Fuse

@hanrahan

“Rest of is could vote Green”

“is”? Islamic State?

Oh!.. “us”… you meant “us”. A typo…

So… the “United States”, right?
Am I right?

(I’ll shut up now…)

@vividspecter

@okwithmydecay

Of course the NSW police approved a neo-nazi rally…
… they wouldn’t want to see their colleagues waste their day off work!

@wildwhitehorses
No, I’m not “new to Australia”.

The point I was making is that the “duration of our showers” is comparatively insignificant compared to commercial water use and wastage.

Data centres, for AI processing, needlessly waste water resources.

Growing rice and cotton on the world’s driest continent seems a bit stupid.

Screwing the geology of the Great Artesian Basin to extract gas seems short-sighted.

There are FAR more pressing concerns than how much water we individuals use while showering. (Sure, there are some small towns or shires where this is a concern.)

@wildwhitehorses

Yeah, right. Any water shortages are likely due to personal hygiene requirements of people, and nothing to do with new b.s. AI data processing centres using gigalitres to cool equipment and maintain humidity levels.

Got it.

@noorbeast

Port? Use of “port” to denote a bag, suitcase, or other “carry all”?

Only octogenarians use “port” in this manner…

@maniacalmanicmania

@No1

What have you got against Great White Sharks?
What have they ever done to you?

AFAIK, every time Pauline Hanson goes swimming at a beach, an environmental impact statement needs to be completed, and clean up operations commence soon afterwards.

@MHLoppy

@sabreW4K3

The government will LOVE this scheme…

1. Make children obtain a government issued ID card.
2. Increase the cost of the ID card from a ‘nominal’ payment to, say, $100 p.a.
3. Require e-bikes to be registered for a nominal fee.
4. Increase the registration fee.
5. Make insurance compulsory for e-bikes.
6. Require registration and insurance for ALL bicycles, including pedal powered bikes.

Then, in 10 years’ time…
7. Spend a fortune on an advertising campaign trying to get people back on ‘traditional’ bicycles.

@Zagorath

Half a penny?
Where’s the rest of it?

@SuperMoosie

Look, here’s the bottom line(s):

‘Age verification’ systems - where a person’s ID is submitted - will not work.
Kids will find a way around them.
ID verification systems are a privacy nightmare and something only a dictatorship would implement.

Device/OS/platform ‘age restriction’ features are workable, but Labor is too incompetent to liaise with the EU to implement them.

It is for parents to supervise and control their kids’ devices, NOT for everyone else to have to provide ID just to access social media.

@Zagorath

@Zagorath

That’s right! (That’s what we/you were talking about, wasn’t it?)

Compel the major devices and OSes to have the feature you suggested.

Make it a requirement for all devices, and available to all users. Give parents the *option* to ‘lock down’ or ‘age restrict’ a device.

The government should otherwise steer away from their likely dystopian solution.

@makingStuffForFun

50% of Zagorath’s name is ‘rath’… as in ‘wrath’.

Beware the wrath of Zagorath!

@Zagorath

@Zagorath

Oh, I do agree with you, Zag!

I detest the notion of citizens having to provide ID, and solutions - at the device or OS level - could be implemented.

It should be a responsibility of parents to limit the social media access by their children, and NOT the ‘surveillance state’ solution of compelling the entire population to hand over their ‘Australia Card’ just to crap on about something here!

@shirro

The ‘ID is required for beer and smokes’ example is misleading.

Most adults are NOT required to provide ID to purchase such items. Only those who look “Under 25 years” *may* be required to produce ID, and even then, that ID is NOT recorded. (An exception may the the NT for alcohol sales.)

Requiring the citizenry to provide ID to either a social media entity OR via a government controlled gateway is something that must NOT be tolerated.

A requirement such as this will ‘chill’ free speech, weaken our democracy, and undoubtedly expose our personal information to hackers.

It’s akin to allowing a person to purchase a pen, paper, envelope, and stamps - but then demanding the writer present both their ID and the unsealed letter at a Post Office, so that one’s written words may be recorded against one’s name.

To paraphrase Robert Bolt, it’s akin to “cutting down privacy to protect children from the devil”.

If you wish to argue in favour of this incoming law, do so *after* you’ve sent a copy of your ID to me.

@Zagorath

Yeah. I used to encounter something akin to the ‘fall back’ solution when trying to watch the odd video on YT. (The video would usually be something as innocuous as ‘Bambi Meets Godzilla’… and f**king Google would want me to Sign In to view it. No.)

No matter how the government tries to protect our community’s ‘precious little darlings’ within a week or two, some teenager will release a fully encrypted app that’s onboarded by ‘invitation only’, where they’ll collectively plan to kill us all in our beds!

@ada

Methinks Zag was suggesting (possibly) that ‘age verification’ should be a *device* and *operating system* (& platform) feature that would be *inactive* by default.

In other words, there should be nothing for an adult (without kids) to do in order for their devices to function as they do now.

A parent would be required to activate a ‘child lock’ feature on a device before handing it to their kids.

Unfortunately, all governments are too chicken-shit scared to compel parents to do this small thing.

Governments *prefer* the option of compelling ALL users to provide ‘age verification’ (possibly Gov’t issued ID) to the relevant platforms.

For the ‘Liberals’ this would be a natural extension of their right wing fascism.

For the Labor party, it’s merely a reflection of their general incompetence.

@Zagorath

#auspol

@princessnorah

You said, “Oh…OH!”

Yes, precisely. That is how one may express, in word form, the vocal utterances of a user of such objects at the culmination or ‘climax’ of the experience.

Well… so I’ve heard…

@princessnorah

No, nothing wrong.

However, due to their shape, there is the delightful possibility of the misapplication of said vegetables as a particular variety of adult toy.

(Everyone’s mind went there… didn’t it? Didn’t it?)

@DiaDeLosMuertos

@princessnorah

No. Not really.

If ‘crap’ is made, it won’t be sold unless people wish to buy ‘crap’.

My point is that the quality of goods made in China has got *nothing* to do with racism and *everything* to do with buyers’ price expectations, buyers’ notions of acceptable quality, and market forces.

In this instance, the buyer (not the OP) ‘took a chance’ with a cheaper product which failed immediately. If sufficient buyers of this product demand and obtain refunds, the manufacturer would be forced to either stop making them or possibly increase their unit price with a concomitant increase in quality.

The reason that smartphones of high quality come out of China is because that is what is demanded by the buyers and with regard to the price they are willing to pay.

@princessnorah

China does make a LOT of really low quality goods. However…
… those goods are made to the quality specified by the importer / wholesaler / buyer…
… because ‘cheap’ goods are often preferred over ‘more expensive but higher quality’ goods…
… by the people who buy them.

Which is probably what happened in this case!

I *think* that most Ming dynasty vases are still ‘under warranty’!

@DiaDeLosMuertos

@zero_gravitas

Appreciable difference? Not really. But a ‘calculable’ difference. Sure!

However, be sure to appreciate the HUGE difference of the landmasses in the northern and southern hemispheres.

The primary way heat “gets into” our atmosphere is via re-radiation from the “ground”.

Compare the amount of “ground” between N45° and the North Pole, with that of the amount of “ocean” between S45° and the South Pole.

At perihelion (around 4th Jan.) the southern hemisphere is in summertime, but the southern oceans easily absorb any extra solar energy by being ‘a little bit closer to the sun’. It’s roughly equivalent to having the energy used by an extra 5000 cars arrive as solar radiation… and for *most* of that solar energy be absorbed by the ocean.

The tiny (almost insignificant) effect the earth’s orbital eccentricity has on weather and climate is FAR less than that of our planet’s axial tilt and the position of our continental land masses.

But, sure, if some researchers wish to tweak the underlying data used for the Milankovitch cycles, then, fine.

But our world is still on fire, and our children’s future will be ashes unless we act now.