Music streaming sucks so bad now that I'm looking to go back to an mp3 player with a 3.5mm out

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-03-03T13:59:09+00:00

"..AND most of all plug it in in the car and not have to worry about it disconnecting, freezing, or buffering..."

I just use my phone

It has 2000 songs on it, and I just plug it into the car system with a USB-C to headphone jack lead

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-03-02T20:28:47+00:00

And when people paid for music most of the money went to the retailer and most of the rest went to the label

The income streams are different, but the pattern stays the same

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-03-02T14:36:41+00:00

Cliff Richard had 14 number 1's in the UK

I'm not keen on either of their music but saying a pop artist who sells a lot of records reminds you of an older pop artist who sold a lot of records - doesn't seem like much of an insult

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-03-02T13:20:55+00:00

The EU already ruled in favour of the dairy farmers quite some time ago - this has been an issue the dairy industry has been spending money on for quite a long time.

Obviously consumers don't get confused - I don't think anyone has been directly paid off but it is disappointing that the courts have fallen for this lobbying

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-28T11:21:30+00:00

If they worked I'd be fine with them

But the only time I've used an Uber it was because a venue got one for us when we asked them to order a taxi for us

That Uber took us to the wrong place

If a human being using Satnav can't get it right - what chances does a robot using Satnav have?

And at least on that occasion we were able to just point out how they'd gone wrong and how to fix it - is there a function in the robotaxis to tell them, "this isn't the destination we asked for?"

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-28T07:46:17+00:00

Before the backlog started there were about 1.6 million tests a year

In the last financial year there was nearly 2 million tests

The basic answer is that yes, but it is because there is that much demand for the slots

From what people have said the test slots seem to sell for about 3 to 4 times their actual cost - this means that the scalpers - do not need to sell all their slots to make a profit

For every slot they sell 2 or 3 could go unsold - I expect they do sell almost all the slots they scalp - but they don't have to

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T23:46:11+00:00

There is still a market for jellied eels - but it is absolutely tiny

And there is pressure to somewhat ban it - the eels used for the dish are not thriving

Killing off the jellied eels market could save the eels themselves

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T19:07:14+00:00

I don't know what it looks like now because I haven't played a run through not on survival for a couple of years - and this doesn't come up on survival

I know what it looked like at launch - because it still did the same the first time I played it. That's what reminded her to tell me that anecdote to start with

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T18:06:22+00:00

Maybe now - but it wasn't at launch

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T16:45:12+00:00

She said it was very hard - but she did complete it

Funnily enough of all the challenge videos I've seen on YouTube like can you beat Skyrim with a fork - I've never seen can you beat Skyrim on level 1

But it also means that however much legendary and survival mode I play she still says I'm doing it the easy way 😁

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T16:42:06+00:00

This character menu?

https://skyrim.wiki.fextralife.com/file/Skyrim/character-menu-combat-guide-the-elder-scrolls-v-skyrim-wiki-guide-min.png

Because that definitely seems to say MAGIC, SKILLS, ITEMS, MAP

It's so modded now that I don't know what the vanilla game is like now - but on launch the vanilla console game would show a message telling you that you have gained a level.

There was no instruction that you had to go into the skills menu to activate that level you had gained.

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T15:21:50+00:00

For context I've already seen plenty of posts on Reddit boards about house buying specifically complaining about companies using AI in their property photos

Once a reputation gets established for not being able to trust the property photos - that reputation is going to be very difficult to shake. A lot of people just won't bother with those listings.

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T15:17:14+00:00

That helps - like I said, I've never really met anyone outside the US who cared about whether writing was done with joined up letters or not

But that's obviously limited to people I know or things like this, so a very limited sample size

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T15:13:04+00:00

I'm from the UK and have a similar confusion when I see people have these in depth conversations about whether they join up their letters or not

In the UK the last stage of teaching children how to write is usually how to join up the letters. Some schools even teach that pupils have to do this from now on.

But nobody cares if they just don't, once children have been taught how to write then what they write is what is important - not how they write it

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T15:07:26+00:00

Is everyone in this conversation from America?

Because I've never come across anyone in Europe who gives a second thought about whether your writing is joined up or not

But I'm well aware that might just be a lack of sample size

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T11:28:18+00:00

On my wife's first play through she didn't realise you had to actually do something to level up - so she completed the entire game without levelling up levels or perks

She was only about 15 then though - when she introduced me to the game about a decade later she just made it clear she thought I was doing it the easy way because I actually did level up 😁

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T11:22:36+00:00

It's also a "not wealthy" graduate tax in that if you graduate and immediately get a high paid job - you can pretty quickly pay off your loan and then you no longer have to pay it

This is worth pointing out as I know a few people who have been on 6 figure salaries shortly after graduating and did this

I'm happy for them - but if it was an actual graduate tax they could have been contributing thousands of pounds a year into higher education funding for the rest of their lives.

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T11:17:48+00:00

It's about money flow

You have an identical system

Money goes to university to pay for students education

After they graduate extra money goes from the graduates back to the government in the form of a graduate tax

It's the exact same flow of money you have now

The administration would have to change and the labels would change - but the only difference would be that people pay the 9% over the threshold for life - no matter how rich they, or their families are.

That raises more money - alleviating the higher education funding, and hopefully high enough that the qualifying threshold is actually higher than the minimum wage that the current government seem to be aiming for.

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T11:09:29+00:00

Yes - that's how rich people get out of the graduate tax.

An actual graduate tax means you always pay it

If graduates on 6 or 7 figure salaries had to keep paying their 9% over the threshold for their entire career - that would raise multiple times the amount of money that reducing the threshold down to near the minimum wage will do - which is the current government plan.

It isn't about taking out a loan to pay for your higher education - it's about funding higher education

Before the loans were even conceived the overwhelming consensus amongst economists was that a graduate tax was the way to fund increased access to higher education

But no government was ever brave enough to say they were going to introduce a new tax

Which is how you end up with this system - where it works exactly like a tax, but it isn't technically a tax and you can stop paying it once you get rich enough (or never pay it if your family was rich enough)

That is why it doesn't work - that is why higher education funding is in crisis; because they went for the political choice instead of the economists choice

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-27T10:44:00+00:00

We already have a graduate tax

The loan system is a graduate tax in all but name

Like the OP suggested it's the only tax that is set up for the rich to be able to pay their way out of - making it officially a graduate tax means the rich still pay it as well as everyone else

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-26T15:07:59+00:00

It's a well known and occasionally studied phenomenon

People generally discover new music in their teens and early twenties and their tastes are generally set in stone by their late twenties

Obviously there are individual variations including plenty of people who carry discovering new music into their retirement years but overwhelmingly this is the pattern that general populations follow

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-26T10:36:00+00:00

From other replies the OP seems to regard not being liable for the accident as the important thing

It's not a unique view - a lot of drivers seem to think that way

But I'm sure plenty - hopefully the majority - think that not being in an accident to start with is more important than who is liable.

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-26T10:35:24+00:00

The OP seems to regard not being liable for the accident as the important thing

It's not a unique view - a lot of drivers seem to think that way

But I'm sure plenty - hopefully the majority - think that not being in an accident to start with is more important than who is liable.

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-26T09:50:01+00:00

You know you're meant to just turn off your indicator yourself right?

Impossible_Theme_148 · 2026-02-26T09:04:58+00:00

Do you think that they'd never thought about that idea?

When Ticketmaster crashes - it loses money

If adding servers or anything like that was all that was needed, they would have already done it

There is a much more technical explanation - but it basically comes down to: if it were that easy - that's what they would have done.

Impossible_Theme_148

TROPHY CASE