All of this applies to many niche communities. In Germany, especially the older forums that are around since the internet became widly popular show such behavior. Take HiFi- forums for example: If your plugs are not made with gold, you are doing it wrong. Also, if you want to spend money for a hobby, don’t bother to start if you are not willing to spend at least an unreasonable ridiculous ammount of Euros.

These enthusiast also complain about a lack of new members. It’s the nobody wants to work anymore sentiment, but with niche hobby communities.

German dubs are actually top notch compared to other countries

This is true for movie productions. They are dubbed well, even to a point where jokes and plays on words are translated as well. On the other hand, cartoons are not. They lack of something that makes them unwatchable when dubbed - I think it’s because some of the play on words and jokes are missing, also the dubbed voices differ extremely from the original. Such thing can make a character appear and be percieved very different, compared to the original. If cartoonn are availiable in original language (English), I’ll prefer that.

Yesterday I watched an interesting video about this topic: Why Germany dubbs movies, but other countries don’t
Warum Deutschland Filme synchronisiert und andere Länder nicht The video comes with insights from a voice actor, who dubbs the voice of Leonardo di Caprio.

Sadly, in this world you accomplish nothing for being nice and considerate. If you want to leave an impact (anything - a new invention, a new product, a new idea, anything with impact to contemporary culture) you have to bully yourself to the top, including stealing ideas and screwing people over, as well as to exploit people. All “great” people who accomplished something did that: Gates (Microsoft), Jobs (Apple), Musk (Tesla, Twitter), Bezos (Amazon), Thiel (PayPal, Palantir), Zuckerberg (Meta), Huffman (Reddit), as well as many politicans. It’s a personality treat.

Here is a video that explains the issue, albeit it focuses on designers:

The wrong Amazon is burning.

Back in the early 2000s I bought my first own car. It had a radio with cassatte. I had a mixtape that I carried around, with a walkman (albeit not the original one from Sony). When I drove the car home - stil with temporary number plates, because I needed to register the car to my name - the song Turn The Page played a few minutes into the drive. I will always associate this song with that particular event.

Are you saying all laws are futile? Otherwise what is different with this law that makes it futile?

I do not say that all laws are futile. The difference with this particular measurement is that it is odd to me, that a no-weapon zone is being established, as it is quite unusual that Germans carry around weapons in general. At least not where I live.

There are other laws, speed restrictions for instance. I get that there is a necessity to enforce such thing, as people have cars and tend to drive faster than they should. Speeding with a car is more common than carrying a weapon. That’s why this law makes sense, as it adresses the issue right there. Speeding doesn’t have an underlying issue that causes drivers to speed.

The thing what makes it futile in my opinion is that a restriction in carrying weapons does not solve the underlying issues (the root causes of socio-economic inequality, among others) that probably lead to harming others with knives. It’s just treating the symptoms, not the root cause.

This would be the use case, where you would break the law, when entering such restriction zone. Unless, of course, your skin tone has the right shade, as police unfortunately does things like racial profiling. If pale, you were on your way to a cooking party - if darker-skinned, you luckily were caught in the act!

Fair enough, I didn’t think of that. What you described is the intended use for pocket knives, MacGyver style.

What I thought of when writing my comment were kind of hunting knives. No one needs that inside an urban environment.

The question is: why would anyone carry a knife in the first place? I can’t think of any reason. Personally, such law wouldn’t have any impact on me, because I don’t carry a knife with me. I can see the intention with such law, and it probably might help to percieve a more secure enviroment.

If someone wanted to do some stabbing inside a party district, such law wouldn’t stop them - unless one has to pass through a security checkpoint (which to my knowledge are not a thing).

This is a futile attempt to establish safety, and it is done so that it can be claimed that something has been done.

If some person has the intention to do any harm to others, this person would not be stopped by any restriction to carry any weapon.

The real issues lay much deeper: A growing number of refugees and asylum seekers that want to work, but are prohibited to do so, but at the same time these are competing in an already tight housing market. Raising costs of living, growing inequality, growing envy and a part of the population which is on the brink of shiftig into a nazi movement, with a growing resentment to foreign people. It takes more than putting up a sign that says that weapons are forbidden beyond this point to solve these problems.

Also, in Germany there is no reason ever to walk around with waepons. Compared to other parts of the world it is pretty safe here.

Putting up a sign that states that weapon are forbidden would have the same impact as putting up a sign that forbids wild fires in the forest or flooding near a body of water.

That is an arrangement, which certainly is not up to the gentleman’s guide for public toilets, which states An open urinal should form a wall between us: During off-peak toilet moments, there are bound to be empty urinals. It is the norm to having an open urinal separate us or things will be awkward. Assuming than each brick on the wall has a length of 16" or 406 mm, that means the walls to the left and right are 90" or 2.03 m apart. This is a quite cozy arrangement. Also, how would the pee-area on the left wall be used when there will be two persons already using the front wall?

Social- and greenwashing proposals.

“By buying [unnecessary product] you will help [marginalized group] to gain a livable income and also send their kids to school instead of sending them to [work place with - even for adults - horrible work conditions]. Also, when buying [product] we will save [arbirtary area] of [rainforest/ coral reef/ mangrove swamp] that would otherwise have been destroyed [but not by us]. Additional to that, your purchase helped us to save [arbitrary ammount of CO₂ - at least in a completely hypothetical scenario]. While using [product] you will make the world a better place.”

As a customer there is barely any way you can ensure or check that these things are true. It cannot be possible to save the enviroment while buying stupid products like, for example, internet-of-shit-devices which will be phased out in no time or single use products made from plastic or other harmful materials that are not recycleable.

All these claims are just an indulgance trade - like it is done for centuries in a religious context. It is just that you have an excuse to consume more, because they to something to help people/ enviroment. If there was a product that would have been advertised as: “Well, we irretrieveably destroyed 100 km² of nature, and for each single product in average two workers died and at end-of-life this product will fuck up the environment once more - also it will impair your health just by existing”, it would be horrible - but at least it would be honest.

I think it is important to have cash as a backup.

A couple of years ago there were some issues with card reading terminals in Germany. Due to a faulty security certificate these card reading terminals were not operational for about a whole month. Many stores were affected, because they almost all use ones from the same manufacturer. The only reason why it wasn’t such a big deal was that people were carrying cash around anyway and were able to switch the method of payment easily. Having cash worked as a backup.

along with your personal apple account username and password.

I would never ever share my personal Apple account with work related things. I prefer to have my private stuff seperated from work related things.

I once worked for a small company that had such a setup: All devices were Apple, and everything was connected with the company owners private Apple accounts. That means that I was able to see personal calendars and to an extend some email-related things - Things that reveald more about a person than you wanted to know.

Lammbock

Back then (early to mid-2000s) it was considered the most popular German stoner movie (at least among my social group back then).

It could become true soon (by the end of the century).

https://www.livescience.com/worlds-population-could-plummet-to-six-billion-by-the-end-of-the-century-new-study-suggests

That would be horrible. Law entforcement would have a field day (not with the fart statistics tho). Our brain is the last frontier of privacy.

Carbon offsetting is a greenwashing scam. You can claim to have done something without actually having to have done someting. Last Week Tonight covered this topic in one of their episodes.

Bayen basked in this image in front of his thousands of followers on social networks: He repeatedly attacked the fast-fashion industry and the masses’ desire for ever-new discount goods. “Every item of clothing we offer does not have to be produced from scratch,” he wrote on one of his company websites. "In this way, we save valuable resources in production and break the vicious cycle of the fast fashion industry."
Sweaters and hoodies from Adidas and Nike are in demand
The growth of the market is being driven primarily by Generation Z’s love of vintage. The only problem for the industry is that the growing demand is being met by a limited number of available pieces. Currently, most second-hand goods are from the 90s or early 2000s, says vintage expert Philip Rohde, and brands such as Adidas and Nike are particularly popular for sweaters and hoodies; sought-after items are sometimes hard to come by and come at a price: "You can expect prices ranging from 50 euros to 120 euros."
Rohde has been observing the industry for a long time.

But since around mid-2021, he has noticed that something is changing: He kept noticing that many new stores were advertising vintage knock-offs, he says: “They actively advertised with pieces that were fake because they could attract more customers that way.”

Shortly before his company went out of business, Bayen even openly admitted in a clip on Instagram at the end of January that Strike was probably also selling counterfeit goods: He was therefore even, he said then himself, facing a court case for violating trademark law. The fact that counterfeits are found among his goods is unavoidable: When he buys second-hand in large quantities, he knows “that there will probably be counterfeits, and that is inevitable with second-hand clothing and has become even more so recently”. He was therefore liable to prosecution simply by importing the goods.
The Krefeld district court confirms the proceedings and Bayen informs us that he has been convicted. It is clear from his email that he feels he has been treated unfairly: the problem is the market, not his company. “In the meantime, I have realized that I can be prosecuted for every container of used clothing,” he writes: “Every time I import a used item of clothing that is counterfeit, I am committing a criminal offence.”

For a number of years, business at Strike was excellent, and at times Bayen was considered one of the most successful retailers on the market - even during the coronavirus pandemic. In 2020, the 19-year-old entrepreneur opened his first store in Krefeld. While retailers up and down the country are struggling with closures and social distancing regulations, customers are queuing in long lines at Strike’s store openings, such as in Halle or Düsseldorf. According to his own figures, he currently has 92 employees and a turnover of 2.9 million euros.

Bayen admits to having ordered fake vintage
Mughal Brothers seems to supply what sells, including fake vintage goods on demand - a chat with a potential new customer from Germany that the retailer wants to win over supports this impression. The prospective customer sends photos of vintage sweaters with the Nike logo and asks: "Could you make these?"
The answer: “We’ve already done that”, the German adds: “I know, for Strike.” The Pakistani doesn’t disagree. He later sends evidence, including a screenshot of an exchange of messages, as he claims, with Daniel Bayen, whom he has saved as “Germany Customer”; the latter writes: “I’m looking for more designs. I need this ASAP” - “Yes please bro, send me all the designs and let me know which ones should be screen printed.” He sends photos of T-shirts stating, "All three screen printed."
To convince the new customer, the wholesaler sends screenshots of chats with another customer, which he says is Bayen.
Daniel Bayen admits to having ordered counterfeit goods. However, he claims that this was only to show his employees how to identify and sort out counterfeit goods. Or by mistake, as he hadn’t noticed: “In any case, I acted negligently in some cases,” he writes.

The Strike company stood for fashion with a credible history, sustainable consumption and cool street style. But now CORRECTIV’s research has revealed that this was partly due to at least unintentional customer deception. Instead of unique finds and vintage rarities, the range also included new mass-produced goods from Asia. Bayen estimates the proportion of fakes on the second-hand market at 20 to 30 percent.
"Gold rush mood" on the vintage market
The Strike company has since gone bankrupt. But the story goes far beyond the individual case: the second-hand clothing business is booming. According to forecasts by auditing firm PwC, the market is set to grow from 3.5 billion euros in 2022 to five to six billion euros by 2025. In 2022, the industry magazine Textilwirtschaft spoke of a “gold-rush atmosphere” with regard to vintage online retail.
Vintage is practically the opposite of fast fashion and monotonous off-the-peg mainstream fashion: unique pieces from the day before yesterday, second-hand and therefore climate-friendly, in short: consumption without a guilty conscience.