Asno @asno@qoto.org

Hidetaka Hirose, 1944-2020

Hidetaka Hirose, the genius behind C.S. Hirose, died early on Saturday. For 40 years, he built bicycles that were custom-built for their riders in every way: Not just size, geometry and tubing selection, but even the components.

Hirose bikes were always beautifully balanced. I had the privilege of riding a few, and seeing many more in action. He had an intuitive understanding of frame geometry that allowed him to tune each bike to its rider. They all handled beautifully, whether they were mini-velos with small wheels, cyclotouring bikes with a big handlebar bag, or bikes intended for a full camping load.

Before you could order a bike, Hirose-san invited you to join his Hirose Owners’ Meeting – a bi-annual, two-day cyclotouring journey on small backroads in the high mountains that he had scouted on his own weekend trips. Hirose followed his riders in his van and watched them pedal. This allowed him to build bikes for them that matched not just their bodies’ dimensions, but also their riding style. It also made for great riding, wonderful camaraderie and great food at traditional inns.

His small workshop in Kodaira (Tokyo) was filled with fixtures, gauges and tools. Many of them he had made himself. There were hundreds of them. He even built his own frame jig, which enabled him to work on both sides of the frame.

Hirose was not just a framebuilder, but he made his own components. He simply enjoyed making things, but his goal was always to improve, not just replicate. He liked desmodromic derailleurs (with cables pulling in both directions), and he made his own 10-speed-compatible versions of the classic Cyclo. Just as impressive was his desmodromic conversion of the Huret Allvit (above), a derailleur known for excellent shifts that were spoiled by its heavy action. Hirose’s desmodromic Allvit shifted smoothly, with a light touch and with a precision that the originals could only dream of.

Hirose also made front derailleurs, and he designed the mechanism and cage shape to match the rider’s pedaling style. It was all part of a true custom bike. The one shown above was also desmodromic. When I tried it at one of the Owners’ Meetings, I was impressed how smoothly it shifted over the wide range of the bike’s triple cranks.

As remarkable as Hirose’s bikes are, the man who made them was even more remarkable. Deeply passionate about bicycles, music and many other things and always smiling – we will miss him.

His shop, C. S. Hirose, is now run by his long-time customer and friend, Mr. Okada.

#cycling #bicycle #framebuilding #hirose

@awlt @mastobikes

In the west, California's burning because of drought, hollywood egotism, climate change, and a mismanaged water crisis fueled by Silicon Valley "ball and chain" of inflated tech stocks making everything worse... .

In the Gulf of Mexico, Cat 4 Hurricane Laura is set to land between Houston and New Orleans... 4' - 7' storm surge putting everybody knee-deep in "uncontainable" losses spread around as thin as oil can... that's the truly "unfortunate" thing about that industry; toxic oil-drilling contaminates spread far and wide, and they cannot be isolated to the industry that much deeper underwater ...

So "of course" the finanical markets are cashing out as wannabe tech elites cash out at the peak of their own deluded insanity. Makes perfect sense, doesn't it?

Another request from a friend.

#calligraphy #handwriting #copperplate

Just a quick appeal:

@peertube , the Fediverse's video sharing platform, is having a fundraising drive to get PeerTube v3 done, which features lots of major improvements including video livestreaming.

You can find out more and donate to the crowdfunding on the roadmap page:

https://joinpeertube.org/roadmap

#PeerTube #Fediverse #ActivityPub #LiveStreaming #LiveStream #Streaming #YouTube #Twitch #Alternatives #FOSS #FLOSS #Libre

Students shouldn't be forced to use Zoom, Skype, and other nasty proprietary software to access an education. Support their #UserFreedom: sign our petition! https://u.fsf.org/34d

Los fachas de Colón de ayer quieren ver el virus, un ser enano. Si no, no se lo creen.

Pero a dios no les hace falta verlo, dios existe y ya está.

Hijos de puta, subnormales, despojos humanos, insolidarios... Ahí es donde hacen falta cargas policiales, no en las manis antidesaucios.

Lemmy is similar to sites like Reddit, Lobste.rs, Raddle, or Hacker News: you subscribe to forums you’re interested in, post links and discussions, then vote, and comment on them. Behind the scenes, it is very different; anyone can easily run a server, and all these servers are federated (think email), and connected to the same universe, called the Fediverse.

For a link aggregator, this means a user registered on one server can subscribe to forums on any other server, and can have discussions with users registered elsewhere.

The overall goal is to create an easily self-hostable, decentralized alternative to reddit and other link aggregators, outside of their corporate control and meddling.

Each lemmy server can set its own moderation policy; appointing site-wide admins, and community moderators to keep out the trolls, and foster a healthy, non-toxic environment where all can feel comfortable contributing.

Note: Federation is still in active development and the WebSocket, as well as, HTTP API are currently unstable

#fediverse #reddit

A ver si hacen algo con los locales de ocio diurno

Youtube nowadays makes you feel un-easy?

Switch to PeerTube!

PeerTube is a free as in freedom +decentralized video sharing and soon possibly even streaming platform.

The good people and developers Framasoft have a roadmap for version 3 of Peertube.

It includes all the things one needs, IN FREEDOM.

Say goodbye to Google (Goolag) oppression.

All about it here, please support if able ==> https://joinpeertube.org/roadmap
_
#framasoft #peertube #stream #p2p #youtube #deletegoogle #libre @Framasoft

Today, I was trying to find (using commercial search engines) information about a topic. Maybe 9 out of 10 or more "relevant" results was about purchasing items related to the topic. Not ads placed in the result page, no, the actual results.

I remember how, when I was younger, I used to marvel at all the information out there on the web. How it was like a giant library.

I scarcely recognize the place now. If you want to search information about a topic you don't go into a mall. But that's what it feels like I'm forced to do.

I remember going to the library and pulling out drawers of index cards to locate the relevant non-fiction shelves with good content on topics I wanted to learn about. Imagine if those index cards had been mixed with cards with advertisements on them. Increasingly diluting the content with junk. That is the web of today.

Se ofrecerán PCR en Madrid en las 6 zonas de más contagios para personas de 15 a 49 años sin síntomas.

Carabanchel, Usera, Villaverde, Vallecas, Alcobendas y Móstoles.

Se pondrán en contacto por SMS con los seleccionados.

1.000 por zona. 6.000 en total.

https://twitter.com/SaludMadrid/status/1294219600901611520?s=19

And here I am - using Linux and Free Software.

I have a problem or something that I want to do? Sure, here in the 5 easy step to accomplish that! Oh btw, here is a free program that you can use if you want.

After have been using and working with Windows during the last 12 month (new job), I have even more questioned the reason why companies or individuals actually chose to use it.

If you want to do simple stuff, like disabling TLS1.0 och TLS1.1 in Windows - you have to follow a 100 step program OR buy a program that does it for you.

And if you want to do B - follow this 50 step stupid guide OR buy this program that does it for you.

No, Mozilla, no está bien. A Facebook ni un tantito así.