Because when the telephone system first was developed, all you had were dial phones, which could only send numbers 1 through 0 (10). So every call needed to be addressible using only numbers.
AT&T came up with the numbering system in the 40s…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Numbering_Plan
When the State licenses things like that, it’s usually because whatever activity is being licensed utilizes shared resources, and the State has an interest in making sure those resources are used in the common interest.
Radio licenses are essential because the RF spectrum is a common resource. The State wants to make sure that certain frequencies are only used for certain purposes, and that those who use them have the proper training.
Some communities use pet licensing as a tool to make sure all pets are properly vaccinated, to reduce the spread of rabies (which really is a horrible way to go…)
Hunting and fish licenses are a way to help control the overall wild animal population, and make sure they are not overharvested and preserve rhe availability for future seasons.
Ah, I know a bit about Kodak, being a resident of Rochester, NY (and a former employee). Go back 100 years, and George Eastman was the Steve Jobs of his day. Kodak was just like Apple, bringing the obscure technology of photography to the masses.
But that tech was very much dependant on chemical processes, specifically the Silver Halides used in film. Although Steve Sasson invented the digital camera whike at Kodak, Management basically told him “Great job! Here’s a bonus. We’re not gonna sell it, though, this will ruin our film business”.
Ridge Road in Rochester is full of factories with large roll coating machines to make film which are now functionally obsolete. As far as I know many of those buildings are still there, but in truth its been a while since I’ve been up there. Kodak sold off bits and pieces of that factory space over the years, even before the bankruptcy. But they tore down much more factory space, entire buildings, because the property taxes were cheaper on vacant lots than on buildings. Yet they haven’t gotten around to divesting it all.
Kodak still technically exists after the bankruptcy, but is far less relevant to the local economy now. Back in the day, when Kodak Park ran 3 shifts making film, local car dealers timed their promotions around Kodak’s “Wage Dividend” bonus. But it turns out their technological advantage had an expiration date.
George Eastman’s influence is seen all over Rochester, though. His name is all over various buildings in town, as well as the University of Rochester and the Eastman School of Music. And when he decided his health was declining and his work was done, he shot himself to end it all in the most efficient matter possible. Even most Lemmings, who abhor the rich, might have a soft spot for an insanely rich person who not only gave back to his community, but also took it upon himself to end it without being a burden to anyone.
Kodak’s value is as a film company. Now that film is a niche product, their brand name has no value whatsoever, except for the fact that it’s still familiar. If you see Kodak branding on a consumer product, I doubt it was actually developed by Kodak, I would bet they just licensed the name.
It is a real department, sort of. Trump used Legislation that was intended for an Obama Era “US Digital Service” and rebranded it “US DOGE Service”. He didn’t even need to change the acronym, although it is now a nested acronym.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_DOGE_Service
They do, in fact, overstep their legal boundaries quite often. But the administration simply fires anyone in any other department who gets in the way until they get an acquiescent administrator who lets them grab the department by the pussy.
Yeah, individual emails can be picked off at any point in the chain while in transit. And someone who has hacked key infrastructure in front of your server can see all emails on transit. But your server might have stored emails, so someone with clandestine access to that will be able to access part of your email history (perhaps all of it, if you use that server for permanent email storage), and they are not limited to emails in transit.
I plan on complaining about it on the Internet. That’ll show 'em!
I know a lot of people with their own domain names and email servers. From a privacy perspective, it is better because you know nobody is reading your emails. Your email address is a method to track regardless. But free email services are only free because they scrape your emails to figure out which ads to send. If you run your own mail server, you know no one is snooping.
The real issue is that you need to be fastidious about security, because your servers are exposed to the broader Internet and there are a lot of bad actors. You not only have to make sure your server doesn’t get hacked, but you also need to make sure the mail server application can’t act like an open relay. Spammers use misconfigured mail servers all the time to send tons of spam messages using someone else’s bandwidth.
And once your mail server is used as a spam relay, it might get IP blocked from major email providers, and I bet that is a pain to get resolved.
So it’s only worth it if you know what you are doing.
Only a matter of time before Trump renames them the Indians by Executive Order
$4.69 at Wegmans
Unless God exercises His Ultimate Veto and cuts his term short.
I went to Beijing several years ago on business. By a total coincidence, it happened to be just after the Golden Week festival, which is a national holiday and businesses were closed. I expected quite a bit of smog, but when I arrived everything seemed clear. My Chinese host took me out to see the Great Wall, and it was breathtaking, and also crystal clear. I was wondering if the dirty air I had heard so much about was a myth.
But then the work week started, and as the week went on and the factories started up again, I noticed that the air was getting dirtier. My Chinese host took me to see the Forbidden City at the end of the week, which was also extremely beautiful, but already the air was so thick that I couldn’t see the landscape anymore, only the buildings in front of me.
Nature does a good job at cleaning the local air itself, but when we spew so much crap in it Nature can’t keep up. So, yeah, smog happens because of constant pollution.
Impeachment must start in the House, and the rules of the House are heavily tilted toward majority rule. So it would need a majority vote to even get started, and it would be referred to a committee with a Republican majority. If, somehow, the investigation done there is fair and a recommendation to impeach passes the committee, it still needs to pass in the House again.
But then, it goes to the Senate, where a 2/3 majority (67/100) is required to convicted. So now we have gone from needing a handful of Republican defectors on the House (including at least one committee member) to needing 20 of 53 Republican Senators to agree to convict. That is an extremely high bar. If you were a Republican House member who is on the fence about Trump, it is simply not worth openly defying him unless you were certain Republican Senators would convict. Particularly after Trump just pardoned a bunch of folks who have already stormed the Capitol once.
New Mexico has an actual constitution, as well as three whole branches of government, who have the official say on what is called. The Gulf of Mexico just has some fish and oil rigs.
The Internet was designed to be somewhat decentralized. Some administrative aspects are centralized, like public IP address allocation, Top Level Domains, and common TCP/UDP port assignments for essential services. But the operational aspects are very decentralized. When an organization wants to connect directly to the Internet, they “just” need to connect with sufficient bandwidth, and then start broadcasting the IP address ranges they are assigned, and the routing protocols figure it all out. If all you want is a private Internet, you can even dispense with the routing protocols and set up static routes yourself, although that won’t scale up.
No matter what happens in the world, there will always be an Internet, as long as the equipment exists and there are enough furries to run it.
It makes perfect sense when you realize that Silk Road was the killer app that launched Bitcoin and the entire Crypto universe that is currently funding Trump’s lifestyle.
Now Ross can dust off that old brain wallet and live large in his stash. When he was arrested, 1 BTC was worth $200ish, it’s now worth $100k. And he can make more dollars whenever he wants to by simply selling a shitty token.
It’s been a common trick for a long time on the right to equate simple disagreement with censorship, and use that as an excuse to practice actual censorship when they take over.
Did the law give Trump the power to change the deadline through executive order?
Yes, it does, but only a one-time 90 day extension and only if the President says there is concrete progress toward a sale to a US entity. Of course, this President will say anything that benefits him personally, whether or not it is true. So he says the magic words, and all interested parties (Bytedance, Zuckerberg, Musk, etc.) continue to buy his shitty NFTs and tokens to influence his decisions.
Hey, Joey, don’t say that shit out loud. Once they realize that there is a way to access content that isn’t sufficiently monetized, they will block it. Keep it secret!
Great, more shit to turn off. Meanwhile, the only new Android Auto app I want is an app to control the car’s radio…