EVE Online AKA Spreadsheets Online, back when I played it in 2009. No idea if it’s the same now. Almost entirely player driven economy and factions (outside of hi-sec).
Elite Dangerous, sort of. No other Space Sim is on its scale (I wouldn’t really call something like Space Engine a space sim). Unique, but mixed recommendations because it’s a very shallow game in a lot of ways, but it’s got a cool vibe. Speaking of which…
Space Engine. Not really a game, so much as a universe-simulator. It is unknown to this day how a mortal could create something of this grandeur. Maybe the source code will be released eventually.
Someone else already mentioned Noita :(
Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead is the most realistic game ever made. No other game had made me ask “what would I do in real life?” before. Of course, this dies out the more you learn the meta, but your first dozen or so runs are special.
Minecraft is hardly unique now, but when it came out it was one-of-a-kind.
Encrypted XMPP/IRC+ZNC/other plain text protocol is the best. Mobile data is everywhere and cheap, especially for text messages. Only one person has to do the heavy lifting setting up the server on a VPS with encryption; connecting the clients is easy. The hard part is getting people to use them when network providers and Android/iOS devs shoehorn SMS/MMS/RCS as the default and only option.
Unless you want to tell me that the Android kernel is the first OS kernel without bugs, it takes at the very least one bug to be left intentionally unfixed and shared with the feds to introduce a backdoor. I wouldn’t consider it infeasible with how large the android kernel is, and how high a barrier of entry kernel dev is. If the bug is found, just move to the next one. Normally I wouldn’t be so paranoid, but this is Google we’re dealing with, on one of, if not the most popular kernels on the planet.
Random hardware suggestions, using mobile Linux support as a litmus test
Pinephone (Pro): Main downside is that OG Pinephone has extremely anemic hardware, and the charging circuit is not controlled through hardware for some insane reason; hope the kernel devs of whatever OS you put on it knows how to not turn your phone into a bomb. Also Pine64 as a company has gotten flak for their support of Manjaro. Can’t deny how good the price is though.
Fairphone 4: Good hardware, but expensive. I don’t own it, but it works good on postmarketOS according to the wiki.
Librem 5: Overpriced compared to the earlier members on this list, but you can guarantee the phosh interface will work well considering it was developed by Purism as well.
OnePlus 6 and 6T: I don’t know much about these, but they’re very popular with the mobile Linux crowd.
As for the pixel, there’s work on it but it’s still broken at the moment. As for the hardware being too old, I haven’t used anything Android in a while, so I don’t know how much performance degrades each release, but a mobile Linux distribution should run just as good today as it will 20 years from now, assuming you use the same interface.
I don’t trust the google kernel when it comes to privacy or security. You think with how many people use Android and with how bad actors Google are they wouldn’t put a backdoor somewhere?
It’s as easy as following any set of instructions. Whether or not you actually understand what the instructions are doing is an entirely different story. If you actually want to learn how to operate a posix system, doing a bunch of command line installs of Linux isn’t going to help you with that. What will help is living in something with excellent documentation like OpenBSD, with minimal reliance on external tooling. Once you have the skills, they’ll transfer anywhere.
If you’re going to give GNOME shit, at least let it before how much they destroy portability of GTK, enabling cancer like Client Side Decorations, and ignoring their community when it comes to things like desktop icons.
You are correct, and thankfully peertube exists and is currently not full of nazis (at least from the instances I’ve checked). Their federation model seems to be opt in instead of opt out though, so it’s hard to actually find content, unfortunately.
The most populated instance I’ve found is tilvids.com, which has a bunch of educational and tech videos.