... on early versions of built-in SAT navs and ending up in harbor basins. At least as dangerous but arguably way more entertaining for onlookers. Especially if it was a BMW. 8-)

I was a hardcore GOG advocate, because they opposed DRM and offered native Linux runtimes of their games. However, their Linux support was pretty lackluster in recent years. Game versions meant to run on Ubuntu 16 and 18 and unusable on any recent version. About half a year ago, after many attempts to get things running on current Linuxes, I finally caved and moved from GOG to Steam, since they offer a hassle-free Linux experience with a curated central Linux-compliant runtime environment.

I presume GOG has noticed people giving up on GOG and now has decided to follow suit. I hope they can build a compelling experience, but they've lost me for now.

I have also been WFH for years before covid. I don't believe my circumstances are the same as everybody's, but I do know I am far from the only person whose duties almost exclusively involve working with people and things that are in another region anyway.

Why are you commenting on a subject that you admit is none of your business? I suppose it's related to the fact that you didn't understand that you literally just said you ARE NOT OK with the ban, since the government definitely DOES NOT meet the requirements which would make you OK with it (and that goes for the US and your government.)

Put another way, employers who gave everyone an effective raise due to exigent circumstances and suffered no harm as a result are now mystified as to why their employees are reluctant to accept an effective pay cut now for no apparent benefit. Given the latter part, they rightly suspect some sort of malfeasance somewhere in management.

Workers want or even need a cost of living adjustment. Employers do not want to and may not be able to afford to increase payroll. For that reason, the COL increases are often several years in arrears as it is. WFH gives the employees an effective raise by eliminating their commute costs and an opportunity to save even more by living somewhere with a lower COL.

As an additional incentive, the employer saves on office space.

On the other hand, WHF was a win-win for employers too. The employees got an effective raise by lowering their cost of living and a reduction in unproductive daily aggravation and wasted time. The employer didn't have to actually pay them any extra to make that happen and could even save on expensive office space. It just wasn't a win for the managers who could no longer hide how bad they were at their jobs.

Perhaps not narcicism so much as short-sighted self interest. Either way, it would be in the company's interest (and the shareholders) to give THEM the heave-ho and leave the workers remote. The workaround for their ineffectiveness costs millions a year.

A day after I wrote the the post I actually was in Hamburg to meet up with old school friends. My buddy and I went to check out the site afterwards. Quite impressive. They had the street covered in sand and gravel covered with steel plates in order to spread the load more evenly. The bridge has since been moved into place but there are pics videos floating around on the Internet if you want some visual details.

That's because the suburbs have basically spread us out to such a ridiculous degree that kids don't have a lot of opportunities to socialize.

I think you are missing important details here. Kids still have their chat groups and socialise over them, pretty much as they did before. The difference is just that these chat groups aren't tied to a social media platform any more.

Before the "ban" there was a lot of pressure for kids to be on one particular social media platform or another, depending where their friends were, in order to socialise with them, with the inevitable exposure to other content on those platforms unrelated to their social group. Since the "ban" there are definitely kids who still have social media on one platform or another, but the fragmentation means that the social media platforms no longer become the defacto common space.

Kids now use more specific apps (eg Whatsapp, Facebook messenger) for their shared social spaces.

The social spaces not only still exist, they are also more purely that, not co-opted by endless scrolls of algorithmically presented content and adverts or subjected to engagement mechanics (likes etc). The social spaces are just actual people talking to other people they know.

In that regard I think the "ban" has been relatively successful, different kids may still have accounts on different platforms and perhaps may still spend too much time on them, but generally kids aren't practically forced to be on a social media platform just in order to talk with their friends.

None of this is about "stripping adults of their privacy" as you describe.

The Australian law explicitly prohibits platforms from requiring ID or retaining personal data collected for age assurance.

I'm not sure if you understood that I am saying the Matrix is unwatchable or not.

So you don't think the 1st Amendment is important. You are OK with the government having power, but don't believe the people should have power. You have a right to that particular ridiculously ignorant belief. What you don't have is the right to infringe upon others rights. You don't have to like the 1st Amendment, but you do have to abide by it.

They won't want to touch the other side of it either. If what Flock is doing is fine, so is the creeper snapping photos on a public playground and creating a giant database somewhere.

That seems...undesirable.

https://www.tagesschau.de/inla...