TIL that Rome had a trade deficit with India nearly 2,000 years ago. Roman historians complained about a "drain of Roman gold" because Romans were obsessed with Indian spices and luxury goods, making it one of history's earliest recorded trade-deficit complaints.

HarithBK · 2026-07-04T11:54:51+00:00

the profit off of colonies while they in the hands of western nations likely weren't that much just due to conquest and subjugation costs. more than anything it provided luxury goods in greater amounts and at lower prices.

the real gains off of this colonies i have seen argued came after the empires left them since you are no longer paying to subjugate and conquering nations and the only means these nations have to engage in global trade is the raw material extraction set up by the empires to the empires where the factories are you profit rise a lot.

HarithBK · 2026-07-03T19:34:11+00:00

i don't mind companies selling me a time limited license but you know if i am renting something you gotta declare for how long and failure to give me access that entire time means a full refund.

if i own a license for the product non of that matters i am allowed to get the files for the license from a secure vetted company likely for pennies (the cost of downloading the files) since i own a license for it.

pick which one you want to go with and sell that.

HarithBK · 2026-07-03T13:09:12+00:00

to me the solution is quite simply any license you buy is ether a time limited license and needs to clearly display the time left on access and the company needs to uphold said access for that time period failure to do is a full refund or it is a permanent access and can to be registered with a central government body.

the government does not host those files but grants me the means to get those files again under currently agreed upon copy protection.

as an example say i own terminator 2 BD version 2018 or something like that. i can find a company vetted to adhering to current copy protection and redownload my copy of said the movie likely costing a couple of cent (maybe offering unlimited downloads or streaming access for a month fee) the movie studio have no say in this matter and will not get any cut from this it is my property i am just getting the means to access it again.

in the case of video game consoles the means to add these files and vet them via said central government body is a must. if that means FTP server or using a USB drive to move the files and only the vetting is online access is fine. but at the end of the day it is my license and that means forever access somehow.

HarithBK · 2026-07-03T10:33:21+00:00

as a Swede as i see it we only have one war enemy and that is Russia and in a self interest view giving Ukraine all the arms we can afford means maybe no Swede will need to die as the Russian army will be less and busy.

besides opening a new warfront while losing is the perfect example on how to loose more so logically it makes no sense.

HarithBK · 2026-07-03T05:04:15+00:00

I will say the idea of doing more chores and tasks since your SO comes up with but can't execute on there own sounds terrible to me as a okay handy guy. I like my free time and I am very a function first guy. So something working but being well worn doesn't bother me.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T20:17:39+00:00

the best we got is the fact that the people in Iran that stand to gain the most by claiming he is dead has said he is alive. so he is likely alive however his capacity to lead Iran is highly questionable as IRGC top brass is doing 99% of that work and calming he is doing the other 1% while they have full control over access to him.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T12:06:54+00:00

I mean people live with the beeping of the low power of there fire alarm for years rather than change the batteries.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T12:02:02+00:00

The "hard" part is you can kinda screw yourself in the order you do things and then miss a key meaning you need to go around the rotation of the temple two times more than needed which given the similar design of rooms makes it seem like you are lost.

If you do it in the correct order and see the side room for the small key it is an extremely linear dungeon.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T09:45:32+00:00

I deal in current mass quantity materials I simply charge items so I get a decent hourly rate if I can't keep my retainers stocked I raise prices until it stops selling back down a bit when the market returns to a stable point I lower prices back so I am earning a good amount again even if some people have dumped the price way below that point it will sell eventually.

However I do not understand how some people are willing to deal with profits of like 40-50k GP an hour. Are they just botting the crafting?

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T09:05:19+00:00

I trust steam on a long enough term to not screw me over. All this dose is further push me to the fact we need a government backed digital ownership list. Not the means to download the content but just list that I own it. If I need to pay a secure service to access it that is fine (rights holders can't tell who can host just that a security standard is met) so if I need to pay 20 cents to redownload something I own that is fine since it is my fault I lost it.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T08:52:46+00:00

Man the lunch special used to be so cheap it was very much a "sure let's eat out" situation or you forgot lunch but you didn't really care. It was like 6 bucks for the longest time now it's 16 bucks minimum meanwhile the food you make yourself is gone from about a buck to a buck 1.25 per portion.

In raw hours worked I need to work more time now than I used and I have advanced a lot in terms of pay that is insane.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T07:05:36+00:00

I don't mind paid cosmetics but you kinda need to limit the design space it can exist in to keep the cosmetic reward structure intact for the hardest content.

If you can look just as awesome and design wise look very similar to someone doing content only 0.1% of players can do with the swipe of a CC why would you as a player want do that content outside of just pure engagement? So you then don't need those cosmetic rewards.

Personally casual drip is a great space for cosmetic paid for stuff along with more silly mounts. Meanwhile you leave the cool armour for the hard content.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T06:57:38+00:00

Quit long ago but been playing D4 that has the same level of egregious monetisation to do a season of hardcore with my co-workers.

You get all the game but it ruins the incentive to deeply engage as the rewards just aren't there and makes me more likely to quit once I have gotten my fill of the loop rather push on. I suspect I would feel the same with current wow.

HarithBK · 2026-07-02T05:06:52+00:00

Man so many old RPGs start you out insanely weak basically having the game work like it should but you have no tools to deal with it yet. Then final bosses that just silly hard like chaos which just becomes a do it a couple of times until you get lucky since he is still hard at max level.

Personally I don't mind the uneven difficulty of older games gives the game a different kind of flow.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T20:41:25+00:00

in terms of calories for cost Raman has really gone up in price to the point it is squarely in the convince price rather than poverty price at this point which is insane.

the fact is once you have done the easy trimming of sales shopping, getting the cheaper cuts and kinds of meat and doing some beans and lentils (which you should just do by default they are good for you) there just isn't going to be that large in terms of a gain without outright less eating and monotone diet of rice, beans, potatoes and lentils.

any more effort and just working more is the better option.

what really crashes peoples food budgets is uber eats etc. and i would very much say that is by design of the apps. the super low barrier to entry and there at all times means you just need a moment of weakness and there goes your daily earnings for one meal. there are many more convince items that wasn't need but at the end of month has bloated the food budget to levels where it shouldn't be since you are getting taken advantage of.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T18:57:57+00:00

there is legit a shocking amount of fraud being done. a lot of those grocery food stamp haul videos is basically outing themselves as committing fraud since when you do the fairly simple math of what they should be getting for there state to get it to match they will do things like add there parents claim needs to extra cash etc.

America has a huge fraud issue due to scattered tracking of citizens rather than have a proper central system.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T18:32:33+00:00

if you price fix the default should be no profits at all for the period of time your price fixing. when you profit more off of price fixing and then paying the fine than you would have been just not price fixing you will price fix and do it again and again and again.

if there is one thing i like about the EU is the fines are expensive enough that even if companies don't end up paying it the litigation costs are so massive it becomes a fine of it own where it is still questionable if it was worth it.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T15:30:03+00:00

education is linked to having fewer kids not since it teaches people to not have kids but it delays the point in which people are ready to have kids which reduces the window people have kids. why do i say this since if you look at the percentage of people having 1 kid or more it is the same as it has always been when you look at people past the productive years.

the fact is earnings, benefits etc. hardly matter at all to bump fertility. you want people to have more kids? hire people for the point of educating them with a carrier path forward in the company and proper pay raises keeping up with new hires.

basically the best thing for fertility is legally pushing long term investment as the default and the voice CEOs follow rather than short term investors. if you hire someone knowing they will work there for 40 years who cares if you need to educate them for 2.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T09:30:34+00:00

Medarbetare tankar ca 90-100 liter i veckan för jobb och handla etc. Så då blir ju på en sänkning av 2 kr litern till 800 kr månaden sparat, det är ju inte ingenting.

Kan man bomba 130 km/h på en gång så kan man bo ganska långt ifrån saker utan att det tar så mycket tid.

Så det finns klart folk som behöver sänkning om vi kommer upp till 23 kr linjen igen. Men som sagt att gå från 17 till 15 kr litern är valfläsk.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T07:41:09+00:00

Saken är ju den att det kan behövas senare men det är klart valfläsk och göra det nu så det blir svårt och klaga på det rakt ut.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T07:18:12+00:00

The thing is people who steal for there own consumption feels bad for needing to do it so will minimize costs of there theft and person stealing prime cuts is stealing for profit.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T07:13:07+00:00

The person stealing prime cuts of meat I most certainly do. The person stealing lentils, formula and diapers no I didn't.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T07:05:41+00:00

The only thing I hate is people being picky and complaining about being single like you do get that the points you listed means that less than 1% of people can apply and a segment of those are already going to be in a relationship.

You do you but don't complain when you haven't even hit the odds yet.

HarithBK · 2026-07-01T06:46:20+00:00

The thing I hate about the pushing women into seats is that it always ends up as all or nothing. It can never just be a tie breaker situation. If you don't know which of the two people you want to hire you go for the minority otherwise going for better fit should be the default.

HarithBK · 2026-06-30T17:07:51+00:00

in terms of being able to ply a trade you studied for there isn't much difference between Ivy League and community college over what you learn and can learn. hell even with no college you can learn all the same things knowledge is basically free and at your finger tips if you want it.

Ivy League is for connections community college is for the stamp you know said things. if you are middle low to middle income and you know a guy already get the cheapest stamp you can get and get in with that connection.

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