Trying to reinvigorate !superbowl@lemmy.world and !anime@lemmy.ml .

SuperbOwl migrated from Reddit but nobody was doing anything with it. I try to post at least one owl a day. Currently I’m posting one owl rescue a day for each US state so people can visit and support them in person. Today is #11, Hawaii.

Anime communities seem so dead in Lemmy. There was finally an active thread last weekend, so I wanted to try to start another one this weekend.

I don’t block too many things, because there can occasionally be news related to a topic I have no interest in that is still interesting. Like I have no interest in sports, but if there’s something big like a scandal or arrest or some great play it mistakes, it’s fun to catch that stuff.

The main things I outright block are anything NSFW that is definitely not for me, but mostly it’s just about all of the meme communities. The amount of material those groups churn out is overwhelming and so many just seem so low effort. Things like programming humor generally don’t bother me much, but most are just meh.

Top for me have to be the combo of Aniyomi and WVC.

Aniyomi is a Tachiyomi fork that adds anime extensions. Tachi is great as is, but after Anyme shut down, I needed something to watch and track anime with MAL integration. Plus if you read manga, I’d assume you watch anime too. App and extensions receive regular updates.

WVC aka Web Video Caster. Chromecast any video. I have watched soooooo much stuff on my TV through this. Great controls and features, frequent updates, and they’re on Reddit to talk to directly if you have issues or feature requests. Great team of people and wonderful app. First premium app I bought.

Bring! is a close third. Works on Android and iOS so me and SO can both share a shopping list every since Google screwed theirs up. Was great when Google Assistant was linked to it, but Google broke that too. Still a great app though. We get notifications when the other person adds an item in case one of us is running errands already.

Came here to say stuffies. There is also Rhode Island clam chowder. All the other seafood was good too. Stopped at a public house that had free oysters that changed my mind about raw oysters.

The Breakers mansion tour was also cool.

HP Lovecraft’s grave is there. I enjoyed looking around Providence at night thinking about it as part of his fictional universe.

I went to the Roger Williams Zoo.

There is a vampire grave people leave stuff at.

Also went to some museums and Block Island, but they just had a fire so that may be closed or difficult to get to right now.

A, B, and C are federated. They can all see each other’s posts.

New group D shows up. A, B, C, and D all start off seeing each other.

D starts posting anti-pastafarian comments. A and B are pro-pastafarian, and defederate from D.

A and B still see C posts, but now no longer see content from D. I forget if that goes both ways or not.

C thinks they should hear D out and don’t defederate, so C still sees everybody.

That’s my basic understanding at least. Politely correct me if I’m mistaken!

An older relative had me help him with his resume recently. He gave me his email as something like jugman1953@domain.net and I asked if that was what he wanted to use. He apparently collects antique crockery… I told him that may come off as something else. He insisted, so I used it.

I guess it shows what I know, because he got the job. Even a questionable email isn’t always a deal breaker.

I did end up getting the Verselab today. I was able to make a few decent loops in the store right away, and the sounds are even better in person. Spent the rest of the night figuring out how to automate between loops to make an actual songs with verse, chorus, etc. and checking out the sound packs. For not knowing what the heck I’m doing it’s been a ton of fun.

I liked finding the old hip hop noises, the synth string ensemble noises from Planet Rock, a things that sounded like the Darude Sandstorm song, and a bunch of other familiar stuff.

The loops I made were all over the place. Some haunted house type thing, some hip hop/trap thing, some juggalo sounding beat with a creepy laugh, one with a middle eastern vibe, and some sad country fiddle jam. It’s got so much to learn, but it’s been a ton of fun and you can do any kind of music.

Got to check out the Minilogue at the store too. The sampler is way more limited, not sure I like the slim keys, and way more difficult to get pleasant sounds out of without just sticking to presets. The presets did sound great though, and if I actually knew how to play keys better and knew more theory, I’m sure it would be awesome. If I had gotten that, is probably just screw around making noise and not learn anything.

Found a localish floor model for sale. After watching a ton of videos on this thing, it sounds great and seems to do wayyyy more than I would have thought for what it costs. The work flow seems much like working with my multifx, and I can plug in my guitar or bass or mic my nylon string guitar. The vocal effects may or may not be a bonus, I’ve never tried to record my singing before.

My amp has RCA in and a blend knob for hooking up a phone or mp3 player, so it looks like I don’t need a mixer either. All the input/output options seem great.

I can kinda see why this thing wasn’t a success at launch, but it feels firmware and the optional app have fixed most of the complaints. I’m really surprised this thing is so cheap! Major thanks again for showing me this was a thing!

I think the DAWless route seems more appealing for me. Getting up and running quickly sounds good, and will let me get back on the Rhodes. Learning keys is my main priority still, I have been learning so much.

The Digitakt seems awesome, but the sound always seems cold to me. May just be YouTube though. The Polyend seems really nice though.

I found a demo unit of the Verselab mentioned in another response for sale near me in going to check out this weekend, but if that doesn’t work out, I may have to get the Polyend. The Roland work flow looked a bit more natural to me.

My friend claims to know a bit about Reaper. I may let him tend to the tedious bits and teach me some if I start to come up with any decent music.

Thanks for the help!

That’s where most of the frustration comes in, since synth gear all looks to work so differently. I can walk up to any guitar, bass, drum set, or amp and have a pretty good idea how it works.

I looked on Korg and Arturia’s dealer locators since they seem to have lots of entry level gear, but they really don’t show much nearby other than listing every Guitar Center in a 100 mile radius.

I did hit up Reddit and search the cities near me, and while the city nearest me seemed to have some decent shops, it looks like 2 hours away there is a big new and vintage store that a bunch of people have said they’ve spent 3-4 hours there trying all sorts of things. It’s a father and son shop and they seen to like to talk gear and let you demo whatever. But sure if it will narrow it expand my options, but it does seem to best place to get my hands on things all in one place.

I have a few accounts, but mainly stick to Beehaw at this point. It just feels different in a good way.

It seems to have died down now, but there seemed to be much hate for it for a week or so after the great Reddit migration. That was originally what got me to try it though.

I’d rather it be people than bots. If it’s someone posting an article of something they’re interested in, I don’t necessarily need an initial comment from them, but if I post one, it’s be nice to get a response back from OP.

Especially if it’s something non-US I like learning how things work on other parts if the world. I didn’t really want a US take on world events when I could get it from someone there.

Shoe horn is underrated. I always used to wear out the lasting of the shoe (where the back of your heal goes) but not since using the shoe horn. A dollar store shoe horn helps save me hundreds on shoes.

We’ve been happy with the VIOFO A129 Pro. Not very expensive and good quality video on both cameras day and night. There are lots of day/night comparison videos and the VIOFO beat a lot of cameras that were much more expensive.

I’ve been trying my best at getting !superbowl@lemmy.world going. It needs more activity, I can only photograph so many owls!