Ya you’re right some of their views are 👎. I actually stopped listening to the podcast sometime over the pandemic when they had a super right wing guest on and they let loose and agreed with his views which was uncommon. Didn’t finish the episode, but came back to it a few years later and I recall hearing Aaron back track. Some of their newer episodes are still interesting and they seem to be more balanced, though I’ve been listening to the pre pandemic episodes.

For me Mysterious Universe takes the cake. A couple of Aussie guys talking about anything and everything paranormal, big foot, lucid dreaming, missing 411, stone tape theory, mediums, hauntings, abductions, time travel, ufos, men in black, remote viewing, alternative history theories, etc. They don’t really delve into conspiracy theories which I appreciate.

They’ve been at it for ages, and they are on season 32 of the regular show and 30 of the plus show (2 seasons per year). Most shows they discover a book or essay and do a deep dive into it, explaining and linking it to other research.

My main draw is how they don’t take anything too seriously, and are able to objectively present a theory about “black ops stealth [person of short stature]”, mixed with “the meaning behind your Thai diving instructor’s tramp stamp”, and follow it by well researched interviews with authors and researchers. Giving facts and letting listeners draw their own conclusions.

All that to say, I’ve listened back to season 11 so far, and have thousands of hours of content. Highly recommend.

I feel like it should be “Jean”, non? If it was a Fiat or an Alfa Romeo, Giovanni would be a great fit. Maybe you have your own context or reasoning though ☺️.

You got it, @[email protected]

Yeah it’s definitely an apples to oranges comparison, especially since the CRA does tax (federal and provincial/territorial) as well as benefits, while all the others are just federal tax. And agreed the IRS is way underfunded and understaffed.

I went on a bit of a deep dive and looked at the CRAs report cards and departmental plans. Lots of neat information there for 2022-23 fiscal year (not sure why that was in a plan for next year, but interesting stats nonetheless)

• $379B in tax revenue (85% of government annual revenue)
• $639B in revenue and pensions administered
• $46.4B in benefits to Canadians
• $89.1B of tax debt resolved
• $13.1B actual spending

There was also a tidbit about tax cheats specifically, and $14.3B coming from that alone, which is $1.2B more brought in, than they spent. Not bad.

As a result, the CRA has increased its ability to identify and target aggressive tax planning, and increased the volume of its gross audit reassessments. A total of 62,660 audits, excluding all other compliance interventions were completed in 2022–23 which had a fiscal impact of $14.3 billion.

Well said. I will just add that the major distinction as someone else pointed out is that the CRA handles all the taxes for provinces, not just federal, and also administers benefits, which make up a large portion of its funding and staff.

I was curious and looked up their report card for last year CRA 2022-23 departmental results, and I’m not sure where this article got some of its information, but it’s quite a bit off, and doesn’t mention published info (at least not in the non-paywalled section).

There is a good table that shows money spent and employees, as well as explanations for the major increase for last fiscal and the major upcoming decreases. TL;DR: major new benefits and changes require employees.

The increase in actual FTEs in 2022–23 is largely attributable to the administration of measures announced in the 2021 and 2022 federal budgets and economic statements as well as those associated with addressing the post-pandemic sustainability of CRA contact centres and the administration of the one-time top-up to the Canada Housing Benefit and the interim Canada Dental Benefit. Over the planning period, the reduction in FTEs from 50,195 in 2023–24 to 47,631 in 2024–25, is primarily as a result of a decrease or sunsetting of funding to implement and administer various measures announced in the federal budgets and economic statements as well as those associated with the COVID-19 pandemic.

To your last point on comparing the CRA to other taxation authorities, some months ago I went down a rabbit hole and I found something like this on the OECD website, but can’t seem to find it now, so I will just link the main page. It wasn’t a comparison between tax administrations per se, but it was a short summary of each country’s stats, how much money they bring in, spend, where they fit globally, employee counts, etc. You could then compare to others yourself. Very informative, and according to those stats, CRA was near the top IIRC.

Not sure about chromecast, but for AirPlay you don’t need internet connection. It’s probably the same for both, but I use an AppleTV and used a Xiaomi Mibox 3 before that, and would just cast to those if I need.

Well that’s just it, mostly unnecessary if you’re using it as essentially a monitor (like both of us are doing). Most of the updates would have to do with their smartcast OS or additional features or apps. The updates could also have additional support for devices as new hardware comes out, bug fixes (or additional bugs), speed improvements, etc.

They could definitely implement hardware that automatically connects to wifi without your permission. I guess a solution to that would be to connect to your own internet at home, maybe on a separate subnet that is blocked from accessing the internet.

I have a Vizio as well. It’s been disconnected from the internet for at least 2 years now and functions fine. I guess I miss out on updates, and if I press the Vizio “home” button it freezes up as it’s trying to connect for 20-30 secs before I can do anything, but works fine with an external Android or Apple box. You obviously won’t be able to use any of their apps if you disconnect from the internet, but it’s 100% worth it.

Adium… now that’s a name I have not heard for a while. Used to have a super nice customized version to chat with friends on various platforms. It was amazing. Thanks for the nostalgia trip!

Holy, that’s so pretty! Would love to have some in my garden.

Depends on the ISP. Many don’t allow you to use one they didn’t provide.

I read this a lot as well, and I think for a time this was true, but in my experience with a 1070 and 1080ti, Ubuntu and Fedora worked fine with minor tinkering, pop_os and nobara work out of the box. Currently on nobara, and most apps and games work just as well if not a little better than on Windows. A mate of mine runs nobara with a 3080 and no issues there either.

How can you ensure this is done? There are so many devices that need to connect to the internet and some that require access to other network devices to function.

Report: I’m in this photo and I don’t like it.

This comment is brought to you by RAID Shadow Legends.

I’m only considering this because of some articles I read that went over it, but they were a few years old. I could see how that could get annoying though, just with the frustration I’m experienced now with multiple drives.

I don’t think the system and apps exceed 40GB to be honest, the rest is filled with steam library and video/photo scratch that will move to the NAS once that’s done.

This is so wholesome! What a fun ritual.

Really great photo. Looks like an album cover!

Really great photo. Looks like an album cover!