It's always been the case that 99% of stuff is crap. We occasionally have periods where there are multiple good shows airing, but they are rare. It only looks better in the past because we remember the good ones, not the rubbish.

There are a few current shows that are worth watching.

Thanks to streaming shows often get cancelled 5 seconds after the last episode of the season airs. They have all the metrics instantly, and don't wait for DVD/Bluray sales figures.

I do buy physical media, but I've given up treating it as a way to support shows. As you say, too little of the money reaches the creators, and it has no impact on the renew/cancel decision. If there is other merch that helps the creators more directly, I'll go for that.

It's the usual failure of the capitalist system. There is little benefit to investing in younger staff and training them. Once they gain skills they want more money, so either you pay them or they leave. Companies prefer to just hire experienced staff, and now can try to replace the graduates with AI.

It used to be the norm to train people out of skill and employ them for decades. Now they expect the graduate to train themselves, at their own expense, and treat them as disposable.

In a way, Amazon "improved" upon one-click and invented zero-click.

Apple's got many faults, but their hardware has a very premium feel. I presume this is where Dell's additional hundred bucks went, because Apple's used to doing that and Dell isn't. They think they are, but they aren't normally as good at it. But they're going to deliver this PC with Windows, and there might be Linux issues — there's no way to know until it's in reviewers' hands exactly what hardware is actually used around the parts we know about. And unless you specifically need Windows, it's very hard to imagine getting excited about spending more money to run that.

I have to admit that I find the lack of a headphone jack offensive, but I wouldn't even consider buying a Dell that's trying to be a Macintosh over an actual Macintosh, and I say that as someone with very little respect for Apple. I don't hate Dell, but I've never been impressed by them either. I would describe them as "less terrible than HP".

The fact that it's a garbage off-brand speaker makes it more likely that it's possible, because people with valuable brands are the ones who are most likely to want to prevent you from changing it, and also the most likely to actually design their own product internals or have them designed to spec. The cheap brands are most likely to grab a complete PCB off the "shelf", or even more likely than that, just have their crappy brand put on someone else's complete product.

But, and it's a big one, they won't be offering the user the tools to do it with. They'd have to figure out who actually made it and/or what chip is on it in order to identify the tool, then they'd have to track it down, then they'd have to maybe short something on the PCB because it's not necessarily as easy as holding down a button, they'd have to do it on a windows PC or at least by attaching a USB hub to a windows VM so that when the device inevitably changes IDs during the reflashing procedure it remains connected, or with some kind of reflashing tool which is cheap but which they definitely don't own.

Watch how this will turn into something to push grok instead.

I would argue Luke was never a Marty Stu - he was impatient, whiny, in love with his sister, made dumb choices (but lucked out of them or was saved by a friend). Rey is much more of a Mary Sue, in that she doesn't even require training by Yoda to become a master with the force.

But there could have been a much more interesting arc to Luke's story movies 7-9 could have explored that did not require a rehash. Once the head of the Empire is defeated, it's not really 'over;' there's still many leaders who are loyal, many units, etc. and the right to freedom isn't one by one dramatic battle, it takes work every day. That could have been a much more interesting series of movies than what we got.

Ok, so no answer there. It being the oldest actually cuts against your argument, other nations looked at our system and decided not to use that system.

Not an answer.

Popular vote for President doesn't change that. Again, we have just one election that has to operate this way. The Senate and Congress and all that still operates the same. This is just about President, one office, one person. One vote per citizen.

This is why I feel like the arguments against popular vote are all vibes and Republicans who want to maintain minority rule. Same as why they wont' support eliminating gerrymanders, they only care about power, not principles.

It's easy to eschew popular vote when you don't actually care about democracy after all!

And I would say that it sounds like "checks and balances" but really, what is it checking? What is it balancing? Judicial/Executive/Legislative, they all have areas of the government that they interface with, who does the electoral college balance with? States interests? This is the executive, states have their own legislative both in their states and in Congress.

As you said yourself the EC was a compromise and logistical solve, not a legal one. Also it's form today with winner-take-all is far from how the Founders imagines it in the Federalist, I would imagine Hamilton would not like the system and outcomes it delivers now.

I would have to hear how the peoples interests and states interests are not represented in a nationwide popular vote.

For their hardware. When you want to move to someone else's hardware, will it still be solved?

Third parties are suppressed in the USA due to the fact we use First-Past-The-Post voting which is going to naturally lead to just two parties. Right now actual candidates can participate in either party primary, its pretty loose all things considered, there's no "You have to be a Democrat for X years to run in the primary" type rule.

I wholeheartedly support moving to a ranked choice or approval voting or STAR voting system but that's a different fight altogether.

Moving to national popular vote for the President is a good first step even with the two party system.

Israel would shoot them down.

Labeling your item with a generic "BOMB" is such a rookie mistake. Always - always! - use more descriptive bluetooth name so you know exactly which device you are controlling. E.g., "cmdrtaco's BOMB".

Oops. Did I just make Slashdot do a U-turn?