I send all my old stuff for recycling now and get a gift card in return. They just did this for my ancient iPad that won’t even run the latest iPadOS.
I go on a site, pop in the serial number, and they ship me a box for free with a return label.
I basically got $45 for an incredibly slow brick, so I’d say that’s pretty good incentive for their recycling program.
Sure, you could install Linux and upcycle it, but how many people are actually going to do that? I think the recycling program is actually great for the 95%+ of people and how they use their devices.
Not in the UK; my iPad was unreliable from the off, eventually it was crashing 4 minutes after starting it. Trying to trade it in just got a message along the lines of "It can still have a good second life, go find a responsible recycler and give it to them. Have a Nice Day!".
It was disappointing to get unreliable hardware from a supposedly premium vendor, but it happens. It was the attitude and service that turned me off Apple though, not the hardware (which really should be more reliable than cheaper alternatives).
I forget who owns Black Diamond, but they're kind of similar.
They haven't fully replaced the product, but what is cool is that they have a repair shop that has been doing free repairs for me. I've sent a very lightweight, very heavily used puffy jacket in twice for repairs at no charge.
Realistically I know that jacket isn't going to last forever, but I respect they are at least trying to help me extract as much life out of it as I can from a sustainability perspective.
It's using less material and less landfill, but I wonder if it really is more sustainable in the grand scheme of things, at the scale of clothing and similarly sized items. The additional round trip shipping and workshop operations (HVAC, lighting, commuting, etc.) could potentially exceed the footprint of just sending you a replacement right off the production line. Obviously there's a crossover point above which this couldn't possibly be (cars, etc.) but it's probably a very blurry line, and I wouldn't be surprised if some companies knowingly take the worse but ostensibly sustainable option, i.e. greenwashing, for the resulting brand loyalty and word of mouth advertising.
It absolutely is, but [using it for production of new items and using it for a repair shop] might take more resources than [just having the former and supplying some replacements]. What I'm saying is that we can't just compare consumption/waste of materials (which is obviously worse when doing replacement instead of repair) because there are also "overhead" resources required in order to offer repairs. Theoretically, in cases where replacements are better for the bottom line than repairs, it's due to using fewer resources, and the open question is how "green or dirty" those resources are.
If replacement is cheaper only because of geographic differences in wages, then we ought to repair. But if replacement is cheaper because of streamlining the use of nonrenewable electricity and so forth, then we ought to replace.
I sent back a down jacket which weighed practically nothing and packed down extremely small. However, harvesting the down is somewhat controversial and only recently has there been a movement to use ethically-sourced down feathers (I haven’t looked into the RDS standard. I’m sure it has problems, but hey, it’s a step in the right direction).
For normal fabric clothing, I think you are probably right. I do feel like the roundtrip in this case was worth it to get the most usage out of the feathers as possible (not to mention the 1000+ fill jackets like this are expensive).
Whether it's VR, "Metaverse", or AI models, I want it to be open source.
I don't want to spend 8 hours a day in some corporation's world, even more than we already are. The incentives are not aligned.
The personal computer revolution (that Apple helped kickstart) was amazing. People could actually run the software locally, instead of a mainframe. People bought apps to run on their computer and videos to run on their own VCR. I feel like the Web started taking things backwards, empowering "the remote server" again, like a mainframe.
Now, we have Netflix, YouTube etc. and the broadband internet hurdle has been surmounted for many. We are fighting the wrong battles with "net neutrality". The real battle should be whether we can host the software on machines of our choice, or not.
When it comes to AI, yes you guys are lucky Meta had that snafu with LLaMa researchers and chose to seize the moment and make LLaMa available freely to everyone. Otherwise it would be quite a different world. Mark Z returned to his open-source roots that he had with Synapse and Wirehog back in the day, before Sean Parker and Peter Thiel “corrupted” him.
But when it comes to everything else, it is the opposite, in my opinion.
Apple sells you the hardware and you install apps locally. It’s not open source, but at least it runs locally. And Apple cares about your privacy.
Facebook is the opposite, it is ad-supported, it will never give you their backend source code or let you run your own social network. They only promote “React” front end framework and other ancillary things. They will try to take your data by hook or by crook (surreptitiously recording your camera and audio as well). Their “Metaverse” play would have to recouo the tens of billions spent on development.
But yeah when it comes to AI, you guys lucked out. Zuck’s image has improved since the first 15 years of “dumbf%[#s” giving him their data. He now surfs in a suit and looks much cooler. But remember — it’s people like Linus Torvalds, Tim Berners-Lee, and all the “BDFL”s of all the languages you use (like Guido Vom Rossum for Python and the Zend guys behind PHP) who really create most of the wealth for the world. If not for open source, you’d be spending more and more of your life in some corporation’s world.
Just ask yourself, when the following technologies enter your home or your body, would you rather all be hooked up to a corporation like the Borg, or at least have your own installation where you have a say:
TeslaBot in your house
Neuralink in your brain
Microsoft Recall recording
Hours in “the Metaverse”
Security cameras everywhere
What do you think the incentives will be for TeslaBot or Microsoft Recall surreptitiously storing everything they can about you, including your passwords?
When facing the temptation. Microsoft has already done it. Facebook has already done it.
But it can go far beyond that. How difficult would it be for TeslaBot to get all the info to impersonate you? All your mannerisms, voice recordings, your heartbeat rhythms, gait, everything?
> I don't want to spend 8 hours a day in some corporation's world, even more than we already are. The incentives are not aligned.
AR will be the 'future' for a very, very long time I think. Maybe there will be a Metaverse chatroom where all the worker bees can bounce around and have a happy hour on Friday or something
I agree that the OS is the most limiting factor of the AVP. In its current form it's just an iPad with all the downsides that brings. I had high hopes for it as a MBP replacement or companion but MVD was disappointing and so I returned mine.
Were you planning on bringing a keyboard and mouse around with you? VR "gesture" controls are godawful and nothing has supplanted mouse and keyboard because they are absolutely wonderful control methods.
If you ARE carrying around a mouse and keyboard and AVP, that seems like a lot more clunk and silliness than just using a damn laptop. What are you doing that actually benefits from gluing the screen to your face?
I want to be explicit: I love VR and have been hugely into it since the very first oculus dev kits, but other than flight/driving simulators and gun games which all hugely hugely benefit from the physical immersion VR provides, there is nothing worth doing in VR. Not that many games actually benefit from a physical presence. Almost nobody playing FIFA or CoD actually wants to do it in VR. The (really fun and quite well made) CoD ripoffs and other shooters in VR are nearly empty, because so few people are willing to stand up while playing. The Wii made this clear 18 years ago FFS.
I'm still waiting for a single use case that isn't sim driving, sim flying, or shooting, or beat saber. Billions invested into producing something, and still there is nothing.
> Were you planning on bringing a keyboard and mouse around with you? VR "gesture" controls are godawful and nothing has supplanted mouse and keyboard because they are absolutely wonderful control methods.
Yes, either external or the ones built into my MBP
> If you ARE carrying around a mouse and keyboard and AVP, that seems like a lot more clunk and silliness than just using a damn laptop. What are you doing that actually benefits from gluing the screen to your face?
I was hoping to use it as a companion (replacement was always "maybe in the future") initially so I was going to carry the AVP+MBP if things had worked out. Not always, but if I was going to be somewhere for an extended period of time (vacation/visiting friends or family/etc) then I would take both and have the "same setup" that I have at my desk at home (AVP+MBP). This was going to be an alternative to my 3-4 monitors (I have the same desk setup in 2 locations and duplicating everything was expensive and annoying). Unfortunately the MVD was too blurry and VR is too limiting (but mosting the MVD issues) so I returned my headset but that's what I was hoping to accomplish and how I was going to use it all.
Have you actually tried that though? People always bring this up like it's some cyberpunk fantasy but working with a one pound weight strapped to your face is awful and staring at screens situation an inch from your eyes is really really hard on them and absolutely sucks. I bet using VR for 8 hours a day would actually hurt your eyes.
Actual VR/AR desktop mirroring is a thing that exists now. It's a niche of a niche of a niche because it's not a good experience. It's interesting for the five minutes until it becomes unbearable.
Consider that many simracers, the niche that VR is the absolute best for, do not regularly use VR, because it's just too much fuss to put a damn set of goggles on, even when you are already sat in a purpose built simracing rig!
It’s pretty evident at this point that any Russian citizen in Russia or with family in Russia can be coerced, and it’s also pretty clear that Putin specifically does not have good intentions.
There are lots of good people there. It’s too bad there is a crazy person at the helm.
It is evident everyone CAN be coerced. Not that everyone WILL BE, because some people still think of themselves as people, not some “honest citizens” or “economic agents”.
It is also evident that someone quite far from Russia HAS ALREADY BEEN coerced to make that unannounced change, but you try really hard to look the other way. “Those Linux nerds” were shown who's the boss in the room when it comes to “important matters”. Don't you feel that the form of that change itself is a sign of silent disobedience, and you are expected to participate in public outcry forcing further developments instead of just bending over willingly?
It is totally possible that there was some direct intelligence that those accounts can be used in some clandestine operation in the future, probably without even asking some of the owners. After all, spies are #1 information source to other spies, they run the global spectacle together. Still, accepting “this is secret” as an excuse, you are already accepting defeat.
The cost/risk to the Russian government of coercing someone to do anything is approximately zero. Not so much in the US/etc., the risk of negative consequences is not insignificant?
> were shown who's the boss in the room when it comes to “important matters”.
Or Linus just doesn't like Russia(ns)? Why is there a need for some conspiracy?
all you have to look at is the number of russian oligarchs being defenstrated since the invasion began to know that if it served russian aims to inject malware into the kernel somehow via their maintainers it would probably be tried. the maintainers are probably not oligarch level rich so imagine the pressure on them if needed.
if you believe Russian government would coerce its own citizens, why do you not believe they would coerce foreigners? they have a world class intelligence agency that routinely assassinates regime enemies in foreign countries after all, so why should it be any harder for them?
There are many alternatives, but I have a 10kWh LiFePO4 pack that is sufficient for my house 95% of the time.
There have been great strides recently in battery recycling and new chemistries. Not to mention alternatives to batteries.
To me this seems like one of those problems that seems impossible until the economics start driving innovation. I think we are heading in the right direction.
Not to mention debris can be in GEO for a long, long time. People worry about LEO constellations causing Kessler syndrome, but the reality is that LEO debris deorbits in the order of months/years. GEO is much, much longer.
> Not to mention debris can be in GEO for a long, long time.
On human timescales, it's basically forever. Hopefully we'll develop the tech to clean up debris in space, but it's extra challenging to do it in geostationary orbit since it's so far away from Earth, both in terms of actual distance, and delta-V.
> People worry about LEO constellations causing Kessler syndrome, but the reality is that LEO debris deorbits in the order of months/years.
It's a little more complicated than that. The time to spontaneously deorbit is based on orbital height. Starlink can deorbit on its own in 5-10 years because it's orbiting so low. But any OneWeb satellites that malfunction[1] will take 1000+ years to deorbit because they're up at 1000+ km.
Yep! That's a great point! I forgot that LEO encompasses quite a bit of difference as well. Starlink has been in the news lately, so that's mostly where my mind was. I believe the newly announced Starlink shells are even lower, so that's good news from a failure standpoint.
> Hopefully we'll develop the tech to clean up debris in space
Rendezvousing is pretty established tech so long as you know a precise and stable orbit of your target, afaik? Which, for geo, we would I think. So taking up some grabbing mechanism probably does it, then use ion engines, burning retrograde (avoiding the need for heavy fuel) until you get it to a low LEO orbit, let loose, and let the problem solve itself within a few ~weeks. Then move on to the next piece, so you don't need a launch to orbit for every individual piece of debris. You also don't have to circularise your orbit to just rendezvous and grab it. And you probably also don't have to go out of plane even if the target object is, if I'm visualising this correctly, because there's always a node where the planes intersect and you can just start the path up to geo at the right point in your LEO orbit
Grossly simplified, devil in the details, but this seems very possible with today's technology and potentially less expensive in terms of delta V than it may seem at first glance
If two hosts have both mutually accessible ULA and GUA addresses, they will prefer _GUAs_ to talk to each other. So the connection will be susceptible to the prefix withdrawal if the upstream goes down (BTW, IPv6 did nothing sane for multihoming either).
> Are you taking about mDNS still referencing the withdrawn prefix?
