4grams

I have a google voice number for that. Most things no longer accept it though.

I had delusions of trying to keep track of which address is sold by who which is why I did the hide my email addresses. But I’ve always kept separate personal and spam accounts. This was my attempt at combining to a single account.

https://xkcd.com/927/

Illogical meat brain that thinks odd numbers are more random that even I guess.

Don’t get me wrong, there are systems that work. I built up a very successful smart card based system many years ago after a failed audit. I initially hated the idea but in the end we built a crazy secure environment that was very easy to use and maintain. That project is long since obsolete but after doing that one, over a decade ago, I figured things were headed in the right direction.

I think I’m extra sensitive right now because my aging mom has made the issue acute. She’s not the same as she was a few years ago and helping her with all her online accounts has become a nightmare. It’s just too complicated for many folks.

Yeah, I’m up to 40 hide my addresses for that same reason. Figure if the password sucks, at least the email can be unique and obscure.

I call that a feature.

This shit pisses me off so bad. I had an identity theft a few years back, took ages to undo, and my credit score is still impacted by it. At the time I moved to a password manager and all my passwords are 31 characters of garbage. I’ve got several, highly sensitive accounts that my passwords don’t work for, in fact one a bank, until fairly recently, had repurposed a phone number field in the DB so passwords were limited to 10 characters numeric only (I managed to get one of their IT folks on the horn to explain why the password was so awful).

I cannot believe we live in 2025 and we still haven’t figured out passwords.

That story is immediately what came to mind.

I think I’ll go get some tacos for lunch and mull this one over…

Almost got me with this one. I’ve heard the same argument deployed unironically from some of my own family…

I really do appreciate the words and the sentiment. I would normally agree but right now my faith is still shattered. I think there are good and amazing people, who have done magical and wonderful things. I just think that small and petty tyrants are more common and more indicative of humanity as a whole. That the righteous have to look up from underneath the bootheel of those who deserve to be crushed under one themselves. Instead, those type get to run the show, and obviously always have.

This weekend has been bad mentally. I hope I can find some optimism again. I’m just so tired of expecting the worst and being proven right.

Without a doubt this is the worst part. It was an immediate and irreversible swing from being an optimist who believes in the good of people to the complete opposite. I now believe humanity is fundamentally flawed and will destroy itself.

Watched too much Star Trek as a kid I guess.

There isn’t a best, maybe a less bad but even then it’s an impossible choice. ✋wins here.

Oh, that makes it so much better…

There are so many flags right now it’s just a sea of red undulations. Done by design, so that we don’t notice the death of democracy.

Married couples often start looking alike over time.

this is how he operates… he denies, then jokes, then encourages others to joke, then when they do he gets serious, then act like everyone was always serious.

this man will NEVER willingly give up a shred of power.

We have two corporate parties, the status quo and the controlled opposition. They occasionally switch labels but until we get the corporate out, we will never have a real choice.

I hate going there these days. I’m not sure if it was a frog boil or what but the site now is a shadow of the one I left during the big mod exodus. It’s terrible now, so much less info, user base has devolved, riddled with ads.

I imagine if I was still there all the crap would feel normal but having left, every time I visit now and see what huge changes have been made. Every time i visit the quality of the site has tanked even more.