Come before them with the exact question to which they’ve had a burning desire to answer for decades, and you’ve won the lottery

If an AI can use CGI programs to create actors on demand, it destroys an entire section of the workforce.

I know why they would want it. I don’t understand why they insist on it in the face of a protracted labor action that is costing them profits today.

Not enough stars

Xi Jinping and Viktor Orbán. A match made in Hell.

Fellow Boomer here. We can be serene in our stereotypes because we don’t have to struggle anymore (or have given up). Whenever I hear younger generations complaining about how awful we are, I want to point out what a jump we are from the Greatest Generation. We haven’t been the saviors that we thought we would be, but…

Around here, almost all of the Slingshots that I see are driven by middle-aged or younger black men.

This is the right answer. Any vehicle with an infotainment system can access the correct time wirelessly, just like the inexpensive alarm radio in my bedroom. I go to sleep and wake up to the correct time without any intervention. The real question is why don’t all electronic time pieces do this? Why do I have to…

I doubt that a completely AI generated performer could be turned into a major “star”. And, yes, producers would love to be able to own rights to every actor that ever worked for them, but even they should realize that is a bridge too far. To think that the producers of Thelma and Louise could use a scan of Brad Pitt…

It would still be necessary to pay the CGI techs to animate a scanned person. Creating the original “actor” is a one-time cost.

The point of ubiquitous AM radio in cars is so that people don’t have to think about being prepared. The means of communicating emergency info is omnipresent. But it no longer seems that requiring it in cars is that meaningful anymore. Between all of the other digital equipment around us anymore, and the fact that…

This kind of piece is particularly significant during the SAG-AFTRA strike. So many actors have their whole career consist of small roles, with just a few scenes and lines, that are significant in the works that we cherish. Imagine if she had been scanned by Dick Wolf’s production company when she did L&O, only to be…

The studios have no doubt been licking their lips at the prospect of scanning actors and reusing them endlessly in whatever they fancy for free

While I have absolutely no faith that Tesla can deliver anything within months of their announced intention, I do think that a 20K euro car makes sense in Europe. Cut both the size and the range and it should be possible. In Europe, reduced size and range should fit in just fine, unlike here in bigger-is-better…

Pretty much the “Everything I needed to know in life I learned in kindergarten” thing summed in one sentence. 

This all sounds reminiscent of IBM’s move into personal computers back in the 1980s. Staid old IBM decided that they would throw off the chains of their old development model, one that was predicated on not-invented-here avoidance. That model had served them well during the mainframe years, but someone decided that it…

Adding a code to enable start is an added expense, and we’ve certainly seen how often accountants will nix good features in order to save a mere dollar or two per unit in production. You also see a lot of pushback on this very site from people that hate to have anything built into the infotainment system, much less a…

Yes, to each his own. I generally prefer to enjoy whiskey neat if I’m having spirits, but there’s a time and place for such things. Sitting on the deck at Ishnala near the WI Dells is one such setting.

No, a WI Old Fashioned is not nuanced. Neither is a Jack & Coke, a Seven & Seven, a Screwdriver, etc. They are simple drinks for people with simple tastes, suitable for simple establishments that aren’t inclined or enabled to make more sophisticated cocktails. But I don’t need to yuck someone else’s yum, and there are…

They aren’t terrible, just different from what you probably expect from an Old Fashioned. Once you get used to that, they a pleasant enough drink, not unlike Jack and Coke.