I love to cook and while married, I cooked when I was at home, simply because I preferred what I cooked, my (now ex-)wife preferred what I cooked and the children preferred what I cooked too.

Now - single again - at work it makes a lot of sense for social reasons to have lunch with the team. So I go out with them and get my daily dose of calories there. That leaves me with little reason to cook dinner (or to order something or to go out for dinner). I'm not a lumberjack to need 3 big meals a day to keep up my strength.

With the lockdown I work from my home like many. No lunch with the team any more so so I have a reason to cook again - and I enjoy it very much.

The time argument doesn't really work for me, as cooking is for me a welcome change of pace that allows me to get my mind of work. Just like gaming does.
That's also the reason why I cook most of the time for dinner and keep lunch very light. Cooking for lunch in a 30 minute break would be more stressful and less enjoyable.

There are many reasons why there's more cooking going on.

Facebook is a prime target for privacy activist here in Europe. I'd say for a good reason, but that's beside the point.

For this reason, Facebook can be sure that on day one of their dating service, there will be inquiries whether all regulations have been properly observed. So for Facebook and the Irish DPC, investigating the compliance before the launch or after the first complaint is only a difference of a few days. And for Facebook it'll definitely less embarrassing if they have it checked beforehand.

I'm not willing to pay for a crappy service.

Ads: Not a problem if you stay away from the crappy Youtube-App but use the browser instead with Adblock Plus.

Their recommendation system sucks. Is it really necessary that Youtube proposes already watched content?

No easy way to filter out content older than a certain age or longer than a certain time. I might be strange, but most content takin more than 30 minutes is mostly crap and I have found very few streams longer than one hour that are worth watching. If someone isn't able to make a point in 15-20 minutes, usually it's not worth it.

I don't really like the way youtube is shadow-banning stuff if they don't like it or isn't advertiser-friendly.

And most important: I'm not willing to pay for a service that excludes adult themes and tries the play the big-nanny-in-the-sky. an no, I don't mean youtube should allow Porn, but the puritanian approach that every nipple or dick is evil and saying the N-, R- is evil.

If youTube goes down the drain, so be it. It wasn't worth surviving. I'll find another place to get my entertainment for a cost I'm willing to pay for it. For youTube my price-tag is 0 € (or $0 for you Americans)

Carrie Chitsey founded in 2008 the company TrueDialog, which is involved in this latest instance of security through naïvity and ignorance.

The story sound so terrible usual.

Some shady startup a digital customer relation enabler company was founded by a digital-technology innovator woman to watch. Being digital technology enabled, they probably called themselves something more glorious than spammers but that's what they do.

They successfully sold their services to companies to lazy or stupid to do their own spamming, get wonderful press-accolades for being so digitally native.

Profit - at least for some.

Meanwhile back in the trenches, why change stuff that works? The code cobbled together in a weekend while the company has struggling to find their first customer still works fine, doesn't it? At least until someone manages to take a peek under the hood.

This is a very good development, even if I believe the reasons cited are bad.

It's a very good development, that the US wants to submit the data of US residents to the same laws as the residents themselves. This will plug many loopholes overly exploited today. Basically it's similar in effect - although not in motivation - as the European data protections laws over which there's an the ongoing fight between the European Union and the USA for the past decade or so.

As to the motivation being bad in my opinion, it really doesn't matter. Whether you want to protect your citizens from evil-bad-horrible data-merchants or the motivation is national security to keep the empires of the east and far east from spying on your precious national secrets, what counts in the end is what is achieved.

I'm certain that many companies will cry foul and paint a picture of impending doom because they can't host their data in China any more to save a few pennies. But is it really that much of a hardship to operate a local datacenter to serve 330 million (USA) or 500 million (EU) customers?

Why are all the people afraid the sky is falling if the holy gig-economy has to play a little more by the rules and crying how many millions of jobs will be lost by a little regulation?

If there's a need for the service, it'll still be viable even with the new rules. In this case the need for transportation doesn't go away only because Uber has 20% more costs to conform to worker protection laws. They might have to rise the prices a little and be a little less wasteful on management bonuses. And if this breaks the company, in true capitalist manner it means they business wasn't sound enough. Some else will come up with a better solution. True capitalism at work.

When those so-called free-marketeers cry foul whenever their preferred loophole gets plugged, they're closer to the socialist cry-babies calling for a nanny state. Capitalism is best system to maximise profit under given circumstances. If the circumstances change, one just adapts.

Another very important aspect of being an independent contractor is that you can set your own prices and do your own evaluation what's economically reasonable.

Strong financial dependency on Uber and a very lopsided power-balance in the relationship in favour of Uber makes it also look more like a employment than being independent.

In the article they also mention, that many drivers see themselves as employees, which is another indication Uber might be disingenuous when classifying their drivers as independent contractors.

Back to reality, it looks as if Uber built their business on trying to be clever at bending rules to pretzels. Turns out they weren't as clever as they thought they are. Across Western Europe they got banned until they get a proper taxi license, in parts of Asia (eg Vietnam) they got kicked because they didn't believe in playing by the local rules, many cities and states in the US don't appreciate them bending the rules. They get what they deserve.

While the whole thing seems a snowflake having a melt-down, at least she stood up for her principles. It really doesn't matter how much or little those principles make sense. Good for her.

As for Github, they probably can survive losing a director of "improving up the gender quota".

I wish her all the best in her future. May she reap what she sowed.

The moment when those activist betray their morals the first time to make sure they have food on their table and can pay their car-loans is when the activist become adults. It's called growing up.

On the other hand, if they decide to forgo the salary to keep their moral values, that's also fine. Then they accepts the consequences of their actions. That's also a way to grow up.

Any way it's a healthy development like the sun melting snow-flakes in spring.

Assuming you're under 40, you've had way too many bosses or you've got the wrong attitude.

If you're part of the gig-economy, contractor, self-employed, the people you refer as bosses are in reality your customers. And you should threat them as such. You can't expect from customers any decency (even if you get it most of the time) and it's your job to make them pay for the privilege to behave like arses. The only true recognition in such a setting is cash. Forget about the pats on the back, the awards, the fancy titles. You're a disposable hireling.

On the other hand, if you're employed with the intention to be part of a company for longer time, there's no way you can have had 15 bosses if you're under 40, without either being a job-hopper or working in a very toxic environment. There's a good chance, you have a hard time behaving like an adult and not like a snowflake, which leads to insecurity, to feeling mobbed or depression. These feelings draws bullies like blood in the water draws sharks.

To sum it up on a more positive note: Make sure you have boundaries and enforce them. This keeps the bullies away and if your boundaries are chosen reasonably gives a better work / life balance.

Note: I've been in both situations for quite some time and I've encountered many bullies of various degrees. However, it never bothered me much. I dealt with them just like I deal with the weather and other circumstances I can't change .

I see here a clash of culture between the USA and Europe (where I am located). If you want to work odd flexible hours that's fine. However, having to work odd hours can be a severe strain on your personal life.

Here where I live, an employer can't really ask for it without enhanced payment. When the agreed upon hours (usually 38 to 42 per week, depending on the country) are done, the only correct thing for the employee is to log off. He has done his part and let the company deal with the remaining problems. That might sound a little harsh, but in the long run leads to a vastly improved work environment.

In my experience, there's a big gap between what you meant when you wrote an email and what is understood when the same email is read. This goes from simple cases that people just don't read the main past the first two lines up to you and the reader work with a different set of assumption about the problem.

Emails are very often also just to cover your arse or to make sure you have a club later to hit the reader over the head when she messes
up.

With telco's it's a lot easier to ascertain that you're talking about the same things and that you have a compatible understanding of the problem. Also it's a lot easier to raise concerns.

The last point is specially important when dealing with off-shore teams based in India or China, where they're often very reluctant to put anything in writing that could either show they have no clue or embarrass the writer. In a one-on-one telco call, it's a lot easier to address these things.

This is a big no-go. Never let them know you don't pay attention. Around here, you get a seriously bad reputation wit management if you're caught at this even once. It means, you can't be trusted to work without constant managerial supervision.

We have here two aspects:

One is people not having to commute, not working in a distracting environment etc is beneficial. But that's isn't tied to remote work. This can be solved just as easily in other ways. I've been working at a place 10 minutes by foot from my home, now I'm working with a commute of 15 minutes by motorbike. Now add a sane office planning (yes, that sound very far-fetched) and I have all the same benefits, no remote work.

And then we have the remote work aspect. I'm working with a team far abroad and it's a lot harder remotely. We're all a lot more productive I'm on site with them. To top this, the guys at the remote facility still have the commute and the distracting office.

To sum it up:

Remote work sucks and generally is a drain on productivity due to losses in communication.
Having a short commute and a sane work environment is really great and improves productivity.