why should one side strictly obey the rules of chess when the other side has kicked over the board and pulled a gun? at this point, playing fair would be Ukraine engaging in a full-scale invasion of russia, kidnapping russian children and shipping them back to Ukraine.
Spoiler alert. At the end of the movie, the Barbies hatch a plan…
They distract the Ken’s by coyly listening to their monologues on film, golf, computers and music. The Ken with a record player mentions Malkmus by name as Barbie fawns over his knowledge. Very funny.
Yeah, I think part of it is their reflexive contrarianism, where "Demorcat Party LIKE Ukraine, so we will oppose it! They hate Russia, so we love it!" And yeah, basically Putin has the same politics as they do: fascism. It's astounding to listen to things he says (as in, the particular style of manipulative lying) and realize it sounds exactly like the BS that Republicans say.
Most bands are lucky to have one great songwriter, Husker Du had two who ensured there was never a dull moment on any of their albums. It says a lot that of the “noise pop/melodic hardcore” era, Candy Apple Grey is probably their weakest album and it still produced all-time great songs like this.
This has long been a “walking around the neighborhood with my headphones in” staple, got the perfect atmosphere for night walk with a chill in the air.
I believe that without Hüsker Dü, there wouldn’t be alternative and indie music as we know it today. To this day the visceral sound of this band still feels transcendent… I also might be high, but I do love Hüsker Dü a lot.
I’ve always been more of a Replacements fan but Husker Du’s place in the 80s scene is undeniable. I first heard of them when they were featured in a Flipside video. Bob Mould said something about how no matter what else you do, a song has to rock or it’s no good. That stuck with me all these years.
The development of alternative is super fascinating, proto punk, punk, post-punk, etc that early days stuff Velvet Underground and oh so much great music under the mainstream that these 80s bands grew up listening to or eventually discovering, then coming up with fresh music bubbling around colleges in the 80s. oh my. So good!
Some shady holding company is going to buy the patent for it and sit on it forever while the rest of humanity continues to pillage underdeveloped nations for their lithium.
I was actually just watching a 60 minutes episode on YouTube the other day about a massive, fully green, generations long mining source of lithium in SoCal. It’ll be able to supply all of the lithium needed for yearly domestic American EV sales and because it’s so close to home, prices for these massive battery packs should fall off precipitously.
I’m sorry, but there is simply no way that anyone can have so little greed as to prefer to exercise their sociopathy rather than become the richest person on earth (where they can harm people much more effectively).
The reason these things don’t materialize is because they weren’t never there in the first place.
It’s happened multiple times before. Mostly when a big company is heavily invested in an alternative technology. They don’t want to completely retool, since it’s expensive, but they want to limit others from developing it, and so become competitors (that eat into profit margins).
The simplest solution is to buy up critical patents and either sit on the, or slow boat them.
Oil and car companies did this with electric/alternative car research for a while. Kodak also did it with digital cameras, since they competed with film cameras. It doesn’t last forever, but it can give decades of extra profit, before the competition gets over the speed bump.
There was plenty of electric car R&D (and it was never overly restricted by patents). Battery technology and electronics were just not got enough until recently, and there wasn’t as much of a financial incentive to go electric.
Kodak is a standard example of a company’s failure to migrate from its legacy business. It very much did not stifle digital imaging.
They disappear because they don’t do what they claim to. Or they only perform that way in a small scale on a lab bench. Or they are too expensive. Or vastly many other reasons.
I think this xkcd statement is equivalent enough: when someone says that they cured cancer in a petri dish, keep in mind that so does a hand gun.
Battery tech exists in a variety of stages. We have been using Li-ion for ages but there are two technologies coming out this year and next which are very much real (from CATL the worlds leader in battery sales) one of which you can buy today.
You can buy Sodium Ion batteries already, search for it on aliexpress and you’ll see the cells are for sale and BYD is already selling cars with it in. Its similar power in weight and density as Li-ion but it doesn’t catch on fire and its a lot more environmentally friendly. Its good a chance of being the main battery used for home/grid storage and cars and other big battery uses, it also lasts a lot of cycles something like 6000-8000 so it will work for decades and its cheap at $50/KWH (li-ion is more like $130).
The other type is a Li-ion advancement into solid state that is due next year and it doubles the power density. That is probably going to end up in laptops and phones and some high end cars with massive range or smaller/lighter batteries where the increased cost for power density is worth it. Not yet at commercial volumes it is well past the theoretical stage however and very much something that can be manufactured already.
All this battery tech in the lab might very well be in the mix in the future but we don’t need them to pan out with Sodium Ion filling that space and quite cheaply due to the abundance of salt. I think for grid storage reflux batteries might see a resurgence for their versatility but it remains to be seen if they become price competitive. Li-ion as we use today is very soon to be replaced thankfully.
You see a lot of stories about the next great battery tech. I’ve been seeing them for years, but still Li-Ion is the ubiquitous tech.
Even if energy density is only comparable, a battery with lower fire hazard and increased longevity is sorely needed. Li-Ion batteries simply wear out too fast. Considering the replacement cost (especially for EV applications), its a huge advantage for consumers. Then there’s a bonus of it being cheaper and more environmentally neutral which is also a big deal.
Of all the proclamations of a better battery, Na-Ion sounds like it might actually be a reality. That would make me happy to be rid of Li-Ion batteries once and for all. The only advantage they have is high energy density, they’re a fail on every other front.
So according to that article Na-Ion energy density is comparable to the LFP type of Li-Ion battery. That’s about 20% lower than the more common types you see in consumer products and EVs. LFP has much longer cycle life and lower fire hazard so it’s used where weight and space are less of a concern. However it still has the same cost and materials issues.
Na-Ion is well poised to replace LFP. The advantage is lower cost and more environmentally friendly materials. Unfortunately Na-Ion is not inline to replace the higher energy density types. As it becomes more widely adopted it may improve to the point where it can so there’s hope for it.
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