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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   1522 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for November 1, 2026

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Anybody out there use a trackball? Any advice on brands, essential features, designs?

I've been using a trackball as my daily driver at work for years. For a long time I used a thumb-operated track ball but eventually I came to prefer the two-finger style track ball and landed on the Elecom Huge from Japan. Amazon says I bought it in 2018 and it's been working reliably since then. If you're going the large-size two-finger ball, I'd suggest you want left-click on your thumb and right-click on your ring finger.

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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