You put so much effort into that post, that I almost feel bad pointing out that you probably should have read the comment I was replying to… you know, the one above my comment.
But, if you’re having a hard time locating it, I pasted the relevant quote that I was responding to:
“…opportunity for a movie-like secret mission with a bag full of consumer drones…”
But yeah, I guess if you completely ignore the actual text I was responding to, you might of had a fair point.
Yes, and that’s what Ukraine is doing at the moment. But they’re doing it in the cities like Moscow that actually matter to Putin, and the Russian elites.
The comment I was responding to was talking about taking a lot small drones deeper into Russia, which are places that Putin couldn’t give a shit about.
So, if they aren’t useful for destroying critical infrastructure, and Putin and the Russian elite don’t care about any psychological impact on those civilians, what is the point? Which is why I covered using them to target civilians, and why that would be a bad idea.
Saboteurs and Ukrainian assets inside of Russia are not an unlimited resource. Wouldn’t it make more sense for them to use their time doing things that actually politically harm Putin, or impact the wider Russian war effort?
I didn’t move any goal posts, I’ve been pretty clear about my views on the general ineffectiveness of using quadcopters to target infrastructure.
But like I said, maybe I’m wrong, and the Ukrainian MoD will have a “Eureka!” moment after reading your comments.
Again, I think you’re vastly overestimating the capability of a quadcopter drone to inflict serious damage on hard infrastructure.
But hey, maybe I’m not only wrong, but so are all of the Ukrainian sabotage teams and they’ll stumble across your advice here and realize what a great idea it is.
Acts of sabotage have been happening this entire time, whether or not they’re getting covered.
Ukraine has also been running a covert targeted assassination program, which unfortunately got some press coverage some months back due to their legally and morally questionable approach to target selection.
But, it’s an existential war for their survival, so I’m not going to moralize about it.
I think you’re vastly overestimating the damage possible from the explosive payload a tiny quadcopter can carry, unless your goal is strictly terrorism i.e. intentionally targeting civilians.
Civilians dying as collateral damage during an attack/assignation of a legitimate military target is one thing, targeting civilians is another.
And before you say Russia does, don’t forget that Ukraine is dependent upon continued Western support, which is already fragile. It’s doubtful that support would survive them explicitly targeting civilians with suicide drones deep inside Russia.
Are you really using all of human history as a timeframe to say that currency is a relatively recent phenomenon?
Again, I’m not anti-cryptocurrency, but it’s not really a currency anymore than any other commodity in a commodity exchange, or a barter market.
And I don’t care if it’s livestock, or Bitcoin, I’m not accepting either as payment if I sell my home, or car. Not because of principles, but because I don’t know how to convert livestock into cash, and I can’t risk the Bitcoin payment halving in value before I can convert it to cash.
And who was talking extremes? I’m just pointing out the absurdity of the claims that crypto is the replacement for, or salvation from, our current economic system, or the delusion that currency backed by a nation is somehow just as ephemeral as Bitcoin, or ERC20 rug pulls.
You said Bitcoin was designed to free us from the tyranny of big capital, but it’s been entirely co-opted by the same boogeyman. So regardless of the intentionality behind the project, it’s now just another speculative asset.
Except, unlike gold or futures contracts, there’s no tangible real world asset, but there is a hell of a real cost.
Printing currency isn’t destroying the planet…the current economic system is doing that, which is the same economic system that birthed crypto.
Governments issuing currency goes back to a time long before our current consumption at all cost economic system was a thing.
lol
Forever? No, of course not.
But paper currency is backed by a nation state, so I’m betting it’ll be around a bit longer then a purely digital asset without the backing of a nation, and driven entirely by speculation.
I’m not even anti-crypto. It was novel idea when it was actually used entirely as a currency, but that hasn’t been true for quite some time.
This is straight out of Monsanto playbook going back decades. There’s a reason why a lot of countries have either passed laws legally shielding local farmers from accidental cross-pollination, or just banning GM seeds, not for any pseudoscience rational, but because of the way agro business uses natural cross pollination as a vector for lawfare and predatory business practices.
I can only approach this from the English language, which is why I said technically correct. But I also feel the article should have done a lot better job explaining that they were Dagestani, which is not unreasonable as if this had happened in Chechnya, it would have said Chechen.
Also, I have never seen Russian used interchangeably with Ukrainian, or Belarusian, before or after, 2014. But again, maybe that’s just my English language only bias.
That said, I do appreciate you writing on the explainer for other users who aren’t familiar with the status of, or distinction between Russia and the Caucasus.
…this was a regional tournament, in the Caucasus Republic of Dagestan.
So calling them Russian is technically accurate, but really they are a brutalized and subjugated colonial subject of Russia.
Also, you’ll find this kind of crazy anywhere you go. She literally just dumped mercury around her opponents chess board when she thought no one was around to notice.
I get why it’s catching headlines, but give me a break. It’s just crazy being crazy.
I don’t see the issue here.
I detest what Spotify has been, and is doing, to artists, but this isn’t that.
Spotify jump started a market by infusing it with cash, and then ran out of cash. It sounds similar to when a patron of the arts no longer has the funds available for patronage.
Yes, it sucks for those people who lost their funding, but podcasts are profitable all over without the infusion of cash from Spotify.
I realize that those with a large overhead, or those who are otherwise just unable to adapt, are in a shit situation, but I suspect the rest of them, and those that follow, will adopt the monetization strategies of other successful podcast markets.
Also, who the fuck wants to use the Spotify app for podcasts? Jesus I would never subject myself to that, they’ll be better off for it in no time.
Really this just sounds like YT membership, allowing users to create subscriptions for premium/special content e.g. gambling picks, porn, etc.
If that’s all it was intended to be, it could have been an actually useful and not intrusive monetization strategy…5 years ago.
Even if that’s how the feature gets rolled out now, unless it’s an unmitigated disaster, I don’t see them being capable of not overplaying their hand.
They will assume that because some users are willing to pay for private porn content, or gambling pick subreddits, that of course most users must also be willing to pay for cat photos and memes.
Personally, I am all for it. I am for Reddit making the worst choices possible and speed running their decline. Mostly, I would like a user exodus that results in Lemmy finally getting growth in a lot of their more niche communities that still keep me using Reddit on occasion.
I realize the article was written to make it sound like they lost money on this, but I would be shocked if they had.
To vastly oversimplify it, private equity does a few things to make money on the companies they acquire:
The last parts are where it goes from amoral to “HOW THE FUCK IS THAT LEGAL?”
The private equity firm will have its own separate entities that provide a variety of services, for example janitorial or administrative.
The new private equity owners will then replace all the current vendors, with their own entities at a expentionally hirer costs. All the while, paying themselves gigantic consulting fees.
Basically those are all just ways to legally embezzle money by extracting all the resources from the company. Once that’s done, they’ll sell the last thing of value: the brand name itself e.g. CNET, VICE, etc.
If there is no money in the brand itself, then they’ll just dissolve the company.
What I’m about to say is coming directly from my own asshole, so if someone actually knows what they’re talking about cares to explain why I’m wrong, I’m open to hearing it.
This feels like an attempt to try extract as much capital as possible before other civil lawsuits and/or regulatory actions are able to do to the same.
Piped apps have been broken at least 6 - 8 times in the past couple of weeks.
It’s the biggest Google effort I’ve seen to crack down on 3rd party YT clients.
I actually used to pay for YT premium, then they removed my discount AND raised the price to over $12/mo.
Sometimes I do miss my algorithm feed, just not enough to watch YT ads, or pay $12 - 15/mo.
Instant Pot didn’t simply go bankrupt. It was busted out by private equity.
$849 and $1,649? Those pricetags are so absurd that this post should be removed on principle alone, nevermind that it’s stealth marketing masquerading as an article.
Politics are complicated, especially in post-Soviet bloc countries e.g. the lingering effects of Russification. But anytime a ruling party is looking to dissolve all opposition parties, and label them as criminals, it’s because they feel threatened in some way.