[BREAKING] News Thread

[Moonface]

I got curious how the area looked on Google Maps, and there's quite a few roads that go right through that proposed area. It makes me wonder how many of those will remain, and for those that will how many will retain their current use or be turned into a way to reach a parking lot or something.
Expansion was another thing I wondered too, given no Nintendo World has been announced for this yet and if it were to be added, there isn't much room to the south for an expansion and the north side is completely out of the question. Going west seems very unlikely because of the A421 being in the way. The areas to the southeast are mostly open land, but they don't form any connection to the areas shaded in red on the proposal map so I don't know if those areas could even be utilized with a connection in place, unless it'll be like Universal Orlando where you go between the two parks via a train system.

[Mr EliteL]

Dang, yeah I'll be 40 or 39 if it opens pre-July. A new theme park for UK, and nice 28,000 jobs but that number might dwindle a bit. I wasn't thinking more could be added on like a Nintendo World if they find a way to do it, that'll probably be 2040 by then.

There's two Inns nearby I saw, possibly some more and perhaps they'll add in one to the park itself, or other establishments open up as well.

[Moonface]

Dang, yeah I'll be 40 or 39 if it opens pre-July. A new theme park for UK, and nice 28,000 jobs but that number might dwindle a bit. I wasn't thinking more could be added on like a Nintendo World if they find a way to do it, that'll probably be 2040 by then.

In the time it takes for this park to open, I feel like it'd be more viable to try and save up a bit each month and just go to the Universal Studio's park in Florida instead that'll have way more to do by default, and will not only have Nintendo World but also the Donkey Kong expansion and likely another expansion on top of that one. Hopefully the UK park will get some unique rides or at least notable variants of the rides that other Universal parks already have, similar to how Disneyland Paris has rides unique to it and others that are very distinct variants of those found in other parks, such as Space Mountain.

[Moonface]

Hmm, looks like Discord finally plans to actually go public after appointing a new CEO, which is none other than former Blizzard/Activision CFO Humam Sakhnini. I didn't see positive views on the prospect back when it was just that, and it doesn't look like the sentiment has changed much. Almost every time I read comments about Discord going public it's how such a move usually means the company/product is going to start declining in quality and see itself meet the same fate as those in the same space that came before it.

I don't really have enough knowledge myself to give an opinion on Discord going public, but I can't recall any other IM platform being built with communities in mind like Discord has, so whereas in the past moving from one IM service to another just meant sharing info with your contact list on the old service before moving to the new one, moving from Discord is probably going to be a much bigger ordeal if it comes down to that for actual communities.

[Mr EliteL]

It's just good there's a proper park coming, but no doubt I'd prefer to go to Florida's over UK's, I'm not waiting until 40's or 50's before I experience them for UK.

Also darn really about Discord? Oh noes but I suppose it was bound to happen eventually (the inevitable collapse/something potentially ruining it that is). I'm out of touch of what alternatives there currently are for IMs, Discord could've remained a comfortable place for lengths of time but alas. I'll continue to use it for now obviously, just hope it doesn't come to an end all too suddenly.

[Moonface]

Also darn really about Discord? Oh noes but I suppose it was bound to happen eventually (the inevitable collapse/something potentially ruining it that is). I'm out of touch of what alternatives there currently are for IMs, Discord could've remained a comfortable place for lengths of time but alas. I'll continue to use it for now obviously, just hope it doesn't come to an end all too suddenly.

For an equivalent to it I don't know of anything; the only other IM service I know about and use is WhatsApp, although that's mainly because my class group chats get made in that otherwise I likely wouldn't have ever signed up for it.
I doubt it'll end suddenly either. It'll probably just be like Skype, MSN, YIM, etc. where they just slowly start to introduce things that feel like a step backwards. Considering Discord already has monetization stuff in place, I would expect that to be the thing that gets messed with the most in an attempt by shareholders and pencil pushers to make more money even if that outcome for them only lasts in the short term if whatever they do pushes people away.

[Kyng]

Yeah, I'm a bit surprised it took this long TBH.

Though, even if it starts declining in quality, it's hard to imagine it becoming so bad that people are going to start leaving it en masse: even if a superior alternative comes along, people are unlikely to want two messaging services open at once, unless the new one is really much better.

Could happen if Discord becomes truly terrible, but I hope things don't get that far!

[Maniakkid25]

A new Pope has been chosen in the wake of Pope Francis' death: Pope Leo XIV, aka Robert Prevost. He's an American, in both the English and Latino sense. He was born in the US, but has spent the last half of his life living in Peru. You can read more about him here.

Personally, this Pope has a non-zero chance of not fucking things up. See, the US wing of ultra-conservatives wanted to put one of their own in the seat to try and steer the church their way, and this Pope is not that person. So, I am cautiously optimistic about this Pope.

[Moonface]

I hadn't even been aware that candidates for the new Pope had been shared before now or that they even get shared in the first place, and only learned all of that from hearing the news of this new Pope being elected.

I also wasn't expecting the nationality of the new Pope to come up, only because it isn't something I've ever thought about or seen brought up for other Popes. I also think it's bullshit that any country should be getting to sway the voting for a result that aligns with their country specifically.

[ShiraNoMai]

It wasn't until Pope Francis' designation that I was aware of the country thing, too. I do remember at the time that him being Argentinian was like, such a big deal. I think it was the first time South America got representation for being Pope (and apparently the first outside of Europe in a *very* long time).

This time around, I do remember seeing this image floating around, and this is how I knew about the candidates myself. I didn't realize the candidacy and the actual deliberation of being chosen amongst those at the Vatican are two separate things. It was like, what, a week or two since Francis left the world? That's when speculation started. But apparently the official delegation and disputation of the position wasn't argued until a day or two ago.

[Maniakkid25]

Yeah, Pope Francis is the first ever Pope from the New World (that being the Americas), and that was a BIG deal. This is the first US-born Pope, which is certainly a surprise. He's also apparently a Chicago Cubs White Sox fan (which makes sense, given his birthplace is the Windy City), for a fun piece of trivia.

Edit: I was lied to lol.

[Kyng]

I do hope he wasn't chosen because of political considerations - because as far as I'm concerned, the Roman Catholic Church is bigger than the politics of any one country, even if that country is the United States of America.

In any case, congratulations to him - and I wish him all the best with his Papacy !

[Moonface]

This time around, I do remember seeing this image floating around, and this is how I knew about the candidates myself. I didn't realize the candidacy and the actual deliberation of being chosen amongst those at the Vatican are two separate things. It was like, what, a week or two since Francis left the world? That's when speculation started. But apparently the official delegation and disputation of the position wasn't argued until a day or two ago.

Now I'm confused because I saw people making jokes about some "pizza Pope" or something and thought it would be due to the name of one of the candidates, but none of the people on that image have a name that comes close to a pizza joke.

I do hope he wasn't chosen because of political considerations - because as far as I'm concerned, the Roman Catholic Church is bigger than the politics of any one country, even if that country is the United States of America.

Likely not, since I read that he was someone Francis picked out for something or other due to both sharing many of the same views and beliefs, so I'd expect the choice was influenced more by that than anything else.


I also never knew until now that the Pope isn't just Pope "first birth name" but actually gets given a Pope name that is initially a latin name that can then get translated into other languages, and that a few names are off limits such as that of the first ever Pope. I've not bothered to go looking it up yet but I'm also curious now how old the youngest Pope was and what the average age tends to be because I've always associated the position with some old dude who probably got a bus pass before they got the position of Pope.