Have you seen AMD's wankery? This is all due to the awful taste of the "Gamer" crowd. Gaming performance, "VR Ready" on every product, big retail experience, etc. - The whole RGB enchilada.
The marketing team does whatever the customers demand and value.
I go to an event called PDXLAN twice a year. It was previously a 550-person event, until this next one and future ones where we've expanded into a new venue and will have 800 gamers present with the possible option of further expanding to 3,200 in the future. It's one of the largest bring-your-own-computer events in the USA, sponsored by nVidia, AMD, Intel, and several other companies that produce hardware for gamers.
We RGB our cases and equipment because it's fun to personalize your stuff. There are over 500 people there, and seeing so many unique setups is entertaining. We've had someone make their computer look like a boombox [0], a centipede [1], or Rey's Speeder from Star Wars [2], complete with custom painted mouse and keyboard.
You might think it's all silly and stupid, but we get a lot of entertainment out of it.
If thats your thing, thats fine, but so often it means that the 'gamery' aesthetic is the only option if you want high end hardware.
Im a professional software engineer, that likes to game, but doesn't wish to outwardly identify with it, I like interior design, and I like nice clean hardware that fits in with my flat.
This excludes me from having the top end Acer Predator Monitor, because its made to look like a throbbing red quantum spaceship component, which it isnt, its just a damn display, and it would look ridiculous.
If you want a laptop with decent GPU hardware, most of the options have all these edges, and lights, dressed up to look like some kind of weapon or something. If I need to bring my laptop to a meeting, I can't have that and and be taken seriously.
It just feels childish, and its hard to believe that the number of people like me isn't enough for the manufacturers to support that.
That should have been the target of his rant not that they won't turn on LTE updates. He comes off sounding like first world problems in the bulk of this article.
> It seems likely, given that this mechanism is "deliberate" and definitely under the control of your DNA, that you live longer and more successfully with aging than without.
Not necessarily "you" but perhaps the species as a whole. Without the aging and inevitable death our ancestors may have evolved slower.
So we shouldn't collect data that might help solve a major crime because someone might commit a minor crime like stalking?
We're trading the potential to solve a major crime for the potential for a minor crime of stalking to happen. As long as we require that a warrant be involved in getting the data and there are punishments in place for accessing without a warrant I'd feel safe with them collecting it.
"Minor crimes" like stalking can lead to major crimes like murder. There are 2 major issues here:
1) The information might be used "off-label" for all sorts of personal and political reasons. There are countless examples of this in history.
2) The standard of evidence must remain high. Circumstantial evidence has been, and continues to be, used to convict innocent people of crimes. Giving the authorities what amounts to a mountain of circumstantial evidence could allow them to build a case out of thin air.
"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, he must be guilty: he entered the bar two minutes after the victim, and left a minute after they did. He took an Uber along the same route and exited at the same address. 3 minutes later the murder weapon was purchased by a man matching his description a block away." ... and so on.
"If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." -- Cardinal Richelieu (disputed, but classic)
Imagine what can be done with a lifetime of data from hundreds of sensors?
1) Which is why the data shouldn't be accessible without a warrant and there should be stiff punishments if it is accessed without one. We shouldn't stop all the other advances that come from the technology of these sensors and the help they could provide in solving very real crimes.
2) There's already plenty of avenues for circumstantial evidence already, this is the reason we have lawyers and judges to argue over and prevent evidence that isn't solid
I'd hope a poorly maintained automated truck which crashes would result in extremely heavy fines and lawsuits, to the point where it could seriously threaten to put a trucking company out of business. Make it uneconomical not to maintain the trucks.
This is not a typical case of Supply and Demand. This is a case of someone having complete control of supply on a necessity for some people and charging whatever they want because insurance and social programs will foot the bill. In some cases the drug companies can very cheaply produce the drugs.
This isn't a problem in a competitive market they would never get away with this sort of stuff but our laws and our healthcare system have created a perfect environment for exploiting.
Can't blame people like Martin for doing it but we can blame politicians for not doing something about it.
