That's the way it works sunshine.

Introducing the $2000 Iphone... same as the $1000 Iphone you bought last year but twice as expensive... and the fanboys will still buy it.

His user ID isn't far off mine and I joined /. in the mid 00s. The really low UIDs will probably be on their way out of midlife by now.

P.S. you're welcome on my law, just pick up after yourselves.

Better design bought on by better regulation (notably from Europe), seatbelts becoming mandatory were both huge improvements in safety, airbags are debatable as in some situations they can be more dangerous (I.E. if you drive with your hands in the "douchebag" position, meaning one hand at 12 o'clock, airbag goes off and you will eat your radius and ulnar and be lucky if it doesn't cause a lot of damage). If you take your car to a Run What You Brung track day, it's advisable to disable them (as you will be wearing a skid lid and possibly a HANS device, negating the airbags function).

Collision avoidance systems are something I believe will eventually be shown to cause more harm than good with the way people treat them. It's called "risk compensation", as we feel safer we start to take more risks. The introduction of seatbelts resulted in more dangerous driving, this is why in some cases deaths went up because a lot of cars still didn't have seatbelts to begin with nor was it mandatory to wear them, however over time it was shown that the safety benefits of a seatbelt outweighed the additional risks being taken, with collision avoidance systems people will start treating them as "the car will automagically save me" if they haven't already done so. This will lead to even more inattention on the road which in many western countries has already overtaken alcohol as the biggest cause of collisions.

You are right that these handles have to go simply because a car is expected to last 20+ years and these things seem like something that will break easily.

This one is still light rail, it's an EMU (electric multiple unit) used for passenger services on a branch line. Many branch lines in the UK are not electrified and still run DMUs (Diesel/Diesel-Electric Multiple Units). The rolling stock in question is a DMU (British Rail Class 230) that has been fully electrified, so replacing the diesel engine with battery packs for the electric motors.

The Greenford Branch Line is a 2 mile line London with 5 stops between two major rail lines (Great Western Main Line and the New North Line). It's not a major line, but it's not out in the middle of nowhere either.

It's a good test to see if the tech is up to snuff as a lot of branch lines would benefit and it's easy to install charging infrastructure at stations. However I suspect it'll be a while before they replace the DMUs on the Reading-Guildford route.

This is something that has bothered me about the Jetsons... What the living fuck did they do to the surface that was so bad everyone had to live in the sky?

This is basically how it ended up in the UK. Charging stations end up in supermarket car parks. 3-5 of them owned by a 3rd party who rent the space from the supermarket, only 1 or 2 working at any given time as the 3rd party nor the supermarket give a crap once they've been installed (government subsidies were for installation, not maintenance).

Wallmart is likely making a deal with a 3rd party to install their chargers in Walmart locations and collect the rent. It's an easy win for Walmart as they don't have to worry about anything except collecting the monthly rent and passing customer complaints onto the 3rd party.

I spoke to an old friend back in Australia a few months back who's coming to the UK for a holiday and wanted to hire an EV (tried to talk him out of it) I warned him that Michael Portillo didn't do a series called "Great British Tesco Car Parks" for a reason.

And the average media consumer doesn't care as long as they get their reality TV.

TVs have reached the point of "good enough" that there isn't really going to be anything revolutionary, rather evolutionary. A panel gets slightly better colour, higher refresh rates and lower G2G times become cheaper, a new panel that uses less power. Nothing to make you race out and buy a new TV but enough over a few years that you might notice a difference between a new TV and your 8yr old model.

It's a lot like Blurry, sorry, Blu-Ray, all that money spent to bury HD-DVD and get DRM on everything and it turns out everyone moved to streaming and downloading. Not a care in the world for how "WOW" the Blurry was. So much so they're still selling DVDs because DVD was good enough and BluRay offered nothing new worth buying..

Most TVs I see these days are being sold on software features, which are solidly on the enshitification track.

We joke about this happening to cars of course but it car manufacturers thought they could get away with it we'd be bombarded with the same kind of enshitification in vehicles. They're already trying in car advertising on for size, it won't be long before "we've noticed you're near a Turd Burgers, stop in for a double colon blocker now, we will automatically redirect your navigation in 3... 2... 1..."

Of course the part of me that enjoys driving will say that cars have been on the enshitification track for years. Automatic transmissions, soft suspension, computerisation, drivers aids with their useless bings, bongs and warbles, SUVs, cars getting bigger and lardier with each iteration. It's hard to find a drivers car these days, a nice, simple, RWD, lightweight 6sp manual (they don't even need to be that powerful, my 140 HP MR2 never failed to put a smile on my face). Kids these days have no idea of the unadulterated joy of nailing the perfect gear change (You are welcome on my lawn, just don't make a mess, K, I can still remember being young).

Yep, and this is one of those nice selective statistics chosen because they can't compete with any meaningful statistics.

There are maybe a dozen different Iphones on sale... compared to thousands of Android models in all shapes, sizes, colours and specs which as you eloquently pointed out can all run everything people need them to.

It's like when someone starts focusing on how much torque their car makes... it's because it literally has no other defining features, it's not fast, it's not powerful, it's not drinks globe luggggsury (with 5 g's), it can't carry huge loads and doesn't corner like it's on rails... All they have is a large torque figure.

Oddly enough, COVID is still going and killing people. Mostly in the US. https://data.who.int/dashboards/covid19/deaths Of the 1.5K reported COVID deaths in the 28 days until 11 January 2026, 1.3K were in the US.... And this is after several states banned the reporting of COVID deaths. Sure, you're correct that they're down but wrong about everyone being vaccinated or dead.

Yep, the life expectancy for the EU is 81.4 years... and the EU includes much of eastern Europe. The people who grew up under the USSR with the food shortages and terrible medical care are still kicking (it was only 35 years ago).

UK is 79.1 for males and 83 for females (so call it 81.5 although technically there are slightly more women), Australia is 81 for males and 85 for females.

Making it to an average of 79 is not an accomplishment.

When looking at statistics like this you tend to filter out things like COVID as it was a temporary situation. You still count deaths from pre-existing conditions, accidents, et al. where people die before they're old or non-natural causes as these continue to happen and fewer people dying from car accidents or homicides do affect the stats.

Turn the logo on it's side.

This was first discovered when the UK's Office of Government Commerce did their logo.

Couple of other good examples on that page as well.

Yep, a grifter is a rent seeker, someone who wants money for doing or providing nothing. Someone who is cheating and/or swindling you out of money.

Doctorow actually produces shit, he's an author and a journalist. It's not uncommon for independent journalists to get funding from donations, with the consolidation of media conglomerates (buying up all the independent publishers) it's often the only way and better than being beholden to the likes of Murdoch. He's not like Trump or Stephen Yaxley-Lennon (Tommeh Robinson) who just fleece people to pay for their lifestyle and contribute nothing in return (or just make things worse).

Yep, contract law is to protect the businesses from you, the little people, when they screw you over.

Hell, even here in the UK it's only been a year since mid contract price rises have to be expressly stated in pounds and pence (actual money) instead of vague allusions to a percentage.