Imagine getting down there only to hear a Winter Lantern singing in the dark 💀

That’s a first page that goes fucking hard 😅

Oh I know. I was just trying to shed a bit of light on whether this company’s decision was an attempt to take advantage and screw people over, or a genuine survival measure.

The root cause is ultimately the tariffs that will be imposed by the US government.

In reality the decision will be more nuanced, and this company will likely raise prices wherever it can whilst also securing long-term stock at current prices to both avoid the tariffs and increase margins to recover the capital quicker.

But yeah. It’s all down to the government’s tariffs.

Without having more detail I can’t speak with certainty, but, general principles of inventory management and cash flow discourage having a surplus of stock, as that ties up a significant amount of working capital in the costs of storing and handling it all - you risk not being able to pay your liabilities because you’ve sunk all your funds into inventory that hasn’t yet sold and generated more revenue.

Companies often have longer term contracts with specific prices agreed that can’t always be easily changed. Those contacts could quite easily become unprofitable if there are sudden increases to the direct costs of fulfilling them. So, rather than trying to fuck customers, this company is likely trying to stock-up at current market prices to ride-out the first year of tariffs, but in doing so, needs a large injection of working capital to cover the expenditure (hence cancelling bonuses), and also puts itself in a very vulnerable position where cash flow is concerned by tying up that capital in inventory - any further sudden and unexpected costs could lead to the business folding.

The glyphs are a fun gimmick. I wouldn’t say you’re likely to use them all that much.

Maybe Google around a bit and see what you can find. There will definitely be other mid-range phones that lean more heavily into the camera, but at this price you’re always going to be making concessions somewhere.

If you’re buying the phone outright then that could work. Provided it’s supported for that long, and you can look after it well enough then I don’t see why not - you just have to be prepared to pay £800 all at once.

Part of my reasoning is the £400 cost keeps my monthly bill down, as I don’t buy the phone outright.

If nothing else, keeping one phone for 6 years would be better for the environment.

In my opinion it’s fine. I’m not super into photography or anything so take that with a big grain of salt. I don’t take too many pictures, but when I do they seem perfectly serviceable.

They’re never going to compare to a newer flagship, mind you.

All of this is more than I’m prepared to pay for a phone these days. It’s absurd.

I switched to a Nothing Phone 1 last year (about £400?) and it’s been more than capable of handling my daily usage.

I’ll keep the thing for three years, then upgrade to another mid-range. I don’t need to pay more than twice the price for hugely diminishing returns.

Dunno, but I miss rage comics.

Oh really? I figured a wallet had to be one of the ones that folds?

I’m one of the younger millennials (I think?).

I never carry cash unless I have to (for some reason dependent on where I’m going). I primarily use my phone to make payments, and I don’t have a traditional wallet, but I do have a slim card-holder that carries my debit card, driving licence and one or two other important cards.

Take that for what you will, I guess!

House of Leaves

Ah really? I could put it on the hard drive, but the whole point of the SSD was for it to take the OS… Will have to think on that.

They generally don’t do more than browse the web so I’m not anticipating any major issues. I used to game on it, but it’s so old now I’ve stopped using it for games.

Maybe I’ll put it on a usb for a while instead of dual booting.

I see Linux in my future, as I just don’t have the cash for a new rig.

I have to be careful though, as it’s my family PC, and the rest of my family aren’t going to tolerate much of a learning curve. It really needs to just work out of the box.

Considering Zorin OS. Hopefully I can get it on my SSD next to Windows so I can dual-boot for a while to test the water…

I own a pair of Porta Pros as daily drivers. I also have a pair of Ananda’s that I run through a BTR7 (not super flashy but more than your average person’s setup).

I would say the average person doesn’t need more than a pair of Porta Pros. They’re absolutely fine 😅

I’m sure I used to use Audacity back in the day as a free, quick and dirty editor to splice up audio tracks. I’m talking at least 10 years ago.

Had no idea it was still even a thing.

He’s a business man.

And business is goooood.

New cars are ludicrously expensive, especially EVs.

The most I can afford to spend on a car is maybe £14K, and that’s under the proviso that about £4K of that is my own money and the rest is a loan to be paid off over about 6 or 7 years.

So yeah, I’m going secondhand ICE with about 50K miles on the clock and praying it doesn’t die before the loan is paid off (and preferably longer still so I can save a bit more towards the next one).

I’m all for EVs, but they’ve got to bring the price down, and they’ve got to get the batteries to last long enough for the secondhand market to be viable.

Every day, the reasons to either switch to dumb devices or open-source software keep piling up.

Yep, it’s like it’s her generously compensating job compels her or something.

Who’d have thunk it?

(For real though, what did people expect her to say?)