Max Glenister

Hyde from lazybea.rs runs a blog interview series called Over/Under, where bloggers rate a mix of topics as overrated or underrated, then pass a question along to the next person. I’m issue 61.

A few of my takes:

• NAS: underrated. Built mine from spare parts for under £200, runs Jellyfin, file sharing, and SSH. No subscriptions.
• Joy-Cons: overrated. Had mine since 2018, stick drift happened exactly as expected. Third-party controllers with Hall Effect sticks cost less and feel better.
• E-ink readers: overrated. Black-and-white reading works well, but colour e-ink promises more than it delivers. I went into this in more detail in my BigMe B6 post.
• VR: underrated. The metaverse stuff is nonsense, but VR for games has been genuinely good since 2015.
• Thai food: overrated, for me personally. Being type-1 diabetic makes eating out tricky to navigate.

The favourite books question caught me off guard a bit. Forced to save two: Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (which I gushed about in 2017), and a family anthology that’s more sentimental than anything I could properly explain.

I also passed a question to the next blogger:

How do you balance work and side projects? I’ve held a blog since 2004, I’ve got drawers full of half-finished projects, two kids and a day job that keeps me busy. Finding time for all of it without burning out or letting something slide is a constant negotiation. I’m curious how other people manage it, or if they’ve just accepted that some projects stay half-finished forever.

I don’t have the answer myself, which is part of why I asked.