i just don’t know what keeps these guys in business.
I've never heard of this company in the US, but I assume they have super cheap rates. That means they will continue to be the first choice of shippers that are covering shipping costs. This is especially true for high-volume businesses that move so much product it's cheaper to replace a couple of lost packages than to pay a better shipping company for every one.
Yeah, I think that list overemphasises the role of fiction in individual inventions. Most significant inventions have messy histories of iterative development and multiple sources of inspiration with varying degrees of influence. Here is a patent for a taser-like devices that predate the taser and doesn't use that name: https://www.freepatentsonline.com/3523538.html. It was also invented by a Japanese guy who probably never read the electric rifle book. The later company and commercial product just used the book as loose inspiration for the name.
On the other hand, that last paragraph in the long post undersells the role of fiction in how people's worldviews are shaped and how it can influence their everyday decisions. I think that's way more significant than any one invention, but it's even messier and hard to trace conclusively.
In the past the dangerous morons sent their kids to die in war, and the people who stayed behind were the ones who were more peaceful
Historically, the number of people who have been offered a choice about whether or not their children would participate in a war is vanishingly small compared to those who have not.
I think that's because in the first case, the amp modeller is only replacing a piece of hardware or software they already have. It doesn't do anything particularly "intelligent" from the perspective of the user, so I don't think using "AI" in the marketing campaign would be very effective. LLMs and photo generators have made such a big splash in the popular consciousness that people associate AI with generative processes, and other applications leave them asking, "where's the intelligent part?"
In the second case, it's replacing the human. The generative behaviors match people's expectations while record label and streaming company MBAs cream their pants at the thought of being able to pay artists even less.
its up to a parent to deal with it
What a nice cherry on top of the hypocrisy pie. The party of "personal responsibility" and "small government" is perfectly happy when government is used to regulate sexuality and help out the irresponsible parents that don't want to spend time monitoring their children's Internet usage. Now young teens are going to learn how to use VPNs or just find the shadier sites that don't give a shit about U.S. state laws.
Both of which would be adequately addressed by parents learning how to use the tools that are probably already built into their router.
Having watched from the outside as other people make this transition, it never looks fun. At least in large organizations, it just looks like a ton of added responsibility without enough additional authority to make meaningful change.
I remember having a period of time like this when I was enlisted - I was held responsible for the completion of tasks but not given authority to reward or correct the behavior of those in my charge. I would absolutely loathe being in that position again in the civilian world.
I don't think that's quite accurate.
The "understand it well enough to explain it to a professor" clause is carrying a lot of weight here - if that part is fulfilled, then yeah, you're actually learning something.
Unless of course, all of the professors are awful at their jobs too. Most of mine were pretty good at asking very pointed questions to figure out what you actually know, and could easily unmask a bullshit artist with a short conversation.
Materials that are actually bulletproof to anything more than 22LR and birdshot don't dent like this.
I like the combination of the absurdly-new tech and a nearly 70 year old front sight post design. Not even a red dot.
FSP gang represent, no other AR sight is better, fight me.
Ready to fly...
I was presented with this captcha before completing an online purchase this morning on my phone. The window is too small to see all of the images or the "Verify" button.
I did eventually realize that I can swipe upwards to scroll down a bit and see the rest, but there's no visual indicator to do so. It took me a bit to figure it out.
My favorite is when it actually says "out for delivery" on the day it's supposed to arrive, never shows up, then changes to "could not be delivered" after not showing up.
I called FedEx last time this happened because the delivery was a firearm, and I needed to know what's happened. The person said it was loaded on a truck that morning, which triggered the status change to "out for delivery", but they didn't actually have anyone scheduled to drive the truck that day so it never even left the lot. It did arrive the next day, but I learned to not even trust "out for delivery" from them.
Awesome system, guys.