And if you're lucky, your library may do frequent book sales!

https://www.bapl.org/book-sales/

What does this even possibly mean? Fastmail has employees in the US, Europe and Australia. As far as I can tell with a warrant the government of any of these is likely to get a response from fastmail, just like if the government had a warrant to search my storage unit or review my bank statements. I don't understand the point you make. either there is rule of law or there isnt.

unless you're contracted (fixed bid) working on jobs then you're getting paid hourly, salary, whatever... boss tells you to stand around and shoot the shit, thats what you do. I dont know why people think 'not my job' is a relevant answer... the job is what they tell you to do...

I do agree with you, and most jobs have a "and other duties as assigned" for that reason.

But I'll equivocate by saying there are exceptions. If you work a union gig (technically a contract), you have to be careful to stay in your lane unless you want a grievance filed. If you are a licensed engineer and your boss tells you to design/stamp something outside your domain of competence, you have a duty to say no. But that kind of stuff is the exception.

Yes I sincerely doubt that the court of opinion, or the real court, would see the difference between "I use MySQL not MSSQL! you cant make me write this analysis" versus sometihng understandable like, you are a for example, a aging and lovable secretary who is being tasked to clean radioactive material from a jobsite because there are no calls coming in.

As for unions - yeah thats what got them kicked out of the convention center. Only certified electricians are smart enough to plug in laptops into sockets!

I don't think you need that dramatic of a strawman for the point. I think a more plausible one in a grey area could be a structural engineer who has experience in low rise commercial buildings being asked to quickly approve a steel scaffolding for a concert venue in the coming weekend. To the uninitiated, it may seem like a reasonable request but to those in the domain it's far enough outside the area of competence to be questionable.

though I am seeing ( work with distributors ) a lot less reluctance to raise prices or adjust. It took a while but many of my customers can now more easily reprice their catalog and customers getting used to it, so maybe its less of a lag as before

do we need disk brakes?

Some EV models have gone back to drum brakes. The main drawback of drum brakes is overheating, which is why they can’t be used for performance vehicles, even though drum brakes can deliver more braking power. EVs with strong regenerative braking reduces pressure on the brakes, making the heat build-up less of a problem.

The main advantage of this is cost, not weight or performance, but it does show that EVs have different profile to ICE cars.

As opposed to relying solely on engine braking (or the EV equivalent thereof)?

I'd personally prefer a belt-and-suspenders approach.

Yes, you must be able to stop independently in the case of some kind of total power failure in the drivetrain.

Can regen brakes keep a car stopped? I would think that the braking force diminishes as the rotor speed approaches zero so it wouldn’t keep you in place on a steep hill, but I’m not sure.

In my experience, it’s usually but not always enough for the hills in SF. But more importantly, regen can’t handle emergency braking (it would generate too much current and heat), and you can’t regen at all if the motor loses its path to the battery.

Good point, I guess the motor could be engaged just enough to hold the car still on a slope but there might be heat issues doing that for too long. Mechanical brake will do that easily so also needed for that reason.

At the very least you need something to keep the car from rolling away when it's parked.

well you could have really cheap drum brakes that probably would last the lifetime of the vehicle. Maybe not even hydraulic - electro-mechanical with a mechanical (E brake) fallback.

even better a motor brake already is a thing. Its kinda of like air brakes, requires current to disengage and looks liek a little clutch thats slapped on the shaft or housing.

you'd need close to a megawatt of engine/inverter to only brake on regen.

ATM Machine

The La Brea Tar Pits => The the tar tar pits

My favorite from Southern California.

OK, I have to admit, that one I didn't know.

It's only a matter of time until someone posts "Torpenhow Hill" -- which does not exist.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torpenhow_Hill

All from the Department of Redundancy Department.

it's easy to do as well. most of these printers can be setup to easily work by catting text directly to /dev/lp0.