"WINE actually works" ... in a very obscure bakazz sort of way only a nekbeard could love. I've used in on-and-off for 20 years and still can make no sense of it. I'm trying to get an old copy of TOPSPICE into an Ubuntu-24.04 system, and nothing is natural or obvious. Naturally , obnoxious WINE is NOT meant to be applied  by the casual-computer user, but by a very "nitch" set of Linux pros who are trapped using  some M$-based software program.  Sadly, WINE like the rest of the Linux eco-system has really not improved ease-of-use since RedHat-6. Get 1/2 f*ing-A step off the beaten path and casual lusr is screwed.

Recently  "... dragged kicking ad screaming ..." euns a bit over-the-top. Do you not think that a ROMAN Centurian carefully watched the design/manufacture/assembly of his centuries ballista "machine" ? Or that  makers of  failing ballista escaped the flog ?  I also understand that maedevil GUILDS were picky about apprentice training not just to limit supply, but because a just G*d was watching them construct the cathedral. Professional certification of engineers  is pretty-much a 19-th Century  anomoly, and was NEVER opposed by practicing engineers until wonkish nekbeards snatched power over computers from the military.

Slow progress indeed.  ICE agents need ice-rifles that shoot streams of liquid nitrogen at narco-MEX border jumpers and their SJW pimps. Frozen on-the-spot , they can then be fork-lifted into fast-frost railway cars for deportation. Cools-off the border regions as a no-cost benefit.

Tell it like it is, bro. The uniformly collectivist crap that issues from NPR stations drove me off the few literate moments. The thoughtful listener is hoping for something like Dave Garaways' Omnibus ; very sad.

I believe current theory says the "strength" of the measurement determines completeness of the wave-function collapse.  Electron hitting a BRICK-WALL is a "strong" measurement. One wimpy X-ray passing thru the virtual-change cloud ?? So collapse is not an all-or-nothing thing.  Always seemed weird that when a particle passes thru a sit  ( in a double slit experiment ) the temporary local fields within surrounding  material couldn't be measured without  wave-function collapse.

Me too. I had a Pixel 5 for years. The battery swelled and damaged the screen. So, because there wasn't another phone (with a LineageOS port) available in the size I wanted, I bought another, refurb Pixel 5.

Two weeks ago, the battery started swelling again, so I just broke down and bought a Pixel 9. Awesome phone, aaaand I kinda hate it. Too big. Too heavy. Way too damned slippery (I hate putting cases on my phones).

What I really want is something the size of the old OnePlus X. That was a great phone (crappy camera notwithstanding). An updated model of the OPX, with a mediocre camera (to keep from having a bump) would be great, and I'd pay a premium price for it.

In a lot of apartment complexes, the physical proximity of tenants make sharing internet trivially easy. Just ask a neighboring unit (or one directly above / below) if they want to split internet costs with you, and you split the bill. Or if you're really smart, have two neighbors "split" the bill with you 50/50 each and they are paying for the internet.

If everyone's internet cost is already included in their rent then obviously this isn't an option. Or folks who just use the internet on their phone over cellular and don't even need WiFi at all.

You say '... block any imported EVs ...' as if that  tariff action were a bad thing. I'd favor the  retro/contra-tilt: block ALL "industrial" manufactured  imports except medical equipment.  OTOH allow  importied "craft" products like German/Russian sausage , Irish whisky and Italian womens shoes.  Individuals and "guilds" and sweatshops may compete world-wide. A producer/designer  society values much higher than  consumer/investor cultures. Let globalist sociopaths and mercantile pederasts immigrant to China ha...hahaha and watch them howl when Maos' doppelganger rises again. .

Cooks' folly is old, not new. Traitorous behavior for financial gain has little to do with modern culture. See  classical Greek Pausinais bend-over for his Persian masters ... after he had screwed both Athens & Sparta. Like Cook, he was a technically competent wanker.

Indonesia is a Muslim country with approx the same population of USA, but sharia-law & a yearly theater  box-office less than 10% of ours. Indonesia really does-not-count as a media mover, so their use of movie.ai fades into noise. When a country ( like China ) with a proven record of world-class films begins slurping *.ai into their art  then movie-goers  can start to worry. BTW// I do not consider integrated CGI-crafted catastrophes as "ai".

Yep. China is employing economic screws to promote state power ... as has every city/state/nation since Gobekli-Tepi.  It's all good ... and USA should return the favor by rejecting ALL/ANY Chinese manufactured products or raw materials.  Shut-down trading that has never been in USA interests, apart from a few sociopathic globalists. If required the USA can go to a temporary  war-time footing and generate everything it needs right here or from "affiliated" partners. USA workers would see huge employment gains and SA/Canada would finally get the USA attention they deserve.  Some unproductive USA economic sectors --- like software --- would suffer: no problemo. To repeat ... China screws us we screw them ...  all's fair.

Not just scientists and engineers find AI technically useful. I am in a no-support / "troubled" WiFi environment with my Linux systems. I have used DDG.ai troubleshooting my  randomly(?)  on-again/off-again internet connection. Without DDG.ai I simply could not fumble-thru enough setting changes to maintain my connection. It's like having a tireless Linux-savvy  pal sitting at my side. 

It's a fair guess ( the Kennedys thought so ) that excluding medicine, basic science has played-out until the next  Archimedes/DaVinci/Newton/Einstein/  comes along.  You know, once every couple centuries. Surely "string theory" failure has taught us something. A  century or two of  plodding experimental/engineering development seems the most robust and productive course of scientific action.  Meanwhile, methods like *.ai and Quantum computing can find their own  value-producing niche venues ... and humans can return to  more face-2-face cultures.

Likely 4Chan can simply ignore neo-Stalinist  British laws/regulation; surely ignore the fine.  Does 4Chan have a "hardware/brick" presence on English property? If not Brit leverage is zero. 'Course the  Brits may install their own "Great Firewall", but that will only provoke world-wide hackers to tunnel thru it as happens with the Chinese version.

Fact:  Chi.com electronics ALL/repeat/ALL include  firmware snooping devices that report activity back  to the CCP "mothership".  Importing such devices to America represents a direct  political/military  security risk. Of-course personal privacy is also suborned by these  Chi.com devices -- and  after corruption fed-back as mis-information --  but American companies have yet to be forbidden such data "kidnapping".  Best let the chi.comz eat their own production while American labor and capitol looks after internal consumption:  tools, raw materials, medical equipment and womens shoes excluded naturally.