After WWDC completed (a few weeks ago), I had intended to opine about just a few things from it (mainly macOS 26 Tahoe + Liquid Glass) along with posting about some brief thoughts regarding the June 12th protests (which happened that same weekend), and then some gaming industry related topics. Actually, there were many things I wanted to post about but I’ve just been both mentally/physically out of it (besides the fact that I also caught something PLUS the back/shoulder pain that knocked me flat out) where everything else in real life just caught up and said “stop”. One of the main trigger points was waking up June 14th to learn that my country (more specifically, this unlawful regime) decided to unilaterally and unconstitutionally bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities (w/o the truthful intelligence, w/o legislative approval, nor any provocation). At that point, I just pulled the plug and turned off all notifications (just manually checking a few messages but primarily staying unplugged).
Observation: Even when I have been actively avoiding this stuff recently, it’s inevitable to learn about just parts of it due to the sheer amount of crap that is happening (even if only a fraction of this is being reported on). There is sort of a “deja-vu” aspect to all this as well (like from back in 2015-2019 when I began to tune out of the internet in general to the point where I eventually mass deactivated a lot of my actual socials besides Blogger and YouTube). Back then, it was mostly out of the growing disgust with the gaming industry (the way games were being released and the toxic attitude of industry execs towards both their workers/the customer player base). Of course this isn’t unique to this specific industry; it is just an amplified microcosm of these corporations when they are approaching their “end stage capitalism” with greed.
It’s like how the modeling for AI is now based on unadulterated copyright/intellectual property theft that corporations are being allowed to get away with where even two recent U.S. District court rulings (Anthropic and Meta) approved of as fair use (highlighting the level of pure BS propaganda we’ve long been subjected to). Sure, it is noted this may not let them off the hook for their library collection being considered piracy, but we’ve seen time and time again how the loopholes are worked in these companies favor.
Anthropic is the company that spent millions on printed books in order to take them apart for scanning in order to train their AI model. Regular people are guilt tripped into their doing it as being piracy/theft while these corporations work the system to basically steal and profit from. Basically, all of that old facade is off completely now where I find myself looking at all of these rules written in many of these companies terms of use/service, and view them through that same “do as I say, not as I do” lens. Similarly, the rule of law is being applied selectively by governments that are being run by what amounts to criminal enterprises (the current U.S. government being a case in point).
I learned a few weeks ago that a YouTube content creator who creates a lot of guides for OBS/streaming on multiple platforms, was on the receiving end of a one day suspension for violating something within Twitch’s vague multistreaming guidelines. There are far larger streamers though who clearly have chats from multiple platforms combined where Twitch doesn’t even care. Likewise, how do you manage alerts or engaging with viewers on those other platforms (the Twitch simulcast guidelines from October 2023 are asinine in that regard). The vagueness also results in the problem of inconsistent enforcement (which is par for the course on these platforms).
As someone who is a moderator for two different Twitch channels, I now find myself at odds with many of these guidelines to a point where I just offer my best advice, but leave the final decision to the streamer (my stance before would pretty much be “best not to do that”). I’m definitely no longer a staunch supporter of the Twitch platform under current “leadership” and more so it’s parent company, Amazon (this just adds to my reasons for further distancing myself from them). And no, YouTube isn’t any better (I mean, its company culture is now so very much like parent Google). As much as I enjoy(ed) discovering this other part (IRL/just chatting) of Twitch, that other side (not just Twitch/YouTube but the online stuff that drove me to just get away from it in 2019), is having that same effect in 2025.
The focus of this blog has not helped; I knew that it had that constant potential down side (where I mentioned previously about not wanting to head down that path) where “stream of conscious” style verbage with many of these topics does not help (it was already bad enough when I did it with the gaming industry). Looking back just a few months ago where I was toying with the now insane idea of possibly switching to a micro-blogging format (using Bluesky as that platform) instead of what I ended up doing with migrating; I am glad I did not go down that former route. As I quickly learned, Bluesky is just a different echo chamber with the same issues as every other social media platform.
Part of re-evaluating/re-focusing again led me back to my (casual) gaming roots again with offline TERA (June 30th has been 3 years since the game officially closed on PC) as well as the ArcheAge (which was shutdown last June) 1.2 emulator (AAEmu); these are basically former online MMORPG’s that I used to play where I am now running them offline (modifying and playing them solo) as part of disconnecting/unplugging. These are two side hobbies that I can enjoy far away from these greedy corporations (as well as away from the real world madness). I am also over the “guilt tripping” these companies have tried to place on people (while they shift the corporate/industry narrative to “online live service” and taking your money, only to shut it all down in such a “rug pull” consumer unfriendly way) when many of us just want the ability to continue to experience these titles offline (especially once they are shutdown by a publisher or developer). And this is what I am going to be continuing back over on my gaming blog (which at one point, I had intended to go mostly into archival mode).
The general moral is this. “Don’t settle” or “never say never”. That is how you learn what works and what doesn’t (for you). Part of life is this cycle of learning. Try things and see what makes you happy (or doesn’t). For myself, this blogging stuff has always been a side thing (and I need to constantly remind myself about that and not getting into that cycle of negativity which comes with the territory on many topics). I don’t look at it as content creation (though others have told me it still is). My decision of never intending to monetize this stuff really does help because you aren’t caught in that trap; that part is especially brutal with audio/visual style content that relies on platforms like Twitch and YouTube (the latters algorithmic treadmill is especially detrimental to many who end up burning out in the process with the amount of time that goes into creating long form content/having to do that consistently to keep the algorithm there happy).
Disconnecting/unplugging/touching grass/freedom to come and go at will is far more easier in this regard (in being able to spend ones limited time doing and engaging in the things that they enjoy) since there is no pressure compared to when trying to monetize something (there is a balance that has to be weighed there like everything else). And that is what I have re-learned in these past few months (not being trapped in the same cycle if you can find ways to get out of it).
UPDATE: as part of this disconnecting, I kicked myself off of Bluesky and Instagram. The latter was cemented after learning about Zuckerberg and his wife announcing the closing (in 2026) of the tuition-free school their philanthropic organization had created back in 2016 (I guess they no longer need the tax break it offered since they are part of the group who will be benefiting from the tax cuts for the ultra-rich). When the community (in East Palo Alto) opines about the “sense of betrayal”, I just wanted nothing to do with Meta properties anymore (even if I was barely using Instagram).
As for Google, am still in the de-Google process (which is now mostly about getting off of YouTube). YouTube (as a viewer) without a decent adblocker is already an awful experience (and on the channel side, even though I don’t have monetization enabled, they still run all of their annoying ad rolls on them). Majority of the videos are gaming archival material so it’s not a high priority (I have just a few vids that are actually shared on the channel for informational purposes).
MEGA (which I’ve been subscribed to for hosting my TERA server/client archive) has a decent album function (photos and videos work but without any fancy functionality). There is an embed function on supported video formats so I am current looking at this as my top replacement. My current Pro plan offers 36TB of bandwidth each month (though I have a percentage of that allocated for increasing the quota free download limits).
Discord and Twitch (which I’ve been thinking about a lot) will be the final part since they are “intertwined”. Discord (post-IPO whenever it happens) will likely turn that platform into an even further enshittified mess while my increasingly antagonistic views of parent Amazon and current Twitch “leadership” is a driver for looking to “disconnect” from the platform. The “intertwined” aspect of Discord and Twitch is the moderator part. I’ll therefore be trying to time this with my “unplugging” from Twitch again (since it will make sense to step down and de-mod myself at the same time). That timeframe is looking like early 2026 (or maybe sooner). Both Twitch channels already have good moderators; I don’t add any further value at this point.
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