Kris contemplating a capture. The PokéDex has opinions.
Oh god, I just aged several years in a single second, a friend of mine sent me a snippet from a fic that read someone put a VHS into a VCR and took so long getting back to it to press play that the menu screen had looped multiple times
every time I think maybe I am putting too much effort into researching the details of technological advances I lived through, something like this crosses my dash
For the young whippersnappers who don’t understand the issue, VHS tapes don’t have menu screens. That is not technologically possible on a tape.
A magnetic tape works because information has been magnetically encoded on the tape. The tape is very long, and is wound around two little spools, one at the end, one at the beginning. In the middle is a part where it is flat and there is a thing called a ‘head’ and it reads the magnetic encoding on the bit of the tape next to it and converting it into sound and/or images. When the tape plays, the little spools wind/unwind so that new sections of tape are constantly being run past the head. Every single thing a VCR can do is a function of controlling which part of the tape is next to the head.
You put the tape in the machine and press play on the machine, and it plays. You press stop and it stops. You press play again and it starts playing right where it left off, because while it’s stopped the tape is not moving past the head. You can pause it instead of stop it, which will leave the frame you paused on on the TV (in contrast to stopping, when the screen goes dark). You can fast forward, and it will wind the tape forward towards the end. You can rewind and it will wind the tape back to the beginning.
in my experience it usually played automatically on being fed a tape, and you had to pause or stop it to prevent this, which was awkward sometimes when the tv volume turned out to be set way too high
unless of course the tape hadn't been rewound before being taken out last time. then, unless auto-rewind was a feature of the VCR in question, you had to push that button first to get back to the start so the movie was watchable.
also if you wanted it to rewind quickly instead of playing the entire film backwards, silently, at maybe double speed, you pushed 'stop' first and it lifted the tape away from the reader to respool at speed.
Now that I have processed this somewhat, here's some other tidbits:
Tapes had no mandatory ads at the front. Oh, sure, there often were ads at the front, but there was no way to prevent just fast forwarding through them.
For the busy among us who wanted to watch a film while another was rewinding, separate tape rewinding devices were sold.
Tape rental places would ask you to "please be kind, rewind!" and some places charged a rewinding fee if you didn't.
Music was affected by the jump from tapes to disc, too! I remember it blowing my mind that CDs could replay a track instantly, instead of me having to memorize how long it took to rewind a tape to play back a tune.
Both VCRs and music tape players would occasionally break and "eat" the tape, which meant an unspooled, destroyed tape and having to take the player apart to free the tape from it. Sometimes the player could be fixed afterwards, and sometimes it couldn't.
Sometimes if you played the same portion of a tape over and over, it would lead to tape degradation: distorted video and audio, or even the tape snapping and having to get a new one. (I did this to at least one Disney movie - don't remember which - and one soundtrack.)
Adjusting the tracking! I don't remember how this physically works but if the video is jumping around, sometimes you would have to adjust it so the VCR reads the tape correctly. Looks like there's some how-to guides out there on the Internet on how to do this. Usually there was a button on the remote to do this.
Some VCRs were extra fancy and had digital clocks built into them. After a power outage, they would reset to 12:00 and flash. Adjusting the clock was a strange and mysterious process that a lot of folks never got the hang of, so their VCRs just had 12:00 flashing on them at all times.
I think I just aged 10,000 years from this post
A lot of people forget that analog media always has some background noise, not just from the mechanical sounds of the player moving the parts but from the player outputting signal from random physical variations on the media itself.
Digital media has a tremendously better signal-to-background noise ratio. If you put a completely blank VHS tape in a VCR it will output a distinctive low "buzzing" noise to the audio system. Cassette tapes hiss. Little popping noises happen sometimes. I think record noises are probably more familiar just because they're so heavily ingrained in pop culture tropes.
Analog audio also isn't *quite* as clear and crisp sounding as digital media. There's the above mentioned background noises which happen to an extent even when there is a track recorded on them. Highs and lows are a little bit more muffled. Some audiophiles actually prefer this because they think it gives a "warmth" to the audio that digital doesn't have.
As noted above, all analog media is much more prone to physical damage from both use and time - atmospheric exposure, moisture, heat and even background radiation will damage a VHS tape that hasn't even been opened to some extent. This obviously worsens the more it's used and exposed to the elements. I just wanted to mention this because an old ass DVD that's been played a lot you get from a thrift store is going to play very close to its initial quality so long as it isn't dirty/scratched. An old ass VHS tape of the same age from the same thrift store that's been played the same number of times is going to have significantly worse audio/video quality compared to when it was first purchased.
I just wanted to mention this because I think there's a tendency to portray pre-digital media as being a bit shittier than it was during its time, because even people who should know better use subpar references when trying to recreate the look. It makes sense when a modern horror story gives shit video quality to a decades old VHS tape hanging out in an abandoned house. It makes less sense when you use the same effects for a new VHS tape in a 90s period piece, but shit like that happens constantly.
were-ralph
Let's play Hangman
________ ____
8 letters, 4 letters go
were-ralph
Hfyffhvhjgfh This was actually it but im pivoting because I didn't think anyone would get it so fast
__e_____ _____
8 letters, 5 letters
were-ralph
Half the time when people are like “world hunger would end if we didn’t grow livestock feed!” It’s pretty clear they aren’t aware that hunger is present in “first world countries”
There are people going hungry in America and it isn’t because we’re growing corn silage instead of sweet corn man
Anyway even with livestock feed farmers currently grow enough food to feed 10 billion people
It’s the distribution and waste that’s the issue
IVE BEEN HANGING OUT WITH MY FRIEND FOR LIKE A YEAR NOW AND IT TURNS OUT WE KNEW EACH OTHER AND WERE FRIENDS WITH EACH OTHER PRETRANSITION
we we’re talking about how we had a mutual friend and how that was so wild and then they mentioned another friend i knew and i was like “yeah i played soccer with them both in the park” and my friend was like “wait does your deadname start with a C” and it turns out she was also there and we just had no idea who each other was this entire time till now
This is fucking wild
This is half a plot for a modern Shakespearean comedy of errors.
Welcome to ‘The Shape of Crimes To Come,’ the podcast where we exploit the real pain and suffering of violent crime so that you have something to listen to on your commute.
I can’t wait for the episode where they completely make up fictional nonsense about someone who wasn’t even part of the events this “true crime” story is supposedly about or the scene where they romanticise the abusive behaviour of a white dude because he’s being played by an actor that straight women find hot! :D
It's weird that people just like... Forget you're disabled.
You'll be like "yeah I've got chronic fatigue and chronic pain" and then you tell them how it impacts your life and then they just... Keep expecting you to do able bodied things.
Like I can't always clean up my hair from the shower without taking a break first because showering is a very physically demanding task. But if I ever say I don't have the energy to do that. They call me ridiculous. They say that's unreasonable.
It's just kind of bizarre.
It's only when you remind them that you're disabled that they back down. Because they forgot. They forgot you couldn't do everything they do.
Literally I’m always saying this
why isn’t he looking where he’s driving
Its Fine Man Chill
I love when a new person is working and a cow calves and they run up to me asking what they should do and without skipping a beat I’m like “put it back in. I don’t feel like dealing with it right now” and they look all concerned
I've had enough of society being catered to morning people.. it's time for everything to be pushed back like two hours
Or you could get off your ass and rise with the sun. You'll feel better if you fix your circadian rhythm and eat food that's actually good for you
Anyway, you fucking weirdo, they did studies that concluded that the most efficient work day is 10am to 4pm, no longer than 6 hours, and people will be most productive if a work week is between 26 and 32 hours.
But you do you, ig.
and for ADHD folks (and astronomers, and other people whose rhythm isn't driven by the sun), sometimes the best working hours don't start until after noon
A circadian rhythm that's different than that rewarded by modern capitalist society isn't broken and trying to adjust to one that's not yours can be harmful.
Actually ppl with ADHD have delayed sleep phase syndrome so it's just worse than society bullshit.
Jules–Elie Delaunay (1828 - 1891)
Young Woman with a Sword
late 19th century
Oh god, I just aged several years in a single second, a friend of mine sent me a snippet from a fic that read someone put a VHS into a VCR and took so long getting back to it to press play that the menu screen had looped multiple times
every time I think maybe I am putting too much effort into researching the details of technological advances I lived through, something like this crosses my dash
For the young whippersnappers who don’t understand the issue, VHS tapes don’t have menu screens. That is not technologically possible on a tape.
A magnetic tape works because information has been magnetically encoded on the tape. The tape is very long, and is wound around two little spools, one at the end, one at the beginning. In the middle is a part where it is flat and there is a thing called a ‘head’ and it reads the magnetic encoding on the bit of the tape next to it and converting it into sound and/or images. When the tape plays, the little spools wind/unwind so that new sections of tape are constantly being run past the head. Every single thing a VCR can do is a function of controlling which part of the tape is next to the head.
You put the tape in the machine and press play on the machine, and it plays. You press stop and it stops. You press play again and it starts playing right where it left off, because while it’s stopped the tape is not moving past the head. You can pause it instead of stop it, which will leave the frame you paused on on the TV (in contrast to stopping, when the screen goes dark). You can fast forward, and it will wind the tape forward towards the end. You can rewind and it will wind the tape back to the beginning.
in my experience it usually played automatically on being fed a tape, and you had to pause or stop it to prevent this, which was awkward sometimes when the tv volume turned out to be set way too high
unless of course the tape hadn't been rewound before being taken out last time. then, unless auto-rewind was a feature of the VCR in question, you had to push that button first to get back to the start so the movie was watchable.
also if you wanted it to rewind quickly instead of playing the entire film backwards, silently, at maybe double speed, you pushed 'stop' first and it lifted the tape away from the reader to respool at speed.
Now that I have processed this somewhat, here's some other tidbits:
Tapes had no mandatory ads at the front. Oh, sure, there often were ads at the front, but there was no way to prevent just fast forwarding through them.
For the busy among us who wanted to watch a film while another was rewinding, separate tape rewinding devices were sold.
Tape rental places would ask you to "please be kind, rewind!" and some places charged a rewinding fee if you didn't.
Music was affected by the jump from tapes to disc, too! I remember it blowing my mind that CDs could replay a track instantly, instead of me having to memorize how long it took to rewind a tape to play back a tune.
Both VCRs and music tape players would occasionally break and "eat" the tape, which meant an unspooled, destroyed tape and having to take the player apart to free the tape from it. Sometimes the player could be fixed afterwards, and sometimes it couldn't.
Sometimes if you played the same portion of a tape over and over, it would lead to tape degradation: distorted video and audio, or even the tape snapping and having to get a new one. (I did this to at least one Disney movie - don't remember which - and one soundtrack.)
Adjusting the tracking! I don't remember how this physically works but if the video is jumping around, sometimes you would have to adjust it so the VCR reads the tape correctly. Looks like there's some how-to guides out there on the Internet on how to do this. Usually there was a button on the remote to do this.
Some VCRs were extra fancy and had digital clocks built into them. After a power outage, they would reset to 12:00 and flash. Adjusting the clock was a strange and mysterious process that a lot of folks never got the hang of, so their VCRs just had 12:00 flashing on them at all times.
I think I just aged 10,000 years from this post
tbh i kinda hate the "lol tumblr users are old and thats why we're in pain" jokes
like. no. you arent old, youre fucking 30, and if youre in constant pain there is something wrong and you may be able to actually DO something about it if you acknowledge it!!!!
like yeah the only medical care a lot of people have access to is worse than useless but instead of pretending its fine and normal we could be sharing resources and figuring shit out!!!
this is super important
I'm a lot older than 30, and my history includes motorcycle accidents, getting shot, tearing tendons, breaking bones, dislocating a shoulder, etc
yet I only feel pain when I do things that I can easily avoid, neglect to do mobility work after hard physical activity, use bad ergonomics, or just do something stupid
if you're relatively young and feeling pain unrelated to a physical injury, talk to someone who's an expert in physiology or physical therapy
if you have good health insurance, get thee to a doctor or a physical therapist who can diagnose what's going on and put you on a treatment or maintenance program
living with unnecessary pain can lead to or mask chronic illness
pain is a warning sign - understand what you're being warned about
i dont even play Stardew Valley that much but this trivia bit is fucking hilarious
watching a video of a guy make a miniature model of a hydroelectric dam outside and like. just imagine that youre an ant living nearby like youve been helping in the colony for a few days so you decide to go to the pheromone trails to get some food but the path is now blocked by the fucking hoover dam
do you think this ant is like "oooooooooooobh wait until the colony hears about this theyre not going to believe. that theres concrete out here"
genuinely unsure how to respond to this
Tumblr user fortidogi why are you not obsessed with hypothetical traumatized ants