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Cake day: August 3rd, 2023

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  • No magnetic confinement fusion reactor in existence has ever generated a positive output. The current record belongs to JET, with a Q factor of 0.67. This record was set in 1997.

    The biggest reason we haven’t had a record break for a long time is money. The most favourable reaction for fusion is generally a D-T (Deuterium-Tritium) reaction. However, Tritium is incredibly expensive. So, most reactors run the much cheaper D-D reaction, which generates lower output. This is okay because current research reactors are mostly doing research on specific components of an eventual commercial reactor, and are not aiming for highest possible power output.

    The main purpose of WEST is to do research on diverter components for ITER. ITER itself is expected to reach Q ≥ 10, but won’t have any energy harvesting components. The goal is to add that to its successor, DEMO.

    Inertial confinement fusion (using lasers) has produced higher records, but they generally exclude the energy used to produce the laser from the calculation. NIF has generated 3.15MJ of fusion output by delivering 2.05MJ of energy to it with a laser, nominally a Q = 1.54. however, creating the laser that delivered the power took about 300MJ.



  • So the right is against self-service now? wtf

    You may want to look into Grover Norquist and his organisation Americans for Tax Reform. It is one of the most influential political lobbying groups in the United States, and it has the support of essentially the entire republican party. They essentially consider tax to be evil on principle and ask every politician to sign a pledge opposing any tax hike.

    ATR is strongly against automatic filing, as they want to keep taxes difficult and complicated to stoke anti-tax sentiment. That is to say, they fear that if filing tax is easier, citizens would be less likely to fight taxes in the way that the ATR wants (mostly they like a low flat tax, because it’s simple and good for rich people).


  • Are we painting Stalin as a good guy here? He only fought Germany because they tried to invade. Before that he repeatedly made attempts to court Nazi Germany. He signed a nonaggression pact, made an agreement to secretly divide Eastern Europe together, and continued trading. Stalin didn’t really give a shit about the fascism part, he only cared once his own territory and sphere of influence were threatened. Same as all the other major allies, btw. Everyone tried appeasement first, nobody really cared about the fascism.

    “Saving Europe from Hitler” paints it as a selfless act of heroism when really everyone was mostly concerned with maintaining their own power.




  • I see the “Republican are always giving up moral superiority to gain an advantage so Democrats should do it too” argument. But at least get something worthwhile for selling your soul. Like, if you’re packing the supreme court you can at least protect abortion rights properly. If you nuke the senate filibuster you can pass some decent healthcare laws, or tax the rich maybe. Pardoning Hunter does nothing for anyone except the Biden family.

    Joe is acknowledging that the justice system sucks and powers that be can decide to fuck you over with it any time, but instead of abusing his power to try and fix it, he’s just bailing out his loved ones and then riding off into the sunset, leaving the rest of us to get fucked over. That’s stupid.


  • I disagree. There is pushing back for political gain, and pushing back for personal gain. Pardoning hunter is certainly an example of Biden abandoning the moral high ground. However it does not advance the cause of the democratic party in any way and only serves Joe Biden and his family personally. This is not a step in the right direction, it gives up moral correctness only to make the political position of the Democrats worse.








  • GOG is getting a nice little pr moment off of this but you’re getting basically the same license, no matter where you buy the game.

    The root of evil in digital distribution is the DMCA anti circumvention clause: it is illegal to circumvent a DRM protection to gain access to some copyrighted work, even if you in actuality possess a license to the work. This law gives big platforms far too much power to control how you interact with their products.

    It should be legal to modify a work to allow it to be played offline, to make copies for archival purposes, to fix the work to run on newer platforms, etc. As long as you have a license to the work you should be allowed to take steps to ensure your rightful access to it.

    By the way, the root beyond roots of evil in digital distribution is the insane length of copyrights themselves. Why are patents 20 years, but copyright extends to 120+? The answer is pure greed.


  • Technically there is no Hi syllable in Japanese either. There is ひ, which phonologically is neither “Hi” nor “Fi”, but somewhere in between. The exact pronunciation varies depending on surrounding sounds, as well as the speaker’s regional accent.

    So I wouldn’t say they really use WiHi. They write WiFi and they say “ワイハイ” which is the closest you can get to WiFi using Japanese sounds. It will kinda sound like WiHi to an English speaker.



  • Microsoft and the European Commission agreed to an initial period of five years. That ended in 2014, and the measure was not extended mainly for two reasons:

    1. Data showed the selection screen had had essentially no effect on browser market share whatsoever.
    2. This period was basically the height of browser competition, with Chrome, Safari, IE, and Firefox all showing significant market share.

    With competition in the browser market seemingly healthy, and the browser ballot not doing much to affect it, it was seen as pointless to keep requiring Microsoft to display it.