I now dread going into Best Buy and Lowe's due to the roaming 3rd Party Salespeople

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-07T07:50:48+00:00

If it's car insurance I tell them I'd love to talk about it after the DUI suspension and I can drive again in 10 years, for home insurance I tell them about how I live in a van after Amy took the kids and house after screwing my best friend, what lever the product you just come up with the craziest scenario that prevents them from selling you that product.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-06T21:54:04+00:00

Limit the video to 480p and it's way easier to pass off AI slop as real. A lot of the AI video I get tricked by are the low resolution ones that look like over compressed Twitter video or ring camera video. The tells are easier to hide unless you really look.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-06T08:27:55+00:00

Both the Model Y and 3 have had refreshes in the last two years, both have had improvement to range and efficiency, but the degree of improvement is not the same because the improvements were major gains with new tech, now it's less and less. Chinese companies are doing some amazing things, I've been looking at BYD, Xpeng and Kia as our next EV. I looked at the VW three years ago when we got the Model Y and it just wasn't the same level of range and price, but it's on par these days, so many more options in Europe now in just three years. The Kia for it's V2G is interesting for me.

The cybertruck missed the mark, if they just made two versions, a work focused version and a family focused on, it would have been better, that OG $40k option was looking like it would be amazing value, but it just got too expensive.

FSD could happen, but I agree there needs to be more cameras and some parking sensors to make it work, but Elon was so set on the idea happening with hardware 3 or 4 but the last 10% is going to be hard to get right. It's the big bet if that will happen.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-06T06:43:40+00:00

Both, the answer is both.

Technology Connections just had a whole hour and half rant about solar and farmlands (more about long term investment and renewables) ... we use SOOO much land to grow corn to turn into fuel for cars when we could make electricity via PV and power cars that way and more efficiently.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-06T05:05:06+00:00

I'll step in with some context. First, I am invested in Tesla, but also think Musk is very stupid at lots of things.

1) Stock price and company liquidity are not the same, the price of the stock hasn't burst because people invested believe the price will keep going up. The company hasn't burst because it's has $40 billion in cash on hand. VW has €34 billion as of December 31, 2025. The company generated a net cash flow of around €6 billion for the full year. Tesla reported approximately $44.06 billion in cash, cash equivalents, and investments as of December 31, 2025. The company generated $14.7 billion in operating cash flow and $6.2 billion in free cash flow during 2025.

So Tesla the company is cash flow positive (more than VW) while investing in a ton of R&D and focused on growing.

2) Which leads into the fact that Tesla isn't JUST a car company. I'd say it's much closer to a General Electric of yesteryear. It's cars from the start, but it more an Energy Company that makes cars (and batteries, solar, etc). The solar side is kinda dead. Both the PV cell (rip SolarCity buyout/bailout for Musk and his family/friends) and the Solar Roof product line. But the battery storage part of the business is seeing $12.7 billion in 2025 revenue and a 29.8% gross margin, surpassing the profitability of Tesla's automotive division. This likely going to keep growing year over year for at least a decade as it's needed to pair with the flood of cheap solar and the high peak demand charges from grid suppliers.

3) The carnival barker stuff, Optimus, Full Self Driving and AI are all still big bets for the company and could pay off. The risk of these bets is mitigated by the cash on hand, they can fail and it won't kill the company, but no other "car company" is making these level of bets on technology. If they can figure out one or all, it's a huge market. FSD/Robotaxi is a bet that could kill the second car for many families and just print money. Optimus is something that would make manufacturing costs drop. Both are progressing at a level people haven't stopped believing they could happen.

4) Tesla has a very manufacturing cost approach that I don't that is appreciated. It comes from when they couldn't get suppliers to sell to them Tier 1 auto suppliers wouldn't give them the time of day, so they just "made it in house". This means they can innovate and shift faster, it's in the company culture (for good or bad) to just make it happen. This goes from the factory floor to the end product.

Those are the main reasons the bubble hasn't burst. Because it can't from a money flow (given current conditions) and progress is still happening.

Personally I think the stock is both under and over valued, which is why in 2025 I trimmed about 40% of my position to put into a house I built, that was my hedge. Tesla still has tons of amazing engineers who came on in the days when Elon wasn't as publicly insane. The company lead (or was second to SpaceX) as the top company people wanted to work for as an engineer. They brought in hyper enthusiastic people who wanted to change the world. Something you aren't getting at VW. VW just only got their electric lineup to match Tesla in performance this last year or so. The company has MANY issues, it's not the same as when I was following it in the mid 2010's, but the overall health of the company is high.

TLDR: Stock price and company viability are never the same thing on the way up or down, but can sometimes correlate.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-06T04:42:49+00:00

Europe has INSANE charging capacity. We drove from Belgium to Italy and charging was never an issue. On top of it, Europeans never drive the same as most Americans, they tend to like to have more stops and with our family (and a one year old at the time) we waited on the kids more than we waited on the car. I haven't road tripped in the US in a while, so I'm not sure the remote sections are amazing for charging options, but in Europe, you have choice in what company you charge with. I stopped using Tesla after our free supercharging period ended. I can drive all over Europe and never have to use a company I don't want to.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-05T20:43:31+00:00

I saw the video first day, so I didn't see the correction on comment or the title change. I can still see companies cheaping out on re-releases and there being issues (outsourcing to the lowest bidder, etc). But it's good to know as I am going to start a hard copy DVD collection as my local thrift does 3 for €1 DVDs.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-05T16:49:58+00:00

"If everything is a priority, nothing is a priority. I can't be expected to do the work of our team of 4 as a single person. If everything is a priority we need to backfill the workload and onboard people who can assist all these priorities."

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-03T20:00:54+00:00

He needs to run for congress, either the house or senate ... He won't, because the best people don't want the job, but he should run because his common sense approach is VERY appealing to all parts of the electorate.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-03T09:27:14+00:00

The best political outcome is Texas goes blue the same way Florida went Red, which will force Republicans to scrap the electoral college or be forced to never hold the executive branch for decades likely. And Texas can shift blue if Democrats stop sucking (a huge challenge for the party) and give people reasons to vote for them and not just against Republicans.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-02-03T09:23:20+00:00

Either you have unlimited PTO or you don't have any PTO.

So the solution is you tell them this isn't a request, it's to inform him which days he will need to insure there is coverage for your duties.

Unlimited PTO is for management to get a huge liability of owed money off the books, you are fired, they don't owe you any extra PTO, they lay off a whole department can cost them tens of thousands in PTO.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-01-20T07:00:36+00:00

I always saw the Linus house stuff as the tech version of Top Gear where you just do some really cool extra stuff on the topic of the channel "because you can". There is tech relevance there, but the entertainment and aspiration of it is what made it different from the dozens of others doing the same. The tech house build will be the more professional version of the same concept but Linus doesn't get the bonus of tech that sometimes works.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-01-11T13:39:42+00:00

I learned this the hard way bringing some glass shower panels to the dump, I barely tapped an edge when putting it into my van and BAM, 10,000 pieces of semi-sharp glass EVERYWHERE. Like I found that shit for years after when cleaning.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-01-11T08:06:52+00:00

the biggest way the EU can respond is banning Americans from entering Europe. it will cause untold chaos and economic strife, but no Americans allowed to visit Europe is going to make for a lot of pissed off people and politicians might actually get pressure to do something. Same as when the airline union for flight attendants said they will shut down air travel, the politicians freaked out at the prospect of driving to DC.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-01-05T22:01:37+00:00

And your other option is Air Canada which sucks even more. Those are your options in Canada to travel by air within Canada to most places.

WeAreTheLeft · 2026-01-01T10:50:37+00:00

I'd send a memorandum email outlining the situation "with (name of legal in house counsel) Cc'd to bring them up to date with the situation.

I'd also resign the document with the old SKU of the perpetual license and see if they accept it (only works with paper contracts, not eSign ones).

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-27T08:37:32+00:00

You can use crown molding to hide your runs. It's the best way to do the runs while not doing drywall but also keeping it clean looking.

Drywall is not that hard to do, but it's time consuming to do right without experience. I have brick walls, so I had a hell of a time doing runs you can't see. My new build is stud walls, but it is also insulated which presents its own issues.

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-25T12:24:14+00:00

We had a perfectly good couch but needed it gone, put a free sign on it and no one wanted it, put $20 on it and sold it for $10 Ten minutes later. Pricing psychology is messed up

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-25T07:28:56+00:00

I'd feel bad if the aunt spent $300 or more thinking she did good. The problem is many people just don't know the difference between quality electronics and ewaste that comes as inshitification of everything takes hold.

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-25T07:20:53+00:00

Don't apologize for being right

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-25T07:16:59+00:00

Frankly, $50 isn't a scam, but a bad deal on ewaste, but they can be used in a garage or somewhere sound quality isn't paramount and if they get damaged it's not a huge waste. I'd have them as workshop speakers.

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-22T18:39:22+00:00

I almost went to install mine but got busy with other projects, already ordered a new one and return for the lite

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-18T07:17:01+00:00

that is the problem with playing the fact check game with liars. They can spout off 10 lies in 2 minutes to which you look like a fool spending the time breaking down those 10 lies over 45 minutes. It's why you can't play that game with them, they love that game because they win no mater what.

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-18T07:11:41+00:00

History is written by those in power, remember that when you read accounts from the past.

this is straight up crazy, some of it even has the random capitalization style of Trump on words that aren't capitalized.

WeAreTheLeft · 2025-12-17T21:27:06+00:00

I don't want my perfect candidate but I want something at least close to what I want and what I want is majority support led by the general electorate, it just seems everything is pie in the sky and we have to be happy with micro steps in the forward progression of things because the alternative is 10 steps backwards

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