Mandolin Picker

14 hours ago, RobertWS said:

One good thing about Alzheimer's....you can enjoy the same joke over and over!

And even if you are married, you can sleep with a different woman every night!

 

and hide your own Easter eggs!

No wonder it looked familiar!   

My bad..............................................................................

Instead of the term "slavery" we now call it "human trafficking". Like others have mentioned, it is a very real issue in 2021 and not many people seem to care about it. I wish as much effort was put into stopping modern day slavery as there is in looking back 150 years.

9 hours ago, Notes_Norton said:

I have no problem with Juneteenth, but I think the name is rather informal and thus not solemn enough. I think it should be called Emancipation Day. IMO, that change would add more importance to the name and remind everybody what it is really all about.

There is already an Emancipation Day celebrated in the District of Columbia. It is April 16 and celebrates Lincoln signing the Emancipation proclamation.

Juneteenth is a different day and is the commemoration of the June 19, 1865, announcement of General Order No. 3 by Union Army general Gordon Granger, proclaiming and enforcing freedom of enslaved people in Texas, which was the last state of the Confederacy with institutional slavery.

Since we are on the subject of Amazon, if you own an Amazon device (Ring Floodlight Cam (2019), Ring Spotlight Cam Wired (2019), Ring Spotlight Cam Mount (2019), Echo (3rd gen and newer), Echo Dot (3rd gen and newer), Echo Dot for Kids (3rd gen and newer), Echo Dot with Clock (3rd gen and newer), Echo Plus (all generations), Echo Show (all models and generations), Echo Spot, Echo Studio, Echo Input, Echo Flex.) you are automatically enrolled in "Amazon Sidewalk". Sidewalk is a new program that will open your wireless internet connection to your neighbors and friends. They will be able to connect through your Amazon device to access the Internet. No you will not be reimbursed for any your bandwidth that others use as part of their web browsing, etc. Those who have accounts with ISPs that have data caps be aware.

There are a lot of issues with this new program, from the fact that is opt out (by being an owner of a device listed above you are automatically opted in), to the use of your bandwidth without compensation, to the security issues involving WiFi and Bluetooth. 

If you wish to opt out, you have to do it through the Alexa app (you can't do it through the web site)

• Opening the Alexa app
• Opening More and selecting Settings
• Selecting Account Settings
• Selecting Amazon Sidewalk
• Turning Amazon Sidewalk Off

For more gory details take a minute to review the Ars Technica article linked below

"Amazon devices will soon automatically share your Internet with neighbors"
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/05/amazon-devices-will-soon-automatically-share-your-internet-with-neighbors/  

52 minutes ago, emeraldsoul said:

Sears didn't trick you into buying a hockey puck for your living room that listens to all your conversations.

Nobody tricked anybody. If you put a hockey puck in your house, you know what it is doing. You made a choice to buy it and hook it up - for "convenience". Same with hooking your TV to the internet - as for me I prefer "dumb" TVs.  

OK, I want to say up front that I have an Amazon account and routinely buy stuff through them. And as was said before, nearly everything I buy through them is because I can't buy it locally. Plus I am not a big fan of Jeff Bezos personally.

However... here is the thing I don't get about the Amazon hate. All Jeff Bezos did was take the Sears-Roebuck catalog and put it on a computer. I mean really, that's all he did. Before the computer it was called "Mail Order" - now its called "On Line Shopping". Its still the same. You find what you want based on a picture and a description, send in your order, and wait for the package to be delivered to your house. Through Sears you could order cars (http://searsmotorbuggy.com/Sears_history.php), a house (https://unbelievable-facts.com/2019/09/sears-homes.html), a barn (https://www.farmprogress.com/farm-life/mail-order-barns-popular-early-20th-century) and the live stock (https://blogs.ancestry.com/cm/the-11-most-memorable-items-from-the-sears-catalog/). You could order anything through the Sears store.

Their only real competition was Montgomery Wards, but they were never a match for Sears. The thing is due to their catalog sales Sears and Wards had the infrastructure in place to take advantage of this new thing called the Internet, but they mad a conscious decision not to spend the money. By the time the tried to get into the game, it was too late. If they would have had the insight to invest in on-line shopping in the early days, I would venture to say that not only would they still be in business, but we would have never heard of Jeff Bezos and Amazon would only be the name of a river.

In the end, Jeff really hasn't done anything that hadn't been done before. He just did it better than they did it before.

So sad to hear this. As others have said, he will be missed.

In honor of 420