There are a lot of books that don't have (and likely not going to have) audiobook versions. So there is some use for getting better text to speech with the extra stuff an AI could add. And of course have accessibility options that don't have such robotic sounding with bad pronunciation.

That being said, shit is about profits first and the other stuff is not the focus. While I would love to listen to some books with the voice of the authors (or even could be neat to hear voices of podcasters I like read them). I would rather hear hear them read by people that either just really like it as a hobby or wanting to practice voice acting if the authors/podcasters aren't in control of their voice an AI is using. Which reminds me that I should check LibriVox for some non-official audiobooks that I want to read but am too busy to do so.

I agree that they seem to have just taken the US support as a massive attempt to both get their cause seen by more people (which is helpful in changing hearts and minds away from the "they are PPK and PKK are 'terrorists'" which was how they were presented by even US propaganda). And to use the really good opportunity in the fight against ISIS to get any and all supplies they could from the US in order to keep their area defended for the inevitable attacks from Türkiye after ISIS. Though I am not sure how many weapons and other defense related items they were able to get (but supplies are supplies). They still need to make sure to walk the fine lines with the Syrian government to be sure.

The most fucked thing that they have been left with is the ISIS prisoners and their families. The longer that those massive numbers of people are left in limbo due to all the nations that they originated from not wanting to take them back. The worse shit will be when those folks break out of containment. Shit would be great to use by Türkiye especially as an excuse to "legitimately" invade. Which means brutal genocide of the Kurds from both sides. And if the open air prisons go on long enough, it will be easy for bad-faith actors to eventually paint them as doing what Israel is doing with Gaza/West Bank. Which isn't what they are doing, but multiple generations of families being imprisoned (even if said prisons weren't setup by the Kurds for that length of time in mind) for crimes against humanity that the new generation didn't commit will be easy to use for propaganda.

The Kurds are resourceful, but trying to figure out how to allow people out without it turning into a bloodbath is beyond fucked. It might have been easier (and still beyond fucked) to have not taken prisoners and kill anyone and everyone that flew the ISIS flag before "victory" was claimed. They know that a majority of prisoners actively plan and openly speak about the torture and murder they will commit if they are able to get out. Which I imagine is what the long term goal of Türkiye and other hostile powers wish to make happen. The nations that want to keep their hands clean of bringing ISIS families back home to have to deal with are fine with Kurds being killed. Just like how the US and the West have done with green-washing themselves by pushing shit off onto "third world" nations.

Getting the feeling that this will be both the US fascist equivalent of both the Reichstag fire and the faked Polish invasion of Germany. The fascists of both parties will be tripping over themselves to hand all power over.

If you have a need to have an MS account but want to set your Documents, Desktop, and Pictures folders back to the old local versions instead of OneDrive taking over. I have found using this to be very helpful when helping customers that don't want to use it and avoid the headache of running out of the free storage. Obviously making a local user after getting into Windows the first time would also work. But it is always good to have fallback options for folks that Linux isn't an option for whatever reason.

If a folder has been taken over by OneDrive it will give a path that shows OneDrive like C\Users\User\OneDrive\Desktop instead of %USERPROFILE%\Desktop so just remove everything before the \ and replace it with %USERPROFILE%

One thing to keep in mind though. If you already have data present while it is set to OneDrive, it might make your stuff look like it is gone. But you can download/copy the files from the actual OneDrive folders into the regular folders after.

They were able to see how fucked up the war on drugs was with regards to weed (and of course alcohol). And they want to make bad shit like addiction even worse by further fucking over people. Just more of the right-liberal alliance just putting more people behind bars for addiction and the crime of being poor. No changing of the material conditions that create both issues. Of course the rich and famous will not be impacted. They get to just go to cushy "rehab centres" and make donations to the pigs (which are always on call to remove the "untouchables" from sight).

I am not sure specifically (since the US has multiple bans/Patriot Act 2.0 bills all in play) if the current ban bill being talked about is this one as the "news" sites just keep saying the "TikTok Ban Bill" and not directly saying which one. But at least the HR 686 anti "TikTok" bills mentions that people that are caught using banned apps from listed adversary nations (which the PRC is listed by name) and/or bypassing bans to use the services can be both jailed for 20yrs and a possible fine of one million dollars. It also seems to share a lot of similar items as the other "TikTok Ban" bill, HR 1153

Honestly it seems to have helped him in weird ways. I even kept forgetting how old he is, and a lot of media also kind of kept talking about him like he was some kind of child. At a certain point, I almost think his team and he himself made sure to not "clean him up." Just keep the look of some tech startup kid that never puts time into hygiene and too focused on the "go fast, break things" shit. He knew what he was doing, his parents knew (and encouraged it while demanding their cuts), and at least the others that were at the top also knew. This wasn't just some minor error (aside getting caught and thinking they could get it back). I also see it as the logical next step for what more traditional bank fraud assholes already do. Just done by people that don't actually know how to be smarter with the greed and the grift.

Another example of "smart" people in one field thinking they are "smart" about everything. Hubris and the false sense of intelligence (and especially the "fake it till you make it" shit we see in all fields these days) is going to be getting worse as everyone is in the bubble of "yes men" and trying to climb fucking ladders into positions they have no understanding of. But that is more a rant of how capitalism is in for a real real bad crash, and no one knows how to do shit anymore (most importantly the fucks wanting power and money for the clout).

All tips are supposed to be taxed. That being said, every single one of my friends that have worked jobs that are primary tip-based would mention that they would hide some amount of the cash tips. This was to avoid taxes, and for the most part my friends would claim most of their cash tips while mentioning that if they were having a bad week or day they might hide more. I have been in restaurant and other service jobs which I was paid normal rates due to being either technically BOH or otherwise not a tip expected job. So in those cases I wouldn't claim a random tip I would get since it was never more than $20. Also the servers didn't have to split anything with BOH since BOH was paid at least $6.50/hr back in 2003 (which was like a dollar or so more than state/national min wage) and the servers were something like $2/hr or so with tips being of course the main source. Though they would give some to those of us that bused their tables quickly on busy nights to get them ready for a new person/group.

But I think that tipping should be completely something that is to show that the worker was in your opinion just worth more than whatever they made the time you interacted with them. As the idea of a tip (IMO) is just that, a more personal sign of appreciation for their labour even if they are being paid like any other worker. And yes, I believe that holds true for stuff like strippers or any other currently legal sex worker (and same goes for prostitutes if made legal and officially taxed).

I am from NC, and not the most high income areas while not being in the lowest either. But $30/hr is almost twice what I make in my non-tip-based job (I am at a pay-cap of $19.48/hr). That sounds like shit I wouldn't start to see unless I climbed the latter a lot to get (and completely stop doing the actual stuff I am any good at). So I am guessing $30/hr where they are planning to open must be like getting less than $10/hr where I am when adjusting for living costs and all that. Otherwise it seems like a real strange hill to die on when it isn't like the people coming into the place won't still do it if the servers are just doing really well. Idk. I stand with the workers no matter what they do, but if they lose the $30/hr for tips-based and the people that come in do what so many do (which is just lord over the worker). Then it would be a real motherfucker.

One thing that continues to prove to me that Israel is completely lying about everything they have been claiming to have been happening since Oct 7th is their lack of providing any proof of any of it. Of course they have been lying about basically everything since they took the land, but this is specific to this current round of bullshit. It is constantly them just passing along "information" to their media and to outside media and governments all about all the "crimes" from Hamas. The beheading babies shit is the easiest example for being a perfect charge that would be spread far and fast knowing outlets wouldn't walk it back with any of the same effort as they did spreading the profit driving sensationalism. They at the same time refuse to acknowledge literally every bit of video and photographic proof that both the Palestinians as a whole and Hamas as a group have been making damn sure to get out to the world showing what is happening. One major bit of fucked up irony with the Zionists that claim the Holocaust victim card to justify everything. The main reason so so many videos/photos/documents/etc that were taken and shown to media/govs/people about the utter next level fucked up shit that happened, was because it was so unbelievable that proof was absolutely needed. After a certain point it just seems like exaggerations if just simply told about it without actually seeing it in as many formats as possible. If those babies were actually beheaded like the IDF/Zionists/Israeli media have claimed. Then they would have absolutely provided videos and pictures to anyone and everyone to see how "savage" the Palestinians and Hamas literally are. But they haven't and therefore it didn't happen and they know it.

I love how often that same line of "thought" is and has been used just in my lifetime. We are told that the best "feature" of capitalism is about supposedly having so many choices because of competition and all that. While at the same time we are just never even told of any potential or existing options. Also used as an excuse to keep things from other places away from us. All because someone in a corp somewhere at some points in time keep claiming that "Americans just can't possibly understand something". Which also re-enforces the culture of praising ignorance and just always assuming we are correct and nothing is better (or allowed in some cases where we missed some cool tech). I know the real point is because they don't want to provide choices. But shit is a broken record for us not know of or be able to use other options.

Not sure how bad it is currently in the UK. But aside from your point about feeling like an asshole for bothering a worker to get something for you. As a worker in a big box electronics store in the US, the corpos already have reduced staffing so freaking much while still 1000% freaking out if so much as two people get close enough to even hint at a line forming. While the customers also seem to be of the same opinion as the corpos with the loud moaning about how long it takes to "be helped." So needing the already thin stretched staff to field even more utterly pointless shit pisses me off. On the plus-side, this open hostility of the rich to workers might actually be the thing that sparks revolts (would really really really love to see mass class awakening and maybe a lot of shit on fire like the French seem to do so well). But with the shoppers also being on team "fuck you lazy workers" and bootlicking the fuck out of the corps. I am guessing it is too easy to just never have popular support so long as all the range is carefully pointed at all of us.

Always was