What an utterly naive interpretation of world history you have. I can assure you, if you'd been a Jew being rounded up for extermination in WW2 you'd have a different opinion. Likewise, if you were Chinese or Korean being subjugated by Imperial Japan, you'd have a different perspective. There is such a thing as a "just war" even though you somehow ignore the concept. It's usually when your opponent starts the war and is hell bent on eradicating you and your way of life.

Alas, you sit there in perfect safety and comfort, passing judgement on those who sacrificed fa more than you can ever imagine so you could impugn their sacrifices.

Banned for who? And who's going to enforce this ban?

You have to remember any treaty (a) must have signatories that agree to follow it and (b) there must be a method of enforcement. If you lack either of these two conditions, the treaty has no effect.

Not sure how you think you could pull that off, but whatever.

Again...exactly how do you plan to accomplish this? It's not like Iran hasn't been firing missiles at our carriers this whole time. Yeah, it's a halfhearted effort by the Iranians, but what exactly do you think would happen to Iran if you managed to even damage one of our carriers, much less sink one? I can describe it thusly: the American gloves would come off. Iran would be plastered into oblivion via conventional bombardment, and there's very little Iran could do to stop it. Sure, we'd take losses, but the Iranian regime would cease to exist in totality. America has had this option available to it since day one. We haven't exercised it. Not because we couldn't do it but because we chose not to. Do not mistake restraint for a lack of capability.

This will wreck some customers. Expats overseas without vpn access. Anyone working or living in a remote location without internet access. Military around the world, both on land and on sea. Maritime workers on ships.

Basically take a bunch of people who rely on gaming devices for their entertainment because of the remote nature of their job or home, and cut off access to stuff they already paid for. Well thought out plan, if the plan is to get people to switch to a different company's products.

They'll try to say that it's only AI that's providing the monitoring and filtering. They'll conveniently omit the part about the AI training itself on your kid's dick pics.

The solar compatible meter does a couple of things. First, it allows solar generated power to go back to the grid if on-site usage is below generated power levels. Second, it communicates with the utility company so they can manage the entire grid. Third, I *think* it both prevents consumer-generated power from leaking onto the grid during outages, and notifies the utility that there is on-site power generation. The last point is critical for safety - If your house is "hot" during an outage, that power can't be permitted to leak onto the grid otherwise it would be extremely hazardous to workers that are restoring service.

The balcony solar kits are supposed to monitor grid power and they're supposed to shut off the power if grid power goes out. That's a lot of *should*. A certified solar compatible meter and panel solves that part of the problem, but it's stupidly expensive due to the regulatory requirements for permits and electricians to do the work. A homeowner can't simply ask the utility company to put in a solar meter. There's more to it and it makes the costs skyrocket.

I've started getting ads in my area (southern california) for "legal" balcony solar add-on kits. Under 2KW systems that as you say, just plug into a socket. Unfortunately they still require the solar meter which requires permits and an electrician, all of which is several times the cost of the actual balcony solar kit.

For an owner like me with a regular meter and panel, I can't just buy one of those kits. I'd have to get the meter and panel modified first. And that's very expensive.

Yes, it'll just become mandatory with credit card or ID age verification even for free accounts.

I foresee almost all online services requiring an age verification (the kind everyone hates when porn services use it) and then an age tiered product being offered. I could easily see a 2 or 3 tier youtube, for example.

Tier 1 would be full adult access no different than today.

Tier 2 would be very limited youth access, utilizing big data to identify when kids are trying to cheat by using multiple accounts. This would have both content and time limits, but the content filters would be fixed based on the most restrictive criteria.

Tier 3 would be "premium" youth, unlocked with a subscription of course. It would by default permit both the restricted youth content, but also educational content that might have otherwise been automatically blocked by the generic tier 2 standard (things like biology class videos, current event discussions, etc). It could also have parental controls that permit modification of usage time limits and various filter settings to allow or block content such as "biology", "politics", "violence", "religion", etc.

They could monetize the crap out of this, especially since many school districts have standardized on google classroom and you can't block youtube without also blocking google classroom, which can't possibly be an accident. Schools using google classroom would have to pay an additional premium to first authorize registered students into the age restricted service tier, and then they'd have to pay AGAIN to unlock educational content that would be somehow mysteriously blocked under the free tier 2 service.

I hate to say it but until it can install solar onto an expensive "100 year" tile roof that is somehow also extremely fragile, I can't be bothered. My stupid 100 year tile roof would cost over $80,000 to replace, and "market rate" maintenance is about $150 PER TILE.

Until solar can be safely installed on THAT kind of roof (very common in my area), it's just something that other people do.

I'm interested in "balcony solar" since apparently it's kind of legal now in more areas, but I don't have the correct meter and installing a solar meter would cost 4x what a top of the line balcony solar kit would cost. If the utility would install a solar meter and associated panel hardware/wiring for free, I'd max out balcony solar tomorrow. As it is, there's zero payout ever due to the up front costs and outdated regulatory hurdles.

Can that robot install a solar-rated power panel and meter? That would be useful.

I've read the book already and I'm re-reading it prior to going to see the movie. The book has about as much "real" science as any Asimov or Heinlein or Pournelle book, and meshes that fairly seamlessly to the "what if" science and plot portions of the book.

My big challenge is to see if I can get my kids to read the book before going to see the movie, and if I can get them to do that while it's still showing in IMAX.

Allow me to posit the following: we could very well be minding our own business but still strongly influence the rest of the world. For example, if a company wishes to do business in America -- the world's largest and most lucrative commercial market -- they must comply with US laws. This is no different than any other country. You may not like it, but that's how commercial business works, and it'd be no different if someone like North Korea had the market everyone wanted. You'd just be complaining about a different country.

Don't like it? Don't do business in the US and you're free to do whatever you want. You'll be excluding yourself from probably 70% of the available market, but you're free to make that choice.

Don't forget, your argument can be turned around quite easily: you could mind your own business and stop trying to tell the US how to do business according to your wants/needs. Funny how that works.

You're blissfully unaware of how national sovereignty works.

Good luck getting the US to accommodate an Interpol extradition request for 4chan and its personnel. There's no reason the US would agree to it since 4chan has violated no US law. So long as 4chan operates in the US exclusively and violates no US laws, they are effectively beyond the reach of the UK government. They could presumably nab some 4chan executive if they ever visited the UK, but all one has to do to avoid that is just not visit the UK.

This is how international legal disputes have been handled since the dawn of international legal disputes. Don't trust me, look it up, I'm sure chatgpt can fill you in.

Some areas would need additional legislative work to eliminate bureaucratic hurdles. For example, where I live in California the physical installation of the solar panels requires multiple permits and a structural engineering design, review, and approval process. You can't simply prop some panels up on a flat roof, balcony, or in the back yard because of California's permit-based approach to public safety on private property. A required portion of the balcony solar legislation involves getting approval for installation and use without requiring main panel and meter upgrades/replacement, because that work could cost several times the cost of the actual solar equipment. But the panel mounting itself also needs legislative relief from the existing permitting requirements. A homeowner *should* be allowed to put 4-6 panels pretty much anywhere they want and however they want, but again the engineering design, review, build, inspection, approval permitting process is prohibitively expensive and again can be far more expensive than the actual solar equipment.

It's about time they admitted to something that was obvious to almost everyone: nuclear power is the only effective path to carbon-free base load power generation. Wind and solar make good intermittent sources, but base load has to be utterly reliable regardless of whether the wind is blowing or the sun is shining. That's nuclear.

Getting rid of the nukes was a knee-jerk reaction, not a smart technological decision. The pivot to depending on oil and gas from a potential hostile neighbor just added to the madness.