Social media has become a toxic dump. If you wouldn't allow children to play in waste effluent from a 1960s nuclear power plant, then you shouldn't allow them to play in the social media that's out there. Because, frankly, of the two, plutonium is safer.

I do, however, contend that this is a perfectly fixable problem. There is no reason why social media couldn't be safe. USENET was never this bad. Hell, Slashdot at its worst was never as bad as Facebook at its best. And Kuro5hin was miles better than X. Had a better name, too. The reason it's bad is that politicians get a lot of kickbacks from the companies and the advertisers, plus a lot of free exposure to millions. Politicians would do ANYTHING for publicity.

I would therefore contend that Australia is fixing the wrong problem. Brain-damaging material on Facebook doesn't magically become less brain-damaging because kids have to work harder to get brain damage. Nor are adults mystically immune. If you took the planet's IQ today and compared it to what it was in the early 1990s, I'm convinced the global average would have dropped 30 points. Australia is, however, at least acknowledging that a problem exists. They just haven't identified the right one. I'll give them participation points. The rest of the globe, not so much.

Thanks, but even looking at the full context and with that definition, I'm missing the joke. So why haven't the moderators rated it Funny already?

Gyre is a more official name for the Pacific Garbage patch, as there are presumably few kids in it

Not really IMO, moderation is broken by design at best

I have to disagree regarding the human cloning. However I think it is being hidden quite carefully because it is illegal.

Having said that, I think the most interesting clone candidate would actually be John Henry. I'm sure there are some gene samples available since he didn't die until 2007.

Pretty sure "gyre" is intended as a joke, but websearch failed me [just] now. Care to clarify the joke?

The "future shape" I was thinking of actually involved smartphone-enhanced clothing. Still don't understand why no one (that I know of) is making clothing with suitable adaptations for smartphones. Also shower proof pouches for people who worry about missing a message when they are in the shower...

I don't see a rash of bans, but I do see the same abusers of moderation given all the mod points they can use every day.

You can thank student loans for that. Earlier generations got their schooling subsidized, but now people have to get loans to pay for it themselves instead. Colleges therefore could raise tuition. Then a bipartisan effort in Congress was launched to make sure we couldn't discharge those loans through bankruptcy like you can gambling or other personal debts, which was led by Joseph R Biden. I think we know how that turned out, forgiveness for a few of the worst abused players, and blaming inability to keep his campaign promises related to partial forgiveness for all buyers blamed on Congress while he went around them to fund genocide in Gaza.

Perhaps they could establish a payment network for them or otherwise make them actually useful. File and pay your taxes for you.

no problem.

I'm actually responding to the AC above you. He is arguing that the attack wouldn't make any sense for either country to make, based on *national* interest. I'm pointing out that's not the only framework in which *regimes* make decisions.

The USPS is also pretty crap about it. They regularly just don't bother to add new addresses to their databases for months or sometimes even years. At work we're having to use an alternate address for a multi story residence with dozens of units because of this. It's really quite irritating. Their address validation system is also shit. They will tell you for example that an address has an invalid secondary (unit number type, e.g. suite/apartment/whatever) but then won't tell you what the correct one is even though they have to know in order to tell you that the one you used is invalid. And this is when you PAY for validation! I don't know how much of this is due to DeJoy but it's shit.

We don't need more military. In fact we need less.

The reason for the existence of the second amendment was to not need a standing militia. We DEFINITELY don't need both things.

Did they actually get it? I only saw it was proposed.

Will farmers actually get it? Farm subsidies are mostly claimed by large corporations.

They are understaffing on purpose not only despite the requirements, but because of their desire to not meet them.