Yep
Readit Newsbfmalky commented on Is HN Down in the UK? · Posted by u/curiousgal
Ableton or Lightroom both have some level of support under Wine but it depends on the version you need. But both also have alternatives and IME killer-apps tend to become a lot less important once users have sufficient other motivations. Nothing is really irreplaceable.
I would love to replace Lightroom, but unfortunately the alternatives just aren't as good.
There are good alternatives to Ableton, but once you get to know a DAW it is hard to switch. And running a DAW with an ecosystem of 3rd party VST plugins and low level access to audio hardware on Wine sounds like a recipe for a bad time, but I confess I haven't tried it.
So, yes, these things are possible, but it is still easier to just use Windows.
>3x the cost of a similar spec'ed windows laptop
Man, I'm not so sure about that. The M-series Macbooks are just crazy good for speed and battery life. The basic bottom-tier Macbook is $1000 and will do for a vast majority of people. A $330 Windows laptop is going to be a phenomenal heap of junk. People were running Ableton on 16GB M1 Macbooks a couple of years ago.
Yes, the bottom tier MacBook Air is about £1k, but only comes with a 256gb SSD. You can get a decent windows laptop for about that price with 1tb of storage and 32gb of memory. A similar spec Mac is close to £3k. CPU wise they are all fine for real-time audio, but the extra storage really matters.
Every time this happens, I wonder why people do not just drop Windows entirely.
I can't run Ableton or Lightroom on Linux, and Macs are almost 3x the cost of a similar spec'ed windows laptop.
The apps are quite specific to me, but I imagine there are similar killer apps for other windows users.
bfmalky commented on Tesla deliveries down 43% in Europe while EVs are up 31% electrek.co/2025/03/25/te... · Posted by u/zfg
To me, it's pretty funny. It's like we're being told "hey, don't worry, this is the world's smartest guy, and he's going to, in a heartbeat, examine every dollar of spending and tell us what to cut. And oh yeah, he didn't anticipate that Tesla might be hurt by his actions."
I don't think it is his DOGE antics that are affecting the european sales though, I think it was the Nazi salute. That went down very badly this side of the Atlantic.
To be fair, every commercial competitor (like Rekordbox and Traktor) also supports mapping MIDI devices that are not officially supported.
But in my experience, you'll never be able to control the jogwheel as precisely as in officially-supported hardware-software combo.
In Rekordbox's case Pioneer have restricted the jogwheel mapping to Pioneer hardware only. So, you pretty much need Pioneer hardware to use Rekordbox. And seeing as Pioneer decks are almost industry standard in clubs and you need Rekordbox to organise your playlists, they have the DJ hardware market sewn up. Which is very frustrating because Rekordbox has to be the most resource intensive (& therefore inefficient) DJ software available.
bfmalky commented on Why are UK electricity bills so expensive? climate.benjames.io/uk-el... · Posted by u/chmaynard
The graph shows the price for 3100 kWh. I'm not sure if that is a very low annual amount or a very very high monthly amount.
The average US household uses 10,000 kWh annually ~833 kWh per month. So I'm guessing most Americans reading the article and looking at the interactive graph are thinking either: this is very cheap or very expensive, depending on whether they are assuming it's monthly or annual.
In the US the average price for 3100 kWh in California would be $1062 which is among the highest in the continental US. So right in line with GB.
In New York it would be $710. Florida it would be $454.
So it's high, but not as eye-watering as it seemed to me initially.
That's the annual figure. But just for electricity. Most UK homes are heated with gas, and many have gas stoves, so the average kWh annual gas figure is much higher (~12,000kWh).
bfmalky commented on Why are UK electricity bills so expensive? climate.benjames.io/uk-el... · Posted by u/chmaynard
you have to admit english people have a weird tick when it comes to poverty. you worship poor people. and yes, you guys willingly live like you are poor when you guys are definitely not poor
This is such a weird take. I have no idea where you are getting your ideas from, but I don't know if you've heard of this thing we have in the UK called 'the class system'. Poor people are definitely not worshipped in the UK. And the wealthy do generally like to demonstrate their wealth in the usual ways (cars, homes, holidays, schooling, etc), so I'm wondering where you've got this idea that people in the UK somehow romanticise poverty.
bfmalky commented on Why are UK electricity bills so expensive? climate.benjames.io/uk-el... · Posted by u/chmaynard
I find it so weird that UK citizens have often just sort of passively chosen to be poor. Like they still had food rationing for years after WW2. Is there some sort of cultural blind spot which prevents them from understanding that there are better ways to do things?
What a bizarre thing to say.
I guess there are some examples of self sabotage, such as Brexit, but no, on the whole people in the UK do not choose to be poor. Like any nation we are at the mercy of the outcomes of the decisions of our politicians and larger global effects that are out of our control.
Also, there are plenty of wealthy people in the UK. You do know that right? The UK is still around 6th in the nominal GDP rankings, so not quite an economic basket case (yet).