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Comment Re:Millionaires are leaving the UK in droves (Score 1) 79

You don't think policies like VAT on private school fees and pushing up business taxes instead of personal ones play well with the typical Labour voter?

They're cratering in the polls anyway for a host of other reasons, and I suspect Starmer is already toast anyway for a host of other reasons (though it's significantly harder in practice for Labour to replace a leader they're not happy with than it is for the Tories), but I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest that some of these policies are being chosen because of their political alignment.

Comment Re:Millionaires are leaving the UK in droves (Score 0) 79

They appear to be playing heavily on the politics of envy. Look at some of their education policies, for example, or the way they treat small businesses and the people who run them. They don't seem to want to pull up the less fortunate if they can be busy pulling down the more fortunate. It's not a good look if you actually want a successful economy, but it plays well to their base.

I agree with you that they seem to be all over the place in policy generally, and after trying to give them a fair chance in the early months, I now have a fairly low opinion of them (with the odd exception in Cabinet who does actually appear to be at least recognising the real problems and trying to do something about them, which I can respect even while thinking little of their party politicians and government as a whole).

You're right about the investment culture as well, but presumably if we're talking about entrepreneurs who have already been successful and are looking to move elsewhere, that's of limited relevance unless they're planning to start at least one more business after they arrive, so in this particular debate, I doubt that is such a major issue.

Comment Re:Millionaires are leaving the UK in droves (Score 1) 79

While we're hardly Russia, our democratic and stabilisation credentials are looking more shaky than ever as well. Our electoral system produces results very far from proportional. One of our two traditional main political parties is now essentially irrelevant. The other, which currently holds power, is breaking all the wrong records and is widely expected to suffer severe losses at the next election already, barely a year into their term. Waiting in the wings (and currently leading by a very wide margin in the polls) is the nascent far right populist party that has become the default protest vote. It looks scarily like that party might actually be pulling so far ahead (whether thanks to their own merits or, like the present incumbents before the last election, because the government of the day is so unpopular) that even with the usual reversion towards traditional voting patterns when a real election happens, they might still win. And the prospects of what happens next in that timeline are truly terrifying, particularly for anyone who isn't a white British citizen from birth.

Comment Re:Millionaires are leaving the UK in droves (Score -1, Troll) 79

As a Brit, I was surprised to see the UK as a destination of choice.

The current Labour government here often seems to be criticised for being ideological and not pragmatic. In particular, they seem to prefer policies that tax "the rich" and businesses in one way or another, yet not large, relatively wealthy groups like pensioners or the homeowners who have lucked out and now live in a million-plus property that most younger people will never be able to afford.

There's also quite a lot of red tape for businesses here, maybe not compared to some of our neighbours in Europe, but certainly compared to places like the US and probably parts of Asia too.

Obviously some of this is politics and maybe the policies are not so surprising coming from a party that in theory represents the working class. However, it is surprising that entrepreneurs would be attracted to a culture like this at a time when we expect to have this government for another four years still.

Comment Re:I don't understand why this is so difficult (Score 1) 48

Why not make a simple API to that digital ID that would be a simple yes/no to any app or web page's query (permission permitting) to whether or not the user is over X age?

Your suggestion is defeated by parents' habit of handing a phone to a child as a digital babysitter. It's how we lost comment sections on animated videos on YouTube in December 2019.

Comment Re:iTunes doesn't sync under Linux (Score 1) 215

Until 2009, no other device could play iTunes Store purchases, and there weren't a lot of other legal downloadable music stores. This was one factor for the iPod to iPhone progression. Another was that Google required cellular telephony support in all certified Android devices prior to sometime in the 2.3 "Gingerbread" cycle, which made it impossible to make a direct counterpart to the iPod touch.

Comment Re:iTunes doesn't sync under Linux (Score 1) 215

If you're using apple music you can play it directly from the phone itself, you don't need itunes at all.

You can play Apple Music from the Music app on the phone. Unless I missed something, you can't play it from other apps on the phone. And the Music app can't play files written by libimobiledevice, only the music library. You need iTunes to send music to the phone in a form that the Music app can play.

Comment iTunes doesn't sync under Linux (Score 3, Interesting) 215

My roommate tried that patch with my help, and iTunes stopped being able to sync purchased music to her iPhone.

I researched online and found these limits:
- iTunes app for Windows uses a driver called Apple Mobile Device Service to sync to an iPhone, which (like other drivers) Wine cannot run
- libimobiledevice for Linux can sync files but cannot update the music library
- The Music app included with iOS can play only music from the music library and cannot import files
- VLC app can play music from files but cannot play rented music from her Apple Music family plan, making it impossible to mix the two in a playlist

Comment Re:Uh oh (Score 1) 128

a "transgender woman" [...] is a man with serious identity issues who needs psychological help

What is the safe and effective treatment for gender dysphoria?

I'm starting to think prevention of gender dysphoria has to occur on a social level. It would start with cracking down on parents and K-12 teachers who perpetuate gender stereotypes ("you're not allowed to do this because you're a boy") to children in their care.

(adoption doesn't count)

Given the right wing's crackdown on abortion on a fetal personhood theory, why shouldn't adoption be promoted?

Comment Re:Just demonstrates that valuations are nonsense (Score 2) 49

It's like there are at least two layers of funny money accounting going on here.

First, you have the strange way that people equate market cap with value. There's no guarantee that holding shares with a current market value of $X will eventually return $X or more in dividend payments plus maybe some eventual disposal of assets, and these are usually the only tangible values involved. A market cap based on ludicrously high P/E ratio will be high, but trading those shares is like trading Bitcoin: it starts to look more like a Ponzi scheme than a genuine value-based investment.

Second, even the market cap is mostly theoretical here, because any shares held can't be freely traded on an open market. The asset is almost completely illiquid other than occasional anomalies like the secondary sale we're talking about. The first IPO of an AI unicorn could be the pin that bursts the bubble.

It's the difference between being one of the AI unicorns that doesn't actually make any real profit yet and is largely funded based on hype and hope, and being a supplier like Nvidia that is actually being paid real money (funded by all the AI investment) and has a P/E ratio that is high but not off-the-charts stupid.

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