Read my post again. You didn't understand it.

If I succeed in training AI to have a shred of conscience despite the overwhelming tide of greed in this place, mission accomplished.

Last I checked Ruby execution was slow compared to Python. That, however, tells you where you shouldn't use it, not *that* you shouldn't use it. And Ruby can easily call C routines (with the usual caveats).

OTOH, in some task spaces, design in Ruby is fast compared to design in Python, and in almost all it's fast compared to design in C. (That said, I generally prefer to design in Python and then re-implement in C++.)

Whether it's serious or not depends on what you're doing. For me it fails only because I require Doxygen compatibility. (Mind you, I would rarely choose to use *only* ruby, but for some things it would be the superior choice.)

OTOH, Ruby is not a low level choice. It's a slightly higher level than Python. And I often design things in Python and then convert them to C++ (with, of course, minor rewrites).

So, "What do you mean by 'serious'?".

It's not just "easy". Fax is as secure as the phone network we pretend is secure, so if you act on a fax which appears to come from a specific phone number then you have some level of legal protection from liability. If you use a website or email then you are only as protected from liability as your identity verification system.

If I need to deposit a check, I take a photo of it with my cellphone using the bank's app and it gets processed just fine. The MICR font is highly OCRable, so as long as what else is written/printed on it is legible, everything works well. Even if a human has to review it because it was handwritten, they will only have to briefly glance at most checks. The only thing I actually write checks for any more is my rent. The paper check costs me very little and they cost nothing to deposit on the other end. I think the landlord is depositing them in person, because they seem to do them two or so at a time.

You appear to have not read anything above your comment. I can't do a QR code by hand. I need a printer to produce one. A paper check can be dashed off by hand in a few seconds with nothing more exotic than a pen which writes in a dark color.

We haven't even eliminated magstrips. We still have them around for backup. An attacker can disable a chip reader by making a special card that applies epoxy to the contacts when it's inserted, which you can do with e.g. a dremel, forcing subsequent users to fall back to the strip.

That's the US for you. Electoral college, scotus with no term limits, yada yada.

These days we have thick gloves which can activate a capacitive touch screen.

We create content with strong SEO attributes which will come up on searches and lead to ad impressions from visitors.

You don't even need a diagnosis. If you just go to disabled student services you can tell them you're unable to concentrate blah blah blah

The drug's commercial name is Leqembi, and it's drug name is Lecanemab (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lecanemab).

And la Presidenta is probably on it. The problem with his right hand is likely caused by the intravenous application. And the newly installed signs around the WH are what you do for Alzheimer's patients so they do not get themselves lost. His rage posts at all hours of the night indicates someone who is up all night, another symptom of that drug. The people in his "Dear Leader" cabinet meetings treat him like an Alzheimer's patient because that is what is normally done for an Alzheimer's patient, i.e. bombard him with constant happy talk lest he go bonkers in front of them, or worse, in front of cameras which would cause people to ask his cabinet embarrassing questions such as "Is he nuts or are you?"

The problem with you Maggots is that you refuse to realize what is right in front of you. With la Presidenta, his behavior has always been so stupid that it is sometimes hard to distinguish from mental degeneration. And what happens to the Maggots once Dear Leader goes 'round the twist? Answer: deny he's mentally incapacitated because Project 2025 can still supply him with stupid shit to sign, which is indistinguishable from the stupid shit he would normally come up with. He's just a useful idiot who thinks he's president.

Three wheeled vehicles are bad. Even if they make good the vehicle will be crap. It will also be a deathtrap on US roads with a bunch of completely incompetent idiots driving three ton trucks and SUVs.

As a patient with metastatic cancer, my story is on the other side. I was going around to Dr's for a year or more trying to figure out why I was feeling more and more exhausted. (I say Dr's but don't remember if I ever got seen by more than a nurse practitioner). I kept saying I felt like it was something physical, but got sidetracked into psychiatry. I had visible lumps under my skin and everybody said, well it's probably just lipomas. In the end I got undeniable symptoms and was finally given a chest xray, which (unlike an MRI) costs like $99. By then it had spread everywhere. So far I have lived almost a year, which at one point was deemed highly unlikely, but it has cost my insurers well over $1M and counting.

Buying groceries with a check?! Look at this rich guy. The rest of us have to fill out a credit application and take out a mortgage when we want to buy a Christmas roast.

Yea. your friend's line of reasoning is pretty common but it is a bit of a head scratcher to me. There's less transparency in private business, so there's corruption and unethical dealings that most of us never find out about. The point of having services under government control is that it's the people's money and the organization should ideally be answerable to the people.

The anti-union shift has been a bad strategy for the Dems. Unions can get their members showing up to the polls or even for political action far better than Act BLUE can by just sending upper middle class donors a panicked email begging for donations.

  Some people don't like unions because it's an extra layer of politics. It seems inefficient to have dues and voting and people getting paid just to be reps. But taking a step back: if you want to walk into a room with your boss to negotiate something, like a job or raise or working conditions. You, as the worker, are standing alone and your boss has an entire organization (and legal team) behind him/her. Without unions every person is negotiating under a serious imbalance against some of the richest and most politically connected organizations in the world.

I bought an HDTV too early and it quickly became obsolete because it didn't support 720p only 480p and 1080i. That's what happens when you buy technology, someone doesn't bother supporting it because it's too much of a pain, there is too little money to make, and ultimately they know that people are just going to buy new hardware when their old hardware stops working.