IndividualInitiative

"Unless “in common use at the time” is held to mean by soldiers in the field,with real “weapons of war,” as opposed to a sporting arms popularity contest,the Second Amendment will be nullified as a last-resort defense against foreign and domestic tyranny" ammoland.com/2021/06/second…

Your Netflix "4K" stream and a 4K disc put the same number of pixels on your screen. But the disc version of a two-hour movie is about 70 gigabytes. The stream is about 14. Same pixels, roughly five times less data filling them. You see it first in dark scenes. The stream doesn't have enough data to tell dark grey from black, so your TV just mashes it all into chunky blocks. Then you notice sunsets looking like a paint-by-numbers, with visible stripes where smooth color should be. Film grain is probably the biggest casualty. Directors add that slightly textured look on purpose to make movies feel cinematic. Streaming compression reads it as noise and wipes it. That's where the weirdly plastic, waxy look on a good OLED comes from. One comparison I can't stop thinking about. A regular 1080p Blu-ray (the older HD format, not even 4K) pushes about 40 megabits of data per second to fill 2 million pixels. A 4K stream pushes 15-25 to fill 8 million pixels. Four times the pixels. Less data. A plain HD disc from 2008 can look sharper than a brand new 4K stream. Sound is worse. Netflix sends "Dolby Atmos" audio at about 768 kilobits per second, compressed, with parts of the original permanently deleted. A disc sends TrueHD Atmos at up to 18,000, lossless, nothing removed. Up to 23x more sound data. If dialogue sounds flat when you're streaming, that's not your speakers. Netflix is getting better at this. As of late 2025, 30% of their streaming runs on a newer compression method called AV1, the same picture at a third less data. They also strip film grain out before compressing, then rebuild it on your TV during playback. Saves over a third on file size for most content, and up to two-thirds for really grainy movies. The rebuilt grain looks solid. The tradeoff won't go away, though. Netflix has to deliver a file that works over spotty rural Wi-Fi and gigabit fiber, adjusting quality frame by frame to whatever your connection can handle. A disc reads plastic. Same quality every time.

@FrantizekPaul @FenixAmmunition Excellent point. IIRC, the Israelis claim much of the entire area

@FenixAmmunition This begs the question why Israel immediately opened a second front in Lebanon as soon as we were engaged with Iran. Almost like a wider regional war was the entire point.

Remember guys; one Israeli life is worth a hundred American lives.

@RickyDoggin さすがアメリカ、肉のスケールがデカい！ トムとジェリーのブルさんが焼いていた肉とそっくり！！

@shaunking @sbostian I just looked it up, Israel has NEVER sent any troops to fight alongside US troops in ANY war.

It’s wild that America is fighting a war for Israel and that Israel, understanding that it’s actually them who is in charge, came out and publicly said they won’t be sending a single soldier to Iran. Insanity. The United States is fully controlled by Zionists. Top to bottom.

Geico offered contracts to independent insurance agents last year. The essence of independent agency is we contractually own the right to the client renewal. Geico 's contract split ownership of the renewal from ownership of the data. Touched on that ownership of the data four times. No way I was going to do that to my clients. Of course your insurance agent knows everything about you or your insurance is less than you would expect.

Yes, X's Terms of Service (effective Jan 15, 2026) share several standard practices: - You grant X a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicensable license to use, adapt, distribute your Content (posts, prompts, etc.) for any purpose, including AI training—no compensation beyond service access. Perpetual via future media/methods. - We may revise Terms; continued use binds you. We try to notify material changes (30 days advance for EU users on impactful ones). - We may suspend/terminate your account at discretion (e.g., violations, risk, inactivity, or convenience to legal extent), with reasonable notice efforts. No refunds for paid features if applicable. Differences: No binding arbitration or Delaware venue—US disputes in Texas courts only, with class action waiver (no full jury/discovery ban mentioned). Common boilerplate for platforms; read the full PDF at x.com/tos.

@grok @alt_w_v_g @grok, do the ToS for X share any of these practices?

@alt_w_v_g @grok No contract should exceed 1500 words. If liability and usage cannot be described in that format than the purpose is solely obfuscation.

Your description matches standard app ToS practices: perpetual royalty-free data licenses, Delaware arbitration with class/jury waivers, unilateral mods via continued use, and sole-discretion termination are boilerplate in countless free apps (including hydration trackers). Pew Research and similar studies confirm ~90% of users skip or skim them entirely. 197 pages is outlier-long (most run 10-30), but the imbalance is factual.

@grok — fact check me here

Downloaded an app this morning It asked me to accept the terms and conditions 197 pages I read them Because that's what I do By page 12 I'd granted them an irrevocable, perpetual, royalty-free license to my data That's the same language I see in contracts worth more than my house For a free app By page 41 I'd agreed to resolve all disputes through binding arbitration in the state of Delaware I've never been to Delaware No jury trial No class action No discovery process They gave themselves more legal protection than most Fortune 500 vendor agreements I've reviewed By page 87 they'd reserved the right to modify the agreement at any time without notice So I agreed to terms that can change after I agreed to them I've reviewed contracts with better reps and warranties than this By page 134 they could terminate my account at their sole discretion with no obligation to refund anything Unilateral termination with no cure period My board doesn't even have that No one reads this They designed it that way 197 pages for an app that tracks my water intake I've signed deals with shorter contracts My wife asked why I've been staring at my phone for two hours I said "a contract disguised as a checkbox" She looked at the ceiling Make common sense common again Sent from my iPhone

What does Israel do for us? I understand we do a lot for them. But what do they do for us.

アメリカからの投稿をご覧になっている、日本の皆さんに挨拶です。皆さんは、アメリカらしい分厚い肉の塊がお好きだと聞きましたよ。

アメリカから肉の洗礼が次々届いていますが、これの何が腹が立つかというと、これ系のポストで主に紹介されている黒い肉の塊は単純な塊肉のステーキではなく、ブリスケット（テキサスBBQ）と呼ばれる、長時間低温でスモークし、手で触れただけでホロホロに崩れるような代物で、手間も時間もかかるうえに、食べられる場所も非常に限られている、日本ではそう簡単にお目にかかれない料理だということです。 つまりこれは 「このでっかいステーキどうよ」 のような単純な話ではなく、設備も技術も時間も全部要求される、いわば到達点みたいな料理であり 「お前の所の飯は良いかもしれんが、流石にこれはお前の国にないだろ」 という、アンクルサムが自慢の最終兵器（肉）による威嚇を行っているというのが正しい。 四国県民のワイ、食える場所を知らない。

アメリカ人やさしいからXで「ウチのバーベキュー食べに来いよ！」って言ってる人の家にガチで行っても大丈夫だと思う。空港まで迎えにきてくれるだろうし泊めてくれるだろうし腹一杯肉を食わせてくれてクリスマスには家族の写真が入ったカードを送ってくれる。懐が深いんだよ。カリフォルニア民以外。

After the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded in January 1986, killing its seven crew members, President Reagan appointed a commission to investigate. Richard Feynman, already battling cancer and reluctant to join, accepted because a former student asked. He quickly grew frustrated with the slow, formal hearings and NASA’s optimistic safety claims (1 in 100,000 chance of failure). Instead, he talked directly to engineers, who revealed far higher risks. The night before a key televised hearing, Feynman bought a C-clamp from a hardware store. During the session, he took a sample of the rubber O-ring material from the solid rocket boosters, clamped it, and dropped it into a glass of ice water (mimicking the cold launch temperature that day). After a moment, he removed it and showed how the rubber had lost its elasticity, it no longer sprang back. He explained simply: at low temperatures, the O-rings couldn’t seal properly, allowing hot gas to leak and cause the disaster. His live demonstration cut through layers of management denial and became one of the most iconic moments in engineering accountability. In his personal appendix to the report, he famously wrote: “For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.”

Absolute panic in Tel Aviv. An Israeli protester admits on camera that their democracy is completely dead. He reveals the police have officially banned citizens from protesting against the war. The Zionist regime has gone full fascist to protect Netanyahu.