I think different people benefit from it differently. Most people regardless of remote or in-office, put on their headphones and barely talk to anyone else all day, and being in the office has zero if not negative networking benefit for them.

Then there are a few "social butterflies" who know everyone in every department, and they benefit in various ways internally and externally. Internally maybe they can move a difficult cross-department project because they have friends there, which then comes back as praise and rewards. Externally maybe one of their friends get a better position somewhere else and poach them, etc. etc.

OTOH we know tablets, smartphones and cars can operate in an open manner, and their users benefit from this. Apple choosing not to make such tablets and phones is similar to cars that could operate on any road and fed any brand oil, but Apple choosing not to for their own benefit.

Maybe not in this day and age of LLMs.

That heavily depends on the city and country. I don't know where OP is, but for example in Berlin it's kinda rare to meet people not speaking any English, basically mostly old people/retirees don't.

There are gyms where people speak English, cinemas with English subtitles, all kinds of doctors speak English, even a lot of bureaucracy like driving exams etc. can be taken in English. Speak to a random person in English, odds are very high they respond back in English.

I'm not saying this to mean it's 100% easy of course. Default language is ofc German, and not knowing it locks you out sometimes. Just saying that it's possible to live in a city like Berlin and not speak the language, and most days you barely think about it. I'd say it's an obstacle once-twice a month rather than daily.

Sony has been pretty successful with that though, and there was a time where they pushed many fan favourites in the cinematic genre. They aren’t arcadey games like Nintendo ones of course, but something like The Last of Us has its own value and audience. It sells too.

Only people without GamePass subscription and no desire to get it for even a month or two would buy the game on Steam.

I suffered with German too, in fact, still do :)

As a trivia: "kurz gesagt" -> kurz: short, gesagt: said. "sagen" is the verb "to say", "ge"+"t" is to form the past participle. (but not always :)

At this price and features it'll probably just be a footnote.

Fargate and Cloud Run first come to mind.

Now everyone plays, watches or at least knows games, but most games are lowest common denominator focus group tested commodity crap. Huge budgets and production value, almost zero innovation. Even indies are 80% slop to make a quick buck.

If you have a hobby no one cares about, hold it dear and close to your chest, and be happy that no one cares about it.

Also time passes and people change. Many of the people on HN today were once dialup users. They are the same people but also different.

> Whatever the dispute between Apple and EU regulators

Sounds like OP doesn't even know what the topic is, he just wants new Siri on his iPhone, and that's enough reason to pressure regulators into bending the rules in Apple's direction.

As another iPhone customer in the EU, I'd much rather prefer EU and its sovereign member states to be able to make their own decisions. Even if that means I don't get to enable whatever the new hotness Apple comes up with this year.

Or alternatively: I could just switch to another phone maker who isn't as hostile as Apple.

Is it? Asking out of curiosity, from a cursory look both countries require self-sufficiency, language (in fact Switzerland looks a little easier on this), no criminal background, an integration test to be taken (and both seem easy) and time in the country.

Only major difference seems to me is Germany takes 5 years in paper (more like 6-7 in reality with bureaucracy) and Switzerland takes 10 years in paper.

What benefits? I don't know every country in the world, in Germany unless you count retirement as a benefit (which is something you pay for and have to reach a certain age that is ever moving upwards) you don't get any assistance if you're not living in the country.