cross-posted from: https://feddit.nl/post/19798927

Sure, the whole world is on fire right now, but there are also little things to be upset about. ☝😉

  • NeatNit@discuss.tchncs.de
    138·
    3 months ago

    There was a time when blue LEDs were the white whale of electronics, always out of reach and everyone wanted to figure out how to make them work. When someone finally did it, it was considered a massive breakthrough, and rightly so. Now they have somehow become the default cheapo LED, moreso than red or green. Could it be an industry-wide ‘fuck you’ to physics? “You tried to keep us from making blue LEDs, hah! Now look at us!!!”

    • towerful@programming.dev
      82·
      3 months ago

      At one point, blue LEDs were super expensive because of their difficult production.
      So any product that has a blue LED was considered premium. I guess they were also considered futuristic and high-tech.
      Somehow, this is still in the mind of some manufacturers.
      All I want is a barely-visible-in-soft-daylight diffused/frosted red or amber LED.
      But no, it’s always some 5w lensed blue LED at somehow produces a tighter beam of horrendous blue light that’s brighter than most flashlights.

      • justme@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        43·
        3 months ago

        Reminds me on a German proverb “to add your mustard to it”, which apparently came from a time at which mustard was rare and exquisite. So they added it to any kind of food just to “up it’s prestige”.

        • towerful@programming.dev
          14·
          3 months ago

          What a great origin. I Googled it, and it now means “to add your opinion”.

          1. Seinen Senf dazugeben

          Literal translation: To add your mustard to it.

          Actual meaning: To give your opinion on something./To give your two cents.

          Where there are sausages, there also must be mustard. If you want to ask someone for their opinion and sound like a fluent speaker when doing it, you better invite them to add their mustard.

          https://www.mondly.com/blog/german-idioms/

          In the process, I found some other great German proverbs with hilarious literal translations.

          Literal translation: To talk around the hot porridge.
          Literal translation: To ask for an extra sausage.
          Literal translation: I believe I spider. (Edit: I believe I spin, see comment).
          Literal translation: To have tomatoes on one’s eyes.
          Literal translation: I can only understand ‘train station.’.
          Literal translation: You’re walking on my cookie.
          Literal translation: The bear dances there.
          Literal translation: Everything has an end. Only the sausage has two.

          But, I guess that’s always the case with idioms. Their literal translation/meaning is useless. Regardless, I find German ones particularly titular

          • Vlyn@lemmy.zipEnglish
            10·
            3 months ago

            As a German they are all technically correct, but one of them isn’t a proper translation.

            I believe I spider.

            “Ich glaube ich spinne.” isn’t in regards to spiders, the last word is a verb. “spinnen” means “to spin”, originally coming from spinning yarn, which then became spinning a thought :)

            • towerful@programming.dev
              2·
              3 months ago

              That makes a lot more sense!
              I’ve edited my comment. Feel free to contact the blogger. “I believe I spider” is hilarious. But “I believe I spin” is much more believable!

          • justme@lemmy.dbzer0.com
            3·
            3 months ago

            Yeah sorry, forgot to mention the actual meaning :) But I can add some more:

            • My dear Mister singing club
            • shit at the wall
            • one has seen horses puke Maybe I’ll remember some more with good English “translations”.

            Something else I just remember is a discussion between Erasmus students (Erasmus is a student exchange program in Europe, so you study for a semester in another country, ergo that group was quiet diverse) about how you call very strong rain: German: is raining cow shit (although that might be local, because those phrases often differ quiet much between German dialects) British: is raining cats and dogs Greek: is raining the legs of Zeus I don’t remember the others… But anyway… what is the deal with English speakers and cats??? A lot of languages have a proverb like “many paths lead to Rome”… But in English apparently it is “there are many ways to skin a cat”… dafuq?

            • justme@lemmy.dbzer0.com
              3·
              3 months ago
              • I believe my hamster is sweeping
              • I believe my pig is whistling
              • you don’t have all cups in the cupboard
    • PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world
      12·
      3 months ago

      Yeah, the history of the blue LED is actually really interesting. It basically exists because one Japanese dude refused to take no for an answer, and continued working on developing them even after his company stopped funding his LED project.

    • grrgyle@slrpnk.net
      10·
      3 months ago

      You even see them in Christmas lights. They’re so retina piercingly stark, like not a chill light at all (though obv on the “cool” end of the spectrum). I’m out here walking my dog looking at the nice twinkly warm lights - no one wants to see your damned pinprick holes into the Tron dimension

    • Rob T Firefly@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      3 months ago

      And when blue LEDs just started being available prop designers for scifi loved them because LEDs work much better on screen than incandescent bulbs, and as blue lights were something people didn’t have yet in their household objects they looked new and interesting. Look at the Doctor Who and Torchwood props from the mid 2000s, everything from the iconic Sonic Screwdriver to alien zappers and bleepers and greebles of all kinds were full of tiny blue lights because it screamed “scifi” to the viewer.

      Very quickly, though, blue LEDs got cheap enough for everyday junk and manufacturers immediately shoved them into every consumer product because they were new and interesting and, thanks in part to the scifi trend, made stuff look like scifi future tech you could have in real life.

      Now, a couple decades on, we’re still kind of stuck there.

    • corsicanguppy@lemmy.caEnglish
      1·
      3 months ago

      They’re the “literally” of LEDs? Wrong in almost every context but people can’t stop using them?