The USA has yet to kill the UAW which they must do to be competitive. It’s not an end-all be-all solution (wages are only like 30% of the cost of a car), but a good start. It also needs an entirely local battery supply chain, buying from China isn’t an option. And they need to pay for every EV that is manufactured, no matter where it’s sold to.

But the US won’t take it seriously so they’ll never compete for real. Maybe they’ll kill UAW but only to increase shareholder value, not to compete for real.

Volkswagen has made a ton of dumb mistakes, but among the worst are paying union wages and not getting super cheap lithium batteries from being located in a country that has a well integrated supply chain.

We don’t want to mine or refine lithium as much in the EU because “boohoo muh environment” but really, if we want to compete with China we can’t let the environment be a deciding factor. Mine and refine all the resources we need instead of buying them from China and letting them dictate the prices. China doesn’t give a fuck about small issues standing in its way and neither should we.

Plastic oil pans save weight, who even uses metal anymore?

The only time I ever got a hole in an oil pan was a metal one and it was my ex who somehow hit a rock and hid it from me. The one car I had with a plastic pan never had any issues, but it also had a skid plate that makes a larger difference than the material of the oil pan itself, since loose debris would just bounce off. Plus the skid plate helps reduce wind resistance so it’s a necessity in this day and age anyway.

There’s a lot of protectionism going on in China, most western manufacturers aren’t allowed to sell their own cars without a Chinese company owning the majority of the partnership. Most countries don’t really have rules like that, China is kinda unique.

The Chinese actually LOVE big cars. Every other European manufacturer makes long wheelbase versions of their midrange sedans for China exclusively. Space in the back is a status symbol more than comfort up front apparently. And there are a ton of big Chinese crossovers out now. I won’t call them SUVs because they’re not really off road capable, much like most western “SUVs” aren’t these days.

They were only high-end EVs because the EV market was dogshit then. They’ve never competed with high-end cars in general.

Unfortunately it’s a race to the bottom and high-end cars are doing the same Tesla bullshit of a minimalist interior with a huge display instead of physical buttons with heft like they used to.

They pretty much do the same in China. Tesla I believe is or was the only foreign manufacturer allowed to own their Chinese business. Everyone else had to set up a Chinese subsidiary majority owned by a Chinese automaker.

Nothing stopping Xiaomi from doing the same with Ford or GM in the US as far as I know?

iPhones were getting 6-7 years of software support when top of the line Androids got up to 3 and bottom end was getting 1 at most. It took YEARS for Android to catch up on this.

Do you buy bottom of the line Android phones?

No, that would be the assholes who lift their trucks, or perhaps your optometrist. Properly aimed LEDs don’t blind for shit. They blind me less than oldschool projectorless halogens even.

Uhh very, very, very different type of memory. You could try using a microsd card if you’re happy with 10 spf I guess, I prefer measuring in fps though

Organic Maps is also technically committing tax fraud by paying the owners dividends but no salaries. They’re making quite a bit off the donations too. All of which was pocketed.

Maksim is a Russian name, Organic Maps creators are Russian and Belarussian. Could literally be a friend of theirs lol

Time to get some oil on your hands!

Err probably not. But what transmission and what are the issues you’re having? Might be something much simpler than you think

I spent an hour improving my hometown but that’s not where I need a map. I need it in places where I don’t know if it’s right or wrong.

More accurate how? It’s still OSM underneath isn’t it?

The chinese models are getting cheaper now that they have “flash” variants

I’m sure Bernie has good intentions but this is exactly what Altman and Amodei want and why they’re constantly shouting how dangerous AI is.

Any AI startup can then be labeled as developing artificial superintelligence. Not them though, they’re working together with the government.

The term you might want to search for is digital signage but there’s not really a ton of those with OLED because it doesn’t make sense for those usually

Which hash exactly? They don’t have to include your battery percentage if they don’t want it.

If you have an open guest network you can just say you don’t know who it was when your IP has been used for something illegal tho?