I work in live TV. The podcast mike’s are tiny compared to the ones used in most TV work. A shotgun mic, with a windshield can be bigger than your forearm.

E.g. the Sannheiser MKE 600 is 20mm diameter and 256mm long (10"), without its windshield.

The lapel mics are both expensive as hell, and far lower quality. They are only used when a better mic can’t be.

The mics used by many podcasts are similar to those used by radio stations and music recording. They trade directionality for compactness, without dropping quality.

It’s a cost-benefit balance. You want to have a minimum amount of collateral damage to achieve the goal. The goal also needs to be worth the damage. Finally, you need to have exhausted non military options.

America effectively achieved nothing, for a lot of damage. Trump also ripped up the carefully negotiated, internationally backed, treaty that was working to bring Iran back into the fold. They didn’t even competently argue that Iran was in breach.

The end result, a large loss of life, a lot of money wasted, and peace set back decades. It will also have knock on effects for years (fertilizer being a big issue).

My guess is that enough people were buying routers and using them as access points. They all tend to be on 192.168.0.1 .254 means you don’t get as bad collisions when that happens. It would cut down on technical support calls.

I mostly agree. I can think of a few niche uses for it. However, they are very uncommon. E.g. bringing a freezer of blood up from “deep storage” temperatures to “ready to use in a hurry”.

I can also think of a few more where a “boost mode” could be useful e.g. a supermarket that knows there is a heat wave. Over-chilling the freezers would let them cope better with the temperature spike later in the day.

Critically, these should still be within safe hard limits. The fact that hackers could effectively switch them off in mass is the huge issue.

I don’t think we are to blame for the beans thing (we prefer our beans as baked beans).

As a rule of thumb though, we can be blamed for far too much stuff. You need to include the french too however. They got up to almost as much “shenanigans”.

Read only remote access is useful for life critical supplies. You want to know, as soon as possible if your blood has gone out of safe storage temperatures, and for how long. It would let you save the supplies by moving them to a new freezer.

The problem is remote temperature control. That bit should be air gapped, unless you have a very good reason to need to adjust it remotely.

I can see a use for adjusting temperatures, based on expected ambient. On colder days, run efficiently. On hot days, run them hard before the weather hears up, to stay ahead of it.

Other than that though, there is no reason to be able to run the fridge out of safe range remotely. Tweak and monitor only.

It’s worth mentioning they also had a battle bridge, that was buried away inside the ship. I accept them not using it much as a conceit to television (and set costs).

Given that enterprise was foremost a ship of exploration and diplomacy, and how many aliens ended up visiting the bridge. Having a “public” bridge and a battle bridge would make sense.

It’s basically a statement to prepare for any issues now, while supply infrastructure is not under stress.

It’s good sense generally. However, the predictions for this winter mean some areas could have issues. The cyber attack on France also lit a fire that supply chains could be disrupted for days.

UK based here.

I was in scouts, and my little minion is now also in the lower levels.

I personally think it fills a critical need for a lot of kids. Schools are locked hard into the national curriculum, and don’t have time for the more character and skill building events. Scouts cover this nicely.

Regarding my local group. So far, my experience has been excellent. The kids adore it and they are doing a lot of fun learning. E.g. recently they did fire lighting. Learning to use matches, and basic fire safety around candles etc is an important skill. Learning as a group also means they learn from each other’s (minor) mistakes.

The group is also mixed gender. While it’s mostly boys, there are enough girls that it’s not intimidating for either gender. Its activities are “boy focused”, so most of the girls are of the tomboy mindset.

There are a few religious aspects attached to it. The pledge/promise mentions God. In practice it’s mostly non religious. What religious elements there are, are quite inoffensive. I’ve also noted that the older groups have a choice of pledge, including a non-religious/atheistic option.

Also, regarding some of the scandals, the UK government now has quite rigorous procedures in place to protect children. Enhanced DBS checks are required for adults in a supervisor roll. While not perfect, these checks stop someone jumping from area to area to avoid their past acts. Parents, teachers and other helpers are also a lot hotter on spotting minor discrepancies before they can escalate. It’s just done calmly and quietly, to avoid accidental witch hunts.

Basically, my minion loves scouts, and I am completely comfortable with them attending.

UTC is designed to be unambiguous, not convenient. I’d imagine most companies would either remap to local times for convenience, or have calculated windows when meetings are reasonable between various parties.

Months have less variation. In the north, it’s “traditional”, in the south, it’s inverted, in the middle, it’s climatic (tied to monsoons etc). The northern hemisphere has been dominant in recorded history for a LONG time, so sets the reference. The inverted mapping is nice and clean to remember. While the tropics have no clean mapping.

The traditional calendar won because we need a consistent global reference, and a local reference wasn’t worth the hassle.

At which time, UTC covers the job perfectly. It’s also great for keeping computer logs consistent.

As someone who travels quite a bit, that would be hellish.

It provides a consistent reference for information sharing. E.g. you move to a new area of the world. Assuming a 9-5 work time is a reasonable baseline. Assuming a kids bedtime is 8pm is also reasonable, etc. Without timezones, you would have to relearn all of those.

You would also be required to memorise those details for friends and relatives who live abroad. E.g. if a friend moved from the UK to new Zealand, you just need to memorise the time offset. That way it becomes easier to catch them before work, or before bed, rather than in the middle of work, or while they are asleep.

Ultimately, both in parallel is likely the best option. Local time for local events, UTC for global level events or referencing.

We have that. It’s called UTC.

The problem is that time zones are convenient for most people. Most of the time you are only interested in local time, not global time. It’s rare to regularly have to coordinate across multiple time zones.

Our subconscious contains a huge number of reflex loops, some hardwired, others soft. By the time your conscious mind is aware of the situation, it’s often over. Martial arts (and other forms of fast competition) aim to significantly rewire these responses e.g. the instinct to protect the face becomes a structured rising block.

As for the snake one. I’ve had a few occasions where it, or something related has triggered. Mostly it’s a false positive, but not every time. I’ve had it go off for a grass snake (harmless) and a mouse before. I was well clear before my conscious brain caught up and could assess and react.

The days are long, but the years are short. My childhood took a huge amount of time to pass. My child’s seems to be flying past at warp speed.

They rapidly become far more of a fully fledged person when they hit school age. Mines a few years ahead, and they are now awesome to interact with.

Depending on how I measure it, either becoming a dad, or founding a community group that has changed quite a few people’s lives for the better.

The horrors persist, but so do I!