I normally dislike self censorship of profanity, but replacing fuck with fsck (filesystem check) is a Unix joke, and I can appreciate that.

I’m sure I hit numbers like that on my DSL.

Yes, that’s adequate for someone who knows how their phone works and doesn’t stream video while out and about.

Signal seems unlikely to comply. It will be interesting to see how they respond. A way to register without a phone number would be ideal.

It looks like that plan allows 35gb of data use in a month before it throttles, I don’t think I’ve ever used that much mobile data.

The fact that casting to older devices is allowed on the expensive plan but not the ad-supported one offers a clue.

Andreessen Horowitz, a venture capital firm.

Yes, the Kel-Tec KSG bullpup shotgun has two magazines and a manual control to choose between them. In addition to twice the capacity of a single tube magazine of the same length, it offers the user the option to switch between two types of ammunition - a more significant advantage for a shotgun than most firearms due to the variety of ammunition available.

Correct, though the car in question here is electric and will almost certainly use the motors to slow the car to reuse that energy. The motors should be able to stop the car even if the hydraulic brakes fail, and probably more effectively than a mechanical parking brake.

It is like paying to unlock satellite TV reception (even though we are receiving the signals the whole time).

It’s reasonable to charge for this because the value is in copyrighted content and a service that costs the provider money to operate. The same would apply for satellite radio in a car or an internet-based streaming service. It is not reasonable to charge for access to the adaptive suspension or seat warmers that are already in a car a customer bought. That breaks the traditional model of ownership.

An interesting middle ground might be to allow the owner to install arbitrary software on the car, and charge for the OEM adaptive suspension app. I think I would like a world where things work like that; OEMs would whine about security to no end.

I think it should be legal to attempt to decrypt satellite signals without paying; if the satellite service is designed well, it won’t be possible. All the anticircumvention laws should be repealed.

It’s an electronic parking brake. Those are common now because a small switch takes up less interior space than a lever for a cable-actuated parking brake, and the computer can disengage the parking brake if it detects that the driver is attempting to drive with it activated. The computer is involved in brake pad replacement to tell the parking brake motor to open to its widest position to accept new pads, and calibrate itself to their thickness.

This requires a special adapter and software subscription rather than a button on the infotainment screen because Hyundai is engaging in rent-seeking and perhaps trying to direct business to its dealers.

Can you? The blog post says it only works with Pixel 10 devices, which GrapheneOS doesn’t support yet. There’s no explanation for why it might need a specific model of phone.

It depends on what phone you have. Some phones have bootloaders you can’t unlock, and you can’t do much at all with that. If you can unlock the bootloader, your options are determined by which third-party Android builds support your hardware.

LineageOS is a popular option with pretty broad device support; GrapheneOS is a privacy/security focused option that only runs on Pixels.

You will get rid of that phone long before the battery dies.

Why? There was a time where smartphone tech was improving fast enough that there was a large benefit to a new phone every 2-3 years, but that time is in the past for most use cases.

A quick search suggests all X1 Nano models can run Windows 11, so they won’t be ultra-cheap because of that.

That’s not criminal anywhere to my knowledge, but very creepy for an adult to say to a 13 year old.

He then said I groomed him.

He was trying to make himself feel better about being creepy with a kid. He’s wrong is this situation. There isn’t really any room for ambiguity.

Neither of us were exactly saints

You were a kid. Kids are entitled to do dumb stuff while figuring out how social interaction works, and should not feel bad about it years later. He was an adult, pretending to be a kid online and being very creepy. Depending on exactly what he said, sent, or requested, his behavior may even be criminal in some jurisdictions.

Reading through this story, I don’t see any mention of sexual contact, which would make it pretty hard for there to be any sexual assault. If I’m reading this right, it looks like you, as a child had a purely online relationship that was half roleplay and half real with an adult.

If you knowingly misled him, kids do dumb things sometimes; don’t do that again. If he knowingly mislead you, he’s an asshole. If he continued having romantic or sexual chats with you knowing your real age, he’s a creep.

If you did it today, it wouldn’t be the first. Here are some:

• The Unbreakable Umbrella is the first one I can recall hearing of. It’s heavy (775g) and made of a composite material the manufacturer claims is good for hitting people.
• The Streetwise Stunbrella conceals an electroshock weapon inside an umbrella.
• Security Umbrella is another umbrella marketed as suitable for hitting people.
• “Bulgarian umbrellas” are poison pellet guns built into umbrellas, intended for murder.
• Windlass Steelcrafts sells an umbrella which conceals a rapier. There appear to be several similar products from other companies.

If he disappeared, people would pursue him. Given the compromising material on other wealthy and powerful people he likely had access to, it wouldn’t just be western law enforcement, but potentially intelligence agencies of adversaries, criminal organizations, and the compromised individuals themselves.