#texodus — Public Fediverse posts

I finally did it: deleted all my accounts on Google, Twitch and Spotify.

This was quite a process, since my Google adresses had been my contact info for a lot of services for many (~18) years, and someone close to me has been making a living on YouTube and Twitch for ~6 years now, but unless we leave, nothing will change. I am here to support digital creators, artists, journalist, entertainers, any day – just not through big tech.
#degoogle #leavingbigtech #exodus #texodus

The house is sold, the funds have been received. Departure complete. Our realtor coordinator congratulated us and said he wished he could leave Texas too, he’s been wanting to for several years. #texodus

Apparently the term #texodus has caught on!

https://gadgetmates.com/why-tech-companies-are-now-leaving-texas-a-huge-shift-in-strategy

« When he lived in Los Angeles and the Bay Area, Chang said he took for granted being able to go for jogs outside or go hiking year-round. In Austin, he's been forced to spend much of the year inside to avoid extreme temperatures and had to buy a treadmill to go running in the air conditioning.

"Literally, I can't leave my house during the summers," Chang said. "During the winter, it's freezing relative to California." »

https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-workers-moved-to-austin-regrets-2023-8 #texodus

And here comes the trade off. It’s -11°C this morning, feels like -16 according to the weather app. (That’s 3°F.)

But that’s just another day in Minnesota. The grid doesn’t collapse, the water keeps running, the heating systems function. There’s no snow yet, but if there was, huge plowing trucks would already have cleared the freeway by now.

#texodus

And there’s some news I was expecting:

“ERCOT’s risk assessment for January shows a winter storm would put the grid at 21% risk of going into emergency conditions — a precursor to rolling blackouts — and 17% risk of rolling blackouts.”

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/texas-faces-risk-winter-blackouts-ercot-s-reserve-18503576.php
#texodus

Meanwhile:

“More than 100,000 Californians moved to Texas last year… She also likes living in a place with less fire danger and less air pollution…”

Yeah, good luck with that.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-11-06/we-fit-in-a-lot-better-here-californians-who-flee-to-texas-find-good-company-camaraderie #texodus

@mathew Great news - I felt the same over here in WA. We were mailed paper ballots to mail or turn in - we were also mailed voter guide books explaining everyone's position for all the races. So civilized. #texodus

Voted today. That was different.

Paper ballot, human readable and human auditable, scanned optically. Which is the right way to do it, assuming you want accurate, rapid and reasonably cheap vote counts with auditability.

Also, no unnecessary ID checks, and no crazies trying to get elected to the school board so they can get things they don't like removed from history lessons.

#texodus

I have my Minnesota driver's license now. I guess that means I officially live here. Next step is vehicle registration.

First snow happened, and there were rabbit tracks by the car. Out walking today, a deer crossed the street in front of me. There was a cougar wandering the city in August, and occasionally there have been bears. For moose, though, you generally have to head a little further north.

#texodus

Applied for my Minnesota driver's license today. Also got some essentials for the Subaru — emergency hand warmers, emergency body warmers, spray de-icer for side and rear windows. We already got a large ice scraper/brush, and a small one for the glovebox. Still on the list: a couple of wool blankets, a tow strap, and a folding snow shovel.

We took a short walk near the lift bridge. The temperature was a pleasant 15ºC with bright sunshine, though the breeze from the lake was noticeably chilly.

Meanwhile in Austin TX, it was 36ºC today, and it's supposed to be the same tomorrow. In comparison, last year the summer heat stopped on October 12th. #texodus

Just arrived in Duluth after the final day of driving. Everything seems a bit unreal. #texodus

Turns out driving through Kansas is a rollercoaster of excitement compared to driving through Missouri. Wasn’t expecting much of Iowa, but suddenly on the state border the landscape starts to give way to forests and fall foliage.

Made it to south east Minnesota late afternoon. I never want to sit in a car again, but tomorrow we do it all again. #texodus

It’s hard to understand how huge and empty most of America is until you try driving across it. Ye gods. #texodus

Woke up in Oklahoma City. Today we drive to Kansas City. Budgies are doing OK so far. #texodus

We had a couple of days of normal weather, but #texodus continues. We’re now finally completely out of the house. The shipping container with our stuff in gets picked up today, and we’re paying junk removers to take away the last of the junk. We finished the shame cleaning last night, the realtors will get professionals in to handle the rest.

Chanced on a flyer for an analog tape event at a local library, people swapping VHS and audio cassettes and demoing analog equipment. I took the last boxes of tapes in for anyone who might want them. #texodus

Most of the CDs are gone in preparation for #texodus, but I'm keeping a few that get a special exemption from the ten year rule. Autographed Andrew Poppy CDs, the first Negativland album with the hand-made box, the deluxe Kraftwerk boxed set in German (the way it should be listened to), the original Factory releases of "Unknown Pleasures" and "Low-life" that came with extra cardboard slipcases to keep them in if you kept them in your car, and so on.

Planning for #texodus continues. Today: buying a Subaru, because as much as we love the Prius, it is not equipped for 6” of snow on a 25% hill.

While working on #texodus we found some more cassettes that needed digitizing. I dug out the harman/kardon cassette deck and set up the high quality audio interface. However, when I started trying to play cassettes, I discovered the deck wouldn't output any audio. It was clearly some electrical fault, as the (delightful) vacuum fluorescent display didn't show any action on the VU meters.

So I stopped the tape, lifted one end of the deck up a few centimeters, and let it go onto the table with a thunk. Same for the other end. Pressed play, problem solved for now. However, this clearly suggests that the cassette deck is on the way out, so time to get everything digitized ASAP, as the last thing I want to do in 2023 is spend $200+ on a comparable new cassette deck.

Continuing to clear out the office for #texodus...

Look at this amazing device — a massive 4GB of storage, in a tiny hard drive that can fit into a CompactFlash slot! (Or a PCMCIA slot, using the adapter.)

On the unlikely chance that anyone wants this (say, to put in a Newton MessagePad or some other 90s device that took PCMCIA cards or CF cards), let me know and it can be yours.

@BeanNoneya Wishing you a smooth and successful #texodus

I have friends who still live there, and I fear for them.