Probably for some. I always put in the hours I needed to put in to do a professional job. Never bothered me other than a surprising number of less productive employees hated me because I "made them look bad". That wasn't the intent

It is a continuum ranging between people who won't work, to regular people who feel strain if they work more than 20 hours a week, or 40 hours a week, to people like me, who a lot of people consider pathological. I put in a complete career, raised a family, spent a lot of time with them too. My extra work came in late or early. I don't expect people who cannot handle the work to work to my standards.

I now work with like minded people, and I have to say, I like it. We all respect each other, highly professional (although the people we work for call us "elites" which is kind of embarrassing.) And oh yeah, about that pay. Money isn't everything, but all in all, it's a nice thing to have laying around the house. 8^) Watch the angry responses to what I wrote. Claiming I'm going to die early (that moment has passed) or other issues. But for some reason, my attitude seems to threaten them I guess. But - no one who doesn't want to do what I do is forced to do that. People need to find their fit.

And yet Europe invented and distributed Perdition (AKA methamphetamine) for both its military and civilian use.

And it wasn't for entertainment - it was to get more work out of them.

Mod me down - but check the truth of what I wrote first.

U mad bro? Don't work for them. Don't work at all. I support you never working another day in your life.

No , it's just that people shouldn't eat gaddammed Doritos! This should be obvious, people!

Something needs to be done about the mentally addicted. Because like all actual addictions, they end up damaging the person with the problems. Just a couple examples.

I went on a ferry ride a few weeks back. I enjoyed watching porpoises playing in the water alongside the boat, walked around the deck, even the seagulls were entertaining, they love to fly around the propeller was behind the ship for goodies that might have been churned up.

About 80 percent of the passengers were staring at their smartphones.

Just last night in a grocery store, some adipose addled woman ran me into a freezer while walking hunched over her phone while she was shopping. She glared at me, quite angry that I was in her vicinity, and she had to look up. And it wasn't a momentary thing, I watched incredulously as she continued down the aisle, never looking up. Must have taken a long time to shop if looking away from the phone is a bad thing.

The Gen Z stare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.... They touch on it, but don't go into depth. These kids are addicted to social media - the actual physical world is not their world, that smartphone is.

Frankly, being around methheads is better. At least they are in the moment.

Another part of the social media addiction follows, some of the biggest victims - so hear me out.

Validation. I have seen this especially with women. As social bulwarks like the #metoo ( itself an example of addiction as it morphed from actual sexual assault victims to women metooing men because of having a date they didn't enjoy) women permanently changed the way that men interact with them, many of who have branded all men as the enemy. Women still want validation (not a criticism, it is something most women want by nature) In a world where I can't tell a woman I think her dress is nice, or I like her earrings, guess where the validation comes from. Online, in social media.

Except now, it is just plain weird to read women giving other women validation about their new dress or earrings, offering sometimes highly sexualized comments to each other as validation. Men in the same groups make no comment at all. Which is what they have been tacitly ordered not to do. Meanwhile the women then go on to speak of how stupid their husband or male friends on in a sort of "can you top this"? contest. The men stay silent and only speak of "guy things" like having to mow the lawn or rake leaves. Sometimes with a "joke" insult reply by the women, that the men ignore.

This is an exceptionally unhealthy dynamic, fueled by mental validation addiction they are no longer getting. A really weird positive feedback loop, as good young women who are not womanists, who would love to have a good man, yet have been raised with social media and womanist adjacent, if not womanist, are getting quite upset that men don't approach them any more.

Men. In my continuing research, places like Youtube have been an interesting waterhole for men. Men who have been damaged in divorce or workplace accusations have found an outlet in Youtube. RedPill content is widely watched and commented on, and RedPill's younger brother MGTOW is really creating some waves, as video after video of women shaming or heaping hatred on men are shown, as reaction videos fair use. Every case found of false accusation are shown. Increasing numbers of young - even older - men have checked out of the relationship arena.

They don't run out of content either. In irony, the shaming has stopped working, every "Looks like the incel has shown up." comment has zero effect. Manshaming as it is known, has been used so often and for so many trivial things, it has no power any more.

Same thing for mansplaining. As many women today complain about a lack of mentoring in the workplace, we have to remember that telling a woman how something should be done, is textbook mansplaining. So men just keep their mouths shut. To the workplace gestalt, women see men conversing, joking, interacting with each other positively, then silence when she approaches. That has to be incredibly uncomfortable for them.

Yet I know so many good women who would make a great partner. Pleasant, cooperative, attractive and well presented. But no guy approaches them. Social media is turning out to be a great way to disrupt society in a really bad way.

I certainly could never figure out having money and not doing anything with it. Money all by itself is boring.

That isn't how the logistics work though. the Apollo program had essentially everything designed and built well before the Saturn rolled out to the launchpad. There were plenty of adjustments, but you can't just say "The Saturn V first stage is ready, let's design everything else now."

This started to interest me greatly, when I hear how we were going to have a million people living on Mars by 2050. Everything transported by Starship. People, materials

Where are the landing sites? Where are the designs for the martian Starship lander that is going to take all this to Mars? Where are these people going to live? At best, we see what I call 3-D program space travel. Renderings with issues that would create problems.

At present I see the Starship as a modern day Spruce Goose - the cool wooden gigantic airplane built by Howard Hughes. I remember as a kid I wondered why they didn't keep working on that. Starship is cool, but seems like an end within itself.

As a veteran of some long term programs, parallel development is the only way to meet some kind of schedule. Sometimes the project finds that an earlier plan wouldn't work, or that materials aren't ready yet, and it gets shelved for a while. My original project I was involved in, after I studied the history of it, was ongoing 30 years before I signed on. Overrunning technology is always a risk when running on the razor's edge of technology (think of what would have happened if they couldn't get the F1 engine to work! But unless there is zero time pressure, you develop in parallel, not series.

Given that Musk is a marketing oriented person, and likes big flashy presentations, I would think that if there were actual plans for the 90 percent of logistics and material, we'd see them.

As one of the top ~ ten percent, there are some issues with the idea that I am a money hoarder. Yes, at this point I have a lot of investments, and my present employ is pretty good, But hoarding? Wife and I get new cars every two years, I've bought two new computers this year, a new office audio system, and I spend many thousands on valuable wood that I turn into various objects that I donate to various charities. I tip very well - around 100 percent, holidays more. We gift our kid several thousand every year - he spends it as he wishes. Kind offhand to call it hoarding.

I don't create jobs in person, but my money goes somewhere that some person somewhere who has a job gets money from.

Yes, people on the lower rungs of the ladder spend a higher percentage of their money on basics. I spend money on basics too.

And yes, there are people who claim I'm the evil element, that they need money that I have, and it is a crime that I have it, and must be distributed to them.

That I wouldn't then be able to provide money for new cars, computers, eating out and being generous with my money is irrelevant to them. I'm the bad guy and their belief is impenetrable

Seems more like crab potting than an equitable fair and moral redistribution of wealth. Not that I would expect to change your mind, but damn, it is a simple prejudice that you might overcome. I've met many people. Poor people, middle people, wealthy people. There are good people and bad people in each grouping. Unfortunately, in today's world, a lot of people have a firm belief that goodness is inversely related to their bank account. The only pure perfect human is the one who has nothing.

So what is the anticompetitive action? That I used the dual monopoly meme is based on that question. to wit..

"The CMA said the two companies have "substantial, entrenched" market power, with UK mobile phone owners using either Google or Apple's platforms and unlikely to switch between them."

People over here in the hinterlands switch back and forth all the time - what is it in the UK that forces people to decide the platform than are locked into it?

And then......the scary part : "The regulator flagged the importance of their platforms to the UK economy and said they could be a bottleneck for businesses."

Sounds to me like a thinly veiled call for taking the first steps to nationalization. The UK government decides what is allowed and what is not. Of course, a lot of people believe that nationalization is the key to a moral world, where everyone is equal, all are paid the same, and all are happy.

Maybe the UK could design and build their version of a Volksphone, using the concept behind the 1930's German radio that was really popular

I agree - switching is incredibly easy here in hinterlands, does the UK throw up roadblocks if a person wants to switch? That would be an internal issue, not Apple or Google's The whole concept that Apple has, and to a lesser extent Android has, is to provide a modicum of safety. This does not mesh with the idea that everyone should be able to get software wherever they want, even if the manufacturer has to be forced to allow that. Your bog standard smartphone user is not a digital guru.

The incredibly ironic part is that iPhone users rather like the old situation. My smartphone is a shitty little, expensive computer that I expect to work every time I pull it out of my pocket. I expect it to not be infected to the extent possible.

I can't find a thing to disagree with there.

I keep thinking back to all the troubles they caused themselves with Brexit, only to copy the EU. Kind of like being a toady.

It leads to lawsuits not to break monopoly, but to extract money. In some countries money is evil over a certain amount.

So if the sovereign nation of the UK start their own UK grown Smartphones and Operating system for them? Ha the rules of competition become so vague that two main choices with a few outliers become a monopoly? Why doesn't the UK and the EU just take state control, and get it over with - they won't stop until them.

Reminds me of Packet Radio - think of it as a very early RF email system. Programmed via terminal or terminal emulator now, to a packet node controller. When I had to learn it around 5 years ago, it was pretty frustrating. another terminal based language to learn State of the art from decades ago. It wasn't exactly complicated, but the commands weren't even consistent with themselves.

If you made a mistake, it immediately responded with "EH?", and the various command parameters were almost a guessing game. I eventually figured it out. Became the local "expert", and now every time someone has a question, I get tortured again.

I'm in the middle of Pensylvania. Some call us Yinzers here.

Oh, crap! About a year ago, we got rid of one. It probably would have had everything you need or even been in better condition. We were running low on space and the boss picked it for disposal. Frustrating, it would have been great to find it a good home.

So it does not work? It is impossible to fix? Explain, because that is what broke is - not even being pedantic.