And that attitude is why you are going to lose.

They cant get their own designs manufactured on EUV machines built by a Dutch company, due to export restrictions placed on those machines by the US...

Which just means that China will develop its own independent capability.

And yes, that might take 10-20 years, but to China thats not a long time, thats just the time it takes - while other countries think about timescales in 5-10 year spurts, China has plans set out 50 years ahead. And China accepts that things take time.

So it really depends on what you mean by "fast".

Ahh no, services and software are not included in the trade deficit calculations for some reason...

So the fact that the world uses American cloud services, financial services and other things - yeah, not important, and you should definitely ignore the fact that those things alone flip deficits on their heads for most countries.

The US: "You arent buying enough from us! You need to buy more from us!"

Also the US: "You cant buy basically anything that you actually need, we forbid it - buy more cheap bulk goods that you can get from anywhere rather than the technology goods you actually want perhaps?"

And there are ice cores going back before then where CO2 was much higher.

It *is* the equivalent of a visa because it dictates whether or not you can travel to the US. If you cannot travel to the US, you cannot use your visa waiver privilege.

They can call it whatever they want, and you can fixate on the name if you want to bury your head in the sand.

There is literally no way to travel to the US currently without either an ESTA or a visa. At this point, visa waiver doesnt matter because its been nullified by the ESTA requirement.

"Hey, you no longer need prior permission to travel to the US, how cool is that!!! Oh, but you need to ask permission to travel to the US before you can use that privilege..."

Sorry but I disagree - an ESTA dictates whether you can travel at all, it does not fill the same role as an arrivals card because you are already in transit at that point, and arrivals cards also cover things like bio security, customs requirements etc.

With the expansion of ESTA to entry by land in 2022, you literally cannot present at any US entry point without having been approved first by the US government - if you do not have that permission, you cant use your visa waiver privilege at all, and the point of that privilege was that you did not need prior permission!

If you were eligible to get an ESTA, then you were eligible for VWP - without the ESTA existing you wouldnt be going to an consulate, you would just be flying/driving/sailing/walking/whatever to the US. And you still have the same likelihood of being granted entry.

My point is, the VWP is pointless because it was supposed to be a "you dont need to apply for permission before travelling" privilege for some countries citizens, and now it very much is a "theres no way to go to the US without applying for permission before travelling".

Effectively, you now need prior permission to travel to the US. Either its with an ESTA or its with an actual traditional visa.

Also, the ranking is flawed because most western nations these days require a pre-travel electronic authorisation of some sort, which basically is the equivalent to a visa (you cant travel to the country without one).

For example, the US has a Visa Waiver Program with many countries, which technically means you can travel to the US without applying for a visa.

But, since 2007 you have needed either an ESTA or an actual issued visa before you can travel to the US by sea or air.

And the ESTA requirement was expanded to travel by land in 2022, basically meaning there is no way to arrive at the US without prior approval - so in actuality, the ESTA is now a visa for the US, but not one which allows actual entry, just the possibility of entry.

Be honest....I bet you like many people, myself included, have several USB chargers sat in a drawer unused which will just end up in landfill which is why these regulations were brought in. I bought a 6 port USB charger years ago so every charger that came with anything I bought was just thrown in a drawer, unused. I now just have a GaN charger, they're dirt cheap like £60 for a 200W 6 port one from Anker.

Oh piss off.

Several of the manufacturers involved here either are, have been or will shortly be, involved in motor sports - where they will collectively spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year eeking out another 1% performance gain or efficiency gain out of an engine which is already vastly more performant or efficient than the engines we use as consumers.

These manufacturers can meet the regulations, they choose not to.

It's common practice both online at larger sites and amongst many national brick and mortar retail chains to whack up prices in the month or two prior to a sale so they can then drop them back to pre-rise prices and claim they're on sale at a double digit percentage saving.

You're missing the point. It's point isn't to be profitable on its own, it's to put advertisements into your home to drive sales, to listen to your conversations to harvest data which it can sell and also use to drive sales. Alexa is very profitable when you factor in the profits Amazon make from sales they wouldn't have otherwise done without tailored ads fed to Alexa devices from the data said device has harvested from you.

Advertising is a small part of the experience....one that people don't want especially on a device they've paid for which has a service they have to pay a subscription to use.

Ddisable Wifi and Bluetooth scanning in Location Services then tell me how well you get on.