The clankers in the OP are from mainland China, so are ultimately under CCP control.

The CCP has indicated for decades it plans to invade Taiwan (CCP refers to this as “reunification”).

People should be concerned. Robots like these may be deployed against Taiwan in the next few years.

Hopes these white coats show up at the White House real soon.

Is the word “Donut” kryptonite to Flock?

Why wouldn’t you be concerned about VM or container escapes?

In the UK at least, decisions and rationale about which vaccinations and treatments should be publicly-funded via the NHS are published quite transparently. For example: https://www.nihr.ac.uk/story/preventing-cancer-extending-vaccination-boys

Vaccinating everyone in the UK against everything for which vaccines are available (even against diseases with very low risk in the UK) would cost so much that the NHS would have to cut treatments with very high benefit-to-cost ratio.

Therefore, below a certain benefit-to-cost threshold, the UK has no reasonable choice except to withhold public funding. The HPV vaccine for boys was right on that threshold. IMO, the UK did the right thing by funding the clear benefit (HPV vaccine for girls, whose risk was significantly higher per existing evidence) and extending it to boys when additional evidence showed it was worth doing so.

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Cost-benefit is the likely reason.

For comparison: the UK initially concluded the cost-benefit ratio was in favour of girls-only HPV vaccination, but IIUC updated this assessment and offered it to boys too after a public campaign by Jaime Winstone.

Thanks for this!

I’m unfamiliar with Aquaseal. If I tried Aquaseal first without success, and it failed, what would be involved in prepping the surface afterwards for Tear-Aid or similar?

In other words, is the Aquaseal likely to interfere with subsequent membrane adhesion - and if so, how does one remove the Aquaseal from a NeoAir without worsening the existing damage.

I’ve used Tyvek for other applications, but never for repairing inflatable items. Intriguing suggestion. I’ll look into it further.

“The iOS 26.6.1 update fixes three flaws in the iPhone Kernel and nearly 20 in WebKit.”

Current short-list, based on Three Points of the Compass post, with too-small items crossed out:

• DCF Repair Patches
• DCF Repair Tape
• McNett GearAid Tenacious Tape (as recommended above)
• Multimat Repair Kit
• Sea to Summit Repair Kit
• Stormsure Inflatable Tent Repair Kit
• Stormsure Tuff Tape
• Stormsure Universal Repair Kit
• Tear-Aid Type A
• Tear-Aid Therm-a-rest Instant Field Repair Kit*
• Tear-Aid Therm-a-rest Permanent Home Repair Kit*

* Three Points of the Compass says Tear-Aid makes the patches included in the Thermarest repair kit.

I wasn’t referring to their legal department, I was thinking of Greyball.

And things like this.

As a Keynesian, I’m in favour of gas pump attendants, while gas stations exist.

As an environmentalist, I’m in favour of phasing out fossil fuel.

As a human, I’m opposed to companies that engage in union-busting, labour casualisation, and surge pricing. AFAICT, all the robotaxi companies engage in those practices.

So-called “ride-share” companies scam people on a bigger scale than individual cabbies ever could. Uber had a whole team devoted to avoiding legal scrutiny.

Robotaxi companies will most likely be just as shady, since they’re backed by the same investors.

As for NJ gas, that’s a false equivalence. A better analogy would be that NJ gas stations are like having a chauffeur, everywhere else is like doing your own driving.

What a pointless reply.

I debunked your concerns. Hopefully, that reassures you schools can function just as well, if not better, without smartphones or even cell phones.

Thanks, I’ll add it to the shortlist!

gonna be a shitshow

Pure doomerism.

The schools where I grew up had one landline for over a thousand kids. The sole school secretary answered it as well as handling other duties. It had a call-waiting system. If there was an issue that might prompt lots of parents to call in, they’d just update the OGM: “If you’re calling about the such-and-such, here’s the latest information. Blah blah. Otherwise, please hold to speak to someone.” It was always fine.

As for checking-in to class, no need to use smartphones: teachers can take the register (roll-call) at the start of each class.

Landlines worked fine for a century or so. Any specific reason you think they wouldn’t work today?

Thanks, I’ll try that.

The issue has happening on an increasing number of websites, though: Ecosia, ScienceDirect, TrainSplit (which thankfully has a fallback to hCaptcha), Indeed, and more.

Thanks. What’s your source for that list? I think you’re right that those measurements are factors in the final “bot score”, but I expect there are many other measurements also factored in.

If you look at my OP, though, you’ll see my browser passed the checks but was still blocked, which Cloudflare said shouldn’t happen.