They are an utterly stupid idea... why? We already have lots of machines that would be dangerous if things go wrong. What about this machine is so different that we can't improve it to be relatively safe and reliable? If we really needed a means to 'warn' automated cars we possibly could. But in your example, you shouldn't need to 'warn' the car to avoid hitting the dog. It should ideally have that capability to detect and avoid it without human intervention. Which is sort of the whole point.

I really wonder why games specifically were getting a discount in the first place?

The effect is to hook them in when it's affordable then bait-and-switch FTW!

McGarbage

Is it reasonable for a (chain of-) provider(s) to suddenly increase licensing costs? Surely the work has been done already.

I'm not sure "we've suddenly become much greedier" or "we think you can be coerced into paying more now your business depends on our fixed-effort-ongoing-cost product" are customer problems.

The licensing cost used to attract a customer should get locked-in until something fundamental changes.

>shadowy figures behind the scenes that are pulling the puppet strings, but nobody can actually identify

Lol, they HAVE been identified, repeatedly.

Just look at the legislation in the past 60 years. Just look at the campaign contributions, and the revolving door of politics and industry/lobbyists.

Some people just pull the wool over their own eyes.

I'd be interested to see if writers could put their energies into imagining the best possible futures, would governments implement the changes needed to converge on these.

I envisage a world without the music industry.

I'm going to generalise and say that any concentration of control is automatically bad - humanity excels at finding creative solutions because of individual differences. Once differences are legislated away, something is lost - just look at the effect of government.

There's no need for the music industry - recording, distribution, promotion are all within the reach of individuals as are voice coaches, tour organisation, etc

Now they're no longer needed they've metastised into an entirely self-serving bull-in-a-china shop - using their financial resources to dominate traditional airplay, influence politics, and generally act as a malign influence on humanity.

Music Industry: Do the world a favour - shift your focus to an area where it's needed.

How about the judge shuts down the record labels?

How much longer are they going to monetise and police a form of expression as old as humanity as if they invented it?

How much longer are they going to prey on young women to ensure overt sexuality is a prerequisite for a chance of a music career?

Insert your gripe below...

For some reason I can hear the theme song from Star Trek Enterprise whilst reading this.

Are existing records of political donations accompanied by exhaustive details of which legislation has been paid for?

I think that writers of dystopian novels should take the hint that governments are tone-deaf when it comes to warnings of how bad things could get - instead seeing every prediction of bad things as an implementation manual.

Let's not forget The EU's support for genocidal nutbags - this could be a new growth area given that people are awakening and are less ready to believe government propaganda or outright lies.

Apple should do it but only if the Indian government agrees to allow Apple to introduce arbitrary (*) legislation into the Indian political system that contains potentially-secret clauses.

After all, politics and smartphone operating systems are general skills

(*) from India's perspective - at least legislation which Apple thinks it's best but may not overlap - at all - with India's plans for the country.

First Street very likely doesn't have some magic model that can predict the future better than anyone else.

When you get a mortgage you have to pay for a flood survey. Even my house 700' above the village where the bank is.

Your flood risk is absolutely predicted by the flood history of your location. The bank writing the mortgage has the skin in the game which is why they make the buyer pay for the flood survey.

It sounds like First Street might be liable for damages based on pseudoscience if these Realtors bring a case. It would be interesting to see them present solid evidence that they prospectively beat the existing flood models and survive a cross-examination.

If they've published a peer-reviewed paper then I missed it.

Hostile design is often a sign of libido dominandi, not just laziness.

SmartTube has probably hundreds of settings you can tweak to improve usability and accessibility. The developer clearly has a user-first philosophy.