My partner is trying to get me into this show and the lack of resolution to the mystery is the least of my concerns.

Okay, sure, but that doesn't change the fact that these two developers, with their decisions in moderating that one instance, have dragged down the reputation of the entire platform. They're asking for donations because they lost the donations they were already getting.

And instead of questioning why that is and addressing it, they're asking for more.

This doesn't inspire trust in them. I trust their ideology not to mess with the platform, what I don't trust is their competence if they can't stop hemorrhaging donation money by refusing to deal with the biggest wart on the platform. They have all of these people saying they would donate if they would just deal with this conflict, but they won't. How badly do they need the money to keep developing if they're not willing to separate?

Here's the better question: do they even want to keep developing if they had to separate from it?

More importantly, just from a straight development perspective, this whole operation is a way too flimsy if it's depending on these two people, alone, forever. There have been a lot of really clumsy mistakes and lack of best practices.

What happens if they finally get another developer that really knows Rust and wants to join the project but doesn't "fit in"? How are they actually going to expand the team so this project can grow and not be so dependent on them when they have the reputation they do?

If the community were going to fork it, they would have forked it by now. I don't think there are enough people around that can manage a fork of this platform as it exists, so we are tied to them. And I don't think I like that. I would like to see this platform expand beyond them, but the current course doesn't seem to indicate that will ever happen.

Alternatives are not even close in quality.

Yes and we can go donate to those alternatives instead and help build them up.

Completely divorced of their political views, I don't think I want to donate to them simply because I don't believe they're doing a good job managing the platform. Donations aren't just down, they lost those donations. And when confronted with this fact, and told that they should probably change some things if they want to keep getting donations, they've staunchly refused.

This does not inspire faith in the development team.

Meanwhile lemmy's development is either too guarded or too complicated for anybody else to join the team and assist. It's still just these two. If the platform is growing, it cannot just be these two.

Freeloading where? They can be donating to the instance they are on.

It is not impossible, it's just difficult. You do not have to keep everyone satisfied, only enough of them. All you're doing here is making arguments for why they shouldn't change because they will never get 100% approval rating. That's just idiotic. No one is expecting perfect, they just expect better.

More importantly, neutrality in moderation is generally seen as more acceptable than swinging fully towards one direction. People will complain that you are allowing x or y, but you get much further by permitting that balance to exist naturally and moderating it at its most extremes, then you do buy stamping out one and promoting the other, which is absolutely what they do on .ml

Whoever said that you had to be a free speech absolutist, either? You can believe in free speech and also not be okay with Nazis on your platform.

It's really not that hard, many internet forums have been doing this for decades. It's kind of telling, frankly, how the very notion of it seems to elude some people around here.

All of which ignores the point the top comment made: that they shouldn't be moderating at all. Let whoever they choose moderate that instance, and separate from it entirely. Focus only on development.

But the fact they're apparently more concerned about the content on that instance than getting donations to support development of the platform is very telling, too.

Also, if they can't make enough money in donations to keep doing this full-time, why don't they let other people into the project on a volunteer basis? Reduce the workload on themselves so they can get part time jobs or something. All I've heard is how controlling they are, but it feels like this is too big of a thing to be on two individual developers in the first place.

If more people than just them could be involved, I'd happily donate. I would like to donate to something that's going to grow and get better over time, not to two individual developers treading water. I get it's difficult to find people that know Rust, and I sympathize, but my point stands. This entire project is operating very precariously on two individuals and if it's going to grow, that has to change at some point.

And as Arotrios said in another comment, the reason they're asking for money is because they lost the money they were getting. The way they operate, and allow that instance to destroy the reputation of their project, is what led to this. And it will continue to lead to this, unless they do some radical changes. I'm not putting my money back in until I see them doing something different and showing they've learned the lesson.

Why should people "Avoid at all costs" a manufacturer that will let you unlock the device with a code? I've never had a problem getting an unlock code from Motorola, and once it's unlocked, it's unlocked.

Why is this only including Play Store games and not F-Droid?

Because far and away the free, no Ads, no IAP Android game I've gotten the most use out of is Unciv.

6 months later, I'm disappointed no one told you to check Lineage. They support a lot of Motorolas

You're trapped in a burning building.

A firefighter hacks the door down and reaches their hand out to pull you free and carry you outside.

And you ask "What's in it for me?"

I truly don't think you people grasp how meaningless all this text your wasting is.

This happened because people are stupid. That's it. That's the long and short of it. They have no, absolutely no concept whatsoever of how bad things are about to get. There's no world where the citizenship understands what fascism is where Kamala needed to do anything different than she did.

At this point, I truly don't think it matters. None of this shit matters. The problem is the people.

Probably heard about the Penguin and wanted to come check it out.

Have you ever called a place and got the annoying automated answering voice? Have you ever sent an email to someone and got a boilerplate response? How did that make you feel?

Words aren't math. They are how humans communicate. When you read/hear them, knowing they didn't come from a human, they're hollow.

It's the facade of communication, because you're not actually communicating to a human being. You're using voice commands to control a computer. Asking an AI a question and getting a response is functionally no different than entering 2+2 in a calculator and getting 4 when you hit =.

If we get to a point humanity no longer recognizes or cares about that difference, we'll be in an extremely dark place.

There's this extremely cringe "museum" that OpenAI effectively paid for where they have all these AI exhibits, and one of them involves a phone you can pick up and talk to an AI generated Mr Rogers. This was done without the knowledge or consent of Fred Roger's widow or family. They took his voice and his words, contorted and strung them up with software, and made them dance.

The man that spent decades teaching and entertaining children with puppets had now been turned into one, without his consent.

The women behind this place goes around trying to sell AI to museum professionals in the form of seminars and such. She had the audacity to say "When I'm feeling down, I just pick up the phone, and let Mr Rogers cheer me up." to a room full of museum professionals whose entire job is to honestly interpret and represent history and the dead, and the never, ever, put words in their mouth.

She got chewed apart in the QandA. It was glorious.

What are you even talking about? The story is about the use of AI to recreate a dead person and create a fake interview.

Your comment feels like it's replying to the title of the thread and not to the context of the post.

OP is disabled, literally struggles to move on their own, and is financially dependent on their mother. Most of your advice is boilerplate and unactionable for them.

So first things first, all the advice you got about adult protective services is basically moot. Ohio law stipulates adult protective services only apply to age 60 and above. Some counties may extend that to adults under 60 with disabilities, but the law does not require, and they'll only help if they have the funds to help.

You said you're in a red county but you're on the outskirts of Columbus. I think you're being a little generous on what the outskirts of Columbus are. All the same, if you're in one of the red ones that circle Franklin county, the only one that will maybe take disability into consideration is Madison.

Other than that, I think you can forget about the APS. As a matter of fact, I would bet if you tried to contact them, they would hand it off to the cops anyway.

If you're close enough to Columbus and you can get there on your own, you'll want to look for any support you can find there. They'll have the most available resources, the most groups willing to help, and the most spaces to potentially house you.

Like, genuinely? If you can find a way to anonymously reach out to some local activist groups, they will be much more likely to give good, actionable advice to you than anyone here.

Discord is good, just be careful who you share your name with.

Actually, none of this advice is actionable for OP because Ohio doesn't have exceptions for disability for APS. You must be 60 years or older.

"Adult" means any person sixty years of age or older within this state who is disabled by the infirmities of aging or who has a physical or mental impairment which prevents the person from providing for the person's own care or protection, and who resides in an independent living arrangement.

https://codes.ohio.gov/ohio-revised-code/section-5101.60

It looks like certain countries may extend those benefits to 18-60 year olds with disabilities, but only if they have funds, and only specific a handful of counties. It's absolutely no guarantee because the law does not require the DOJFS to respond if the person is under 60.

Honestly, if they follow your advice, the DOJFS is likely to just call the cops anyway.

Right but their comment is suggesting APS which will not help them. They are 21, Ohio's APS program is only for people over 60.

This is OHIO. The Ohio DOJFS's APS services are explicitly only for adults over 60, and moreover, they don't just come pick you up. They send someone to investigate first and then make a determination on your need. This does not happen quickly and you CAN be be denied.

Rural Ohio native here. OP if you don't mind sharing what county you live in, I might be able to give you better info. If you don't want to share that (and that's perfectly understandable), what part of the state? Northeast, Southwest, Cleveland area, Columbus area, etc?