Search found 92 matches

by jcb
Tue Oct 29, 2024 6:29 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

Doesn't that require a lot of fussy bookkeeping? Maybe, but it would be built in, invisible to the customer, and it would be no more intrusive or difficult than the tracking that underlies the ad network. (Some visibility is good, e.g. on your monthly bill, so you can adjust your usage.) ISPs alrea...
by jcb
Tue Oct 29, 2024 5:37 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

Now, micropayments never worked because no one wants to allocate $0.30, or $0.03, or whatever, every time they access a web page. To make it work, it'd have to be built into the system, and automatic-- probably an extra charge from your ISP. You'd need a tracking system to distribute the money... b...
by jcb
Mon Oct 28, 2024 8:54 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

I don't know how to explain the US though! One thing I don't understand, for instance, is why the Silicon Valley used to be able to turn out good products in the 2000s and 2010s -- Gmail, Google Maps, even Twitter (which, surprising as it may seem, was an interesting place and not a huge troll farm...
by jcb
Fri Oct 25, 2024 7:51 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

I've been the leftist economics rant guy here from around 2019. lol Once more a taste of my spiel: I used to think the right's proto-Marxist rhetoric can be developed into scientific socialism. This might be possible in some cases. Nowadays, I'm inclined to think it's an adaptive mind virus that's ...
by jcb
Thu Oct 24, 2024 12:35 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Emoji Archetypes 🦋
Replies: 23
Views: 728

Re: Emoji Archetypes 🦋

for people surprised that mail delivery would pick up from the house, what is the arrangement where you're at? do you get mail delivered to your house but not picked up from it?? or some other system Yes, pretty much! In the UK, most houses have a letterbox, a flap in the front door which the postm...
by jcb
Mon Oct 21, 2024 7:29 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

As for the idea that a Trump victory would somehow lead to a net win for socialism -- I'm sorry, but that's just magical thinking. I never said that it would. You miss the point. As a socialist, I could be like jcb here and insist that I will only support any candidates that support socialism. But ...
by jcb
Mon Oct 21, 2024 12:50 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

political candidates and parties need to earn people's votes I can't help but notice how I repeated this same idea. Sure, for example, in theory, if there was a far left voter, and there were only two viable parties to vote for, it would make sense for them to vote for the lefter one, no matter how...
by jcb
Sun Oct 20, 2024 12:08 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Emoji Archetypes 🦋
Replies: 23
Views: 728

Re: Emoji Archetypes 🦋

In America, the flag (the red thing on the side, which is made of metal, not cloth) on the mailbox is raised by the owner to signify to the mail carrier that there is outgoing mail inside the box. Otherwise, the mail carrier might skip opening the box and miss the outgoing mail if there is no mail ...
by jcb
Thu Oct 17, 2024 3:31 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Emoji Archetypes 🦋
Replies: 23
Views: 728

Re: Emoji Archetypes 🦋

There are four different American mail boxes. I don't quite understand the difference between them. Here are the four: 📬📫📪📭 In America, the flag (the red thing on the side, which is made of metal, not cloth) on the mailbox is raised by the owner to signify to the mail carrier that there is outgoing...
by jcb
Wed Oct 16, 2024 12:07 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Emoji Archetypes 🦋
Replies: 23
Views: 728

Re: Emoji Archetypes 🦋

Since emoji were invented in Japan, I'm a bit surprised that there's not more variation or use of Japanese norms. E.g. the Samsung bear is a beige color, but all the eagles have white heads. Well, there are some emojis of japan-specific things, like: - map of japan 🗾 (No other country has an emoji ...
by jcb
Tue Oct 15, 2024 7:07 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Emoji Archetypes 🦋
Replies: 23
Views: 728

Emoji Archetypes 🦋

Here is the emoji of a butterfly: 🦋 Here it is as an image, because your browser probably doesn't show it the same as mine: https://em-content.zobj.net/source/microsoft/407/butterfly_1f98b.png In my browser, it is orange, because the archetypical butterfly that the artist referenced is a monarch but...
by jcb
Sat Oct 12, 2024 9:18 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Navigating in a City with Illogical Street Names
Replies: 73
Views: 4932

Re: Navigating in a City with Illogical Street Names

'll concur with most people, yes. I'd guess that it's not even in the modern internet era that systems like yours are much more useful. People use the systems they are used to and they still find places. In your city, what happens if you can't remember if it was 36 & 25 or 37 & 26 or 26 &am...
by jcb
Wed Oct 02, 2024 12:38 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

At his rallies, Trump brags about how anti-union and anti-strike he is. Don't lecture us about how much blue collar class solidarity people who cheer for that kind of thing supposedly have. Two wrongs don't make a right. Why did the Democrats nominate someone with Bill Clinton's policies in the fir...
by jcb
Tue Oct 01, 2024 3:14 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

Coal miners, seriously? There are 44,000 coal miners in the US. FWIW there are 10 million NYT subscribers. This literalism is a common trope I've encountered with liberals before. I worked in a factory for 5 years. Even though the people there weren't coal miners, when Trump talked about coal miner...
by jcb
Sat Sep 14, 2024 11:45 am
Forum: Languages
Topic: Neo-grammarianism
Replies: 15
Views: 1023

Re: Neo-grammarianism

Historically we see completed or mostly-completed sound changes, so they look regular. But it's not guaranteed that every word that could be affected actually was. So sound changes can have a patient zero? Patients zero, but yeah, pretty much. Labov even identified which sociological groups are lik...
by jcb
Sun Sep 01, 2024 11:08 pm
Forum: Languages
Topic: Order of Adjectives
Replies: 10
Views: 1013

Order of Adjectives

Adjectives in English follow a certain order. I found images like this that describe an order, but I think it's somewhat incomplete and incorrect, so I've revised it into this order: (order) kind - example (1) determiner/possessor - a, the, this, my, John's (2) number - one, two (3) size - big, tall...
by jcb
Thu Aug 29, 2024 6:42 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Navigating in a City with Illogical Street Names
Replies: 73
Views: 4932

Re: Navigating in a City with Illogical Street Names

Thanks for the replies, everybody. You memorize the main streets. Despite the grid that my city generally follows, that is what you have to do here too, because the minor streets don't always continue all the way without being interrupted, especially when they meet the new car-centric neighborhoods ...
by jcb
Thu Aug 29, 2024 2:50 am
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: Navigating in a City with Illogical Street Names
Replies: 73
Views: 4932

Navigating in a City with Illogical Street Names

I live in a (small) city where the streets are named logically, by which I mean they follow the following two principles: (1) Streets *always* run north-south, and avenues *always* run west-east. (2) Most streets and avenues are named with numbers (3rd street) (as opposed to, uh, names (elm street))...
by jcb
Tue Aug 20, 2024 9:06 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

Who do these people protesting the DNC think they're helping? Every non-vote for Harris is a vote for Trump. I must point out that nearly every case of institutional failure applies this kind of logic to silence their critics. Example: "Priests are molesting children, which makes the Catholic ...
by jcb
Sun Aug 11, 2024 5:28 pm
Forum: Ephemera
Topic: United States Politics Thread 46
Replies: 1909
Views: 528153

Re: United States Politics Thread 46

(Ironically, in some other contexts, such as fiscal policy, center-left people are perfectly aware that what works for individuals doesn't always work for entire societies.) Indeed, but as you said, this situation personally benefits liberals in the establishment (AKA the elites). Because they are ...