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wayward vagabond from homestuck: we should improve technology somewhat. well dweller: xkcd 927 “standards”

  • paultimate14@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    Without knowing the context of what drove OP to make this meme, my guess is they have some high and mighty idea for some sort of standard and someone else pointed out the XKCD comic is the most likely result.

    • Masimatutu@mander.xyzOP
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      11 months ago

      Found it on Mastodon, I don’t know if it’s the original source. The XKCD does have a good point, of course. But I mean, if we’d all think like that, no good standards would ever develop, so people shouln’t cite it as a fundamental truth everywhere and avoid all meaningful discussion.

      • Robaque@feddit.it
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        11 months ago

        Yeah it is worth looking into why certain new “standards” get adoped and others don’t.

        Standards don’t ever get designed just to be the new universal standard, right? There’s gotta be some kind of improvement in mind, whether iterating on previous designs or otherwise. I’d say that in many cases the improvement is the focus for the developer, not the delusion of creating the next big “standard”.

        It’s better for “standards” to develop naturally as happens in FOSS rather than for them to be imposed by authorities that will resist changing them once they become outdated, or companies that don’t care either way and will follow the profit of least resistance.

        • TheOSC@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          Plenty of standards are created with the express purpose of being a standard and selling the license for that standard to large companies. USB, HDMI, BlueRay, CD, Bluetooth, etc. all of these are standards designed as standards.

          • Robaque@feddit.it
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            11 months ago

            Which is why they often suck, no? Took years for USB to really find its footing, and now with all the EU legislation setting USB-C I feel like it’s gonna become frustratingly outdated eventually.

    • 4am@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      “You know what it would be cool if Lemmy could do?”

      Replies: xkcd standards strip, 15 times

  • spudwart@spudwart.com
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    11 months ago

    A bad standard adds to the pile.

    A good standard crushes the pile.

    Example: Git and Linux.

    Proof: what are the other source management softwares? (Don’t mention Mercurial, that’s cheating).

    Also for Linux, it’s down to the license and history. Linux isn’t a bad investment because all commits directly to the kernel are given freely to all. And it’s not Unix. It doesn’t have the stain of AT&T and their sue happy ways. Also Linux dominates all computer markets except for user desktops. Servers, phones, application specific utilities, etc.

  • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
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    11 months ago

    I love how both FB messenger and Google talk/chat/whatever were compatible for 3 months, thanks to a fucking standard, before they both “improved somewhat” to be incompatible.

  • Jimmycrackcrack@lemmy.ml
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    11 months ago

    I know that XKCD comic in particular but I don’t get what’s going on with the image it’s been superimposed on to or what it has to do with it.

    • csfirecracker@lemmyf.uk
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      11 months ago

      The original image has something along the lines of “I hate this system” and the smug guy in the well is saying “Ah, and yet you participate in said system!” as a gotcha. I think the purpose in this one is just carrying over the smugness with which people post the XKCD when any new possible technological standard is proposed (whether or not it has any merits)

    • neptune@dmv.social
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      11 months ago

      It’s become a meme where a poor soul wants some thing, and the kid pops out of the well with a trite rebuttal.

      In this case, the trite rebuttal is a cartoon about technological standards.

  • kpw@kbin.social
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    11 months ago

    How about improving existing standard implementations instead of more fragmentation?

    • Jamie@jamie.moe
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      11 months ago

      Unless the original standard agrees and implements it, then you’ve just created a new standard.

    • orangeboats@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      There are times when the original standard has zero forwards compatibility in it, such that any improvement made to it necessarily creates a new standard.

      And then there’s also times when old greybeards simply disregard the improved standard because they are too used to the classic way.

  • CoderKat@lemm.ee
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    11 months ago

    I like the idea of having a regulated, living, backwards compatible standard. Which seems to be what USB-C is now, for phones. The EU has soon to be active regulation that will make it a requirement for many things. Yet, it’s not a single, set in stone standard, but one that’s constantly being expanded (eg, version 3.2 and PD).

    Of course, the regulation has to also be living. Eg, at some point, maybe there’ll be a strong enough reason to allow another standard (by no means do I think USB-C will always make sense). And the regulation has to very carefully choose the standard.

    That way we get the benefits of standardization (from actually everyone using the same format), but we aren’t unreasonably crippling ourselves to do it.

  • dokapuff@lemm.ee
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    11 months ago

    Why is the alt text calling the peasant “Wayward Vagabond from homestuck?” I mean that’s fucking hilarious but why

  • Artyom@lemm.ee
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    11 months ago

    This meme should be the new standard format to resist standard proliferation!