#lowest electrical services

[perfectrepairs]

perfect repair services - Electrical services

How to protect home appliances from the dangers of electricity

Protecting household appliances is an electrical hazard issue. Learn about home electrician tips and advice for your ideal maintenance to protect your home

What are the electrical risks to home appliances?

First, the electrician of Sharjah homes explains the definition of the dangers of electricity. As the dangers of electricity to the home appliances are considered to be damaging or causing the failure of one of its electrical components, or the occurrence of a fire, God forbid, on the devices. That is why it is very important to protect your devices in every home as these devices have become a daily necessity and when they stop, life stops.

The cheapest home electrician in Ajman to detect home electricity

A home electrician in Ajman offers his services at the cheapest price. Be sure that you will not find prices comparable to the prices of electricians for your ideal maintenance. As a result, your ideal maintenance technicians provide their service for free if you get a lower price for the same service.

Tips for avoiding electricity hazards

Home electrician from your ideal maintenance

7 important tips to avoid sudden electrical faults

The most common electrical problems

Abu Dhabi house electrician explains the damages of electrical hazards on the devices

One of the worst things that can damage home appliances such as washing machines, refrigerators, desktop computers, and televisions. Power failure and sudden recycling. In addition, electricity can temporarily raise the temperature of the connections, and God forbid, kill the occupants of the house with fire.

Explanation of the importance of regular maintenance of electrical appliances

Therefore, in order to protect your home appliances from electrical hazards, the homeowner must regularly disclose the electricity of the home. Undoubtedly, your ideal maintenance home electrician is a professional in detecting electrical faults. At this time, your ideal maintenance electrician has the necessary devices and equipment to detect electrical faults with ease and professionalism.

Contact an excellent home electrician to protect your home appliances

Now, it is possible to contact a home electrician, to obtain electrical tests for the entire house, to ensure that all electrical connections in the house are safe, and to deal with electrical problems professionally in consultation with an electrician.

The maintenance electrician also provides an important set of tips for protecting your appliances from electrical hazards:

Use a built-in cord to connect the appliance to electrical power and turn it off to avoid electric shock. If the voltage is higher than normal, the fuse will blow, causing a power outage and interrupting the power supply.

Turn off devices that were on before the outage, wait a few minutes when power is restored, and then reconnect the device to mains power. This is because the recovered energy can damage power plants because the device is higher than the resistance for which it was designed.

To protect all electrical devices, install fuse units in the electrical panel so that all devices are cut off at once.

Power lines are equipped with fuse units, so contact your power company to protect your equipment from power surges. This work should be done by the best electricians in Kuwait.

Protecting devices, especially computers, from power problems, as the devices contain backup batteries that allow electrical devices to operate for a long time in the event of a power outage.

Use a "voltage protection device". Because the device acts as an alternative to current and voltage regulators, as it relies on a processor to intelligently control the performance of the device, and to detect and connect to high-voltage devices that oppose it. Low voltage, lightning current, sparks, frequency fluctuations.

Electrical system

Switch gear

light sensors

spotlight bulbs

Repairing a fault in the electrical panel

The role of electrical wiring in protecting equipment and devices from electrical hazards

One of the most common causes of electrical problems in the home is improper and inappropriate electrical wiring, and these faults lead to property damage and personal injury. Therefore, an electrician who specializes in residential electrical systems must be used to prevent accidents and damage. Likewise, if an electrical fault or problem is discovered, periodic electrical maintenance and necessary maintenance should not be neglected.

Where to provide electricity services in your ideal maintenance

Home Electrician , Home Electrician Abu Dhabi , Home Electrician Sharjah , Home Electrician Dubai , Home Electrician in Ajman , Perfect Reapairs

Our perfect repair services will do it

In fact, your ideal maintenance company for technical services offers many home maintenance services. It is a comprehensive center for providing maintenance services in the Emirates. See what services your ideal maintenance technicians provide. And don't forget to check out your ideal maintenance offers and discounts.

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[mostlysignssomeportents]

Cleantech has an enshittification problem

On July 14, I'm giving the closing keynote for the fifteenth HACKERS ON PLANET EARTH, in QUEENS, NY. Happy Bastille Day! On July 20, I'm appearing in CHICAGO at Exile in Bookville.

EVs won't save the planet. Ultimately, the material bill for billions of individual vehicles and the unavoidable geometry of more cars-more traffic-more roads-greater distances-more cars dictate that the future of our cities and planet requires public transit – lots of it.

But no matter how much public transit we install, there's always going to be some personal vehicles on the road, and not just bikes, ebikes and scooters. Between deliveries, accessibility, and stubbornly low-density regions, there's going to be a lot of cars, vans and trucks on the road for the foreseeable future, and these should be electric.

Beyond that irreducible minimum of personal vehicles, there's the fact that individuals can't install their own public transit system; in places that lack the political will or means to create working transit, EVs are a way for people to significantly reduce their personal emissions.

In policy circles, EV adoption is treated as a logistical and financial issue, so governments have focused on making EVs affordable and increasing the density of charging stations. As an EV owner, I can affirm that affordability and logistics were important concerns when we were shopping for a car.

But there's a third EV problem that is almost entirely off policy radar: enshittification.

An EV is a rolling computer in a fancy case with a squishy person inside of it. While this can sound scary, there are lots of cool implications for this. For example, your EV could download your local power company's tariff schedule and preferentially charge itself when the rates are lowest; they could also coordinate with the utility to reduce charging when loads are peaking. You can start them with your phone. Your repair technician can run extensive remote diagnostics on them and help you solve many problems from the road. New features can be delivered over the air.

That's just for starters, but there's so much more in the future. After all, the signal virtue of a digital computer is its flexibility. The only computer we know how to make is the Turing complete, universal, Von Neumann machine, which can run every valid program. If a feature is computationally tractable – from automated parallel parking to advanced collision prevention – it can run on a car.

The problem is that this digital flexibility presents a moral hazard to EV manufacturers. EVs are designed to make any kind of unauthorized, owner-selected modification into an IP rights violation ("IP" in this case is "any law that lets me control the conduct of my customers or competitors"):

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

EVs are also designed so that the manufacturer can unilaterally exert control over them or alter their operation. EVs – even more than conventional vehicles – are designed to be remotely killswitched in order to help manufacturers and dealers pressure people into paying their car notes on time:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

Manufacturers can reach into your car and change how much of your battery you can access:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/edison-not-tesla/#demon-haunted-world

They can lock your car and have it send its location to a repo man, then greet him by blinking its lights, honking its horn, and pulling out of its parking space:

https://tiremeetsroad.com/2021/03/18/tesla-allegedly-remotely-unlocks-model-3-owners-car-uses-smart-summon-to-help-repo-agent/

And of course, they can detect when you've asked independent mechanic to service your car and then punish you by degrading its functionality:

https://www.repairerdrivennews.com/2024/06/26/two-of-eight-claims-in-tesla-anti-trust-lawsuit-will-move-forward/

This is "twiddling" – unilaterally and irreversibly altering the functionality of a product or service, secure in the knowledge that IP law will prevent anyone from twiddling back by restoring the gadget to a preferred configuration:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

The thing is, for an EV, twiddling is the best case scenario. As bad as it is for the company that made your EV to change how it works whenever they feel like picking your pocket, that's infinitely preferable to the manufacturer going bankrupt and bricking your car.

That's what just happened to owners of Fisker EVs, cars that cost $40-70k. Cars are long-term purchases. An EV should last 12-20 years, or even longer if you pay to swap the battery pack. Fisker was founded in 2016 and shipped its first Ocean SUV in 2023. The company is now bankrupt:

https://insideevs.com/news/723669/fisker-inc-bankruptcy-chapter-11-official/

Fisker called its vehicles "software-based cars" and they weren't kidding. Without continuous software updates and server access, those Fisker Ocean SUVs are turning into bricks. What's more, the company designed the car from the ground up to make any kind of independent service and support into a felony, by wrapping the whole thing in overlapping layers of IP. That means that no one can step in with a module that jailbreaks the Fisker and drops in an alternative firmware that will keep the fleet rolling.

This is the third EV risk – not just finance, not just charger infrastructure, but the possibility that any whizzy, cool new EV company will go bust and brick your $70k cleantech investment, irreversibly transforming your car into 5,500 lb worth of e-waste.

This confers a huge advantage onto the big automakers like VW, Kia, Ford, etc. Tesla gets a pass, too, because it achieved critical mass before people started to wise up to the risk of twiddling and bricking. If you're making a serious investment in a product you expect to use for 20 years, are you really gonna buy it from a two-year old startup with six months' capital in the bank?

The incumbency advantage here means that the big automakers won't have any reason to sink a lot of money into R&D, because they won't have to worry about hungry startups with cool new ideas eating their lunches. They can maintain the cozy cartel that has seen cars stagnate for decades, with the majority of "innovation" taking the form of shitty, extractive and ill-starred ideas like touchscreen controls and an accelerator pedal that you have to rent by the month:

https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/23/23474969/mercedes-car-subscription-faster-acceleration-feature-price

Put that way, it's clear that this isn't an EV problem, it's a cleantech problem. Cleantech has all the problems of EVs: it requires a large capital expenditure, it will be "smart," and it is expected to last for decades. That's rooftop solar, heat-pumps, smart thermostat sensor arrays, and home storage batteries.

And just as with EVs, policymakers have focused on infrastructure and affordability without paying any attention to the enshittification risks. Your rooftop solar will likely be controlled via a Solaredge box – a terrible technology that stops working if it can't reach the internet for a protracted period (that's right, your home solar stops working if the grid fails!).

I found this out the hard way during the covid lockdowns, when Solaredge terminated its 3G cellular contract and notified me that I would have to replace the modem in my system or it would stop working. This was at the height of the supply-chain crisis and there was a long waiting list for any replacement modems, with wifi cards (that used your home internet rather than a cellular connection) completely sold out for most of a year.

There are good reasons to connect rooftop solar arrays to the internet – it's not just so that Solaredge can enshittify my service. Solar arrays that coordinate with the grid can make it much easier and safer to manage a grid that was designed for centralized power production and is being retrofitted for distributed generation, one roof at a time.

But when the imperatives of extraction and efficiency go to war, extraction always wins. After all, the Solaredge system is already in place and solar installers are largely ignorant of, and indifferent to, the reasons that a homeowner might want to directly control and monitor their system via local controls that don't roundtrip through the cloud.

Somewhere in the hindbrain of any prospective solar purchaser is the experience with bricked and enshittified "smart" gadgets, and the knowledge that anything they buy from a cool startup with lots of great ideas for improving production, monitoring, and/or costs poses the risk of having your 20 year investment bricked after just a few years – and, thanks to the extractive imperative, no one will be able to step in and restore your ex-solar array to good working order.

I make the majority of my living from books, which means that my pay is very "lumpy" – I get large sums when I publish a book and very little in between. For many years, I've used these payments to make big purchases, rather than financing them over long periods where I can't predict my income. We've used my book payments to put in solar, then an induction stove, then a battery. We used one to buy out the lease on our EV. And just a month ago, we used the money from my upcoming Enshittification book to put in a heat pump (with enough left over to pay for a pair of long-overdue cataract surgeries, scheduled for the fall).

When we started shopping for heat pumps, it was clear that this was a very exciting sector. First of all, heat pumps are kind of magic, so efficient and effective it's almost surreal. But beyond the basic tech – which has been around since the late 1940s – there is a vast ferment of cool digital features coming from exciting and innovative startups.

By nature, I'm the kid of person who likes these digital features. I started out as a computer programmer, and while I haven't written production code since the previous millennium, I've been in and around the tech industry for my whole adult life. But when it came time to buy a heat-pump – an investment that I expected to last for 20 years or more – there was no way I was going to buy one of these cool new digitally enhanced pumps, no matter how much the reviewers loved them. Sure, they'd work well, but it's precisely because I'm so knowledgeable about high tech that I could see that they would fail very, very badly.

You may think EVs are bullshit, and they are – though there will always be room for some personal vehicles, and it's better for people in transit deserts to drive EVs than gas-guzzlers. You may think rooftop solar is a dead-end and be all-in on utility scale solar (I think we need both, especially given the grid-disrupting extreme climate events on our horizon). But there's still a wide range of cleantech – induction tops, heat pumps, smart thermostats – that are capital intensive, have a long duty cycle, and have good reasons to be digitized and networked.

Take home storage batteries: your utility can push its rate card to your battery every time they change their prices, and your battery can use that information to decide when to let your house tap into the grid, and when to switch over to powering your home with the solar you've stored up during the day. This is a very old and proven pattern in tech: the old Fidonet BBS network used a version of this, with each BBS timing its calls to other nodes to coincide with the cheapest long-distance rates, so that messages for distant systems could be passed on:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FidoNet

Cleantech is a very dynamic sector, even if its triumphs are largely unheralded. There's a quiet revolution underway in generation, storage and transmission of renewable power, and a complimentary revolution in power-consumption in vehicles and homes:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/12/s-curve/#anything-that-cant-go-on-forever-eventually-stops

But cleantech is too important to leave to the incumbents, who are addicted to enshittification and planned obsolescence. These giant, financialized firms lack the discipline and culture to make products that have the features – and cost savings – to make them appealing to the very wide range of buyers who must transition as soon as possible, for the sake of the very planet.

It's not enough for our policymakers to focus on financing and infrastructure barriers to cleantech adoption. We also need a policy-level response to enshittification.

Ideally, every cleantech device would be designed so that it was impossible to enshittify – which would also make it impossible to brick:

Based on free software (best), or with source code escrowed with a trustee who must release the code if the company enters administration (distant second-best);

All patents in a royalty-free patent-pool (best); or in a trust that will release them into a royalty-free pool if the company enters administration (distant second-best);

No parts-pairing or other DRM permitted (best); or with parts-pairing utilities available to all parties on a reasonable and non-discriminatory basis (distant second-best);

All diagnostic and error codes in the public domain, with all codes in the clear within the device (best); or with decoding utilities available on demand to all comers on a reasonable and non-discriminatory basis (distant second-best).

There's an obvious business objection to this: it will reduce investment in innovative cleantech because investors will perceive these restrictions as limits on the expected profits of their portfolio companies. It's true: these measures are designed to prevent rent-extraction and other enshittificatory practices by cleantech companies, and to the extent that investors are counting on enshittification rents, this might prevent them from investing.

But that has to be balanced against the way that a general prohibition on enshittificatory practices will inspire consumer confidence in innovative and novel cleantech products, because buyers will know that their investments will be protected over the whole expected lifespan of the product, even if the startup goes bust (nearly every startup goes bust). These measures mean that a company with a cool product will have a much larger customer-base to sell to. Those additional sales more than offset the loss of expected revenue from cheating and screwing your customers by twiddling them to death.

There's also an obvious legal objection to this: creating these policies will require a huge amount of action from Congress and the executive branch, a whole whack of new rules and laws to make them happen, and each will attract court-challenges.

That's also true, though it shouldn't stop us from trying to get legal reforms. As a matter of public policy, it's terrible and fucked up that companies can enshittify the things we buy and leave us with no remedy.

However, we don't have to wait for legal reform to make this work. We can take a shortcut with procurement – the things governments buy with public money. The feds, the states and localities buy a lot of cleantech: for public facilities, for public housing, for public use. Prudent public policy dictates that governments should refuse to buy any tech unless it is designed to be enshittification-resistant.

This is an old and honorable tradition in policymaking. Lincoln insisted that the rifles he bought for the Union Army come with interoperable tooling and ammo, for obvious reasons. No one wants to be the Commander in Chief who shows up on the battlefield and says, "Sorry, boys, war's postponed, our sole supplier decided to stop making ammunition."

By creating a market for enshittification-proof cleantech, governments can ensure that the public always has the option of buying an EV that can't be bricked even if the maker goes bust, a heat-pump whose digital features can be replaced or maintained by a third party of your choosing, a solar controller that coordinates with the grid in ways that serve their owners – not the manufacturers' shareholders.

We're going to have to change a lot to survive the coming years. Sure, there's a lot of scary ways that things can go wrong, but there's plenty about our world that should change, and plenty of ways those changes could be for the better. It's not enough for policymakers to focus on ensuring that we can afford to buy whatever badly thought-through, extractive tech the biggest companies want to foist on us – we also need a focus on making cleantech fit for purpose, truly smart, reliable and resilient.

Support me this summer on the Clarion Write-A-Thon and help raise money for the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/26/unplanned-obsolescence/#better-micetraps

Image: 臺灣古寫真上色 (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Raid_on_Kagi_City_1945.jpg

Grendelkhan (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ground_mounted_solar_panels.gk.jpg

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

[starlightshadowsworld]

Kinda pissed the whole big 3 pact didn't have consequences.

Not like breaking an oath sworn on the Styx is said to be a worse fate than death.

Not like they swore on the Styx to not have kids and than 3 came along.

Those being Thalia, Jason and Percy.

Because Hazel, Bianca and Nico were all born prior to the pact.

But what if it did have consequences?

They made the pact because their kids were too powerful and we're a threat to mortals.

And this isn't said but I think Zeus in particular was afraid that a son child he sired could be powerful enough to overthrow him.

Like how Uranus overthrew Kronos who was than overthrown by Zeus.

Clearly the fear wasn't enough to stop Zeus.

Enter one Beryl Grace, the mortal star who managed to get the attention of both Zeus and Jupiter.

Giving birth to both Greek and Roman demigods.

Something that to my knowledge hasn't happened anywhere else in the series.

And without letting anyone knowing abd getting the biggest I told you so in history, Zeus has to deal with this.

Hera finds out because of course she does.

And offers Jason to Lupa, the wolf goddesses.

While Thalia runs off when she's old enough, Hades founds out and is very sore after the whole Maria Di Angelo incident sends a monster after her.

She almost does but Zeus saves her by turning her into a tree.

And when she's free she joins the hunt.

And the fates are pissed that Thalia being of the hunt is shielded by Artemis and they cannot intervene.

But there's still one unexpected item in the bagging area: Jason

(I'm well aware of Percy but the fates saw his life and went yeah it's gonna suck enough let's leave this one.)

Jason who has been abandoned by all he loves to the literal wolves.

A child, little more than a baby being trained by the wolf goddess himself.

Perfect.

Jason gets older and stronger, he goes to Camp Jupiter and is made Praetor.

He goes on quest after quest in service for the God's.

But instead of unwavering loyalty and being happy simply to serve the God's, as expected, Jason feels empty.

Because if there's one thing Jason wants, more than thing in the world.

It's to have a family.

He adores the people of Camp Jupiter but their almost colleagues, acquaintances.

United under their existence and mission to serve the God's.

His only true friend, Reyna is distant, she is a companion he is happy to have in his life but their relationship has always been professional.

And she's made herself clear that she doesn't agree with his want for family. That it's kind of ridiculous.

Jason snapped at that, saying it was easy for her to say as she had her sister Hylla.

Though they didn't see much of each other, Hylla still visited camp and both were close.

While he had no one.

It was one of the only times Jason had gotten angry at her.

And while taken aback, Reyna apologised. Though it only reminded Jason how lonely he truly was.

People at Camp spoke to him, sparred with him but it was like he was a star.

Something to be looked at in awe but couldn't be approached because it was out of reach.

Jason refuted that he was better any of them, even putting himself in the lowest cohort just yo be seen as anything but that.

His efforts were futile.

Jason had been claimed his first day of Camp.

And since than he'd been rendered untouchable.

He hated it more than anything.

And than Jason began to dream.

Dreams the fates slowly fed him while whispering in his ears that he did have a family.

His father claimed him, so he knew of him.

His family, his father was waiting for him.

No God's entered Camp Jupiter of course so the only way was to meet him in Olympus itself.

He dreamt of marble floors, of a man on a throne who shared his electric blue eyes.

Hand outstretched and a warm smile, welcoming his son to his side.

A father, the fates whispered your family.

You can have all you ever wanted.

And Jason craved that.

He wanted it more than anything.

And they knew it.

Jason gave in.

He sneaks out of Camp without anyone seeing him, following the path from his dreams all the way to the Empire State building.

The usual guard isn't their and from his dreams Jason knows how to access the 600th floor.

It's exactly as his dreams looked.

And their, their was his father in all his glory atop his throne.

Jason can't help the smile on his face.

He's done it.

Finally

Finally he would have the family he always wanted.

He marches to his father's throne, dropping to a bow and announcing himself as Jason Grace, son of Jupiter and that he's so happy to meet his father, so honoured to meet him.

When he looks up.

The smile he expected is nowhere to be found.

His father is enraged.

As are the rest of the Olympians.

"A son?! You, you dare berate me brother for my own offspring while you've been hiding your own!"

"Son of Jupiter?"

"How did he get here?!"

Tells of outrage and anger echo throughout the room but none are as mad as the God before him.

"You... Insolent child dare to approach me. You dare to come to Olympus, to what? Intimidate me?"

Jason shook his head frantically "No no I only wanted to meet you... I'm your son."

Why... Was this going so horribly...?

Zeus sneered at him "I don't know what you think you are doing here, but if you think for a second you belong in my presence you are sorely mistaken. You are nothing, not to me not anyone else."

And something.

Something in Jason snapped.

His dream, everything he ever wanted burning before him.

He laughed.

It was loud.

Hysterical.

He even had tears in his eyes.

"All this time... All this time they say, your father is the mighty Jupiter. Your father is a King amongst men, the vanquisher of Kronos."

He laughed again.

How wrong they were.

How wrong he was.

"I wanted nothing more to meet my father, this mighty king... And you, you are just a pathetic man with a paper crown."

Silence swept the throne room.

Zeus stood before Jason, enraged didn't even capture just how angry he was.

But Jason found he didn't care.

He was angry.

The being he'd served his whole life was not the great King he'd thought him to be.

His fathered towered over him but Jason didn't back down.

He'd been lied to.

All his life he was to serve his father, his whole life he'd served his father and he didn't even want him.

He didn't love him.

Jason questioned if he ever could feel love.

His life meant nothing.

"You... Insolent!"

Jason didn't hear the rest of the speech.

Not before a bolt of lighting flew at him.

Instinctively Jason threw up his arm, reaching out for the Bolt.

It stopped.

It swerved.

And made a dent in his father's throne.

Jason looked down at his hands in shock.

Before chuckling "is that, all you've got?"

That... That was the infamous Master Bolt?

His father truly was nothing like he'd been famed to be.

If a lowly Demigod like Jason could swat his prized weapon like a fly.

No one had ever made it to Olympus without being detected.

They hadn't even noticed him until Jason announced himself.

They were pathetic.

How... How had he spent his whole life training, serving them.

"Is this why you require demigods?" Jason thought out loud "your weapons are nothing but relics collecting dust. Your feats are nothing but stories. Your power, nothing but a distant memory."

Jason almost pitied them.

Almost.

"So you spawn demigods to do your dirty work, your chores for you because you can't." He snorted.

They were nothing.

They were nothing so they trained their young to do their bidding.

Ignored... Alone...nothing but the fantasy of serving their parents who didn't care for them at all.

Fury.

"How dare you!"

"Oh I dare, all your good for is screwing a mortal and sitting on your backsides! I've lost friends! I've lost so many comrades on your stupid quests!"

A coldness settled in him.

A surety amongst his fury.

"I've lost my childhood, my life for beings who wouldn't care if I lived or died. They'd just bed another mortal and sent the fetus off to battle... And I won't lose any more for you."

Their was defiance in Jason's eyes as he eyed his father.

His father who looked at him with pure rage.

"If you do not silence that demigod Zeus... I will"

Jason didn't bother to see who spoke.

"No, this is my mistake and I will correct it."

"What are you gonna do, smite me? Gonna have to get one of my many... Many siblings to pull your bolt out for you."

Zeus snarled, but Jason was raised by wolves and simply scoffed.

His father blasted him.

Those watching would say it blew the egotistical demigod to smithereens.

Others say he transported himself elsewhere.

Hades himself vertified that the boys soul had not entered his domain.

Jason left, changed.

His yearning for a family had been stamped out.

He was nothing but a tool.

A soilder.

But now, now his sword wasn't pointed to monsters.

But the God's themselves.

They'd stole him.

They'd stole his dream.

They'd stole his childhood.

They'd stole the lives off their own kids to further their goals.

And Jason.

He watched as the crumbled throne of Krios reformed around him.

He sat atop it.

A smile on his face that was all teeth.

Teeth stained with ichor that he licked from his lips.

He was going to destroy them all.

And the fates they smiled upon him.

Their work here was done.

[reginaldqueribundus]

the year is 2048. a smiling young farmer in a power wheelchair sells me the biggest bag of muesli I've ever seen out of a market stall built from repurposed drone parts. he sees the toys in my reusable bag and insists on throwing in some homemade cat treats “on the house”. I get an email from the wind farm: they've deposited another $20 in my account for using up excess electricity outside peak hours, so I decide to splurge on some flavoured honey and boba tea. I tell the barista I feel like a billionaire today and she smiles politely and asks me what a “billionaire” is. I run into an old friend handing out free insulin packets and we spend some time catching up. I've got a new gig at the organ printing depot and she's on rotating job assignments with the Workers' Cooperative: this month is insulin distribution, last month was reprogramming robot dogs as automated planters for the pollinator farm, next month she'll be on a work crew converting the old football stadium into a greenhouse. She's been sleeping in the park (by choice, of course, the local housing co-op has tons of suites open) but the climate bureau is cloud seeding this weekend and we're expecting a lot of rain. I invite her to crash at my place. She smiles and says she would like that. Our trolley ride home is briefly halted by an impromptu pride parade and the sun is setting as we pass the ivy-covered sign advertising the golf course that once existed where my neighbourhood now stands. A friendly technician explains she's just finished replacing the faulty router on our block so we can use the public WiFi again. I start a fire in the fireplace and sort through some mail: a postcard from one of my exes in Hawaii installing carbon dioxide scrubbers that double as frog habitats, a flyer for a music recital at the rehab clinic, and a letter from International Blood Services declining my donation because they are fully stocked. I ask my Global Music Archive uplink to select a random decade, country and genre and it starts a playlist while the two of us snuggle together on the couch under a hand-knitted blanket and my cat makes biscuits on top. On TV, a newscaster says global temperatures are at their lowest point in the last 40 years. I flip channels to some standup comedian saying kids these days don't know how to conceal when they're high because there's no cops anymore. We laugh until the rain softly falling on the roof lulls us to sleep.

[goodfish-bowl]

A Way of Death

Ectoberhaunt Day 12: Way of Life/Cause of Death

AO3 Link

Summary: Everything had been going pretty well for Danny, all things considered. Things being his own body buried just outside of town. Joseph Brown is having a decidedly horrible day, and really hopes this ends in a court case. 

Warnings: Description of corpse

Words: 1149

Notes: I do love me some Corpse AU. As a treat.

@ectoberhaunt

The Coroner, Joseph Brown, looked down at the body they’d been given, then at the info sheet. He’d ran the standard series of tests, like protocol demanded, and his gut wrenched. He’d never dealt with a John Doe corpse before, not like some of the bigger city morgues. His role and title in the APPD was more cosmetic than anything else. Since the ghost arrived over a year ago, human crime had been at an all time low, hell, they probably had the lowest numbers in the country. He mostly worked in the funeral service now adays.

The body in front of Joseph was small, not much larger than a child, and the tests confirmed as much. Male, young, probably early teens, and had been buried in the ground for at least a year at this point, probably since right before the ghosts had shown up. There weren’t really any leads at this point, but it wasn’t his job to find leads, just make notes of what he finds. Which is what he’d been doing.

The blanket the teen had been wrapped in was already sealed away into a specimen bag, faded and tattered from it’s time in the ground. It looked like it had once been space themed, and had been tightly, almost lovingly, wrapped around the teen, liked he’d been tucked into his grave. Which made no sense, since he had been found in an unmarked grave on the outside of town, not too far from a well known stargazing spot. It was dichotomic. Joseph had noted as much in his report. The clothes too, Joseph noted, were odd. They were definitely the ones the teen had died in. They didn’t have the same damage as the body did. It had been a hoodie and sweats, also added to a specimen bag. It really was like someone had lovely put this boy to bed before burying him deep in the ground. It made him nearly sick to think someone could do that.

The body itself had its own issues. He was dealing with a John Doe, with no identifiable features other than Caucasian and black hair, and perhaps a clothing size. Everything else had rotten away during his time in the ground. This surprisingly didn’t stop him from identifying a bit about the boy’s life, nor his cause of death.

Whoever his John Doe was, he had a mild case of malnutrition and some growing problems. Due to what? No clue. Genetic tissue wasn’t usable for something as fine point as that, and Amity didn’t really have the resources for that anyways. A bone sample found the kid’s exact age to be 13-14 years old, which was tragic in its own way. The cause of death had been electrocution.

Joseph had read about electrocution victims in his textbooks, but whatever voltage this boy had been hit with was high enough to cause visible bone damage across his entire left side, along with instantaneously cooking him alive. Kid went out painfully and quickly. It appeared to start in his left hand, probably where he ended up touching some exposed electric whatever, went through his entire body, before exiting from the right foot into the ground. Whatever the kid had been wearing must’ve been protective to some degree, because the voltage seemed to have a hell of a time leaving once it got in. It probably ended up doing more damage than it did good.

On that note, Joseph didn’t think it was murder, this definitely seemed accidental, probably some kids just messing around. But accidental or not, there had been a cover up. He didn’t understand why whoever found the body hadn’t just reported it and gone about things the legal way. They had obviously cared about whoever this kid had been, so why bury him in an unmarked grave?

After a moment, Joseph found a reason. With how young the boy was, on top of the malnutrition and cause of death, a neglect case could be filed against his parents, which would also link into the lack of a missing person’s report matching the profile.

Joseph sighed aloud, thinking to himself, What a way to go.

  Danny had been minding his own business, carrying out his daily afterlife like he typically did.  Barely sleep, go to school, sleep in class, fail his classes, ditch because a ghost showed up, and then sulk around town (a.k.a. avoiding going home for as long as possible). Usually this happened with or without Sam and Tucker. If he was lucky, he’d make it home just before curfew, avoid talking to his parents, and then sneak out again for patrol. Rinse and repeat. It was a shitty way of life, and he knew it, but it didn’t feel like he had any other options.

Danny froze, suddenly feeling sick, almost getting shot out of the sky by his parents in the process. Ignoring the feeling for a moment, he ditched his usual game of ghost and hunter to go find somewhere safe to recover and spill his guts. Usually, he’d keep this up until his parents went home for the night, making sure they left the other ghosts alone, but not like this. He’d mess up.

Danny buckled on the roof of a random building in the old historic district, now dubbed the Neon District. He wasted no time emptying out what little food he’d managed to eat that day. He felt awful, like someone was poking and prodding at his insides. Another wave of nausea spiraled over him, and he fell to his hands and knees, gagging.

Ancients, what was going on? It felt like someone was walking all over his-

Danny’s head snapped up and towards the edges of town. No. It couldn’t actually… He took off at max speed towards the outskirts of town.

The area had always been quiet, and it was far enough from town that it was rarely ever visited. It also just happened to be once of the best places close by for stargazing. His parents used to take him, whenever they weren’t busy with some new invention or project, which happened less and less as the years went by. They hadn’t gone even once since the portal had opened up. He figured it had been a safe spot as long as he kept away from the used area.

Danny touched down in what was blocked off like an active crime scene. The small clearing was covered in powered off cameras and lights, and a hole in the ground in the center of it all. There was nothing but dirt in the bottom of it.

It was gone. His body, which he’d buried in this exact spot, was gone. Danny was filled with a harsh mix of rage and dread. His horrible way of life was about to get a lot more complicated.

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[insert-witty-user-name-here]

10+ Good Things Biden has Done: Climate & Labor Edition

Just a list of 10+ good things Biden has done in the last 4 years because I’ve been hearing too much rhetoric that it doesn’t matter who you vote for. It does make a difference. 

Find more 10+ good things here, here and here.

Rejoined the Paris Climate Accords.  

Listed more than 24 million acres of public lands across the country as environmentally protected and has channeled more than $18 billion dollars toward conservation projects. (And revoked the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline amongst others). (x)

Invested $369 billion to reduce greenhouse emissions and promote clean energy technologies through the Inflation Reduction Act. Through the tax incentives under the Inflation Reduction Act, renewable energy (such as wind, solar, and hydropower) has surpassed coal-fired generation in the electric power sector for the first time, making it the second-biggest source of energy behind natural gas. (x)

Strengthened protections against workplace assault through the Speak Out Act. (x) 

Increased protections for workers during the union bargaining process (x)

Is making it easier for passengers to obtain refunds when airlines cancel or significantly change their flights, significantly delay their bags, or fail to provide extra services when purchased. (x)  

Invested $1.2 trillion into roads, waterlines, broadband networks, airports and more allowing for more bridges, railroads, tunnels, roads, and more through the Inflation Reduction Act (which also added 670,000 jobs). (idk about you but I like driving on well maintained roads and having more rail options).  

Strengthened overtime protections for federal employees (x)

Raised the minimum wage for federal workers and contractors to $15. (x)

Strengthened protections for farmworkers by expanding the activities protected from retaliation by the National Labor Relations Act and more. (Previously anti-retaliation provisions under the National Labor Relations Act applies mostly to only U.S. citizens) (x)

Invested $80 billion for the Internal Revenue Service to hire new agents, audit the wealth, modernize its technology, and more. Additionally, created $300 billion in new revenue through corporate tax increases. (x) 

Lowered the unemployment rate to 3.5% — the lowest in 50 years.

Proposed investments in a lot of programs including universal pre-k, green energy, mental health programs across all sectors, a national medical leave program for all workers and more. (x) 

Last… let’s also not forget all the truly terrible things Trump did when he was in office. If you need a reminder, scroll this list, this one mostly for giggles + horror, for actual horror about what a Trump presidency has in store, learn about ‘Project 2025’ from the Heritage Foundation. I know this post is about reasons to vote FOR Biden but let’s not forget the many, many reasons to vote for him over Trump.

Looking for more?

10+ good things Biden has done in education and immigration and

10+ good things Biden has done in healthcare and housing

10+ good things Biden has done in the justice and courts system

A few other notes

Voting for Biden or Trump shouldn’t be the only reason you vote. You know what elections have more power over your life? LOCAL elections. If you’re not feeling jazzed about Biden… vote for someone really cool running for mayor, or your rep, or on your school board and then begrudgingly vote for Biden. 

A reminder that if someone online is trying to discourage you to vote there’s a good chance they are a paid actor to do so. Voter suppression was a well-documented tactic during the 2016 election and I’m sure the trolls are out in force again. 

Check your voter registration here, make a plan to vote, and encourage your friends to vote as well. 

All in all, yeah… there’s a lot of shitty things still happening. There’s always going to be shit but things aren’t going to change on their own. And that change starts (it certainly doesn’t end) with voting. 

Go vote in November.

[architectuul]

Mexico's Urban Improvement Program

For five decades, few architects had public or social commissions in Mexico, and it was not until the election of the left‑wing political party Morena in 2018 that selected architects were given the opportunity to design for the wider population. During his six‑year term in office, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) wants to bring about a better future for neglected populations by implementing roughly a thousand urban infrastructure projects in Mexico’s poorest and most dangerous neighbourhoods with the Urban Improvement Program.

But there is a lack of time, money and experience among most of the people involved, as well as a lack of expertise and interest in maintenance after completion. For a project to have the best chance of long‑term survival, adoption by the population and the lowest possible maintenance requirements are crucial. In Mexico City I had an opportunity to talk to Mr. Román Meyer Falcón, a prominent figure in the field of urban and agrarian development, currently serving as the Secretary of Agrarian, Land, and Urban Development (SEDATU) in Mexico.

Mr. Meyer Falcón's extensive background in public service and urban planning has positioned him as a key advocate for equitable and inclusive urban development in Mexico. His leadership has played a significant role in shaping policies and initiatives that promote affordable housing, land rights, and sustainable urban growth. In addition to his national role, he holds the position of President of the UN Habitat Assembly. In this capacity, he spearheads international intergovernmental efforts to address global urbanization challenges, working toward the implementation of sustainable urban development goals on a global scale.

‘The work of architects on public projects in Mexico goes far beyond mere design’

Who, how and why started this process of the Program of Program Improvement?

RMF: When we started this administration in 2018, we had already worked in advance with the transition team of Mr. Andrés Manuel López Obrador, now President. The idea was how we could establish a comprehensive program that could address the major needs in urban contexts of high marginalization; that is, those neighborhoods lacking water, electricity, drainage, paving, basic services, infrastructure. We set out to create a comprehensive program to make these facilities and public spaces that do not exist in the neighborhoods of greatest marginalization, which, unfortunately, often —not always— are the neighborhoods with the highest crime insecurity.

The new public market in Huimanguillo, Tabasco by 128 Arquitectura y Diseño Urbano replaces the old, which was affected in its infra and superstructure derived from the lack of maintenance and the high level of corrosion. Photo © F8PHOTO, Alejandro Gutiérrez

In addition to this issue, the Program not only makes facilities and public spaces with an added value —architecture—, but also, in the vicinity of the works, of a plaza, of a sports facility, within 500-600 meters, we provide direct housing support so that women, in particular, can make improvements: build a bathroom, add a second level, install a water tank, make a door, apply waterproofing. They are not given the money directly. Also, within the same radius, 500-700 meters from a facility, we deliver public deeds; that is, the documentation or possession title that proves that people own their house. The fourth element of the Program is that in those same municipalities we update the urban development plans, which are the basis for the granting of construction permits. So, these are the four components of the Program: public facilities spaces, housing actions, regularization of land tenure actions, public deeds, and something very important for us, the issue of planning; that is, these documents that grant construction permits, that establish where we should not urbanize, where we should and how we should do it as efficiently as possible: where housing goes, where commerce goes, where infrastructure goes, etc.

The renovation of the Old Municipal Trail in San Cristobal de las Casas by LAU creates new public spaces that allow the integration with the cultural elements that are part of the collective memory. Photo © Jaime Navarro

And the component for which I imagine this interview is about is one of the four pillars of the Program, which is the facilities. When we analyzed this, at that time with Mr. López Obrador, we put on the table, sort to speak, the possibility of addressing a specific type of infrastructure. Commonly, when talking about public infrastructure or urban services, water, paving, lighting are thought of as the most important. But there is a type that we think is the most important urban infrastructure of all, which brings together all the elements: and that it is public space, which combines water, light, drainage, paving, vegetation. And in neighborhoods with lag or marginalization, it is a very often lacking element, and that is where we work  in those neighborhoods.

Chicxulub Market Square by MMX Studio improves the square and the construction of the market. Photo @ Dane Alonso

We have worked in advance with the communities. This means that 8 months or maybe a year before a backhoe comes in to do the foundation, we had participatory workshops with the community, with the local authorities, sometimes with the State government, to tell them “well, of all the needs you have, let's define which are the most important." So they tell us "well, for us a high school is very important, because our children currently take an hour and a half to go to the closest one, because we don't have one." Alright, then we ask "what else?", considering that we have a limited budget. And we work on a program based on the main needs.

Which were the criteria of the selection of the communities and location?

RMF: Primarily, in 60% or 70% of the cases, the locations correspond to places where the Federal Government has some major infrastructure project. So, this means, for example: the Maya Train corridor, which is 1600 km long; the Isthmus of Tehuantepec Corridor, which is 400 km; the vicinity of the Felipe Ángeles International Airport; the northern border with the United States, which was more of a fiscal incentive project. That's where the program supports the large federal infrastructure investments with its four components. So, we attend or accompany these large developments. For example, in the case of the Maya Train, some neighboring municipalities: having a train station does not mean that there are automatic immediate urban benefits. So, to avoid having, let's say, elements of great contrast, if the train station influences or benefits a population one or two kilometers away, we still have very lagging neighborhoods further away. So, we do complementary actions in those surrounding areas, but far from the train station itself. 

Bacalar Ecopark by Collective C733 reduces the requested program to a minimum and act with actude to be able to wander through the natural richness of the flora and fauna of the site, affecting as little as possible. The lagoon is in the largest freshwater bacterial reef in the world. Photo © Rafael Gamo

So in every location you kind of need to do the preliminary research of what the community needs?

RMF: Yes, we arrive with a team of urban planners, architects, sociologists, so that they can start working as quickly as possible with the communities and with the local authorities. And that's where we make a basic master plan of the city. We say, "well, the marginalization of this city, which is in the middle of the Maya Train path, is more prevalent in these neighborhoods. These neighborhoods are the ones with the greatest lack of basic services." And among those basic services lacking, we focus on public space. So, we go from the general to start defining polygons or neighborhoods, and once we have those polygons, with densities, with levels of marginalization and needs, we go to the chosen neighborhoods and conduct participatory workshops in coordination with the municipality. And there we start to cross the different interests: because, for example, the municipality might say "I want this," which is usually what the Mayor has in mind. But it is also important to attend to the Mayor, because otherwise he will say "you never asked me what to do, so why do I have to maintain and operate the space?". So, we have to cross-reference the needs of the community and the local authority, so that, as far as possible, both parties are satisfied and say "well, maybe it wasn't what I wanted, but I agree that a high school should be built"; "I agree that a fire station should be built"; "I agree that a public market should be built." With that, we define: we see what are the best possible lands, which can be granted to us by the local or state authority. Because we do not buy the land, it must be given to us as a donation, because the infrastructure is handed over to the municipalities; it belongs to them. That is, that high school belongs to the Municipality; that market belongs to the Municipality, that sports facility belongs to the Municipality. We do not keep the infrastructure: it is a federal Program to support local authorities.

Museum of Geology by MMX Studio in Progreso, Yucatan is a cultural element and an element of public space. Photo © Dane Alonso

How actually could you manage to make so many projects in such a short time?

RMF: It's an intensive job, there's no other way... A team effort, yes. But also I personally visit each of these facilities, on average, 10 times. Before the backhoe comes in, I check the plan, I tell them "yes, move the building, move it here, place it here, it's misoriented." I do other visits during the preliminary works, during the foundation stage, during the structure formation, during the configurations of facilities, during the masonry, finishing, and completion stages. 

The Pyrotechnics Museum by Miguel Montor concerns a location that is recognized for its work with pyrotechnics at a national and international level for many years. As part of the request for post-pandemic economic recovery, it was proposed that the local workforce was to be used throughout the construction of the project, in order to generate employment. Photo © Onnis Luque

There's a very common phrase in Mexico that says: “a una orden dada, no supervisada, se la lleva la chingada”, that implies that if an instruction is given but not properly overseen or followed up on, it is likely to be neglected, forgotten, or poorly executed. Which is somewhat the nature of this administration and this government. The President is also a construction supervisor: every 15 days, for example, he goes to the Maya Train and checks the status of the project. And so, the only way to achieve these goals is for you to be physically supervising.

But you also work not only to check the work of architecture, also as you told you work very strongly with the communities. How do you get the trust of people?

RMF: I believe in trust, but also determination. Because we cannot afford to be ambiguous. We have so little time to complete these projects —because the program, from planning to the delivery of the work, has to ideally be done within a year or a year and a half—, so you have to close the fieldwork as quickly as possible: agree with the authorities and communities. Collaboration agreements are signed where it is stated 'yes, we all agree that we are going to make here the new public square' and everyone signs in understanding. And, as much as possible, as the construction process goes on, solve socialization problems. 

Public works are a constant conflict. In general, construction is a conflict. If you build, it's a conflict, whether it's public or private. But when it's public, it's greater, because it is a matter of common interest; because public funds belong to everyone, to all Mexicans. So, let's say, many points of view, local interests come into play, which must be politically addressed as much as possible. Because otherwise, upon delivery, the reception and operation of the spaces can become a conflict. That's why we, every two months, go back to each space and do supervision work: we check if there is light, if the bathrooms are working, if they are open, if there are waterproofing problems, if the municipality is correctly giving operation and maintenance.

The renovation of the main square in Cosoleacaque, Veracruz by Colectivo MX, Gabriel Konzevik, Reyes Ríos and Larraín arquitectos improves the quality of social life based on an in-depth review of how and why people have used existing facilities. Photo © Andrés Cedillo - Grupo Provimex

So, it's not only about the construction, but also about following up every two months with the local authorities to see if they are using and taking advantage of them. And if not, you call the Mayor the Governor and say “listen, I have three abandoned projects in your state, what happened?”. So, it's a constant political pressure of supervision.

Something interesting is that almost all the facilities made in the first years, 2019 and 2020, are now active; I believe all of them. Because a political effort was made to ensure permanence. This means that when a work is delivered, it does not mean that it will function the next day. You have to wait approximately two years for a sense of permanence to consolidate among the community and the local authorities to understand that it is a place that needs to be followed up. So, after delivering a facility, you have to be two years behind those responsible.

And how did you do the selection of architects?

RMF: In the first year, we worked with UNAM’s Architecture Faculty, for better or worse. Because UNAM, which is the great National University, is also a very complicated bureaucratic apparatus, and when two bureaucratic apparatuses want to work in short times, it's a disaster. But aside from that, it gave me the opportunity to get to know the work of many architects. It was, let's say, a letter of introduction to good and not-so-good architects.

The House of Culture and the Kindergarten (CADI) in Tlatenchi by Taller CD represent two projects developed jointly, although in separate properties. Photo © Andrés Cedillo

After that year of work, in which the University and the Faculty made the executive projects, we were able to meet many architects and from there we began to define which ones were the good ones and for what types of projects. We chose many of them for other years insofar as they were architects or firms who are interested in reviewing the work on-site. Because there were some who delivered the executive project and afterwards never returned to the site.

The architect is forged in the field. Indeed, it is important that they enroll in a Faculty and study. But architecture is done in the field and, hence, the only way to learn is by stepping on the territory, there's no other way. So, we also got involved with those architects who we know return to the building sites, who supervise their own works without us having to pressure them; those who return, that review the project with the company, with the director, make their observations, and that when I see them —in those visits that I make— raise their hand and say what is wrong and, in front of the construction company, in the field, we debate.

How many architects are included in the Program?

RMF: Well, there must be more than a hundred, and all of them are nationals.

Can you present me with one of the studios?

RMF: Yes, for example, we have Loreta Castro from the firm Taller Capital. Just yesterday, we delivered a project of hers, the Bicentennial Park in the municipality of Ecatepec. It is the most intensively used urban park in the country, located in one of the poorest and most densely populated municipalities. It also serves as a regulating basin, capturing and filtering water due to significant water shortages in the area. We also have Gaby Carrillo, who has assisted us in many projects, as well as Estudio MMX, which is, let's say, "special," but good. Miguel Montor, who worked on the Mammoth Museum. They all teach somewhere...

What’s next? Will you continue to do this?

RMF: I believe so. You know, there's a saying: "an old monkey doesn't learn new tricks." At our age, we're already specialized in something. In our case, urban planning and architecture. It's very unlikely that I'll quit. So I have to stick with something I like; it's a vocation; something I enjoy despite the unfriendly bureaucracy and the fact that it is often tyring.

For instance, I like the project behind you: it's the new Agrarian Archive, the second largest and most important archive in Latin America, located on Reforma Avenue, the most important one in Latin America as well.

This section over here is a Botanical Garden, with sections that range from jungle to desert, with different lighting conditions. It also has a public plaza with a small skatepark. Below is the entire archive, and we have the bureaucratic part as well. This is an example of institutional projects that we undertake within the Ministry without architects. These are the types of projects that we have been very enthusiastic about. This particular project is already about 65% complete. The structure is already up, and we are working on coverings and facilities: there's, for example, an Agrarianism Museum, which will be made up of pieces that blend in with the landscape and the botanical garden. We have pieces from the National Institute of Anthropology and History from the 16th and 17th centuries, which we will use as references for why agrarianism in Mexico is so important. 

[thepastisalreadywritten]

SEOUL, South Korea — In fried-chicken-obsessed South Korea, restaurants serving the nation's favourite fast-food dish dot every street corner.

But Kang Ji-young's establishment brings something a little different to the table: a robot is cooking the chicken.

Eaten at everything from tiny family gatherings to a 10-million-viewer live-streamed "mukbang" -- eating broadcast -- by K-pop star Jungkook of BTS fame, fried chicken is deeply embedded in South Korean culture.

Paired with cold lager and known as "chimaek" -- a portmanteau of the Korean words for chicken and beer -- it is a staple of Seoul's famed baseball-watching experience.

The domestic market -- the world's third largest, after the United States and China -- is worth about seven trillion won ($5.3 billion).

However, labour shortages are starting to bite as South Korea faces a looming demographic disaster due to having the world's lowest birth rate.

Around 54 percent of business owners in the food service sector report problems finding employees, a government survey last year found, with long hours and stressful conditions the likely culprit, according to industry research.

Korean fried chicken is brined and double-fried, which gives it its signature crispy exterior, but the process -- more elaborate than what is typically used by US fast food chains -- creates additional labour and requires extended worker proximity to hot oil.

Enter Kang, a 38-year-old entrepreneur who saw an opportunity to improve the South Korean fried chicken business model and the dish itself.

"The market is huge," Kang told AFP at her Robert Chicken franchise.

Chicken and pork cutlets are the most popular delivery orders in South Korea, and the industry could clearly benefit from more automation "to effectively address labour costs and workforce shortages," she said.

Kang's robot, composed of a simple, flexible mechanical arm, is capable of frying 100 chickens in two hours -- a task that would require around five people and several deep fryers.

But not only does the robot make chicken more efficiently -- it makes it more delicious, says Kang.

"We can now say with confidence that our robot fries better than human beings do," she said.

Investing in 'foodtech'

Already a global cultural powerhouse and major semiconductor exporter, South Korea last year announced plans to plough millions of dollars into a "foodtech" fund to help startups working on high-tech food industry solutions.

Seoul says such innovations could become a "new growth engine," arguing there is huge potential if the country's prowess in advanced robotics and AI technology could be combined with the competitiveness of Korean food classics like kimchi.

South Korea's existing foodtech industry -- including everything from next-day grocery delivery app Market Kurly to AI smart kitchens to a "vegan egg" startup -- is already worth millions, said food science professor Lee Ki-won at Seoul National University.

Even South Korea's Samsung Electronics -- one of the world's biggest tech companies -- is trying to get in on the action, recently launching Samsung Food, an AI-personalised recipe and meal-planning platform, available in eight languages.

Lee predicted South Korea's other major conglomerates are likely to follow Samsung into foodtech.

"Delivering food using electric vehicles or having robots directly provide deliveries within apartment complexes, known as 'metamobility,' could become a part of our daily lives," he said.

"I am confident that within the next 10 years, the food tech industry will transform into the leading sector in South Korea."

'Initially struggled'

Entrepreneur Kang now has 15 robot-made chicken restaurants in South Korea and one branch in Singapore.

During AFP's visit to a Seoul branch, a robot meticulously handled the frying process -- from immersing chicken in oil, flipping it for even cooking, to retrieving it at the perfect level of crispiness, as the irresistible scent of crunchy chicken wafted through the shop.

Many customers remained oblivious to the hard-working robotic cook behind their meal.

Kim Moon-jung, a 54-year-old insurance worker, said she was not sure how a robot would make the chicken differently from a human "but one thing is certain -- it tastes delicious."

The robot can monitor oil temperature and oxidation levels in real time while it fries chicken, ensuring consistent taste and superior hygiene.

When Kang first started her business, she "initially struggled" to see why anyone would use robots rather than human chefs.

"But after developing these technologies, I've come to realise that from a customer's perspective, they're able to enjoy food that is not only cleaner but also tastier," she told AFP.

Her next venture is a tip-free bar in Koreatown in New York City, where the cocktails will feature Korea's soju rice wine and will be made by robots.

Entrepreneur aims to improve South Korea's dish using robot

11 September 2023

[the-daily-tizzy]

News from the Year 2059

Ozone created by electric cars now killing millions in the seventh largest Country  in the world, Mexifornia, formerly known as California.  

White minorities still trying to have English recognized as the third language.

Spotted Owl plague threatens Northwestern United States crops and livestock.

Baby conceived naturally! Scientists stumped.  

Couple petitions court to reinstate heterosexual marriage.

Iran   still closed off; physicists estimate it will take at least 10 more years before radioactivity decreases to safe levels.  

France   pleads for global help after being taken over by Jamaica. No other country comes forward to help the beleaguered nation!

Last Castro finally dies at age 112; Cuban cigars can now be imported legally, but President Chelsea Clinton has banned all smoking.  

George Z. Bush says he will run for President in 2060.  

Postal Service raises price of first class stamp to $17.89 and reduces mail delivery to Wednesdays only.  

Average weight of  Americans drops to 250 lbs

85-year and $75.8 billion study: Diet and exercise is the key to weight loss.  

Global cooling blamed for citrus crop failure for third consecutive year in Mexifornia and Floruba.  

Japanese scientists have created a camera with such a fast shutter speed, they now can photograph a woman with her mouth shut.  

Abortion clinics now available in every high school in The United States .                

Senate still blocking drilling in ANWR, even though gas is selling for 4532 Pesos per liter and gas stations are only open Tuesdays and Fridays.  

Massachusetts   executes last remaining conservative.  

Supreme Court rules any punishment of criminals violates their civil rights.                  

A Couple Finally Achieved  Sexual Harmony . They had simultaneous Headaches.

Average height of NBA players is now nine feet seven inches with only 5 illegitimate children.  

New federal law requires that all nail clippers, screwdrivers, fly swatters and rolled-up newspapers must be registered by January 2060.  

IRS sets lowest tax rate at 75 percent.  

Floruba voters still having trouble with voting machines.  

[loominggaia]

S¿Cuáles son los peores lugares para vivir en este mundo? Y que personajes nacieron, o vivieron ahi

(Translated via Google Translate)

SWhat are the worst places to live in this world? And what characters were born or lived there?

I know I talked about this before, but I can't find the post, so I'll just do a quick rundown:

Taybiya: Itchy, Zeffer, and Lilan were all born here. It's a large independent settlement south of the Evangelite border. It was founded by criminals and slaves fleeing surrounding kingdoms. It's a lawless place plagued by crime, slave trafficking, and drugs. It is also infested by vampires.

Shadow Sector and Gutter Sector, Damijana: Jeimos wasn't born in these sectors, but did spend some time there. These are the lowest sectors in the Empire of Damijana. No sunlight can penetrate down here, so these streets are always dark and thick with toxic fumes that don't filter out properly. The Gutter Sector is the worse of the two; in fact it's so bad that the Damijani government won't even admit that is exists. Both sectors have major crime and sanitation issues.

Kirkmar: Glenvar was born here. It's an independent stone-age settlement in Halostira. Only humans live here, and they are quite unfriendly to outsiders, even towards humans of other races. Life is very hard in Kirkmar because temperatures rarely rise above freezing. It's constantly at war with surrounding settlements.

Laraine: Alaine was born here. Laraine is an independent settlement south of Zareen Empire, in the Kingsfall Swamp. The people here are poor, the weather is miserable, and disease is rampant. Undines attack the settlement regularly. The flora and fauna are both hostile in this region, and the swamp water is full of sewage, trash, and even corpses that flow down from Zareen Empire.

Chidibe: Javaan was born here. It's known as the poorest settlement in all the Great Kingdoms, located in Yerim-Mor. This place looks like it was bombed to the ground...because it was, several times. It's plagued by war, plague, famine, horrible poverty, and worst of all, the Cult of the Crescent has a big presence here. It's hard to escape this place because it's surrounded by miles of treacherous desert on all sides. The famine is so bad here that Chidibeans have a reputation for cannibalizing eachother.

Slegelse: Ojio lived here for many years. It's a Damijani prison camp located on a small island. Everyone living here is a prisoner or slave of the Damijani Empire, and they are being forced to mine crystals and hunt pyriads on an active, magma-spewing volcano. The work is so dangerous that most prisoners here are killed before their sentence is over.

Irontree District, Viersen: Jeimos lived here for many years. It's a district in the Zareenite city of Viersen mainly populated by Damijani immigrants. These immigrants are often undocumented, broke, alone, and face heavy discrimination from the Zareenites, making it almost impossible for them to advance to higher places in society. They get stuck here, in this dirty, crime-riddled slum with few services.

Kelvingyard Town: An Evangelite settlement, home of the notorious Kelvingyard slaving company. Everything about this place is depressing. Most of its income is generated from the massive slave yard, and this slave yard is also its only source of electricity. Slaves are forced to turn a heavy wheel which generates power. Most men in the town work for the Kelvingyard Company, and as we know, Kelvingyard does not employ the best and brightest...what I'm saying is: this town is populated by very stupid and sociopathic individuals. The infrastructure is pretty good by Evangelite standards, but if you have more than 2 braincells, living here will frustrate you.

Glasstide: Sofia was born and raised here. An Evangelite settlement located on the northwest tip of Noalen. A huge chunk of its population is made up of lycanthropes, which isn't all that surprising, because you almost have to be superhuman to survive in a place like this. It's incredibly cold and windy all the time. Frequent ice storms. There are no good jobs, only low-paying grunt work. Few civil services are available and it's very far from other civilization. Evangeline Kingdom neglects this place pretty bad, so not many hospitals, schools, police, or disaster relief.

Duali: Feredil and Balthazaar lived here for some time. It's a Morite settlement located very far out in the Serkel Desert, and because of this, it's neglected by the kingdom. The Cult of the Crescent has a big presence here, so people are always getting kidnapped, sacrificed, and terrorized. The economy is not doing well, so most people are poor. It's also one of the hottest places on Gaia.

Wattana: An island off the coast of Serkel. This was once a beautiful paradise until Matuzu Kingdom raided it for resources. Matuzu has since left, but the natives are still reeling from the damage, leading to lots of poverty and dysfunction. More recently, they've been getting harassed by the Aquarian Alliance. This place just can't catch a break.

*

Questions/Comments?

Lore Masterpost

Read the Series

[subdued-moderation]

INFILTRATION: Shepherd's Flock \ Part V

PREV | NEXT

===================

The elevator ride is spent leaning against the wall, idly playing with the water he had under his control. A quiet moment, no doubt before whatever storm this lot is brewing up.

From the length of the ride and speed of descent, he can tell that he just passed the lowest point of the city sewer system. And after a moment longer...It stops.

His hand flicks to bring the water still as he stands straight, watching the elevator door open before he steps out. Underground facility, exposed earthen walls along with concrete flooring. Certainly not state of the art but serviceable for activities you want to keep hidden.

Of course, this is just an entryway, he can't see what they're up to in here. And ahead, past the entry...

Well, more Entities. They sneer at him, but one smirks confidently, activating something just within the doorway. Then the doorway seals shut, locking him out.

He approaches, regarding it closely. It doesn't seem to be exceptionally tough metal, just steel. It wouldn't take him too long to tear through it. Except...As he brings his hand closer to it, he feels his skin crawl suddenly, sensing the electrical current running through it!

He growls to himself, he can't knock this down without frying himself. And digging through the earth would take far too much time, not to mention the risk of caving the ceiling in.

He thinks to himself...Before he feels a drop hit his nose, looking up.

Unseen by anyone, a small smirk crosses his features.

Inside...

"You sure it'll hold?" One of Charity's servants asks.

"Yeah! They can't even touch it!" Another responds, before motioning elsewhere. "Come on! We need to hurry and make sure Lady-...!" They're interrupted but the sudden sound of something breaking on the other side of the door. Then...What sounds like a hose spraying against the metal?

"Uhhh...What is Lord Temperance doing?"

"It sounds like they have water...But where'd they get it? The others said they just had a little water bottle!" Concern begins to grow amongst them, as one inches closer to the door to try and investigate..

The sound slowly grows sharper and more focused on a specific point of the door, until... "YAAGGGHHH!!!" The one that had gotten closer to investigate shouts in pain, recoiling back and quickly trying to get as far from the door as possible!

"Wh-what happened?!" One of the few humans in the room shouts, looking at that Entity. They're grasping at a deep looking cut in their shoulder, like they got sliced by a sword! Looking back at the door, the cause is clear.

Through a now developing hole, slowly making a cut is a very narrow, incredibly highly pressurized stream of water. Like a water jet cutter!

All inside can just watch in silence and stay away as it cuts a large circle through the metal. When it's complete, it just takes a small blast to knock it forward into the room, clattering onto the ground.

Temperance moves the water left on the ground aside as he steps through, avoiding the conduction of electricity.

"How...Did you...!?" One of the sheep-like Entity's shout, trying to comprehend what happened.

Temp's response?

He just points upward. At the large water pipe snaking along the ceiling, that also happens to run through the entryway.

One of them facepalms.

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[frenchiefitzhere]

two major missed opportunities in black adam and a few things that were cool

Caveat 1: I saw the movie once and don't have access to any reference material, so this is all just from memory. Caveat 2: Although this is criticism, I do intend to be respectful of all the creators and others who put their hard work into the film. On the other hand, I know people who are writing fanfiction and making other content in...like...their spare time for zero budget who don't make as much money or get as much fame who can craft a story better than DC Studios, so here we go. DC can take the hit from lil ol' me. [spoilers below...obviously]

Missed Opportunity #1: Redemption Arc, Editing, and Pacing

So, it seems pretty clear that Amon is the reason Adam has any softness whatsoever after he busts out of his prison, and like many other stories, that's probably because of the fact that he's a dad who lost his son.

And so, what COULD have happened with that scene where Adam stops the bullet from hitting Amon in the face is a flashback (even for a second) to the arrows hitting Adam's son (instead of 17,000 of the same shot of him with just his wife...story's not about her...it's about the kid...that's clearly the story you were trying to tell, folks...why aren't you showing that?) Why? Because Dwayne Johnson was ACTING THE SHIT out of that moment. He knew what he was doing. That's the story he was trying to tell on his face, even though he's playing a character who's notoriously stoic. So why aren't we showing the audience the thoughts/memories behind those facial expressions? Because DC is mediocre at storytelling. That's why. Missed Opportunity #2: Theme of Liberation...and Pacing Again From the beginning of the movie, it seemed like there was this underlying theme of "the people" of Kahndaq being the ones who needed to be their own heroes and save themselves from oppression. This theme was, unfortunately, anemic through the rest of the story, the lowest point being when Sabbac raises up the legions of hell and the people are meant to be fighting in the streets. This should be their big moment but instead it lasts for about five seconds before Adam pulls off the hero moment and the fiery skeletons just go poof. But I guess the "good guys" won, so the people don't care? Idk. You get him smashing the throne. But basically, this is another thread that should've been running through the whole thing in a much more pronounced and meaningful way, but instead they just paid lip service. If it's gonna go in the script, it needs to go in every other aspect of the film. High Points: As I said...acting/casting: all good, all around. Aldis Hodge as Hawkman. hello, siiiiiirrrrr I am looking soooooooo respectfully at youuuuuu "I die by electricity!" Karim, you lovable goof!!! Truly lovable comic relief side character for once!!

[beardedmrbean]

Helsingin Sanomat has a leader article (siirryt toiseen palveluun) suggesting that the expected energy crisis, brought on by Russia's attack on Ukraine and the subsequent disruption of gas supplies to Europe, has been postponed.

As COP27 pursues solutions to climate change this week it is perhaps ironic to note that the milder conditions this autumn are one of the reasons Europe is expected to manage its energy supplies better.

Another is consumer action to manage consumption, and the paper also carries a piece (siirryt toiseen palveluun) on electricity pricing trends that sheds some light on that.

The piece says that some companies in Finland will now only offer spot price-based contracts to new customers. 

Where they are available, fixed-term fixed-price contracts are prohibitively expensive in Finland now, meaning that increasing numbers of consumers now have a heavy incentive to use electricity when demand is lowest: during the night, or at least outside the morning and evening peak times. 

Erdogan's choice

As Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson heads to Turkey to discuss ratification of Sweden (and Finland's) application for Nato membership, Iltalehti has analysis (siirryt toiseen palveluun) that is fundamentally pessimistic about prospects for a rapid resolution.

The piece argues that Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan holds all the cards, and he has no pressing reason to give them up. 

He has already forced Finnish and Swedish governments to talk in a 'Finlandised' manner about Turkey's concerns about terrorism. That's a big shift from Sweden's previous rhetoric about human rights in Kurdish regions, and both countries' now-rescinded pause on arms shipments to Turkey.

The IL piece says that this helps Erdoğan demonstrate political strength ahead of parliamentary and presidential elections next summer. 

There's no pressing reason for him to relent and allow the Nordic countries to join Nato, so we could expect this state of affairs to continue for some time.

Whatever happens, it is likely that Erdoğan will emerge looking like a winner. If he ratifies the applications he can point to changed rhetoric on Kurdistan and new rules on arms shipments as concrete 'wins' ahead of the election. If he continues to deny membership, he is showing his electorate he is a powerful figure on the world stage.

In any case, IL says that Nato membership is not quite as pressing for Finland as previously thought. The Russian military's shambolic performance in Ukraine, and new security guarantees from the United States and the United Kingdom, give Finland a little more reassurance than it had in the spring. 

Mental health crisis

Tampere daily Aamulehti leads with an article on long queues in the city's mental health services (siirryt toiseen palveluun). 

The crisis is seen in particular at the Pitkäniemi psychiatric unit in Nokia, which is the region's largest unit and in October reported itself to the local Regional State Administrative Agency noting its excessive load of patients and its staff shortage.

"Some patients have slept overnight in chairs in reception," said Hanna-Mari Alanen of Tampere University Hospitals' psychiatric division. "There is no human dignity in this. It is a matter of time before the parliamentary ombudsman intervenes."

Alanen adds that the staff shortage has consequences. The emergency department at Pitkäniemi often deals with patients in extreme distress, with police accompanying the patient in the ambulance. Some 30 percent of the personnel say they experience fear at some point in their shift. 

Non-acute patients are also feeling the strain. Those with mental health issues can wait up to a year for their first appointment, and the queue currently stands at more than 1,800 people. 

That is partly down to the Pirkanmaa region's population growth, with 500 referrals a month now coming in — previously the number had been 400. 

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