dangeresque's recent activity

  1. Comment on HP wants you to pay up to $36/month to rent a printer that it monitors in ~tech

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    You get the overpriced ink for "free". Also, I'm curious (but not curious enough to spend any time looking into it) whether they extend warranty and provide service in the event of breakage, like...

    Is there something in these subscription printers that a non-enterprise consumer would need?

    You get the overpriced ink for "free". Also, I'm curious (but not curious enough to spend any time looking into it) whether they extend warranty and provide service in the event of breakage, like you get in a typical corporate copier lease.

    3 votes

  2. Comment on <deleted topic> in ~tech

    dangeresque
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    Dan and Jordan covered this on Knowledge Fight because they cover Alex Jones and Alex Jones covered this. It's a fascinating episode.

    Dan and Jordan covered this on Knowledge Fight because they cover Alex Jones and Alex Jones covered this. It's a fascinating episode.

    3 votes

  3. Comment on Subaru cars phone home to 3G cellular network that no longer exists - drains battery in ~transport

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    This probably varies widely by make and model.

    This probably varies widely by make and model.

  4. Comment on Why is Popeyes so good? in ~food

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    One way to ease a guilty conscience is that any time you give money to those Chick-fil-A fucks, donate the same amount of money to The Trevor Project. Everybody has a vice. Just try to minimize...

    One way to ease a guilty conscience is that any time you give money to those Chick-fil-A fucks, donate the same amount of money to The Trevor Project. Everybody has a vice. Just try to minimize the damage.

    4 votes

  5. Comment on Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s job is at risk after US House of Representatives votes to move ahead with hard-right effort to oust him in ~misc

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    Gaetz declared that he will "absolutely not" put himself forward for the position. He's a coward who wants to sit in the corner and shriek. He doesn't want to actually be responsible for anything.

    Gaetz declared that he will "absolutely not" put himself forward for the position. He's a coward who wants to sit in the corner and shriek. He doesn't want to actually be responsible for anything.

    21 votes

  6. Comment on Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California dies at 90 in ~news

    dangeresque
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    We've been brainwashed by corporate interests into believing that term limits are a good thing. Term limits are a bad thing. They reduce institutional knowledge and experience and keep the...

    We've been brainwashed by corporate interests into believing that term limits are a good thing. Term limits are a bad thing. They reduce institutional knowledge and experience and keep the revolving door a-spinning. This way, lobbyists are the only people in politics who know how the system works. Fresh-faced politicians have no chance against lobbyists when they don't have more experienced politicians who can show them the ropes, because they're all fresh-faced.

    Baltimore City recently passed a charter amendment to impose term limits on most elected officials in a question that was squeezed into the ballot at the last minute and was funded almost entirely by the executive chairman of Sinclair Broadcast Group... because if you have no chance to win in a hardcore Democratic stronghold, you can at least ban Democrats from electing the people that they think are doing a good job.

    The term limit initiative was coupled with a recall initiative as well, which failed to gather enough petition signatures for ballot placement. Because for some reason David Smith and his ilk wished they could recall the new mayor and return the chair to one of the corrupt bastards who have been running the city into the ground for the last few decades, who are exactly the type of people that we are told that term limits are supposed to kick out.

    We as a whole country need to be more willing to accept primary challenges and try to chip away at the ridiculous advantage that incumbency has in an election. But term limits are anti-democratic, as they remove the citizenry's choice to vote for the person that they like.

    4 votes

  7. Comment on Unlimited Kagi searches for $10 per month in ~tech

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    @lux provided a lot more detail than I can come up with... but I'd like to add/reinforce that the results I've been getting from Kagi in the ~4 months (and 3,615 total queries) I've been using it...

    @lux provided a lot more detail than I can come up with... but I'd like to add/reinforce that the results I've been getting from Kagi in the ~4 months (and 3,615 total queries) I've been using it have been utterly fantastic. I've used DDG for a very long time, and I'd found myself needing to !g more and more in the last couple years... but even Google has been getting really bad at showing me what I'm actually looking for, and now just outright ignores you when you try to refine and specify your query. But I've only felt the need to try Google or DDG a handful of times in the last few months when I couldn't find what I was looking for on Kagi.... and in those cases, Google and DDG also didn't help. Kagi really has been that fantastic, even in some obscure and specific subjects that I wouldn't have expected their index to be complete enough to handle yet.

    I'd also like to add that while people here keep talking about the lack of ads, I want to de-emphasize the ads themselves and bring more attention to the clarity of the business model: Give money, receive services. It's straightforward. You don't need to worry about how they're paying for the free stuff they give you. The price is right there on the sticker.

    14 votes

  8. Comment on Hundreds of flying taxis to be made in Ohio, home of the Wright brothers and astronaut legends in ~engineering

  9. Comment on Hundreds of flying taxis to be made in Ohio, home of the Wright brothers and astronaut legends in ~engineering

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    It's not so much that public transit budget was allocated to hyperloop, but that hyperloop pulled public and government interest away from real things, delaying the funding and approval of those...

    It's not so much that public transit budget was allocated to hyperloop, but that hyperloop pulled public and government interest away from real things, delaying the funding and approval of those real things.

    But, it also DID divert public money from competent public transit in Las Vegas. They could have decided to build a subway system, but instead they have a tube that Teslas get stuck in.

    2 votes

  10. Comment on It’s official: Cars are the worst product category we have ever reviewed for privacy in ~tech

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    Perfect! I will have not received what I paid for, so I'll just take it back! When congress won't do their job, I feel like this is the only way to communicate displeasure to the manufacturers.

    Perfect! I will have not received what I paid for, so I'll just take it back! When congress won't do their job, I feel like this is the only way to communicate displeasure to the manufacturers.

    3 votes

  11. Comment on It’s official: Cars are the worst product category we have ever reviewed for privacy in ~tech

    dangeresque
    (edited )
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    I'm about to buy a new Subaru. What happens when I read and do not consent to the privacy policies in the infotainment system after I've already bought the car? I can simply return it, right?

    I'm about to buy a new Subaru.

    What happens when I read and do not consent to the privacy policies in the infotainment system after I've already bought the car? I can simply return it, right?

  12. Comment on Armed with traffic cones, protesters are immobilizing driverless cars in San Francisco in ~transport

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    You and I have discussed this elsewhere in the thread, but I think it bears repeating that the key issue here is liability. I think I am truly okay with less-than-perfect as long as the...

    But short term, anything that's as good as human is good enough. Even if, as harsh as it sounds, people get killed by these vehicles; as long as it's less dead than with the vehicles they replaced, that's a net save.

    You and I have discussed this elsewhere in the thread, but I think it bears repeating that the key issue here is liability. I think I am truly okay with less-than-perfect as long as the manufacturer bears the liability to the exact same degree that the driver would in any non-autonomous situation. But if the owner bears the liability when the manufacturer's program goes awry, then the manufacturer is only incentivized to make people think their cars are safe rather than to actually make them safe.

    3 votes

  13. Comment on Armed with traffic cones, protesters are immobilizing driverless cars in San Francisco in ~transport

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    imo I can't wait for level 4 to become an actual thing in the market and for level 2 and 3 autonomy to be outright banned. That would simplify the line: You are either driving or you are not...

    imo I can't wait for level 4 to become an actual thing in the market and for level 2 and 3 autonomy to be outright banned. That would simplify the line: You are either driving or you are not driving. There is no in between. There is no "oh this one active safety feature malfunctioned and yanked the wheel to the left and I couldn't overpower it to keep the car straight". There is no "WARNING YOU NEED TO SUDDENLY LEAP OUT OF YOUR HALF-NAP TO LOOK AROUND AND TAKE CONTROL BECAUSE IDIOT COMPUTER CAN'T FIGURE OUT WHAT'S GOING ON" 2 seconds before you plow into a wall and then let the manufacturer claim that you were in control when the car plowed into that wall. All active automated control should be disabled while the driver is driving, and the safety features limited to warnings and alerts.

    3 votes

  14. Comment on Armed with traffic cones, protesters are immobilizing driverless cars in San Francisco in ~transport

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    If manufacturers accepted liability for any casualties their self-driving tech causes, then I frankly wouldn't care about normalizing the data or see the need to debate about its safety....

    If manufacturers accepted liability for any casualties their self-driving tech causes, then I frankly wouldn't care about normalizing the data or see the need to debate about its safety. Manufacturers wouldn't need to lie about the safety of their cars in order to gain acceptance, because if they weren't safe they'd simply go broke.

    3 votes

  15. Comment on Armed with traffic cones, protesters are immobilizing driverless cars in San Francisco in ~transport

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    The subject I notice is missing from most of these conversations is liability. Tesla gets away with having a shitty safety record because their self-driving tech is beta tested by suckers who pay...

    The subject I notice is missing from most of these conversations is liability. Tesla gets away with having a shitty safety record because their self-driving tech is beta tested by suckers who pay for the privilege and accept all responsibility for anything their car does because they're "technically" at the wheel. If you force manufacturers to provide unlimited liability insurance for their self-driving vehicles, I think you'll find they quickly become more responsible.

    8 votes

  16. Comment on Python in Excel: Combining the power of Python and the flexibility of Excel in ~comp

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    What makes Python running in an Excel document any different from VBA running in an Excel document?

    What makes Python running in an Excel document any different from VBA running in an Excel document?

  17. Comment on Python in Excel: Combining the power of Python and the flexibility of Excel in ~comp

    dangeresque
    Link
    Cloud-dependent for absolutely NO reason other than controlling your data.

    Cloud-dependent for absolutely NO reason other than controlling your data.

    7 votes

  18. Comment on It looks like Facebook will be forcing me to switch to Messenger. What are my options? in ~tech

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    Signal pushes the theoretical limits of how private and secure a centralized messaging platform can possibly be, and I'm not exaggerating. Their servers know almost nothing about you. The servers...

    Signal pushes the theoretical limits of how private and secure a centralized messaging platform can possibly be, and I'm not exaggerating. Their servers know almost nothing about you. The servers can't tell what groups you are actively chatting in. They can't even identify the sender of most messages.

    Matrix's default settings are less secure, and its decentralized nature widens the possible attack surface. Of course, if you're careful, you can use Matrix as securely as you can use Signal. But you're right that it is a bit more daunting for the tech-illiterate to get started with. IMO Signal is the better recommendation for the general public if you don't need the more expansive IRC-like features of Matrix rooms.

    3 votes

  19. Comment on Bosses dislike work-from-home but suspect they’re stuck with it in ~finance

    dangeresque
    Link Parent
    It's especially frustrating with a brain like mine which cannot handle rapidly switching between tasks. I can be in an incredibly productive groove and if I'm interrupted by something unimportant...

    It's especially frustrating with a brain like mine which cannot handle rapidly switching between tasks. I can be in an incredibly productive groove and if I'm interrupted by something unimportant but requires more than a modicum of thought then my momentum is gone. You may have only taken five minutes of my time but you easily wasted an hour of my productivity.

    3 votes