https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/intelligence-agencies-sus...
https://www.theverge.com/news/847891/a-starlink-satellite-se...
This is why many newer hotels choose to sliding doors, which barely take up any space, or just remove doors entirely.
[0] For a door of r=3 feet, A door swings a minimum of 90 degrees, which takes 3.14 * 3*2 / 4 = 7.065 sq feet at a minimum to 14.1 sq feet to operate.
And when you view what Apple is doing from their long-term vision of the iPhone becoming a transparent piece of glass, it starts making sense.
And for what?
> Apple designers eventually hope to remove most of the external ports and buttons on the iPhone, including the charger, according to people familiar with the company’s work. During the development of the iPhone X, Apple weighed removing the wired charging system entirely. That wasn’t feasible at the time because wireless charging was still slower than traditional methods. [0]
Actual rumors include a prototype of said phone making rounds around the office.
And again, Mark Gurman from 2025:
> "But all of these changes were supposed to be just the tip of the iceberg: Apple had originally hoped to get ever more ambitious with this model... An even bigger idea was to make the Air device Apple’s first completely port-free iPhone. That would mean losing the USB-C connector and going all-in on wireless charging and syncing data with the cloud."
> "But Apple ultimately decided not to adopt a port-free design with the new iPhone, which will still have a USB-C connector. One major reason: There were concerns that removing USB-C would upset European Union regulators, who mandated the iPhone switch to USB-C and are scrutinizing the company’s business practices." [1]
[0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-21/why-apple...
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-03-16/apple-...
The GP is suggesting that Apple was more than happy to have this mandate. I tend to agree: they wanted to switch the iPhone to USB-C anyway, but there’s always people who are going to be upset that their Lightning accessories no longer work or need an adapter. But this way they can say that the EU forced their hand. They get what they wanted all along, but they also get a scapegoat who can take the blame for the remaining downsides.
EU regulation stopped this from happening, and now once they added USB-C it's difficult to take this feature away. I predict we'll be stuck with the USB-C port and form factor on most phones for the next decade.
Docker has security issues if you're not careful, and it's frankly kind of a shitshow out of the box with defaults. Maybe that's part of the reason. But I struggle to see how a bespoke solution like this is the right answer.
There's also the security angle. Containers managed by Proxmox are strongly isolated from the host, but containers running on Docker sidestep this isolation model. Docker is not insecure by design, but it greatly increases the attack surface. If the hypervisor gets compromised, the entire cluster of servers will also get compromised. In general, as little software as possible should be installed on the host.
The US payment networks are also incredibly robust with some fantastical operational guarantees. I cannot recall the last time I couldn't get an online authorization at a merchant terminal. There are rooms of people monitoring these things like a hawk 24/7/365. Imagine being called by your ISP proactively when they detect >.01% packet loss on your line. That was my job for an entire year. Calling banks on the phone in the middle of the night because we think there might be an issue before there actually is an issue. Statistically speaking, this is one of the most certain things in the life of a typical American. Visa alone processes a quarter trillion (10^12) transactions per year. We've got a lot of samples that say the system works really well and might be worth the cost.
You can point to regulation and artificial moats for prohibiting competition, but it's genuinely a difficult problem to solve, even if you can do it purely digital. Trust is the most challenging element. I think moving cash, checks and other paper around is easier in a lot of ways.