A 50-something French dude that’s old enough to think blogs are still cool, if not cooler than ever.
https://thefoolwithapen.com

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Joined 9 months ago
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Cake day: November 26th, 2023

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  • Not the OP, but that’s a great idea.

    Like the OP, my spouse and I have become quite tired of those (overpriced) full-plastic pseudo brands that are worth shit, and we’re also not that interested in connected robotic battery-powered vacuums either. I will check around if I can find some good old school wired vacuum, and also ask my local thrift store owner if they have any idea where I could find some around here.





  • To keep YT under control: Firefox is my web browser, with the uBlock Origin extension installed. So, all Shorts/Suggestions, ‘News’ and ‘Related content’ are now automatically removed from YT '(easy to achieve with uBlock Origin when using Firefox).

    😍🥰 Firefox + uBlockOrigin

    And whenever Google/YT suggests me some turd content, I dislike it and ask it to not suggest the channel/content anymore.

    In the end, my feed is mostly made of stuff I enjoy watching, with so little noise that it can not be considered an issue.




  • Hello Science Community, Thank you for taking the time to review this manuscript. While it includes philosophical elements, it also explores scientific ideas that I hope will spark thoughtful discussion and constructive criticism. I look forward to your feedback. Thank you again!

    https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XuhV1MwntVU-Gsb7M69jxhudAwGuh4uEkw1Ri4ZkFt0/edit

    You are sharing your personal opinion in that text (and, yep, I read it). That’s not science and it’s not philosophy.

    Opinions are fine. I mean, we all have opinions and they can differ widely from person to person. That’s the reason why they’re called personal opinions. But they’re just that, opinions, aka the expression of personal judgments/values and personal preferences.

    I don’t like bananas’ is a personal preference of mine. ‘I think bannas taste like shit’ is my personal opinion on them. My preference and my opinion say absolutely nothing about bananas and their qualities as a fruit. At best, they state a fact about me. Not about the bananas which, obviously, are perfectly fine fruits whether I like them or not.

    Despite the intense dumbing down going on on in our societies, opinions and preferences don’t make a science. And if they can sometimes be considered a starting point to a (or some makeshift) philosophy , they still need a little more work — the important words in the latter definition being ‘system’, ‘analysis’, ‘theory’ and ‘understanding’, not expressing one’s opinions.


  • when you put them back in the boxes, how do you do it? Do you put them in chronological or alphabetical order?

    Each card as a unique ID (it can take any form you fancy but it has to be unique) and I simply put each card back at its place following that ID, no matter the content of the card. What matters is the info you associate to each card, using its ID as a reference, in your index.

    The index is a pile of cards alphabetically ordered that contain a list of keywords. Each keyword will then a have list of pointers to cards IDs and to other index entries to find any related content.

    (For example in the D section of my index I will have a ‘Dinosaur’ entry and in my T section I will have a ‘T-rex’ entry. The Dinosaur index may points me to, say, the 222.1.1.10B card (in which I’ve written stuff about the latest attempts in recreating living dinosaurs) and to the 421.1 card (in which I have a few notes on my last visit at the natural history museum, where there are those great dinosaur fossils). It will also have refs telling me to go check the ‘T-rex’ and the ‘Diplodocus’ and so on index entries for more related cards, as well as say the ‘Meteor’ and ‘Species (extinction)’ entries.)

    Using the index is akin to using Cmd/Ctrl+F to do a search on text: fast and almost instantaneous. This index is really the key to my Zettel.

    Each of the card the index would have suggested I read may itself contain refs to other cards. Like you would have internal links between cards, using Obsidian.

    Finally, I have my bibliographical references, an alphabetically-ordered series of cards. Those allow me to quickly find notes from any book and author I’ve read and to reference back to it, using its own unique ID. This also helps a lot when I’m reading to quickly take notes (on blank index cards, with that unique book ID written in one corner). So, while I’m reading it barely takes seconds to write down whatever idea or keyword I want to be able to find later on, plus the corresponding page number in the book. No need to reference the book itself, no need to write long comments or explanations (those will, or will not go later on in my main Zettelkasten cards, when I’m reviewing my reading notes) it’s really all about quickly jotting down a word or two + a page number, which saves a lot of time.

    And when you want to find one again, do you have to search through hundreds of cards just to find the right one?

    I use the index or the bibliographical refs, depending if I’m searching for an idea or a keyword in general or for some specific book annotations or author. Those point me to all relevant cards in my Zettelkasten. And like I told you each card can then also point me to other relevant/interesting cards on its own.

    That said, at times I’ll randomly pick some cards and browse through them (just as a way to ’thought-provoke’ my own brain with random ideas and notions).

    Regarding your first comment:

    1. Easy backups

    I take pictures with my iPhone of all new cards from that day, those photos are then automatically converted by the scanning app into a PDF and saved to my iCloud storage, it’s real quick. All my iCloud being regularly and automatically backed-up on external drives.

    The app I use is ‘Scanner Pro’ by Readdle (I purchased the license many years ago and the scanner still works perfectly with the latest iOS). It’s very simple aka quick to use, it does an impressive job at auto straighten the card no matter how poorly I present it to the camera, then it creates a PDF with all the day worth of images and then save it to iCloud, all by itself.

    1. No physical storage space required.

    It’s not really an issue for me as my Zettel is not that large. That said, it does take space but I can use it without a computer/screen (which also takes space)… and for storage, old shoe boxes don’t cost much ;)

    I might look up some tutorials next, but I don’t want to overcomplicate things. With any system there’s a point where you end up spending more time fussing with the scaffolding rather than just building the building, if you know what I mean.

    100% agreed. If it works well enough, then it’s all one needs.

    Watching a few videos to better understand the appeal of a digital Zettel myself, I realized it was something many ‘new’ users were not aware of and also something way too many video creators were not worrying enough about.

    I mean, some of those videos are very well made but they’re also mostly empty chatting and/or trying to chase a unicorn by focusing on what to me seemed like insignificant details or an unrealistic desire for perfection. Doing so, they spend a lot of their time and energy, and a lot of their viewer’s time and energy too.

    I do understand keeping the user watching as many videos as possible, for as long as possible, is the entire business model of making video on YouTube (more talking + more videos = more watching time = more ads viewed = more money) but as a user I don’t think it’s worth my time and efforts so I don’t watch them ;)


  • Is that normal in your opinion?

    Imho, a better question to ask yourself would be to consider why you’re giving up quickly?

    If you give up because you realize you can’t be bothered with whatever that activity is, fine. I tried a few things I realized had little value to me. No big deal.

    If it’s because you don’t want to make the effort of learning to do it properly and/or because you can’t accept that, as beginner at it, your not already good and get not success. Then, it’s probably not a great decision.

    I see two things our society as a whole (even more so when it is lived through social media lenses) tend to discourage younger people to reflect upon:

    1. Not being good at something new is normal.
      It is to be expected from most beginners. That’s why as adults we’re supposed to teach ourselves (so we learn and get better at that thing), and that’s why, as little kids, we are being taught by adults. And that learning takes time and practice. A lot of both.
    2. Failing at something new is to expected too.
      Failing is how we learn. Remember how you learned to walk as a toddler? Was it by being good at walking? Or was it by falling on your diapered bum many, many times over and over again like a clumsy toddler? At least, that’s how I learned ;)

    That’s also how we learn to read and to write. By doing mistakes. Not by picking up our first pen and writing the next best-seller.

    So, to get back to your question, if you give up on something because you would want to be good at it instantly, you’re probably missing out on something.



  • Yep, it would have helped a lot. Back when I was in university, we did not even had a single note-taking/research course. We had to figure it out by ourselves, which i know a lot of my fellow students did not bother doing.

    As for Obsidian, do not hesitate to share a few insights as I have yet to see how it can help me better than paper does. I mean, beside a faster search inside my notes (which is not what matters the most to me). For example, the fact I cannot manually/freely reorder my notes, in a note-taking app, is beyond me and it’s something I do all the time with my slip of papers. But I’m also willing to admit I’m missing out on something important.



  • What exactly would you call a federal government?

    I would call it a (federal) government, not a country.
    How would you call it?

    I more than disagree with what our government is doing in my country (and how they are doing it), do you think I should dislike all the people living in it, and all the places of that country because of me disliking a bunch of politicians and their politics? I don’t.

    Like, you’re taking it as “people from a country” and trying to be high and mighty about it. When literally no one else is having that conversation…

    Like, do you really think it’s healthy to only answer what people are expecting?

    and trying to be high and mighty about it.

    In our days and age of constant hastily proclaimed condemnations, I can appreciate you taking the time to better know me before expressing your informed opinion on my person.



  • Not sure to understand your question but if it is about finding local stores, here is what I do:

    • At anytime anywhere I’m, I take notice of any new shop that may interest me. It’s easy for me as most of the time I will be walking, leaving me plenty opportunities to look around. I also listen to what people say.
    • When I need something specific I will check (online or by asking around me) for local shops that may have it and I… call them. When they’re not too far, instead I’ll walk there to ask in person — which is always interesting to get a feeling for the place and see how customers are dealt with. As a bonus, it’s often a good opportunity to discuss and ask questions about whatever it is that you’re looking for and maybe get some suggestions for alternative/cheaper/better solutions/products.

  • I hope Lemmy doesn’t bow to the I want reward, I need my shiny recognition ribbon trend.

    That’s 100% infantilization of participants. Even on the few reddit subs I’m subbed to (on average, those have real high value content), I can see a few people focusing on that karma thing and that’s sad to watch and, well, not flattering for them. It’s also a lot of useless work more to do for those mods that try to maintain a certain level of quality, which is not a great thing.

    Imh(and admittedly naive)o, people should post based on what they’re interested in and based on what they think they can bring to the discussion and not in exchange of a tap on the shoulder, or some good grade — unless they’re still kids going to school, doing homework and passing exams but even there… maybe one day, we will realize focusing our attention on grades more than on understanding/learning was a huge and costly mistake.

    Edit: mistakes and clarifications.


  • To be clear, Apple’s Support has its fair share of drawbacks and always had — I’ve been their customer since the mid-80s, there never was a magical period where they were perfect ;) — but what matters (to me, at least) is that while the product is under warranty a customer doesn’t have to worry too much on average (because, once again, there will be cases where support will fail the customer).

    Outside of warranty, that’s an other story but then the real issue is in the way Apple designs its machines to not be upgradable or not easily fixable, if at all. That’s the real shame and that should be outlawed.