LordOfTheChia @ LordOfTheChia @lemmy.world

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307

Joined

2 yr. ago

It depends on when you were around and reading geeky news sites. FUD came up often on Slashdot in relation to Microsoft:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear,_uncertainty,_and_doubt#Microsoft

and the SCO v. IBM section are relevant.

Eh, that at least goes back to the days of dial-up (at least).

56k modem connections were 7k bytes or less.

The drive thing confused and angered many cause most OSs of the time (and even now) report binary kilobytes (kiB) as kB which technically was incorrect as k is an SI prefix for 1000 (10^{3) not the binary unit of 1024 (2}10).

Really they should have advertised both on the boxes.

I think Mac OS switched to reporting data in kilobibytes (kiB) vs kB since Mac OS 10.6.

I remember folks at the time thinking the new update was so efficient it had grown their drive space by 10%!

This video presentation on Reddit explains it best (SFW):

https://old.reddit.com/r/sbubby/comments/ce4udd/why_did_i_spend_another_whole_week_on_this/

(Sound on)

Just the system, keeping another African American down.

"That's where they get ya. That's why I always travel with extra cheese slices."

This punishes the dog and the human. We should just punish the human.

Cut the owners head off and sent it for rabies testing?

"Sir, your pet bit someone and doesn't have their rabies vaccine. Due to a new animal compassion law, I'm going to have to cut your fucking head off."

(Pulls out rusty serrated knife)

The surprising part is the price. Baby colognes have been in a thing in other countries (the ones I've seen have a lemony scent). Example:

I started a thread on asklemmy to find out what are alternatives to scummy tax services that lobby against the better interests of tax payers. So far Tax Free USA seems like the one with the lowest cost (free Federal, $15 State) and while they are a member of a lobby group, the group has spent a fraction of what Intuit and H&R Block has to keep our tax returns complex.

Seems if I link the thread, my comment is hidden.

Info about their lobbying actions: https://sunlightfoundation.com/2013/04/15/tax-preparers-lobby-heavily-against-simple-filing/

Outside of tax preparers themselves, the industry is reinforced in its opposition to return-free filing by various trade and advocacy groups. One of these is the American Coalition for Taxpayer Rights (ACTR), an organization composed of various tax preparers and makers of tax software. In addition to Intuit, H&R Block and Jackson Hewitt, their membership includes TaxAct, TaxSlayer, Liberty Tax Services and more. It's a relatively new group, but in the only two years it's existed the ACTR has poured almost $450,000 into the tax lobby, including six mentions of opposing "simple-filing" in their disclosures.

So far from this old reddit mega-thread:

https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/10ebor4/tax_filing_software_megathread_a_comprehensive/

the most recommended over the services above is FreeTaxUSA

also there's this tip in the comments:

My tip: turbo tax only charges you at the very end when you go to actually file. So what I do is do my tax paperwork at both turbo tax and freetaxusa then compare the final return (or due) amount between the two. Every couple years, there’s a hundred or so dollar difference between the two and I dig in to find the difference before submitting and paying for ONLY freetaxusa

Edit: Credit Karma was another recommendation, but they are owned by Intuit since 2020:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_Karma

Edit 2: Another article on industry lobbying

https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2023/09/tax-prep-companies-lobbying-against-free-file-face-scrutiny-from-lawmakers/

So you mainly want to avoid Intuit owned companies and H&R Block. They alone spent millions per year to lobby against easy and free filing for taxpayers.

Then there's the ACTR (American Coalition Of Taxpayer Rights) who spend $100s of thousands a year lobbying for the same (and are made up by 14 members:

https://www.americancoalitionfortaxpayerrights.org/about/

Intuit

H&R Block

Tax Act

OnLine Taxes

Wolters Kluwer

Tax Hawk

Liberty Tax

Drake Software

Jackson Hewitt

also the following financial institutions:

Netspend

Republic Bank

TPG Santa Barbara

pathward

Edit: Started a post in /c/asklemmy to find out alternatives. Tax Act was my go-to company, but they've joined the ACTR at some point, so they're a no-go.

https://lemmy.world/post/8447282

Edit 2: Checking out some older reddit threads on the subject, FreeTaxUSA may be the best option so far. FreeTaxUSA are owned by Tax Hawk which is a member of the ACTR, however of all the ones i've checked so far, they are the cheapest (free Federal and $15 state), and at least they're not one of the top lobbying companies like Intuit(Turbo Tax/Credit Karma tax services), H&R Block, or Jackson Hewitt.

The orcas thought the humans wanted to start a mosh pit.

That would be a correct assessment:

https://pubs.rsna.org/doi/full/10.1148/radiol.2020192084

Radiology departments are major energy consumers within a hospital through operation of CT and MRI scanners, which require energy in the range of 0.5–30 kWh per examination, with peak consumption reaching beyond 100 kW for a short time period.

Note that the low side of that are CT scanners, MRI are in the 25kWh to 30kWh range per exam.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/344207928_Emergency_Power_Supply_for_NICU_of_a_Hospital_by_Solar-Wind-Based_System_a_Step_Towards_Sustainable_Development_Journal_of_Solar_Energy_Research_JSER_53_506-515

The neonatal ward of the hospital under study contains 10 phototherapy devices and 4 incubators, with their consumed kWh during the day, equal to 1.08, and 10.76, respectively [16].

So just under 12kWh to operate those 14 NICU devices for 24 hours.

So the energy to perform 1 MRI exam would at a minimum power 28 NICU devices for 24 hours.

On top of that, the peak power usage of an MRI can reach 100kW!

Don't forget, you're not only powering the machine itself, but also the cooling it needs to stay operational.

More info:

https://www.vitalscan.health/how-radiology-can-be-greener/

An MRI machine can use up to 400kWh per day across 12 hours or 12000kWh per month. This electrical consumption is equal to running 40 average houses for a month

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-direct-file-update-free-secure-irs-run-electronic-filing-option-on-track-to-be-available-in-2024-as-a-limited-pilot

If you don't qualify for the pilot, you can also find out what other tax filing companies do not lobby to keep taxes hard to figure out and file.

Which is why they keep wanting to defund the IRS (example):

1. It allows the wealthy to cheat on their taxes with less concerns of getting audited or if they do get audited, they can outspend the auditors.
2. It would have de-funded this measure the IRS is getting ready to test which would allow Americans to figure out and pay their taxes without feeling compelled to go through middle men like Intuit and TurboTax.

Edit: More direct example of point 2

https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2023/09/tax-prep-companies-lobbying-against-free-file-face-scrutiny-from-lawmakers/

After President Joe Biden’s December 2021 Executive Order instructed Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to consider “expanded electronic filing options,” Yellen testified before the Senate Finance Committee that building a free direct filing service is “definitely a priority.” The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 allotted $15 million for the IRS to explore the creation of a free federal tax filing service.

In May, the IRS released a report announcing plans to launch the pilot program for the 2024 tax filing season and indicating that most U.S. taxpayers are interested in filing their taxes directly to the IRS for free.

But in June, Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee proposed a budget rider that would bar the IRS from using federal government funds to create a government-run tax preparation software, unless approved by the House and Senate’s appropriations committees.

If the underlying concept is good and was well thought out, it's better to build upon it instead of reinventing it.

Look at the 4 stroke engine (and engines in general) many of the design concepts date back to the 1880s!

There's other engine designs (ex:rotary engine) but the 4 stroke has over a century of testing, improvements, and refinements. A new design can adapt some of the refinements, but would have to catch up on decades of innovation and testing just to catch up!

On the Unix side, there's the evolution of the Posix standard (which was based on Unix).

I think of snap and flatpack as docker containers but for GUI apps.

There's more differences of course, but I take that as the gist.

I haven't used mint in a while but did for a few years. The out of the box experience (at that time) was better.

Article from 2011:

Linux Mint 11 is a very respectable and speedy distribution and is comparatively very media friendly and easy to use out of the box for newcomers. These qualities likely have contributed to the operating system’s place on the Top 5 Linux Distribution list.

https://pcper.com/2011/11/linux-mint-rising-in-popularity-and-surpassing-ubuntu-for-top-spot/

More contemporary Mint users chime in here with why they prefer Mint:

https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=383991

Take a hugely popular distro which alienates some some users with some issues or unappealing GUI choices, Mint comes along and polishes it further and you end up with a distro that is just perfect for that niche.

I think quite a few Ubuntu users migrated to KUbuntu or Mint when Canonical made Unity the default (in Ubuntu 11.04).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_Unity

"Your honor I object!"

"On what basis?"

"On the basis that it's devastating to my case!"

For decades I thought they were saying "a piece of his sandwich" and not "a Vegemite sandwich"...

But he's being taken out of context!1! /s