Random Thoughts Thread

[Luke]

So... what's the secret to cooking up zoodles that end up with the texture and fortitude of actual noodles?

Soak in iced water for around five minutes, drain, pat dry, cook shortly in a tiny bit of hot oil.

[Exhuminator]

Soak in iced water for around five minutes, drain, pat dry, cook shortly in a tiny bit of hot oil.

Alright, I'll try that approach, thanks man.

[Luke]

Wonder what razor Superman uses to shave.

[Erik_Twice]

Wonder what razor Superman uses to shave.

No razor would be sharp enough to cut Superman's beard so he uses his laser vision to shave

[Forlorn Drifter]

I've been perusing the internet pretty hard for various reasons lately.

And the internet is a seriously disturbing place. There are some great bastions of normalcy around (such as here, when I'm not being un puñeta), but the comment sections of the majority of otherwise normal sites, and the majority of sites your mother wouldn't peruse... they're just wrong.

[Erik_Twice]

There are some great bastions of normalcy around (such as here, when I'm not being un puñeta), but the comment sections of the majority of otherwise normal sites, and the majority of sites your mother wouldn't peruse... they're just wrong.

I remember reading an interesting article that I sadly cannot find that argued that many of these places are awful, not because they aren't well-moderated or incite this kind of comments, but because they naturally attract the worst kind of people.

For example, I think one of the reasons why Racketboy is such a nice place is that everyone here has a very wide understanding of games and nobody cares about console wars, or the last cycle marketing cycle. There's no group polarization; if you are the kind that wants to get mad at someone speaking well of the Xbox One,you are going to post in Gamefaqs or Neogaf not here.

I also feel that once a community starts to attract the wrong kind of people, it's very hard for it not to spiral out of control. At best it leads to politically charged, abusive moderation and, at worst, the reasonable part of the community leaves and only the crazies remain.

[BoringSupreez]

For example, I think one of the reasons why Racketboy is such a nice place is that everyone here has a very wide understanding of games and nobody cares about console wars, or the last cycle marketing cycle. There's no group polarization; if you are the kind that wants to get mad at someone speaking well of the Xbox One,you are going to post in Gamefaqs or Neogaf not here.

I think having an unofficial knowledge barrier is a great filtering method for almost any website. In my experience, people with wide or advanced knowledge of any topic are more likely to be civil while discussing it, vs those that are either new or never bothered to increase their knowledge. Trolls just aren't the type to expend effort bettering themselves.

Simply by not being the sort of site that tolerates things like present-day console wars (fight me on N64 vs PS1 any time though), low-effort topics like "which is better: battlefield or cod?", and name calling/constant bickering, we prevent the Gamefaqs and Neogaf type users from bothering to visit.

Constantly talking about obscure hardware and video games helps as well. Who knows how many people have found this place during a Google search, then closed the webpage because we were discussing which CRT TV is best for retro gaming, or how to repair Sega CDs?

[Ack]

Blade Runner was set in Los Angeles in 2019, 4 years from now.

This photo was taken in Beijing today:

[fastbilly1]

So now I am watching Blade Runner tonight.

[Exhuminator]

This photo was taken in Beijing today:

So we've got the giant animated billboards and cancer inducing smog. But where are the flying cars? Or the sex slave replicants? Society has failed us.