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Joined 9 months ago
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Cake day: October 5th, 2023

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  • I'm not sure why you would need to start an email from halfway down the page? I'm not sure I'm understanding you but I feel like I'm on the verge of having my mind blown about how the other half write emails 🤣 Please explain further, I'm genuinely curious!

    For me, I write things from top to bottom. If I want to do a later paragraph then I will simply write it in, then go back to the top and hit enter to create a new line




  • I'm not arguing the validity of temporary lockdown restrictions due to public health emergencies. I largely agree with the measures. I'm just pointing out your example of "well our constitution doesn't explicitly protect this, yet we can all still do it" is really not the same thing as having explicit protections of a freedom.

    It's more applicable with freedom of speech. Australia does not have explicit constitutionally protected freedom of speech. Which is never important until all of a sudden it is!

    Look at what happened to the ABC a few years back when the AFP raided them after reporting on the activities of some members of our military.




  • The article makes valid points but completely misses the real point. The real point, that has been pointed out every single time Google kills another product, is that every time they do that it erodes user trust. This point has been harped on for years, with more and more people agreeing with it the more and more Google kills products.

    Is it any surprise then, that we're finally reaching a critical mass of users not trusting Google? It's less update this specific promise being untrustworthy, then the entire company being untrustworthy and this just happens to be the point that the dialogue had changed.


  • Excellent points. Thank you for putting in the time to discuss this with me. You, and others here have been invaluable to me. It's too hard to find quality information like these replies through searching. I'm the kind of person that likes to understand things in an extra level of detail so when I discuss things with people I can know what I'm talking about. Knowing only the bullet points makes it hard to back up opinions when talking to people of differing opinions.


  • Couldn't agree more. In general, I think left leaning people make the mistake of overly debating the points that right leaning people make and this creates a lot of confusion and muddies the waters to the detriment of the left leaning. I'll explain why. These are generalities and cut both ways too.

    • A lot of arguments aren't made in good faith. Trying to rationally and logically explain/debate something when the other side isn't making decisions rationally or logically usually doesn't work. (explaining why fear mongering isn't valid)

    • Debating a bad idea directs too much focus towards that idea and makes it harder for good ideas to be heard. This leads people to missing the point or not seeing the bigger picture. (arguing that there are already indigenous people in parliament)

    • Recognising that some ideas are based on emotional opinions can lead to trying to directly counter that in an emotionally adversarial way. (if you don't support me you're racist!)

    I think making these mistakes can too easily turn discussions into identity clashes and further entrenches pre held ideas. Obviously you should respond to concerns and as long as the discussion stays civilised there's no problem. Unfortunately not many people are able to discuss different ideas without taking it personally.

    I'm grateful to everyone here that has done their best to express their opinions without resorting to personal comments.


  • There's a lot of helpful comments here and being your age is a great time to start tinkering with computers! Just start by installing them into a VirtualBox because if you don't have the knowledge it's very easy to break things and anyone else that has to use the computer isn't going to be very happy with you.

    However, I want to point out something that actually address your concerns.

    1. If you are concerned about getting "caught" for torrenting then Windows vs any other OS makes zero difference.
    2. If you are concerned about viruses, Linux is more secure based on the fact that most viruses target Windows. However, this does not mean it is impossible. Learning basic security practices will help you on Windows and much as any other OS.


  • CORRECTION: It was pointed out to me that I was confusing userStyles.css with userChrome.css. I'm not aware of anyway that styling the UI outside of the DOM could be directly detectable. Theoretically, if you could resize some UI elements that would change the viewport size and therefore be detectable. I'm not informed enough on userChrome.css to make that call however. Original comment is below.

    Yes. As CSS styles can be queried, any differences can be used as an identifiable data point used to form a fingerprint.


  • I think that's a bit disingenuous because if you look at the page you link there's a lot more detail than just the excerpt you provided, including at the very top that they are voted upon by the people of the states. It has provisions for different cases as well.

    The voice proposed change has none of this detail.

    I would like to see some accountability included in the proposed change and I think that's why a lot of people are skeptical. The way it is now still leaves a lot of room for political sabotage at any future point as long as there is a "body called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice" that exists. There is nothing in the amendment that even specifies who makes up this body, how many people, how they get chosen, term lengths, etc. These details are at least considered in our current constitution for senators.

    It's not that any of this would make me vote no. I do support this type of cause and I'm glad that steps are being made. It's just that, as far as I can tell, there's no constitutional protection that would stop, say, PwC from being assigned the role of "the Voice".







  • Thank you for replying so thoughtfully. This has explained it better to me than anyone else has (from both sides).

    I think part of the communication problem is how wishy-washy the vote is. Without the historical context the importance of the vote gets completely missed. I've heard so many people wave their hands and say "representation", "constitution", etc., but no one is able to define anything. Your comment makes it clear to me that it's not so much about the affirmative action, but explicitly avoiding the failures of the past.

    Side note: it's crazy to think we don't even have a constitutional freedom of speech