Why would Amazon want to hinder the accuracy of the price tracking in that way?

Accurate price tracking leads to people saying “Oh well it was 50% less a year ago. I’ll wait on a sale, not paying full price on that” and waiting on a sale, leading to less conversions. Amazon has pressured Camelcamelcamel into agreeing to not track specific low prices (i.e., Prime Day, if that actually had any good sales). I’m unsure if they track coupons or not, they were not clear about what the criteria for not tracking a price are.

Camelcamelcamel is unfortunately compromised by Amazon, it’s probably mostly accurate but there are price points they do not accurately log at Amazon’s request.

my vision for a peaceful future isn’t a perpetual Mexican standoff. Nor do I like the idea of political power and representation being directly proportional to one’s intent and capability to do violence.

The unfortunate reality is that all political power is derived from one’s capability to do violence, whether we want to acknowledge it or not. I pay my taxes because if I don’t the federal government will forcefully take the money from me, or my other possessions. Yeah, arresting someone is “nonviolent” until that person just says “I’d prefer not to.” Forcing someone to pay a fine is nonviolent until they say “I’d prefer not to.”

It’s the only motivator the government or any body of real power has at the end of the day. It’s a bunch of social norms and agreements all backed by the understanding that you will be made to comply by force otherwise.

I’m not arguing one way or another but I want to clear up some very common misconceptions about US gun laws.

in some states, you can get semi-automatic weapons (which are completely banned in Austria) in a shop in just minutes. And that without any background checks, psychological reports, justifications, approval required, without anything like that

This is just blatantly untrue and I wish people would stop parroting it. If you go to any shop you need to pass a federal background check to buy any non-vintage firearm (pre-1899…not exactly a ton of those floating around). The exception here is private firearm sales, i.e. I go to Craigslist and sell a rifle or handgun. The law states the seller has to have no reasonable cause to believe they would be an unlawful possessor (weak, yes). With that said, almost half of the states (22 per Wikipedia) have implemented state-level laws requiring a background check for private sales.

In many states even convicted criminals can get guns like that.

Again, objectively untrue. You are not buying a firearm from any legal, licensed dealer in the US without going through a background check. And a violent criminal offense will get you barred from purchasing. For the 28 states without laws around private sales, the seller can be federally legally liable if they sell to someone that is not legally allowed to have a gun and they use it to commit crimes.

In the US, guns are sometimes a presents for kids which they can just…own and use (while in Austria everything is obviously 18+).

No, a child cannot legally own a firearm. The parent can purchase and own a firearm that they are allowed to use, but they do not own it. In many states if the child hurts themselves or others with such a firearm the parents will be held liable, many states have laws around safely storing firearms when children are around.

While in the US (in many states), you can just carry any gun around in public whatsoever. So even if the police sees you having weapons in public, they can’t / don’t do anything about that

In most states if you don’t have a license to conceal carry and you do you are breaking the law and can be charged. I’ll say this one isn’t entirely false but heavily depends on your state.

A large part of why this issue gets nowhere is that neither side can even agree on what is true today, rather than what should be true to bring down the issue of violent crime. If one side says “They’re totally unregulated you can just buy one off Amazon and start blasting. We have to do something!” The other side is gonna think “Well they obviously have no idea what they’re talking about, no point in listening to what they have to say”

Owning a ghost gun is a crime, right?

(Ignoring the fact that “ghost gun” is a meaningless and intentionally emotionally charged term)

In New York, yes. In the vast majority of the US, no. It’s illegal to file the serial number off an existing firearm, but 100% legal in most states to manufacture your own unserialized firearms for personal use. Just cannot be sold/transferred.

I’d note the article you linked says nothing about how many of those are actually 3D printed, it is infinitely easier to deface the serial number on an existing firearm than it is to 3D print one.

Not saying it’s a good idea, but a lot of the complexity surrounding automated driving is actually because you are confined to a 2D space and have to follow roads/road signs. When you can just lift off and adjust verticality to avoid objects all you really need is a way to detect and avoid obstacles and some navigation logic. Landing is probably the most difficult part to automate.

Not super easy but it is actually easier than self-driving cars (which is why almost all of a commercial flight is running on autopilot)