I’m not biased and I’m not picking a side, but there is a lot of whataboutism is this thread and I stand by my stance that it is a weak argument and a logical fallacy.

Whataboutism isn’t a very convincing argument.

Just organize your library properly and pretty much every software will manage it better. There are options for organizing and renaming them mostly automatically, like EastTAG or filebot. Some people use Sonarr and Radarr to organize shows and movies, but those are probably overkill for you. The various *arrs will be more useful if you’re consuming new media through a server hosting Plex or Jellyfin. Kodi is also a waste if the library isn’t already meticulously organized and you don’t need a 10 foot interface.

If you’re only consuming on desktop and you insist on being disorganized, then why even bother with anything other than VLC? It runs on Linux, Windows, iOS, and Android.

Jokes on them. Batman is fighting crime in a failing empire. I might have fun writing a paper about how the comic series is actually about the fall of empires like the Roman empire. I’d footnote and meticulously cite the shit out of that paper just to code clues that I knew exactly what the Professor was trying to do.

Short simplified answer: nobody wants to pay for the infrastructure. Especially in the last mile. There’s probably a Planet Money episode about it. If not, there should be.

Why are you bickering with me about it? I don’t appreciate people asking questions in bad faith just so they can make a spicy comment. Think I like it?

There are choices, it’s just they all suck unless you’re willing to move. Nobody’s arguing that it is a local semi-monopoly.

There’s other options, but they’re all MUCH slower. If you want a different ISP with comparable or faster speeds, you need to move. In my case, internet is bundled with HOA fees. And there is no other fast option available at my address anyway.

It’s not a full monopoly. You can choose another ISP, but it’s just that in practice you’d need to physically move to a new location to make that change of vendor.

Yes, I’ve done almost exactly this while traveling. You can even carry around a couple variously configured sd cards for different use cases. I had one with jellyfin for sharing locally and also Kodi for direct HDMI connection to TVs. There is a in app on Android for jellyfin called findroid that allows offline copies from the media server, which allowed me to not need the thing powered the entire time I wanted to watch something on my phone, just long enough to download it. Adding samba shares adds a other layer of accessibility. I had another SD Card with video game ROMs for retro gaming, but this one got left at home because it requires controllers and I didn’t think I’d use it that much. I had another with “little backup box” installed for automatically backing up my photos and videos after a day out exploring with my camera.

I used a Raspberry pi 5 for all of this, running from a battery backup, because I didn’t really need a keyboard once I had remote connections to my phone sorted out. Pick a rugged case and you case just toss it in your bag of chargers. It took up about as much space as a pack of cigarettes. Another option would be the Raspberry Pi 400, built into a keyboard. A little bulkier, but maybe more resilient in the face of technical difficulties.

Oh yeah, I totally support the local copy. That will save you in times up hardware failure or fuck ups. I could just never keep up with the maintenance and kind of gave up making automatic backups and syncing. But reorganizing often translates to integrating deletions into rsync or whatever syncing protocol you use, and that has caused me headaches and heartaches.

Yeah, that was a typo. Thanks, I’ll fix it.

I have a very similar setup to yours, a relatively large music library around 1.7TB of mostly flac files on my server. I’m able to organize these files locally from my laptop, which at various times has run either OSX, various GNU/Linuxes, or Windows. However I do not bother pushing the files themselves back and forth over the network.

Even if I did, I wouldn’t automate the syncing, I’d only run it manually after I’d done my organizing with Picard for that day. After all, it the organization with Picard isn’t automated, why should the syncing be? I’d probably use rsync for this.

In actual practice I do this: Connect to my server from my laptop using ssh, forwarding X. Run Picard on the actual server through this remote connection. Picard runs just fine over ssh. Opening a browser from a Picard tag for occasional Musicbrainz.org stuff is a little slower but works. I would then use a tmux or screen session to run the rsync command when I’m done with Picard for the day for syncing to a backup if necessary.

I don’t really bother keeping a whole copy of my music collection locally on my laptop or phone though, since It’s been bigger than is practical for a long time. Managing multiple libraries and keeping the two in sync turned into such a hassle that I was spending more time organizing than actually listening (or making mixtapes/playlists). To listen to my music locally I’ve used either Plex or Jellyfin, sometimes MPD (like when my server was directly connected to my stereo receiver), or just shared the folder via samba and NFS.

I can see you haven’t interacted with many police in these areas. I wouldn’t be surprised in the least by any of that behavior. The cops only protect and serve property, not people.

Setting up Sonarr and Radar with docker isn’t all that complex. If you set up Prowlarr as well then you can still get the instant search and download aspect you mention except you can search ALL the good websites at once and (most importantly for my stress level) avoid all the bullshit ads and malware you’ve got to worry about blocking while browsing those sites through the web. Sonarr is perfect for following any show, not just those you might binge watch. Topical shows like SNL and last week tonight get picked up automatically. Long term favorites with unpredictable release cycles (looking at you Doctor Who) get snapped up when they’re most popular and download super fast. Cleaning up old seasons to clear out space is as simple as navigating a web page. Both radarr and sonarr can connect to other services like that.tv so less tech savvy household members can add a show or movie to their watchlist and it will automatically get added, searched, downloaded, and hosted without any extra interaction from me. You can even set up profiles so that certain lists meet quality standards, so for example the kids cartoons aren’t downloaded at the same high a quality as the adult shows.

My point is this, make the switch to automating the searching and downloading, not so that you can hoarde everything, but so that you can’t stop spending as much time being the home video librarian and more time enjoying it. On more than one occasion I’ve been out with friends and somebody mentions a movie they liked, I’ve taken a minute to add it to my list, and the movie is ready and waiting on my Plex (and/or Jellyfin) before I get home.

Worse is a hard metric to analyze when comparing 2 different storms. One may have higher winds. Another might dump more rain. Another might have brought a high storm surge to an area that couldn’t handle it. Another might come in kinda mild and just stall, battering one area for a long time. One storm might do massively more damage if it hits Atlanta vs. Miami. I’ll forgive people for getting a little hyperbolic when describing a storm that has personally impacted them. Storms may hit a broad region, but the impact of a storm is always hyper local.

Don’t blame Plex for that, they’re just aggregating streams from other sources.

Why?

Then maybe you can tell me what “attempting to do more” means, because the author of the article certainly didn’t. Or why that’s bad. My only take away is that the author thinks the system should facilitate the running of applications and just get out of their way already. But that sounds a lot like building a road network and then failing to install traffic controls because the DOT should just stay out of the way of traffic.

This is why I set up tasker to lockdown my phone under certain conditions, such as: getting disconnected from Bluetooth (like when my phone is separated from me and my watch, my headphones, or the car), getting disconnected from WiFi (like when it’s taken from where it’s supposed to be), getting a slight jolt from the accelerometer (like getting thrown to the ground or even just a swift tap). My phone may get locked down a bunch during day to day stuff, but at least I know it will lockdown automatically when it matters.

We’re talking about the history of racist voter disenfranchisement and this literacy test was a prime example of that from our recent past. Although national IDs exist they are VERY far from common and they are often relatively difficult, time consuming, and expensive to get.