Miscellaneous News

Bellum_Romanum said:

I'll let these posts speak for itself about this laughable take:

View attachment 165162

Click to expand...

Eventine said:

Keep in mind TFR 1.3 is still better than what China has currently (TFR 1.0). This is why I’ve always been of the opinion that China can and should do better on promoting fertility; since if a country as crowded and geriatric as Japan (just look at how dense their population is as an island nation) can reach TFR 1.3, China should easily be able to support TFR 1.7 or 1.8. There’s no reason China should be losing to Japan of all countries on demographics.

Click to expand...

Eventine said:

Keep in mind TFR 1.3 is still better than what China has currently (TFR 1.0). This is why I’ve always been of the opinion that China can and should do better on promoting fertility; since if a country as crowded and geriatric as Japan (just look at how dense their population is as an island nation) can reach TFR 1.3, China should easily be able to support TFR 1.7 or 1.8. There’s no reason China should be losing to Japan of all countries on demographics.

Click to expand...

Randomuser said:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Tejas crash dampens export hopes for Indian fighter jet​

NEW DELHI/DUBAI, Nov 23 (Reuters) - The crash of India's Tejas fighter in front of global arms buyers at the Dubai Airshow is the latest blow to a key national trophy, leaving the jet reliant on Indian military orders to sustain its role as a showcase of home-built defence technology.
The cause of Friday's crash was not immediately known but it capped a week of jockeying for influence at the event, attended by India's arch-rival Pakistan six months after the neighbouring foes faced off in the world's largest air battle in decades.

Such a public loss will inevitably overshadow India's efforts to establish the jet abroad after a painstaking development over four decades, experts said, as India paid tribute to Wing Commander Namansh Syal who died in the crash.

CRASH AT SHOWCASE EVENT IN DUBAI​

"The imagery is brutal," said Douglas A. Birkey, executive director of the U.S.-based Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, referring to the history of crashes at air shows where nations and industries seek to tout major national achievements.
"A crash sends quite the opposite signal: a dramatic failure," he said, adding however that while the Tejas would suffer negative publicity, it would most likely regain momentum.

Dubai is the world's third-largest air show after Paris and Britain's Farnborough, and accidents at such events have become increasingly rare.
In 1999, a Russian Sukhoi Su-30 crashed after touching the ground during a manoeuvre at the Paris Airshow, and a Soviet MiG-29 crashed at the same event a decade earlier. All crew ejected safely and India went on to place orders for both jets.
Fighter sales "are driven by high order political realities, which supersede a one-off incident," said Birkey.

POWERED BY GE ENGINES​

The Tejas programme began in the 1980s as India sought to replace vintage Soviet-origin MiG-21s, the last of which retired as recently as September after numerous extensions due to slow Tejas deliveries by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

(HAL).
The state-owned company has 180 of the advanced Mk-1A variant on order domestically but is yet to begin deliveries due to engine supply chain issues at GE Aerospace

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

.

A former HAL executive who left the company recently said the crash in Dubai "rules out exports for now".
Target markets included Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and HAL also opened an office in Malaysia in 2023.
"The focus for the coming years would be on boosting production of the fighter for domestic use," the former executive said, requesting anonymity.
But the Indian Air Force is worried about its shrinking fighter squadrons, which have fallen to 29 from an approved strength of 42, with early variants of the MiG-29, Anglo-French Jaguar and French Mirage 2000 set to retire in coming years.
"The Tejas was supposed to be their replacement," an IAF officer said. "But it is facing production issues".
As an alternative, India is considering off-the-shelf purchases to fill immediate gaps, with options including more French Rafales, two Indian defence officials said, adding that India still plans to add to about 40 Tejas already in service.

India is also weighing competing offers from the U.S. and Russia for 5th-generation F-35 and Su-57 fighters - two advanced models also rarely sharing a stage in Dubai this week.

'BASE' FOR FUTURE PROGRAMMES​

India has for years been among the world's biggest arms importers, but has increasingly projected the Tejas as an example of self-reliance with Prime Minister Narendra Modi taking a sortie in the fighter in November 2023.
Like most fighter programmes, the Tejas has fought for attention at the intersection of technology and diplomacy.

Development was initially held up partly by sanctions following India's 1998 nuclear tests as well as problems in developing local engines, said Walter Ladwig, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London.
But the jet's long-term significance is "likely to lie less in sales abroad than in the industrial and technological base it creates for India's future combat-aircraft programmes," he said.

REGIONAL RIVALRY PLAYS OUT​

Both India and Pakistan were present in force at the show, where the Tejas performed multiple aerial displays in the presence of the rival Pakistani contingent.
Pakistan disclosed the signing of a provisional agreement with a "friendly country" to supply its JF-17 Thunder Block III fighter, co-developed with China.
On the ramp, a JF-17 was flanked by arms including PL-15E, the export variant of a family of Chinese missiles that U.S. and Indian officials say

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

at least one French Rafale used by India during an aerial battle with Pakistan in May.
At an exhibition stand, manufacturer PAC distributed brochures touting the JF-17, one of two models deployed by Pakistan during the four-day conflict, as "battle-tested".
India is a lot more careful with the Tejas, which was not actively used in the four-day conflict in May, Indian officials have said, without giving any reasons.
Nor did it participate in the annual January 26 Republic Day aerial display in New Delhi this year due to what officials said were safety reasons associated with single-engine aircraft.

Click to expand...

Americans are holding onto devices longer than ever and it's costing the economy​

If you are holding onto your aging printer or cracked smartphone longer than you had planned, you are not alone.

Heather Mitchell, 69, retired and living in Tucson, Arizona, is content with her phone even though it is old by smartphone standards.

"My Samsung Galaxy A71 is six-years-old. It's hanging in there surprisingly well for a jalopy. I've had issues with it, and still do, but they are minor," said Mitchell. "I love Samsung phones, but can not afford a new one right now. A new phone would be a luxury."

The average American now holds onto their smartphone for 29 months, according to a recent survey by Reviews.org, and that cycle is getting longer. The average was around 22 months in 2016.

While squeezing as much life out of your device as possible may save money in the short run, especially amid widespread fears about the strength of the consumer and job market, it might cost the economy in the long run, especially when device hoarding occurs at the level of corporations.

Research released by the Federal Reserve last month concludes that each additional year companies delay upgrading equipment results in a productivity decline of about one-third of a percent, with investment patterns accounting for approximately 55% of productivity gaps between advanced economies. The good news: businesses in the U.S. are generally quicker to reinvest in replacing aging equipment. The Federal Reserve report shows that if European productivity had matched U.S. investment patterns starting in 2000, the productivity gap between the U.S and European economic heavyweights would have been reduced by 29 percent for the U.K., 35 percent for France, and 101% for Germany.

Experts agree lost productivity and inefficiency are the unintended consequences of people and businesses clinging to aging technology.

"Think about how much internet speeds have changed in the past decade or more. In the 2010s, 100MB speeds were considered high speed and very good. A short 10 years later and we're operating at 1GB speeds, which is roughly 10 times faster," said Cassandra Cummings, CEO of New Jersey-based electronics design company Thomas Instrumentation. Operating at higher GB speeds requires different electronic hardware, and a lot of the older technology can't handle it.

"Those devices were engineered when no one could fathom speeds that much faster would be mainstream," Cummings said.

That can be a drain on nationwide networks as well.

"Both the cellular and internet infrastructure has to operate to be backwards compatible in order to support the older, slower devices. Networks often have to throttle back their speeds in order to accommodate the slowest device," Cummings said. "Often entire sections of networks or company internal networks are running slower than they would if all devices were up to the newer standards," she added.

Cummings doesn't deny that staying up to date with new devices and hardware is expensive.

"Many companies, especially small businesses, and individual people can't afford to constantly upgrade to the latest and greatest devices," she said.

To ease the transition to new technologies, she says there should be designs that are repairable or modular rather than the constant purge and replace cycles. "So perhaps future devices can have a partial upgrade in say ethernet communications rather than forcing someone to purchase an entirely new computer or device," Cummings said. "I'm not a fan of the throw-away culture we have these days. It may help the economy to spend more and force upgrades, but does it really help people who are already struggling to pay bills?" she said.

Indeed, entrepreneurs in the device resale market see the longer-lived tech as a success story that can be improved upon. Steven Athwal, CEO of the UK-based The Big Phone Store — which specializes in refurbished phones — says devices longevity is not the problem. "The issue is the lag. Businesses and individuals are trying to squeeze modern workloads out of old hardware, heavy processing, rendering, generation, and admin, and that creates a productivity drag. Things like slow processors, outdated software, and degraded batteries on older tech waste energy and morale," Athwal said.

He adds that when people hold onto their phones or laptops for five or six years, the repair and refurbishment market becomes an active part of the economy. But right now, in both European, American, and global markets, too much of that happens in the shadows.

"It's unregulated, underreported, and underutilized. If governments and big tech supported refurbishment properly, aging devices could become part of a sustainable circular economy," Athwal said, improving the second-hand cycle by extending software support, improving access to parts, and treating repair as infrastructure.

"That's how you disable constant replacement. No need to constantly push upgrades, which financially strains both small and large businesses alike," Athwal said.

Still, some device manufacturers have found ways to entice consumers to ditch their older phones for newer ones. For instance, Apple just had one of its most successful new launches with the iPhone 17, and artificial intelligence could be a game-changer.

Najiba Benabess, dean of the business school at Neumann University, says rising prices and sustainability concerns are among reasons "America's gadgets are aging out," but the market should be focused on slowing productivity, increasing repair and maintenance expenses, and limited access to software updates and efficiency gains.

"Small businesses, in particular, lose valuable hours each year due to lagging systems, creating what economists call a 'productivity drag,'" Benabess said. On a national scale, this translates to billions of dollars in lost output and reduced innovation. "While keeping devices longer may seem financially or environmentally responsible, the hidden cost is a quieter erosion of economic dynamism and competitiveness," she added.

Most people still want the newest and most up-to-date phones and tablets, according to Jason Kornweiss, senior vice president of advisory services at Diversified, a global technology solutions provider, but research does show a widening gap between businesses and individuals when it comes to aging devices.

"Corporations with hundreds or thousands of people are not investing at the same rate," Kornweiss said, adding that technology is changing so fast IT departments can't keep up with the pace and that bloated corporations need to vet the newest technology, which takes time, and by the time they do the vetting, something new has arrived anyway. The result: businesses with increasingly long-in-the-tooth technology.

"Businesses establish shelf-life that is multi-year. Employees look at replacing devices within an organization as too tedious and people cringe when the IT department comes with a new device," Kornweiss said, even when it is a meaningful upgrade, he added.

The price to the organization is then paid in lack of productivity, inability to multitask and innovate, and needless, additional hours of work that stack up. Workplace research conducted by Diversified last year found that 24% of employees work late or overtime due to aging technology issues, while 88% of employees report that inadequate workplace technology stifles innovation. Kornweiss says he doesn't expect there's been any improvement in those numbers over the past year.

There's a disconnect between the numbers and behavior. Many workers report that aging devices stifle productivity, but like a favorite pair of shoes or an old sweater, they don't want to give them up to learn the intricacies of a new device (which they'll learn and then have to replace with another). Familiarity can trump productivity for many workers. But the result of that IT clinginess is felt in the bottom line.

"Productivity is hampered and it all has a tangible impact on the economics," Kornweiss said.

The biggest commodity a worker has is time, he says, and older devices gobble that up. Bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policies can be a savior for businesses slow to upgrade, with individuals using their own more functional devices easily able to integrate into most workplace systems these days, Kornweiss said. Another option for companies that don't want to buy a bunch of quickly dated devices is to lease.

Kornweiss sees a future where technology continues to advance at warp speed and companies will continue to have trouble keeping up. And individuals like Heather Mitchell will continue to hang on to their devices.

"I tend to hang onto my phone until I have no choice in the matter. In 26 years, this is only my fifth phone," Mitchell said.

Click to expand...

While it may seem to be a smart money move, it can result in a costly productivity and innovation lag for the economy.

Click to expand...

DOGE 'doesn't exist' with eight months left on its charter

Click to expand...

Overbom said:

Deluded?

Click to expand...

Eventine said:

A weak China has always been a target for surrounding countries / groups. The northern nomads for example, were a persistent threat for over 2,000 years until the advent of modern technology rendered their horses obsolete. The Japanese have a pirates mentality and will thus always be looking to prey on the weak and defenseless; laws, treaties, and agreements are all worthless in this regard.

The only lasting solution has historically been either technological (like industrial military weapons making horse archery useless) or demographic. The colonization of Manchuria by Han Chinese eliminated the Tungus as a geopolitical force in East Asia. While Xinjiang was forcibly pacified via Chinese military settlers who remain essential to the region’s stability.

It is unlikely the Japanese threat can be permanently overcome through demographics. Whole sale colonization of Japan is not something China is likely to ever do given the population size. Cultural assimilation or transformation can be attempted in the event of conquest but it also isn’t likely to succeed based on the stubborn cultural characteristics of the Japanese, which has made them somehow less Westernized than Koreans & Taiwanese despite being more thoroughly occupied by Americans.

That leaves two options. The first is technological - asymmetric weapons like nukes and biological weapons can keep the peace for a long time even if China becomes weak / internally divided. Japan won’t attempt anything as long as its home islands can be obliterated in a strike even if it becomes conventionally superior. This sort of dynamic will last until the next technological revolution.

The second is to just always stay ahead of Japan and use it as a pacing metric. The Qing failed to do this because even as the Meiji Restoration was happening, the Qing was rejecting serious reform and clinging to the old ways. Strengthening internal dynamics (like correcting any factors promoting divisions, regionalism, weak demographics, etc.) and creating a kill switch within Chinese political institutions to prevent a Qing situation from ever happening again is critical to deterring not just Japan but all the other vulture nations around China waiting for an opportunity.

Click to expand...

tokenanalyst said:

I don´t know what it is but there is these group of global clowns idiots in recent times that have given themselves the task just keep pushing buttons to see how close they can get to the fire without getting burn, how close they can get to provoke a total war. From clowns in the US with their sh*tty sanctions, the Europeans for example in the Nexperia case, to the right wingers in Japan and obviously separatists in Taiwan who looks like they have a death wish and want to see that island and its semiconductor industry destroyed to rubble from coast to coast.

Click to expand...