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> The motorcyclist fell to the ground to the left side of the Waymo, then another car tried to pass the Waymo and struck the motorcyclist, killing them. That other driver fled the scene.

I wonder if they ever caught that guy?


She turned herself in (After the police went to her home and she wasn't there)

> So would banning alcohol.

As in a full on country wide prohibition? Whatever amount of road deaths that would prevent would be offset by idiots dying via drinking industrial spirits.


Last time we had a national alcohol ban, it sparked an entire car racing industry.

Of course they do, an 8 bit PC rigged up to an old Nintendo Duck Hunt sensor would drive more safely than some of the morons in my neighborhood. I've ceased to be annoyed at them, and instead just shrug at the idiocy.

Good for them!

Has nine children, lives on a halting site. There is a name for folks like that.

What is it?

There's a lot of that with this guy... His comment about requiring a low power environment so he discards all laptop power bricks. Dude, unless you're powering things off a hand cranked dynamo a few laptops are not going to melt your fuse board.

My guess is that the "why" is largely just showing off, coupled with oddness.


That's actually a valid choice in an extremely watt-hour per day (or week, or month) constrained environment. Like a relatively small to mid sized sailboat crossing a whole ocean. If you have very limited solar power, for instance, and you have critical instruments/radios and stuff to power.

If you have a "house power" 12V battery bank, and a regular laptop which expects 110-240VAC input, 19VDC output (example, random Dell) power brick which is being fed from a small true sine wave inverter, like 12VDC-to-120VAC, you're losing energy to heat and the DC to AC conversion process.

You're converting DC to AC and then the laptop is converting that back into DC. Ideally you do something like wire up a small inline fuse and a tiny meanwell DC-DC converter that can take 12VDC input and output 19VDC natively.

He has basically replicated on a limited budget and in a very small space on land a setup that is not that different than economically built DC power systems are done on boats.


His logic is correct though. The native power of his grid is 12V. He has a 20V step-up circuit and an inverter. 12V -> Inverter -> 12V is only good for UPS. He can directly setup USB-PD up to 9V from the 12V circuit or full 12V PD from the 20V one.

Also, I believe he hoards the power bricks as he notes.

What he does is not ideal, and I don't share the same view with him, but I understand what he does.


It is odd but also fascinating. If he likes it that way then all the power to him. He's not exactly trying to convince others to do the same.

> If he likes it that way then all the power to him.

Except the literal power, apparently!


The Russians at it again no doubt. The dastards.


I think it stopped once public bathrooms became used for things other than taking a whizz


Yeah you have to actually hire people to clean them and patrol for homeless weirdos. Which is why in my country they cost money.

I never really understood the economics of public restrooms in America. Who pays for them?


We thought it was mean to homeless people to make them pay for bathrooms and made it illegal to charge. Then once bathrooms because a massive cost center, we closed all the public restrooms and made it a sex offense to piss outside. So now instead of making homeless people pay $1 for a toilet, we throw them in jail at a cost of $100k/yr.

Thank these folks: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_to_End_Pay_Toilets_i... - the road to hell is paved with good intentions I suppose.


Having lived in SF, LA and NYC, I find it very hard to believe that the homeless or the addicts roaming the streets in big cities are being thrown into jail for much of anything short of overt violent behavior. You can see people drop a deuce in the middle of Mission St any day of the week and nobody bats an eye. As people say, "it's just a normal part of life in a big city".


We're not throwing the homeless in jail here, but all the streets smell like urine and you have to watch your step on the sidewalk.


A few years ago I visited downtown SF for a convention at Moscone center. I remember walking along St Patrick’s thinking this is a beautiful place but , my God, the entire area stinks of urine.


Public urination is not a sex offence, it's a misdemeanor.

You don't get arrested for public urination. You get a citation, if you are drunk they might haul you to the jail for public intoxication, but you are out when you sober up.

As long as you don't pee near a school and what not you should be fine.


Where are we throwing homeless people in jail for pissing outside?


> Who pays for them?

Americans. The same population as most of the beneficiaries.


The public pays for them via taxes.


> I never really understood the economics of public restrooms in America. Who pays for them?

Local sales, income, and/or property taxes.

Municipalities, counties, state, and the federal government all have the power of taxation in the US.


The problem with homeless is also what do you do with them when you find them?


Several bathrooms at the openings to hiking trails near me had been smeared with feces. The local newspaper reported someone was caught and taken to a homeless shelter. I remain suspicious that simply resulted in the shelter's bathroom meeting the same fate.


We all pay for it. We do this whether publicly-accessible restrooms exist or do not exist.

Everybody poops; shit happens. The only real question is: Where does this shit happen?


I don't think I've seen a public bathroom in America in my lifetime. They're all privately owned, usually required through regulation.

But to answer your question, public things are paid for by the public.


Never been to a public park with a bathroom, or a state provided highway rest stop?

Many transit centers are owned and operated by a municipal transit agency and typically have restrooms, especially large airports and train stations.


Public parks and transit centers make sense. I was thinking more in urban areas, not large public land. For example, if I was in a town and needed to go to the bathroom, usually the only option is hoping a business will let you use their restroom.


We've got a ton of actually-public restrooms in my neck of the woods (in Ohio).

Public rest areas are pretty common along major highways and these include restrooms.

Publicly-owned parks usually provide a place to poop, too: Sometimes it's an installation with composting toilets, sometimes it's just a seat over a septic pit that needs pumped out periodically. Sometimes, it's fancy with flushing toilets and sinks for handwashing. Other times, it's just a rented portajohn (that may be full of spiders and smell like death, or be very tidy). And sometimes, they're locked at night when the park is closed. But -- usually -- public parks of any substance offer something for facilities.

Just last week, I worked next to a public park in a very small town (population ~2,000) with some well-maintained basketball and tennis courts. There were a couple of portajohns present. (I did not investigate them further.)

And when there's a major events that draw crowds, like our very public fireworks displays in downtown areas: Temporary restroom facilities are provided.

What we don't have very much of here are permanent, literal-public restrooms in the denser parts of cities. That is very problematic, but it is slowly improving[1].

[1]: https://downtownservices.org/news-article/three-public-restr...


> I don't think I've seen a public bathroom in America in my lifetime.

You've never been to the beach, a city park (or state or national park), a highway rest stop, or any of the thousands of other places public restrooms exist?

What a weird take...


Its not a take, it was a personal observation that ive since realized is wrong because I wasnt considering bathrooms on large public land, I was thinking about small plots of public bathrooms within large urban areas. Obviously publicly owned airports have bathrooms.

I was also not considering things like port-a-potties during public events, since i was only considering permanent structures.


the public bathroom should be redesigned so that one can do only the thing it is designed for - and maybe it needs to be a single-user design.

Almost like an airline bathroom size - might be a bit claustrophobic but these are for emergencies and space saving would be big.

the doors could be wired to sensors that are connected to a central network that shows in real-time the availability and also some alarms if something is out of the ordinary etc.


How do you accommodate ADA requirements?


perfect is the enemy of the good...

how about some of them being ADA-conforming, with maps noting where they are?


Well said, he got what was coming to him too.


Nonsense, it'll end up with merely some public head scratching and shrugs, and a "gee whiz monsieur, it sure is a mystery to us too".

Interesting that whatever they wanted to do backfired in NYC.


Well of course, that’s the point - it gives the French government the cover to investigate while sending Israel a soft warning.

“Israel, thank you for your cooperation, my gosh, we’re really going to get to the bottom of this” = ‘We know what you’re doing, fuck off’


Here in Scotland it seems the desinfo campaign targeted mostly the SNP and Swinney. I guess it's hard to know how effective it was but his party lost 6 seats in last month's elections.

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/26188090.john-swinney-ta...


At least the French demonstrated they hold other governments accountable. Israel is shrugging off the killing of some 70k civilians, for sure they will shrug off this one too, to no one's surprise (including the French government).


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