What is so bad about virtual environments? I found them to be really nice and useful when I developed in Python over about 5-ish years. It was really nice being able to have separate clean environments for installing libraries and executing things.

Granted, I only used Python as a solo developer, so if there are shortcomings that emerge when working with other developers, then I would not be aware of them....

Edit: also, performance is a bit more of a subtle topic. For numerical logic, Python actually is (probably) much better than a lot of its competitors thanks to numpy and numexpr. For conditional logic, I would agree that it's not the best, but when you consider developer velocity, it's a clearly worthwhile tradeoff since frameworks like Django are so popular.

True, but if you're looking at a Python library that doesn't have type hints in 2024, then chances are that it's not very good and/or not very well maintained.

Website redesigns. Just more whitespace all over the place, less information on the screen, and more trouble trying to get anything done.

Github is especially bad about this. I'm so tired of only being able to fit about 50 lines of code on the screen at a time, or issues with a similar lack of information density. I can understand this paradigm for websites that you only use once every year or so, but for something that most people use regularly every day, it's such a backwards anti-productivity trend. I hate it... hope it dies someday.

The comic states that Firefox is a crown jewel of open source, not the crown jewel.

That said, I agree that if I had to pick only one, it would definitely be Linux over Firefox.

Don't worry everyone, I'm here to help:

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Glad to be of service! Until next time....

Your Steam games will go to the grave with you

Great, then I'll finally have some time to play them....

The best part of all of this is that now Pichai is going to really feel the heat of all of his layoffs and other anti-worker policies. Google was once a respected company and place where people wanted to work. Now they're just some generic employer with no real lure to bring people in. It worked fine when all he had to do was increase the prices on all their current offerings and stuff more ads, but when it comes to actual product development, they are hopelessly adrift that it's pretty hilarious watching them flail.

You can really see that consulting background of his doing its work. It's actually kinda poetic because now he'll get a chance to see what actually happens to companies that do business with McKinsey.

Sounds to me like these tech workers could really use a good union to protect them.....

All your points are sound. The issue that I have with this is that remote disable functionality is not necessary to achieve any of these aims. Before they were connected to the internet, people were still able to rent/lease autos and the world managed to survive just fine. There were other ways for lenders to get remunerated for breaking lease terms - they could issue an additional charge, get a court order for repossession, etc. Remote disable was never needed or warranted.

So let's start by considering the due process here. Before, there was some sort of process involved in the repossession act. With remote disable however, the lender can act as judge, jury and executioner so to speak - that party can unilaterally disable the device with no oversight. And if the lender is in the wrong, there is likely no recourse. Another potential issue here is that the lender can change the terms at any time - it can arbitrarily decide that it doesn't like what you're doing with the device, decide you're in breach, and hit that remote kill switch. A lot of these things could technically happen before too, but the barriers have been dramatically lowered now.

On top of this, there are great privacy concerns as well. What kinds of additional information does the lender have? What right do they have to things like our location, our habits, when we use it, and all of the other personal details that they can infer from programs like this?

There are probably lots of other issues here, but another part of the problem is that we can't even start to imagine what kinds of nefarious behaviors they can execute with this new information and power. We are well into the age where our devices are becoming our enemies instead of our advocates. I shudder to think what the world would look like 20 years from now if this kind of behavior isn't stopped.

Despite that success, and the App Store’s role in making it possible, Spotify pays Apple nothing.

That's because Spotify doesn't owe you anything. If I release a piece of software for Apple, Android, Linux, Windows, etc., I don't owe these OSes anything for that. Apple makes plenty of money selling hardware, that's good enough for them.

These delusional bastards really need a few slaps around their heads to get this concept to sink in.

However bad they may make it, it can't possibly be worse than it is for non-adblock users.

But hey, if they want to torpedo their own services, have at it. It's not like they have a reputation for it or anything....

If the infrastructure can't handle it, then upgrade the fucking infrastructure! Politicians will fall at voters' feet to build new roads, highways, etc., but when it comes to the green energy transition, there's no problem too minuscule to be ignored!

I'll happily admit that there are going to be many issues in the green energy transition; we should acknowledge them, but we should also strive to address them, rather than throwing our hands up in the air and idly promulgating the status quo.