Randy Talks about Twitter, other tech news, and tech hype.

Apple Maps has come a really long way. It used to be the worst. Now, I think it's the best, since Apple doesn't bank on selling every piece of information about you like Google does. Does it annoy me that Apple Maps is locked to only Apple devices? Yes, that's the main thing that I can't stand about Apple - Their overpriced App Store (for shoppers and authors), and their walled garden concept.

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### Why guarantee an income to some company that is taking advantage of you, and will cut you off, with no measure of loyalty?

- Subscription services are not just getting out of hand, they had already gone too far, many years ago.

    - These companies know you're programmed to rent things from them, and they're abusing this power. [Ever since the pandemic, those services are being purchased more than ever.](https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2022/03/why-subscriptions-are-hard-to-cancel/623885/) Remember that, unlike with media that you used to purchase, when you stop paying, you have nothing to show for what you've been paying for years.

    - YouTube Premium, for years, was $18/month for a family plan, but is going up to $23/month next month. They said this price increase will "help them to develop more premium features". [Source for this BS.](https://variety.com/2022/digital/news/youtube-premium-family-plan-price-increase-1235411355/)

- Supporting Data/Reference

- Case Stud/Example/Anecdote

- Conclusion

### Cancel this garbage and stop wasting money

- Start small, and maybe cancel one or two things a month.

    - Every month, look at your credit card statement, and find another recurring cost for something that you don't get to actually keep. Maybe it's Amazon Prime, Adobe Creative Cloud, Netflix, Paramount +, Disney, HBO, or billion other ones I won't waste your time mentioning.

    - Try experimenting with signing up for a trial with different credit cards, email addresses, only when you're in the situation of needing that service. A good example would be watching TV Series, or Movie on YouTube TV. You could sign up for their 2-week free trial at the point, watch the series, cancel service, and not owe a penny. They don't deserve your money when you're not using it.

- We are used to paying for services that are actually necessary, such as "water, gas, electricity, and other utilities. Why on earth do we contribute to these monthly expenses with entertainment?" Source: [DataDrivenInvestor](https://medium.datadriveninvestor.com/monthly-subscriptions-are-taking-over-the-world-and-i-dont-like-it-4e30ff092107)

- The writer in the DataDrivenInvestor article mentions that, for the price of 3 months of the full Adobe Bundle, you can buy Affinity's full collection of software with lifetime updates. Affinity makes great photo and vector-editing software.

- If it really adds that much value to your life, buy it. You do you.

### Intro

Hello everyone and welcome to the Manly Hanley Podcast. This is the Podcast with no limits on what we'll cover.

I'm your host, Randy. Have a snack, sit back, and relax.

This Episode was recorded on Sunday, November 13th, 2022

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### Tools or Servers I Run to Avoid Big Tech Tracking and Selling my Data

- A Pixel Smartphone running [GrapheneOS](https://grapheneos.org/).

    - Android and iOS track the hell out of you - out of the box.

        - Apple tracks you a bit less out of the box than Android does.

            - GrapheneOS allows you to avoid a lot of Google tracking on Google's own phones.

    - GrapheneOS is a custom ROM/OS that you can flash to most Google Pixel smartphones. It allows you to avoid using Google Play Services/Framework/Store. You can use multiple user profiles to (for example) setup your work apps where you might want to use Google services, and then perhaps a personal account where you block everything related to Google. It's brilliant.

    - I've not seen an easier-to-install Android ROM than GrapheneOS. Their installer works right in the web browser, and it's solid: Worked on the first try for me when plugging in my phone and following their guide! I was blown away; Flew right out of my chair.

- There are some downsides that you might know about until you try it out, such as not being able to use Android Auto. If you want something to be highly-secure, you're going to have sacrifices. If someone tells you otherwise, they're lying.

- [Wallabag](https://www.wallabag.it/en)

    - An Open Source "Read it Later". It extracts only the article's content and places it into a nice view. It even lets you highlight areas of the content that you're extracting and add notes!

    - They mention that they don't store data on US servers. They write:

      "Because **your data belongs to you**, we don't want to store them on US servers. That's why we only chose European partners, like [Online](https://www.online.net/fr) (french web hoster), [MailJet](https://www.mailjet.com/) (french emailing service) or [PayPlug](https://www.payplug.com/) (french payment solution)."

        - It's important to note that, this solution is still great in that you can host it on your own US server, since it's open source. I do what I want with my server. The coolest thing is that you can export your data from Wallabag and reimport it into your own instance. This would be great if you wanted to sign up for their service as a trial, end the trial, and move the data to your own server. Amazing!

### Announcements

I'm back!

I'm excited!

Subscribe and follow for more to come!

___

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- If you're a new listener to the Manly Hanley Podcast, we would love to hear from you. [Visit our website](https://randyhanley.com/) and leave a comment. Send me an email with any questions or comments.

- Follow [Randrums](https://twitter.com/randrums) on twitter

Randy shares some updates regarding this show's scheduling and what's to come!

### Intro

Randy has landed back on Linux Mint and discusses why you should try it out.

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### Linux Mint is so polished and stable

- The desktop decoration is not over-the-top but looks darn good somehow.

    - I really have not much more explanation of it. It comes with some simple wall papers and a basic theme and it looks great. It's easy on the eyes for all types of websites, dark or light.

    - Just try it. Trust me. [Home - Linux Mint](https://www.linuxmint.com/)

Follow our Podcast 

- If you're a new listener to the Manly Hanley Podcast, we would love to hear from you. [Visit our website](https://randyhanley.com/) and leave a comment. Send me an email with any questions or comments.

- Follow [Randrums](https://twitter.com/randrums) on twitter

### Intro

Randy gives some reasons why we need to use Linux

___

Announcements - I've moved the entire studio back into the basement; This is not just my desk and recording gear, but drums, drum mics, PA System and mini blue couch.

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### Why we should use Linux

- It survives while being free.

    - The source code is accessible. Windows and MacOS will not Open Source their code. I speak of Linux openly because I'm referring to both the Desktop and the Server versions.

    - There are constant issues with Windows and MacOS breaking things during their upgrade cycles.

        - A few years ago, MacOS dropped 32-bit application support during the Catalina upgrade and broke tons of shit. MacOS Monterrey broke a lot of users' file paths in apps such as Dropbox and OneDrive.

        - Microsoft often breaks stuff with Windows update, sometimes it might be an activation issue (greed).

- You can trust software that is free.

- If you listened to my last episode I gave some reasons on why you can't trust Adobe and their greed. Do you think their software is open source. Heck no.

- There is so much software to try, almost anything you think of, so you won't go broke when trying/scrapping different installs.

- Package management is superior in Linux.

- The fake "Windows Virus Detected" messages that pop up in the browser don't even apply to you.

- No drivers to install (for the most part), aside from NVIDIA.

- Linux is easier to install than Windows, and much easier to than MacOS.

- You can "TRY" Linux. In 2022, we still don't have a Live USB environment for both MacOS and Windows.

### Here are my recommendation to get started on trying multiple distributions

- Get a USB Stick, perhaps 32GB in size or larger. They're extremely affordable as of this writing.

    - Go to the Ventoy site at: [Ventoy](https://www.ventoy.net/en/index.html)

        - Ventoy makes it very easy to make a bootable USB disk that you can put tons of ISO (Disk Images) on and select them from a menu during boot time. Follow their guide and try it out, I highly recommend it.

- Now that you have a Multi-Boot USB, start adding your ISO (Linux distribution downloads to it. (The Ventoy site shows you how to place them on the Disk..just drag and drop or copy/paste))

- Download all the LInux distros you'd like - go crazy, it's free!

- Once you boot up your Ventoy USB drive, you can then select from the menu any of the distributions you've downloaded.

Hello everyone and welcome to the Manly Hanley Podcast. This is the Podcast with no limits on what we'll cover.

I'm your host, Randy. Have a snack, sit back, and relax.

This Episode was recorded on Easter Sunday, April 17th, 2022

I'd like to thank you for putting time aside to listen to the podcast.

Follow our Podcast

### Intro

Are skilled trades dying?

### Skilled Labor Shortage

- No notes for today, just commented on this source: https://esub.com/blog/impact-skilled-labor-shortage-construction/

- Also, this source: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210318005265/en/U.S.-Skilled-Trades-Labor-Shortage-Heightens-as-In-Demand-Jobs-Remain-Unfilled-the-Longest

### Closing Remarks 

I'd like to thank you for putting time aside to listen to the podcast. 

Follow our Podcast 

- If you're a new listener to the Manly Hanley Podcast, we would love to hear from you. [Visit our website](https://randyhanley.com/) and leave a comment. Send me an email with any questions or comments.

- Follow [Randrums](https://twitter.com/randrums) on twittered

Randy discusses whether or not distro-hopping can be a problem for Linux users.

___

### What is Distro Hopping?

- Not settling with any particular Linux distribution.

    - Novice Linux users are likely the ones that do this the most.

- Do you actually learn or grow when hopping.

- There are articles on how to stop distro-hopping, and find one that you can stick with for decades

- On particular article is from MakeUseOf.com that mentioning how there are so many distros out there that it may seem like a nearly-impossible task of finding the best one.

- Source: [How to Stop Distro-Hopping and Find the Perfect Linux Distro for Yourself (makeuseof.com)](https://www.makeuseof.com/stop-distrohopping-find-perfect-linux-distro/)

- It talks about distro hopping like it's almost a drug addiction. Maybe it is. I've been using Linux to close to 15 years and still would consider myself a novice user.

- Think about why I distro-hop in the first place.

- Looking for a stable system?

- Best eye candy?

- Rolling release distro that is always cutting-edge?

- What are the major issues that I run into with a distro - and is is really a deal breaker that causes me to hop to another?

- The solution may just be listing your needs and preferences, according to MakeUseOf.

- Here are some that I can think of for myself to look out for to start:

- Absolutely necessary applications that can replace what I did in Windows or MacOS.

- Best package manager for me.

- Fast, snappy desktop operations.

- Awesome U.I.

- Since there are so many distros out there, take that list that you made and see what aligns with closely with the next distro that you want to hop to. Maybe this could be my last hop.

### Closing Remarks 

I'd like to thank you for putting time aside to listen to the podcast. 

Follow our Podcast 

- If you're a new listener to the Manly Hanley Podcast, we would love to hear from you. [Visit our website](https://randyhanley.com/) and leave a comment. Send me an email with any questions or comments.

- Follow [Randrums](https://twitter.com/randrums) on twitter