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Joined 11 months ago
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Cake day: August 16th, 2023

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  • Disclaimer: IANAL

    Contracts in perpetuity don’t hold up, especially since this isn’t even a contract. They always expire at some point, unless renewed.

    A claim of false advertising could hold up, but again that’s a promise not held in a contract.

    Finally, it looks like that marketing campaign was over 7 years ago. No court would ever hold them to business plans from that long ago. They have to provide adequate notice for any changes (often 30 days), but they can certainly discontinue a program.




  • “Let’s imagine: It’s time to elect a world leader, and your vote counts. Which would you choose:

    “Candidate A: Associates with ward healers and consults with astrologists; has had two mistresses; chain-smokes and drinks eight to ten martinis a day.

    “Candidate B: Was kicked out of office twice; sleeps until noon; used opium in college; drinks a quart of brandy every evening.

    “Candidate C: Is a decorated war hero, a vegetarian, doesn’t smoke, drinks an occasional beer, and has had no illicit love affairs.

    “Which of these candidates is your choice? You don’t really need any more information, do you? Candidate A is Franklin Roosevelt. Candidate B is Winston Churchill. Candidate C is Adolf Hitler.”

    Biased and selective comparisons can prove anything.



  • You have to keep in mind the scenarios where it will be used. While truly fast charging does exist today (20 minutes or so for 80% charge), that is not widespread, nor is that the way it’s typically done. Level 3 (DC fast charging) is expensive (moreso than gas), potentially detrimental to the battery, and still usually not very fast (an hour at least). As such, you aren’t going to charge at your local gas station the same way you get a fill up today.

    Most people use a level 2 charger, either at home or at work. This means it can sit for 8 hours to refuel. Many parking garages have this as well. Level 2 chargers deliver AC directly to the vehicle, meaning you don’t need a lot of infrastructure- just a 240v line and a billing system. This in turn means it’s cheap and relatively easy to install. Sometimes you’ll see these outside of Starbucks or a grocery store, but not especially often. You’ll get ~25 miles of range per hour charging using level 2. But even if you spend 2 hours drinking coffee, or buying groceries, you’ve only added 50 miles of range.

    This is where level 3 comes in. It requires some pretty significant equipment (which is part of why they’re always broken), because it has to convert AC into high voltage DC. It also has to chill the cables internally, otherwise they’d quickly overheat from the electricity passing through. But this takes up space that’s probably not really available in the lot.

    I am seeing fast chargers now being installed at travel centers/truck stops along major highways. It fits in nicely with regular stops on a road trip for food. I’m also seeing them being installed at most Walmarts, since that’s perfect for grocery shopping.

    Around here, that last group has been from Electrify America, which does NOT require an app. They have a standard credit card reader.





  • Licensing and activation are separate, and only loosely related. If you are at anything resembling a large org, they don’t even use the HWID or OEM key- they will be using an internal KMS server.

    It really sounds like you have way more permissions than you should have on a work device. You should’ve hit a wall even attempting to install Win11 (I can confirm that my work blocks this very effectively). I also question why you would want to do that at all. I’m also not sure you needed to do anything to activate- I believe 10 and 11 use the exact same HWID/keys/etc



  • Your description isn’t very clear on what exactly you have, or what you need.

    It sounds like you have wired NICs in both server and laptop, which will be physically close to each other, but your only connection to the Internet will be WiFi that you don’t control. How accurate is that?

    Next question is how do you want them to connect to each other? You can do a P2P wired connection, which is more complicated but fully isolates your traffic. It also means that, unless each device has a separate connection and an appropriate routing config, it won’t be online to the Internet (unless you set up some form of connection sharing). You can also connect them to a router that has no Internet. Simpler than the above, but the same limitations.

    You could easily and cheaply get a USB Wi-Fi NIC. The major downside is that all traffic will be going across the wireless connection, both ways. This makes it slow and unreliable.

    You can also connect them to a modified router configured as a wireless bridge. DD-WRT and others can be configured in a different way than usual. The wireless router will provide wired LAN ports to your local network, but then use the wireless connection to connect to an upstream WiFi.

    None of this has anything to do with Linux, BTW. Once you choose a path, you should be able to implement it in whatever OS (or multiple OSes) you would like. None of it is new or special. You might get more options if you post in the Homelab, Data Hoarder, or Self Hosted communities.




  • Unless you’re on a self-hosted VPN (defeating the whole purpose), it’s not especially hard to identify VPN connections. All of the common ones are known, and many use IP ranges and reverse lookups that clearly identify the VPN/seedbox provider.

    It’s a bit harder when you are connected to one that resolves to a residential-looking hostname. But again, unless it’s truly unique (defeating the purpose), simply sorting users by IP will reveal almost all of them.

    Some trackers used to do this to weed out people with multiple accounts. Some of the big ones still actively detect and block (or punish) anyone connecting to their website with a VPN (torrent traffic is still generally allowed, though)




  • TorrentLeech has open registration several times per year. Keep an eye on Opentrackers.org for any of these. Note that some are open, while others are open application. The latter means you must meet certain criteria to be accepted. Typically this is proof of your stats on other trackers, but sometimes it’s exclusively for refugees from one that failed.

    Keep in mind that you will not ever find open registrations on an established, reputable tracker. They don’t need more users. They only recruit from lesser, more accessible trackers. You will need to start on these to establish yourself. There are plenty of guides on this, with most starting on RED or MAM.

    If you aren’t on any of these, it’s not because they’re too hard to get into- it’s because you don’t want to put in the effort. Which is exactly what private trackers want to avoid.

    Also, smaller doesn’t always mean bad. TorrentDB was a rising star, with regular open invites, right up until its collapse. Even the giants like PTP started from nothing. Getting in early is a perfectly viable strategy, especially if you help grow it.


  • What legal reason(s) do you have for needing to see their appearance when making a decision on whether to hire them? You may have some, such as requiring a professional appearance. These need to be spelled out in the job requirements. It also opens the doors to claims of illegal discrimination, since this will be on full display. In the US, that includes race, age, and gender. Having a required video can also reveal protected classes like familial status and religion, depending on what’s in the background.

    Whether an action is “Legal” is almost always dependent on context, and the lawyers/courts involved. A common tactic by racist nightclubs is to set a dress code, particularly on shoes. The argument is they aren’t refusing entry based on race, but on clothing. But the unauthorized shoes are the ones commonly worn by people of the race they’re discriminating against. Different courts have made different rulings on whether this (and similar actions) constitute racial discrimination.