Around 3 years ago my phone's screen broke and changing the screen would cost close to a half the device's original price. It was cheaper to throw away and buy a new one.

This is clearly wasteful, but I guess this is a typical experience with well-known consumer brands. But hey, I don't want to move to a new home because my sink broke!

In Europe, new regulations like Right-to-Repair Directive represent a smart step to force the hand of manufacturers. It requires them, for example, to keep spare parts stocked for at least 10 years. In France, I always check the repairability index before buying. I'm more than willing to pay a bonus price for good product design and engineering, that respects the resources and costumers.

So I've begrudgingly replaced my phone. But this time I wanted to break the wasteful cycle, so I've bought a Fairphone, which promises 10 year software and hardware support. Also, if something breaks I can just order a replacement and repair it myself. So far, I'm pretty happy with the experience! It works, it just does. I feel soon I'll replace my battery, and that's it: it will probably stick with me a bunch more years.

Since my old laptop became my home server, I needed a new one for hacking on the loose. Following a similar strategy, I'm going with Framework for my new rig.

They send the machine in a very simple DIY kit. It's a bit too easy for those used to tinker: snap, screw, click, boom! But it's a genius brand move to prove less experienced people that they can do it too.

The final result is pretty good. Come back in 3 years and I'll share my thoughts.

sent from my framework

They play for 28 hours! We did it and it was pretty cool o/

Well... not all those hours were spent actually playing, we also had to decide what to play next! With more than 500 games available at the event, this sometimes took a while :)

You can picture 3 rooms like the one below, full of meeples, cards, coins and fun.

It was the 16th edition of the festival 24h Chaud les Jeux! in Cholet. The festival name (and the association behind it) is a well-chosen self-referential pun! It translates to something like "hot for games", and the chaud les sounds exactly the same as the city's name. French people, especially hairdressing owners, love their jeu de mots.

The festival is made not only for hardcore gamers: it's open for anyone that passes by. I always find it heart-warming to see friends and family sitting around, just enjoying their company on a Sunday afternoon, while they fight furiously for the control of Tokyo, or accuse each other of being a Moriarty malfeasant ready to explode the Big Ben, or just casually arranging their azulejos the best they can.

For my part, I've managed to discover 9 new games and play other 2 that I already knew. The big ones were Endeavor: age of sail, Coming of age, Nemesis. I like them and would happily play another time.

Playing Nemesis for the first time at 08:00 was a difficult task hhaha! After 3 hours, we all exploded in space before coming back to Earth because one of the players decided that it HAD to auto-destroy the spaceship in order to content their desire for chaos! It was a nice play though, we were all dead and happy (and ready for lunch).

We made good choices of lighter party games to cool down: Decrypto, Nosferatu and Cabanga!.

A big Thank You! for the game club Chaud les jeux for all the time and effort you've put into this event. I'll be happy to see you again next time.

I used to blog as a kid back in the 2010s, and for a long time I wanted to get back to it. Now it's the time! This is my personal space on the web, it's not the shiniest, not the most visited, but it is mine :)

For now there isn't much to see here, this first post is mostly a hack to get me going.

See you next time!