A lot of Americans probably won't be able to commute on a bicycle, but could easily use one for shorter trips like visiting friends, doing groceries, getting a burger, etc.
Even with commutes, there are lots that could be done on a bicycle. I briefly lived in the US and had a 6-mile (~10 km) commute. It was an unpleasant experience because there was exactly zero cycling infrastructure along the way, but otherwise it was a brief 25-minute trip, shorter than any of the commutes I've had in Europe. Not a single one of my American colleagues, all of whom lived locally, cycled or took a bus.
The issue is not just commute distances, it is cultural. Just in my personal "click" there are 5 people of which:
- 2 live less than 5 minutes from a metro that literally takes them to the office, they never take the metro
- 2 live easily within a biking distance to work, 1 has a bike, another has e-bike, they never bike to work
- 1 lives literally walking distance to work, she never walks to work
Public transportation where I live is vast, you can easily commute with the public transportation to just about everywhere but only low(er) income people will take public transportation.
Two most-frequently cited reasons I hear why not bike/walk/...
1. Dangerous - every female friend I have lists this as #1 reason they always drive. Regardless of the fact that I live in the area where I often forget to close my garage overnight and leave the front door open (very very low crime rates) the women feel unsafe. A lot of sensationalism in the news regarding every minor thing happening might be to blame but I have a wife and a daughter and am godfather to several girls so I understand
2. Inconvenient - what if after work I want to go to ____ and ____ and ____. Now I got to track back home and then perhaps change clothes, clean the house... and then get into the car to go to _____.
You act like looking random facts up is the only thing we do on phones. My phone is a personal computer, I use it to navigate through the world, work, access my bank accounts and other personal information, and communicate with others. And yes, sometimes these can't wait the 10–15 hours I might not be at home.
> Do gun manufacturers get sued for mass shootings at US schools?
Odd examples since we know that countries that don't hand out guns like they're candy have virtually no school shootings.
I wouldn't put it solely on gun manufacturers, but the manufacturers, sellers, lobbyists, regulators and politicians are definitely collectively responsible for gun deaths. If they're not currently being sued, they should be.
I saw the ads on the tube and was very confused. I knew about Mullvad, but it never crossed my mind they were trying to get me to search for "and then".
I'm a journalist. As a general rule, if someone approaches me with a pitch for a feature or investigation (not news piece) that was already published elsewhere, I'll turn it down. To be fair, I turn down all PR pitches, but there are journalists who don't but still want an exclusive.
It sometimes happens that you spend weeks or months working on a story, only to be scooped by another publication. It sucks, especially if you think your story is the better one, but unless you can pivot or add a substantial amount of new insight, it won't come out.
Not perfect, but better than nothing I guess. I don't think I've noticed the glasses IRL anywhere, but if I start seeing them, I'm definitely installing the app and avoiding any interactions with those people.
The Wayfarer style was always bulky, they have been a fashion staple for decades at this point. The Meta gen2 ones aren't really that noticeably larger than "normal" Wayfarers - probably why they latched on this style as it gives the most room to stuff electronics while remaining similar sized to the original Wayfarer design.
I still see folks wearing Wayfarers almost every single day, and have owned various (non-Meta) pairs of them for most of my adult life. It's literally one of the most popular sunglasses designs of all time.
Meta have a minority stake in Ray Ban and Oakley's parent company, EssilorLuxottica. The investment was largely to support development of future AI glasses. It does make me a little sad to see Wayfarers end up this way too.
What do you mean by "better [...] at handling sensitive info"? As in, they are more technically competent, or they will treat your data more ethically?
I don't think these projects claim they've got better infrastructure for handling private data, just that they won't sell it to advertisers. I trust Google are experts at handling my data, I just don't want them to.
I've been working with UK/EU lobbying data in recent months, so that's the one I felt competent to pick on. I thought I'd leave the nature of capitalism to someone else.
