The scale of the power draw is also a problem. When I worked in a manufacturing plant, they had standby batteries for power that would power the plant for 15 minutes or so. They had diesel backup generators that were supposed to kick in within a minute that could last days before refueling. These datacenters need their power plant to be built just as backups which would never happen.

I suspect it's a straightforward incentives problem. If you can get away with making it the grid's problem there's not much incentive to pay for more expensive facility power setups. Presumably this is why ERCOT is testing current and prospective customers and making noise about it; and why there are at least some standards for how ill-behaved a load can be while still being allowed to hook up; with some awkward interactions between very large sites that also have the ability to shut down rapidly at relatively low cost. If you are 'mining' crypto you presumably prefer the gear to be online because it is depreciating by the minute regardless; but the risk and inconvenience of shutting it down and booting it up again isn't particularly dramatic compared to having to cold start an aluminum smelter or something.

I'm sure that there are worse options, probably being actively considered since this is no longer getting them what they want; but an opaque 'public/private partnership' slush fund that spends its time slathering a thin layer of dubious military justification on random projects seems like a very, very, dodgy way of doing things.

YOU use something does not mean everyone else has your wants, needs, resources, etc. Some uses for that shitty 3.5mm jack exist because upgrading that existing equipment is expensive. For example, airplanes. For people like me, I have lots of equipment have those jacks. Some have alternate means of outputting sound but USB headphones don't work on legacy equipment without an adapter or other equipment. And there are people who simply don't care about the best sound or DAC.

Hey it will be here in time for my flying car. Just you wait.

If it's like every spam caller I have had, they claim to be one of my cousins. . . which don't exist. Or a "friend" with the same first name that refuses to give out their last name or how we know each other. For example, I got two different calls from my friend "Susan" for two different things. When I texted Susan, she was like, "WTF is going on?"

They are lies and you know it, Tony.

BAHAHAHAHAHAAH. Good one, Tony. Tony: "Texas has no snowplows." TxDOT: "We have many snowplows." You: "That's poor media literacy." Why must you lie so much Tony?

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Tony: "Texas in snowplows don't exist." Media: "Here's news footage on snowplows in Texas removing snow." You:" That was all careful editing to fool you." I think you misunderstand what a "fact" is.

NO ONE said snowplows pave 100% of roads. No one. Not even up north where they have snow all winter are 100% of roads plowed. What Tony constantly lies about was that snowplows do in fact exist in Texas, and that they are used in snow storms for SOME roads. More specifically roads like highways and main thoroughfares. His point again is that they don't exist which again is a LIE.

Tony: There are no snowplows. TxDOT: There are 700. You: 700==0 because . . . No True Scotsman. Tony was caught in an easily debunked lie but he continues to excuse it with whatever means necessary.

Do you not understand what the word, "road" means? Tony would like you to believe that no snow plows exist in Texas and thus are never used ON THE ROADS. We have footage of them being used. Every snow storm. Ambiguous. Please. Tony is trying to excuse his lies. That's all.

Depends. Audiophiles using the best headphones want the best of everything including the best DACs. But ordinary consumers use headphones with 3.5mm audio jacks that have been around forever. For example, when I have a Zoom/Slack/Teams meeting, I use 3.5mm wired headphones not to disturb the people around me and for some privacy. To me the best DAC is rather useless in that scenario. If I am watching movies and TV episodes on my laptop like on a plane, I use headphones because I am not a sociopath. Some content don't require the best sound. (Like reruns of The Office)

And you missed the point. A budget laptop is geared towards budget consumers not professionals. While professionals can use it, the laptop is not designed for them. Thus it might want to have a headphone jack.

I'll just tell all the consumer electronic equipment manufacturers they need to come to my house and change out their ports on the equipment I already own. Also when I am on a plane the next time, they should phased out audio jacks long ago. I have that kind of power. . . . no I don't. Do you have that kind of power as you are the one who is demanding I change out my equipment? And everyone else's equipment because you want to use $20 headphones.

The grid was part of the problem. Texas' grid is largely disconnected from the rest of the country. So when there are failures, they can cascade quickly. The issue was not an area of Texas lost power. The issue was MOST of Texas lost power.

Shhhh. If you talk too loudly about Texas, Tony Isaac will start posting here about how wrong you are about Texas. See Tony Isaac is a Texan and lives specifically near Houston. Based on that, he can boldly claim things for all of Texas. For example did you know that " We don't have snow plows either, nor should we invest in them. We just shut down when it snows, and that's OK." When pointed out that parts of Texas like the panhandle gets annual snow and thus have snow plows, he was not wrong. Nothing gets in the way of narrative.

See major cities like Dallas do not actually use snow plows according to Tony. "No, Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio do NOT clear the vast majority of their streets with snow plows. The vast majority of them are just allowed to thaw on their own, or at most, saline solution is dispersed." So every time the local Dallas TV news shows Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) snow plows on the road, they do not exist according to Tony.

When pointed to actual articles from TxDOT using 30 snow plows in North Texas storm, Tony says the population of Dallas is large so those snow plows don't count. Also the 700 snow plows that TxDOT has across the state don't count because Texas has a large population. So No "True" Snow Plows exist.

Define "rolling". If you mean up to a week in some places, most people do not call that "rolling".

Obviously the switch from "loss leader on a scale the capital markets can barely absorb" to "losing money" is going to sting; but I'm curious if we'll see sneakier knock-on effects.

So long as they were losing money hand over fist the vendor does want to throw enough tokens at you to make you feel like you are having a good time; but as few as are required to do that since they lose money on every one. If they were breaking even or turning a profit the incentive would be to sneak as much spend and upsell in as possible; and it's well known that the verbosity/cost of LLM chatter is hard to predict; harder if there are multiple models and other complications being switched around in the background.

What sort of exciting little tricks will we see from vendors who actually make more if you use more?

I would think that buying headphones that can only be used in a specific and newer ports would not appeal to the average consumer, the type of customer a $699 laptop is intended. The 3.5mm jack has been around forever. Also people have headphones they already own that use these jacks. It is not about technical capabilities; it is about friction in use.