Only problem is, we are by now in a technological position that the next collapse has a decent chance of being our last collapse.

So the more a shame that most times we leave them to their grim fate in the urban hell we brought them to with us!

Given the fact that they mainly were a food source instead of noble mail carriers, perhaps having been abandoned in reality has not been that bad a fate…

🤪

Well, more metaphorically and limited to densely populated areas. I mean, rural pigeons are great!
But their city dwelling cousins are mostly poor beasts, malnutritioned, disease plaqued, often invalid: half blind, missing leg, barely enough feathers to fly even short distances.
On top of that a public health issue. So the rat comparison mostly holds, I am afraid…

And if we are talking about other birds than pigeons - totally different topic!

Happy about airborne rats?
Seriously?

Not only the U.S. grid is weak compared to China’s… Strategically China seems to be outpacing the U.S. on many fronts, being much more stringent and focused on long term goals than the chaotic U.S. at the moment. I really don’t like the idea of living in a world with China as the leading nation, but it increasingly seems like the most probable development in the mid to long run. And transition will likely not be smooth…

That surprisingly wasn’t that hard, actually.

One side of the family already settled on Threema for communication years ago, the other side I had to first show Signal to and help with installing it, but now they are even using it in other contexts.

And apparently I live in a bubble that is quite open to Signal, so most of the people I know at least use it in parallel to WhatsApp. And for the rest there is still RCS.

The actual hard part are (since I became a parent) all the WhatsApp groups that exist for most kinds of organized child activity, including distributing much of the crucial information regarding school.
Also at my wife’s work WhatsApp is standard for coordinating with the colleagues.

For that purposes we use an old customized WhatsApp-only smartphone, that is used by the family like some old-fashioned fixed phone-terminal, only for messaging…

It’s not just weird hobbies here, but basically all that are somehow organized.
Also a lot of relevant school information is only shared within parent groups on WhatsApp.
My complete WhatsApp-boycott lasted exactly until the first of my childs entered school… :-(

Also:

original message: “Please don’t leave dirty socks on the sofa.” The AI then offers “funny” rewrites, such as: “Please don’t make the sofa a sock graveyard,” “Breaking news: Socks found chilling on the couch. Please move them,” and “Hey, sock ninja, the laundry basket is that way!”

Am I the only one that thinks the “funny” ones in the given example are much more offensive than the original one?

Nice, another reason to not use WhatsApp…

Sure you do… BONK!

You mean Hannah Fry? No, I think this isn’t her.

I am pretty sure it is normal cat behaviour. Basically all cats that I have met or owned (with the exception of some very relaxed Persians) randomly behaved that way. Some more, some less.
Eyes go suddenly wide with hyperfocus, tail starts wiggling and you now have 2 seconds left to react to the sudden change of mood… Or play along for some serious pretend-fighting :-)

They are not that common here in Germany in general, but my city has in the past years put up a dozen or so, mainly in public parks.
They are maintained by our municipal utility service and are basically always in perfect condition.
At least during summer. Being outdoor installations they are shut down (actually completely removed) during the winter months.

Other than that I only had one in elementary school 30 years ago, which also worked and a lot of actual natural springs with drinking outlets that are often maintained by rural communities.

Our city also has one of those natural water drinking fountains, but as it is the (still maintained and monitored) remains of a thermal baths project from a hundred years ago, it is not so suitable for actually quenching your thirst. Full of crazy salts and minerals with a faintly sulfuric aroma on top - but supposed to be healthy :-)

So, in general: no complaints where I live.

It’s missing the part where they suddenly change mind, hiss at you and smack you.
At least our cat is that way. Loving it nonetheless. Stockholm Syndrome or so l guess…🤷‍♂️

Well, an AI is incredibly patient and you can toy around with the language freely without perhaps feeling embarrassed. That alone lowers the entry bar (especially for slightly awkward persons like myself…) considerably.
On top of that AI is dirt cheap compared to a personal tutor or traveling around the world.
So it would open effective language learning to a much broader audience than before, which undoubtedly is a good thing!

I see, so probably based on the resemblance to “Kathy Deeds”… Wow, that is not even decent dad humour level…

Interesting insect, never heard of it before!
Although I am slightly sorry as I can’t stop giggling at the moment since I realized how silly all the references to feet sound in this description. 🤭
What I don’t understand is the text in the speech bubble… Is that some kind of insider joke? Seems not to be a valid information…