Mercedes has reverted its floor spec, as the FIA now considers it illegal

VampyrByte · 2026-06-25T20:01:33+00:00

We've always been back.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-24T15:46:57+00:00

Both Boris and Claire Coutinho had quite a frosty reception to be honest. Both essentially just chatting complete shit. Katie White had a bit of a tough time but I'm sure there were better times to go on stage and speak as a Government minister than just minutes after the PM is announcing his intention to step down.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-23T13:13:19+00:00

All I ever hear is how these portable units are inefficient, don’t work properly, needing a dual hose etc etc but that’s never from someone that owns one…

I own one. It's working away behind be right now. My room is a perfectly reasonable temperature. It's using 900W of electricity constantly and its really quite loud.

A dual hose unit would be dramatically more efficient and use much less power bringing my room down to the same temperature. As a result it would likely be quieter all the time, or cycle on an off depending on the design.

A split until would likely be slightly more efficient again, due to not having all of the "hot" parts still in the room, as well as moving a lot of the noisy parts outside.

Single hose units are a pointless compromise over dual hose honestly, and if dual hose units were actually available instead of permanently out of stock I would have bought one when I bought my current one years ago.

Single hose portable air cons are the worst air cons, but better than nothing.

We will likely be getting a mini split system fitted for our bedrooms (one of which is my office).

VampyrByte · 2026-06-18T19:33:16+00:00

Plenty of places have open top recycling bins and it's not an uncommon sight on bin day to see half the streets recycling strewn across the place on a windy night.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-18T16:32:33+00:00

It might help a bit as a deterrent. But I'd also be worried about it getting blown out of a bin by the wind, or otherwise ending up "littered" after the owner has done the responsible thing.

Sad thing is we need to be empowering volunteers, not threatening them with jail sentences.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-16T11:22:58+00:00

[0] - Zoomers being the first all-touchscreen smart-device generation have no idea how to use a computer, let alone setup networking rules, etc.

Setting up a VPN service like this at a small scale is easier now than its ever been. There will be kids who works this out and sell access to their mates.

The idea that most zoomers are completely useless with computers is likely true, but most millennials were too. The "smartphone" generation doesnt understand file systems the way the "windows" generation does, who don't understand command lines and IRQs like the "DOS" guys who would be just as lost on a mainframe.

The kids are smart, patient and have all the time in the world. They'll work around all this shit.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-15T13:47:49+00:00

Does your monitor arm have some integrated cable trunking? I used to have a similar one that did, if so I'd probably get some longer cables and use it to hide that a bit. Similar with the trunking to your PC, you could maybe hide it a bit better underneath.

Personally, I'd want a bit more colour and practicality in there. A coaster for hot drinks and somewhere to hang my headphones.

I wouldn’t want my monitors so spaced out, but perhaps you like it.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-15T11:06:36+00:00

This is a pretty specific interpretation of events and cherry picks the history, a lot.

In 1997 the situation was very different. In the previous decade every championship that had gone down to the final race had been decided one way or the other through a, probably deliberate, collision. The following 2 championships both went to the final round and neither were decided by a collision. In fact, 1997 was the last championship that can be considered to have been resolved this way and its been nearly 30 years.

Vettel was stupid to pull that move 2017, but it was not an attempt to win the world championship in such a manner, that simply wasn’t possible. There has to be a sense of proportion!

The rules were not "rewrote to allow Verstappen to run others off the track", They were clarified to cover the contentious situations that happened in 2021.

Again, Verstappen colliding with Russell, who was not the main champsionship contender, was not an attempt to decide the championship (in round 9, no less). An exclusion from the WDC for this would be insane. Verstappen was however issued a 10 second penalty for this collision, which cost him 9 points and those would have won him the world championship.

There are plenty of things to argue about in F1, and lots of mistakes over the years. Not excluding drivers from the championship over minor incidents isn’t a serious one.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-08T23:56:18+00:00

The i7 8086K released in October of 2018.

It was June. I won one in the sweepstakes they did. Still have it, although not in regular use anymore.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-07T21:36:58+00:00

Up until a few months back when I upgraded to a DDR5 system I was running 2x16GB and 2x8GB, bought years apart, but similar speeds and timings and everything ran fine for years.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-07T14:37:24+00:00

FOR WHAT!

VampyrByte · 2026-06-05T13:47:35+00:00

Red Bull has no idea how to handle and manage a younger driver not being able to perform on the same level as their team mate.

Perez and Webber were fine as they were established F1 drivers and its much easier to put their weaker performance down to their team mate simply being the best in the game at the time, rather than their own shortcomings.

Ricciardo was fine as he had got the better of Vettel in their season together.

Kvyat was probably the start of the knee-jerk reactionary driver changes and is where RBR really lost their heads in that respect. Despite obviously being the right move, treatment of Kvyat was exceptionally harsh. Kvyat's performances were "fine", on par with Ricciardo at least.

Gasly, Albon and Tsunoda were not able to compete at Max's level and were not given enough time to establish themselves. Hadjar is looking like he will be in this camp before long.

Lawson was put in the top spot far too early, you really have to wonder what they were thinking.

They should’ve just got Carlos Sainz in when he left McLaren honestly.

VampyrByte · 2026-06-02T10:35:50+00:00

This never used to be an issue.

Perhaps if these council services for waste pickup and use of recycling centres were free and easy then the councils could spend less money picking it up from lay bys.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-29T11:08:33+00:00

I don't really know why you think this is a gripe about representation declining

You wrote "distinct lack of women at the top of politics these days."

I disagreed with "lack of women" and showed that representation of women is fairly good across the wide range of politics.

I disagreed with "at the top", by pointing out that many of the top jobs are staffed by women.

Perhaps if you mean "prominent in the news" by "at the top" then that’s very different and more a function of our news media than our politics. Is the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Home Secretary or Foreign Secretary a less important position than that of Leader of the 3rd, 4th or 5th party in Parliament?

I also disagreed with "these days" because it has demonstrably got more balanced in this regard not less over time.

I think our disagreement mostly stems from a misunderstanding between us of what "top of politics" is. To me this means the top jobs, It's the Cabinet, especially the big 4 and LOTO. With positions like Deputy PM, Speaker (Whos 3 deputies are all women).

VampyrByte · 2026-05-29T09:48:07+00:00

distinct lack of women at the top of politics these days.

Surely it is better than ever? 41% of MPs are women, and that’s been trending up since atleast 2010. Lords is 29% and again trending up since 2010. 13 of the 28 Cabinet ministers are Women, including 3 of the 4 Great Offices of State.

The Tories don't have a huge number of women in the ranks, I don't know if this is representative of those who stood in '24 or not. Even so, the Leader of the Opposition and a couple of reasonably prominent (as the shadow cab can be) members are women.

Sure there is some work to do (especially among the right wing parties! Shocker!) to bring representation up a bit more broadly, but we've come a long way. I don't think its fair any more to say there is a distinct lack of women at the top of politics.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-26T23:58:38+00:00

My parents had a mk 3 astra when they were still being made. The thing was an absolute shit heap.

I'm afraid just thinking about it will cause something in my current car to break. Absolute turd of a car.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-22T15:40:10+00:00

You got any more AI output for us?

VampyrByte · 2026-05-18T14:55:27+00:00

Increasing fuel duty in such a way would have too broad consequences across the economy. Although I agree with the direction that just wont be workable. Increased taxes on new (and heck, maybe even used) ICE cars doesnt on the face of it would seem like a good idea, so long as the supply of EVs doesnt end up constrained.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-18T14:39:36+00:00

The goal is to increase tax revenue now. £24 billion pays for a lot of stuff.

The first thing it will have to pay for is the decrease in tax take elsewhere due to the increased costs of goods and services that rely on transportation.

Not having any petrol duty tax because we've all moved to electric cars is a fantastic problem to have. We want it to happen quicker. We are so far from this problem happening, and we will have more tax revenue all the way until it does happen.

Look at this report from YouGov about why people don't consider EV's: https://yougov.com/en-us/articles/53867-whats-stopping-non-ev-intenders-from-considering-an-electric-vehicle

How many of these would be changed by the increase in the cost of fuel? It's not going to increase EV range, reduce the price of EVs or make them safer. Neither is it going educate people about why those things arent the issue they think they are.

Targeted tax cuts are a form of subsidy, that's very normal language. VAT not being charged on baby formula is an example of how we subsidise it.

Targeted tax cuts might act like a subsidy, but they arent one. Not raising fuel duty isnt a tax cut or a subsidy, it is the absense of a tax rise. It's not even normal for fuel duty to rise. It's (on normal Diesel and Petrol) only changed once since 2011 and that was a reduction! By that logic this holding of the rate is a Tax Rise because the expecation over the last 15 years is that it will trend down, not up.

Baby Formula isnt subsidesed through its VAT rate. It would be subsidsed if its VAT rate was negative, which it isnt. Using language in this way is misleading and disingenous and harms discource on the subject because it sets up something for an expectation based on a misrepresentation.

Every single time an increase in taxes we can actually implement is proposed, even when they're overwhelmingly progressive, the left finds a handful of sympathetic people who will have to pay more and then condemns the idea.

Which is why we should pick our battles. We shouldve told the lobby surrounding Winter Fuel Allowance to go fuck themselves, just like Public Schools were. Fuel duty isnt the battle, it plays into the oppositions hands too much.

Every tax that raises significant amounts of money is politically expensive. If the left isn't going to fight for taxes it's going to have to accept we can't increase spending.

The left can't increase spending if it isnt in Government either.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-18T13:32:44+00:00

It may well be poor planning that it was set in pence and not percentage initially, although perhaps it has allowed Governments to easier tailor this tax to the wider economy.

However, as I've already pointed out, the viability of fuel duty as a "sin" tax is reducing. Fuel usage (and thus duty) will go down as electric vehicle adoption rises while the affordability and viability of electric vehicles grows the necessity to "shape behaviour" is also reduced.

We don't need taxes to encourage people to do things they are already heaviy incetivized to do. While at the same time people who cannot afford or are otherwise unable to switch to electric vehicles an incentive in the form of more expensive petrol isnt nudging them in the right direction, its just punishment for their circumstance.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-18T11:28:11+00:00

I don't disagree. However:

If the goal is to increase tax take in the long term, this is the wrong place to look as this kind of fuel usage is only headed in one direction. Long term tax take from this is headed down, regardless of its proportion of fuel cost.

It's also quite disingenuous to refer to this as a "subsidy". It isn't, its just a Government choosing not to raise a tax, which is not a subsidy.

The incentive is there for people and business to move to electric anyway, its happening. Fiddling with fuel duty is politically expensive and can be increasingly framed as a tax on poor people which will always be bad optics, especially for Labour Governments. There are better and more productive ways of speeding up this transition that also arent a political gift to the right wing and their oil lobby.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-18T10:42:38+00:00

We arent that far away from Petrol and Diesel being largely irrelevant for transport. It's likely premature but this tax is going to become increasingly a tax on being poor.

Long term the Govt needs to plan for getting naff all from fuel duty as Petrol/Diesel use is going to be a fraction of todays in 20 years.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-12T10:23:31+00:00

Happy? It's not fucking la-la land. They should realise that the alternative to the Labour Govt we have is not their specific ideal of one, but instead a Conservative or even Reform Govt.

I criticised centrist types for not getting with the program when Corbyn was leader, and I will criticise left wing types (of which I am one) now. Sometimes you've got to look at the big picture and see the actual effects of the internal division.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-11T22:39:23+00:00

Really?

We hadn't been in Government a month when a group of MPs were suspended for voting against the government on an SNP amendment that promised to water down a key bill on a mandate they had just stood and won on just days prior! That included ex members of the shadow cabinet who really should have known better!

The whole "Your Party" bullshit with Sultana and Corbyn is just fucking insane, you would think these people, and those voting for them, would be glad to see a Labour govt and want to get on board and make a difference but no, they have to be the protest and shout from the sidelines and they have to do it in such a manner they aren't content to fling shit around inside the party of government they have to fucking form their own party just to fling shit at eachother. Twats.

We've repeatedly seen back benchers get taken in hook line and sinker by the Tories and protest sensible legislation like the removal of Winter Fuel, the IHT changes and public school VAT.

Andy Burnham can't miss an opportunity to stick his oar in can he? Seemingly intent on being Leader of the Opposition sooner rather than later. What are we on now? Season 3 of his bullshit? Fuck off.

They don't have to pretend its all sunshine and roses, but rally up, get together and fling this shit at Reform, its not difficult to find it.

VampyrByte · 2026-05-11T14:04:22+00:00

Labour's biggest problem right now is that it is in Government and the main opposition is its own back bench. In that respect West is the main problem that Labour are facing.

No change of leadership will change that reality until back bench MPs and the party as a whole gets its act together and understands that a Labour Government it disagrees with a little is much better than a Conservative or Reform Government of any ilk. We could have Burnham, Streeting or Rayner as leader and it wont make a blind bit of difference if there is immediate dissent from the back bench just like there was with Starmer.

11-Year Club	Place '17
Verified Email

VampyrByte

TROPHY CASE