At the lower end of the budget you could consider libreboot - it’s a one person band who ships refurbished Lenovo thinkpads with Linux pre-installed

veilid is a framework designed for hosting completely anonymous P2P apps. They already have a chat app reference implementation - (think P2P signal) and there are others popping up like vdrop

In the UK we already have a law where isps block porn by default (blacklisting) the adult who took out the plan can contact the isp and ask them to opt out of these blocks. That’s been a thing for about 10 years. You can own a Pay-as-you-go sim as a minor but you have to send government id to prove you are over 18 to get the adult content filtering turned off.

That’s one of the things that made it clear to me that the new law is an authoritarian data mining operation and blatant power grab. Like… We already have these tools in place. If you don’t want your kid accessing porn, don’t opt out of the filters provided by your isp.

You could argue that putting the onus on the platform is more effective at “protecting kids” than having the isps maintain blacklists but there will always be small sites that don’t comply and enterprising kids who find a way around any block. Just like the law requires you to be 18 to buy alcohol or tobacco here but there are always dodgy shops who sell tobacco to underage kids. There are older siblings and relatives willing to buy cigarettes and alcohol for underage teens.

This was never about protecting the children. That was the Trojan horse used to justify these laws to the technically uninformed.

We don’t have geforce experience on Linux (afaik). Ubuntu has a built in “proprietary drivers” app that just pulls the Nvidia drivers for you on first boot after install. Very low effort (on the happy path at least. If you use unsupported/brand new cards, you’re probably going to have a much less fun time)

I can’t imagine any sane person who lives their life guided by marketing hype instead of direct knowledge and experience.

I mean fair enough but also… That makes the vast majority of managers, MBAs, salespeople and “normies” like your grandma and Uncle Bob insane.

Actually questioning stuff that sales people tell you and using critical thinking is a pretty rare skill in this day and age.

You should see how many calories are in plutonium and uranium. If you eat a pellet of either one it will be the last meal you’ll ever need in your life!

They know. The “think of the children” angle is just cover to enrage the tabloid readers and to be used as a straw man against anyone criticisng the law (“you’re a pedophile”). The real purpose is “let’s enumerate the IDs of everyone who uses the internet for anything we don’t like” and “let’s censor anything we don’t like starting with LGBTQ content”

My entire experience as a software engineer for the last 15 years has been being ignored by the non-exprerts in charge. It goes like this:

MBA: I want to solve this problem using this solution

Me: that won’t solve the problem well, how about-

MBA: I don’t care for the laws of reality. Do it my way [or find another job]!

They say they want our expertise but really they want validation of their own terrible ideas and they think coercing experts with threats of unemployment is as valuable as actually listening to those experts.

This applies as much to the public sector and the absolute clowns we vote in to govern us as it does to the private sector where the clowns hold the purse strings. Frankly it makes me want to give up the subject I have a PhD in and grow potatoes on a remote island somewhere.

From banksy’s limited run “Cut it out” book apparently. Yours for only £310

Agree although, presumably joining the Schengen and the euro would make it harder for the oligarchy to keep using London City as a money laundering and tax haven funnelling device. I suspect there would be strong pushback on that!

They will just instruct everyone to throw their obsolete AI pc onto the landfill like they already have been doing with machines that won’t run windows 11