The post in February triggered a tidal wave of reaction from parents similarly gripped by anxiety about providing their children with a device they fear will open them up to predators, online bullying, social pressure and harmful content.

Can you imagine having to teach your kids about these risks, help them to deal with them and prepare them for adulthood?

That would be so much work.

you also don’t hear about it as much because people tend to bike more in warm weather so it’s more likely for you to go long stretches of time without biking when it’s getting colder.

Off topic, but I think it’s funny how cycling is viewed in different parts of the world. You look at it as a hobby that is naturally done less in the winter. For me it’s just a way to get to work and I still have to work when it’s cold, so obviously I’m still cycling just as much. And this is true for a lot of people, the bike rack at my job is almost as full in the winter as it is in the summer.

This feels like something that would be illegal in the EU. I have no idea if it actually is.

Nylon can be washed in the dishwasher, but in my experience it does degrade a bit over time. Silicone on the other hand tends to absorb any smell or taste, including dish washing detergent.

Also, check out this one weird trick to get positive results almost every time: just use 20 different end points!

“move fast and break things people”

I went with a Sony 1V. It processes the images a lot more like a regular camera, so more natural but also less ‘flashy’ by default. If you take a boring picture, it’s going to look boring. But I just like that high-contrast, natural colors, ‘real camera’ look so much better than the always-on-hdr, artificial, tacky look of many modern smartphone cameras.

Amazing hardware, but I was really disappointed with the way the 13 pro processed pictures. I ultimately went with a completely different brand after being really hyped for the 1" sensor. The 13 ultra came with some minor improvements, at least that was my impression, but still wouldn’t have been an option for me. I’m really interested in what they’re doing with this newest iteration.

However, I find it much easier to check if the given answer is correct, instead of having to find the answer myself.

For toilet bowl cleaner, you want to make sure it has the ‘quality seal’ on the packaging. It looks like this.

Generally, if you have hard water and a lot of issues with limescale, you will need an acidic cleaner. These are usually advertised accordingly. Bleach won’t help with limescale and is usually not necessary. It’s also very dangerous to mix bleach with acidic cleaners.

Never ever. It wasn’t the reason why I got my current phone, but I thought I would use it at least sometimes. I don’t.

…in the US

While we’re on the topic of CPR, I want to address the myth that CPR “almost never works”. It’s great at what it does, which is pumping blood through the body enough to keep vital organs supplied with a bare minimum of oxygen so they can survive.

However, there’s usually a reason why the heart has stopped beating and in most cases, CPR can’t reverse that reason. If the patient is in a car crash and has completely bled out, CPR won’t get any blood back into their system. Or if they’re at the end stage of a terminal disease, CPR can’t magically cure the disease.

But in cases where the cause for the cardiac arrest is simple and easily reversed, chances of survival are much higher. For example, if someone is drowning and you get them out of the water within a few minutes of cardiac arrest, CPR is very effective, with the majority of patients surviving. Here’s a study with 113 patients who were resuscitated after drowning and only 8 were confirmed dead. For 20 patients, the outcome was unknown, but even if they all died as well, that’s still a 75% survival rate.

Yes, a heart that has completely stopped beating cannot be restarted by defibrillation. It only works in a condition called ventricular fibrillation, when the muscle fibers of the heart are still contracting, but are no longer “in sync”. This causes the heart to twitch chaotically, which is not an effective way to pump blood. And without blood pumping, the heart itself does not receive any oxygen as well, so it will eventually go into a complete flatline after a few minutes of untreated ventricular fibrillation.

The electric shock helps the fibers resynchronize. If you want to see the effect directly, here’s a video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCbawp9ZSnY

Be warned, it shows an open chest and an exposed heart, most likely during heart surgery. They are using spoon-shaped internal defibrillation paddles. In the beginning, you can see the heart in ventricular fibrillation. It’s twitching chaotically and not pumping any blood. After defibrillation, it starts contracting rhythmically again.

I’ve never heard of a punctured heart personally, but I do think it’s possible. A punctured lung is much more common. But both conditions are usually treatable if the patient survives.

CPR does carry some risks, but not doing CPR is guaranteed to be lethal. So any risk (to the patient) is worth taking at that point.

There’s a new, more effective malaria vaccine coming out right now:

https://www.who.int/news/item/02-10-2023-who-recommends-r21-matrix-m-vaccine-for-malaria-prevention-in-updated-advice-on-immunization

We do in Germany, every two years. It’s not helping and I don’t know why. Maybe people are aligning their headlights correctly just for the test. Or the test is garbage. Next time my car is due, I’ll ask the guy.

No argument here. I recently talked to someone who works for an insurance company and he said it feels like working for the mafia.

You’re generally correct. Insurances are a bad investment from a purely financial standpoint. Never get an insurance to save money or to avoid cost. Don’t get insurance for things that you can easily pay for from your savings or for things you can do without. For example, don’t get insurance for your flagship smartphone. Even if you can’t afford the same model again if it breaks, you can always get an entry-level or used phone for a fraction of the price which will do fine for daily tasks until you have saved up enough money.

But there are cases where losing money is just part of the problem. For example, health insurance can literally save your life by paying for a treatment you otherwise couldn’t afford. Or personal liability insurance - if you cause more damage than you can afford to pay for, you can lose your house and pretty much the kind of life you may have lived up to that point. On the other hand, if you’re already broke, living in a shitty apartment and hardly own anything of value, then there’s no point getting that insurance.

Exactly, as soon as the money goes from your bank account to theirs, they can do whatever the fuck they want with it. Not saying that’s a good thing, but that’s how the system is currently designed.