You mean every 33 minutes.

All this has happened before, and all this will happen again.

Without knowing precisely how Explorer is structured, it's conceivable that there may be different dynamically-linked libraries and/or execution points for running the desktop and for the file explorer, in which case just having explorer.exe running in and of itself doesn't mean that new modules have to be loaded if explorer.exe process fires up. The solution could very well be to load the libraries involved in file browsing when the desktop opens.

Just guessing here. There was a time when there was a lot more horsepower required for GUI elements than folder browsing, but this is 2025, and explorer.exe probably uses orders of a magnitude more resources now than it did in 1995, because... well, who knows really. Probably to sell more ads and load up more data to their AI.

All the extraneous bullshit Microsoft added to the start menu is always lurking in memory for performance reasons.

That, on modern hardware, they have to preload a fucking file browser so that it pops up faster is just an indication of what a steaming pile of garbage MS is. They had sweet spots with Win2k-WinXP and with Win7, but their incoherent need to be a whole bunch of contradictory things --- with AI! has led what was a rather iffy OS and UI experience to begin with to become a cluster fuck of incoherence.

I do most of my day to day work on MacOS and Gnome, and fortunately the Terminal services version I have to RDP into is Server 2016, but every time I have to work with Windows 11 I'm just stunned by just how awful it looks and how badly it behaves.

Fear of facts is a sign of cowardice

School issued devices often don't permit installing arbitrary apps, only those on the approved list.

Most iPhone owners didn't buy them outright. They got them "free" with their plan. Consequently out in the real world I commonly see people with old iPhones with cracked screens. They can't afford to replace them, we don't have an Apple store anywhere near here, etc.

The tariff revenues are needed to cover the tax cuts for the wealthy instituted at the same time, so no.

"An employer can only pay the workers what their output is worth, so if your industry is producing things that are difficult to sell, then you're not going to get a good paying job"

You're blaming the victim. If the employer's plan doesn't include paying a reasonable wage then their plan is crap and they need to go out of business so that someone with a better plan can succeed them.

"The experience of Detroit should be a warning to those who believe that this economic law can be avoided; the car makers sold the same stuff year after year whilst Japanese and German producers made ever better stuff."

That's not because they couldn't do better. They chose not to and depended on regulatory capture instead, preventing others from bringing more superior products to the market. Again it's the employer's fault and no one else's.

In Google's case, they're under quite a lot of FTC scrutiny, operating under two consent decrees, and they have an employee population that isn't known for keeping their mouths shut. It's possible that Trump's FTC might not act if he were paid off, but a leak would definitely generate a lot of press.

Keep moderating down, fuckups! Does not change that you are fuckups.

Indeed. Dark times.

It isn't a thing in the US, unfortunately.

New buildings might have it integrated into their HVAC systems, and older construction might have it retrofitted, but the vast, vast majority of buildings in the US do not have CO2 monitoring. We have CO (monoxide) detectors, but that's an entirely different issue.

Another consideration is that for assessment of infectious disease risk, measurement of CO2 in indoor communal spaces needs to be distributed throughout, as opposed to having a single point of measurement that might only reflect the average air quality for HVAC control purposes. It's the same principle with temperature; multi-room dwellings such as offices will typically have thermostats distributed throughout the building to control each zone. When employees gather in a conference room and close the door, the CO2 level can skyrocket, easily hitting 1800 ppm without ventilation. I believe that CO2 concentrations should be as easy to access as temperature, and that the public could be educated about its meaning.

Regarding VOC versus CO2 monitoring, they both have their use cases, and which one is a more suitable to measure depends on what we are really wanting to know. VOC sensors will detect a wide array of compounds, but not all of them are indicative of human occupancy, whereas CO2 concentration is the direct product of respiratory activity (unless non-biological sources of CO2 are present, such as dry ice). So if we are interested in transmissibility of airborne diseases, I would pick CO2, since you could measure high VOC levels in the air of an unoccupied storage shed or basement that otherwise has virtually no risk of infectious disease. But if we wanted to measure if the air is clean and fresh--i.e., relatively free of pollutants, I pick VOC monitoring over CO2. Both are important because they are meaningful proxies for health risks, but they are proxies for different types of risk.

If they think it's safe, then they should be the first to demonstrate it first hand, using their own bodies.

The issue with PFAS is not necessarily direct product-to-human exposure. The whole problem with this class of molecules is that they are extremely long-lived in the environment, due to their chemical structure. Their persistence is what causes bioaccumulation in ecosystems and food chains. Sure, the farmers might wash off the residue before delivering them to the market, but where does the effluent go? And if the EPA further relaxes the reporting standards, what is the most economically efficient path these agribusinesses will take with respect to these waste products?

So consider the industrial-scale usage of persistent pesticides without adequate reporting and oversight. It'll kill off insect populations (because that's exactly what they are designed to do), which then disrupts the ecosystem. Animals that feed off of these insects will accumulate these chemicals. Fish and amphibians will accumulate them because they're swimming in the polluted water. The whole food web gets tainted.

There is no escaping the conclusion that this decision is based in corruption and absolutely will pollute the environment and kill/injure people.

They are called "religion", "propaganda", "fairy tales", etc.. and they are always used to control people. The only thing that is different now is that we can automatize it. The ones that were not impressed before will continue to be not impressed.

But with about 85% of the human race being religious, there is a rich target field for manipulation. Incidentally, this corresponds nicely with about 15% of the human race being able to fact-check.