There are plenty of alternatives these days. From the completely DIY with ESP32, RPI, etc to build your own speaker to commercial streaming boxes that are not locked in to any one service. If you are so inclined there are the somewhere in-between options to tie into locally running services like Squeezebox, Home Assistant w/ Music Assistant, etc.

Sonos is for Muggles.

Man, fuck all these cameras.

[sticks modern Mac Mini inside G5 Mac Pro case, adds foot switch to turn on all fans at 100%, for that great retro-vibe]

Mrs cra'Bapple is quite the stickler for graphene embiggement.

Watermark is the name of my next dog.

Let's call it Clod

Meanwhile people are knee deep off the coast of Zanzibar

Aunty M, Aunty M, it's a fuckin' twister!

I thought "vibe" was replaced by "aura".

Let's call her chuck roast.

Indeed!

Eloi, Minions (small number of required techs), and morlocks (Katie bar thuh door!).

How many years has Zuck trained his people to respond to him in a positive fashion and not to counterdict any of his ideas?

Of course the AI flattering systems would seem like a perfect replacement for his labor co– I mean, workers; it tells him what he wants to hear.

The AI tools respond the way TechBrahs have designed it to, flattering their egos and building up their self images so yeah, seems like it's ready for prime time.

I think a two party democratic system is terrible and it should be easier to create new parties. The current two should likely be split.

My reasoning is that a democratic system should not be treated as a sports game of two teams. There are plenty of views and we need variety of representation, not to simply fall in line with the two options available or be treated as an outsider.