Spot on, batteries are supposed to be consumables that are easily swapped out, but manufacturers are keen on sealing the battery inside so that the whole device becomes a consumable from the perspective of an average consumer.

Same here, I tend to pay attention to the melody rather than any of the lyrics unless I actively try otherwise.

English is my second-ish language, but perhaps I have an unfair advantage for this question since I spent nearly all of my childhood in the US and started learning English at age 5.

It wouldn’t be outwardly noticeable, but the remaining non-native element for me would be the alphabet. I learned the English alphabet well before learning English itself, so the sounds of the individual letters are in my mind still part of my first language. In other words, whenever I recite the alphabet or spell words out loud letter-by-letter, it feels as though I am switching back to my first language.

Am wondering, how do you complete a transaction on Aliexpress? On Librewolf and Firefox, something always goes wrong for me at some point, usually a bogus security check failing or buttons mysteriously ceasing to work.

The monitor my work provided me is much more recent and it touts:

• Reduced blue light emissions (thought I don’t know how that should be achieved without affecting color accuracy)
• 90 Hz refresh rate
• Potentiometric brightness control to avoid PWM flicker

Some individuals are much more sensitive to the latter two, but I don’t feel much of a downgrade when I come home to my crappy old monitors, hence I joke that my eyes suck.

If it involves much creative vision, I prefer working alone. If it’s more grunt work, I’m happy to work in a group and at least get some time to socialize with colleagues out of it.

AI is just another tool in the box, never a substitute for an actual person.

Hard to say personally since I can’t remember the last time I had a real-life conversation go tense. I’ll entertain some pretty wild thoughts, but once the other party centers the debate over emotion at the expense of evidence, I’d say that’s the point I start losing patience.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the Slate Truck/SUV ends up being just marketing hype, but I’m keeping my eye on it since they promise a minimalist EV where you plug in the smarts in the form of your own smartphone. Otherwise, it’s just a dumb EV, which is how I’d keep it.

My eyes would bleed at the sight of my laptop’s 1366x768 TN panel if I got used to anything better! Those are the “good” monitors haha.

7.5/10. I find that most people I encounter, even if they support causes against those which I support, would agree with my viewpoints, as long as I don’t say “socialism”. That is an unfortunate consequence of being raised in an environment of capitalist realism.

Where’s the other 2.5 points? I’ll happily listen to my opponents recount the life experiences and thought processes that make them oppose my viewpoints. But for my own sanity, I refuse to engage with those who merely throw attacks at me.

I back off from arguing on the internet in general, also for my own sanity.

• Phones on contract payment plans
• New monitors: Maybe my eyes suck, but my set of two 21-inch LCD monitors from 2005 is still going strong
• Third-party meal delivery: I’m fine sitting down with a microwaved meal or some canned soup if I don’t feel like cooking
• A new car every x years: My car of choice is old and relatively cheap, so I could afford to pay in full in cash. Bonus of being spyware-free, so I’ll just maintain it for as long as I can.
• Stuff from Aliexpress, Temu and the like: the user experience is horrendous, customer service is nonexistent, and discount codes are pure gimmicks

Russell Brand

Uh-oh

The algorithm should already give you plenty.

The sink. It never occurred to me that people regularly brush their teeth in the shower until now.

I used to brush without wetting the toothbrush, but ever since I saw a fruit fly on my toothbrush, I’ve rinsed it off before using.

For most people, nothing drastic aside from college if they do start at the typical age of 18. Not that things won’t change, but change will be gradual. Depending on where you live, you may gain the privilege to vote, join the military, drink, smoke, or be tried as an adult. The former two are up to you, but the latter three make for bad habits.

If you are on good terms with your family, cherish the time you have with them. That is often the first thing to start drying up. The next decade is a good time to find out what you’d like to do, special skills you’d like to learn, the people you want to have by your side, and the things that will keep your mind and body happy.

Nice, that’s a better rugged laptop than I imagined. Seems to be a fortified variant of a regular Latitude, so you should have access to interchangeable parts for years to come.

The implications of the ageing feature mean that I wouldn’t ever use it, or I would never leave once I let it run. Unless that piece of media features time travel that translates into the real world.

I’d love to go for a walk through the museum on those old multimedia encyclopedia CDs. Probably would visit some childhood memories on old cartoon tapes as well. And go for a spin on the Death Star.

It is on the back of my mind, but there’s only so much I can do as a civilian. And I’ve already got enough personal stuff to keep me busy before turning to the news.

Some form of lentil or bean stew. Best if served over (brown) rice and vegetables, which are also easily prepared in a rice cooker / steamer combo.

I won’t pretend that I have self-hosted storage that is reliably accessible from beyond my home, but most people who have set up a self-hosted cloud drive report that it can be done in a matter of hours on cheap second-hand hardware, which would also save you on subscription costs. You’ll also be spending some time migrating files over in either case already.

A fine start, but I think the plan could be made a bit more sustainable.

1. Make a threat model. Hardware that is impenetrable today might not be as secure five years later as new security vulnerabilities are found. Who or what do you want to defend against?

2. If you don’t use an OS that phones home, options without AI-enhanced wiretapping will still be around for years to come. There’s also several existing layers of hardware-related wiretapping to consider: the Intel ME, AMD PSP, BIOS, embedded controller firmware, SSD firmware, input peripherals, etc.

3. I’d be happy to be proven wrong, but what you have sounds like specialty hardware, for which parts will become increasingly rare and expensive over 8 to 9 years. Ironically, common business-class laptops could be more future-proof by this metric, unless perhaps you plan on using one out in the field or in a metal foundry.

4. Laptops are fundamentally like desktop computers, just in a portable form factor. Any security measure on a laptop can be more or less replicated on a desktop computer.