> And how much "surveillance" does a VPN prevent anyway?
Changing your acc number every other month and paying anonymously is much easier on Mullvad than on the ISP level. You can also get multiple people on the number very easily. And Mullvad is likely an entity outside of your home country, hence more difficult to coerce than your ISP.
In my eyes ISPs are compromised by default so the aim is to guard against them, if Mullvad is also as compromised it's more difficult for them to track me across account numbers and, even if they do, my data is then in another country, which worries me less than it being local since I'm not important enough to warrant international action.
> And Mullvad is likely an entity outside of your home country, hence more difficult to coerce than your ISP
This is not true in the EU or for the signatories of the Lugano Convention (the EU, Switzerland, Iceland, and Norway). Mullvad is very explicit that they'll abide by all EU laws. For instance, see the e-Evidence Regulation specifically written for "network-based services" like "proxy services": https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A...
> Mullvad is also as compromised it's more difficult for them to track me across account numbers
That's your assumption, not an assertion Mullvad makes?
> even if they do, my data is then in another country, which worries me less than it being local
There exists international treaties on intel sharing (including for "cyber") at every level: The UN, The European Council, the EU, the NATO states, and so on.
> I'm not important enough to warrant international action
Your government can demand action of other governments and businesses via various treaties it may have in place. Mullvad, since it says it'll abide by all EU / Swedish laws, is not a hurdle for your local LEA you think it might be.
> is not a hurdle for your local LEA you think it might be
Everything is possible, of course, but in no world is it <= difficult to get information out of an entity outside your borders. A police officer can go to my local ISP's office and ask to see my logs. If he gets lucky, he gets them, otherwise his escalation path is smaller. If he wants to do that to Mullvad he has to start some process that goes through multiple people and takes a lot more time. Additionally, by the time he reaches Mullvad he probably has my ISP logs.
> That's your assumption, not an assertion Mullvad makes?
IDK what they have to say about it, but the ISP has a hardware line to my home, my name on a contract and recurring card payments. Mullvad has some money with no clear source and an ID with 3-4 people on it that jump ID every other month. I can't change my ISP every other month so one has a single big ass log for my home in a folder with my name on it and my payments while the other has multiple logs they have to bring together and no name on the payments.
They can absolutely parse things and follow me across IDs to put me in a big log and maybe do some data magic to tie it to my person but:
1- It's extra work for them to get to the ISP starting point
2- That starting point is actually still worse since possible mistakes in that process can be argued in court.
Politics. I used to be really into them but they just make your life miserable and most discussions are pointless since the topic is always very broad, which makes it have a ton of side effects which then need to be ignored since everyone's trying to solve political issues that have existed hundreds of years in 20 minutes with extreme policy swings.
1- You need a ton of internal knowledge so it doesn't really matter what they know past the basics.
2- Testing gets expensive with seniors
3- You can't get mid-senior level employees you like. I see very often companies having really high requirements for hiring leading to the only candidates passing being friends of employees. Juniors pass easier via the 'he's motivated to learn' path.
4- Juniors bring a motivation with them. Seniors tend to generally care less so a couple of energetic juniors can get them moving a bit quicker. Especially if you find a good one, since a senior really doesn't want to get outperformed by a fresh graduate. Also, since they usually suck at politics, it's easier to prod them about why things aren't working than the seniors who've played the blame game for 20 years and have perfected the art of dodging responsibility.
I use a Keychron Q14. Keypad on the left can be found by searching for "southpaw". The only issue I have with it being on the left is that I was used to sometimes pressing the numpad enter key with my thumb while holding the mouse. It does take a while to get used to using it with the left hand though. Maybe having it mirrored would help, idk.
1. You can buy a cotton tshirt from LIDL for 3 bucks and it'll hold for years. It won't be cut perfectly or have the softest material but it's definitely not bad.
Of course, if I get it from Temu for 6 cents it'll probably fall apart in a week, but modern clothing isn't really covered by "the cheapest thing I can find".
Same for ultralight fabrics, that, while lovely in summer, usually get trashed in a season or two simply because the thing weighs fuck all.
I'd even say we're in a golden age for clothing. I can get a motorcycle jacket that can slide at 80kmh for 40 bucks with shoulder and elbow protectors and a thermo layer insert.
Cheap cotton cannot hold for years, the fiber length and yarn quality makes it simply impossible. On top of that, cheap cotton is bleached and fast dyied which makes the clothing change after few washings.
I mean if you mean "hold" like, you can't still wear it albeit it looks nothing like it did two washings before, of course it does.
But then you look exactly like what you buy, someone with worn low quality clothing which looked nice in the shop and first wear.
The 3 buck LIDL tshirt isn't really intended for casual business attire tbh.
If you want good looking (symmetrically cut, better stitched, etc) tshirts long term I then raise you Uniqlo with 7 bucks per DRY synthtic tshirt and 12 for a supima cotton one. I pretty much daily them and in over at least 3 years they haven't shown significant aging. Only the supima ones have mostly lost the "supima" text on the inside at the back of the neck area.
Comically enough I also have 3 shirts from Primark for 1$ each that are now at least 5 years old, probably more like 7 that still look fine. I still wear them to work without worry. The shaping of them was all over the place though. No two in the pile were identical.
Dying could be an issue, I wear gray and black ones so your mileage may vary with colored washing. I also don't blast them at 90 degrees C but rather 60 for black/gray, 40 for everything else.
Or your standards are just ultra high compared to mine, for better or worse. From my perspective tshirt quality ends at Uniqlo and I then go to Olympus business/casual shirts. From there the only option I have to look more businessman-y is the wool suit.
Note that many carpet installers and other handyman also do work (partially) under the table so their salary isn't representative of their regular income either. This also fluctuates a lot based on season. It's the cost of being (partially) self employed.
Why should the government be asked to cover income that wasn't reported / taxed by an individual? There's a clear process to report income that's non W2 (or equivalent)
Mentioning it since it's mostly the same with small artists. You'll always only report the bare minimum which results in the unemployment $ being rough issue.
I'm not in Ireland but it's the same everywhere. No one likes paying taxes.
Not saying that anything should be done about it. TBH I'd even like to have unemployment benefits be an optional insurance to reduce my taxes since I haven't gotten a cent out of it yet, but that's separate.
Just noting that artists aren't in some unique situation.
Nothing is stopping them from opening a company and giving themselves a fixed salary or doing some mix of salaried, freelance and under-table work.
I strongly agree. There's even the argument to be made that if no legislation exists, even if you're anti X, you might get incentivized to build a company for X just so it's not a fan of X at the helm of the top company for X.
Blaming it on the employees is pointless. It's the law that should dictate what's allowed and what isn't and if the lawmaking or enforcement isn't working you probably want some "good" people in those companies.
This reminds me of a company I worked for recently, that, at the yearly meeting talking about the financial situation were all depressed as if we were broke since the profit (and revenue) was slightly less than last year, which was significantly higher than any other year in history with the year prior also being a record. This was essentially when the interest rates jumped after covid and businesses had to adapt so I'm sure it would have been another record if the economy in general wasn't doing worse that year.
Of course, they want to keep people from asking for raises and bonuses, but I found it very weird to see them act worried with the profit/revenue graphs at a crazy peak still.
The Cayenne has no right to be as fast as it is. The stupid thing will powerslide out of corners at 120 kmh and fly at hot hatch speeds through twisty cobblestone roads. The brakes were also wonderful and surprisingly cheap for the size. Didn't have air suspension so it rode like a fast car though.
Changing your acc number every other month and paying anonymously is much easier on Mullvad than on the ISP level. You can also get multiple people on the number very easily. And Mullvad is likely an entity outside of your home country, hence more difficult to coerce than your ISP.
In my eyes ISPs are compromised by default so the aim is to guard against them, if Mullvad is also as compromised it's more difficult for them to track me across account numbers and, even if they do, my data is then in another country, which worries me less than it being local since I'm not important enough to warrant international action.
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