Lintson

@Lintson@aussie.zone

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨There's a baby drought in Australia. Maybe we should fund IVF?⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  And when they didn’t have a stream of babies they traded to get more people. Or just outright stole them.

  It’s going to be an interesting time when the generation of 10 people is faced with hunting and gathering for the generation of 1000. Pro-tip: It doesn’t end well for the generation of 1000

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨There's a baby drought in Australia. Maybe we should fund IVF?⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  The number of people in the world is predicted to start going negative before the end of this century.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨‘Poison portal’: US and UK could send nuclear waste to Australia under Aukus, inquiry told⁩ ⁨⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Safe bet they will not use any of the old mines or remote ports you mention because $$$

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Cricket: Australia have withdrawn from their men's T20 series against Afghanistan over continued restrictions on women and girls in the country under the ruling Taliban⁩ ⁨⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  While it is the right thing to do, continued cultural isolation of its people is exactly what the Taliban want

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Secretive firm behind voice no campaign billed taxpayers almost $135,000 via Coalition MPs, documents show⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Remember governments past and present piss away this and more routinely for far less social benefit

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨"Australian banks massive beneficiaries of the pull back from China:" country's top institution CBA lures funds despite profit expected to fall⁩ ⁨⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  That’s way too basic to be a solution. If you take from them they’ll simply take it back from us by cutting jobs and services while raising fees.

  We should be making it harder if not outright illegal for them to arbitrarily cut costs in the way they do i.e closing branches, offboarding atms, making workers redundant to keep up profits. They are in many ways a public service and the service component is worth protecting.

  Countering this behaviour would be far more impactful to Australians and the economy than just having them hand a bag of money to the government.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Top Customer Service by Me Bank⁩ ⁨⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Love the smell of cheap KPI attainment in the morning

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Peter Dutton calls for boycott of Woolworths after Australia Day merchandise dropped⁩ ⁨⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  In a large city they can be practically boycotted. Most people just can’t be bothered.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The four houses dads belong to.⁩ ⁨⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  In Australia

  Ryobi: for DIY, apprentices or otherwise cheapskates. No shame in it. Best bang for buck if you don’t wear them out and the best part is you’re not going to be worried that someone will nick off with them. A lot of their range isn’t brushless and these tools will let you down the moment you need to do something moderately demanding.

  Milwaukee: has won the trades tool war. They have a huge range of tools and their customer service with regard to warranty replacement can’t be beat. Tradies are very comforted that know that they can abuse the crap out of their tool and not be out of pocket.

  Makita: my house. I consider more of a gentlemans tool even though many swear they are the most rugged things out there. I think their batteries are better than the competition in terms of overall cycles so long as they are not abused. Their carpentry tools are so so buttery to use. Wish they had a bigger tool range.

  Bosch: Not as good as the above two but priced the same or higher. Limited tool range. Batteries are really not amazing. Sad to see but the only persons using these are really those who insist on buying only a german/european branded product.

  Dewalt: Yellow is not as good as red or teal and is priced accordingly. Weird second best niche. Batteries kind of trash imo.

  Ozito/Ferrex/etc: Chinesium. Bit of a roll of the dice. Some stuff may last but generally expect these tools to fail at some point even with light usage. Generally not fun/comfortable to use either.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Streaming costs are rising, and there are more platforms than ever to choose between. Some people are going back to piracy⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  This is the way

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨‘Tragic and unnecessary’: Truck driver didn’t see cyclist hit and killed⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  We’ve actually spent tax dollars sending council members over to Holland to check out the safe bicycle infrastructure

  Forget Holland, the most amazing bicycle infrastructure I’ve seen are in Chinese cities. Because bicycles were a dominant form of transport for most of the 20th century their cities were built to cater for this demand and had to have it work.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Sara Lee Crumbles as company heads to voluntary administration (headliner writers must've waited their whole career for that pun)⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  I’ve always liked a Sara Lee cheesecake but Sara Lee faces stiff competition at the budget end of the frozen dessert market and the much expanded availability of higher quality offerings. Australia’s dessert tastes are also changing. I expect Sara Lee will follow the likes of Arnotts and other such formerly beloved supermarket snack brands.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Striking actor Stephen Fry says his voice was stolen from the Harry Potter audiobooks and replicated by AI⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  Theres already an AI Attenborough that narrates Warhammer 40k lore. It’s brilliant

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I rented a Tesla for a month. It was a steep learning curve⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  My dad and I once sat in the cabin of a push to start vehicle for 20 whole minutes before admitting defeat and walking back to the rental office and asking how to start the car. If an action is completely alien/illogical to you, it’s not a matter of being bad at adapting, you’ll just never get it.

  In this case we needed 3 actions done correctly: fob in dock, brake pressed down (even though its in park) and hold the start button down for longer than 2 secs. It was the last step that really screwed us around

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Fewer of us are cycling – here's how we can reverse the decline⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  There needs to be cycling roads that are just for cycling, not just painted green strips on existing roads. Big ask but it’s what we need for the majority of persons to use bikes as an actual mode of transportation.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Record number of Australians at risk of mortgage stress as RBA interest rate rises bite⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  The wealth of so many Australians is tethered to property ownership that to threaten housing prices is to basically ask to lose an election.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Opinion: Why it’s time to raise the speed limit in Australia to 130km/h⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  In many placez Public transport doesn’t necessarily need to be faster, it just needs to be way more frequent to be practical

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Families distressed after 'highly misleading' video used by anti-Voice campaigners goes viral⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  You vote yes because the people hoarding the power/money pie that is Australia are working hard to make it seem like you will be losing your share of that pie. In reality they possess all of the pie already and you don’t have any; so voting to give a fraction of that pie to Indigenous Australians is of zero consequence to you.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨'Young people are hustlers': Gen Z 'willing to do what they need to' to make ends meet⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  Well with the quintessential aussie “side hustle” of having an investment property now out of reach more than ever its no surprise Gen Z are turning elsewhere.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Australian Cheng Lei's first message from Chinese prison describes harsh conditions⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  A valid opinion but I have a different take on her story. Given her Chinese background and immigrant status it is perfectly reasonable for her to end up working in China. You have to understand a few points.

  • She really wanted to be a Journalist/News Anchor but was convinced to go into Finance by her father because in all honesty her prospects of becoming a news anchor in Australia were near zero at the time. SBS would be her only prospect but the token east-asian slot was already filled by Lee Lin Chin
  • Relations between China and Australia at the turn of the century (early 2000s) were very different than they were now. China’s meteoric growth meant that loads of Australians and westerners in general, not just Chinese Australians were moving to China to find their fortunes. It is not unusual at all for her to have a career based in China
  • She wanted to pursue her media dreams. Given the pan-asian if not globalistic economic culture that was emerging at the time it is not unusual that she was hired as a correspondent by CNBC and then ultimately achieving status as a news anchor for CCTV. Even today in 2023 I’d say her prospects of becoming a news anchor in Australia are below 1% no matter how hard or qualified she is.

  Tldr; she wanted to be a news lady, not a speck of a chance that would happen in Australia, used her Chinese background and the prevailing economic winds at the time to nail that dream in China.

  Yeah there were plenty of warning signs and opportunities to leave but when you’ve built an outstanding career over 20 years it is hard to leave. It’d be like finally getting to be footy captain and then calling it quits. Also when you have lived and worked in China (or anywhere) for that long everything gets normalised. The bribes, corruption, harsh penalties and censorship of the state become part of everyday life, things that are objectively wrong don’t feel wrong anymore. Just like how we in Australia have become accustomed to paying ridiculous fines, levys, fees and insurances. Also uh… COVID kinda made it hard to escape. Australia wouldn’t have let you in and China wouldn’t have let you return to your job. Many at that time were hoping to ride out the storm.

  She is indeed, to a degree, a victim of her own ambition but given thr above I can’t really say it’s a “leopards ate my face” situation. Perhaps in some warped way she thought that being a state media shill would offer her some insurance against detainment but in reality it only made her an even more attractive target for the increasingly heavy handed Chinese State authorities.

  She is 100% being used as a political weapon against Australia as every day she is being detained erodes the value of Australian Citizenship. There will be plenty who will argue “weelll she’s not really one of us is she?” but that only serves to tear apart our multicultural values which benefits the geopolitical power of the Chinese State. One of China’s problems continues to be the massive flight of human capital (and in turn $$$) from their shores. Power plays like this demonstrate to that nobody in China is untouchable and furthermore a foreign citizenship is worthless even if you obtain one. A truly twisted way to enforce loyalty among your own populace.

  Finally she gets to write one letter home per month. Wouldn’t believe most of what’s written as you can guarantee that shit is heavily curated to hit us in the feels.