While the labels give retailers the ability to increase prices suddenly, Gallino doubts companies like Walmart will take advantage of the technology in that way.

“To be honest, I don’t think that’s the underlying main driver of this,” Gallino said. “These are companies that tend to have a long-term relationship with their customers and I think the risk of frustrating them could be too risky, so I would be surprised if they try to do that.”

Rather than seeing an opportunity to use surge pricing, Gallino says retailers are likely drawn to electronic shelf tags to ensure consistency between online and in-store pricing.

This person must live on another planet.

Sure, the prices won’t be changing every six seconds, but anyone with half a mind can see these tags won’t be used only when stock or expiry are a factor. The prices will be up on the weekend to start. Then later it’ll be changing through the day to get higher prices between 4:00-7:00 when people are getting off work.

The arguments of no longer needing people to do yet another menial task and increasing utility of labels for consumers both have merit, but this alien even says the primary factor:

“The bottom line … is the calculation of the amount of labor that they’re going to save by incorporating this."

Agreed. The whole idea of these huge payouts could be eliminated and replaced with what exists for everyone else - severance pay. Calculated off a regulated minimum formula, based primarily on how long the person served the company.

I also agree with you that the top and bottom salaries should have a correlation. The C suite making the salary of a shelf stocker in one day should not happen. I think I could accept that the top gets somewhere around 10 or 20 times higher salary. Even 100x would be an improvement to the way it is now.

Like you point out, between stock options and whatever else, an executive salary could be a few hundred thousand, even if their total compensation is tens of millions. In fantasy land it would be nice if, once a company grows to a certain point, say a billion dollars in value, if it were required to convert to an employee owned cooperative entity.

It’s a shame things are the way they are. Maybe one day we won’t have politicians that can be bought. That’s a different discussion altogether.

In an ideal world, the penalties you describe are suitable. Though, gaming industry aside, for the executive level of most any corporation, being a scapegoat and handed a golden parachute is the worst case scenario for them leaving. In many cases floating across the street right into another executive position.

Jail time isn’t a likely outcome. It just isn’t the world we live in, unfortunately.

I was looking at the Volt a couple years ago but the only ones around were over 25k. Then I started looking for a BMW i3, but, like so many of the cheaper EVs, there’s not many for sale. It’s a shame these smaller vehicles, even a hybrid, aren’t pumped out the factories left, right, and centre.

It’d be so much safer - and quieter - in the city if smaller cars were more pervasive.

It’s almost like they knew in the sixties that they were in for some problems and have since been devising ever more complicated methods of disinforming the public in order to maintain their wealth. Does my head in sometimes.

Without knowing any examples of the vehicles that are for sale everywhere except, roughly, half the world, I can’t really say much them. What I can say is that compared to the monstrous subsidies the oil and gas industry recieve, it does seem like those tariffs could be done away with. At least on the face of it, perhaps the issue is more intricate than that but I’m sure you grasp my meaning.

I see what you’re getting at but this would be difficult for a publisher to stick with in the event the game does horribly. Requiring them to keep their word to the date advertised would end up with them only guaranteeing a week, or send ramifications through all industries requiring truth in advertising.

A middle ground would be simply to legislate that when games require online connectivity for any reason, the appropriate software is released to allow a locally run server to enable online function at the time the company decides to decommission their servers. Then require them to hold these files in an accessible manner for at least as long as the servers had been active for.

That would be difficult in the event the company goes out of business, but I’m sure this would be a difficult thing to explain to most politicians so maybe not so simple after all.

When 52% of all trips made are less than 3 miles and less than 2% are over fifty miles, I don’t think battery swapping is something any individual needs on a regular basis.

I could get on board if manufacturers were making $10,000 sub 50 mile vehicles that were compatible with a swap station so you could switch to a larger battery for the weekend. This would have to be a standard adopted by all however, and even before that, they’d have to make small cars. Which they won’t, because we all know they are too busy making trucks and SUVs.

Ignoring that they shouldn’t be getting any of these ‘gifts’, could you imagine being one of the others only recieving a few thousand a year. I’d be rather annoyed.

Not sure if this image from the DOT is actually of this specific shipment because I found this image from April when they moved the eighth part and it’s less that half the weight. Here’s a two minute video of it.

Do you live in a city or an are with a lower population? I strap the helmet on in the city or doing some speed, but when we’re out visiting with family in the country or a small town, we usually go without it.

I’ve been using Shokz for a decade now. They’ve replaced a couple sets at no cost. I wear mine every day. Even for the occasional swim.

Listening to podcasts definitely gives longer battery life than listening to music. Though even the odd time I’ve drained the battery in a day, I charge it with a battery pack for fifteen minutes and it’s charged again.

Not many products I’d say are worth every cent, but from the quality to the customer service, Shokz are great.

Seems like you’re describing renting in an apartment complex or similar. Not exactly an apples to apples comparison to owning a single family home.

Not that you’ve raised bad points. Renting does have the benefits you’ve described, though lawn care in my experience is hit and miss. The issue is getting these benefits must cost something. So long as having them doesn’t mean the rent is double the mortgage, then it’s worthwhile.

Otherwise, renting is just another more expensive option for all the people that can’t afford the upfront cost of getting into the housing market.

I think that last bit is more of a ‘what you make of it’ situation, regardless of how smart or dumb a phone is.

Unfortunately the manufacturers want the data and advertising revenue, and they’d only be persuaded to offer an alternative if they made the same amount of money.

If each sale of a $900 smart phone gives them $100 of ad revenue over a couple years, I’d bet my bottom dollar they would charge $200 for the ‘dumb’ version.

A big difference I find is having the separations be padding and not a line. Even if each option took up the same number of pixels, the line makes it too visually crowded.

I’ll give Voyager a go and see how it is.

Might be a hold over from Reddit is Fun but I can’t say I’m keen on the way the voting is displayed there. Seems to take up too much real estate maybe?

Either way, I’m not a fan of colouring certain text or the lines dividing each post. Both these things make is too busy for my taste.

Then again, maybe I’m just bland.

Here’s what posts look like in my compact configuration of Jerboa:

I’ve been using Jerboa for that reason. Condensed information so I’m not constantly scrolling.

What’s Connect look like for you?

It is quite annoying. Samsung has trimmed up their bloat and strange customizations over the years, but some things are still incorrect as far as I see them.

NetGuard can manage network access on a per app basis but it uses the VPN function to do so, while not actually being a VPN service. Sadly this means I can’t be using an on-device VPN at the same time as turning off app data.

Annoying compromise.

Unfortunately disabling network access entirely isn’t a universal feature.

I see what you’re getting at, but there will always be the higher and lower end of any type of product. Many companies charge orders of magnitude more for goods or services that most people get elsewhere for cheaper.

As with most any issue of a company damaging the environment or abusing their workforce, the answer could lie with stronger regulation, but that’s getting a different subject altogether.