There's a finite amount of information that the human brain can process. AI coupled with a "Reverse Centaur" business model is the root cause.

Don't know what a Reverse Centaur is?

https://www.versobooks.com/products/3584-the-reverse-centaur-s-guide-to-life-after-ai

First the will build the infrastructure to control minors from gaining access to certain products, services, information, and entertainment.

Then with the infrastructure in place, they will extend it to certain demographic groups causing the regime some trouble.

Finally, it will be extended to all so they can control what you see, hear, and do.

I was turned off when I read that the astrophages are immune to electromagnetic radiation. Also, storing large amounts of energy in an astrophage is dubious at best.

User access to the system?....No. The embedded Linux system in the appliance would be locked down so the user never gets access to make this change. I know how this goes, since I worked for a company which did this. They blow one-time fuses in the microprocessor which prevent the bootloader from being changed without a signing key. They disable all serial ports and run SSH with the requirement that a logins be done via certificate. All the external SSD memory fetches are encrypted so removing the SSD and analyzing that gets you nothing.

Recurring costs can be very inexpensive if you have low data rates ( e.g. no graphical ads).

Here is one example:

https://tealcom.io/cellular-iot-connectivity-unlimited-5g/

Here is another:

https://www.hologram.io/pricing/

And another:

https://www.volersystems.com/blog/wearable-devices/inexpensive-low-data-rate-links-for-the-internet-of-things

Cellular modems speak TCP/IP they look like a Ethernet interface in Linux.

I worked for a company which DID include a cellular modem in its rental product. With this they could shut down the product if the customer failed to make the monthly rental payment.

Cellular modems are now very cheap to implement, and if the cellular bit rate is low and usage is low, the connection fees are low as well.
With cheap cellular data rates, I would expect more appliances to implement cellular modems and become "monetized:" to increase the appliance manufacturers profit margins.

Eventually you might not be able to buy a dumb appliance any more; that is, unless consumers put their foot down.

The manufacturer's answer to this will be cellular modems. You'll have to tear into your fridge and disconnect the antenna or place a cellular jammer next to the fridge. Of course these actions might cause the fridge to stop working and spoil all of your food or just void the warranty.

If the launch fails at a point where it is say 50 miles up, and the reactor has been turned on prior to launch so that the core is now highly radioactive, it could rain down fission products on Europe or Africa. If the core has never been turned on, the risks might be mitigated.

1. TV's where if you don't enable them and keep it connected to the Internet , they don't turn on the HDMI ports. All you can do is watch OTA TV
2. Cellular modems in TV's so you can't bypass ads sent through the cellular modem.
3. All sales final return policy
4. Potted and sealed electronics with tamper grids.
4. DMCA lawsuit if you modify the TV and they find out.

I guess at this point people won't but TV's anymore.

You would see nothing. 92 pairs is an extremely small number of particles. Even if a small fraction of the energy were converted into visible light (e.g., through secondary interactions with surrounding matter), the total number of visible photons produced would be far below the threshold required for the human eye to perceive a flash.

The original copyright term in the United States, established by the Copyright Act of 1790, was
14 years from recording the title, with a14-year renewal option if the author was still alive. It applied only to maps, charts, and books. This was later extended to 28 years in 1831, plus renewal.

Make the renewal fee 20% of all future profits.

Record companies losing in the short term:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhBx0nuYEZU

Record companies lobbying congress for DMCA V 2.0 because it ain't over yet:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWb07Xh4jaA

Will state something in their press releases like: We will vigorously defend against this/s

And Ubiquiti has some of the best most flexible router firmware. It would suck to see them not be able to sell in the US.