There are plenty of options for personal computers; you have to make the choice to go private and personal.

I built my own desktop, which remains very common and is relatively easy to do. I have Linux and Windows on it, and use Linux nearly 100% as I agree I don’t like ads etc. I use a Firefox with ad blockers and don’t get ads; I use lots of open source software even to access services like Youtube (Free tube).

There are also even linux laptops, and the Frame.Work laptop which is fully modular and bring your own OS.

There are open source OS for phones.

You’re right about the corporatisation of the internet and services, but it remains up to users to vote with their feet and chose to take back their privacy and person computing.

Linux is at 4% of desktop users in recent months - that is many millions of people actively choosing to exist in a space where they control their personal computers. People don’t need to remove computers, just chose to set them up to be what they want them to be.

As others have said, gaming is thriving - AAA and bloated incumbants are not doing well but the indie sector is thriving.

VR is not on the verge of collapse, but it is growing slowly as we still have not reached the right price point for a mobile high powered headset. Apple made a big play for the future of VR with its Apple Vision Pro but that was not a short term play; that was laying the ground works for trying to control or shape a market that is still probably at least 5 if not 10 years away from something that will provide high quality VR, untethefed from a. PC.

AI meanwhile is a bubble. We are not in an age of AI, we are in an age of algorithms - they will and are useful but will not meet the hype or hyperbole being banded about. Expect that market to pop and probably with spectacular damage to some companies.

Other computing hardware is not really stagnating - we are going through a generational transition period. AMD is pushing Zen 5 and Intel it’s 14th gen, and all the chip makers are desperately trying to get on the AI band wagon. People are not upgrading because they don’t see the need - there aren’t compelling software reasons to upgrade yet (AI is certainly not compelling consumers to buy new systems). They will emerge eventually.

The lack of any landmark PC AAA games is likely holding back demand for consumer graphics cards, and we’re seeing similar issues with consoles. The games industry has certainly been here many times before. There is no Cyberpunk 2077 coming up - instead we’ve had flops like Star Wars Outlaws, or underperformers like Starfield. But look at the biggest game of last year - Baldurs Gate 3 came from a small studio and was a megahit.

I don’t see doom and gloom, just the usual ups and downs of the tech industry. We happen to be in a transition period, and also being distracted by the AI bubble and people realising it is a crock of shit. But technology continues to progress.

As someone who drives to and around Wales multiple times a year, it’s a poorly thought out and implemented policy.

Many people speed and break the limit, particularly on main roads, and it’s lack of popular support is an issue in itself.

The policy could work if the speed limits was reverted to 30mph on bigger roads but local councils and the Welsh assembly blame each other for the issues.

There is also little enforcment at present - that is changing and once people start getting fined for breaking the 20mph limit it’s likely to become much more unpopular.

It could have probably been implemented successfully and with popular support with more careful designation of 30mph roads. It’s a failure of politicians rather than the idea itself.

After being forced to standardise to usb c and be responsible for some of the e-waste it produces, apple has finally relented.

They fought tooth and nail against the EU regulations to force charging standards. I don’t care if they up sell cables to some people; most people will reuse what they have and thats the whole point of the regulations.

Regulation works.

OpenSuSE - YaST is as good as is made out to be. I like how many fundamental parts of linux are managed via one tool. Other distros I’d used before were heterogenous mix of tools that felt cobbled together and inconsistent, while YaST feels well designed, integrated and consistent.

Maybe he broke terms of service with the streaming companies but they should be pursuing him in civil courts. This feels like abuse of the criminal justice system to retrieve money for companies that were negligent in how they were running their streaming businesses.

This guy produced music and he alsp streamed the music even if it was bots at industrial scale. He seemingly met the criteria needed to get money from the streamers. I’m not a lawyer at all but on cursory look at the definition and elements of wire fraud, I guessing this will hinge on whether this was a “material deception” - but he produced actual music and he streamed it, so is it?

Also i wonder whether it can be proven that the intent was to “defraud” rather than take advantage / game a system.

It feels like the tax payer is bearing the cost of prosecuting someone for a dispute between a person and the multi billion dollar music industry.

Also the music industry trying to paint this as theft of money from other artists is a bullshit - the streaming fees are supposedly divided out proportionately from overall streaming. He caused more streaming so the pot was bigger, and he took a proportionate share of that bigger pot. And any disproportionate sharing reflects the shitty practice’s of the streamers and the big music rights holders who are essentially monopolies squeezing out the smaller competitors from the system.

No I thinks is basically right although could be better worded maybe

/sys is virtual file structure for kernel system info

/proc is virtual file structure of kernel process info

My understanding is /proc came first but was abused/free for all and started being used for all sorts of non standard/process kernel access. So /sys was created with stricter rules to make it more standardised.

Yea it is user friendly. If you’re using your computer once a week presumably its for things like web browsing or working with documents - these are very easy and straight forward to do in linux.

The other big benefit is the cost - linux is free and you’ll save £120 on a basic version of Windows which can be used to get get a better PC or just saved.

Add to that no advertising, much more private and entirely yours to do what you like with. And if you don’t like it you can easily install Windows instead, so its zero risk to try Linux.

Might be even simpler - the elderly can decline very quickly mentally and also physically, and that may he what we’re seeing with here.

The article is a bit vague on the pros and cons of reflective LCD screens.

It seems to be pros that it has a good refresh rate, can be used without a backlight so is good outdoors and indoors in a bright room, and maybe better for your eyes due to the lack of the backlight/blue spectrum light. It also may offer better colour depth than e-ink currently.

The cons are not clearly addressed but presumably battery life is worse than e-ink but better than a backlit display such as OLED or AMOLED, that colours are still not as good as other LCDs even if better than e-ink, and it seems cost (although that may be due to the small market at present).

Also there is no obvious innovation noted in the article so its not clear what has changed about these displays? It sounds more like some small companies are just using the displays in a new way to try and mimick paper. But maybe thats wrong or will change?

Maybe this would compete with e-ink if cost comes down. The battery benefit of e-ink with a static image is one of its big benefits, to the point that its being used for shelf labels in supermarkets. E-ink isn’t going anywhere but good to have more choices in the tablet space.

Maybe worth trying an alternative OS with a different kernel entirely from Linux, as a live USB. For example Haiku or ArcaOS?

However if you’ve tried Windows and not had the issue then it may not add anything as you nay already have excluded defective hardware?

Zuckerberg thinks Facebook should self regulate and that means in this case be free to allow posts of anti-vax propaganda and covid conspiracy theories that literally cost lives.

This is just a great example of why social media needs external regulation.

Trump has cognitively declined since 2016 and is increasingly incoherent and nasty. I think the Dems are gambling that many voters aren’t watching his stump appearances so this is a good way to expose him to voters.

I think its too big a gamble and mute him. I think he will expose himself enough on his own turns to speak.

Isn’t it too late to change VP candidate? I saw speculation on this before and the issues were around the need to reconvene delegates for the RNC to approve the change and also to be on the ballot? Early voting starts in September so October is also too late?

“Yacht maker who makes yachts for billionaires scrambles to blame the crew so he can save more yachts and not be sued”

That’s the story here. He’s trying to set the narrative as entirely human error rather than a design flaw. For example one concern is how quickly an intact vessel sank - 30 seconds is being claimed in some areas - and the yacht may have an overlong aluminium mast which contributed to it capsizing .

People saying they don’t care about billionaires dying are missing the point. The yachts maker is trying to pin it on the crew before its even been properly investigated.

What you’re asking is if you can run the existing Linux Mint on your drive within Windows running on the same drive?

It may be feasible if VirtualBox or VMWare are able to access/mount the existing Linux partition as if its a virtual drive, and boot the OS but its likely to be difficult. The main issue is that windows does not easily mount Linux partitions. It is also an edge case use for most users so there will likely not be much guidance on how to achieve this easily.

It might work more easily the opposite way round - boot Linux and mount Windows within Virtualbox but is not likely to be straightforward. Windows may be less flexible about being booted into a virtual machine with totally different hardware.

All this may be overkill to the problems you’re trying to solve. You can mount the existing NTFS Windows drive within Linux Mint to access all your windows files without any virtualization. But I’m not clear what “settings” you’re looking at when you boot back in to windows? That seems to be the stumbling block. Is is specific software / tools you’re trying to migrate settings for?

Another approach may be to launch windows, create a new linux Mint VM in Virtualbox, share a folder between Linux VM and Windows host, create whatever settings you’re trying to migrate in your VM Linux Mint, and when happy copy the home folder / settings folders into the shared folder. Then boot your PC into linux, mount the windows drive and pick up the settings files from the shared folder to migrate into your main Mint system. But whether that is even worth doing depends on what you’re trying to migrate.

This is badly written and ignorant article. Fat32 supports up to 16Tb partition size (depending on cluster size - 2Tb -16Tb).

Its microsoft’s windows tools that arbitrarily only allow users to create 32Gb partitions, and it is this that is being changed. This is not a change to Fat32, this is a change to windows. 3rd party tools on Windows and other systems like Linux have long offered more options for partition size.

That its taken to 2024 for Microsoft to fix the command line tool (and still not fix the GUI tools) is ridiculous.

Firefox will support Manifest v3. However Mozilla will be implementing Manifest 3 differently so the routes Ublock and other extensions use to maintain privacy and block ads will still be available. Firefox will support both the original route and the new limited option Google is forcing on Chromium.

Googles implementation deliberately locks out extensions by removing something called WebRequest, supposedly for security reasons but almost certainly actually for commercial reasons as they are not a neutral party. Google is a major ad and data broker.

Apple will apparently also be adopting the same approach for Safari as Mozilla is for Firefox.

Could you give an example of something linux can’t do?

Or are you alluding to windows software not running on linux even with wine etc?

Probably Obama’s endorsement which finally shut down the prospects of a contested primary.

The Dems got into the mess with Biden because they wouldn’t test him with an actual open primary process. Not having a contest for Harris may be pragmatic but it may dog the party in the future. If she loses then there will be recriminations. And if she wins they will have to think about what they do in 2028 - does she get a free pass again or does the party get a say? Do all those ambitious contenders step aside again?

Problems for another day. I think the dems are doing the right thing in coronating Harris now as they have been left with no choice. But they really need to think about what happens with sitting presidents and the primaries - waving Biden through was disasterous, and him dragging his feet on steeping down shut down all other options. I have very little respect left for Biden - he did the right thing but took far too long to do it, risking everything.