Yep, it’s just evil to their own staff. It seems every time I have to call some call centre these days, when I finally get to a human the conversation starts something like “I’ve just spent 40 fucking minutes trying to get to talk to a person and I’m really pissed off. I know that’s not your fault and I apologise in advance if I struggle to contain my frustrations while we talk. Now…”

I’m open to suggestions for what else I can do. I’m already not buying anything made in the US.

I get what you’re saying but, as someone observing from outside, stuff like this is all I can do to resist.

Facts, by definition, are devoid of context. They don’t change depending on who states them! How can you have a reasonable conversation about anything at all if you can’t agree on some baseline facts. That’s how the fascists operate - everything the orange turd says is a fact, so you can’t reason with them.

Well that’s a bit disappointing.

I wouldn’t say he admitted it either. I’d say he’s bragging about it.

This is me too. I’m still on Facebook for some family contacts and a couple of useful groups. Years ago I could spend hours a day there. Now I spend maybe 15-30 minutes each morning scrolling for friend/family updates and group content - and hitting “Hide all from …” on every single bit of unsolicited content. I was reporting and blocking them, but I’ve decided it probably doesn’t achieve anything and it was too many taps/clicks.

Instagram is similar - I used to spend hours there too but now I only go to check if there’s progress on one car build I’m following and scroll for maybe 5-10 minutes and I’m out for the day.

Which is really really sad. When I was younger I used to think we just need these old people to age out of the system and my generation can do things better. We seem to be doing significantly worse.

This isn’t a generational thing. For a start, he’s technically Gen X, not a boomer. And secondly, I’m older than him and I’m just as happy about that as everyone else.

convert $i ${i%.*}.jpg

NB: I’m no guru - I just googled “remove file extension in bash”.

Exactly - I’m still very happy with my 4a. A used 5, 6 or 7a would be very cheap and very usable.

It might be expensive, but still worth a short visit. I’ve got a shockingly bad memory, but I’ll never forget the awe I felt waking up to a view of the Alps.

I can’t understand how someone hasn’t explained to them that it’s impossible to enforce. I can only see two possible ways:

1. Require every social media platform operating in Australia to do rigorous ID checks on all users to ensure no-one is under the legal age, or

2. Somehow lock down the whole Australian internet so that users must login and then validate the identity, and therefore age, of all users. Then maintain a huge filter table to restrict under age users from social media.

Both of these are clearly never going to happen. Have I missed a simpler way to do it?

Almost a chuckle

I must be old - it’s WordPerfect to me.

I’m fairly certain it is only anonymous “on paper”. Behind closed doors, they know where it came from and what is expected in return.

Where do you live that Antarctica is “up”?

Once an end-to-end, encrypted, connection is established between a pair of peers then anything can be sent through it. The establishment proces is generally facilitated by a server of some description so neither peer needs to allow inbound connections. (I’m a long, long way from being an expert on this and happy to be corrected - but this seems like network fundamentals?)

I don’t know Bauhaus well - Bela Lugosi’s Dead was on a mixtape I got from someone, and I enjoyed it, so I listen to them a bit. But I imagine they would be awesome live - I’m jealous.

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, supported by Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, at the Coogee Bay Hotel in 1985, or maybe '86.

Arrived nice and early, just the right amount stoned, and got right up front leaning on the stage.