Recent posts

#61

Off the Record / Re: The Off Topic Topic

Last post by Tamas - Today at 10:39:52 AM

There's been a rat (gawd I hope it's just the one) that has made its way up to our loft, and runs around down a floor just above our bedrooms. The noise is.. unsettling. Rat guy was here 5 days ago put down poison, waiting for that to take effect.

Yes I know it's going to stink like hell if we can't recover the body. I just want to be dealing with that stage of the problem, will at least know the fucker is dead.

The guy also gave a couple of tips on how to make new infestations harder. Apparently there's a pretty easy highway from the top of our garden fence to the garage roof and from there into the gutter downpipe that leads up to the roof.

#62

Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023

Last post by Razgovory - Today at 10:21:05 AM

About what?

Amazing projection in yelling hypocrisy with views like yours.

You would have to read my posts from time to time to understand what I was talking about.  What is hypocritical about my views?

#63

Off the Record / Re: [Canada] Canadian Politics...

Last post by Grey Fox - Today at 09:19:11 AM

What had you understood?

Rereading Viper's post, I see a possibility that he meant that Joly was delivering Québec to Trump. Was that it?

#64

Off the Record / Re: [Canada] Canadian Politics...

Last post by crazy canuck - Today at 09:09:02 AM

Ok, that makes more sense, Joly was commenting on the policies of Quebec politicians. 

#65

Off the Record / Re: Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-2...

Last post by jimmy olsen - Today at 08:40:35 AM

Is having major power plants outside your capital blown up and having to sell your gold reserves a good sign?

https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:3ilzhrzkar3icae4mfyupmqp/post/3m6btnt2vv227?ref_src=embed
https://bsky.app/profile/wartranslated.bsky.social/post/3m6btnt3nd227

Shatura power station in Moscow region was hit overnight, igniting transformers at the 1500 MW facility with locals reporting at least six strikes.

Ukrainian OSINT researcher CyberBoroshno assessed damage at approximately 820 MW, with strikes hitting two transformers at 210 MW units and a gas distribution station feeding a 400 MW German-built unit.

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/11/20/russias-central-bank-starts-selling-physical-gold-from-reserves-a91192

Russia's Central Bank has for the first time begun selling physical gold from its reserves as part of Finance Ministry operations to fund the state budget, the Bank said on Wednesday.

#66

Off the Record / Re: Dead Pool 2025

Last post by Syt - Today at 07:13:19 AM

#67

Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread

Last post by Josquius - Today at 06:45:31 AM

And almost all of those ads also flow through other servers (Meta, X, etc) plus ads on those servers that don't appear on Google servers. Ads are not discrete objects. Having an ad on a server places no limit on the ad's appearance on other servers.

I don't think thats true. I can't think when a site would be using Google's tools and meta's at the same time - incidentally IIRC more evidence for the monopoly point, meta stopped supporting their google ad competitor a few years back as it just wasn't profitable.

Ads on facebook, twitter, etc... are just ads on facebook, twitter, etc....  They have tracking data all over the place, but if you avoid their specific sites its not going to do them much good.
Google on the other hand is basically everywhere else on the open web (and their own very popular sites).

Ah you meant focusing on the ad part directly vs focusing on the front end services.
It's breaking up the front end that usually gets the attention but it is the back end that is absolutely the problem.
 It is heavily reliant on the front end however so say forcing Google to sell youtube for example would damage the actual ad monopoly.

HVCs figures sound like what I've seen for what Google actually owns.
The actual ads on Google, on the space that it owns directly, is only a small part of its operations and alone wouldn't be an issue.

I didn't mean anything by focus.  I was asking you what you meant.

I'm starting to get the impression that y'all are talking about the stuff in Hillary's link when you talk about "monopoly in advertising."  Am I right?  Ad exchange and publisher ad server (whatever that means).

I missed that link. But yes. Its back end stuff that is used by basically everyone in online advertising. If you see an ad online and you're not on facebook, twitter, amazon, or some other walled garden.... then it's probably a google ad.

#68

Off the Record / Re: Dead Pool 2025

Last post by Solmyr - Today at 05:50:21 AM

RIP Udo Kier.

#69

Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023

Last post by Josquius - Today at 05:39:30 AM

About what?

Amazing projection in yelling hypocrisy with views like yours.

#70

Off the Record / Re: The China Thread

Last post by Crazy_Ivan80 - Today at 01:38:59 AM

The question is of course how much it matters if China manages to keep it up long enough to knock its competition out of the game