Named for the Spring Maiden & the Iron Queen

"They've got nobody in the Odyssey?"

"No I'm saying they don't got nobody."

"Nobody's there?"

"Nobody's not there!"

"So everyone's there?"

"Everybody but nobody!"

Level 1: browser extensions

This one is basically impossible to get wrong, or at least to get wrong badly enough that it causes any problems.

Get Firefox, or a Firefox fork like Waterfox. If you use a fork, make sure it's one that will let you use add-ons. On a PC, pretty much any Firefox fork will take add-ons, but on mobile devices, many don't. Iceraven is one that does.

Get the add-ons uBlock Origin, YouTube Sponsorblock (if you use YouTube), and FBCleaner (if you use Facebook).

uBlock Origin comes with a built-in list of filters to block ads and trackers, but you can add your own filters to block any specific element of a website you don't like. You know those goddamn floating frames on fandom.com sites that block half the screen? Now you can zap 'em.

Sponsorblock uses crowdsourced timestamps to automatically skip sponsor spots and self-promotion in YouTube videos. Never listen to anyone say "hit like and subscribe" or "Raid Shadow Legends" again.

FBCleaner hides all content from your feed except posts from people, groups, and pages you've actually chosen to follow.

Level 2: leaving enshittified services

The software that's become standard over the years in a lot of fields is steadily selling more of your data, showing you more ads, and pushing you to buy more expensive subscriptions. Time to tell them to get fucked.

Dump Adobe apps for Affinity or Krita. Drop Microsoft for LibreOffice. Change your default search engine from Google to DuckDuckGo or Qwant. Use OpenStreetMaps instead of Google or Apple Maps.

Level 3: network-level DNS fuckery

DNS, or Domain Name Service, is the thing that tells your computer where www.website.com is actually located. By hacking your network's DNS you can force it to tell your devices that ad-hosting domains don't exist at all. Some of the steps on this one can get pretty technical, but because you're doing all the difficult stuff on a dedicated device, you can't really fuck up anything that seriously.

Get yourself a Raspberry Pi (a cheap older one like a model 3B will work just fine for this purpose), and follow a guide like this one to get it set up running AdGuard Home. AdGuard, like uBlock, has built-in filter lists, but you can also add your own if there are specific domains you want to block.

Once it's up and running, you'll need to change the DNS settings on your router to point to your AdGuard service. This is different for every router but will always start with logging into the admin panel with a password printed on a little sticker somewhere on the router.

With that done, every time a device on your home network looks for ads.website.com, it'll get back a message that says "sorry, can't find it", so it won't be able to load any ads.

Level 4: Android-specific DNS fuckery

Because AdGuard runs on your home network, it can't block ads on your phone when you're away from home - and what's worse, your phone will sometimes remember the addresses it got when you were out and about, and ads will get past your AdGuard wall even when you're home.

To avoid this, get AdAway for DNS-based ad-blocking directly on your phone. The easy, but less seamless, way of using AdAway is the "local VPN mode", which doesn't require you to do any mucking about with your phone's operating system.

Level 5: automated media piracy

The best way to stop seeing ads on all your streaming services is to stop using streaming services. There are loads of ways to do this, but the best ones involve setting up what's called an "arr stack" (Google that for setup guides) along with nzbget and a usenet account. Most of the time you'll want to set this stuff up on a dedicated device - an old laptop gathering dust in the closet is a great option, or you can grab something used from a charity shop or a local electronics recycler.

The great thing about usenet is that unlike with torrents, you don't have to do any sharing from your computer, so you're in a lot less legal jeopardy - legally speaking, distributing pirated content is waaayyy more serious than accessing it. I pay about £3 a month for a secure, high-bandwidth usenet service.

Once you start getting your own collection of media on your own computer, use the open-source media library manager Jellyfin to browse and play things from basically any device.

Oh, and don't be a dick. Pirate all you want from big corporations, but please pay independent small-time creators for their work.

Level 6: fucking with Android

Android phones are a lot more locked-down than they used to be, but depending on the device you own you can still do a lot of messing around under the hood. Note that if you get something wrong while doing this, there is always the possibility that it will turn your device into a paperweight.

Before you buy a device, check where it sits on the Bootloader Unlock Wall of Shame. Once you've bought it, check the xda-developer forums for guides on how to unlock it and "root" it (gain admin access) with Magisk.

Once Magisk is installed, you can add modules to do all sorts of cool stuff, including using AdAway in "root mode" which makes it basically invisible.

You can also install YouTube ReVanced, which will do all the ad- and sponsor blocking stuff we took care of in your Windows browser a few paragraphs ago. Be careful: there are a lot of fake sites out there pretending they're associated with the ReVanced project which might be injecting malware into their downloads. This Reddit post has the official instructions and links.

Also, try out the modded version of Facebook from APKmoddone, which will block most of the same shit as the FBcleaner add-on from earlier. There's always a possibility that modified apps like this are doing something dodgy, but I've never had any issues with this one personally.

Level 7: fucking with Windows

This one is scary because it can seriously fuck up your shit if something goes wrong, but some really cool people have actually made it very simple to strip all the bloat, ads, and spyware out of Windows. The tool I use is ReviOS. Start reading at https://www.revi.cc/docs. Basically, you'll need to download a tool called AME Wizard and the ReviOS "playbook" that tells AME what to do. Read the documentation before you do any of this.

Level 8: switching to Linux

I'm not going to pretend this is an option for everyone. Half the software I use on a weekly basis isn't available on Linux. But if you can switch? Do it. These days, Ubuntu - one of the most popular flavours of Linux - is built with people switching from Windows in mind, and a lot of things will be pretty intuitive. It also has great documentation and a huge community you can go to for help if you're confused about stuff.

You don't even need a pihole for it anymore. You can throw "dns.adguard-dns.com" into your android phone under Network (or Connections) > Private DNS > Private DNS Provider Hostname in your Settings app. You can also set your router up to use it via the IPs:

94.140.14.14

94.140.14.15

Link to to source for that:

That will depend on your router, just search "How to set up custom DNS for (router name & model)". You can usually find that info on a sticker on the router itself. The model name is often nonsense like CM1000.

For switching to Linux:

If you're worried about software not working, and the software isn't something with work-related requirements attached, you can usually find alternatives. Alternativeto.net is a good place to start with that.

If you're a gamer, protondb.com will let you see how well your specific game runs on Linux. Ranks are from:

Borked - Does Not Work At All, or works so poorly that you cannot play the game at all

Bronze - Sort of works, but with glitches that don't exist on Windows that affect gameplay

Silver - Works, but requires tinkering, and has glitches that don't affect gameplay, or requires heavy tinkering to get running

Gold - Works, requires mild tinkering (usually just selecting another proton version from the drop down)

Platinum - Works out of the box

Native - Is made for Linux

Other common alternatives:

Spotify: I've heard good things about Tidal, but haven't personally used it (I use a cloud storage service and local files for music)

Google drive: Nextcloud. You can find free servers on their website

Google office: OnlyOffice has a desktop/mobile app, and most of the features

Gmail: Free providers aren't common, but disroot is one of them. They also offer quite a few services. Personally I use mailbox.org, but they do cost $36 a year minimum

Google search: Disroot has a searx instance, startpage.com exists, and you'd be surprised at how far you can get by setting your default search engine to Wikipedia. Marginalia's also good, but selective about what they index (mostly indieweb stuff)

I, admittedly, run almost everything through Emacs nowadays, so there may be better alternatives now.

source: @wordsmithic / wordsmithic on insta

let's address the elephant - people want to draw up parallels between Lewis and Kimi because lewis won the WDC in his second year in f1 and it seems like Kimi is on track to doing the same. however this specific point can be overruled so easily it's not even funny.

mercedes built the best car from these regulations, there's no disputing that. because of these regulations, a lot of weight is placed on energy deployment and since merc has kind of? mastered this aspect almost every win this season has gone to a teal blue car, with 6 out of 8 going to Kimi Antonelli.

obviously, if you only take THIS merc propaganda narrative, it does look like Kimi is dominating the season, mirroring 2008 Hamilton, dogwalking his teammate and fs deserves the hype, blah blah. but it really is not that simple.

the 2026 regulations are a joke. every driver says it, it's true, there's also no disputing that. specifically there's been a lot of discourse over the issue of reliability regarding energy deployment - the "yo-yo" racing many drivers refer to. setting aside the safety concerns which arise from situations like piastri's melbourne crash on the formation lap due to an excessive burst of energy + bearman's suzuka crash (50G mind you), energy deployment is becoming a super annoying topic to deal with because, in the words of wise Alonso, "there is not any driver input or driver talent needed to overtake a car in front of you" and you only need to press a button to overtake.

this is a MASSIVE contributor to the unparalleled success Kimi is having this year because if there really was opportunity as equal(ish) as 2024 or even last year for drivers to win I am 100% sure that drivers like Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc, Oscar Piastri, Lewis Hamilton, Lando Norris, and especially GEORGE WILLIAM RUSSELL??? would be winning races just like Kimi has been. All this shows us is that Kimi is winning all because his car is a little better at energy deployment than everyone else's cars.

does that make him a better driver than his teammate? does that make him the next coming of Hamilton??

surely not come on

there we have the main argument against people who think that the similar structure of kimi's 2026 season and lewis' 2008 season is evidence supporting the baby goat kimi campaign

for anyone who wants to argue that Kimi has also had reliability issues and hasn't just been cruising along with a perfect car all season, i recognise that!

but then you take a look at drivers like Charles who has been having brake issues all season and only took 2 races to adapt and get to a podium + a win.

you look at lando norris who had a terrible car up until friday and made the absolute most of his good pace before his team fucked him over.

i look at oscar piastri who drove his heart out for his beloved p5 even with a damaged front wing and the genuine shitbox that is the mcl40, who was probably on track to a podium before charles bombed him :(

you look at isack hadjar who fought back from p fucking 21!!!!! to get to p6!!!!!!! with a slightly better than average car!!! and suddenly it doesn't seem all that impressive that kimi won a race with his uranium fueled rocketship after having like 2 bad races. like alright.

all this to say kimi isn't special btw

also not to shit on kimi even more or anything but we KNOW he isn't all that good at many of the technical/racecraft heavy aspects of racing. e.g. his w2w

EDIT: HOWWWW did i forget andrea kimi track limits antonelli????? i saw someone say mercedes should buy him a colouring book to teach him to stay in the lines and 😭😭😭

i really don't know even a single kimi fan that says his wheel to wheel racing is good. up until a few races ago, his starts off the line were questionable to say the least. all this to say he has definitely not been the best driver from the start of the year, and the only evidence to support THAT claim is the championship standings/points lead over other drivers. if i see a SINGLE hamilton fan using those 2 things to defend kimi i'll riot

Actor and comedian Zissis Roumbos said that the movie is very good and entertaining especially in its technical aspects and has Nolan’s trademark professionalism. It is very cinematic. He says Nolan gives his own perspective / interpretation in the end of the story. He also says that it is a movie not made for the Greeks or the aficionados of the Greek classics. He describes the lack of Greek contribution or Greek element in the movie as “deafening”. He flat out says that this movie is not addressed at all to the nation that inspired it. Roumbos rates it as an 8/10, when addressed to generic audiences that are neither aware nor interested in the Greek classic or the Greek civilisation.

A movie critic that I think goes by the name John Duree in social media who had been reasonably optimistic and mildly supportive towards Nolan’s choices the previous time said that the movie is indeed of an epic scale and agrees that it has very impressive technical and visual elements. He says however that he was disappointed in several scenes of the movie, hinting that Nolan might have taken plenty liberties with the plot for the worse. He said that while it’s a technically very good and enjoyable movie with a lot of spectacle, it is by no means Nolan’s best movie.

Like maybe you are anti intellectual, easily baffled by something that requires a second of a thought instead of being reactionary racist, as is common with Greeks, but that is the civilised world does not not have to be dragged down in the mud with the other swine with you.

Except Odysseus and his men hadn't come to Polyphemus' island to conquer the land; they wanted shelter.

Polyphemus was Poseidon's son, who was mad at Odysseus and his men for killing his sacred animals to eat (literally in the opening sequence of the Odyssey).

Polyphemus ate Odysseus' men alive and Odysseus stuck the piece of wood in his eye to rescue the rest of his men.

Instead of repeating the American view that "the monsters in the Odyssey represent the oppressed people and Odysseus is the imperialist" that has 0 basis on the Odyssey and instead changes the very words of the Odyssey (never mind implying that the natives of a conquered land are cannibalistic, stupid barbarians), maybe you should read other translations of the Odyssey. It being a "respected view in the field" means naught. Which field and in which country? Cause I doubt any Greek scholar (whatever the politics) would agree with that view.

Lewis: its easy to be negative about people... I think its worse when its a driver that knows how hard it is in this field.... and they dont even have the success that I have

->

Nico to Villeneuve: he was speaking to you. He said he hates when ex-drivers criticise him who've not had his success 😗✌️

>First, we’ve discovered that about a quarter of all the internet connection in or out of the house were ad related. In a few hours, that’s about 10,000 out of 40,000 processed.

>We also discovered that every link on Twitter was blocked. This was solved by whitelisting the https://t.co domain.

>Once out browsing the Web, everything is loading pretty much instantly. It turns out most of that Page Loading malarkey we’ve been accustomed to is related to sites running auctions to sell Ad space to show you before the page loads. All gone now.

>We then found that the Samsung TV (which I really like) is very fond of yapping all about itself to Samsung HQ. All stopped now. No sign of any breakages in its function, so I’m happy enough with that.

>The primary source of distress came from the habitual Lemmings player in the house, who found they could no longer watch ads to build up their in-app gold. A workaround is being considered for this.

>The next ambition is to advance the Ad blocking so that it seamlessly removed YouTube Ads. This is the subject of ongoing research, and tinkering continues. All in all, a very successful experiment.

>Certainly this exceeds my equivalent childhood project of disassembling and assembling our rotary dial telephone. A project whose only utility was finding out how to make the phone ring when nobody was calling.

>Update: All4 on the telly appears not to have any ads any more. Goodbye Arnold Clarke!

>Lemmings problem now solved.

>Can confirm, after small tests, that RTÉ Player ads are now gone and the player on the phone is now just delivering swift, ad free streams at first click.

>Some queries along the lines of “Are you not stealing the internet?” Firstly, this is my network, so I may set it up as I please (or, you know, my son can do it and I can give him a stupid thumbs up in response). But there is a wider question, based on the ads=internet model.

>I’m afraid I passed the You Wouldn’t Download A Car point back when I first installed ad-blocking plug-ins on a browser. But consider my chatty TV. Individual consumer choice is not the method of addressing pervasive commercial surveillance.

>Should I feel morally obliged not to mute the TV when the ads come on? No, this is a standing tension- a clash of interests. But I think my interest in my family not being under intrusive or covert surveillance at home is superior to the ad company’s wish to profile them.

>Aside: 24 hours of Pi Hole stats suggests that Samsung TVs are very chatty. 14,170 chats a day.

>YouTube blocking seems difficult, as the ads usually come from the same domain as the videos. Haven’t tried it, but all of the content can also be delivered from a no-cookies version of the YouTube domain, which doesn’t have the ads. I have asked my son to poke at that idea.