but I'm not touching the ad-serving vehicle that is Chrome and its derivatives with a ten foot pole. And, let's face it, this is the only reason for anti-firefox propaganda these days - they really need to whittle it down before forcing manifest v3 through, or users will mass-switch.

Since a polite way of putting it isn't cutting it, let's try again. What the "x maintainer" in questiponn posted on the linux kernel mailing list doesn't matter because nobody reasonable gives two shits, more so in a completely different project. So, you coming with it like it's a revelation is at best ridiculous.

I've never liked the distribution - I've used SuSE, Slackware, Mint and finally Debian... but there's a difference between "I'm not a fan" and "this unapologetically sucks". The internet is full of people having issues with Wayland.

...so? In what way did that impact his X.org work? Like, when I go to a restaurant I care that the cook knows how to cook, not who he voted for.

Yeah, but living expenses are fixed costs, so even percentages are tricky. A flat 50% tax on someone hypothetically earning 15000 a month is survivable, on someone who is earning 1500 it isn't.

I don't fly, and the last concert I've been to was before Corona hit, so, no. As for the internet, most of the stores that I've bought stuff from require no login and my browser is relatively well warded so I'm more certain than not that no discriminatory pricing is being offered.

You're mostly right, with one exception - there's no way there could be anything fair about the practice, since it exploits both an information asymmetry (store collecting data about you) and a negotiation asymmetry (store changes offer but you can adhere or get out, there's no counter-proposal from you) to royally screw you over. All this is is rentseeking on crack.

There's multiple differences here - one is that progressive taxation is based on the idea that if you're rich, you're using the commons and the services society provides to a greater extent, thus you should contribute more. On the other hand, there's nothing such that Wal-mart or Kroger is providing for you, they're simply taking a bet that you'll not walk away in disgust at seeing the price they toss at you.
Furthermore, you're overly optimistic in that financial dispositions are the only factor entering this - you could pull off tricks like noticing a customer really seems to like one brand of say, mayo and start cranking up the price, or even more atrociously, identify things which look like a necessity and amp up their price... or ,for instance, amp up the prices for people with full baskets because they're less likely to leave if they've already picked up a ton of wares.
The whole practice smells sky-high of bullshit, and I'm certainly not going to visit any store that has electronic price tags.

Well... if you want to wait for the ideal champion with a flaming sword and white shining armour, be my guest. For the rest of us, Alexandra Elbakyan is enough.

The eight years of shelling of Doneck and Luhansk was sure peaceful.

We're in a story about an unelected group with long history of malfeasance towards poorer countries talks about setting up the exchange protocol for CBDCs, thus both proving CBDCs are in the putting and revealing plans of making the system even more intractable and inter-linked. There's absolutely nothing to worry about here, much like for the countries that took on "cheap" loans from IMF in the 60s, then turned into impoverished colonies when the interest rates sharply rose.

Combining every disadvantage of state fiat currency with every disadvantage of crypto.

Stuff 'em where the sun don't shine.

...Are you for real?

I'm not even going to address the more discutable claims - the fact that you assert that inflation means more money (what in fact means is everyone's savings going to hell, all the while the rich get richer because their wealth is held in assets) and your interesting assertion that there's less poverty at a time when real wages have fallen almost everywhere, public services are continuously being outright dismantled or simply set up for failure and the main conclusion governments have taken from the entire COVID fiasco is that social consensus doesn't matter and if you force an issue long enough, the public will comply (being put to the test, see, say, the protests in France and Netherlands) means that you apparently live n an alternate reality that has, in fact, been doing wonderfully

Say hi to Doc and Marty McFly for me!

I absolutely would? Because it of course included people whose job it was to help sort the stuff out and who were usually competent, as opposed to nowadays, where half the time when you reach out to a company to get an order (place I work for requires a written offer and a pro-forma bill to pay, to put it very short) half the time you get someone utterly baffled and suggesting "just order through our website?"

And other BS like people expecting you to be within reach 24/7, both private and public, and, what I think even dumber, phones not auto-dumping a call because the line is blocked but allowing to ring anyways? Because yeah, you should just excuse yourself from the call you're making now to go deal with some moron calling you *now*.

I have a half-dumb button phone and I wouldn't touch modern touchscreen bricks with a pole... at least east germany et al. had the decency of bugging your conversations at the state's expense, rather than expecting you to pay for your own.

Considering that, clearly, this kind of "abuse" wasn't actually reported by the individuals in question (since that would need no AI), one has to wonder what's the point of prosecuting a few hundred people for the equivalent of running their mouth at a pub

Of course, this only goes to show the main use of AI, which I've been mentioning ever since the articles about "Google AI can understand humour" were popping up a year and something ago, which is that at the end, this will be used to suppress political dissent more than anything, as AI is a state security cop that doesn't sleep and doesn't get bored.

Let's make a wild guess, Germany or UK are going to use AI to find people with adverse political opinions next, if they haven't already.