The US rail network is decades behind the times in terms of signaling and switching. Countries like Japan have fully electronic implementations that remove the need for human beings to be fully in the loop for that stuff. Now, there’s still monitoring of the larger network and all that, but basically the switching and…

This is just some Hyperloop-style grift bullshit.

Isn’t a carbonated martini basically an un-sweet Tom Collins?

I’m going to leave aside the notion that there’s “economic value” in the concept of artificial scarcity, which is transparent market manipulation.

I do get where you’re coming from, but I’m not sure there’s a ton of daylight between a purpose-built race car that gets a 500-car “production” run for homologation and a purpose-built race car.

If I have to quit FFXIV because of NFT bullshit I'm going to be very sad.

Cryptocurrencies and NFTs are nonsense, thus the hate. Whether or not they’re “here to stay” is beside the point. 300 years ago you could have said that about chattel slavery, but that didn’t make it a good idea.

That’s the thing about a collective bargaining deal: it can be whatever the union negotiates for. SAG, for example, establishes certain minimum levels of pay, workplace safety, benefits, etc, but obviously the average SAG member is not making, say, Matt Damon money.

Yeah, always good to catch up with Sang-Wing.

But they don’t actually provide ownership, they provide a receipt. There’s nothing stopping people from getting the exact same thing basically for free. Sure, I guess in the future Twitter could prevent you from uploading a profile picture without a valid token, but if they did it wouldn’t be driven by a principled…

It’s good that you remember the years from 2011 to 2016, but I’m not sure that’s the golden age you think it was. Sure, there wasn’t a hot-tub meta, but there was still on-stream cleavage, and the associated endless complaining from puritanical “gamers” who were presumably offended that a woman appeared on screen…

Yeah, maybe those cyclists had it coming!

God it’s the best mount. Worth it to have a crafter/gatherer class available to do those quests for it. And honestly the whole tribe questline is pretty funny.

Uprooted and Spinning Silver both rule so hard.  I have the first of these two books on my shelf but haven’t yet read it, unfortunately.  I really need to catch up.

Conservatives are demonized among progressives is that their ideology is reactionary as hell. Even non-MAGA conservatives believe in the abolition of legal abortion, further aiding the rapaciousness of capital, and eroding or outright destroying any semblance of social safety net. These are people who believe every…

I think Pathfinder 2nd Ed is a better modern d20 game than 5e.  Dungeon World is cool, though it's a fairly different kind of experience from DnD in general.

You seem to take for granted that Nintendo’s legal arm only moves when necessary, which is untrue. It operates as part of an overall corporate strategy that zealously defends both their IP and their overall brand, but only the latter is really at issue here. If Project+ itself were a threat to Nintendo’s IP, they’d…

Thanks for answering the exact question I was asking in my head.

Their response is likely legally sound, but it’s not necessary. Nintendo has nothing material to lose from allowing the tournament to take place. That they believe there is some further, intangible damage dealt to the brand by the tournament is further evidence that Nintendo is run by people with no understanding of…

Modifying software doesn’t inherently infringe on IP (copyright/trademark). Presuming that the mod does not somehow violate copyright (i.e. allow for piracy) or trademark (e.g. add extra characters that are trademarked) then it’s not a threat to Nintendo's IP and enforcement is not necessary to protect it.