> What's there, that politicians don't know already?

They need to be ‘reminded’ of the issues that ‘campaign contributions’ are contingent upon.

Have you seen Microsoft’s price over the last year. If AI doesn’t pan out they’re going to be the next IBM.

Installed by default is their moat. Trying to arrange a video conference on other platforms means making sure that everyone has the client installed, which can be a real headache. Teams is the common denominator.

Google Meet doesn't require a client

> But you don´t get to to that.

You can, and for tax purposes you must. The bean counters hate that you can’t deduct capex.

We’re gonna need a bigger wall.

“ It has not occurred to you that your ancestors were survivors and that the survival itself sometimes involved savage decisions, a kind of wanton brutality which civilized humankind works very hard to suppress. What price will you pay for that suppression? Will you accept your own extinction?”

- Frank Herbert, God Emperor of Dune

The same can be said for moments where avoiding savage decisions resulted in survival; when oblivion was the alternative, and where it was the result of humanity's capacity for compassion and cooperation overcoming "civilized" humankind's tendency towards a banal and unthinking brutality.

Remember that, multiple times in the past half-century, the protocol was to launch all ICBMs and pray.

Which is kinda hilarious given that despite being called a tyrant, Leto II had basically created a post scarcity society that was almost entirely castrated of violence or capacity for it. He kept chastising people for that desire to tame those base instincts but he was doing the exact same thing. It's just a funny thing to quote given the context of his character.

better to attribute it to God Emperor Leto Atreides II , not Frank Herbet the author

> Non-exclusive use of farmland or wasteland (or even - at least until maintenance complexity is considered - offshore) isn't a major barrier

Not now, but with solar power output doubling every few years how long before we run out of land?

Never. As the post you apparently quoted without reading said, we're talking about a rectenna composed of pylons and wires structured as a mesh that doesn't interrupt farming and can theoretically be offshore, not panels here

Space based solar power has much bigger challenges in gaining acceptance, proving the physics works in real world conditions and delivering on its promises than the theoretical possibility that there is absolutely no unoccupied region of land or sea

> The reason they couldn't because they didn't have the metallurgy and the machining to create pistons, valves, etc.

It was a turbine. You don’t use pistons in a turbine. They lacked knowledge of turbine blades, the metallurgy to make pressure vessels, and the tools to make parts with the tolerances needed to spin at high RPM and withstand high temperatures.

Probably could've connected it to some tiny device, and then someone surely would've thought, what if we made a really big one a d connected it to our Archimedes screws?

The Romans didn't have a need to pump water from coal mines because they hadn't yet cut down all their fuel forests or exhausted all their surface deposits of coal. Newcomen's engine was so inefficient, it needed to be at a coal mine to power it and this jet screw engine would have been even worse. If they wanted to turn an Archimedes screw, it would have taken less labor to just have a person turn it by hand.

I'm sure they could afford to build one or two as an experiment.

It’s not just government money. Factory workers wages in China are still a lot lower than western countries, and they have a lot fewer labor rights.

Also, the government hinders as often as it helps, since they can always take over an industry or make it’s CEO disappear if they feel like it.