Jake

Jake

  • Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
    Speaking of which... https://twitter.com/brianroemmele/status/1721197147943829558 Douglas Adams: In my radio series and the novel I adapted it into, I included a passage about "robots with Genuine People Personalities(tm)" as a cautionary tale and/or spoof of how people thought the future would...
  • Commented on Fuck the Monarchy
    I'd be more enthusiastic in my endorsement of this position if I thought the sort of person who gets to be in charge of the elected bits of our government would be an improvement....
  • Commented on Crib Sheet: Escape from Yokai Land
    Not terribly germane to the topic, but just for the record, "Dilbert Stark" is the best nickname for Elon Musk I've ever heard and I'm going to be calling him that exclusively from now on....
  • Commented on An AI app walks into a writers room
    All that aside, I'm now intensely curious as to what our gracious host would do if he was really asked to write the script for a Wallace and Gromit short....
  • Commented on Decision Fatigue
    Considering the likely disposition of the sort of people who would seriously consider going into tax exile on Mars, it may well come to that. It probably won't be a literal gun, that kind of frightener would draw too much...
  • Commented on Strong and Stable!
    "Known to UK rail types as "Thunderbirds" (meaning International Rescue, not USAF display team). For anyone who wasn't paying attention to the railway press at the time: This is because Richard Branson paid a significant amount of money to name...
  • Commented on Strong and Stable!
    You know what, that's valid. Although that might be somewhat temporary one way or the other....
  • Commented on Strong and Stable!
    On the plus side, by the time they can no longer procrastinate about holding an election there's a strong possibility of the Tories getting so badly clobbered that the official opposition ends up being the Lib Dems while the Tories...
  • Commented on London Bridge
    The EU is also rather more decentralised in its setup than any actual country, even the United States. If and when it gets to the point of being an actual nation with its own foreign and defence policy, its own...
  • Commented on London Bridge
    Meeting our newly appointed Prime Minister and thinking, "Oh, bugger all this for a lark, I'm leaving early to avoid the rush," is not an entirely unreasonable reaction if you ask me....
  • Commented on The gathering crisis
    Doesn't mean they can't start another one that aligns more closely with their objectives and values. But the point I was trying to make is that if the party of government makes a policy of only abiding by referendums (or...
  • Commented on The gathering crisis
    If I had to guess, I'd say that would be the point at which we start hearing the phrase "paramilitary wing of the SNP" on the evening news....
  • Commented on Omicron
    Personally, I don't think there's going to be another lockdown... Or rather, there might or might not be a lockdown on paper, but in practice everyone will ignore it and do whatever they want because who the hell cares anymore?...
  • Commented on An update on the revolutionary experiment
    Personally, I've always thought the best argument against abolishing the monarchy is the question of who might be elected to whatever office we choose to replace it with. As our host notes, a democracy is only as good as the...
  • Commented on Because I am bored ...
    Are you sure it's safe to risk giving Musk ideas? Then again, so far as I'm aware he hasn't tried fuelling one of his rockets with FOOF and dimethyl mercury, so it's unlikely he's one of your fans....
  • Commented on "It'll all be over by Christmas" (Part 2)
    I can't speak for everyone, but I wouldn't have the first clue where to buy one; they were on sale in a local corner shop at one point, for a ridiculous mark-up, but they're long gone. I was also under...
  • Commented on Public appearances in a time of pandemic
    Which means that DT's chances of re-election, are effectively zero. UNLESS - he postpones the election.... He can't, at least not unilaterally. At minimum he'd need both levels of Congress to agree to it, which would be an uphill struggle...
  • Commented on COVID-19
    Five litres per person/day is probably optimistic for California, at least in the middle of summer with no air conditioning. To the point where it's likely not worth stockpiling much drinking water at all: One of those handpumps with a...
  • Commented on Tentative hypothesis
    Fair enough then. I'm the sort of Linux user who'd rather make do with an inferior FOSS alternative than use WINE as a substitute for real Linux support, but I'll keep it in mind if I ever get the urge...
  • Commented on Tentative hypothesis
    You know, I'm sure I remember there being a native Linux port for Scrivener, which I messed around with for about half a day before giving up and going back to LibreOffice because it was too damn complicated. Did that...
  • Commented on CASE NIGHTMARE BLONDE
    As I understand it, devolution was basically a privilege granted by Parliament, and could therefore be rescinded at will. Sure they could, if they didn't mind a civil war breaking out in the province where we keep all our nuclear...
  • Commented on Upcoming events
    Further to which, is it just me or is the vaccuum cleaner the only really worthwhile thing Dyson have ever made? The other products of theirs that I've encountered seem to be an object lesson in why "innovative" and "unconventional"...
  • Commented on The Inevitable Brexit Thread (1)
    On the other hand, nobody really wants to talk about this too loudly, but Her Majesty isn't going to be around that much longer. How much does she really have left to lose, given that it's all going to be...
  • Commented on Brexit! Means! Brexit!
    And it's not the Leave voters who've been stockpiling emergency supplies of food, putting solar panels on their roofs and so on in anticipation of everything going tits up, is it?...
  • Commented on That sinking feeling
    That doesn't just apply to Ireland. I'm sure the application process for "settled status" for EU nationals is going to be efficient as any other part of this process, so on B-Day +1 a lot of people will have missed...
  • Commented on That sinking feeling
    I'm too young to remember any of this, so correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm fairly sure this country didn't have an existing "lost generation" of disaffected casualties of a previous economic crisis in the Seventies. How many foodbanks...
  • Commented on That sinking feeling
    Here's another cheery thought for you all. Everything our host just said about the police (redundancies and budget cuts, personnel having their own families to worry about when things start to get bad etc) also applies to the Army....
  • Commented on Unsustainable Interstellar Civilization, Hotspot Colonies, and Dwarf Culture
    My one issue with this is that there's several practical advantages to going the sustainability route from day one. The equipment needed to extract and process oil is going to take up a large chunk of their mass budget, and...
  • Commented on Crying fire in a crowded theatre for pleasure and profit
    I was thinking more that fistfights breaking out over who got a hood and who had to make do with holding their breath would create at least as many problems as they might have theoretically solved....
  • Commented on Crying fire in a crowded theatre for pleasure and profit
    The problem with smoke hoods is twofold. For one thing you'd have to have a blanket ban on residents having guests in their flats to be absolutely certain there'd be enough to go around, which would be not just hugely...
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