💾 Archived View for lantashifiles.com › gemlog › entries › 2022-11-21.gmi captured on 2023-01-29 at 03:26:06. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
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I once again have an operational Pinephone (Piney)! Piney's screen got messed up, with a distortion around the edges, that over time started working its way inward. The distortion had to have something to do with the touch layer, because once it covered part of the keyboard, those letters would not work anymore. It was really frustrating. Due to that, I let Piney sit in a drawer for awhile, not updating it with the latest Mobian, not charging it, and just using a desktop instead when I was on the computer.
Well, no more! I know someone who had a Pinephone with a different problem - the SD card reader was no longer working, nor the SIM slot. So we did what any self-respecting tech geeks do in these situations, and cannibalized the phones to create one complete, working phone. Basically the internals from my Pinephone, and the screen and case from the other, were put together! The result - Piney lives again, and I am typing on it right now.
I updated Mobian, and wow, the Phosh interface is a lot better than when Piney had gone into the drawer. You now swipe from the bottom to get the app-drawer, instead of just tapping the arrow at the bottom. This is an important change, a huge change, because I would often accidently hit that arrow when I was trying to type, and it would pop open the app-drawer and mess up what I was doing. It was quite frustrating. Good job Purism (on Phosh)! Keep working on it... Phosh is really coming along!
Among other things I used Piney for in the past was working on this Gemlog, so, as I bring Piney back to life, I figure it is time for the Gemlog to be refreshed as well! I hope to post a lot more. It is almost a year since my first post! I posted a lot the first few months, and then things dropped off. Hopefully I can re-energize, and get year 2 off to a good start.
One advantage to avoiding the "big net" is that a lot of noise has been passing me by. I knew Elon Musk had moved to buy Birdsite, but since I'm not on Birdsite, it really doesn't affect me in any way. From what I've seen of the news lately, I'm not sure if Musk is trying to fix Twitter, or tear it down. Either way, a lot of birds are fleeing the nest onto alternatives.
Including Mastodon.
Mastodon is cool, and it sounds like there has been quite the influx of users lately. Anything to help Mastodon, and other parts of the Fediverse, grow is good news. Now individuals and small instances will control content, instead of billionaires. It will take quite a while for the fediverse to grow enough to attract the less techie people out there, I fear. But it is definitely a start.
I saw a great post by Skyjake on everything going on "Mastodo or Mastodon't" (link below). A lot of what he said resonated with me, because, like him, I'm also an introvert. It sounds like he did the Birdsite thing and the Facebook thing when they were new. I never got all that into those, though once upon a time I had an account on each. I never put that much personal information on them, because, ugh, what a mess they both are, especially privacy-wise. I agree totally about smaller networks having a better vibe to them
Skyjake also talked about Gemini a bit. I'll add my 2 cents.
I really like Gemini, and even though my posting has been light (almost non-existent!) the last several months because of life happening, I still pay a lot of attention to it. I got to *know* some of the people here, even though you don't know me. I like Antenna, The Station, etc. I really like the tech posts. I could do without the political posts, because those are always a bit charged, and don't really fit with my personality. I like that there are other capsules about music, teaching, etc. Gemini is young, and small, but the content is actually pretty diverse.
Gemini also tends to be thoughtful. Sometimes I run across something that I really disagree with. Not that it matters whether I agree with someone or not. I just like to read other people's point of view, especially if they are well written. And a lot, maybe most, of what is written on Gemini is thoughtful.
To put it simply, I like it here. I like it a lot more than the big net, and even more than Mastodon. I hope to participate more, as life allows.