There have been multiple accounts created with the sole purpose of posting advertisement posts or replies containing unsolicited advertising.

Accounts which solely post advertisements, or persistently post them may be terminated.

furrowsofar

@[email protected]

Interests: News, Finance, Computer, Science, Tech, and Living

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

furrowsofar ,

I am still not clear what supposed crime he has committed other then pissing powerful people off. He should get a reward for that.

furrowsofar ,

He is not an American citizen and he is not in the US. How does US law apply.

furrowsofar ,

I put a question up yesterday on Reddit and got no engagement with it in like 12 hours. Maybe no one that knows anything is answering questions now. I guess we will see.

furrowsofar ,

Maybe that is why I cannot see the answer. I have ublock origin enabled. :)

furrowsofar ,

No I did not. Financial forum her is kind of dead. Not sure what other tax related forums there are on lemmy. My question was about some specific issues related to getting an incorrect 1095-C. I think I have decided on a cousre of action now but was looking for others thought too.

U.S. Sues Apple, Accusing It of Maintaining an iPhone Monopoly (www.nytimes.com)

The department joined 16 states and the District of Columbia to file a significant challenge to the reach and influence of Apple, arguing in an 88-page lawsuit that the company had violated antitrust laws with practices that were intended to keep customers reliant on their iPhones and less likely to switch to a competing device....

furrowsofar ,

Yes. This is why I would never use an iPhone. Closed walled garden. Cannot even load apps from other repos.

furrowsofar ,

Yes we know who Musk is… and it is a very mixed bag. Some where around the time he became the world’s richest person I feel like something changed and he went over the top or over the edge. Not sure which.

furrowsofar , (edited )

I was on Reddit the other day asking a tax question. Seemed like posting was less. Felt like a ghost town in some subreddits. Just my impression. Had not been there for maybe 6 months. Place seemed different.

I wonder if traffic and posting is really down?

Edit: Read the article. Says maybe stable maybe some growth. Says search driven traffic less fractionally. I know I see fewer search links to Reddit on DDG when I search.

Edit: Article was a bit vague about stock of new content. Are big contributors adding important new content? Not even sure how to measure. Reddit seems to like to focus on page views and time on site, maybe because financially that is all that matters? Maybe they do not really care about good content and content generation so much?

furrowsofar , (edited )

I liked how the article tried to paint less fractional users from search as a positive. Too me that sounds like less relevance which is negative. Also interesting that Reddit no longer publishes that statistic. Makes a me wonder why.

Edit: Also in line with my experience. Feels like I see less search links and when I see them, I am less likely to click on them.

furrowsofar ,

Storj is the other one. No personal experience with it. Also of course Drive e2, and wasabi which others have mentioned. Not sure any of the 4 low cost providers are that different in price though your specific use patterns will matter.

Personally I have been trying Backblaze B2 recently.

furrowsofar ,

By the way, some of the mentioned services are annual and block pricing. Those plans, the per TB cost depends on where you are in their brackets. Backblaze is pay as you go which is more flexible and you do not pay for more then you use.

furrowsofar ,

I am confused. How is $250 per TB/month cheap. Backblaze B2 is about $5TB/mo.

furrowsofar ,

Thanks. That is what it seemed like to me. $245 for the software and $5 for the storage per month. Which of course is a bit nuts.

Block level deduplication does seem interesting. My experience file level dedup is not that effective though of course incrementals are. Compression is not either but easy to do. Lot of document formats are already compressed too. Cross system dedup could be large savings also.

furrowsofar ,

I have the same concern about them. Seems to me that one wants data in a professional and planned data center and based on contractual relationships.

furrowsofar , (edited )

The other cheaper way is just 3 USB drives and rotate 1 off site. Should probably do that anyway. If USB is too slow or small then hot mount SATA slots, drives. and drive storage boxes. Presumably SATA drives in hot mount slots are what Backblaze uses anyway.

furrowsofar ,

Yes I have a brother. Mostly good. Does have issues with some PS where I get offending commamd was… Also cannot really update the firmware without windows which sucks. Mine is a multifunction printer but I just scan to my phone or a USB. Never tried to connect scanning to Linux.

Decentralized networks/ISPs, are they even possible? A talk and my idea

So I was thinking about what if we could make a network that the only thing you needed to connect to it is to directly connect ( through wires or directed wireless antennas ) to at least 1 computer that takes part in it, with no centralized node of any kind. For that we would need a whole new protocol and address system. THIS IS...

furrowsofar ,

The challenge is the physical layer. The how you send the physical signal is where the cost, the telecoms, and regulation steps in. The rest use what we have. Linux and IP stack.

You could for example become a ham radio operator and IP can be used there but you could only talk to other hams and encryption is not allowed plus other rules.

You could use unregulated band used by wifi routers and build a mesh but the range would be small and there are regulations.

You could lay fiber but you’d have to have access to the utility right of way.

You could setup a WiMax like system or point to point microwave links but you would have to have access to the spectrum to do that which costs money and has regulations.

It goes on and on. The short answer is almost anything is not allowed without money and tons of hoops. That is why we have telecoms and how they protect themselves.

furrowsofar ,

What licensing and cost is needed for the links? I assume one just cannot set it up free and no paperwork?

Thanks.

furrowsofar ,

Thanks. Interesting.

furrowsofar ,

Yes. Ham is about playing with tech, learning skills, and building a social network all before the internet existed. It was also considered a means if communication in a national emergency and presumably a base of skills. It was not intended to be a service delivery platform.

Plus as the post says, the security apparatus does not universally like the use of encryption by the public. This is a fact not a conspiracy theory. Liked the way the poster said that.

furrowsofar ,

This is the reason I balk at personifiing these things with human terms. It sounds cool but it is both inaccurate and misleading especially in the hands of the media and the general public.

furrowsofar ,

It is sad, but most people seem to go to school for certification not learning. Use to grade when in grad school… the lazy sloppy work was nuts. Working for a company… the terrible writing some people do even with advanced degrees.

furrowsofar ,

I am not sure why anyone cares. As far as Reddit, I moved on last year.

Faster backup solution?

I use Beyond Compare to sync files from my laptop to my NAS which is a QNAP (my laptop is Linux Mint). It is incredibly slow, to the point that it is driving me crazy. Admittedly, I have lots of large files on my laptop that I move around frequently, so that may just be how it is. I do have my laptop setup to sync to my phone...

furrowsofar ,

Yes maybe moving files could be an issue. Lot of software archives by path. rsync is one way but I suspect it is path based. If your using BTRFS I suspect the bulitin mirroring utility can track movement. Never tried though.

For backups as opposed to syncing Deja Dup, duplicity, or dupliciti are suppose to be efficient. Not sure if they are path or Inode based though for example. GNU Tar in some modes can track hard links but I do know if it can handle movement of files, I suspect no.

furrowsofar , (edited )

I have published in peer reviewed journals and done a few reviews myself. It is not a perfect system. There are generally only a few reviewers. Typically others that have published in the journal in that area. The goal is not to check the work deeply and the tilt is to allowing and also trusting the authors. The other thing that shocked me, the authors generally pay quite a lot of money by the page to publish articles. Also not every journal is the same. Some hard to publish in and others easy. Some nonprofit and others profit making entities. The rush to publication and the publish or perish situation in science creates its own issues too.

This is not that much a failure of science in that it was discovered pretty quickly and presumably a retraction has been made. It is comical.

I would add that the patent system has similar issues. It is far from perfect too. Invalidating a patent is a lot more time consuming and costly and a lot less funny.

furrowsofar ,

Jounal articles are the start of discussion not the end. They get an idea out there for others to consider test and extend or dispute.

Keep in mind reviewers are generally unpaid as well.

Code reviews do not test correctness of code either of if the code is bug free. They also tend to assume good will of the participants. They have similar issues.

furrowsofar ,

I will be interested in what others say too.

Use to be that there were quite a few white box laptop suppliers but not so many these days. Even with the white box suppliers lot of the components were custom. This is one reason my wife and I still have desktop computers. The laptop and mobile market kind of sucks for standardization.

furrowsofar ,

I think it is about product differentiation and the cutting edge. Also Apple has historically defined the trends even for the non-Apple markets. Apple reaches for the next high end thing, then it filters to others after they prove it out. Similarly on the PC side one has to sell an idea to the brand’s first. So design is heavily brand driven and hence custom. I use to work in the industry. You would not believe the pressure to drive out a mm of thickness, an ounce of weight, a watt of power.

So do customers care. I do not myself. More normal people, well they will buy what companies like Best Buy choose to sell and push though the size, weight, features, and design do matter presumably.

furrowsofar ,

You could order from the same supply chains that Brands do but the up front costs and lot size requirements would be too much for anyone other than a major brand. Plus it would have to be worth their time and not upset their other customers. Big barrier to entry. I do not doubt it could be done, but at a very high unit cost.

furrowsofar ,

Interesting idea. The netbooks that ASUS introduced and Google Chromebooks are good examples if minimal hardware. ASUS had to stop promoting and apologize to Microsoft for competing with them but Google of cousre did not because it could go it on its own and has deep legal pockets.

Other thing is to think in terms of minimum usable product. A barrier there is that it needs to be enough hardware to drive a web browser and a screen that is or is near HD. This tends to mean a lot of memory and computing power.

furrowsofar ,

Actually CompuServe was before AOL. AOL was just a rewarming of it with flash sessions because the connect costs were so high. AOL was also faster to embrace actual internet connection and the web. Before this no one except universities, the military, and select few at large companies had internet access. For the general public dialup and BBS was the the thing.

Only point is how you experienced all this depended on who you were and what access you had.

furrowsofar ,

I think my mom still thinks that she has to open Firefox to connect to the internet as she did with AOL. She has broadband so of course she is always connected.

furrowsofar , (edited )

My mom is well into her 90s. She knows how to use her laptop, Libreoffice Writer, her printer, Thunderbird, and Firefox. Pretty much nothing else. She can stream her sports and navigate Facebook. She does not send email any more. Partially forgotten how and partially her contacts are no longer around. She is afraid to do business online so I help her with that, though she is fine researching and using search. Her big fear is making a mistake so she calls me when she needs help. That habit really helps in avoiding social engineering and malware.

She is a little afraid of her iPhone and Apple watch. She can make and receive calls. She can revcieve texts but does not send them. No interest I think. Recently to my surprise, she has gotten excited about the sleep monitoring app and uses that.

She is probably well ahead of her age group. Her mom was too. Back then her mom’s friends thought that she was a wonder to be able to use a microwave.

furrowsofar , (edited )

I was thinking more about what you said. I think at least for my mom her approach is procedural. If she can write down a procedure she can do it… well and has a good reason to do it often. Problem with that, you do not learn UI paradigms on one hand and on the other she is afraid to just try something for fear of breaking something. She is also not good at figuring out what the graphical icons mean. Some of that is context but it is not her strength either. UIs are based on paradigms and on exploring, no documentation needed. The lack of documentation and procedures really bothers her. Exploration is too scary.

As far as CLI, I am not sure she would use a computer at all without a GUI though I think she could do it because she is good a procedures. She would have to have a good reason.

Also she also will not use a desktop computer… She had one for a time and only really started using a computer often after I got her a laptop. She’s a very mobile person.

furrowsofar , (edited )

I am not sure I agree with their interpretation of the numbers. Inflation is not back to 2% and is unlikely to return there. Interest rates are high on loans. Stock market is not that up… just more recovering and the next 10 year return estimates are more like 6% not like the 10 or 12% people saw in the prior decade. Gas I do not use so I do not care. Geopolitics is concerning. Climate change is concerning. Internal politics is concerning. Both news and politics truth does not seem to matter… sensationalism seems more important then constructivism.

Hard to find positives. Maybe macro employment numbers are good. Not sure about working conditions or if incomes have matched inflation. Probably not universally. We may have avoided a recession I guess that may be positive. Money Market, CD, and Bond interest rates are up which is nice for some.

furrowsofar ,

Sure I agree that inflation is linked to the cost of carbon fuels. We need to eliminate 80% of that but it will be painful and difficult.

furrowsofar ,

Management greed, stupidity, and self serving is perennial. Nothing new there.

furrowsofar ,

I guess it is HP think it is OK to brick your printer due to HP updates but using competing cartridges is just so dangerous. Typical.

I never heard what happened to those bricked printers.

Facebook degrading Firefox user experience now?

Recently, most images on Facebook have stopped loading for me. Sometimes it’s just a few images. Other times it’s almost all images. The longer I scroll, the worse it gets. Today, I couldn’t even see my own pictures. Are any other Firefox users having this problem, or maybe it’s a server issue on Facebook’s end?

furrowsofar ,

Actually I like my facebook experience. I just mostly do not use Facebook anymore. I agree though, when I do go on it is nuts.

furrowsofar ,

The international situation is the biggest argument against Trump. Another 4 years of incompetence and self serving is something we cannot really have right now without huge consequences. Kind of feels like all the arguments in the US are just a distraction from the bigger issues.

‘The tide has turned’: why parents are suing US social media firms after their children’s death (www.theguardian.com)

While social media firms have long faced scrutiny from Congress and civil rights organizations over their impact on young users, the new wave of lawsuits underscores how parents are increasingly leading the charge, said Jim Steyer, an attorney and founder of Common Sense media, a non-profit that advocates for children’s online...

furrowsofar ,

The thing about social media companies is we all have one important power. Just uninstall the app. I agree they suck in so many ways.

Kids though… There are a few things that make me glad I do not have any. Cell phones and social media. They just seem problematic. Not sure anyone under the age of 16 should have either or be on an unfiltered net connection.

Really no one that does not know the standard net rule of block and move on and never share PII should be on the net. I would hope that a 16 year old would know that but maybe not.

Very sad.

furrowsofar ,

Money is not always the issue. FOSS software for example. Who wants their FOSS software gobbled up by a commercial AI regardless. So there are a variety of issues.

furrowsofar ,

Of course it is. About 50 years ago we went to a regime where everything is copywrited rather then just things that were marked and registered. Not sure where.I stand on that. One could argue we are in a crazy over copyright era now anyway.

furrowsofar ,

Most people cannot install or debug windows. For most people the biggest issue is their support network. My father-in-law and my wife run Linux and have done so for 20 years. They are not technical and it works just fine. My mom uses Windows and I have not suggested Linux because I am not local. She needs a local support network. I spend as much time or more supporting her.

The worst barrier is explicit hardware compatibility not software. Most hardware works but you never know. For software most things have FOSS eqyivalents. If you actually want to run commercial software then sure Windows or whatever platform it runs on.

furrowsofar ,

I liked that quote. Intuit being the biggest waste of money claiming direct filing is a waste of money. Like you said, FreeTaxUSA is at least reasonable.

Hard to argue that having a dozen companies developing IT software and systems to file taxes is more efficient them the organization that specifies the filing requirements do it once. The current system is more like a welfare program for the tax companies.

furrowsofar ,

Just fully remove chrome. I do not even have chrome on my phone. Firefox works fine on mobile. Have no idea why people think it does not.

furrowsofar ,

Firefox is far from irrelevant. Pure stupid click bait. Market share of courses is a sad thing and may lead to irrelevance when most web sites stop supporting. In the late days of Netscape and the early days of Firefox that was the case… lack of website support. I am just starting to see that again.

furrowsofar , (edited )

I have a plugin hybrid that is less then 10 years old, why would I want an EV until about 2030? After that I will probably buy a Bolt or something similar.

I would guess early adopters that can afford it and where it is a no brainer already have either a hybrid or some kind of an EV so the next increment is harder.

Our Volt has been wonderful but that is just us. It fits our needs really well.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • random
  • lifeLocal
  • goranko
  • All magazines
    •