As a test, I have a set of 36 old MS paint Drawings, originally drawn on Windows 98SE, originally saved in bitmap format with a total size of 53.4 MB.

Transcoded to PNG format using FFmpeg and the highest -compression_level of 100, this same set of images takes up 403.8 kB.

Transcoded to -lossless WebP format using FFmpeg and libwebp with the maximum -quality value of 100 and maximum -compression_level of 6, the set of images takes up 174.8 kB.

Transcoded to lossless JPEG XL format using cjxl in the highest compression settings, the 36 images only takes up 126.6 kB.

Given the computing power required to decode JPEG XL images and their limited support, it may not make sense to use JPEG XL for non-archival purposes, but lossless WebP is an excellent middle-ground, achieving over 2x the compression level of PNG.

Lossless WebP has also been supported by all major web browsers since September 2022, when Apple finally added full support for lossless and animated WebP images. It really doesn't make sense to still be using PNG, unless you're targeting really out-of-date Mac or iOS devices. Having drawings and illustrations be 50% smaller (versus PNG) is huge!

It's not as funny in hindsight, given the unexpected results of that election, but at the time, it felt like top-tier humor.

Then there's the fact that automatic emergency braking requires the software algorithm to make decisions based on data that is a lot more complex and ambiguous than the data used by electronic stability control and ABS systems. It's much easier to detect steering angle and wheel slippage than it is to detect how an object in the distance is likely to behave.

Even when it doesn't slam on the brakes, if you were concentrating on the road, those jarring beeps can just as easily break your focus on driving as they can break your focus on a distraction. I think it's better to avoid distraction by keeping cruise control off, and you can compensate for having human-level reaction time by following at a safe distance and staying in an appropriate gear or setting an appropriate level of regenerative braking to avoid mindlessly getting too close to the car in front of you.

I think that too often, driver assist features are being added to cars to compensate for the other features (like adaptive cruise control) that encourage drivers to mentally disengage from the task of driving. There's also the fact (well, opinion) that driving a car without electronic assists and nannies is fun and engaging (especially on back roads with the windows down and the radio up). Riding in an autonomous vehicle is just as dull as riding on public transportation, all while being less efficient, less social, and worse for the environment.

It would be interesting if we could somehow test how the reduction in crashes with the introduction of driver assists would compare with if we had just banned cruise control, introduced minimum visibility and minimum suspension stiffness standards, and mandated manual transmissions.

Containers are nice, but they're not strictly necessary. On Google Pixel 6 and newer phones, you can take it a step further and root your phone and run a KVM-accellerated arm64 Linux virtual machine on your phone. There's a port of Limbo PC emulator that includes support for the KVM accelleration, and it works quite well! It even allows you to pass through USB devices to the guest.

Old Optiplex are also good deals. I bought a Dell Optiplex 5070 MT for $150 for myself and 2 Dell Optiplex 3070 SFF computers for $75 each to replace my mom's aging Windows 7 PC. All 3 computers take DDR4 and M.2 NVMe SSDs and have an Intel i5-9500 CPU that will also run Windows 11 pretty well, if you're into masochism that is.

Termux is only slower without root if you use proot. PRoot provides a limited implementation of chroot that runs unprivileged in userspace, but this also causes it to be pretty slow. If the server software you want to run is available in the Termux repos, you can use that and have it run at full-speed.

Termux works by patching all programs to treat /data/data/com.termux/files/usr as the root directory and /data/data/com.termux/files/home as the home directory. This introduces some compatibility issues, but it doesn't make it any slower.

The Termux project has a great wiki at https://wiki.termux.com/

RFK Jr. is an anti-vax crackpot, but Hep C isn't vaccine-preventable. On the other hand, we can absolutely blame RFK Jr. for our rising Hep A, B, and D rates.

Timing issues can be worked around and GPS modules are cheap.

NAT problems aren't usually that bad. Only a minority of networks use symmetric NAT implementations, with most seeming to be using port-restricted cone NAT (EIM/APDF), which can still communicate with any other NAT implementation using endpoint-independent mapping (EIM). Most CGNAT implementations that I've encountered use EIM, with some also doing endpoint-independent filtering (EIF). Between UDP hole-punching, UPnP, NAT-PMP, and IPv6, it's usually possible to establish a P2P connection between 2 endpoints.

A game could use a hybrid client/server and P2P model, with the option to run entirely P2P while accepting its limitations.

I believe 1970 was also the year when amphetamine (Benzedrine) inhalers stopped being OTC.