Futurology Today

Lenovo or ASUS? Trying to figure out which laptop to go with.

Which company has a better reputation (in quality, privacy, pricing...), or are they both bad?

EDIT: Please see https://lemmy.world/post/39088746, I have come the the conclusion that both Lenovo and ASUS are extremely terrible, anyone who sees this post should go straight to framework laptop

• Then I did a stint as managing editor of "Vague" before retiring.
• Oh, "Vogue", I mean, that's a big deal.
• No no. "Vague" magazine. Different publication.
• Ah. What's that one about?
• (shrugs) This and that.

This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/steamdeals by /u/otherside9 on 2025-11-21 22:17:30+00:00.

This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/steamdeals by /u/larry4lyf on 2025-11-21 13:41:55+00:00.

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/5735486

This is an opinionated piece by Andrew Latham, professor of international relations at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minn., a senior fellow at the Institute for Peace and Diplomacy and a non-resident fellow at Defense Priorities in Washington.

Addition to insert the official statement by the Canadian government: Security and defence partnership between the European Union and Canada

Archived link

...

Canada and the European Union have signed a new Security and Defence Partnership focused on cyber defense, maritime security, hybrid threats and industrial resilience. It may sound like bureaucratic routine, but in fact it represents the next step in the evolution of Canada’s grand strategy: a consolidation of its northern vocation as an Arctic and North Atlantic power.

For years, Ottawa’s strategic posture has been scattered — globalist rhetoric masking an absence of focus. That era is ending. With this agreement, Canada is beginning to align its diplomatic and defense priorities with the geography that truly defines its security: the northern approaches.

...

The partnership builds on decades of cooperation but carries new strategic weight in a world of revived spheres of influence. As Russia militarizes the High North and China pushes Arctic shipping and data routes, Canada and Europe are binding together their defenses of the North Atlantic and Arctic seas.

The focus on cyber resilience and hybrid threats echoes the growing anxiety about undersea cables, satellite networks and energy infrastructure — the connective tissue of modern power that is increasingly vulnerable to disruption.

...

The industrial side of the partnership deserves more attention than it has received. The joint declaration calls for stronger supply-chain integration, cybersecurity cooperation and joint production in key sectors such as munitions and aerospace. This is not just about trade; it is about strategic endurance.

The U.S. is straining to supply both Ukraine and its Indo-Pacific posture. Europe is rearming but remains dependent on fragmented supply lines. Canada’s integration with Europe’s industrial base offers a way to build redundancy into the alliance — to strengthen the defense-industrial fabric that keeps deterrence credible in a protracted contest of attrition.

...

Canada’s partnership with the EU is an act of adaptation, not defection — a recognition that the Arctic and the North Atlantic are now central theaters of global power, and that securing them is both Canada’s duty and opportunity.

Seen through this lens, Ottawa’s strategic posture begins to look more coherent. The same logic that drove its focus on undersea cable protection, Arctic over-the-horizon radar and modernized continental defense now extends outward into transatlantic collaboration. Canada is not turning away from the United States but is reinforcing the northern shield that protects both continents.

...

I've seen a lot of statements made all over the internet and in how-to guides in weekly newspapers and the like, on how to best deal with cast iron skillets..

So here's my own, the large Griswold skillet and the smaller, unknown make, egg pan came from my grandparents - they cooked for decades on them and in fact the egg pan is one of the "old" pieces my grandmother got from HER grandmother.

They were cleaned with a stainless steel scouring pads for as long as I can remember, and we're talking early 1970's. I use stainless steel Chore Boys on them. The mid-sized Griswold saucier pan, is one I found at a yard sale some 30 years ago.. It was black with the baked-on acrylamides and it's almost finally scrubbed clean of all that nasty black gunk.

It's kind of the reason why I'm not that famous on Lodge pans - they've got that texture to them that catches the baked on seasoning and it's hard to get super clean.

I season - just wash, dry and wipe with coconut oil and bake for 45 minutes or so at 350 degrees, every 6 months.

I store them in my oven proper, with a light coat of coconut oil on them. All three are close to mirror smooth from being steel polished for decades and with a light amount of cooking oil (usually coconut) seldom does food stick.

Russia is likely to test NATO’s collective defense pledge very soon, Sweden’s top military official said, as Moscow escalates its campaign of hybrid attacks against Europe.

“I'm sure and I'm convinced that they would be ready to test Article 5 of NATO at any point in the Baltic states or in some other part of Europe as well,” Swedish Chief of Defense Gen. Michael Claesson told POLITICO, referring to the alliance's common defense provision.

“They are prepared to take enormous strategic risks to gain whatever they see possible to gain,” he added, pointing to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s past military campaigns. “We have seen it since Chechnya, we have seen it in Georgia, we have seen it in Crimea.”

A Grays Harbor County resident died Friday after earlier testing positive for a type of bird flu never before detected in humans, state health officials reported.

The death was the second from bird flu recorded in the U.S. since 2022. It was also the first human case in the state this year — and the first in the country in at least eight months.

The University of Washington virology lab revealed this month the virus is H5N5, a variant previously reported in animals but not in humans.

The risk to the public remains low, according to state health officials. No other people have tested positive, and monitoring of those who were in close contact with the patient continues.

Bird flu rarely infects people and makes them sick. When it does, symptoms are typically mild, health officials said. Most cases in people have occurred after they exposure to sick or infected animals. No person-to-person transmission has been documented in the U.S.

The Washington resident, an older adult with underlying health conditions, was hospitalized in early November with a high fever, confusion and respiratory distress, health officials have said. They were treated at a King County hospital. Other details about the patient were not disclosed.

The patient had a mixed backyard flock of domestic poultry that was exposed to wild birds, and was likely exposed to the virus through domestic or wild birds, health officials said.

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/6819666

"From the perspective of an immigrant from a Muslim-majority country, this story sends a troubling message: the message is that simply escaping war should be enough reason to be grateful.”

Feel free to comment on it!

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.today/post/42210452

A Grays Harbor County resident died Friday after earlier testing positive for a type of bird flu never before detected in humans, state health officials reported.

The death was the second from bird flu recorded in the U.S. since 2022. It was also the first human case in the state this year — and the first in the country in at least eight months.

The University of Washington virology lab revealed this month the virus is H5N5, a variant previously reported in animals but not in humans.

The risk to the public remains low, according to state health officials. No other people have tested positive, and monitoring of those who were in close contact with the patient continues.

Bird flu rarely infects people and makes them sick. When it does, symptoms are typically mild, health officials said. Most cases in people have occurred after they exposure to sick or infected animals. No person-to-person transmission has been documented in the U.S.

The Washington resident, an older adult with underlying health conditions, was hospitalized in early November with a high fever, confusion and respiratory distress, health officials have said. They were treated at a King County hospital. Other details about the patient were not disclosed.

The patient had a mixed backyard flock of domestic poultry that was exposed to wild birds, and was likely exposed to the virus through domestic or wild birds, health officials said.

Based on my understanding (which isn't much, please mention any additional things I missed) Marx believed that the "proletariat" (the workers) were being abused by the "bourgeois" (the owners) in the capitalist system, and that the proletariat should seize control of the state and the means of production ("dictatorship of the proletariat"), and that the end goal was a stateless, classless society where everyone was equal, and that the state would "wither away".

As we all know, a perfect communist society was never achieved, and that the state never ended up withering away for any of them.

How would Marx react to the Soviet Union under Stalin and his purges, Khrushchev to his denouncing of Stalinism and brutal crushings of protests in the Warsaw Pact states, to Gorbachev and his "glasnost and perestroika" reforms?

How would Marx react to the communist states that took power in Latin America, Africa, and Asia? Would he be happy that a communist state was able to compete with the capitalist U.S. in terms of global dominance, twice (Soviet Union during the Cold War, PRC in the modern day)?

Note: I am neither procommunist or anticommunist. I think that some if Marx's ideas were quite good (everyone should be equal, classless society, etc.) but others not so much (history tells us what happens when there is a "dictatorship of the proletariat", the state never withers away like Marx imagines it would, as power corrupts all)

The end of expanded subsidies for the Affordable Care Act exchanges means more people will go without health insurance, workers, doctors, and researchers said.

Open enrollment is under way for 2026 insurance coverage, and millions of Americans are facing extreme sticker shock thanks to the end of expanded Affordable Care Act subsidies, which capped Obamacare premiums for a “benchmark” insurance plan at 8.5 percent of income. Twenty-two million people relied on that funding, at a cost of about $35 billion annually.

With the expanded subsidies set to expire at the end of the year, reverting back to a less generous subsidy level last in place in 2021, patients around the country are facing premium increases that are so extreme, they’re either reducing health insurance coverage or dropping it altogether. Some are facing price hikes many multiples higher than they paid last year; those whose costs only doubled told the Prospect they considered themselves lucky by comparison.

Good video that goes over the Ukraine counter offensive

archive.is link

Memes are getting a reboot. Not like a Marvel-is-trying-to-make-Fantastic Four-happen-again reboot. More like a rewind. The Great Meme Reset of 2026, as it’s being called on TikTok, demands that on January 1 all memes revert to their 2010s glory days. Bland “brain rot” and AI-looking memes are out; Big Chungus is in.

As with anything on the internet, the origin of the Great Meme Reset is hard to place. Most sources point to a March post from TikTok user @joebro909 that called for a whole new generation of memes to save the platform from the “drought” that had engulfed it in the spring. The post said nothing of a January 1 launch date, or a return to the memes of the last decade, but the idea was planted. Now hundreds of posts are discussing the reboot—and a return to the internet’s “dank” era.

Which implies, of course, that memes lack dankness these days. If anything, Gen Z– and Gen Alpha–fueled internet culture has prided itself on somewhat meaningless content like “6 7” and absurdist, seemingly AI-generated “Italian brain rots,” but after nearly a year of memes with little humanity or depth, a backlash has begun.