buttmasterflex

JFK was not actually killed by Lee Harvey Oswald; his head just did that on its own.

Pirate bay, search for "9 2009”. You can find it about 3/4 of the way down the page

Make a marionette out of my body and use it to tell my life story.

A friend from high school wants his hands to be glued to the side of his face, then be decapitated so it looks like he pulled off his own head.

It really depends on the location within the US. Each state really operates like their own country, connected through the federal government, so standards of living, and what constitutes poverty can widely vary. However, the broad trend is: minimal to no labor protections, employer or self-funded health insurance are the only way to begin to afford medical care (dental insurance is a rarer offer), and there are a lot of trade-offs in determining how to survive. There is very much a different reality for people with money compared to how a lot of others are forced to live. The reasons are historic and systemic, and there’s too much to fully unpack in a response to a post. However, it can be simplified to: rampant, virtually unchecked capitalism is used to extract all of the labor and wealth from the general populous. The “American Dream” is propaganda shoved down everyone’s throat to make people think that they, too, can work hard to become wealthy enough to not have to scrape together enough money to survive. Except that it’s all a lie built on generational wealth, servitude, and violence.

Tipped wages originated from business owners refusing to pay freed slaves a fair wage after the US Civil War. The US still openly practices economic slavery. The 13th Amendment to the US Constitution allows slavery as punishment for a crime, which is why prison populations in the US are enormous. Private companies operate prisons here. This country was built and is maintained by slaves. The wealthy segregate themselves so they don’t have to see or think about it, but that doesn’t make it any less true.

I have a OnePlus 12, and I personally enjoy using it. Over a year from purchase, the battery can last up to 2 days of light use, or 1 day and change for heavy use. The cameras are great for being cameras. There is decent support for software and security updates (nowhere near the best out there, but decent). I tried to disable all of the AI integration I could, simply because I don’t like it for how I use a phone. Other than that, it’s a solid “flagship” phone at a reasonable price (around $650 USD at purchase).

Nerd alert, incoming: Not sure about isopropyl, but the azeotropic distillation point of ethanol is about 97.5%. After that, dessicants are needed to remove the remaining water content.

You can purchase laboratory grade 200 proof isopropyl, but I would guess it is rather expensive.

If you use a VPN that also provides DNS servers (e.g., Mullvad), you can prevent your ISP from snooping on your internet traffic and selling that information or having it hoovered up by government agencies and immediately tied back to you. HTTPS encrypts your internet traffic, but the metadata of what sites you are visiting and the frequency is typically enough to make some decent assumptions about what you are doing. No matter the legality of what you are doing, your data shouldn’t be for sale and shouldn’t be collected for government surveillance. Using a VPN cuts down on your information being available. There are still other ways it is collected, but there are other tools to mitigate that. The uBlock origin browser extension is a great first step.

In short, a VPN will help make your internet traffic a bit more secure and more private, but it won’t grant you complete anonymity or necessarily protect you from sophisticated surveillance.

Disclaimer: I am just a lay person with self-taught experience. I am not an IT professional.

BS in Geology and professional licensing after the adequate work experience and exam requirements were met. It does just fine in my line of work. A Master’s or higher would have left me completely burned out, and honestly would have overqualified me for entry level work with no industry experience.

When all of the Civil War Confederate generals walked free instead of standing trial and being executed for treason. When the era of Reconstruction was allowed to be ripped away and ground into nothing. When minorities were openly lynched and the perpetrators went unpunished. When, and when, and when…

My favorite part about geology is the application of fractal theory. So this new model should apply on both the micro and macro scales. I would love to see this daring new model evident in both a thin section and a road cut!

I’m not surprised. The standard Microsoft disclosure on my work laptop at the login screen states any use ofbthw computer may be monitored and/ or recovered by Microsoft and law enforcement. That’s why Microsoft products are not present in my home.

The deadliest Bop-It

Rocks and minerals, whether they are refined or not: roads and building materials; ore processed into elemental metals; soils (biologically, chemically, and physically weathered rock); quartz is used for glass (melted and shaped) and timepieces (piezoelectric application of quartz); micas: (windows made of thin leaves, Muscovite), used as reflective additives in road paint and makeup; gypsum is used as fertilizer, sidewalk chalk, plaster, drywall, etc. The list goes on and on, but my point is, geology provides many things in our world that are considered mundane or often overlooked.

Having operated on major sleep deprivation for years on end (babies are hell), I can tell you without a doubt that you should follow a healthy sleep schedule and get a regular 8ish hours of sleep. Sleep deprivation has cumulative impacts on the body, including a suppressed immune system, suppressed healing abilities (if you exercise, your body will take longer to recover), and absolutely diminished memory and brain function. Sleep is your body’s time to heal and clean cellular waste out of your brain. Sleep deprivation has similar effects to being inebriated when it comes to brain and motor function, especially if driving or operating machinery. Be safe, be healthy, and get some sleep, yo.

I’m tired of this, Grandpa.

Fully agree

Sadly tech security, privacy, and freedom are not a focus for most people. Just gotta keep doing what you can personally do to make it better.

Second vote for Fedora. I set up my wife’s laptop with Fedora KDE, and she uses it with no issues. She gets easily frustrated by tech hiccups, and Fedora KDE just works for her.

I get your point on that. My assumption with the tech glasses is that you purchase the hardware outright and pay a subscription for the software functionality, similar to other tech devices that have fallen to enshitification. The prime difference I see is that standard glasses packages are a one time lump payment vs a one time lump payment followed by a slow bleed of money. Yes, prescriptions change, frames break, etc., but on a 1:1 comparison level, you get more reliable functionality and cost effectiveness through regular glasses rather than something that can be bricked through a bad software/firmware update or rendered nonfunctional by the manufacturer if you reject an invasive privacy policy or let a subscription lapse.

Again, no. My point is that if I purchase a pair of frames with lenses, the transaction is over. I would not have to pay a monthly subscription for those same glasses and lenses to remain functional, which is much more likely for a set of glasses infused with technology and tracking, backed by Amazon.

The tech glasses positied here would still need to be updated periodically. Per the article, they have a base prescription lens that then has additional focusing ability layered on via the technology.