Lord Wiggle

I have used dual boot, live usb sticks and VM’s. It’s just that I don’t feel that comfortable within the Linux environment as my knowledge is lacking somewhat and I haven’t used it enough to fix that.

I’ll check it out, thanks!

So, I’m not that great with Linux. I know the basics, that’s it.

Is it user friendly? I mainly want Linux with Android app support because I hate Google.

I’ve used windows my entitle life. Now windows 11 upgrade was done without consent, now they are doing their best to make it even worse then it already was. I would love to switch to Linux, it’s just that I’m using some apps which do not exist for Linux yet. Next to that I’m not that comfortable with the Linux mechanics to make the switch on my main PC. As in: Like I know what I’m doing on the machine which I use a big part of my time. I need full control. I know I have it with Linux, I just don’t know how. And I feel stupid for it.

The moral of my story is: I’m scared to make a switch from something I’m so familiar with for years and years to something new, even though I hate the corporations behind the stuff I use.

I want a Linux phone capable of running android apps

Just Vivaldi browser works too. On your phone I recommend grayjay.app

And that, kids, is why you should pirate. Paying customers are restricted and being ripped off. Piracy gives freedom, it pays off, it makes sure you dont have to agree to stupid user agreements which take away you rights. Make sure to support your favorite creators though, through other platforms like Patreon. Don’t take the money away from them. Just take away the power and control away from the evil mega corps like Google and Meta.

Get the RiMusic app. YouTube music without ads.

The awesome algorithm for recommendations on YouTube was turned off to prevent fake news bubbles. This means that when you listen to a song and want YouTube to create a Playlist with similar artists for you, this doesn’t work anymore. But this function does still work with YouTube music.

It has its own like and dislike system, so it’s not cluttered by yt bots.

Sure, that works too, however with grayjay you can follow creaters across platforms. So in case someone’s account gets banned by YouTube due to whatever bullshit reason, you can continue following them on other platforms. Next to that you won’t get spammed with Shorts junk. If you want to download a video to watch it offline, you can actually watch it offline (you don’t require a connection like with YouTube to watch something offline)

They also can use sponsors in the video, but that only works when you have enough views.

You can still watch YouTube without ads using grayjay.app including sponsor block.

Thanks to Louis Rossman

but my question remains… how does American companies, whose entire (or practically entire) production is manufactured in China, avoid those pitfalls?

Good question. Who knows. Maybe have more expensive production in other countries then China, or raw resource import and produce the products yourself. But this is cutting very deep in profits, maybe even impossible as the competition will be a cheaper option for the consumer.

the same cheapening out in materials and corner cutting strategies are applied in North America all the time.

May be so, but within the US there are regulations which are (or should be) checked. There are federal bureaus tasked with this. Doesn’t change the fact that many regulations are weird, some non-existant due to loopholes and many regulations are laughable at best compared to EU regulations. But still it’s way better then any unregulated stuff from China, or regulated stuff from China but the guy doing the checks got bribed.

Cheapest production, biggest profits. Yeah. But it’s not necessarily the American company responsible for buying cheap junk. Chinese companies love to get the profits by cheaping out on build material while upselling it as quality products. It’s hard to Check the entire production line and it’s resources as they often come from many different places and there’s barily any quality control within the Chinese factories and it’s supply routes. You don’t know whether they may have cheaped out on one expensive resource by replacing it with a cheap toxic alternative.

There’s a European quality check for products, the CE logo which stands for “conformité européenne” meaning "European conformity"on commercial products indicates that the manufacturer or importer affirms the goods’ conformity with European health, safety, and environmental protection standards.

China created an identical looking logo meaning Chinese Exports so they can bypass the EU regulations and use toxins instead of safe resources. It has the logo so people believe it went through the EU checks required to be allowed to use the logo on the product. Instead they add the logo without any quality control as it’s basically a different, yet identical looking logo. This is how China operates.

Tariffs don’t make them ok, but invisible. For instance, phones are produced in China for 95%. Then they are shipped to Vietnam, finished to 100% and shipped to the US without the China tariffs. Whatever happened in China during the 95% is unregulated and unregistered. Whenever it is shipped from China directly there are regulations for the construction of parts and the materials used. But already finished parts without this info which are imported from somewhere else can miss this info, like the 95% phones shipped to Vietnam have. Vietnam needs to declare whatever they used for the 5% for the regulations and the other 95% is declared as a pre-made product. This is how toxic materials are able to enter the western markets without anyone knowing it and how China tariffs only help covering up the use of toxins by shipping goods through hubs in other countries and the production of products without any safety regulation resulting in exploding batteries for example. And for food products to be unknowingly covered with highly toxic pesticides. Don’t underestimate the corruption in China, it’s like the US x2.

Oh and the video is just a yt vid, I know, but he has a lot of Chinese sources as he lived there for several years and he nicely sums up all the articles I’ve read about this all so far. He uncovers a lot of corruption which the Chinese government desperately tries to hide. I’ve seen different sources backing him up.

This is a nice video which sums it up pretty well, concerning EV’s. Many are coming to the US and EU market too, like BYD is doing now for example. They are growing faster then Tesla, threatening to surpass Tesla sales soon.

There are many articles about Chinese EV’s spontaneously combusting or exploding. And that’s just the EV’s.

There are many products containing extremity toxic materials which are imported anmass through Chinese digital market places like alibaba etc, but also as parts for American produced products. Products like cheap 3D printer filament, children toys, car parts, metals, food (with pesticides), etc. It’s hard to check everything, it’s hard to regulate everything, especially when loads of it is produced in a country where there is little to no regulations but instead loads of corruption. It’s imported by hundreds of thousands of shipping containers per day. Sure, some products are fine. But there are many which are toxic and sometimes deadly and we often find out about it way too late. Regulating takes time. China finds loopholes. It’s standard operating procedures.

Chinese government has entered chat

If safety wouldn’t be a real issue those products wouldn’t be banned in the EU. Regulations in the US are often very weird, loose and corrupt as well.

Nice Americans are proud of stuff. That doesn’t make it safe. Remember, there are Americans proud of Trump, guns, the cybertruck, racism, etc. “Proud” isn’t a safety standard.

Ps: Nice American meat processors are fucked up as well. The entire country is fucked up. Nice. Let’s be proud of it and everything becomes safe again

Yeah, that may be so, but priorities man. Priorities! Think of our profits man! In this harsh economy, ever ad counts! We’re only controlling 90% of the internet while we strive for 100%. That’s 10% short. 10%! We only had a revenue of 305 billion in 2023 which is not nearly enough to cut down on ads. Billionaire lives matter man! Come on, everybody, say it all together: Make millionaires billionaires again! Billionaires first! Meemaws don’t consume enough anyway. Screw her. By the way, want some penis enlargement pills?

You mean cheaper and worse, there are little to no regulations and if there are any, inspectors are paid off as China is corrupt AF. and the cheaper part is because the general factory workers are kept extremity poor to uphold the cheap labor, next to the Uyghurs in concentration camps who are forced to work for free. There are no rights or regulations for factory workers, so no protective clothing or gear, no safe work environment, while working with extremity toxic materials as those are cheaper then the safer alternatives. Working 12 to 16 hours per day, as young as 8 years old, 6 to 7 days a week, no sick days, no holidays. There is no quality control. There is media control, so every online post of a spontaneously combusted EV, which are maaaaany, is removed.

So you confuse quality with quantity. Yeah, it’s cheaper. But at what cost. Not just the lives of the Chinese workers, those toxins are also in the products we use.