things that having a fair amount of curiosity produces is an interest in a lot of things. Very few of those curiosities and interests produce expertise of any sort, and especially not deep expertise in many of those things. Which can leave me conversant on a significant number of topics without having the ability to do in-depth materials, unless the person or people that I'm talking with have the expertise that I lack.

As the meme goes, "I have approximate knowledge of many things."

That interacts with some other elements of my personality (and several of the traumas related to my school days and the interactions of my undiagnosed self with the world outside) to fully commit to some things and embrace the period of time that will be marked by inability, failure, learning, trying, and developing what will be expertise or competence in a new skill or topic. And even with things that might be interesting or desirous to do a deep dive into, cognizance of the opinions of others on the matter and what they believe about the subject can mean downplaying the amount of time and effort being put in when talking about the subject with others. It takes a person of great fortitude to forge ahead with things without taking into account other people and how they might be affected by such things. (That does not necessarily mean that the person forging ahead is doing a right and moral thing, just that they have great fortitude to get what they want without giving a care about what others think or how others will be affected by what they're doing.)

( So we arrive at the point of adjacency )

Doing December Days this year is a lot about the communities that I feel I am explicitly part of, but I also wanted to acknowledge the communities that I may not feel explicitly a part of, somewhat nebulously connected to, am vicariously experiencing through others, or that I feel like I don't have the basic requirements for entry, pay no attention to whatever it is that I've been creating or making that's definitely in this community, it's not good enough, not like those other people there who have been doing it for far longer and produce works of more detail and skill than I could ever hope to achieve, even with as much training and practice as those people have. The feeling of adjacency is often related to the feeling of competence, or the feeling of credentialing, or the feeling of belonging. If those elements are absent, or perceived absent, then someone is more likely to feel adjacent rather than a participant. And it's up to each community as to how much they want to be inclusive and welcoming to everyone, or set requirements about what must happen to gain entry, so that the purpose and discussion of the community isn't derailed by curious amateurs looking to perform their own brain surgery in non-sterile environments.

So if you feel adjacent to something, that's valid, although it may not be a belief shared by others. If someone else is feeling adjacent and you don't think they are, this is one of those situations where you have to listen carefully to what they're saying so that you can frame your counter-proposal in ways they will listen to and acknowledge, even if it may still take a journey for them to change their beliefs.