It is possible to build an age verification system, where you use your actual ID with a cryptographic process without any personal data. The technology has existed for decades now.

I‘m already exploring Linux. Both GNOME and KDE actually have sensible UI design and consistency in their own way.

I‘m starting to lose hope that this will become better. They have been stuffing macOS and iOS with endless features and their UI design is optimized for nice looking screenshots, not actual use.

The worst is everybody else is still copying Apple‘s UI design trends.

Photos.app has never reached the usability of iPhoto, that it replaced. System Settings is a convoluted pile of over engineering.

The hoops you to jumpt through to run software I download from a website have reached infuriating levels.

Even Meta isn’t very successful with their much cheaper Meta Quest Series. VR Headsets are mostly toys.

Try downloading the file.

I have an iPad myself and try to use it to work every now and then. I always run into pretty basic limitations on iPadOS very quickly. For example working with large file on a network share is painful. The file manage is a slow toy compared to the Finder. The limited RAM and no swap means app will lose state regularly. Transferring data between applications is still cumbersome.

they were constantly talking about the push to unify macOS and iOS UI

They made several attempts at it and none succeeded. There’s lots of shared frameworks, Mac Catalyst, and Swift UI. None of them work consistently or are particularly good.

iOS and iPadOS have fundamental limitations baked into the design that severely limit it.

Making a unified mobile, tablet, touch, and desktop OS was also tried by Microsoft and Ubuntu and the results were weak to mixed.

What Apple really needs is a new paradigm. For that they need a vision, which they don’t have since Steve Jobs died.

This is very bad advice for cold weather.

Washing hands is overrated. It only leads to a weaker immune system.

This opium-cannabis-arsenic tincture will make you feel much better in no time.

Sure. Lots of fiction, especially TV stick to well established tropes, regardless of a human writing it or not.

I think the new Liquid Glass UI is meant to better support the rumored upcoming MacBooks with touch screens. The Mac’s UI has been wasting more and more space over the years, I think with this target in mind.

I go no ads. Using Firefox and Ublock Origin.

You can improve the novel writing by using agents. First you generate just an outline with the plot points to every chapter. Then you chop that up and feed it to several agents to flesh out individual chapters. Finally the generated chapters are verified against the outline and overall plot. If that doesn’t fit, the agents are tasked with a rewrite. Repeat that until you have something serviceable.

As you point out, there exists plenty of bad writing in TV series. These often have a number of different authors, who don’t necessarily know the other episodes very well.

One of Netanyahu’s sons was a press officer behind the lines, but the other was with combat intelligence at the front.

Israel is different in this regard. Everybody serves in the army. It’s also a small country. The military Is closely woven into society. The IDF is not a professional army, but mostly made up of reservists who are called up as needed. That means the political leaders will know people personally who have to fight.

What unit you serve in can make a big difference for your later success in life. Combat units, special forces, Air Force, and intelligence have the highest prestige.

Politicians benefit immensely in their credibility, if they have a distinct military career.

Yanis talking without shutting up while rolling sounds like a fun time.

Valid. Employers want people they hire to do as they are told.

Interesting research for sure. They do a lot of statistical analysis on simple markings of objects found in Europe. They somewhat resemble the predecessors of cuneiform (Sumerian) writing systems. So it’s not letters or hieroglyphics, but something more simple like numbers, movements, or a memory aid of some kind. It would be interesting to see a comparison to old Asian, African, and Amerindian cultures.

Our results illustrate that the statistical properties of sign sequences from the Swabian Aurignacian are very similar to those of the Uruk V protocuneiform period (roughly 3500 to 3350 BC). For the later protocuneiform periods of Uruk IV (roughly 3350 to 3200 BC) and Uruk III (roughly 3200 to 3000 BC), however, we already find a significant divergence toward higher information encoding potential.

The qualification is social proof, that you’re from at least middle class background. Meaning you have a little manners and know social codes.

There are many nice and FOSS GUIs for the tasks ffmpeg is usually used for.

Handbrake is a great example for macOS, windows, Linux.

For more advanced video compression Shutter Encoder is fantastic.

Good old AVIDemux has a few other cool features as well, like cutting without reencoding.

There are also a bunch of straight up ffmpeg front ends as well.

Why do people use those shitty websites?

They show up as a fast and easy option without having to research, download, install, and learn to use a more complicated application.

Lexx was a British-German-Canadian production.

Lexx is a British-Canadian-German production.