tankplanker
@tankplanker@lemmy.world
- Comment on Tough new driving rules could land Brits with a ban for ‘minor’ mistakes 3 days ago:
Phone use is meant to be detectable by the latest automated cameras, along with seat belt use that are on trial last I heard. If it works as good as they say they do then I suspect a lot of people will be facing a ban.
- Comment on Members of public to be selected for ‘honest conversation’ about MPs’ pay 5 days ago:
Any conversation around salary has to include their generous pension scheme (better than civil servants), significant expenses that they are allowed to claim for their lifetime in parliament, expensive freebies such as Taylor Swift or access to an Arsenal box, subsidised food and drink, and the opportunities offered for additional salary from outside jobs and lobbying. Oh and if they lose their seat the get a decent pay out, significantly more than statutory redundancy. And for the small number who might have a baby in office, six months full pay, far more than statutory again.
Just focusing on salary when its only part of their actual net income makes it appear meaner than it actually is. They should be forced to stick to statutory requirements as that would incentivize them to improve it quicker rather than yet another exception.
- Comment on YSK that if you can't find a book at the library, you can probably request another one to send it to yours via inter-library loan 6 days ago:
UK as an adult you often have to pay for this per request and there is a limit on the number you can request at once. As it can take weeks or even months to complete while you wait for your turn in the queue so it makes it very hard to stack requests.
As a kid I used to love this service as it was free without real request linits and a lot faster. I could just pre order books that hadn’t come out.
I stopped using my local library because of it as their planned fiction book selection is basically large print romance or war stories or westerns.
- Comment on Steam Summer Sale 2025 has begun! 1 week ago:
Classic is a little different from modern tsw, it could have been retired when it became Classic but they kept it on. How long on total was that dlc available for? And I don’t believe its been turned off just not available to buy or officially supported?
- Comment on Steam Summer Sale 2025 has begun! 1 week ago:
I purchased a bunch of dlc for Train Sim World (tsw). I only buy dlc for tsw when its on sale, save a small fortune that way.
Bonus savings if you can get one of the bundles on sale for double discount. I got £150 of dlc for about £55. Yeah dlc is super expensive for tsw but it doesn’t go out of date and nor is it needed for a multiplayer mode so why rush?
Been after the expansion pack for Germany and the Preston Route for ages.
Train Sim World® 5: West Coast Main Line: Preston - Carlisle Route Add-On Train Sim World® 5: Schnellfahrstrecke Kassel - Würzburg Route Add-On Train Sim World® 5: DB BR 101 Loco Add-On Train Sim World® 5: Maintalbahn: Aschaffenburg - Miltenberg Route Add-On Train Sim World® 5: Hauptstrecke Rhein-Ruhr: Duisburg - Bochum Route Add-On Train Sim World® 5: Ruhr-Sieg Nord: Hagen - Finnentrop Route Add-On Train Sim World® 5: DB BR 363 Loco Add-On
- Comment on When the AI bubble bursts 1 week ago:
I agree it has some value, but the problem is that value doesn’t seem to align with the cost of Western AI.
If you look at what Altman said about how much OpenAI was losing despite charging an arm and a leg for its premium subscription, no one will pay for that for low value items such as transcription or scaffolding code.
Unless it can actually replace high value jobs long term rather than short term pretend replace as with Klarana then its doomed with the current models.
- Comment on Students in England now graduate with average debt of £53,000, data shows 2 weeks ago:
People will blame Nick Cleggs Lib Dems for this and yeah they play a big part in this, but the root cause is further back.
Tony Blair removed the cap on the number of students who could go to university which lead to introducing tuition fees. Before then you used to get a grant, I got three grand a year, to go to university.
Suddenly universities could massively increase the number places so they did. This lead to spiralling costs, which lead to fees going up and loans had to go up to cover this. They also borrowed heavily to expand.
David Cameron removed the cap on fees while increasing the money students could borrow with Cleggs backing (against a key Lib Dem manifesto pledge fucking the Lib Dems for years after) and Universities started getting properly greedy.
Inflation kicked in but the loans available to students didn’t because the government couldn’t afford to, majority of students never pay back the full amount before its written off. Student loan book is set to be a trillion pounds in about 20 years.
The whole situation is fucked because Blair said anyone could go, rather than being honest about what we could afford to pay for. Now we have a ticking timebomb that someone’s going to have to pay.
- Comment on Angela Rayner: I’ve taken all sorts — but we won’t legalise cannabis 2 weeks ago:
It would cost them votes with a certain group of voters who would make this a capital offence if they could.
It doesn’t really impact MPs, see the studies into drug use at the HoP or even this articles headline, so why bother risking losing important votes in swing seats? If the police started throwing MPs in jail for drug use then you’d see something done quite quickly.
Much like a lot of these wedge issues such as abortion there are a few nutters in the HoP who are rabidly opposed to it on moral grounds and a few whose husbands own legal medical cannabis farms who frankly don’t want the competition.
- Comment on BYD is testing solid-state EV batteries in its Seal sedan with nearly 1,200 miles of range 2 weeks ago:
PHEV for certain situations is still the best choice, but its more a limitation of the charging infrastructure than anything else. In some countries this is not a quick problem to solve so PHEV has a use for quite some time.
PHEV was very much a stop gap when batteries were even more expensive, performed by third parties (so losing that profit margin as well) and production limited so they reduced the size of the battery to keep the car affordable. Long term they are a dead end outside of specialised use cases.
A lot of PHEV owners do not bother to charge regularly as the small battery needs daily charging.
They have higher engine wear due to the engine being used more aggressively when cold as battery was used for the start of the journey.
You are also carrying around an entire ev and an entire ice, with additional complexity to meld the two together. It’s just not smart design, KISS after all.
I much prefer range extending engines like on the i3 that act as direct generators as a concept for properly remote travel. Although the tech is far far from perfect and advances in battery, such as these solid state batteries, look to make it superfluous.
- Comment on BYD is testing solid-state EV batteries in its Seal sedan with nearly 1,200 miles of range 2 weeks ago:
If you can charge at home especially on solar they make so much sense. I would not switch back for any ICE as my main car even if i was gifted a non returnable Ferrari lease.
- Comment on BYD is testing solid-state EV batteries in its Seal sedan with nearly 1,200 miles of range 2 weeks ago:
So most petrol pumps do about 38l a minute for cars, even in a car with a big tank that’s less than 2 minutes. Now you have to pay, either before or after depending on the pump, 5 minutes if you have to go in a bit less if you can pay at the pump. 7 minutes max assuming no queues?
I just do not see charging to be even in the same ball park unless:
All cars and chargers support OCPP so you just have to plug the car in and it starts charging no messing with apps or payment cards.
Batteries reduce in size with the increasing efficiency so you are charging less kw but this does not impact charging speed as at the moment more cells means more speed for longer.
People accept that charging to 100% when trying to charge quickly just isn’t going to work, the last few percent are always going to be much slower. It’s quicker to charge twice to 80/85% than once to 100%
Best time can do currently is about 40kw in 18 minutes, even with halving the amount to charge its going to be 10 minutes but then its only adding about 160 miles of range. We’d need to get to double that of range for most people, pretty significant jump.
Personally I’m happy having to stop for twenty minutes or so for a comfort break for me while it charges every three hours or so. Not having to go to the petrol station while at home is also a massive perk.
- Comment on What's the e-reader you would buy if you were in the market? 2 weeks ago:
I love my pocketbook colour three. The extra screensize is very much appreciated for comics
- Comment on The "standard" car charger is usually overkill—but your electrician might not know that [32:26] 2 weeks ago:
Well I did say I was being pedantic, which is absolutely the best way to watch fast and furious with friends
- Comment on The "standard" car charger is usually overkill—but your electrician might not know that [32:26] 2 weeks ago:
You almost had me charging? You never had me charging - you never had your car charging, it had tripped the socket
Pedantic but: 7kw isn’t three phase in the UK, just 30A. Three phase electric can give you up to 22kw in the UK for charging, obviously not every EV can charge that fast, most only go up to 11kw AC. I would kill for that extra charging speed but I can’t justify the extra cost and effort to get it fitted by the electric company
- Comment on The "standard" car charger is usually overkill—but your electrician might not know that [32:26] 2 weeks ago:
We have a granny charger that came with one of our EVs that we use as a backup and with our caravan to charge on sites that allow it. As I am UK it tops out at 2.4kw (10A @ 240v) and its annoyingly slow even charging for more than 12 hours at a time.
Our main home charger is 7kw, and as we get cheap electric every night for 7p a KwH for 5 hours, we can charge about 40kwh in that time period. Means even our largest battery is fully charged in two nights from completely empty. If we tried that with the granny charger it would cost significantly more, as it would be up to 40p a KwH outside of the main hours and take 40 hours to charge the same amount.
Now if you doing only a few miles a day, less than 40 miles (4 miles per KwH, charge for the 5 cheap hours using the cars charging timer, charge 10 KwH), it might work out ok for you, but then charging every day cannot be good for the battery? I know it would get annoying quite quickly. It would also get pretty painful if you have more than one EV, we have three between us and the kids, so its not remotely practical.
- Comment on Whatever happened to cheap eReaders? – Terence Eden’s Blog 4 weeks ago:
Yeah I am the same, I would rather pay more for a better device, and preferably not one from Amazon if I can help it. Its only a matter of time before they start cracking down even more on side loading as they are in the process of removing backing up your own books already. They were only ever cheap in the first place because Amazon wanted to dominate the market and close up shop around their own bookstore so they heavily subsidised the price and turned a blind eye to piracy.
I upgraded my ancient paperwhite for a PocketBook InkPad Color 3 because I wanted colour and a larger screen to read comics but also something that was more responsive. Sure its never going to beat a good tablet for colour depth or responsiveness, its still eink after all, but its so much nicer to use than my old paperwhite.
For something that I use for at least an hour a day, every day (I had a near 600 week streak on my kindle), I do not see the money spent as a bad investment when they lasting a near decade. I could have just replaced my battery in my paperwhite and carried on using it, but the upsides of a nicer ereader that is away from Amazon was a big pull for me.
- Comment on WHERE ARE MY PRECISION SCREWDRIVERS 5 weeks ago:
I can snap the heads of cheaply made screws or ones made from softer material like “brass” with a screwdriver let alone an impact driver.
If I am doing something with a lot of screws, say decking, then I will spend more on my screws simply because I want better quality if I am going to be fitting a few hundred in a day. I also want to know that if I come back to it in a few years that the screw will unscrew quickly when I come to it. Sure it can be a significant cost increase but the time and frustration saved makes it back.
Quality screwdrivers like Vessel Megadora or Wera or Swisstools or similar tend to cam out less than the pack of ten you got from the dollar store. Same with the hex bits for your impact or drill driver.
Last test I heard had Roberson above Torx for reducing cam out, but if you camming Torx that easily I would just switch to an actual bolt if it needs that much torque to tighten.
- Comment on The Telegraph has deleted this sob story 5 weeks ago:
Getting to a good university is only part of the battle and the real prize is the job afterwards. Having a big network is what helps with the latter.
Take law, even at Oxbridge only about 10% of students on that course at either university get into a training contract to become a solicitor. Its closer to 1% at normal universities.
Getting onto that training contract is knowing how to present yourself to the right contacts and go to the right events.
Many subjects are like this, especially for the top jobs.
- Comment on 30% of South Korean schools have adopted AI-powered digital textbooks since the country's education ministry began a full-scale rollout in March 2025 1 month ago:
Interestingly the AI stories are voiced by real people, ractors. That would now be one of the first things cut, see James Earl Jones
- Comment on Thanks to the american FPTP voting system, Nigel Farage could obtain an absolute majority with a minority of the votes 1 month ago:
They and the Torys are inveterate gamblers who every couple of decades win a huge number of seats as Labour did at the last election and that hope that they can win big every time rather than playing the odds properly.
This is coupled with wanting to lock out smaller parties like the Lib Dems, but that doesn’t really work for Tory adjacent parties like Reform when seat boundaries have been gerrymandered by the Tories to such a degree that a small shift in certain seats can win the election.
- Comment on Microsoft Teams will soon block screen capture during meetings 1 month ago:
Simplest way is a Windows VM and screen capture in the OS running the VM. Obviously next step for Microsoft is to detect and block Windows VMs, good luck to them with that.
- Comment on Yvette Cooper ‘open to EU youth mobility scheme’ 2 months ago:
This will be hilarious if it goes through. Imagine the scenes when a certain pro Brexit demographic that has always been the priority for government policies suddenly doesn’t get preferential treatment at the airport for their month in Spain every winter yet “millennials” do.
(Yes I am are the youngest Millennials are 28, its part of the joke)
- Comment on [deleted] 2 months ago:
The problem is that the battery is usually half the cost of manufacturing the car, larger batteries still means more expense, at least until whatever replaces the current battery tech is mainstream.
Britians cheapest brand new EV that isnt limited to 28mph top speed is the Dacia Spring at £11k. $17k is about £13k. UK average commuting distance is a round trip of about 40 miles. In an ICE car thats costing about £6 a day, vs. 70p in an EV that can charge at home overnight. My kids basically get brand new (small) EVs for free vs. running an older ICE that I would gift them just on the fuel saving.
Obviously not everyone can change at home, but this will change the more people push for it.
- Comment on [deleted] 2 months ago:
Do they speak Spanish? The English version of them make no effort to learn to speak Spanish, or integrate outside their own communities, then make videos about people doing that who go to England.
- Comment on 'An Insult To Life Itself': Hayao Miyazaki’s AI Criticism Resurfaces As OpenAI’s Ghibli-Style Image Trend Takes Over Social Media 3 months ago:
It’s a fundamental issue understanding what art is for sure. People who could really draw well could already copy his style perfectly, but just because you can perfectly copy it doesn’t make it original, and thus have the same value. It’s not that it has no value, just considerably less value than his films.
It’s that total lack of originality with AI slavishly copying a style like this that shows its lack of creative value. It’s like pressing play on a keyboard programmed with 20 top tunes of the 80s and randomly pressing the high hat key.
Sure, it enables someone who can’t play the piano to “play” a song, but not really. It’s the same getting AI to copy by rote someone else’s style they developed, it requires no effort or application of originality.
- Comment on How Tesla blew its lead. 3 months ago:
Only touch screen controls for important controls are a safety hazard, and the upcoming safety standards in the EU will withhold the top ratings because of this: etsc.eu/cars-will-need-buttons-not-just-touchscre…
Controls for things like the radio or cruise control are fine on the wheel as buttons. Indicators absolutely aren’t, and are the example I used for good reason. Honestly I have no words if you cant see that they are an actual safety hazard on something like a roundabout, particularly one you would navigate at speed.
Simple left or right turns at say traffic lights or other junction aren’t the problem, trying to activate them while the wheel can be at some random orientation is difficult, so you end up not bothering.
Not signalling when at a round about is an offense in the UK. Its rarely enforced due to lack of traffic police, but its enough that its an actual offense that the car should be designed not to make it considerably harder to use them. In the event of an accident serious enough for the police to get involved if you didn’t indicate then that’s going to count against you.
- Comment on How Tesla blew its lead. 3 months ago:
Which ones aren’t? Also deciding to copy dumb ideas from elsewhere is even more dumb as someone else did the alpha testing for you, showed it was dumb, and you still copied it.
I forgot the yoke instead of a wheel. That’s another Elon special.
Buttons for indicators I know are on modern ferraris, I can’t afford one but I still wouldn’t buy one because of them. Try using buttons on a steering wheel when doing a right at a roundabout, just the dumbest shit.
- Comment on How Tesla blew its lead. 3 months ago:
BYD is eating everyone’s lunch at the bottom not just Tesla.
Tesla could have prospered by sticking to the mid range but their build quality is appalling even for a lower mid car.
Couple that with some truly dumb design ideas from Elon (no lidar, no physical buttons, indicators as buttons, stupidly high repair bills due to design choices) and some even more stupid personal behaviors from him and he has just cut the legs out of his market.
EV buyers who are spending more money care about this kind of thing, budget buyers it is mostly about price.
- Comment on Why can’t HVAC be made smarter? 3 months ago:
With a thermostat, smart or dumb, you set a target temperature and a time. With a dumb thermostat it waits till that time and then activates. With a smart thermostat it should learn how long it takes to heat or cool to that target temperature in certain conditions and then aims to hit the target at that point.
So if you got up at 8am and wanted it 20c with a dumb thermostat you got to work out when it needs to go on in order to hit that as no heating system is instant on something the size of a house, with a smart thermostat with learning you do not need to do that at all, just set it for 8am.
As no system is working in a vacuum how hot or cool it is outside, even how sunny it is, has a big impact on how quickly your system heats or cools. Being able to measure and compensate for the outside temperature means the actual start time can be adjusted for you. This can save significant amount of cash.
As an example, lets say the outside temperature was going to be -10c 6am till 8am and you wanted it 20c by 8am. Doing it with a dumb thermostat you would either have to live with an under or overshoot on temperature. Say next day its 2C, now you need to adjust your overshoot again. With a smart thermostat I do not need to do that at all.
Sure, you can just live with the under/overshoot, but its better for your bills and better for the environment not to.
- Comment on YSK: There are 6 levels (0-5) of autonomous driving 3 months ago:
Aren’t the robo taxis remotely supervised as well? Not really level 4 if somebody is having to do that.