Loosely inspired by how much people seemed to enjoy a similar question I asked on Games about unappreciated titles. But answers don’t have to be media related (they still can be though).

  • GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    47
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    9 months ago

    Connections.

    I love the stories about how seemingly disconnected events at different times and in different parts of the world actually have a connection. Like how some random chance meeting of two people 100’s of years ago started a chain reaction that ended up with us having some cool new technology or idea.

    • Justas🇱🇹@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      18
      ·
      9 months ago

      Jeri Ryan, who played 7 of 9 in Star Trek, was married to Jack Ryan, who was a Republican senator. Allegedly, Jack liked watching her have sex with strangers. They got into a sex scandal that led to Jack Ryan losing the re-election. The man who won that election was, then a political upstart, Barack Obama.

    • AlolanYoda@mander.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      9 months ago

      Oh! I also love that too! And thinking about maybe having seen some of my current best friends before we ever met - like we were both at a mall at the same day when we were kids or something.

      Basically that one episode of Community!

    • arcane@lemmings.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      9 months ago

      There’s a connection where 50 Shades of Gray wouldn’t have been written without 9/11 happening.

    • Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      9 months ago

      What’s the difference between complicated and complex? Normally people encounter complicated things in everyday dlife, but what you’re talking about is way beyond complicated. It’s truly complex.

      There are other definitions on Wikipedia, but this example should get you started.

  • Knusper@feddit.de
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    43
    ·
    9 months ago

    Sound engineering. Most people think sound is somehow sine waves and that’s it. And well, that’s technically correct on some level, but you can layer sound waves on top of each other to create triangle waves or square waves or what specific instruments happen to sound like: Waveform diagram showing flute, oboe and clarinet. They have very different, repeating squiggly lines. Source

    And well, these aspects have implications. Like with an oboe, even the basic waveform is quite interesting, so it’s excellent for solos.
    On the other hand, with a more boring sound, like a sine wave, you can do relatively wild things in terms of melody or combining them into intervals, and listeners won’t feel overwhelmed as quickly.

    And then you’ve got the fun field of drums. You can often just take white noise (or pink noise etc.) and just make its volume drop off rapidly and that already sounds similar to a drum.
    Which is again interesting on the boring/interesting spectrum. That noise signal adds a short moment of chaos into the mix. But then we often make drums play quite structured rhythms to entertain a different boring/interesting spectrum over time.

    • 4onTheFloor@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      9 months ago

      I love sound engineering and design as a whole. Music production was what got me into it. It’s still mind boggling to me how much you can do with a simple sine wave and process it into essentially unlimited amounts of various sounds.

      I never knew a thing about music theory, synthesizers, drum machines, etc. Almost 7 years down this path and I’m still learning as I go and just as curious as when I first started.

      Seeing different instruments through an oscilloscope or watching the different frequencies dance as a whole on an EQ plugin is my favorite.

      • Knusper@feddit.de
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        9 months ago

        The thing for me is, I did already know large chunks of music theory before getting into sound design, but traditional music theory doesn’t concern itself with waveforms.

        So, I know that a fourth interval sounds spiritual or that a triad in the base key sounds like ‘home’, i.e. you probably don’t want to return there fully, unless you’re concluding the journey / music piece.
        But like, these are two completely random, basic examples and I don’t know what the waveforms look like for them. Whether there’s anything in the waveforms that correlates with that perception.

        So, it feels like I learned most of the chemistry without any of the physics. And that I do now need to learn the physics to discover more of the chemistry. That there’s potentially even quite large chunks of uncharted territory for music theory, because everyone’s so obsessed with chemistry. Will have to see, if I’ll discover as grand things as I’m hoping for.

    • Archibald@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      9 months ago

      This is interesting! How can I get into this? Do I have to invest in some equipment or can I just use software to create sounds?

      • Knusper@feddit.de
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        9 months ago

        No idea, if there is any guided path into this. Much like the other commenter stumbled into it via music production, I stumbled into it via composing.

        Personally, I’ve mostly dicked around with SurgeXT and MilkyTracker.

        SurgeXT is a so-called VST plugin for use in digital audio workstations (DAWs), which is what the big boys & gals use to make electronic music. But it can also be started standalone, as just a digital instrument. And then you can type on your computer keyboard to play your sound like on a piano. SurgeXT is powerful, it will overwhelm you. Still does for me.

        MilkyTracker presents an old-school way of making complete songs, generally 8- or 16-bit songs.
        It’s quite reduced in its features, which makes it a lot less daunting, and does allow playing around with waveforms for instruments rather directly.

        Honestly, I don’t think, you can really make a wrong start into this field. Lots of modulation methods have been around since the 70s and 80s, which you’ll find in basically any music software.
        Try to find something that’s fun to you, to do with those sounds, so you keep coming back to try out new things.

        For example, I’m a musician, so somedays I do just jam out to myself.
        But working towards a little 8-bit song and just trying to create pseudo-instruments is also cool.

        If you do have fun with it, you can splurge on hardware, like good headphones and a MIDI keyboard, but you don’t need those to get into it.

  • Adalast@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    32
    ·
    9 months ago

    I literally cannot answer this without seeming like a pretentious, arrogant ass. Anyway, quantum field theory, high energy physics, condensed matter physics, generative art, computing algorithms, arcane math theories (meaning difficult to understand, not magical), procedural art, simulations, awesome places to visit in the world, Factorio, the channels I watch on YouTube. Honestly, I don’t have anyone around me who cares about or understands most of my hobbies. They all love me and care for me, just not the stuff I like.

      • Adalast@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        6
        ·
        9 months ago

        And grow it shall. Nice to meet you fellow engineer. Nauvis deserves to be paved for being in the way of our ships.

    • DeVaolleysAdVocate@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      9 months ago

      have you watched the youtube series ‘the biggest ideas in the universe’? it’s got about all that (no art). That PBS space time channel is additionally quite fire

      • Adalast@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        9 months ago

        I never miss a Space Time. So glad I found that years ago. Thank you for the suggestion.

    • Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      9 months ago

      awesome places to visit in the world… the channels I watch on YouTube.

      Those sound like two possibilities for general interest conversations. (You don’t sound pretentious btw.)

      • Adalast@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        9 months ago

        Thanks, and yeah, most of the YouTube channels I watch pertain to the rest of the list. It’s kinda hard to find someone who gets excited about Factorio or sorting algorithms.

        The travel is great, but where I live is one of those black hole places where people get sucked in and stuck, never really getting (or wanting) to get out and see the amazing places in the world.

    • kugel7c@feddit.de
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      9 months ago

      Contrary to some of the other comments here I think what you are saying is pretentious, but also that it’s good, It’s Good to be pretentious, at least sometimes.

      I try to think about it like this sometimes: "Don’t be a gatekeeper, but also try to hit the in joke when appropriate.

  • hperrin@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    32
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    9 months ago

    Cassette tapes. They may not have the most accurate sound, but they have a cool, unique sound, and they feel really nice to hold. People who love vinyl often hate tapes. I love both.

    • Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      11
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      9 months ago

      I have fond memories of making or receiving mixed tapes. It was very labor intensive to produce and imperfect (start of the songs often cut off, no smooth transition between songs, last song might also be cut off on the end) but that was part of the charm.

      • klemptor@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        7
        ·
        9 months ago

        When you called up the radio station and placed a request so you could tape it but then the fucking DJ talks over the intro so every mix tape you make with that song has his dumb yapping baked in

    • Snorf@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      9 months ago

      I also love both for their unique sounds, but i attribute that to having grown up with cassettes.

    • drummerguy520@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      9 months ago

      I recently started collecting cassettes since a number of metal bands release on the format. Everyone always has an odd reaction when I start talking about why I think they’re cool.

    • Clegko@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      9 months ago

      I collect both. I still have an old early-90s Sony system that I plunked a modern record player on top of and use almost every day. I also have a (factory) tape player in my old project car and will record CDs to a tape with the same system. Listening to modern music on tapes in an old car is just fun.

    • debil@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      9 months ago

      Cassettes also remember where you stopped listening so it’s trivial to continue later from the exact spot.

  • 🇰 🔵 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 ℹ️@yiffit.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    27
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    edit-2
    9 months ago

    Theology. I’ve read so many religious texts from all sorts of religions and while many people might discuss the organizations of religion a lot, or make fun of religious people, I rarely get to talk about the belief systems and their cultural relevance to various peoples both now and in the past or even discuss the possibilities of God and what God may be if one existed. I don’t study for the belief itself, I personally am an atheist; but knowing these belief systems helps understand people a bit better. Plus some of them are actually full of kick ass stories. Hindu is insane with space battles and shit.

    • frankPodmore@slrpnk.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      9 months ago

      I’m also an atheist who’s read most of the major religious texts, and you’re right, this is the best way to read them. If I’d sat there going, Ha ha, this is all very illogical, I can prove this didn’t happen… well, I wouldn’t have had a lot of fun!

      I love the bit early in the Mahabharata where two brothers keep fighting and causing chaos. Eventually the gods get annoyed at them and turn one of them into a turtle and the other into an elephant. BUT! They find a shallow lake, so that they can keep fighting, but that causes loads of flooding, so then another god (who’s a bird) comes and picks them up and puts them in a giant tree.

      Absolute classic, pure mad mythology.

  • Quazatron@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    23
    ·
    9 months ago

    Computing history, obscure operating systems, movies and music my friends never heard about, fringe humour nobody gets.

      • Quazatron@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        9 months ago

        For instance, some Portuguese comedians that are not mainstream in Portugal. Can’t get more obscure than that.

    • Ashu@lemmy.zip
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      9 months ago

      I really like messing with various softwares on my computer. Most of the times it’s the old webpages and the old pieces of software that engage me the most.

  • Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    17
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    9 months ago

    Asian beauty items, specifically kbeauty and jbeauty skincare. I love hearing about people’s skincare routines and new niche items, ingredients and brands. But my friends irl aren’t really into beauty (everyone i know is so pragmatic lol).

    I really love beauty empties- I used to follow subreddits related to finishing beauty products, aka panning them (panning meaning hitting the metal pan at the base of powder cosmetics; panning has come to generally mean using up your products). There is something so satisfying about using up your stuff and I like vicariously experiencing it through other people. I mentioned that I was saving my empties for a few months to review which ones were worth repurchasing and my friends laughed at me, thinking I was joking.

    • FireTower@lemmy.world
      cake
      OP
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      9 months ago

      I don’t wear make up but as someone who once got all the toothpaste out of the tube I can relate. Knowing that something got used to it’s fullest is quite satisfying.

  • jagungal@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    13
    ·
    9 months ago

    The State Emergency Services of Australian states. Basically, they’re state government funded volunteer rescue agencies that focus on floods and storms. They also provide other rescue services outside of major population centres, like vertical rescue and road crash rescue. I think it’s a great idea because we get enough severe storms and floods that a specialist agency is worthwhile, but there can be years between large scale events, so having the surge capacity of a volunteer agency is great.

    It’s a similar story with the CFA/CFS/RFS/NTFRS¹/TFS¹/whatever’s happening in WA¹, but instead of rescue they do firefighting. Their main (“combat”) role is fighting bushfires, which happen seasonally so surge capacity is important. However, in country areas they also provide structural and vehicle firefighting services. I’m aware that the US have a similar situation with volunteer firefighters though, so I’m not so keen to teach grandma to suck eggs.

    ¹These agencies are metro and rural firefighting agencies, so their combat role is all fires, not just bushfires.

    • Krzd@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      9 months ago

      Sounds similar to the German THW (Technisches Hilfswerk - engl. Federal Agency for technical relief) It’s 99% (unpaid)¹ volunteers, and they assist in case heavy/specialized equipment is required. For example they build large pipelines and water reservoirs in case of wildfires to supply the firefighters, build tent cities including drinking water filtration, sanitary and kitchen facilities, as well as recovery operations after disasters².

      While they mostly act locally (supporting buildings after fires, or recovering car wrecks when the firefighters don’t have big enough equipment) they do have some international quick-response forces.

      ¹ The volunteers are insured via the state, and employers in non-critical jobs are required by law to release them in case of an alarm.

      ² They were initially founded as a civilian service to restore infrastructure and recover civilians during wartime, (Ziviler Bevölkerungsschutz - engl. civil protection) they thankfully haven’t needed to do that job and nowadays focus on natural disasters, both national and intentional.

      • jagungal@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        9 months ago

        Similar, except both types of Australian agency do the firefighting and rescue work as well as the support work and some of the recovery stuff. The main focus of volunteer training though is on rescue/firefighting.

  • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    14
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    edit-2
    9 months ago

    Chess! I suck ass at it so I don’t fit in with actual chess players, and everyone I know is totally disinterested in the game. I can only fuel my love for the game by watching Gotham trash talk 1200 rated players when I know that I’m a lichess 700

    Astronomy! Not astrology! No, that’s not a smudge on the lens, that’s M3, and it took me an hour to find it in this Bortle class 7 suburb with my 4.5" dob, and I’m damn proud of myself for that

    Anime! No, I haven’t seen Naruto, or DBZ, and I ain’t got time for One Piece. How’s about Shinsekai Yori, Haibanei Renmei, or ACCA? Nah, nobody I know has seen those, even though we’re in our late 20s and are a bit old for shounen at this point

    • Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      9 months ago

      Hey fellow chess lover! I’m like 900 on lichess :-D

      It’s such a rich game it’s incredible, and the history about it. Crazy actually.

  • SuperSpruce@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    11
    ·
    9 months ago

    Googology. The “study” of ridiculously large numbers. It’s a rabbit hole of recursion and mathematics that starts with stuff like googolplex (1010100) and never really ends.

  • Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    8
    ·
    9 months ago

    NA and NULL values.

    In R (programming language) they have some interesting differences. You can think of a vector as a train with many cars, and each can hold a number. Let’s say I have train with three cars and I store the number 2, 3 and 5 in them. That would be a normal well behaved vector (2, 3, 5).

    I could take away one of those numbers and leave that seat vacant. It could look like this (2, NA, 5).

    If I tell you to find the third number in that vector, that’s easy. It’s 5. If I tell you to find the ninth one, that just doesn’t make sense and the answer would be NULL.

    So in other words, NA is a vacant seat with no number sitting in it. NULL is a place where there is no seat to begin with.

    • Acters@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      9 months ago

      I personally think if you are writing code and you reference outside your memory space, then you should receive an error. I guess a null is already considered an error value, but I think notifying why you got a null would be great.

      NA is not applicable or?
      I don’t like this approach

      • Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        9 months ago

        The best thing about R is that it was written by statisticians. The worst thing about R is that it was written by statisticians.

        I guess this NULL thing would be one of those cases.

        NA would not be applicable, because it’s a placeholder for a missing value. In data analysis, you tend to have have lots of NA-values, and dealing with them is super common. Every function needs to be able to handle them gracefully. For instance mean(someValues, na.rm=TRUE) would be a command for calculating the mean of a particular vector while igrnoring all NA-values. Super handy. Excel handles these missing values in a very annoying manner, but that’s a topic for another rant.

        NULL can be considered an error value, but obviously it’s not very helpful because it doesn’t tell you what went wrong. Obviously, R does have all sorts of error messages, but in this case it just says NULL instead. If you find that some variable has NULL in it, you can be pretty sure something went wrong and it’s most likely due to going outside the space of a particular variable. Likewise interger(0), character(0) or logical(0) are the results you get when you’re searching for something that doesn’t exist. Not really my favorite type of error.

  • rockandsock@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    7
    ·
    edit-2
    9 months ago

    Obscure 80s and 90s hip hop records that very few people have heard of because they sold less than a couple hundred thousand records, some much less

    Classic black and white films and TV shows. No one I know in real life enjoys these.

    • Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      9 months ago

      Can you give us some examples of both? Some that you think we will find obscure and some that you yourself find obscure?

      • rockandsock@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        9 months ago

        This is copied from my reply to another person here.

        Most of the music is on Soulseek.

        MC Rell is rapper from the late 80s that dropped a pretty good album, very few people have heard of him.

        The Lootpack is a 90s hip hop group from LA that was good but for some reason it never caught on, I don’t know anyone else who’s heard their album.

        The older films I like aren’t really that obscure, I just don’t know any film nerds in real life. I’m a big fan of the Preston Sturges comedy films, film nerds know them but no one I know in real life watches old movies.

        Have Gun, Will Travel is one of my favorite western TV shows. It’s kind of stuck around but, not like I Love Lucy or The Honeymooners did.

        There was a series of b movies about a detective called The Falcon. They were kind of a mix of The Thin Man films and the Sam Spade films.

        They were lots of fun to watch but I don’t know anyone else who’s seen them.

        • Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          9 months ago

          Ah, I love Preston Sturges. I guess I’m lucky to know a few film and TV nerds in real life. ETA: The Lady Eve is one of my favorite movies. (When I’m asked what my favorite movies are, I say that and I Know Where I’m Going by Powell and Pressburger.)

          • rockandsock@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            9 months ago

            I’ve seen The Lady Eve a few times over the years but not in a while. TCM used to do Preston Sturges marathons every year or so.

            I have never seen I Know Where I’m going but the entry on Wikipedia makes it seem interesting.

            • Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              edit-2
              9 months ago

              Please check it out. I’ve seen it many times over the years, eventually owning a couple of copies. It’s magical. P&P made some really great films - Black Narcissus and The Red Shoes really stand out.

    • Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      9 months ago

      You should digitalise those and share them (I mean it would be very cool if you did!), I’m sure lots of people would like it, they just haven’t got the time/energy/possibility to find those kind of things.

      I’d be interested for example :-)

      • rockandsock@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        9 months ago

        Most of the music is on Soulseek.

        MC Rell is rapper from the late 80s that dropped a pretty good album, very few people have heard of him.

        The Lootpack is a 90s hip hop group from LA that was good but for some reason it never caught on, I don’t know anyone else who’s heard their album.

        The older films I like aren’t really that obscure, I just don’t know any film nerds in real life. I’m a big fan of the Preston Sturges comedy films, film nerds know them but no one I know in real life watches old movies.

        Have Gun, Will Travel is one of my favorite western TV shows. It’s kind of stuck around but, not like I Love Lucy or The Honeymooners did.

        There was a series of b movies about a detective called The Falcon. They were kind of a mix of The Thin Man films and the Sam Spade films.

        They were lots of fun to watch but I don’t know anyone else who’s seen them.

  • FireTower@lemmy.world
    cake
    OP
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    6
    ·
    edit-2
    9 months ago

    I should probably add something of my own. I like failed firearms designs that had some features that makes them objectively better if you overlook all the downsides. Or generally anything where one person made it because they thought it was cool and no one with better judgement stopped them.

    Like the Gyrojet pistols, unlike traditional pistols they used rocket projectiles. This meant two major things one the guns didn’t need to have any pressure bearing parts and could be made incredibly light compared to normal pistols (.88lb/.4kg vs 2.2lbs/1kg), and the down side they reached maximum speed much slower than normal cartridges.

    This meant that in practical terms a target close enough might not give the rocket sufficient time to accelerate to effective speed and wind would have a greater effect on the projectile. Hence they don’t make them anymore.

    • Justas🇱🇹@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      9 months ago

      The PN 90 is used a lot by the movie industry because it ejects casings downwards so they do not hit the other actor’s or the filming crew’s faces. It was originally made as a relatively small firearm that can penetrate body armour to be used by the truck drivers and guards in case the Soviets invaded and dropped well armoured paratroopers behind the front lines.

    • vivadanang@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      9 months ago

      I’m a big lover of the engineering and design of firearms, but think we’re ridiculously over-armed in the US. Puts me in an odd position; I’m prior service - I look at weapons as weapons. Some people see them as fetishes and it gives me the creeps.