There were laws in many places where you could fight a traffic ticket because you couldn't plainly recognize a police vehicle, especially when a taillight or headlight is out, but now we pay for graphics to make them more invisible. "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about." I like the plausible deniability angle, myself
https://deflock.me/ deserves a mention for its crowdsourcing of ALPR camera data on https://openstreetmap.org and on the site. Recording even one camera may be the only notice a resident has that Flock and ALPRs are operating in their municipality.
Well, I didn't know there Flock cameras in use near me, but apparently I'm nearly surrounded and would have to take a weird route to avoid them. Some are marked as being operated by the local PD, and others are "Unknown". Thanks for the link
All the Flock cameras around me are stationed around the entrances to Lowe's parking lots.
Most of the ones in my neighborhood are pointed at parks, playgrounds, and the big transit center. Which makes no sense to me since there's a ton of government buildings around that you'd think would be under Flock surveillance for "safety."
All of the ones I've noticed have been pointed directly towards streets for mostly license recognition but it's notable that they record whatever objects a typical real world AI image model could. In my area, we have Flock, Shotspotter, Stingray devices, free Ring camera programs from law enforcement departments.
Our Lowe's have the mobile parking lot camera/light units, I wasn't aware if these were Flock but either wouldn't be surprised if they were, had access or plans to buy in.
imho, Nintendo had a hard enough time with preventing piracy and unlicensed games with the NES and SNES and saw the PS1 got modded within a year, even with the special black coated discs to hide the tracks. There wasn’t a lot of optical/compact disc copy protection magic at the time and, cd-rs and writers started getting popular quickly as well. ps1 in 1994, n64 in 1996, backwards Dreamcast GD-ROMs and beginnings of larger discs and DVDS in 98.
> I agree that the PS1 had more piracy, but I'm not sure that actually diminished its success?
At least in my corner of the world (Spain), piracy improved its success. Everybody wanted the PSX due to how cheap it was, I think it outsold the N64 10:1.
My current problem in Windows is there’s at least 3 system functions, PowerToys and screensaver places vying for control somewhere that I have to manually turn on the Dark theme on when signing in every morning.
Seems like a self-inflicted problem. You can turn off Light Switch in PowerToys. I don't know what screensaver software you're using, but if it's hijacking the setting maybe consider uninstalling it.
You eat at McD's or most fast food places these days, you need the app to get reasonable prices, usually at a 15-20% discount. The app really does enhance the experience, order exactly what you want without human error, roll up to the drive-thru, give them the code, and they begin making the order at that point.
They've been pushing $5 value meals recently because the dollar menu's just not fiscally feasible anymore and $10-12+ for the normal value meals isn't a value to most people.
> The app really does enhance the experience, order exactly what you want without human error, roll up to the drive-thru, give them the code, and they begin making the order at that point.
They're particularly good at getting orders right compared to some other restaurants, so the additional value here to me is negligible. It's actually negative value to me, since if I can do a transaction without having to sign up, that's what I prefer. The value is entirely in the other direction: McDonald's wants to monetize their customer's identity information.
It's really location dependent. The one near me missed opening time by more than 30 minutes one day last week. I don't have more data because I only would splurge for a fast food breakfast when I need it.
The app doesn't work if it's installed from a location other than the play store. I install it via aurora store without a Google account for privacy reasons (I do have play services installed but it's not logged in, notifications still work). It's a ridiculous limitation for such an app.
You can thank Play Integrity for this, Google gives app developers the tools to implement remote attestation and "integrity" of the apps and systems they run.
Don't overlook paper coupons. A while back I took a look at the advertising junk that appears in my physical mailbox instead of just throwing it in my recycle bin and found some really good fast food coupons.
Where I am both Subway and Burger King have been sending approximately monthly a sheet full of coupons with some quite good deals.
I go through my apps and put most of them to deep sleep, ie never work in foreground. Later I heard from an internet stranger that a mobile operators app prevents users from using their phone as a Wifi hotspot.
Why would you allow notifications from most apps? What could the McDonald’s app possibly offer to warrant allowing it to dictate your attention for even a fraction of a second?
For the few times a year I eat at Burger King, I just install the app on the way, use the discount, and uninstall it right after while I'm still eating.
I've always tried to apply "The Internet gives a fuck about what you don't like" when it comes to commenting, but it's also helpful to remember it's not just the Internet.
https://gdigraphics.com/police-car-ghost-graphics/
There were laws in many places where you could fight a traffic ticket because you couldn't plainly recognize a police vehicle, especially when a taillight or headlight is out, but now we pay for graphics to make them more invisible. "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about." I like the plausible deniability angle, myself
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