13 barn owls in a trenchcoat

Wandering monster. Writes stuff. Makes things. Tech writing, software preservation, game dev, weird fiction, some occult references.

Follow reqs welcome.

Likes bicycles, strength training, metal, EDM, the Ultima CRPG series.

Experimental games & Twine abuse at https://mightyowlbear.com
Personal game reviews at https://hauntedgames.net/

Work alt: Owlbear (npub1ar9…k7r0)

Avatar by MaxiMJdev

🌱 Ⓥ 😷

~twoot~

Languages: en ⛧ fr ⛧ el ⛧C# ⛧ JS ⛧ MUSHcode ⛧ bash ⛧ C++ ⛧ Python ⛧ GDScript
Age: Middle. My Linux and black metal anecdotes are old enough to vote.
Games: https://13-owls.itch.io

Public Key

npub12dxxvakxmjshkfw0ss6lmp4vad7qyhwz6nq2lr6h3hwrvh68l3vsg9h7z7

NIP-05 Address

hauntedowlbear_at_eldritch.cafe@momostr.pink

Profile Code

nprofile1qqs9xnrxwmrdegtmyh8cgd0as6kwklqzthpdfs903atcmhpktarlckgpz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dsujmppd

Publishing to

atlas.nostr.land

relay.damus.io

nos.lol

Author Public Key

npub12dxxvakxmjshkfw0ss6lmp4vad7qyhwz6nq2lr6h3hwrvh68l3vsg9h7z7

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Last Notes

2026-05-12 12:53:19 UTC

Until two pairs of Bluetooth headphones can be simultaneously paired with a single audio source, the technology lags behind those stereo splitters that kids in the 80s used to share the output from their Walkman.

2026-04-26 10:06:16 UTC

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I'm accepting that growing our (digital cross-media) studio as artists is going to require grant applications. But the entire process, from the kind of business status required to identifying which application calls are even relevant to us is *daunting*.
I'm as in admiration of your admin skills as your artistic ones is what I'm getting at here.

2026-02-23 20:20:19 UTC

The anecdotes behind the rise of Hemmingway's (apocryphal) "For Sale: Baby shoes. Never worn." story are fascinating.
Especially that Arthur C. Clarke played a role in the spread of the original story in the exact format that I first heard it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_sale%3A_baby_shoes%2C_never_worn

2026-02-21 18:59:03 UTC

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Honestly, I hope they get in touch to complain, then I can ask them about preserving their other CDs!
The band and micro-label have both vanished off the face of the earth, so I'm considering this to be both music preservation *and* bait.

2026-02-21 16:59:18 UTC

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Yeah, I have loved and appreciated many small artists, some now well forgotten, or who've withdrawn early works from distribution.
I'm archiving their work from time to time, although I'm lagging behind about it.
Here's a favourite:
The October Country - Clean Kills and Other Trophies
https://archive.org/details/the-october-country-clean-kills-and-other-trophies

2026-02-08 20:42:16 UTC

Look, does anyone know what's going on with the names of Reaper versions?
*I cannot work out this naming schema*
https://www.reaper.fm/download-old.php
I've found a Peanuts reference, a 30 Rock reference, the title of a highly specific history book that briefly featured on The Detectorists, and a Prince lyric.<li>With Liberty and Justice for All </li><li>Someone doesn't know their audience</li><li>Happiness Is a Warm Puppy</li><li>The Rural Juror</li><li>Pigs on the Minor Seventh</li><li>A place both wonderful and strange </li><li>What you don’t know, makes you stronger</li><li>Common Buttons of North West Essex</li><li>This is your pilot Prince speaking...</li>
#MusicProduction #Reaper

2025-11-25 00:21:34 UTC

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https://1351.bandcamp.com/

2025-11-18 16:16:24 UTC

I just configured VLC to work as a flawless MIDI to FLAC conversion tool via the Fluidsynth plugin and a ripped Roland SC-55 ROM for the voices.

2025-07-21 11:11:38 UTC

Hey, fedizens, please recommend me zines that people here make!
Radical, queer, artistic, technical... all welcome.
#zines #zine

2025-06-30 20:22:20 UTC

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This. Changes. **Everything.**
I love AppImages but dislike managing them, and this solves a lot.

2025-06-27 12:41:48 UTC

Huh. It should have occurred to me that
"slide-up gamepads" was a patented form factor.
https://retrododo.com/sonys-patent-on-sliding-handhelds-has-ended-paving-the-way-for-a-retro-revival/
"Have you ever wondered why we never saw more sliding handheld technology after the Sony Xperia Play? If you weren't in the handheld or mobile business, then you probably didn't know that Sony filed a patent for the gaming handheld with a slide-up screen back in 2010, a year before the Xperia Play released. "
#retrogaming

2025-06-27 11:06:25 UTC

Capitalism was a terrible idea on paper and turned out to be even more miserably unsound in practice.

2025-06-01 15:52:16 UTC

Do I recall a list of fiction magazines and markets that were on fedi?
Could anyone link me to it, please?
#writing #DuckDuckFedi #writersofmastodon #fiction

2025-04-27 13:46:57 UTC

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Thank you! I'm travelling at [disgusting-in-the morning] tomorrow, but I think even though you're in the UK (I have a passport for there, but don't live there atm) there's still going to be some common ground, as I'm after a vibe check what's getting money as much as anything else.
I'll send a hopefully-not-too-onerous clutch of question as they come to me/get assembled in good order.
Oh, did you apply as an individual or as an organisation?
TYSM for the pointed, @npub1rvy…6l5j !

2025-04-27 08:35:23 UTC

I know this is the kind of question I probably ought to sign up to Bluesky to ask but:
Do I know anyone who's applied (successfully or unsuccessfully) for a European arts grant to help fund production of a video game or other forms of interactive art?
And if so, could I ask you a few incredibly basic questions?
#GameDev #Arts #ArtsGrants #art

2025-04-02 15:13:39 UTC

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Huuuh. Steam Deck 256GB LCD starts at 419 EUR. You have to pay 569 EUR for OLED tho.
I've not peeped the new Switch's specs, but that's not really the point, is it? (I ask rhetorically, as a thousand gaming YouTube channels run to make exactly the same comparison.)
It's that you get that first-party and exclusive library, and that family friendliness.

2025-02-03 11:50:06 UTC

Friends, is noauthority.social a full on fash server or is it just incredibly badly moderated?
**Edit:** between some kind responses and a bit more unpleasant checking, they're definitely fashy on purpose. I casually found holocaust denial, racism, and anti-vax content.
I've blocked them from the servers I admin and recommend doing the same.
**Previously:* Trying to work out if I should bother poking their admin or just blocking them from my servers outright.
#fedimeta #fediadmin

2025-01-22 13:29:42 UTC

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tag urself, I'm orgone energy

2025-01-12 20:44:01 UTC

Taiwanese folk metal artist NiNi got a fake copyright claim on her viral hit cover of Zombie, in a successful attempt to steal her revenue from YT and Facebook.
She's currently trying reach YT and Facebook to gain access to her revenue.
This is another example of how automated copyright claim systems are not fit for purpose and should never have been required under EU law.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Wor6G6Jg9A
#copyright #metal #facebook #youtube

2024-12-31 15:49:24 UTC

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TFW you've been working on (and not quite finishing) a #fedijam game but mostly forgetting to post about it on fedi.
*sound of frantic uploading of functional but incomplete thing to itch*
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/748/222/334/921/386/original/0954f5e87f7e2037.png

2024-12-21 08:25:00 UTC

The wolf of night did not eat the sun at the end of their chase through the longest night.
Somewhere, a king has been sacrificed to ensure the return of light.
Happy solstice.
#WinterSolstice
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/689/806/614/012/674/original/6e74f5cbfad6cf64.jpg

2024-12-06 17:01:14 UTC

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They're... ghosting a social network?
And yeah, people should absolutely try all kinds of services and forums.
I love fedi and currently run three different servers, a number that's only likely to increase, but I'm absolutely going to try bsky once I get a datastore server set up to host my posts, as a bunch of my music and gamedev friends FINALLY left Twitter and popped up there, and I miss them.

2024-12-06 12:56:00 UTC

SOLVED!
Thanks to @npub16j4…8gtv I now know that Atari/Bioware **Linux** installer for the **original** version of Neverwinter Nights (not the recent Enhanced Edition) can be downloaded from https://neverwintervault.org/platform/linux
I'm contemplating a 2003 era retro Linux PC build.
#LinuxGaming #RetroGaming #SoftwarePreservation

2024-12-04 21:54:37 UTC

We're actually getting further in this #fedijam because I've gone back to abusing Twine horribly. (You can't see it here but there's an acquired attribute system and its variable handling and presentation is *grotesque*.)
#gamedev
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/596/757/497/779/207/original/a4e95cfc5368b8f1.png
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/596/757/489/460/366/original/2314fe0340a48a2a.png
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/596/757/513/174/248/original/fe75c97170e2dce2.png

2024-11-15 14:44:35 UTC

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some of us have moved to places other than bluesky and if you/they are going to ask us if we're interested in signing the petition on fedi, perhaps it ought to actually mention fedi?

2024-11-12 09:43:35 UTC

This week's #TuneTuesday theme is #SciFiSongs
I was going to say that I'm not usually super into sci-fi themed bands, but that is 100% a lie.
Friends, this is Hawkwind.
Hawkwind - Spirit of the Age (1979 Live version)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ze1lVah7o5s
Lyrics: https://genius.com/Hawkwind-spirit-of-the-age-lyrics
A musical setting of a poem by the band's troubled sometime vocalist and lyricist Robert Calvert, this dystopian affair was originally released in a more muted form on 1977's Quark, Strangeness and Charm, but I vastly prefer the vocal performance (uncertain if Bainbridge or Brock but I think the former?) on this astonishing live version, found on the Live 1979 album. It's heavy, intense, bleak, and Tim Blake's electronics are god-tier.

2024-11-08 09:42:55 UTC

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I'm a genuine enthusiast of the One True User-Owned Datastore model, although I've found current models of that to be offputtingly obtuse in deployment terms
(I mentioned Solid earlier - see https://solidproject.org/about) - let alone for laypersons.
As someone currently operating three different ActivityPub servers (Masto, GTS, WriteFreely), the fact that user data is still siloed on a per-server basis is a weak point, as if the server goes, the user loses that data. (Which I can solve by running my own servers, but the data remains on its home server. This has both advantages - I like specialisation and compartmentalisation! - and disadvantages, in that siloed, non-transferrable data becomes particularly sensitive when you don't run your own servers.)
In an ideal world, I'd like to see user-owned data stores that could be plugged into ActivityPub on a protocol level, although I suppose that's not something that's going to be on the AP roadmap as it's fully mature now, but instead something that falls under the Spritely Project's area of interest for the next generation of open, federated protocols.
I don't think the AT Protocol successfully overcomes the user accessibility to data stores problem. (And I've no interest in touching Bluesky and its projects for a variety of reasons.)
@npub1nmy…0y83

2024-11-08 06:55:44 UTC

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it's early and I'm skimming, but AT's approach sounds akin to the idea behind Solid pods - user controlled data store, interoperable protocol, monolithic services that those can be plugged into?
I know I should read the material properly (and intend to), but is that where he went with this?

2024-11-05 10:14:21 UTC

I had to take someone to an appointment, so didn't have the big camera, but as promised, proof that I live in Silent Hill. (Actually, I live a few kilometres outside Silent Hill, but it's my nearest administrative centre.)
#photography #photographe #brouillard #fog
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/429/807/448/014/055/original/4704fa5eab144ab5.jpeg
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/429/807/732/705/660/original/eb351f9f664d0845.jpeg
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/429/808/094/186/822/original/918216d02101e499.jpeg
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/429/808/297/165/275/original/e38a66d6acdca9d3.jpeg

2024-10-16 18:37:30 UTC

Hello everyone, I made an audio recording of The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas by Ursula K. Le Guin for a friend.
I've licensed the audio to the public domain, so if you want to listen to it, or remix it, or use it in a thing, go nuts. (Note: the text itself is under copyright, see replies to this post for licensing contact if you have commercial requirements.)
I'm still working on my voice acting and narration, but I think it came out well. (And if you require this voice, please note that I need money and you can hire me to read things for you.)
You can read the story in text at:
https://usa.anarchistlibraries.net/library/ursula-k-le-guin-the-ones-who-walk-away-from-omelas
Download it from https://www.theos-cloud.eu/index.php/s/XysJdENm6enGe9D
#LeGuin #SpokenWord #VoiceActing
https://eldritchcafe.files.fedi.monster/media_attachments/files/113/318/536/921/600/361/original/e5f50697a39c8000.mp3

2024-10-14 12:08:04 UTC

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very gently, on the assumption that you missed this nuance:
this post was clearly not an attempt to prove a point. It was an effort to provide vocabulary and identifiers for a problem that exists for many women and that *does not require proving* for its intended audience because it is part of their lived experience.
You (and, for that matter, I) are not its intended audience, thus do not need to engage with it, debate it, or correct it.

2024-10-10 17:26:59 UTC

Isn't it funny how whenever you hear about a hip new indie game by a cool new studio set up by former devs from $GameDevMegaCorp it's always approximately two to four cis white men?

2024-09-26 00:10:14 UTC

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can personally note that Apogee was a big deal in the UK, Greece, and Cyprus, fwiw!

2024-09-20 10:47:15 UTC

Symbolism check!
I want to use (roughly) this symbol: )|(
for a body mod
*before I do anything permanent with it*
Does this - or any symbol resembling it - have any pre-existing meanings that you know of?
And before anyone asks why I would put a symbol I don't know the meaning of on my body, this is one of several designs I am iterating on that mean something to me - I just want to know if it means anything *else* as well.

2024-09-16 07:35:36 UTC

How do you pronounce fstab in your head?
(Regardless of how you think it is intended to be pronounced.)
#Linux #knives

2024-09-14 13:50:50 UTC

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Is that a spomenik? I'd love to hear about it!

2024-09-13 20:22:52 UTC

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Wait, I feel that I need backstory on this.
please and thank
@npub1uur…9kt2

2024-08-22 17:43:28 UTC

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this take is correct

2024-08-20 13:20:55 UTC

It's #TuneTuesday and the theme, from @npub1kgj…wxfy is #NameSake - which I think is songs that mention a first name, which people would then come to think of when that name is mentioned.
I am, presumably, "people", so here, I have never met a Melissa without thinking of this track:
Mercyful Fate - Is That You, Melissa
https://mercyfulfate.bandcamp.com/track/is-that-you-melissa