litchralee

I've not used it, but have heard decent things about Kagi, a paid search engine. Supposedly, it finds things like how old Yahoo or old Google worked, without AI (but is optionally available?), and no ads.

I would think the major barrier to entry is the business model: ad revenue goes to those that can deliver results. Google AdSense has dominated that realm for years, so it would take a major upfront investment to challenge them on that. Not much different than how it's hard to compete with established airlines to a particular airport that they already serve. Economies of scale tend towards consolidation.

In California, a U turn is considered a left turn that keeps going. As a result, a U turn is legal anywhere that a left turn is legal, except when signs are posted otherwise. So in a left-turn pocket/lane, it is both reasonable and expected that people will make left turns, some of which will continue into a full 180 degree turn. People who do U turns are doing what is allowed, and they have every right to do so. If this seems like a problem, then talk to your transportation department to restrict U turns.

I'm not aware of any aspect of a U turn procedure that would be any different than than a standard 90 degree turn: use turn signals, look for oncoming traffic, look for pedestrians, turn slowly as required by the radius, roll out of the turn with careful acceleration.

American English speaker here. While I would understand what "to auction away" means, I'm not aware of anyone here in California that would say it like that. Usually, I would say "to auction off", which follows in a long series of other "X off" verbs, like "to bake off" or "to shake off", all of which usually involve some sort of adversary or competition.

Note that we do use the verb "to give away" but that would mean a gift without compensation, which is definitely not an auction.

Civil forfeiture and DEA is a separate problem unto itself, and you've always hit on the key points: DEA operates within the country, whereas customs is at port of entries. DEA's corruption and geographic reach mean they have caused far more problems than any customs agent, in pursuit of a 1990s zeal that "drugs are bad" and expanding that into a parallel law enforcement system, despite already having a federal law enforcement department: the FBI. Civil forfeiture should be abolished as unconstitutional, violating due process, equal protection, and property law.

So yes, once you're in the country, there is a risk to carry around large sums of cash. But that's hardly connected to the customs declaration requirement, and certainly cannot be connected to the declaration requirement on the way out.

When entering or exiting the USA, the rule is that cash or financial instruments need to be declared above $10,000, but you can bring as much as you want. So bringing a literal suit case of Swiss francs worth $5 million USD is perfectly fine, provided you tell the customs agent.

While I can't really advise going to the USA right now, it's not like they will confiscate cash above $10,000. The particular phrase used in most places is "freedom of capital", meaning that money can flow into or out of the country without significant impediment. The entire USA financial sector relies upon freedom of capital, whether that's electronically or -- if need be -- with bundles of cash.

Declaring cash helps prevent money laundering, since people intending to secretly move money would not want to declare to customs. The threshold is intentionally set so that normal people going on holiday with cash or travelers checks (yes, I'm aware it's 2026) won't be burdened by the rule.

Obligatory XKCD: https://xkcd.com/3138/

Please let such a thing never exist!

I think the market for each is quite a bit different. Prop guns, whether functioning or not, are often regulated in law as "replica firearms" because while they may (or not) be functional, the issue is that they are intentionally similar to the real thing. Hence, some jurisdictions have limits on who can sell replica firearms and who can buy them.

One rank below firearms and replica firearms, air/pellet guns and BB guns propel small balls or shuttlecocks (?) made of metal using compressed air or spring power. These could still be harmful to people, but aren't usually fatal, which makes them effective for pest control or target practice, in lieu of live firearms. Accordingly, these are often regulated like how knives are: don't just hand a pellet gun to a child without supervision, and don't assault people. Otherwise, do as thou whilst.

Meanwhile, airsoft guns propels small plastic balls using springs, compressed air, or electro-pneumatic pressure. By sheer virtue of having less density, a plastic airsoft projectile carries less energy than a BB pellet, and certainly a lot less than a live-fire bullet. Also, whereas firearms can attain supersonic velocities, the speed of sound puts a firm cap on what a plastic, ball-shaped projectile can achieve, when not using chemical-based propulsion (ie gunpowder).

Only 8 US States regulate airsoft guns, and even those that do are not restricting them as heavily as firearms (except New Jersey?). The common requirement is that an airsoft gun should have an orange tip. That means a majority of Americans are potential customers for airsoft, and that means an environment will form that host matches, competitions, and so on. Big market means lots of producers, so lots of variety, high quality, and lower prices for all.

Whereas, what's the market for replica firearms? Show business? Gun enthusiasts?

Even when something is fairly inexpensive and readily available, the nature of the thing may preclude it from being well-noticed in public, even if it's not being intentionally obscured at all. Things that move are an especially good example, because most people don't really pay significant attention to passing traffic or stuff moving approximately 3-5x faster than their own walking pace, with the exceptions of when they themselves are in motion too (eg seeing another train while riding a train), or if the object is coming straight at them.

An example suited for fellow Americans: seeing the same color and model of your car, parked in public, is very easy to spot, because that's how you're accustomed to seeing your own car: stationary. Whereas seeing your own car in motion (while you're stationary) is slightly harder because: 1) it's whizzing by for only a few seconds, and 2) you're not used to seeing your own car drive away from you. Confirmation bias then means that you rarely see that same model of car in motion.

Drones have the same perceptional bias, but compounded by the fact that humans aren't in the habit of scanning the skies overhead for drones. And even if they do, identifying a hovering drone means to spot a small dot that's hanging dozens of meters in the air, or being within earshot (inverse-square law limits this distance). And if the drone is moving, then spotting it is even more difficult, although it does have a moving audible footprint now.

Finally, there's the operator, which in almost all circumstances is stationary. Yet, for similar reasons, why should anyone notice if someone is standing in a forest, looking at a screen with a set of controls? If nobody is around, is a drone operator even there? As a fairly solitary activity, it's no surprise that few have ever seen a drone actually being operated, much the same that loads of people know of Pokemon cards and yet few have actually seen the TCG played out on a tabletop (this fediverse audience excepted).

TL;DR: the general public only perceives things that are easily perceivable. When did you last see your car moving?

The short answer is that it depends. Some countries have treaties where civil court judgements (ie money compensation) from overseas are honored domestically, meaning the domestic court would not have to relitigate the facts but would just be to re-issue the local equivalent of an order to pay up.

Seeing as this is a lawsuit in the UK, Valve does not appear to have a dedicated business location in the UK or EU, and that Valve has not already stopped offering services, I would guess that they don't intend to skip town. The appeals process in British courts is similar to how it is in the USA, so there would be room for any award to be adjusted downward, before being forced to pay it.

Also, to not pay a lawful judgement in one jurisdiction would cause potential issues in other jurisdictions, such as the massive EU market next door. This is precisely because Valve doesn't operate a subsidiary but is doing business under their USA corporation. So the EU authorities would be within their rights to curtail the same corporation that skipped on a lawsuit in the UK, even when the UK isn't part of the EU anymore.

Note: some lawsuit judgements are explicitly disallowed from being "repatriated", such as lawsuits regarding free speech in the USA. Under the SPEECH Act, an overseas judgement for speech that would have been legal if said in the USA. Thus, that judgement cannot be collected on USA territory or against USA bank accounts. It would have to be collected against the person when they're traveling, or from their non-USA bank accounts.

If a lot of people suddenly stopped consuming anything there would be a drop in price. The producers don't have time to adapt.

This is generally correct, but with a somewhat-rare caveat. If the product was priced as the sum of variable costs (eg unit cost of fuel to yield 1 kWh of electricity) and of fixed costs (eg price to build a power generating station that will last for 20 years), then a reduction in consumption can actually cause an increase in per-unit costs for the remaining consumers.

This is precisely what is playing out in California with the incumbent electricity provider, PG&E. For arcane reasons, their regulated monopoly allows them to undertake large-scale construction projects, with a guaranteed rate of return (aka fixed cost) passed onto consumers. But since solar installations have smashed even the most optimistic expectations, demand for fossil fuels generation is slowing. But because a power plant running at 50% output still needs to pay off 100% of its loan payments, PG&E is using the situation to try to hike consumer rates even more. You know, to pay for those large projects that PG&E owns...

At the end of the day, non-solar consumers are being asked to shoulder more of the burden despite falling electricity demand (pre AI), but it's not caused by solar early-adopters, but due to PG&E's own greed and desire for guaranteed profit.

TL;DR: prices will usually go down when consumption goes down, unless a monopoly is trying to save their own skin. PG&E should be dissolved.

Glad to see this! And thanks for getting back to me.

Btw, is there a presence for the project on Mastodon? I'd like to follow along on new stuff in this space. Or even an RSS feed that can be pulled by a bot on Mastodon?

In a nutshell, revolution turns on information and power asymmetry. Sometimes just one of those is sufficient, having both makes the results highly likely, but not guaranteed.

Stating with information asymmetry, we start with the identifying the usual groups of people. I will be using terminology more akin to the Westminster style of governance, which does not so clearly distinguish the roles. In a governmental revolution, there are those in power (eg a president, prime minister, members of parliament, monarch), there is the state and its institutions (eg military, judiciary, civil service workers in those departments, treasure, welfare, foreign representatives), and then there's the citizenry (aka the people).

Of these, the citizenry are the absolute largest group but the least organized. In a monarchy or autocracy where power is concentrated in the very few, the citizenry are often denied the means of communication or it is strictly censored or controlled. In a republic, the state is created as the organization which is meant to serve the people, and I'm not aware of any republic that has ever created two duplicate organizations to guard against usurpation. To that end, the citizenry are the most dependent on the state and the government for information. Even when it's now technically possible to exchange information using mesh networks, online forums, ham radio, and even plain ol letters, the fact is that convenience means that the majority just aren't dialed into the situation, or that the official mouthpieces have enough sway to quell the public.

But it need not only be the citizenry that are kept in the dark. The government itself can end up being split apart by those who know versus those who don't. As an example, look to the former South Korean president that attempted to impose martial law. In the chaos that ensued, members of the legislature needed to understand what was going on first, in order to combat the situation. It eventually emerged that the legislatute was being blockaded and that a vote would be held to nullify the imposition of martial law. Photos of some legislators scaling the outside wall of the assembly made international headlines. That was only possible because enough representatives got word that a vote was going to happen, and that it wasn't a trap.

The South Korean example also shows what happens when the state is not on the president's side. The military was doubtful that the president could lawfully declare the legislature as acting against the interests of the country, and so they did not substantially mobilize. Likewise, the citizenry were not having it either and protested in public. Perhaps it would have been different if the president was able to sever communications lines, an often-used tactic in the hours prior to a coup.

As for power asymmetry, that's much easier to explain. The same groups as before each wield separate powers, some of which are more effective at times and some less. For example, the military has all sorts of hardware that could be used against the citizenry or against the state institutions. Shopping mall, tax offices, and city halls aren't exactly built to repel RPGs and mortar fire. The government also benefits from having authoritative power, meaning they can claim a mandate (eg from heaven, from the monarch, or from the people) that legitimizes their attacks on the state institutions or the people. See the Stalinist era of the USSR.

Meanwhile, the people have the power of populism, where the influence of social mores can and does have tangible impact. Look to the UK where MPs and cabinet members have been forced to resign "due to scandal", where their position "becomes untenable". From an American perspective, this would seem unusual since a corrupt politician would still end up serving their term. Yet in the UK, they recognize that they cannot continue in their job if nobody will ever look at them with a straight face. No committee would keep them on, they could never hold a cabinet portfolio, they can't effectively represent their constituency, and can't represent the country in good terms overseas. They could just sit there and collect the paycheque, but ultimately, they know their days are numbered or the government will have the police service investigate them. So they resign, simply because of the crushing weight of public opinion. That is power.

Finally, there's the institutions themselves that have power. With the presumption of regularity, institutions hold tremendous soft power. That is, without firing a gun, an IRS tax agent or DMV worker can make someone's day, or make it their worst day. A judge can grant search warrants that authorizes someone's house to be turned upside down. Or a department of transport can start eminent domain proceedings to acquire someone's home. Meanwhile, the central bank can change the value of money, even the banknotes in your wallet, overnight. So powerful are institutions that in at least two places in California law, one of which is the open government act, the law opens with a declaration that "The people of this state do not yield their sovereignty to the agencies which serve them". This is a warning against the institutions to not abuse the power they are entrusted with.

So, what does this mean for revolution? For both information and power, it's not about how much is possessed but how it is used. Sometimes information can coerce power to be used. The Zimmerman telegram was a large part of how the USA joined WWI, because the British intercepted it and realized it would spur Americans to support the war against Germany. Domestically, small power can be used to test a larger power, basically to try calling a bluff. If the police declare a curfew due to false allegations of rioting, protesting is a response to the dare: will the police actually try to pepper spray and arrest thousands of people that show up anyway? If they don't, they've folded. If they do, there is now information (eg video, photos, TV) that can be leveraged to encourage more power (eg more protests, or state intervention against local police). In the most extreme case, the police could respond with overwhelming force (see Kent State Massacre). But in that situation, it was so uncalled for that other powers responded: the USA's involvement in Vietnam and Nixon's presidency became more unpopular than ever, causing mandatory conscription to end in 1973. It has not come back since, because people will still remember that event. Even as the shooters in question escaped legal culpability, it has cost the nation the effective power to call the citizenry into military service. Such power would be tough to regain, because the citizenry would fight it. Hence why all such attempts since in the USA have failed to reintroduce conscription.

TL;DR: the balance of information and power ebbs and flows over time, sometimes yielding unique opportunities or colossal failure.