The large U.S. carriers have plans that are, I think, $20-30 a month and you get the newest phone as soon as it comes out, apple or Samsung. They also partner with manufacturers for discounts and trade-in deals, especially when a new model comes out. My last phone was 2 years old but when they offered me the newest one for something like $120 after trade-in (I think that was almost $1100 off, I don’t remember all the details) I upgraded everyone on my plan. I think they did the same thing this year but even with those discounts the pain in the ass of upgrading plus the price, even though it’s low, wasn’t worth the small year over year change. Probably next year or the year after. Assuming similar deals, that makes it $40-$60 a year to get a new phone every 2-3 years.

Edit: You do have to stay with the carrier though. If you leave in less than 24 months you have to pay back a prorated part of the discount. Or at least the part that comes from the carrier, I think you keep the enhanced trade-in from the manufacturer.

Even if Tesla somehow managed to de-Elon themselves and address the quality issues, those cars look so dated compared to other EVs that are available and what’s coming soon.

They gave the model 3 a facelift but they really need a major bodystyle update across the whole line. Nothing in the entire line looks much different than the 2009 prototype model S.

They went from being futuristic to boring as fuck.

Edit: Except for the truck, of course. But that’s just something else entirely and I don’t feel like writing an essay.

Regulatory capture, it’s a problem through the government. Decades ago U.S. regulatory agencies were well respected around the world, to the point where if a U.S. body approved something, many other countries automatically followed. Now they’re a joke, taking orders from the industries they are supposed to oversee.

It’s not even just cheapo stuff anymore. They’ve really stepped up their game in the last several years, with ICE and a good range of EVs. I know a few people that have Hyundai EVs, and they all love them.

Their Genesis badge is also legit luxury. I would say they might be the best value in luxury cars right now because they can’t yet command the price the more established brands can.

These aren’t the shitty tin cans from when I was younger. If you’re looking for a new car don’t dismiss KIA/Hyundai/Genesis without checking them out.

I think part of the difficulty discussing this is the discussions usually combine two different things. The production and distribution.

I was informed elsewhere in this thread people can already produce these images/videos on their own machines with no third parties involved or remote processing. I can’t think of a single thing that can be done about that so acceptance is all we’ve got.

Nonconsensual sharing, on the other hand, we can and should do something about. The legal system won’t be able to stop it altogether but it can push it to the fringes and stop it from becoming mainstream so any victims wouldn’t see fake images/videos of themselves proliferating everywhere.

Well…shit. It seems like any new laws are already too little too late then.

Some people can, I wouldn’t even know where to start. And is the photo/video generator completely on home machines without any processing being done remotely already?

I’m thinking about a future where simple tools are available where anyone could just drop in a photo or two and get anything up to a VR porn video.

As soon as anyone can do this on their own machine with no third parties involved all laws and other measures being discussed will be moot.

We can punish nonconsensual sharing but that’s about it.

I didn’t expect to get a laugh out of reading this discussion, thanks.

It’d be a damn shame if everyone started putting pixelfed at the end of every message to both deny threads content and create a Streisand effect.

So it only disrupted the speaker when it detected reggaeton?

So it wasn’t the loud music early in the morning he objected to, he just thought his neighbor had shitty taste.