Ironically the only streaming service I know of that doesn't interrupt with ads is.... Netflix.

Yes, I believe there are several others that if you pay enough (generally a LOT more) you can avoid them.

I'm not defending the system, because I too think it's broken... But please let me know a society where the rich don't get more of what they want?

And before you reply with something like "but in my country they can't buy their way out of a parking ticket" note that I'm not defining "rich" either. Generally assertions of virtue in this context merely means the price is higher and/or indirect, ie hiring better lawyers, funding the right politician in the next election, or donating to the right thing.

Two sides of the SAME card!

I am a Home Assistant user for at least 8 years.

Initially, it was for automating a few things, including existing door/window sensors from a legacy alarm manufacturer. Using RTL-SDR and rtl_433 I was able to intercept the messages, have them decoded, and into Home Assistant over MQTT.

Then it started to be essential for things like: if you leave a door or window open for more than x minutes, it will complain, unless you turn off that automation temporarily.

Now it does many things: Outdoor temperature, humidity, wind speed, wind direction, and rainfall. Indoor temperature, humidity, Volatile Organic Compounds, CO2, Radon.

It also emails me a weather forecast in the morning and evening. The contents are aggregated from the weather station, and two different sources for the forecasts (Environment Canada, and Met.no [Norway's weather service which covers the globe]).

It also runs my humidifier in winter, factoring in the values for indoor humidity as well as outdoor temperature (to reduce condensation on the windows).

And it interfaces to my Ecobee thermostat, via HomeKit, so it is cloud-free (not depending on an internet connection at all).

Overall, it is a nifty project. Very useful, very customizable.
My only gripe is that they discontinued support for running from a Python venv. I had to move to a Docker container instead. That made certain things that I have been using for years not work anymore (e.g. voice alerts, sending emails from shell scripts). I created workarounds for those, and they work well.

We all know real programmers use butterflies.

Jesus Christ man, does anything in your day not somehow involve thinking about Trump?

Checks are a last vestige of a higher trust society.

I work for a European firm and they (their auditors) despise checks and can't comprehend how America can be so backward as to still use them.

Ironically we just had a customer involved in seven-digit fraud payments ...which couldn't have happened without electronic payments. Had they been "allowed" to pay us in checks like they used to, it simply couldn't have happened.

I'm not sure listing another random rule that allows the German state to arrest people is a "win".

In a way this is good news.
Seriously.

If Russia expected to win this conflict, it's unlikely even they are dumb enough to cause major nuclear leaks in territory they expect to hold.

It's possible this is a clue that they DON'T expect to do so, and we've advanced to the "well if I can't have it nobody can" scorched earth stage, which is very Russian.

Trump says thanks for letting him live free in there.

Didn't all of these problems come up with Google Glass over ten years ago? In fact the term "Google Glasshole" was coined for people using Google Glass to record people who didn't want to be recorded. While it is legal to film in public, they did not seem to understand why people did not like it. This user seems to fit that mold.

No but they were experimenting with germanium. My understanding is that researched stopped because while they could get better results with germanium, the problem was how to use it germanium practically as it is 1.6ppm in the Earth's crust while silicon is 282,000 ppm.

That's like the situation where one of my neighbor's dogs pooped on my lawn. Which neighbor was it? Was it the one that I see conscientiously pick up their dog's poop every time on their walks. Or the neighbor that lets their dog roam around the neighborhood with no leash? Your argument would be the conscientious one did it to frame the other neighbor. Because . . .sympathy and support? I do not believe Europe needs any more justification for sympathy and support for Ukraine.

Consider Russia indiscriminately attacks civilian targets, I would bet Russia hitting it by accident or on purpose. It is hard to know at this point.

No what that means is higher production costs do not necessarily map 1:1 to higher price in the end product in every instance. Sometimes the cost is eaten by the manufacturer in terms of profit. Sometimes the manufacturer can change the product to offset the increased cost. For example, cheaper materials, cheaper labor, etc. Now I am not saying they are good changes but that would be one way higher production cost is not passed onto the consumer directly in terms of price.

While the article focuses specifically on memory prices, the AI boom could also cause PC CPU and GPU prices to go up which affects everyone. Currently fabrication at TSMC and Samsung are limited with companies like NVidia and AMD booking orders years in advance. To chase profits, NVidia and AMD will shift more of their orders to AI chips if they haven't already done so. That means fewer consumer CPUs and GPUs and thus higher prices for consumers as there may be shortages.