What sites are you on?? I never get any geoblocking browsing from inside EU except from little news sites from broadcast TV in places like Oklohama that get linked to occasionally. Its so rare I can't even remember the last time I got geoblocked (normally the 451 http code)..... And I really appreciate the sites that allow me to block cookies. I get its 'work for you' but allowing the consumer to know 1) where their data is going to and 2) to block it WITHOUT logging in was one of the better moves of the EU on the internet. If you're not allowing me to block cookies or data uses on your website, and its geoblocked from EU, nothing of value has been lost.

People say "I was raised with TV and I'm fine!" but when kids in the 1950s->pre-netflix era watched TV you typically had a serial stream of crap to choose from, with cartoons on at certain socially-acceptable times of day (normally after school or saturday mornings only). Older demographic advertisements made more money so kids either watched that crap or, more likely, turned it off and did something else. "Good" video games that could keep your attention for hours (lets say mid-90s) started to change this equation but even still, it wasn't ubiquitous and many kids didn't like the games that offerred this level of immersion.
 
My kids have a thousand, *good* cartoons to choose from, just on Netflix, not to mention *every disney movie ever made*, 35 seasons of the Simpsons, and the thousands of other good programs on Disney, not even talking about the free shit you find on a typical smart TV (and I'm not even adding in the Youtube app on the TV which is a whole other thing).
 
4K HDR Dolby Sound Screen Time now is addictive in ways it NEVER was in the past, so yes, we do have a harder time as parents in the 2020s managing screen time than parents did 20 or 30 or more years ago. "My friend has a phone and can play as much as they want" arguments don't help either. Digital Interactivity has reached Drug Addiction levels and its hard to be able to know when to draw the line.

There are zigbee thermostats (at least for radiators) that do not require a cloud connection. The trade off to not having a cloud connection and hence a centralized app is user-supplied technical skill, which is lacking in 99% of the population, thus why cloud connected devices are popular.

I also run home assistant. There's a few problems with what you want to do -

1) The easiest devices to integrate are *already* in the cloud, and you add some credentials to let HA automate the API
2) Using local automation protocols like Zigbee or Z-wave
3) Hackery via various serial protocols or MODBUS or something to get it to work as you expect.

The average internet user has ZERO experience with almost any of this which is why alexa/google home are so popular. It Just Works, except when it doesn't, and you can ask alexa or gemini for assistance.

Limiting the number of cloud connections isn't magically going to cause deshittification. The problem is capitalism and chasing ever increasing profits. I feel like this is a drum I keep beating recently but its really the root of the problem - companies need (via capitalistic growth desires) to figure out ways to attract new customers and extract more capital from existing customers, so they add features, change features, and end up enshittifying their product.

In order to get away from this, we have to stop chasing absolute growth for the sake of it, but its absolutely ingrained not just in business, and government, but in our very culture. Maybe its even a part of being human, I don't know, but growth for growth's sake is what is killing the internet and the planet in general.

I thought it was the new user block that did that, there was still a ton of spam with the delay because it took less time to sign up for a new account than it did to wait for the limit.....

Maybe you're trying to be funny but its most definitely not close or 'the suburbs' for Beijing, any more than 800 miles is 'the suburbs' in the USA (unless you consider Jacksonville Florida a suburb of NYC)... Its easily 10+ hours or more by train to this 'Eiffel Tower', especially for a tourist with limited time, its absolutely wrong and not even close.

I think you don't understand what either of those words mean, or you are just trolling.... Beyond being just plain wrong, Cory Doctorow also gives away most of his books for free with a CC license. Whether you like him or not, he is neither a grifter nor exploiter of human beings, and indeed seems to try hard to be the opposite of those words.

1250 km away is not ridiculously wrong to you? You're saying "well, it said the eiffel tower was in Rome, which is not as ridiculous as it sounds, there's an eiffel tower in Paris 1250km away." It would probably get this absolutely right 100% of the time if there was only one Eiffel Tower, but since there's a dozen replicas or more, its much easier to hallucinate.
 
Even if it was only 500km away its still wrong and deserves ridicule, specifically for a *travel focused* chatterbot that is supposed to help you plan a trip.

If we can't make a capable quantum computer, then how do we know its protected?

Ah, is that what those Romans were trying to use? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPQR builds post-quantum bridges and triumphal arches!!
 
Seriously though, as a signal user, I'm happy they are thinking about increasing encryption safety but how can anyone take any 'post quantum' marketing seriously when we're still in pre-quantum, and a quantum computer hasn't even been able to break weak encryption? Will real quantum computing power actually be stronger than 'post quantum' cryptography? Or maybe we'll find out current EC based crypto is stronger than we thought. Who knows!

There's *plenty* of remote work out there. It might just not be with Meta, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon or Alphabet. Which are the ones paying newbies six figures+.

WTF? Nice pivot to politics where non existed.
 
Bill Gates specifically, along with Meta and Google, have poured billions of dollars into US Education (and other countries too), giving the 'next generation of CS majors' a head start. I always thought this was to increase competition and thus reduce wages. Coal miners and oil field workers tend to have other skills that can make them a bit of money.
 
The CEOs of the companies funding this are all Trump bootlickers, so I'm not sure how that's a 'leftist' thing, especially since its not really political to not want the coal fume poison in our air, its a regional issue with the very few coal miners left in the USA.... And oil seems to be doing better than ever.

Its not convenient to carry around ANY sort of storage if you're into immediate gratification of looking at videos or pictures with your friends, which is what this is targeted for. "Remember that time we did X? Wait, let me find my keys, put in the storage, open the program etc". This is targeted at young people, not old patient tech nerds.
 
Anyone in that category who wants long term storage has many options there, and, just guessing, isn't using snapchat....
 
Just to re-emphasize, the cloud is about immediate gratification (keyword: IMMEDIATE not 1+ minutes from now). No one who uses snapchat enough to need these storage plans has enough patience to do what you suggest.

Yeah I was not very clear - I was commenting on the 'maximum' tier, which is 5TB for $16/month. 5GB isn't too hard to fill up if you're a video taker.

Its a kid thing, by the time you're out of college you don't use it. The growth has slowed and if you're not growing revenues, you're dead, even if you're steady at billions of dollars a year.
 
My take on this is they are hoping to get money from the adults who have used it for years and don't want to lose whatever crap they had that reminds them of the good ol' days. Good luck with that. 5TB on snapchat???? You'd have to record hours of video every day for years at those compression rates to fill that up. This is how you drive people off your platform.