Normally, I would have advocated for the nationalization of Starlink and SpaceX as a matter of national and global security, but it’s not like the current American regime would do any better. I’m not going to be counting on them to investigate, let alone prosecute the affairs of this Russian junkie-stooge either.

Nothing in particular, except the terms generally used to describe models of governance - cronyism etc. - tend to have greek rather than latin roots.

I’m insufficiently educated to figure out how to render “Rule by Golden Fat-tip Pen” in Greek, but whatever it’s called, the model has proven unsurprisingly ineffective so far. Maybe it’s best if we don’t name it and just forget about it. Forever.

I suppose the next batch of marks have now learned why some of us don’t trust Microsoft any further than our noodly coder-arms can throw them.

Hell no. The essential difference between games and movies/television or books as a source of entertainment is that they’re participatory. The player’s choices during interaction affects the exact outcome.

That’s not to say there’s anything wrong with being entertained by others making those choices, but they won’t be yours.

Incidentally, that also happens to be a highly accurate description of Trump’s testicles.

“Is someone close to him on the list?”

“Yes, much like you, it’s someone who’s very very close indeed.”

When I read the headline, it immediately made me wonder where ‘abroad’ Orban is admired. It certainly isn’t in my neck of the woods.

Meanwhile he has drawn admirers around the world, including US Vice President JD Vance and Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze. US President Donald Trump has called Orban “smart” and “a tough person”.

Ah. Yes.

Alternatively, you could use a browser instead of an advertisement delivery app.

Those are some interesting and creative suggestions. Now, I’m no weapons engineer, but I believe there’s a term for aerosolized gasoline when deployed to put out a fire, and that term is “thermobaric bomb”.

Never mind that though, it’ll totally work: Not only is a building that no longer exists not a building on fire, but it’s guaranteed to never catch fire again. Problem permanently solved. If you’re in the market for a job, I’ve been told that Hellfire (“We may not put you out, but we’ll definitely put you down”) Inc. is hiring.

“Gilette - Follow The Road, Don’t Cross It™”

It’s like reading an article about a petrol refining company, who, having prior experience with gasoline as a useful and profitable substance, decides to seek venture capital for the development of a petrol-based fire-extinguisher. They obtain the funding - presumably because some people with money just wants to see the world burn and / or because being rich and having brains is not necessarily strongly correlated - but after having developed the product, tests conclusively prove the project’s early detractors right: The result is surprisingly always more fire, not less. And they “don’t know how to fix it, while still adhering to the vision of a petrol-based fire-extinguisher”.

Ah yes, the printing press: Likely the most cumulatively subversive memetic infection vector ever conceived.

Define ‘mind-control’. Trans-cranial magnetic stimulation has been perfectly capable of changing people’s broad moods since 1985 and is being actively used to treat depression right now. The underlying technology is only going to get more precise, especially as more research on spintronics is done for other purposes. Sure, right now our understanding of how what goes on in a given brain translates to ‘thoughts’ is insufficient to change those thoughts in any reliable way, but there’s little doubt that when we do, the technology to make it happen will almost certainly be around.