bittercynic (u/bittercynic)

bittercynic commented on Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices theguardian.com/us-news/2... · Posted by u/bookofjoe

CommenterPerson · 10 days ago

I shop at Walmart and Costco. The customers at the Costco appear much better off, but they seem much more arrogant and inconsiderate. They leave carts in the middle of the aisle, talk on phones with their families blocking the way, and so forth. Same behavior in the parking lots. Maybe it's because Costco is always packed. The shoppers at the Walmart definitely look less well off. They are much more respectful and considerate of others. I like shopping at the Walmart more.

bittercynic · 9 days ago

The shoppers at costco vary drastically by location. If you have more than one warehouse reasonably close by, it may be worth your while to try them all.

bittercynic commented on Dollar-stores overcharge customers while promising low prices theguardian.com/us-news/2... · Posted by u/bookofjoe

qeternity · 10 days ago

It would help people to consider your point if you made even a modest attempt to explain and justify what you mean.

bittercynic · 10 days ago

Dollar General and their ilk are behemoths compared to the shops that might have served these areas before they rolled in. It's possible they're the only game in town because they engaged in dumping or other dirty/illegal tactics to drive out established businesses.

I'm not an expert on the topic, but I don't think it's a reach to think that they might have engineered this situation.

bittercynic commented on All praise to the lunch ladies bittersoutherner.com/issu... · Posted by u/gmays

dpark · a month ago

The quality of food is probably extremely variable across schools even in the same general region. I’ve seen some pictures of really appealing lunches plucked from European schools. But how many different schools are there in Europe?

bittercynic · a month ago

Absolutely. I work at a school where the food is OK, but just, and the school across the street has very good food. One of our students used to sneak into the other school in the mornings for breakfast. He made the mistake of bringing the food back to our school where people asked questions, and pretty soon the other school knew he wasn't their student and banned him.

Something seems really off to me about different kids within a couple hundred feet of each other getting drastically different quality of food.

bittercynic commented on Life After Work mechanize.work/blog/life-... · Posted by u/colesantiago

constantcrying · 2 months ago

There is a very stark discrepancy here. In online spheres Utopianism rises as a popular idea, describing a near future of complete abundance. At the same, in reality, people around me are noticably worse off, they can afford less, products and services degrade in quality and social bonds are deteriorating.

I can only believe that the former is a psychological reaction to the later.

bittercynic · 2 months ago

There are some extra weird things going on, though. Many people are simultaneously getting poorer by economic/financial stability, and have less access to medical care and safe housing, but at the same time enjoying more luxurious vehicles than ever and ordering door dash multiple times per week.

I'm not criticizing people in that situation. Many people close to me wouldn't have a chance no matter how thrifty they were.

This is not some "revealed preferences" situation either. Something very harmful is happening, and it's not easy to see exactly what it is or why it's happening, though I suspect increasing wealth inequality plays a big part.

bittercynic commented on Boring is what we wanted 512pixels.net/2025/10/bor... · Posted by u/Amorymeltzer

pavlov · 2 months ago

Windows 7 is sixteen years old. There are full x86 emulators available. Seems like a niche pursuit.

bittercynic · 2 months ago

I have an old card printer that I only use occasionally, and firing up a windows 7 virtual machine is (was?) the most convenient way to do it. I think it's not so uncommon to have old devices around that don't work with newer versions of windows.

bittercynic commented on Boring is what we wanted 512pixels.net/2025/10/bor... · Posted by u/Amorymeltzer

bittercynic · 2 months ago

They say no downside, but if you need to run windows 7 in virtualbox, you still need an intel mac (or other non-arm computer).

bittercynic commented on Life next to 199 data centres bbc.com/news/articles/c93... · Posted by u/easton

guywithahat · 2 months ago

Well noise drops off following an inverse square law, so possibly everyone. Moving down just a couple houses can significantly cut down on noise pollution.

bittercynic · 2 months ago

The direction of wind and shape of terrain has a huge effect on noise, too. If a noise source is down wind of you the gradient in wind speed wrt elevation effectively makes the noise curve upwards, and even very loud things can sometimes be inaudible at ground level.

bittercynic commented on Amazon strategised about keeping water use secret source-material.org/amazo... · Posted by u/chhum

rcpt · 2 months ago

Hopefully we will emerge from this with a legislative framework that says "fuck your view"

bittercynic · 2 months ago

I appreciate that my view isn't the only consideration for that kind of decision, but when a new building goes up much larger than anything else in the area, and affects the skyline for thousands of people, I think that should be one of the considerations.

bittercynic commented on Amazon strategised about keeping water use secret source-material.org/amazo... · Posted by u/chhum

nzach · 2 months ago

I find it really odd this recent push for discussions around the development of new datacenters.

There is a plan for constructing a new high-capacity datacenter [edit: near my city]. And a lot of discussions in the media are done through an emotional tone around water and electricity usage.

The media generally frames it as if installing a new datacenter would put the neighbors in risk of not having water or electricity. I'm not arguing that a datacenter doesn't bring any problems, everything has pros and cons.

Both sides seems to be using bad faith/misleading arguments, and I thinks that's really bad because we end up with solutions and agreements that don't improve the lives of the people affected by these new developments.

bittercynic · 2 months ago

One went in 1/4 mile from my home a couple years ago. I ignored the notices of development because I thought it was far enough that it wouldn't affect me, but it blocks the view of the mountains that I used to enjoy, and sometimes I can hear noise from its cooling system (I assume).

I wish I'd known what was coming, and gone to the meetings to oppose it.

bittercynic commented on Replacement.ai replacement.ai... · Posted by u/wh313

didibus · 2 months ago

> Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.

-- Frank Herbert, Dune

The "government" is just the set of people who hold power over others.

Those who will own machines that can match humans will have unprecedented power over others. In effect they'll grow more and more to be the government.

Even now, companies hold more and more of the power over others and are more part of the government than ever before.

So it confuses me when you say it's what the government is for? Who would that be? If we pretend it would still be a democracy then I guess you're saying it's everyone's problem?

So here we are, let's discuss the solution and vote for it?

bittercynic · 2 months ago

>The "government" is just the set of people who hold power over others.

Often, yes, but in a more functional society it would be the mechanism we collectively use to prevent a few people from amassing excessive wealth and power.