The Musings Of The Consensus

I write this article because I want to make clear an issue I have a burning contempt for, and I believe I do so with good reason. Any community that tries to be as opaque about how authority is exercised, meted out, and put into practice. I believe accountability for one's actions is a fundamental good for everyone, and it ensure the parties who are supposed to enforce the rules are not above them, nor can they use the rules as an excuse to vent their own personal beliefs, hatreds, and grudges under the guise of doing their jobs. That is not to say I believe there are not times when such opaque activity is bad. In the case of legal matters, private information, or other matters requiring sensitivity and discretion, then there is a reasonable, ethical basis for not being flagrantly transparent, such does more harm than good. My primary basis for this contempt stems from many web communities I have either been members of or have administrated myself, but I believe, the above ex...

I recently found out Wikia shuttered the Crappy Games Wiki, apparently due to this guy. By their own account, they did so because they were fighting sexism and fighting libel and defamation. ( archive ) The truth is far from this supposed moral high horse they want to ride. In fact, the real reason they did this was revenge for being blocked . ( archive ) Proof they are the same person on Wikia and RationalWiki . ( archive ) This all said, I just want to say I'm not going to get into whether GamerGate or any allegations made by anyone on anyone are valid in detail save to say I was an adamant supporter. I fought that battle long ago, consider the matter over, will let the facts speak for themselves, and I'm leaving it at that. However, what I am going to say is that this PKMNLivesNew/ UglyRat disgusts me because despite their supposed claims to fighting sexism and violations of Wikia policy, they were trying, as the above links demonstrate, to recruit a personal ...

SuperTuxKart is a free and open source attempt at making a Mario Kart clone, and to be honest, it's pretty decent. In fact, I recommend it for those who love FOSS games for the following reasons: 1. For starters, it's quite well put together. It's very stable, quite fleshed out, and has a lot of content out the gate. 2. It tries to do it's own thing instead of straight up ripping off Mario Kart. The physics engine has several differences with Mario Kart while still having similar gameplay, the characters are based off the logos of other FOSS software (like Wilbur, the logo animal of the GIMP program) and each has their own unique playstyle. 3. It's multiplatform, so Windows, Mac,and Linux users can all enjoy it. About the only downsides is that it is pretty huge (500 MB for the Windows version) compared to Mario Kart (the Mario Kart 64 rom is around 8MB), but in this day and age that's pocket change in terms of space, and if you want a Mario Kart styl...

Because I love FOSS (free and open source software) and love the Civilization games (not all that keen on Civ 6 though), I decide to try the FOSS FreeCiv out to see if it's a decent replacement for the commerical product. Note: Based on version 2.6.0 for everything below. It comes in three versions using a different engine client for the user interface, though the underlying gameplay, heavily inspired by Civilization II, remains the same. First, an overview of the pros and cons of each client: GTK: The most stable one, and the one closest to the look and feel of Civilization II. The interface definitely is familiar to Civ II veterans, but mouse control is wonky, some UI elements scale poorly, but it otherwise feels like Civ II and players of that will adapt fairly easily. QT: Less stable than the GTK version, but has a more updated, Civ III feel. I found mouse control better and the UI was more helpful in presenting useful information, but it has stability issues over ...

Some imbecile pissed at the Kiwi Farms awhile back (you know who you are) established a libelous forum filled with whatever dox (personal information) they could scrape via a Google search with a hefty dose of unprovable bullshit and recruited the biggest group of deviants, criminals, lunatics, and other dregs of humanity to join the shitshow, until they made the mistake of going after a lawyer who was willing to burn them at the stake legally until they sold the original founder out to save themselves and burned the original forum. Given how they have yet to start shit anytime soon and given how what is being regurgitated on a recent successor (named like before as another member of Joshua "Null" Moon's relatives), I have every reason to believe the new one is being set up by an even dumber person who simply copied the first one and has recruited an even more pathetic group of insane jackasses into what the Kiwi Farms loves to call "Autistic Legion of Doom". ...

Recently, Joshua "Null" Moon of the Kiwi Farms, has released information about some utterly morally bereft scum who decided to psychologically torture and blackmail a mentally ill man for their own greed and sick amusement . I will not belabor anything he has already stated with more clarity than myself, but I urge anyone with conscience to spread the word about the crimes Joshua Moon has uncovered and the criminals responsible as far and wide as humanly possible. The party these crimes were aimed at harming is legally known as Christine (nee Christian) Weston Chandler, and the sociopaths who decided to extort thousands of dollars out of him as well as force him to commit degrading acts under threats to his reputation and legal safety are utterly beyond the pale. While CWC has been the target of various trolling schemes for years, the actions done that Joshua Moon has revealed to the world are in no way funny or morally, legally, or ethically justifiable, and I urge any...

I write this as a reflection how I've learned to deal with people above me in various who are unreasonable. This can range from an unreasonable boss or employer to some asshole mod on a website, but the advice applies equally to all unreasonable superiors wherever you go, and I hope this advice helps you deal with them. For starters, NEVER respond in kind: It is a basic impulse that when someone is a prick, you lash out in kind yourself, as no one like to be insulted, browbeaten, or treated like shit, especially if they are in a position of authority and are clearly using that as a justification for shitting on you. But never respond in kind for the following reasons. 1. Never give them the high ground: People who do this want you to give them justification for their asshole behavoir, especially superiors, bosses, or some other figure in a position of authority looking for an excuse to justify punishing you for whatever reason, justified or not, even if they do or don...

Recently, I have been been musing what makes a good website leader, especially if you have to enforce order on said website, and based on my own experience and that of others whose moderation I've witnessed, I've come to a few conclusions. 1. Civil behavior is a two-way street: As a site moderator, you are obligated to enforce civility, especially if you want it returned. If you can't yet have rules to be civil, you are making it impossible to be taken seriously. 1a: While enforcing the rules, be civil: Even if a troublemaker is annoying you, keep your temper in check. Even if you are otherwise reasonable, you make it clear that you cannot deliver effective discipline without acting childish, which future troublemakers can exploit to make you angry. You should always present a wall of dispassionate calm in any official capacity. This also applies to reading out the riot act or whatever other rules to those who have doubts or questions. Just because you don;t like ha...

It's been awhile since I wrote a post here, so I'd like to cover a few tricks for reducing one's load order on Skyrim Special Edition. There is a program written for merging plugins I used to use, but I have since discontinued use, it tends to bug out quite a bit despite Skyrim SE native support. Instead, I recommend the following: 1. Turn small mods in ESL files in the Creation Kit: The ESL limit is far higher than the ESP limit, and if the mod is under 4000 lines of content, this should work quite nicely. 2. Merge Plugins xEdit Script; While written for Oldrim, it works fine for Skyrim SE, but I have some caveats I must mention. A. Refrain from use on mods with BSA archives: The BSA structure is bit different on SE, and while merging many non BSA mods into one mod that uses a BSA and replacing the name of the merge mod with the name of the mod needing the BSA should generally work, the other way round tends to cause a lot of issues. B. Save the original mods i...