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TomK32

2,592 karma · joined December 17, 2009

Ruby on Rails developer. Learning Godot. Freelancer

https://github.com/TomK32/

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TomK32··on Italian parliament votes for return to nuclear energy
Neither nuclear nor gas or coal will matter any more in a few years. It took California only six years to install 41% of the battery capacity goal it has for 2045[1]. As batteries are becoming part for new solar and wind installations, they will push nuclear and gas out simply by being cheaper and more predictable as an investment.

[1] https://www.emi-bg.com/en/battery-storage-in-california-has-...

TomK32··on BYD Slashes Price of Electric Car and Becomes Cheapest in Australia [video]
All infrastructure for cars and the fallout from their pollution (don't forget the tyres) is heavily subsidized by the tax payer and not as cost effective as a tram or railway.
TomK32··on BYD Slashes Price of Electric Car and Becomes Cheapest in Australia [video]
Australia is one of the most urbanized countries in the world with 87% of its population living in cities and suburbs. Being car dependent is a political choice pushed by the car industry for decades. Getting people into public transports, onto bicycles or their two feet requires reducing the vast space cities waste on privately owned cars. Super blocks that focus on active travel, less surface parking space and slower speeds are what is needed.
TomK32··on 4,400-Year-Old Tomb of Egyptian Judge Found at Saqqara with Colors on Walls
Just put "Don't use emojis" into the prompt.
TomK32··on 4,400-Year-Old Tomb of Egyptian Judge Found at Saqqara with Colors on Walls
Ran it through several testes, only one flagged a few sentences as AI, including the one you mention. Fair enough, it's unlikely that English is the (turkish in this case?) author's first language and a little AI help can't hurt here.

I learned a great lesson for a gamedev youtuber this summer: Use AI to give you a summary what you have to implement, what functions you'll need, what edge case you missed and then write it yourself. Putting this into practice helps me to refine the ticket I'm working on. With the last ticket I had to persuade the AI (Atlassian's Rovo in my case) that a new data model wasn't necessary and we can do it more elegantly with less code.

Many of us still have to figure out how AI fits into our workflow, letting it do all the work isn't it but asking AI to point you towards the goal and let it review/refine your work sounds a lot more acceptable to me.

TomK32··on AI companies destroy physical books – let's scan rare books before it's too late
Books have been declared dead several times of the last quarter century, yet in the EU alone it's still half a million new titles every year and a 40 billion Euro market.
TomK32··on AI companies destroy physical books – let's scan rare books before it's too late
I've read a few of those articles in recent months, both in English and German, and I did read any book title that was rare. The Rare Book & Special Collection Div at the Library Congress considers books published before 1801 as rare. Searching for old books on abebooks is surprisingly hard but I didn't find any for less than 10 Euro and nothing in those articles suggested they were buying up anything but cheap books.
TomK32··on Why some people mow a lawn better than others
I had a neighbour once who was quite unhappy about how short their lawnmower cut the grass, I did show them the two adjustment screws to raise the ground clearance...
TomK32··on It's a shame what's happened to radio
bbc.co.uk still allows listening to all stations live and yt-dlp has no problem to download shows, you just got to find your way to the correct page that doesn't trigger a redict to bbc.com e.g. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001qng7/episodes/player
TomK32··on It's a shame what's happened to radio
BBC 6music has a lot of great DJs, Chris Hawkins being my favourite with plenty of banter for a 5am show. While it's just a Friday late night show: Ashley Storrie on BBC Radio Scotland and don't be surprised if you hear the same listeners sending in messages on both stations. But then, they aren't commercial stations with less pressure. Whenever I have to listen to an Austrian (where I live) station I get bored. Even the public funded stations have commercials or, even more annoying, un-labeled advertising for the lottery.
TomK32··on Qwen 3.8
You might want to ignore politics all day long, but rather sooner than later it's politics that will creep into your life and take an interest in whatever things that politicians mis-understand about your little niche.
TomK32··on Qwen 3.8
[flagged]
TomK32··on America pays workers just 27% of what its wealth allows – the worst in the OECD
Oh sorry, I missed that CA over-cautious warning label nonsense.
TomK32··on The Three-Second Theft: Why AI Voice Fraud Outruns Every Defence
I'm getting a lot of calls recently and don't give them more than a Hello and whatever music, radio show or Tour de France broadcast I'm listening to. Sometimes they hang in there for half a minute.
TomK32··on I tricked Claude into leaking your deepest, darkest secrets
They only do if you give your container that file system as a volume.
TomK32··on America pays workers just 27% of what its wealth allows – the worst in the OECD
The DOT has a list of interesting studies on the active transportation in the form of walking and cycling https://www.transportation.gov/mission/health/active-transpo...

You can also search for studies that compare the societal cost/benefit of using a car vs a bicycle. The generally accepted conclusion is that cars have a cost while cycling has a benefit for society.

TomK32··on Count Binface
> If he goes into the parliament building without his costume

If the people vote for a man in a bin costume then he should have the right to represent them in that very same costume. On the other hand, to satisfy both his desire for a costumes as well as parliament's rules that basically allow its members to look at each other eye to eye, he might switch to a transparent bin. Something that would benefit the whole country as transparent bins allow its users as well as the bin (wo)men to identify bins that have been filled with the wrong waste.

TomK32··on Count Binface
He was re-elected once more in 2009 and because the English have a really weird political system, the direct election of mayor was abolished by a vote in 2012 making him the first, last and only directly elected mayor the town ever had.
TomK32··on Count Binface
Other interested candidates can submit their nomination from tomorrow to Friday and I think one needs the support of only 10 constituents and a hundred quid

More info should follow here today:

https://www.tendringdc.gov.uk/content/13-august-2026-electio...

TomK32··on EU Parliament greenlights Chat Control 1.0
Wouldn't it be fun if those who are in favour of such measures were the first to behave their messages scanned?
TomK32··on Sick leave: Germany rising but not the worst in Europe
Fehmarnbelttunnel is the better example because you can see the difference in legislation between Denmark and Germany. Denmark passes laws for projects of such importance while in Germany the project has to hop over every existing legislative hurdle that are great for preventing smaller projects going bad, but do cost extra time and money on a larger scale.
TomK32··on Sick leave: Germany rising but not the worst in Europe
AOK insured 27 million in 2021, couldn't find a more recent number.
TomK32··on My Favorite Keyboards
That Model M SSK looks real nice. I have not one but two Filco Majestouch 2 TKL with brown MX keys, one for 12 years and counting. They are so much heavier, nicer compared to what I got recently second hand: a WASD with a very wobbly case.
TomK32··on The US Army Issued Ocarinas to Soldiers in World War II
In peacetimes, yes, but if it's defensive war I don't see many arguments against a draft, it can't be generalized though.
TomK32··on Founding a company in Germany: €9600, 152 days and I still can't send an invoice
There's weirder things in existence like SPAC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special-purpose_acquisition_co...
TomK32··on Giant Banana Pulled Over: Driver Says Cops Have Stopped Him 100s of Times
Stopping a driver at 1AM gives the cops a better chance at "solving a crime".
TomK32··on Giant Banana Pulled Over: Driver Says Cops Have Stopped Him 100s of Times
He should keep a log book for his police encounters, categorized by ticket with every cop putting their name and number into it so he can show the cops how often they waste everybody's time...
TomK32··on Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040
Solar farms come with batteries included these days https://reneweconomy.com.au/the-solar-farm-that-winds-down-a... and https://octopusaustralia.com.au/our-projects/fulham-solar-fa... and https://edp.com/en/asia-pacific/australia/merino-solar-farm and https://www.pv-magazine-australia.com/2026/06/23/australias-... That's a new trend and easy to miss but it will push out coal and gas.

And as much as a cyclist I dislike cars, the nice thing about electric cars is the potential that most often they can be charged at a time when it is convenient for the network. Mind you, cars just sit around 95% of the time.

TomK32··on Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040
With the prices for solar (the expensive parts are not the panels but the inverters and labour costs) and batteries still going down you will get more than what you thought when you started to spend the first billion.
TomK32··on Steam Machine launches today
I'd like to factor in the cost of games, but then my Steam library might be a little bigger than the average... Am I willing to pay €60 for a game? Rarely. Am I willing for the spring/summer/winter sale on Steam? Yes!
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