The advantage of the N64 approach is that it allows both the D-pad and analog stick to be primary inputs. They're both ideally positioned under the thumb, because they're the only input the thumb needs to interact with. It's a tradeoff between the number of available inputs and ergonomics. Every other controller has to compromise on one or the other. e.g. The DualShock is obviously a SNES controller with two sticks slapped in the middle, but since it was an update to the standard (D-pad focussed) PlayStation controller, they're not at the angle where your thumb naturally rests. Successive PlayStation controllers moved the stick up and out slightly to bring it more in line with the thumb.
The Saturn 3D Control Pad along with other "modern" controllers like the Xbox line, GameCube and Switch have the opposite layout, where the analog stick is the natural resting place for the thumb and you crane to reach the less-accessible D-pad. With the benefit of hindsight, this is probably the "right answer", because most games since the fifth generation are designed around the analog stick, with the D-pad occasionally used as four additional action buttons which you either don't need at all, or only use sparingly. I don't know that this style of game (e.g. tactical shooters with squad orders on the D-pad) really did or could have existed in the N64 generation, so the lack of D-pad access ends up being irrelevant to the kind of games that were actually coming out in the era.
If you released a console today with the N64 controller, that would be a terrible idea, because there are the kinds of games coming out that expect you to have four triggers, two analog sticks and reasonably convenient access to the D-pad. But I can't think of any N64 games that were worse because you couldn't access the D-pad. What games needed those extra inputs? What games didn't get made because those inputs weren't convenient? Coming at it the other way, what games were released for the Saturn 3D Control Pad that wouldn't have been possible on N64?
Everyone else took all the good critiques of this article, so here's mine.
Bluesky appears to have reached their goal as far as federation. Users can self-host a personal data server (PDS) which federates with Bluesky. If you want an analogy from somebody extremely unqualified to offer it, it's sort of like bringing a bucket of water to a swimming pool. You can't go swimming in the bucket, but you can pour it into Bluesky's pool and swim in there. If the pool closes down or implements segregation and if somebody else opens a swimming pool, you can take your bucket to their pool instead. However, if nobody else wants to open another swimming pool, your bucket is useless. In this analogy, buckets are only useful to very slightly fill somebody else's swimming pool and for no other purpose. It's a very good analogy.
Bryan Newbold, the protocol engineer at Bluesky, said the following about PDSes and federation:
i.e. In Bluesky's terminology, federation is not a future goal they're hoping to achieve, it's what they're already doing right now.
The (ActivityPub) fediverse is different, because ... damn, I really screwed myself with this swimming pool thing ... it's like a bunch of boats in the ocean. There's one-person dinghies and giant cruise ships, all with different owners. You can bring your own boat, or you can hitch a ride with a friend or a generous stranger. If you want to hang out in a different boat from the one you arrived in, that's fine too. Ultimately, we all float on the same ocean which we all have to share. Crucially, nobody is in charge of the water. There's rules on the boats, but the ocean is just the ocean. If your boat crashes into an iceberg and sinks, the ocean will still be there. You might lose some of your stuff, but there's plenty of other boats to pick you up.
The failure state in both cases is better than nothing. With Bluesky, you lose the swimming pool, but keep the bucket. With ActivityPub, you lose the boat, but keep the ocean. If Bluesky dies, ideally you can take your federated identity with you to an alternative service that exists in the future, but you no longer have access to Bluesky, because it's gone. When a Lemmy instance dies, you pretty much have to start over: register a new account, subscribe to all your communities again, etc. But the whole fediverse is still there: all the communities you were subscribed to, the people you followed, all your old comments, they're still out there floating on the ocean.