EnderMB

I'm in the UK, and I work with a LOT of Americans already, so know this first hand:

• You fuckers are always in for a culture shock when you realise that everywhere isn't like London. You seem to either expect London or Harry Potter Land, but when you end up somewhere like Bristol, Leeds, or Birmingham the frame of reference just dies and you see the wheels turning in your head trying to make sense of it all.
• Weirdly, you seem to really like our supermarkets. They're a lot smaller than yours, meal deals are a novelty that never gets old, and paying the price on the tag is the greatest thing ever.
• You love our bread, and our chocolate is like crack to you. You'd think that you'd moved to France or something...
• Butter on bread will fuck you up. You use Mayo all the time, but we use butter/spread, and it messes with your minds.
• You quickly learn that Europe is a continent, and that cultures across the continent are very different to one another. You also learn that no one knows US history that well, or that we had a war with you (since we have basically had a war with everyone at some point).
• The drinking culture is a really interesting one. Some love it, some hate it. It's a staple of British life
• We get paid a lot less than you do, but your money will go much further because you're not spending it on healthcare. You'll also get taxed a lot, but ultimately you'll earn enough to be comfortable, and a comfortable life in the UK is nice.

To answer your question, you're more than welcome here, and it's much easier to get a visa to the UK for you than for us to go to the US. Expect some people to give you shit for Trump, but give them shit back for Brexit and electing the Tories for 15 years.

It absolutely fucking BAFFLES me that Brooks' Law isn't known by every software manager on the planet.

I've quoted it so many times at work, even in engineering focused teams in at least two big tech companies. It's not a concrete fact, but it explains why so many teams are hilariously shit at delivering software.

Yeah, the person above isn't being accurate at all.

While here in the UK we rely heavily on the US for control of Trident, the US dropping NATO support would just require additional defence spending and closer alignment with Europe. If Trump is bought by Russia, Putin would see this as a Very Bad Thing, and would want to keep the US in the fold because even with the US NATO would likely steamroll Russia.

The Trump dynamic is somewhat problematic, should it fester elsewhere in Europe. Globalisation was an important trait to maintain for the US, whereas most populist movements move towards buying local or supporting national interests above all else. Europe is largely self-sufficient, even in defence, so Trump would probably cut off huge numbers of imports/exports just to prop up Elon's shitty cars.

I say this as someone in big tech, AI is pushed because it's an easy lie to keep big companies viewed as innovating to shareholders. I say this knowing that Google, Microsoft, Apple, and Amazon have contributed significantly to AI research in the last few years alongside the obvious contributions of OpenAI - the goal isn't groundbreaking AI work, but to act as a smoke-screen to show that nothing else has been delivered.

Google has lost ground in advertising, and is losing customers on many of their services. Amazon is losing ground in cloud computing and in retail. Apple has stagnated with recent poor releases. Microsoft has made ground in cloud, but has struggled in advertising, Xbox, Office, and Windows. They use GenAI to keep their stock price high, otherwise they'd drop like a sack of shit because shareholders would say "what the fuck have you even done in the last half a decade?"

It's quite simple, and aligns with why he got in in the first place.

The economy and cost of living is still in the toilet. Trump is a protest vote because competent public servants have failed to even acknowledge that everything costs 2-3x what it did a decade ago. Sad to say, but most people don't give a fuck about LGBTQIA+ rights, Israel, Ukraine, or anything outside of this.

Call it apathy if you want, but it's ultimately a failure of moderates to acknowledge a better social net for people (I.e. left policies) or propping an economy by improving lives for regular people so their money goes further.

I imagine a lot of it is to remove current stock, and because the UK has several tobacco companies that moved into vapes, and also employ hundreds

Gigs and concerts are pretty grim for this now too.

Source: I was a mod on /r/soccer for a while.

You won't win this "battle", no matter what you do. Being a mod is a thankless job, and you'll piss people off regardless of which side you take. The only thing you can do is be fair and balanced. List your rules out, enforce mostly to the rules, but add common sense, and regularly check in with the community to get feedback.

I got into cooking during lockdown, and have managed to get surprisingly good at it, to the point where if you asked me to make a meal of your choosing I could probably make it without looking up a recipe. It's actually unbelievably simple to make even complex stuff, basically using all the same rules you apply at work:

• Use the right tools for the job
• Plan it out first, do your prep and the actual work is simple
• A simple dish will take much longer than you think
• RTFM. Many sauces and dishes from classic cooking are basically a mixture of a small handful of base ingredients/techniques, and they've been written down for decades.
• Once you have the basics down, you can basically make it up as you go. You'll make amazing meals, and you'll never be able to replicate it again because you eyeballed it or cooked it in a way that made sense at the time. You say you'll document it well, but deep down, you know you won't.
• Nothing is original, everything is stolen. Adapt recipes you see, look at ingredients of sauces and sachets you buy/use, etc.
• You can be a solid hobbyist, but against a pro that does this shit all day every day, you don't know a fucking thing. You're also probably not going to replicate what they can do in a professional setting while at home unless you've got money.

I have a hard time taking some of the advice here seriously, especially around there being some kind of conspiracy where the police are right-wing and full of fascists - but let's take it at face value

Instead of law enforcement, go to a lawyer and ask them to help, stating that you feel that you cannot go to the police. Any law firm worth their salt would ensure that you are represented, or that you're represented by someone from your district that will protect you. They will also keep an eye on adequate law enforcement to ensure they actually protect you, and don't just farm you back to relatives. At the very least, they can give you enough protection to ensure that your relatives in the south can contact you and take you in if needed.

On the American Dad theory, there is a long-running theory that Roger's ultimate goal is to replace all of humanity. The start of the show is just him, and then "learning" to put on disguises, but he's become more and more people over time, to the point where it is hard for almost everyone (except the Smiths, who he trusts) to know it is him.

It isn't inconsequential, but an interesting theory on whether the finale of American Dad will either be finding out that Roger IS everyone, or if Stan saving Roger actually saved humanity by allowing Roger to see humanity.

The problem with these fundamental rulings is that they're largely trying to fit square objects through round holes. When a simple ruling is made to essentially say "to current law, no", the law itself ultimately becomes meaningless, because older games couldn't be easier to pirate. Most of them are smaller than a TikTok video, and are so cheap/easy to host that you'll never stop them from being shared. Hell, emulation has come so far that you can effectively emulate these games on a browser, on multiple devices, even devices that don't natively support gaming.

The smart thing to do would be to say that maybe the legal framework that embodies retro gaming needs to be researched and heavily considered. It's a hard task that'll require many lawyers, many fights, and lots of lobbying to ensure the word of law is worth something. Sadly, it's easier to say "lol no" and to essentially just promote piracy.