produces higher quality sperm

That's really important for the sperm destined for the septic system, sure...

I think the only Premium TVs left are the business TVs that give you meaningful mechanisms to not have intrusive "Smart" features.

Is there a meaningful difference between a Sony TV that harvests data and won't let you opt-out of "smart" features, and a Wal-mart TV that harvests data and won't let you opt-out of "smart" features?

I guess I am blessed to not be an audiophile and not have flawless supervision :)

FWIW, I have:
- a 20 yo 720p dumb 42" plasma
- a 20 yo 1080P dumb 50" plasma
- a 1yo 4k Samsung 65" TheFrame TV

That last one was a splurge I wanted because the "Art Mode" is just too beautiful, and at the time, Samsung really had the only coherent offering. (I guess there are now "off brand" ArtTV attempts from HiSense and others.. i have no experience with them.)

On the ArtTV, we watch youtube or DVDs or XBox on it a little of the time, and all that stuff looks fine to me on the 65" Samsung. But the TV is otherwise displaying pretty artwork almost all of the time, and whatever Samsung has done with the screen, dimming control, bezel, etc, really does work and really is lovely. And you don't need a service or an app to get the experience - just stick a USB full of public domain masterpieces into the TV.

Even so, the Samsung ecosystem is pretty annoying. I can have it show my images in ArtMode, but i cannot have the "real" experience you'd get with a subscription - with Art XML metadata and stuff (artist, date, etc). We don't always remember what a piece is or who painted it when it comes up..

Anyway, AFAIK, the only way to get TVs that aren't enshittified spyware is a business SKU, right?

In my house, we use Steam to play "windows-only" games on:
- Devuan with XFCE
- Devuan with Cinnamon
- Arch with hyprland
- bone stock Ubuntu 24
- ubuntu 25 laptop w/ second GPU

From my POV, there's not much need to port games to Linux. With the heroic efforts of Valve, most Windows games now just work. Win32, DX, D3D, and whatever else windows game devs have been using seems to have become the defacto reference gaming API on Linux.

Steam makes it work on every linux distro we've tried.

In writing this, it occurs to me: The F/OSS ecosystem does a very good job of re-implementing someone else's API/products (WINE, Proton, LibreOffice, etc)

The F/OSS ecosystem does a comparatively poor job at independently developing its own technology and then standardizing/universalizing those choices. E.g. the transition from X11 to Wayland; the systemd "situation(s)", desktop environments... gui greeters, audio muxers...

I think Valve has done the right thing. They made existing games work on Steam; they made Steam work on most linux distros.

Making everyone use a reference linux platform seems to be a total non-starter.

We already have a reference gaming platform: Windows 7 thru 10. And what we learned in 2025 is that Steam on nearly _any_ Linux often implements that windows reference gaming platform better than Windows 11 does.

Take your pick.

Would someone, please, think of the children?!

designed a chip with 41 vertical layers of semiconductors and insulating materials

I love, that it is a prime number!

The consequences of the big government's War on Fat will be felt for generations. The loving and caring lesser governments even went so far as to outright banning butter in public schools...

Libertarians hate being proven right...

USSR — and then Russia — were/are the supporters and often outright instigators of most of the world's terrorism and other evil.

All efforts should be aimed on defeating that first and foremost.

If the Ukrainians are on the tip of that spear today, they must not lack for weapons, supplies, nor other support.

And you represent the essence of neo-feudalism where my bank account is the sole determiner of my worth to society and those poor's should just die more efficiently to pave the way for the glorious ubermensch to rule the masses.

You libertarian types

There is nothing — zero — in the Libertarian doctrine, that mentions anything anywhere near the strawman you attributed to me. Indeed, your verbiage is straight out of the most infamous (though not the most evil) Statist of all L-)

Live on a different planet. Go live where you are alone and die well there.

This is an interesting attitude — considering, that Libertarians don't at all mind other people organizing themselves into any kind of Collectives they genuinely want to. A Libertarian government wouldn't touch you — as long you don't coerce anyone to join you.

It is the other way around, that is impossible — Statists wouldn't leave the Libertarians be. So, if anyone ought to be exiled to a different planet, it is you — the oppressors — not us...

Yeah it looks like Putin is going to be your new best buddy.

On the contrary, that is quite less likely now, that we've avoided Obama's fourth term.

Baltic nations said this week they are investigating whether the cutting of two fiber-optic undersea telecommunication cables in the Baltic Sea was sabotage.

Of course, it was. We even know, who the saboteurs are.

Though the collective "Biden" may not realize it, Russia's been at war with the West for many years... They started it, and we ought to end it — on our terms.

I knew, I could count on you to refill my mug any time it runneth empty. Not that there is any danger of that at the moment :-)

Have fun applying for a new job at 50. Especially after the gut the labor board and age discrimination is legal.

This quote represents the very essence of Statism. It openly admits, that government needs to — indeed, must — maintain and enforce rules, which would compel people to hire those, whom they don't want to hire.

It is quite funny, that these are the same Statists, who are trying to scare us, that it is the other side, that "threaten our freedoms"...

Tell me more about "my kind."

Your kind is Collectivist — people valuing the (glorious) Collective above the (cantankerous and selfish) Individual.

Oh, you may be genuinely aghast about GULAG and Holocaust, but you're not in the slightest against government ownership — or strict control —of the means of production, are you?

The former would make you a Communist, the latter — a Fascist (like most of the Western establishment nowadays) — and I don't really care, which side of this murderous coin you personally prefer.

Making that pesky document known as American Constitution into a "living and breathing" one, which (emphasis added): "evolves, changes over time, and adapts to new circumstances, without being formally amended " is just a tool towards the end of spreading the Collectivism wider, and your kind — be it a Slashdot-poster or a UChicago law-professor — are happy to use it.

I simply pointed out your self-inconsistency — you don't want the same "life and breath" for the Ten Commandments; because that would make your theft of content harder to justify.

That said, I'm impressed, that such ethical justifications are still something you look for — even if in the wrong places — maybe, there is still hope.

Finally, back to the topic — your "Insightful" argument is that of semantics: your (implied) defense of the practice of theft of content is simply "oh, it is not theft". Well, it is wrong for the same reasons as the theft of a tangible object would be. Whatever you want to call it, it is simply unethical — and you're wrong.

Knowledge is its own reward, whether it translates into financial gain or not. If you can afford longer education — or can find someone willing to sponsor you (not the taxpayer forced to do it) — go for it...

Whether spending that time and resources in a formally-recognized graduate school is the best way to learn — that's another question...