You are pretty close. I honestly can't even remember why, it was so many years ago. I only remember hating the messaging app and hating what Google offered and heard about Textra. Tried it, and it solved all my problems. I paid a few dollars to support it. And over the years, it just kept getting better.

Since I have no interest in social media or other DM, all I need/use is SMS. It is possible there are better options now, but I have no motivation or need to explore anything else yet.

So you're complaining about something that doesn't affect you in any way, shape, or form. Either that or you think wildlings are entitled to that money for some reason, even though they're not. The only connection you have to this whatsoever is America just sent the first wildling, ever, outside of the Earth's atmosphere, which entitles you to nothing.

>"Why would you want SMS app with "ads and in app purchases" when so many fully featured ad free with no in app purchases SMS apps exist?"

I have been using it for many years. Long before there were any good other options. There might be better options now, I don't know. I have been happy with Textra, though. Updated regularly, lots of features, and reliable.

>"Everyone has their own message app, and outside US, almost no one uses it for anything other than SMS. For everything else, it's Whatsapp, Telegram, WeChat, Signal, etc."

I have never used Samsung's, although it is on my phone. Or any other manufacturer's (LG, Moto, etc). But I also don't use Google Messages. I use Textra with every phone, regardless of brand. But I also don't use any other messaging except SMS. I just want something that works and does what I want.

https://textra.me/
https://play.google.com/store/...

It entirely depends on the bloodlust of the audience clicking and generating the revenue to survive.

If we raise our kids properly they just might realize why they absolutely need to value Truth and Honesty in the future society they create. Because all of us grow tired of being fucked with by clickbait marketing. AI will only make that far worse, because gullible humans.

Imagine sitting down with someone born in this century and describing what it was like to be able to actually trust in life. At face value. The stress alone constantly worrying about everything less than that, is the reason so many struggle today. Even if you want to be honest, the world we live in, doesn't.

Translation: A TikTok-edumucated audience, doesn't give a flying fuck about "AP" or truth anymore. Which is why AI is all the clickbait-rage.

Unfortunately that customer base is their target demographic now (by volume), in order to survive.

By pseudo-embracing the 80's motto of, be kind and rewind..history?

Sorry. Was trying to justify it about as well as JFK did.

If it's any consolation, it is estimated based on current functionality that Outlook will function perfectly within the gravitational pull of a black hole.

Even if nothing else will.**

Including you.

(** Yes. The damn thing will still need a spam filter. Fucking cockroaches.)

It's a system of checks and balances. For example, how do you think we got rid of school prayer when the overwhelming majority of the country was in favor of it at the time? Because the constitution explicitly gave SCOTUS the power to do so. Not the voters, not the legislature.

Your king holds all of the checks. You're just relying on him to exercise restraint. You can't impeach him, and you can't veto him in any way.

They define 133-400k "family of 3" as "upper middle class".

Which is just patent bullshit.

All it is, is they keep the same old income brackets for "middle class" while inflation pushes wages and COL higher. There are actually far fewer people able to maintain a 1990s "middle class" lifestyle, and I'd argue most of these "upper middle class" people are living month to month. "Middle class" used to mean you were financially secure and had investments and retirement. That's a joke for most people under 50.

They're defining upper middle class as " family of three earning $133,000 to $400,000 per year". So that's 2 middle aged adults + an adult child as the upper barrier.

What's that mean for your typical "family of 2"? Do they normalize on 3 incomes and play funny with the figures, using extrapolation for the third?

Because the cost of living has increased. $133k is going to just barely buy you a house in most of the country. Is starter home ownership "upper middle class"?

Absolutely not.

This is just inflation, and a disingenuous bullshit article in the NYT (as you can expect, at best). The middle class is markedly smaller, not larger, and they're just using old income brackets to define "upper middle class".

So the only way to qualify as middle is to be able to afford two of the most expensive neighborhoods in the country? I tend to think "middle" or even "upper middle" would include a lot more than that.

Yeah, Via made a clone that was similar not-quite-i586 fairly recently too.

I have an old embedded box with one that has SATA 6Gbps ports on it that I thought I would use zeroing out old hard drives.

I tried Puppy, DSL, SystemRescueCD, and a bunch of others and none would finish boot. FreeDOS is fine.

It's either eWaste or I need to dig out an Infomagic CD from the attic to get Redhat 9 pr whatever. Probably need to look up when the jump from 3 to 6 happened in SATA land.

But Linus is correct that actual distros don't supoort it. There's one project for composing embedded images that I might try before it hits a shredder. Or NetBSD maybe.

The ignorant part is people assuming a mind on psychedelics can’t make stupid and sometimes deadly decisions. Especially an ignorant immature mind.

Yeah. You’re right. It wasn’t the mushrooms that killed the young adult they’re hosing off the front grill of an 18-wheeler. It was the psychedelic trip they were on that thought it looked like a grilled cheese sandwich wanting a fucking hug.

Now go tell his Mother the doctor is still as right as you are.

>"How exactly would they serve us the ads?"

With text and static images.