companies will go where the money is. If Valve enables, say EA, to have their yearly franchise and in-game-stores on mobile devices, they will find a way.
> Very cool, should be very hackable. Very unlike every other standalone VR headset.
That might be the reason I'm going to buy it. I want to support this and Steam has done a lot to get gaming on linux going.
< Which again brings me to the question: why? Why would anybody do that?
Because why not have a fence that at least generates some power instead of a fence that does nothing! Costs are not that much more, 2k is easily spent on a bigger fence and this way, you don't have to get up and hustle, our fence does it for you!
I think that is one of the facts that I like about solar. It plays towards tinkers and builders unlike any other power source, can be surprisingly flexible and seems to scale pretty well. Also, besides knowledge about electricity, you don't really need and special knowledge or take additional precautions (besides the usual, safety third and all).
I think it would help create fintech local alternatives to Visa and Mastercard, if it gets feature parity. It could be cool and, to be honest, this market could use a bit of a shakeup.
Here in Argentina we have as altetnatives the debit card (mostly a Visa variant), and QR from MercadoPago (MercadoLibre) and Modo (¿a alliance of the banks?) and a few minor ones. Even the guy that sells dobious products in the subway or sing or just ask for money my have a QR or a text alternative (like house.banana.dog). It's not necesary to create digital pesos, they are already digital.
We have that too, but it basically moves money around, like a debit card. A few key features from credit cards are missing, like reserving an amount for a car rental. That would be the most relevant thing to get right.
Both Visa and Mastercard work just fine with the regular old school euro, why would you need something entirely new to create a local competitor to an already existing service?
Why might someone be interested in replacing two monopolistic entities headquartered in a foreign and increasingly irrational power both of which have long histories (and recent controversies) in applying their own moralistic framework to economic activity?
You don't need to make any changes to your currency to create an alternative to Visa and Mastercard, all you need is political will. Russia created its own system years ago and forced both Visa and Mastercard to comply with it, it's the reason that card payments continue to work as expected inside the country. You can even still use your old physical visa or mastercard cards inside Russia, even though the companies themselves left in 2022.
I'm not a finance wonk so I don't know for sure, but given how absolutely everything else in the EU works I'm fairly confident that every country has their own sovereign financial system for handling currency and then cross-border transfers are facilitated via hacks.
It would therefore follow that any international financial system would be very complicated and expensive to set up, and would be helped enormously by a burn-it-to-the-ground-and-start-again replacement system.
(...if that system was well designed, and given how everything in the EU works...)
Visa and Mastercard are subjected to political pressures to disincentivise conducting transactions. If the market would be more diverse, these pressures would be way less effective.
If a digital € would change that is questionable though. Perhaps ambitions would get even worse.
Also a very good argument for cash. I like untracable transactions. I isn't just to benefit crime, it is also about privacy.
"Germany is persecuting anyone who dares to criticize officials on the Internet
Bull. Shit. If you break the existing laws, by insulting or slandering someone, you might have to face the consequences.
But I guess it is easy to point the finger at Germany and conjure the specter of the fascists if you live in Dubai, come from Russia, and created 2 of the biggest troll-mills ever. Would not want to rattle the cage too much, would we.
Same for his suggestion the 1000s of people are in prison for tweeting - there are people who are jailed for malicious communications but that includes terrorism and a few others things that are far more serious than simply presenting an opinion on a website.
The German government makes it very easy to point fingers at them:
The German minister of economics and "vice president" (vice chancellor) had so much free time and capacity to sue more than 800 citizens!
https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/1493232/umfra...
The vice president of a G7 country suing old men because they called him a numbnut on the internet is ridiculous.
no, its not. He exercised his right to not be insulted and slandered - same as if those people would have walked up to him and talked to him directly.
Especially if you see the hate that was sprewed at him at every single post, news, update or whatever, i completley understand. This has nothing to do with criticizing someone - Habeck actually has a good track record of sitting down with other people and talking with them, but stuff like death threats.
<< Habeck authorized prosecutors to pursue the case for the insult against him by issuing what in German is known as a "Strafantrag." However, this is different from an individually-submitted criminal complaint to law enforcement authorities known as a "Strafanzeige," and could indicate that law enforcement had first invited or asked Habeck to press the charges. Prosecutors did not specify who had approached who first.
So, not Habeck going after him, but simply saying that its ok to pursue the inquiry.
<< The Bavaria resident is also accused of posting Nazi-era imagery and language earlier in 2024. According to prosecutors, this post may have violated German laws against the incitement of ethnic or religious hatred.
Yeah, that "old guy" seems like a real treat and not at all like an asshole right-wing dumbnut.
