Should Trump be convicted, I think it will alienate a group of voters into full disbelief of the existing system.

Good? Our existing systems across the board are entirely fucked. Straight white men generally benefit the most from these systems and have generally continued to turn a blind eye to these problems, as it's easy when you're in the "winning" position. If this somehow wakes them up, maybe we can actually fix something.

For those interested in solving this problem...

Cats generally use furniture because it works better than the alternatives they are provided. Companies aren't selling your cat a scratching post - they're selling YOU the scratching post.

If your cat uses a particular piece of furniture, find a post of similar size/shape and place it next to it. IE, if they're scratching the back corner of the couch, get a 3 foot tall post and place it next to the corner of the couch. If they're tearing up the rug, get one of the scratchers they stand on, and place it near that spot.

Cats scratch in different ways/angles/shapes to not only sooth their nails, but also to stretch certain muscles. If you can give them a scratcher that is aimed at similar muscles, it'll be more pleasant to use than the furniture, and they'll likely use that instead.

They also increased the saturation/contrast too.

RIP Play Music.

But yeah, Drive and YT bundles are basically the one thing I'll still pay for, and it ends up including YT Music which isn't bad.

Yeah, this is the one I don't see happening.

Look at Twitch. Microsoft, Facebook, and (somewhat) Google have attempted to dethrone them and they've all failed. Things like Rumble and Kick are still going, and Kick may have a slight chance.

But that's a much smaller platform, that everyone agrees is absolute garbage and trying to kill itself at every turn. YouTube would be a much bigger challenge.

Hewlett Packard

IMO the thing is that people don't care about their privacy. Sure, some people around here do, but your average person owns an Alexa, has a FB/Instagram account and constantly posts their location, uses the same password on many sites, uses TikTok, doesn't block cookies, etc etc etc.

Most people don't actually care. Some claim they do, but then can't even be bothered to stop using Instagram etc because of the "inconvenience"... So do they really care?

Some companies (Apple, etc) push their products under a narrative around safety and security, and people will repeat that point as a way to justify a decision they already made, but if they actually cared, they would be doing other things too. But they don't.

The number of us who do actually care about privacy and security is actually very small.

I've seen YouTubers also say "nothing else has any users". I think this is generally the public sentiment and the reason people stick around. I would say that even if there's no alternative, just leave but... Unfortunately people feel like they "need" Twitter.

And people say social media isn't addicting.

Yeah, my main problem so far has been finding communities actually worth following/joining/contributing to.

If suddenly tons of average people join, they won't really find communities, they'll deem that their analysis of Lemmy, and leave with tiny chances of a second chance. It'll just boom and bust in it's current state. Most people aren't interested in starting or growing a small community.

Meanwhile, if we stay at this size for a while, communities may form/grow, and as people trickle in, they'll grow bit by bit.

Aircon plus solar panels for the win? Other than the initial manufacturing cost, it's a fairly good solution.

Can't tell if you're thinking this is anything more than an emergency stopgap for people that can't bear living in their home, but.... All A/C does is spend energy to move the heat back outside, and also produce some more heat on the side. So it isn't a sustainable solution or fix, even if your energy generation is somehow perfect.

And swamp boxes are basically just a fan with extra steps that puts a miniscule amount of heat into the water. They feel a tiny bit better, but they're not really fixing anything either. That warm water still needs to go somewhere etc.

It's closer to the hardware. Generally harder to update. It's less frequently updated. And it's less fault tolerant.

Idk, sure, it's technically software. But it's pretty clearly at least a distinct subsection that deserves it's own moniker.

I used to think this was unlikely to happen, and didn't like how fragmented streaming services were... And I don't watch enough TVs/movies to justify one or more subscription services.

So I'd just buy everything on YouTube. Figured I'd only buy it once so I paid extra for the 1080p. Then they decided to stop supporting anything over 480p on browsers that aren't Safari. Watching 480p movies is a joke.

Apparently you're only allowed 720p/1080p on phones/tablets (lol at watching a movie that small), smart TVs (why would I own a TV with this little TV consumption) or Safari (lol Macs).

I don't even know what to do at this point. Go back to collecting DVDs? Think I'm just done watching movies.