Due to a quirk of unifying 2 standards, Europe and the UK, the range is 216.2 volts to 253.0 volts.

That encompasses infrastructure built to a tighter tolerance around 220V in Europe and infrastructure built to a tighter tolerance around 240V in the UK (and Australia).

We expect 3150W out of a kettle most of the time. Our heaters will say 3kW.

Usually you’ll find a few volts over 240 out of our outlets and that’s to design spec.

And Hollywood profits aren’t from movies, honestly you’ve fallen for basic accounting tricks…

A franchise that doesn’t make money devalues the retail space. McDonald’s model links rents to sales so they take maximum value at all times.

Royalty fee: 4% of gross revenues

Brand marketing and promotion fee: 4% of gross revenues

Location rent: Unlike most other franchises, McDonald’s owns the land and buildings at its locations and franchisees pay rent that can be based on a percentage of sales or as a fixed amount. Percentage rents are 31.75% of sales. Fixed rents are typically £100,000 to £225,000 per month.

So Corporately it looks like they make their money from rent. But that rent is directly linked to sales and labour in most cases.

Without sales they don’t get rent unless they’ve agreed a fixed rent and that’s increasingly rare. Usually only the highest value sites.

The real estate value of the property is linked to business revenue as well. If a franchise fails and doesn’t get another investor then the empty building is worth a lot less.

By picking McDonald’s you’re actually about as wrong as possible. Everything of value is linked back to labour, even the value of the land.

It might work differently in other countries but I doubt it. Economics work the same everywhere and McDonalds didn’t like to standardise when they find a winning model for themselves.

Yes. If you have a half full battery it’s at 50% full.

If the charge goes up by 50% you get a 75% full battery.

If the charge goes up by 50 percentage points it goes up to 100%

It remains to be seen what he’s actually done to benefit anyone who gave him anything.

And he stopped accepting them once he entered the office. We found out because he told us about it all and the mistake of accepting some gifts a bit too late.

With the only arguable benefits being publicity for the brand it’s not nothing but it really is daft the perspective tricks that have been played with that particular molehill. It’s the press that actually gave the gifters the benefits, not any actions by Starner himself.

Being given something isn’t proof of being bought. Acting for the person who gave you something is.

I predict that as the COVID era corruption comes to light his previous job will result in him prosecuting and recovering quite a lot of public money. Sadly I don’t think he will get a result of jail time for anyone. The laws just aren’t in place for that and he can’t get them made retrospectively.

A UK constitution would be very interesting. But I’d just settle for some actual laws specifically against corruption rather than relying on MPs following conventions and being honourable.

The shocking thing is that hundreds of millions of pounds worth of corruption through the “fast lane” wasn’t illegal to do. We’ll only be able to recoup from the companies who actually didn’t deliver their contracts.

He’s a prosecutor who apparently can’t be bought.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/feb/13/tax-authorities-should-prosecute-evaders-keir-starmer

That’s far more dangerous to a billionaire than a firebrand.

If Starner only delivers a non-corrupt legal system it’ll be an incredible win for the Country. But I do think he needs 10 years in office so he should focus on actually winning the next election.

Look into the maintenance costs of Germany’s 1970s reactors before calling an entire nation brain dead.

The cost of nuclear today is high and continues for thousands of years. Cost is the entire problem.

Nuclear power isn’t green, it’s just at the beginning of the cycle where it’s waste is seen as a small problem because there isn’t a lot of it. Like fossil fuels were a century ago.

Unfortunately we don’t have a lot of suitable places to put nuclear waste so the small amount we already have is already causing problems in Europe. The US being a bigger place may get to that point a little later than us. But nuclear waste stores are already oversubscribed in the UK, Germany, and France.

Nuclear power is short sighted.

The money spent should be on renewables and grid storage. Then more efficient heating and insulation.

Not nuclear, not carbon capture.

Proponents of nuclear power never look at the total lifecycle cost of a reactor. In fact it’s usually deliberately hidden.

Nuclear reactors have always been and will always be military technology. They should be funded as military spending.

By all means put a price on carbon so they can get a better price on energy but the military should be funding the reactors they need and dealing with the waste out of their budgets.

It was dead the moment we didn’t elect a low towing fop.

Russia funded and led the conservative movement here in the past 10 years. We got Brexit, we got incompetent government, they got a place to park their wealth (a lot of it is still here), they got crimes without much fuss.

Europe was weakened.

As the funding for Trump’s loans and Musk’s Twitter buyout as well the moment we woke up and voted for a different party we became a target state instead of a puppet state.

Even Boris Johnson realised we had to help Ukraine. They replaced him with Truss and Sunak, more controllable puppets.

There are of course other factors, but the effect of global oligarchs spending fossil fuel wealth is clear in Western Democracy at the moment. Saudi is another big influence, they court both sides as long as they aren’t crossed.

Every crisis delays climate action, every election they can influence delays action. The longer they delay the more profit they get.

Trains are easy and they’re easily electrified already. So putting solar on the trains won’t have any advantage.

Rails are the difficult part of railways. They never seem to put them between my house and my work. They’ve put something called a road in between instead.

Not when you consider the maintenance costs of the plants they closed. Basically of them were beyond original design life.

And the democracy sausage!

Because by having a private company “screen” people there’s added corruption.

He gets to simply sell clearances to private companies.

Look at TANF.

Give any control to states of federal funding and it’s the most vulnerable who suffer.

And that creates a whole load of angry people suffering who tend to fall for rhetoric blaming others for their problems.

Republicans gain votes by making people angry, poor, and powerless.

If the Democrats want to flip a swing state the best way to do it is making people better off.

The fact Republicans then try to get credit is irrelevant. If Republicans need to say how much “they” improved things it’s them saying how positive things are and evidence the damaging messages the party usually spews are failing. This representative is panicking because of the infrastructure bills effect.

“Regular people”

https://bankingjournal.aba.com/2024/08/survey-one-in-four-americans-have-less-than-1000-in-savings/

You’ve proven yourself wrong.

Mochi Tetsu is mentioned in that article as being a source that produces higher quality products than iron sand. Exactly what you’re arguing against.

The facts are that due to the limited availability of good quality iron ore the steel produced in Japan often used iron sand and that led to lower quality products.

Why? The past lives long in the memory.

Sony was at the Vanguard of Japan’s post-war recovery. Making any electronics for the home.

Rice cookers and standard small white goods in the 40s.

They had a huge success with the transistor radios in the mid 50s.

Bearing in mind transistors themselves were first created in 1947. Sony is putting them in consumer products 8 years later. Copying a product produced in small numbers but making it better. Using the latest technology.

I own a 1960s reel to reel machine that still works perfectly. Sound on sound recording, echo and reverb effects. Built using transistors and “solid state” amplifies. Not at the cutting edge but using transistors to mass produce a product more reliably than previous tech.

All high fi equipment following the same pattern. Can they replace the old style amplifiers in record players. Yep.

The cassette tape comes along Sony makes it portable. And this is the point they also start hitting the top of the market in quality.

The portable tape decks Sony produced are considered the best.

This is while they’re dealing with videotape and producing betamax and the first consumer recorders and cameras.

Sony is a mark of reliability from the 50s by replacing old tech with transistors and a mark of quality by being better than the mass market competition by the 70s.

They then look at digital and create their own media. Betamax is a war they eventually lost even though it was better quality than VHS. But they made money on the professionals end of the market because of that quality.

This moved Sony into that direction. Focusing on the premium product, aiming high and for the mass market, but with the idea that quality will guarantee the high end segment.

In audio

Digital cassette DCC, DAT CD SACD Competition for Dolby Surround SPDIF optical audio. LDAC Bluetooth protocol

All the devices to play and record/transmit these.

In video: U-matic Betamax MMCD (mothballed to then partnering with DVD) Blu-ray Blu-ray 4K

The devices to play and produce them. The media to go on them from Sony Music and Sony Pictures.

Displays they created Trinitron displays to go with their analogue video cameras and formats.

They produced the first LED backlit LCDs. They produced the first quantum dot displays to go with the professional cinema quality digital cameras.

In the computing world they produced the first 3.5" floppies then CDs, then flash memory storage.

They tried to partner with Nintendo on the first CD-Rom gaming system and, when they were kicked out, launched their own console.

Sony have aimed for the professional market and bring those lessons learned to the masses.

Always based around a media format.

1999 Sony produced SACD. R&D in audio finished when that wound up in 2007.

High end audio equipment before that point is great. After that it’s just badges up stuff made to the lowest price.

2006 Sony produced Blu-ray. Blu-ray 4K looks to be the last gasp in 2016.

They were aiming for the top with video, TVs and blu ray players were great.

They’re still the best quality audio and video products you can buy.

But no one is buying them. We left quality of CDs for the convenience of mp3. We left Blu-ray for streaming.

We left high quality physical products for software products and codecs for convenience.

We left individual electronic devices for smart phones.

Sony have stopped R&D and quality control on devices as the market for them has dropped.

You can still buy a great high end TV from Sony.

Everything else, they’ve let the high end go.

If the high end isn’t mass market. Then they’re not going to make it high end anymore.

But as the last mass manufacturer to leave so many segments over the years. The cheapest high end device is still often a second hand Sony.

When the high end drops out of a segment all the individual components they would mass produce get penny pinched. Before they would produce huge numbers of lasers for CD players and make sure they were all good enough across the whole range.

When no one wants a high end CD player, no more high quality lasers get made.

The same with each component. Amplifiers, connectors, buttons, power supplies.

Sony’s products borrowed from each other’s tech and as the high end went in one area it had knock on effects in others.

Look at the PS5, the components are not produced in Japan by Sony. They’re outsourcing.

The 4K Blu-Ray disk drive is optional.

They say they’re unlikely to ever release their 8K Blu-Ray standard.

Top quality is no longer a priority and you place 20 years ago about right for audio. Probably 10 years ago for video.

The playstation 3 was Sony’s last CD player in a console. The last to be backwards compatible. The last of the Sony attitude of trying to be the best and trying to be backwards compatible.

The best CD players, SACD, players, DVD players etc all come in one Sony 4k UHD Blu Ray box.

Then you need a decent receiver and speakers to take that digital signal through a DAC, and amplify it. The last vestage of high end Sony audio is there.

The TVs the last of Sony’s high end lines in general.

The best portable cd players without breaking the bank, old Sony’s.

Incorrect

Yes, but your country being unable to have sensible judicial selection and poor judicial elections is not an argument for anywhere else.

The US ranges from failure to bad.

Other countries range from the good to the point other countries refuse to replace their own court system in order to continue using the good judiciary that’s trusted internationally.

Using the US as an example to follow in this case is a bad idea. Even if removing selection from the US system would be an improvement, it isn’t relevant anywhere else.

Especially when discussing an ideological law like making elections compulsory.

1st attempt was a republican shooter. He was

2nd attempt didn’t actually happen. They didn’t see Trump or draw their weapon. It was just someone who owned a gun in America.

It’s the republican party who have consistently displayed the attitude that the 2nd amendment is there for this type of thing, not the democrats.

How calm are you about your party doing this?

There are no illusions that politicians are experts.

Authority given to a judge is because of expertise, not in order to represent.

Elect representation, select expertise. Ensure oversight for both situations.

I’ve said before oversight is already in place be a democratically elected official. So stop with the silliness in claiming I’m antidemocratic.

The difference between you and me is you’re sprouting ideology and I’m explaining how a good system actually works in the real world in my country.

Asking millions of unqualified people to pick an expert and professional will not be as successful as an unbiased selection committee.

Not every problem is solvable with a popularity contest.

As long as a committee has democratic oversight democracy can still fix any problems as you wish. But it’s much more efficient and successful most of the time.