niracler

March, the turning point of my life. The world's fog has only opened a little; whether it's heaven or hell, I suppose I have to experience it.

🍵 - An Unexpected Opening#

The Cold Wave Arrives: A Constricted Space#

At the beginning of this month, I was inexplicably invited to an unexpected 🍵 meeting. This scene reminded me of when I was playing "Baldur's Gate 3," just after disembarking from a spaceship, and within half an hour of the plot, I was pulled into prison. This incident stemmed from my previous following of a certain account on the X platform, which led to my innocent entanglement. As a result, my X and Telegram accounts were canceled under an irresistible force. (Who is inflating the KPI!!!)

Thus, for the first time in my life, I stepped into a police station in such an absurd manner. I certainly can't disclose the specific details here, or I might replicate the situation again. However, perhaps I can give you a version through a private chat on TG. ([[🍵 What I experienced that day]])

This incident hit me quite hard, especially since my TG channel had been around for six years, filled with memories. It is particularly regrettable that I only granted my secondary account admin rights and did not give the rights to add admins, which means I can no longer add bots to the channel. The only way now is to freeze this channel; you should be able to see the corpse of my channel in my Blog's Profile.

Regrouping: Future Strategies#

If I were to say what I did wrong before, the problem is that I was almost using my real name online. Faced with the situation I encountered, I began to reflect on how to maximize the protection of my identity. Here are a few self-rescue insights I've condensed:

1. Differentiation of Avatar and ID: Ensure that the avatars and IDs on domestic and foreign platforms are different. Using too conspicuous an ID may lead to being searchable in various domestic databases, so it's advisable to avoid directly associating personal identity information. (My previous ID was too obvious; any high school student could easily find me online.)
2. Avoiding Prominent Personal Features: Avoid choosing overly distinctive ID features. According to the TF-IDF algorithm, selecting some more generic IDs, like Steve Jobs, can better hide personal identity among a plethora of information. (So I want to take it a step further and use different IDs on various platforms.)
3. Do not use domestic email for foreign services: Email content is hard to avoid being scrutinized domestically; if suspicious tendencies are discovered, the corresponding email platform may be forced to cooperate and hand over data. Now, I try to use randomly generated emails from fastmail for registration on various sites (it's indeed convenient with 1Password).
4. 。。。（There are many more）

The core principle is "I cannot let others deduce which domestic account I have through my foreign account." However, doing so will have a huge impact on the establishment of personal IP, and the information across platforms will become exceptionally fragmented. Because the means of anti-tracking is to prevent others from having a complete understanding of me, which is contrary to the idea of establishing a personal IP.

It's entirely a method of self-castration to seek survival. I also vaguely feel that this is largely just self-indulgence. (It might also be a reaction to PTSD; perhaps over time, I will recover.)

PS. I won't promote my new channel.

🦠 - Troubled by Illness#

After the New Year, things have been quite unsettled, with me coughing non-stop. Being sick is really frustrating; over the course of about a month, I experienced two rounds of illness:

Fever (2D) -> Runny Nose (2D) -> Prolonged Cough (14D)

I wonder if this is a sequela of COVID-19. Now, I easily cough into bronchitis at the slightest cold, which has never happened before.

During that emergency visit, the hospital was packed; unless you had a fever of thirty-nine degrees, you might have to wait nine hours to be seen. In the end, I couldn't get seen and had to go home empty-handed. Moreover, appointments for the respiratory department on Sundays can only be scheduled for Thursday, the hospital is truly overwhelmed.

Fortunately, I have finally recovered somewhat. Looking back, it seems this illness indirectly led me to confront my boss and resign.

🌰 - Time to Open the Map#

Yes, at this point, I have already resigned.

Procrastination is a Bad Habit#

It took me half a year to finally resign; the most suitable time was a year and a half ago. But at that time, I was filled with countless fears and unable to face an unpredictable future. And it turns out that procrastination made the reality I faced increasingly difficult. (The job market right after the pandemic was much better than this year's situation.)

I should say that writing this xlog has helped me regain a sense of self to some extent.

But a missed opportunity is just that; it is what it is. Continuing to procrastinate would only lead to worse outcomes for both parties.

WHY#

The reasons for my resignation are complex, but ultimately, it still boils down to personal choice and direction. The weariness of my current job, the desire to change jobs, and the people around me are all reasons. There are three main points: one is what I mentioned before, one will be discussed later, and one has not been mentioned.

I can hardly imagine repeating the same routine day after day with the same people in the same place. After all, I am a greedy and weary person. As the following quote states.

A person's height is defined by their vision; if you see the same kind of people every day, read the same types of books/videos, and (read) write code belonging to the same domain, then your vision is likely not broad enough. The internet evolves at a breakneck pace; if you confine yourself to a small corner, you can easily become a person in Tao Yuanming's Peach Blossom Spring: unaware of the Han, regardless of Wei and Jin.

Later - Perhaps Worse#

Perhaps what awaits me is an even worse future, and I might have to give up YY for XX. But perhaps this is also something I am destined to endure. I am still young; if I fail next time, there will be another chance to stand up again.

I can't say I am an excellent person; I rarely invest myself wholeheartedly in work. Just as a magician cannot cast spells they cannot imagine, I have also, in a sense, defined and limited myself. I even doubt whether I truly perceive and recognize my own problems.

The only thing I can be sure of is that my views and what I think are correct are mostly wrong, even absurdly naive. All I can do is continuously perceive and adjust them.

I want to go to a place with subways outside of Guangdong. "Cities without subways are like being nailed to the map --- unable to move." I really don't like being so close to home, as if I have never stepped out of my door.

PS. The fog in my world has only opened a little; whether it's heaven or hell, I suppose I have to experience it.

Works#

Articles#

• Steam Customer Service :: Steam Family User Guide and FAQs - Come build a cyber family. In less than five days, I've gathered 5 people to enjoy over 160 games (though currently in a gaming slump).
• Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe | Hacker News - Good news, I haven't used it much yet.
• My Attitude Towards Piracy - Minority -

  Imagine an e-book being published in a bookstore without any protection; what would happen? Of course, piracy would run rampant! Thus, digital rights management (DRM) systems emerged. It seems perfect! But what’s the cost? Let’s take a look at these seemingly brain-dead system designs:

• Reinterpreting Heptabase | Jin Cheng Goidea - I was originally looking for mind mapping tools, but now it seems I should try Heptabase. (In the end, I still returned to the embrace of Obsidian~~)
• Human X Community X Object - 2024-03-26 - niracler - It looks like the update is almost done, about eighty to ninety percent.
• DNA Testing Reveals the Actual Severity of Incest - It turns out there really are plots like this in the comics.

  Jim Wilson, a geneticist at the University of Edinburgh, was shocked by the frequency of incest he found in the U.K. Biobank, an anonymous research database: according to his unpublished analysis, about 1 in 7000 people is born from a first-degree relative—namely, siblings or parents and children.

• Exploring High-Quality Content on the Internet | Immersive Translation - Just in time to organize some information sources.
• Personal Information Acquisition and Knowledge Management System (Heptabase + Logseq + Readwise) · Pseudoyu - Unlike others who are "confident in their ability to filter and digest their own information," I find I completely lack this ability. (Especially since Yu-chan can use too many tools simultaneously.) I often swing between two extremes: either "information cocoon, unaware of worldly affairs," or "obsessed with scrolling, then looking around in confusion." I often find myself unable to stop scrolling once I start. Ultimately, it feels like fishing for a needle in a haystack to find content I’m interested in.
• Mental Health in Open Source - Some of my thoughts on my mental health during my journey in Open Source.
• c - Why is the create system call called creat? - Stack Overflow - Just like a real name, the more it is referenced, the harder it is to change later.
• Using Cloudflare Workers to Bypass GFW and Avoid Being Banned from OpenAI API - Tested and effective. Basically, any inaccessible API abroad can be accessed this way. I have set up forwarding for GitHub, xlog, Telegram, OpenAI, Pinboard, etc., all in China.
• milanvarady/Applite: User-friendly GUI macOS application for Homebrew Casks - Previously, I downloaded software from various vendors' official websites and installed them via dmg, resulting in a hodgepodge of software sources. Today, after a friend's reminder, I checked out Applite, and as a result, I almost reinstalled all the software on my computer. In the future, I can export the list with brew list --cask in one click.
• Weekly Review #33 - Beijing x Story x Farewell · Pseudoyu - Just a year ago, someone else's story. Indeed, this is the real, cruel side of life that we must face.
• Hurl - Run and Test HTTP Requests - Used for API testing; it seems pretty good so far. No need for GUI tools like Postman anymore.
• The Collapse and Rebirth of a Six-Year Open Source Project - DIYgod - Just as I was working on a project based on hono, it seems I can refer to this for learning.
• The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's Whitelist is Here; How Should We Safely Bypass the Firewall? A Conversation with Zhang Lei, the Former Head of 360 Safe Desktop - YouTube - Privacy and security!!!

Anything Else to Say#

Honestly, I feel a bit at a loss. I can only talk about some things I plan to do next. I'm not sure if I can accomplish them, so I'll start with the simple tasks.

Cover Image#

In a cyber bar, naming a drink after myself.