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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: August 19th, 2023

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  • Someone made a mistake here. It’s not getting your IP address. An IP address is assigned by the gateway when you’re connected to an access point. An IP address is not an identity. They are always changing and can be shared. This has already been tested and upheld in court.

    It’s actually collecting your MAC address. Which is exchanged when your phone or tablet scan nearby WiFi points or Bluetooth devices. However, this can already be defeated. By default iOS and Android both have the option to randomise the MAC address in intervals. Making it extremely difficult to prove anything. This feature exists because the devices real MAC address never changes. It is unique. Alternatively, users can disable WiFi and Bluetooth scanning entirely. However, your device no longer participates in the Find My Devices program by Apple and Google, location does take longer to acquire in some scenarios, and accuracy may take longer to triangulate.




  • It’s always been bad practice to just blindly update software. That’s why we have different distros.

    Ubuntu and Mint hold your hand and make it easy for newcomers. Great way to dive into Linux. I completely agree these are great for “it just works” and no fuss. I’ve not had one break on me.

    Arch and Gentoo expect you to have experience and know what you’re doing. You build it up how you want it. That’s what makes these so great. But you need the experience and knowledge.

    I’ve personally tried openSUSE and in my opinion it feels like a good middle ground between both ends. In the past I’ve recommended Mint to get started, openSUSE once you’ve got experience, and then Arch for when you want total control.




  • From their own privacy policy they outline what they do:

    For research and development purposes, we may use datasets such as those that contain images, voices or other data that could be associated with an identifiable person.

    To provide location-based services on Apple products, Apple and our partners and licensees, such as maps data providers, may collect, use, and share precise location data, including the real-time geographic location of your Apple computer or device.

    Apple’s websites, online services, interactive applications, email messages, and advertisements may use “cookies” and other technologies such as pixel tags and web beacons.

    We also use personal information to help us create, develop, operate, deliver, and improve our products, services, content and advertising

    At times Apple may provide third parties with certain personal information to provide or improve our products and services, including to deliver products at your request, or to help Apple market to consumers.

    Apple may collect location, IP Address, network information, Bluetooth information, connected devices, accessories, personal demographics, browsing history, browser fingerprint, device fingerprint, search history, app data, usage data, performance, diagnostics, product interaction, transaction information, payment information, purchasing records, contacts, social graph, watch history, listening interests, reading list, call metadata, device information, messaging metadata, email addresses, salary, income, assets, health data, ad interaction, in-app purchases, in-app subscriptions, app downloads, music downloads, movie downloads, TV show downloads, Apple ID, IDFA, Random Unique ID, UUID, IMEI, Hardware serial number, SIM serial number, phone number, telemetry, cookies, Nearby WiFi MAC, Siri request history, Web sign-in, songs played, play and pause times, playlists, engagement and library.

    Literally all of this is what Google does. The only thing Apple does differently is hinder 3rd party apps to a greater degree, whereas Google is more permissive. But to be fair, Google has been improving the Privacy features of Android with each version.

    https://tosdr.org/en/service/158





  • It’s not odd at all. It’s well known this is actually the truth. Ask any video editor in the professional field. You can search the Internet yourself. Better yet, do a test run with ffmpeg, the software that does encoding and decoding. It’s available to download by anyone as it’s open source.

    Hardware accelerated processing is faster because it takes shortcuts. It’s handled by the dedicated hardware found in GPUs. By default, there are parameters out of your control that you cannot change allowing hardware accelerated video to be faster. These are defined at the firmware level of the GPU. This comes at the cost of quality and file size (larger) for faster processing and less power consumption. If quality is your concern, you never use a GPU. No matter which one you use (AMD AMF, Intel QSV or Nvidia NVENC/DEC/CUDA), you’re going to end up with a video that appears more blocky or grainy at the same bitrate. These are called “artifacts” and make videos look bad.

    Software processing uses the CPU entirely. You have granular control over the entire process. There are preset parameters programmed if you don’t define them, but every single one of them can be overridden. Because it’s inherently limited by the power of your CPU, it’s slower and consumes more power.

    I can go a lot more in depth but I’m choosing to stop here because this can comment can get absurdly long.




  • Think outside the box. Get a previous generation. Pixel 8 was about to be released. To move inventory, Google discounted the 7 series by like 30-40%. I got the 256GB 7 Pro for $600. Without the sale, $600 is the same price as the 128GB 7. I got a top of the range flagship phone for the cost of a midrange. My mom did something similar with a Samsung phone. She got an S20 when the S22 released. Huge discount when Verizon offered it for $449.




  • so much for track day, I guess?

    Stuff like this is likely planned in advance with sports and super cars. Since this technology has existed for a while. Assuming you visit a recognized track, wherever it may be, the limiter simply turns off. For example, the 2009 and later Nissan GTR is sold in Japan with a 112 MPH artificial limiter in the software. The limit is there by law. GPS / Sat Nav is standard on this car. If you visit say, Fuji or Laguna Seca, the car knows where it is and turns the limiter off. Allowing you to achieve the ~200 MPH top speed. Examples sold for other markets such as US and EU need not worry. The redline in 6th gear is your physical limiter.

    On a slightly related note, clever people have figured out ways around limiters. Such as tricking the GPS or modifying the ECU. Unfortunately, these days it gets harder to do this as manufacturers like Mercedes, BMW, VW, and a few others, are encrypting the communication network physically located in the car. It’s not the traditional low and high speed CAN Bus. FlexRay is becoming more commonplace unfortunately.