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Comment Re:Beanie Babies (Score 1) 48

Given the boom and bust cycle of fads like this, you also might not want to best they will,

Absolutely agree. I wouldn't bet either way, but I might bet on the company's ability to make the right bet.

In general, there are very few collectibles that can beat an index fund for returns. Those that do tend to do so because some particular instance had some association with someone famous, which means you're not ordering it from Amazon.

It is much easier to choose an index fund than guess which detritus will sell like Paul Newman's Rolex and acquire it before someone else.

Comment Education isn't about knowledge (Score 2) 133

if you go in to it thinking it is, or worse, wanting it to be, you will be very disappointed.

University sells you a bundle of services:

- Prefab peer collection - you get to pick friends/lovers/hopefully a partner from a pool of your supposed peers.

- Training to act like an adult while still adulting with training wheels.

- Somewhat related, but having time and space to explore who you want to be.

- Certification that you're capable of some professional acts that you will probably not use, but will get you in the door for some other job.

- And yes, if you want to learn, you can do that too, but many people don't. This is mainly training in how to pursue your own goals while paying lip service to someone else's. (Don't diminish the value of this - this is how most people spend most of their lives.)

Comment Re:Now do USPS (Score 1) 65

right, they modded me troll decade and a half ago here when I said the nations will fall apart, governments will fail, libertarian ideas will take hold. They are modding me troll today, yet it is exactly what is happening. It is possible that people are actually afraid that my comments will cause ot to jappen somehow should more people read them. My comments are not the reason anything happens, that is magical thinking by the fearful moderators. My comments are a prediction and the reality is moving in the direction of my prediction.

Comment Re:Now do USPS (Score -1, Flamebait) 65

see, here nobody accepts my belief system, they have moded both of my comments as "troll", yet I never troll here, I always say what I mean when it comes to tech, politics and economics. To mode my comments as "troll" means to declare that I do not believe and practice what I say or maybe that I am trying to start some sort of a riot. The former assumes that I am not serious, the latter assumes that everyone reading these comments camnot engage in civilized discourse, it is disgusting really, that people deny others their intentions or agency.

Comment Re:Now do USPS (Score 0, Troll) 65

Correct, government shouldn't be running services, this is up to the private individuals to satisfy needs at an agreed price. Years ago here I said that at some point in the 21st century we will see collapse of the government structures, we are observing it now. The next logical step is to have all services, no matter what they are to be done privately if needed. This is what I am rooting for, I am hoping to see it in this life time.

Comment Re:Been using it for ~ 8 years ... (Score 1) 98

Lately, HA has focused on voice control, and there seem to be a strong push that yielded some tangible results.

I don't use it myself, so I don't have first hand experience.

But the web site now has a section on voice control.

And there was blog post on it too.

If you search Youtube, you will find people implementing the above too.

Comment Re:Couldn't happen to nicer people (Score 4, Insightful) 115

Also busses, tractors and combines and all sorts of farm equipment, everything that could be looted from businesses and homes was looted. Hundreds of thousands of children were kidnapped.

ruzzia is a scourge, always was always will be, unfit to exist on this planet.

Every time I say it here, I am moded down as a troll, doesn't change the reality.

Comment Been using it for ~ 8 years ... (Score 1) 98

I am a Home Assistant user for at least 8 years.

Initially, it was for automating a few things, including existing door/window sensors from a legacy alarm manufacturer. Using RTL-SDR and rtl_433 I was able to intercept the messages, have them decoded, and into Home Assistant over MQTT.

Then it started to be essential for things like: if you leave a door or window open for more than x minutes, it will complain, unless you turn off that automation temporarily.

Now it does many things: Outdoor temperature, humidity, wind speed, wind direction, and rainfall. Indoor temperature, humidity, Volatile Organic Compounds, CO2, Radon.

It also emails me a weather forecast in the morning and evening. The contents are aggregated from the weather station, and two different sources for the forecasts (Environment Canada, and Met.no [Norway's weather service which covers the globe]).

It also runs my humidifier in winter, factoring in the values for indoor humidity as well as outdoor temperature (to reduce condensation on the windows).

And it interfaces to my Ecobee thermostat, via HomeKit, so it is cloud-free (not depending on an internet connection at all).

Overall, it is a nifty project. Very useful, very customizable.
My only gripe is that they discontinued support for running from a Python venv. I had to move to a Docker container instead. That made certain things that I have been using for years not work anymore (e.g. voice alerts, sending emails from shell scripts). I created workarounds for those, and they work well.

Comment Re:Saved from the Ellisons, at least (Score 4, Informative) 73

So you forgot when Netflix was funding the Biden fascism machine?

Honestly, yeah, I do. When was this, and what was the pro-fascist action?

We need a right-winger billionaire to balance Soros

You've got plenty. Publicly known support from home-grown billionaires (this omits foreign actors like MBS giving billions to his family, donations to 501c3s, "partnerships", his shitcoin bribe pipeline, and any quiet bribes be haven't heard about yet):

- Richard Kurtz
- Steve Wynn
- Bernard Marcus
- Elon Musk
- Cameron Winklevoss
- Tyler Winklevoss
- Miriam Adelson
- Jimmy John Liautaud
- Geoffrey Palmer
- Don Ahern
- Roger Penske
- Robert Johnson
- Timothy Dunn
- Elizabeth Uihlein
- Richard Uihlein
- Phil Ruffin
- Linda McMahon
- Diane Hendricks
- George Bishop
- J. Joe Ricketts
- Douglas Leone
- Andrew Beal
- Larry Ellison
- Kenny Troutt
- Kelcy Warren
- Jeff Sprecher
- Kelly Loeffler
- Antonio Gracias

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