Maybe gamers would be more reponsive to some good games instead of the usual monetized Bethesda / Activision slop.

Are you a retard?

No, somebody capable of observing what Apple are and their predilection with shutting out 3rd parties. And many phone makers burn an efuse when the bootloader is unlocked. This is common knowledge. But if you're so fucking childish, clueless and immature to call somebody a retard instead of even considering the point or doing a simple google then that's the end of the discussion.

They don't allow it on iOS and go out of their way to prevent people rooting phones. And MacOS is very clearly converging with iOS - same silicon like M series chips, similar software stacks like SwiftUI. MacOS 27 only runs on M series, no more Intel so the days of even slightly commodity hardware are gone. So I wouldn't be so sure they're not going to lock down the bootloader and the operating system so you have no choice but to run their OS on their hardware.

As for the EU, yes it might threaten their plans but Apple has history of being dicks when the EU tells them to do something. Like even if they were forced to support other OSes they could burn a diode in the CPU so it irrevocably only runs Linux from that point on if its rooted and gimp the device in other ways. That's something some other phone makers have done when the bootloader is unlocked.

The counter argument is that Apple loves controlling its hardware and software, and allowing some 3rd party OS to run on their hardware is something they cannot countenance. To their thinking these Linux folks will be reverse engineering hardware and god knows what they'll dig up.

Nobody wanted the chatbot in WhatsApp and the fact that Meta gave no choice but to opt in and to stay in makes clear of that. So if it's an anticompetitive action give them the choice - remove it entirely or require people to affirmatively opt in and select AI from a lost. Sam should go too of course for Gemini and any other agent that is made almost mandatory to use.

The UK demanded porn sites age verify. The reputable ones did, the disruptable ones didn't. I'm sure kids are exposed to far worse content than if they hadn't bothered. Then the UK discovered that VPNs are a thing, and they're making noises demanding VPNs not be used to sidestep porn verification. Then they're demanding phones and tech companies identify porn and block it which merely requires impossible demands.

All of this is so fucking stupid because the solution is simple - require ISPs (and VPNs if they so wish) to provide optional content filters to UK account holders. Adult account holders can opt into filtering on a per device basis or the entire account. Child account holders (e.g. kids with SIMs) get it enabled without choice until they turn 18. The filter can block porn and it can block VPN and does so effectively. It doesn't require random businesses around the world to comply with UK law.

It's not rocket science.

Bending Spoons is a farm up North where brands you haven't heard of in a while can go to run and play.

There are a number of highly affordable EVs in A, B and C segments on sale in Europe. People have been waiting for prices to come down and they have. Sales of EVs are expanding by double digits year on year and by 2028 it's likely that the majority of new car sales will be EV. The car industry is still lobbying the EU to sell shitty "hybrid" models instead of meeting the looming end to ICE sales.

Escape Room but with bees.

Certification is a feature, not a bug and this is how marine systems operate for example. You don't need to buy a chart plotter, radar, radio, GPS, autopilot and depth sounder from the same manufacturer and it doesn't have to be made specific to your boat. You buy all the bits and pieces to your requirements, piecemeal if you like, but all certified and they talk with each over a marine grade CAN bus. If a component goes, or you want to upgrade, you buy a new component and away you go.

I see the same being completely viable for farming equipment. In fact it's something that countries should mandate for new equipment to stop all the lock-in bullshit.

Make all the computer controlled stuff plug into the tractor via CAN bus or something. Open up the specs so any certified product can plug into the tractor or communicate with other products on the same bus. e.g. allow products to consume sensor data, provide tracking, even control the steering or monitor/control other things hooked up to the tractor.

Whenever I'm leading a project that does anything to do with human input like names, addresses, written text I have to repeatedly drum into people that internally the code should be UTF-8 and UTC time unless there is an exceptionally good reason not to be. The weird thing is there is usually somebody from India, Iran, China or wherever where I shouldn't have to say this but I usually have to. They're so used to everything being English and assuming everything fits in a byte with unambiguous values it almost escapes them that it isn't true.

As for Slashdot, I haven't seen this site receive a major update for over a decade. The original version used to be a mess of Perl. I imagine these days it's a mess of Perl and some other stuff with some very fragile scripts that can't cope very well or consistently with different character encodings let alone being UTF-8 end to end. Using a subset of HTML as markup probably doesn't help either.

By that token every dogshit subscription service with autorenew enable can use that tagline that people are "saving". After all think of the precious seconds they're saving not requiring people to renew to something they may have forgotten they were subscribed to. And let's save people even more time by not inconveniencing them with an email about a pending renewal.

Can I set up an AI agent to orchestrate a rugpull?

I updated xtelink e-reader (it has an ESP32 in it) through Chrome and I couldn't believe how simple it was. Ordinarily I'd be downloading some dump bin and having to run some mysterious Chinese written flash software to update the device. Yet all I had to do was go to a website, grant a permission and the device got flashed in about a minute.