I hope they would do a better job of handling climate change this year 
Future of Climate Change | Climate Change Science | US EPA.
Happy new year!
Surely 2024 will be better. But will it be better than 2023 or better than 2025? Happy new year!
He proved it again?
So, apparently Queen Margrethe II of Denmark has resigned. This made the local TV news and the newspaper. The newspaper article said that her successor would be her son who will become King Frederik X. When I read that - I am not making this up - there was a split second where my brain went “wtf. The new king will be named after a social media platform … oh … wait, thats probably a roman numeral, duh, yeah that actually makes more sense”.
I always wanted to do that stunt at the end … as well as a lot of things done in his channel. Among the few people that not only deserved the success they got, but it can be argued that, even so, they are still very underrated:
Good job, Tom!
Thank you for asking! I believe that the world’s problems are too deep for a single individual to solve. So we need a scaling solution that starts with interested individuals and spreads from there on up. I teach an effective form of meditation, effortless, brief, cheap, and practical, that can be added to anyone’s life. Clients report more peace and happiness, more creativity and intelligence, more success at work and with family, all based on the dissolving of stress stored in the nervous system. I currently have 3300 clients. That’s what I’m doing, and finding more interested people all the time.
A glimmer of hope that humans can match AI in 2024?
I don’t like how this article seems to imply that the kill screen is triggered by simply reaching a score of 999999. His actual score was around 6.8 million, and he reached the displayable max of 999999 after only about 6.5 minutes of his 38 minute feat. The actual technical reasons behind what causes the kill screen are quite complex.
This article has some more interesting information about the technical aspects, challenges, and advanced playing techniques necessary for such an accomplishment.
It also links this great video with a lot more information about the history and context about this achievement:
If you think you are playing too much…
Meanwhile, culture wars…
Apparently she is quite popular in Denmark (and her successor is as well).
A quote from American-British author Bill Bryson writing about Copenhagen might illustrate this:
The city is so safe that Queen Margarethe used to walk from Amalienborg Palace to the shops every morning to buy flowers and vegetables just like a normal citizen. I once asked a Dane who guarded her in such circumstances, and he looked at me with surprise and replied, ‘Why, we all do,’ which I thought was rather sweet.
Another player, Fractal, has done it
He managed to trigger the earliest possible crash, whereas Blue Scuti missed that opportunity (at the transition to level 155) and won at level 157 instead.
In Fractal’s video, you hear him counting out the final few lines of level 154, since he needs to trigger the transition to level 155 with specifically a single-line clear in order to win. In Blue Scuti’s video, because he was under pressure due to some earlier mistakes, he misses this opportunity (by clearing three lines to transition to level 155) and you hear him despondently say “I missed it”.
Is that better? It seems to me that getting to a higher level is more of an achievement
It’s another goal, something that nobody has done before. I would say getting the earliest possible crash is better than just getting any crash.
But also getting the latest possible crash is better than getting just any crash?
Definitely.
In theory, it’s possible to avoid all of the crashes (although incredibly difficult) and reach level 256, which resets back to the first level, due to byte overflow. So, in principle, it may be possible to play indefinitely, unless there are some other unavoidable crashes.
This is mentioned in the longer video that I posted earlier. This “rebirth” goal may be some ultimate objective to shoot for, and people can still go for max level and max score records, or speed run the crash.