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During the height of the Triangle Trade, Europeans built a lot of forts to protect their interests along the Gold and Ivory Coasts; why these forts are considered castles by this site is beyond me (just for clarification: a castle is a fortified private residence).
Edit: I now realise that the site specifically says "Map of the world's great castles & fortresses", so I guess the site considers them fortresses, not castles. I retract my snark.
If I was filthy rich, I'd buy a plot of land near a railway line (that is at least attached to the main lines), build my own siding, and buy one of DSB's IC3 MUs[0], maybe also an IR4 MU[1], so they can together ride on electrified and non-electrified tracks. Then refurbish their interior, install as many signal compatibility systems, and, for the IR4, have it support as many overhead voltage systems as possible. I have a soft spot for the MF/ER class trains.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DSB_Class_MF [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DSB_Class_MF#IR4_%22InterRegio...
Unfortunately, I cannot edit my original post anymore, but it seems a few replies misunderstood my comment; in short: I wasn't questioning whether it is a wordplay (it clearly is), I was questioning which wordplay. Is it Old'aVista just because it kind of sounds like AltaVista, or is it Old'aVista because "alt" in German means old?
Perhaps I am imagining it, but I immediately thought it was a pun on AltaVista in that "alt" in German means old. But there is nothing on the site that seems to suggest that that was how the name came about. (Though in that sense, you can argue the original AltaVista already meant "Old'aVista".) The only clue is this line from the FAQ:
The name of the website itself is a wordplay on Altavista.
Though, the creator mentions on his own page, that he is a German citizen (due to his grandfather), even though he speaks no German and have never lived there[1]; which could mean that pun is intentional. Not that it is really all that important (like not at all), but I can't help but wonder now...
I now recall why I did not buy the 6300 4G, because I remember it looked very promising: it is out of stock everywhere. I'm going to assume HMD aren't making more of those, and they don't seem to have any KaiOS feature-phones in the works.
I've been searching for a decent dumbphone for the better part of a decade. Unfortunately, I cannot really say I've succeeded. In that time I've tried the following phones: Nokia 225, Punkt. MP02, Mudita Pure, Doro 7030 and now a Nokia 2660.
My list of requirements isn't long: 1) should make/receive phone calls, 2) should make/receive text messages, 3) have physical buttons and 4) preferably use 4G and be able to create hotspots (the last requirement, I have deviated on occasionally, like with my current phone). A requirement 0, if you will, is that it needs to do these things at high quality. But in one way or another, they suffer wildly in either hardware or software, or both. Often to the point, where I wonder if the creators themselves use them.
The two Nokias unfortunately have quite a few ad programs (like Facebook of all things), that just clutter up its menu (but which I can thankfully just ignore), its T9 dictionary is weak (though this will be a recurring theme, they are all bad at doing T9 dictionary typing), and its text message storage is severely limited. The Punkt. MP02 had high quality hardware, but again its T9 typing was frustrating, and eventually mine just bricked. The Mudita Pure was probably the worst one, though: it only supported characters A-Z, despite being developed in Poland, which is frustrating when living in a country, that regularly uses characters beyond that. The Doro 7030 had bad buttons, that often wouldn't properly click, leading to missed characters while typing, and it had an annoying behaviour, where sometimes it would just miss calls, and its T9 typing was abysmal.
I still have all the phones (except the Mudita Pure, which I sold to someone in Greece, even though I explicitly warned them it would not work at all with Greek letters, which they later confirmed, as it was just showing squares), and I am generally sad, that it feels like a bit of an electronic waste.
And why not a dumbed down smartphone, then? My requirement 3 isn't debatable, I loath touch screens; they are - for me at least - the bane of modern existence. I cannot avoid them entirely, but I can lower my own exposure. For example, when I bought an induction stove top, I made sure to get one with knobs.
Maybe when I feel ready again, I will try my hand at another[0]...
"Europe" may be a bit broad there. In Denmark, I can get by without a smartphone; I have to carry what they call a "MitID code display" to gain access to online public services (though the device is entirely free of charge), but I also carry keys, so it's not a big hassle.
That is a bit of revisionist history: conspiracy theories gripped the revolution, and a lot of them thought Marie-Antoinette was already organising an Austrian invasion of France (since she is Austrian), so rather than wait for the supposed inevitable to happen, France attacked first. And that's what made the coalitions form. Not that they liked the idea of a Republican France, but before France attacked, they were unlikely to do anything about it.
Apparently, the three 7-Eleven stores with the highest revenue are all located in Denmark[0], two of which are located at Copenhagen Central.
[0] https://www.retailnews.dk/article/view/1178986/6000_kunder_o... (Danish)
Airbus didn't require them because of money
I am pretty confident that aircraft manufacturers themselves cannot require these things, only regulators can. The FAA in particular used to lean heavily on budget constraints for airlines (who would also push back against expensive upgrades); but I am sure the same applies to EASA and other regulators as well.
The Dark Ages are dark, because they lack surviving written record; ironically due to advancements in writing technology, where people would begin writing on hides instead of papyrus or chisel stone; this made writing a lot faster, but also had a far shorter life span, particularly because people could wipe the hide clean (after the text was of no use), and then rewrite on it.
Conversely, a lot of the writings of the Antiquity are preserved, in large part due to Middle Eastern scholars. The Dark Ages aren't a myth, but rather what is meant by "dark" is misunderstood.
Except that source article doesn't make that claim, only number of gun deaths. The best source[1] I could find on heatwave related deaths on short notice has the following summary:
Asia observed the highest heatwave-related mortality, accounting for 47.97% (85,611 deaths) of the global excess death, followed by Europe (37.23%, 66,443 deaths), the Americas (13.15%, 23,467deaths), Africa (1.61%, 2,881 deaths), and Oceania (0.05%, 83 deaths).
That of course muddles the picture by combining both American continents, though further down it quotes 9,666 for "Northern America" in table 1; though the Europe number also includes all of Russia. Those numbers are from 2023. Additionally, Europe has more than twice the population of North America. Without doing the maths, the gap claim sound about right; however, that doesn't necessarily mean it's due to a lack of air conditioning in Europe.
[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266667582...
Frankly, the last true Citroën (and I know this is going to sound a bit snooty) was the Xantia Activa. The C6 was supposed to truly harken back to the Citroën of old, but it fell short on so many levels: only hydro-pneumatic suspension (brakes and steering were conventional), too little leg room in the back, no frontier engineering, etc.
While the Xantia itself wasn't any particular standout in Citroën's history, its Activa variant felt like the Citroën engineers had finally broken through the Peugeot penny-pinchers. At least one last time. Citroën used to be about pushing unconventional engineering (like front-wheel drive (Traction-Avant), unibody (ditto), hydro-pneumatic suspension (DS), self-adjusting headlights (SM), active self-adjusting steering (CX), anti-roll (Activa)); the Metropolis - by contrast - just seems like a styling exercise with some conventional (though uncommon at the time) engineering.
Citroën used to push the frontiers of car manufacturing, but haven't done that since the 1990s.
Disclaimer: I own two classic Citroëns, so I'm likely a bit biased.
As an aside, it really irks me how Tolkien's names are used in this manner.
For those curious: Cambridge ML is a thing, but abbreviated CML[0]; and whilst Caml is part of the ML family, it appears to be unrelated to CML.
[0] https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/teaching/1011/FoundsCS/usingml.html
I would go a little further (and apologies for being rather blunt): but I find the over-use of irrelevant images to be rather insulting, as if I am unable to maintain focus on an article, without the frequent shiny object.
Also from Denmark, but I would prefer permanent standard time (just like it was prior to 1982); yes, it's still dark in the morning, but at least I won't have to wait months before I start seeing sunlight for my commute. I can only manage the darkness for so long, before the winter depression truly takes hold. Permanent summer time would be devastating to a lot of people here.
It's also still the Department of Defense; only Congress can change its name, and they haven't.
Isn't it more an incentive to buy an older car that cannot be controlled remotely? You know, a car that can be fixed with a spanner.
I cannot speak for other countries; but in Denmark, they are always crystal clear when the train has hit someone (»personpåkørsel« in Danish); and even when they suspect they might have hit someone; so when I say "technical problems", I mean technical problems. Besides, I am not sure I see the point of hiding when they've hit someone?
The train starts moving. The driver announces there are “issues around Bonn.” He does not specify what kind. No one asks. We have learned not to ask.
This is one of those issues I keep mulling about; it seems train operators (and airliners for that matter) tend to avoid being technically specific about operation problems, and just say "problems" and - if they are kind - where the problem is. And I cannot decide whether this is the wrong or right approach: how much information is too much? The argument is that travellers don't care why the train cannot move or why it is delayed, they just want to know when the next train is.
The problem - however - is that train operators come off looking like idiots, when they really aren't. As an example, the S-trains around Copenhagen have recently switched to a CBTC signal system, which has increased punctuality to 97% (below 3 minutes, cancelled trains counted). At cold temperatures, railway points (or switches, if you will) might become inoperable, as their mechanism freeze (of course, there are systems to prevent this, but can occur anyway). This happened this November on the S-train lines, but the announcement was "signal failure"; which meant the train operator (DSB) (and the railway owner (Banedanmark)) kind of looked a bit stupid, since the whole point of CBTC was to eliminate signal failures entirely (in fact, if you're being pedantic, since CBTC has _no_ signals, there technically cannot be any signal failures), and had promised as much.
But - then again - travellers really just wanted to know what the next train was, but I still think train operators are doing themselves a disservice by being oblique about the actual problem. Particularly when a problem lasts for several days, "technical problems" just makes people think their engineers are incompetent, when in reality they have no idea about the severity of the problem (because it is not communicated).
I may of course be biased here, since I have a high interest in how trains operate, but friends of mine - whose interest is far lessen compared to mine - are also frustrated by these opaque messages; and I think the reason is a strong sense of lack of control - since (assuming one made it to the station on time) up until this point, the passenger have done everything right, and yet the system failed, and now they are not privy as to why.
Perhaps it should also avoid putting too much emphasis on several comments to the same story: there was a story about VAT changes in Denmark, where I participated with several comments; but the generator decided that I apparently had a high focus vat, when I just wanted to provide some clarifying context to that story. I wonder how comments are weighed, is it individually or per story?
Specifically this roast:
You have commented about the specific nuances of Danish VAT and accounting system hardcoding at least four times, proving you are the only person on Earth who finds tax infrastructure more exciting than the books being taxed.
Yeah, but I did it on the same story (i.e. context).
Though the other details it picked up, I cannot really argue with: the VAT bit just stood out to me.
My understanding is that most countries just don't bother; I once drove around North America on Danish plates; since European plates are much wider than North American style plates, none of their cameras could scan my plates; so camera-only toll roads were essentially free for me. I consider that it happens so rarely anyway, that they don't bother.
Similarly, I've been flashed for speeding in France, which does have cameras adjusted to my plates' size, but they also didn't bother sending a ticket. Germany - on the other hand - will send you a ticket, but since they allow Ö, Ü, etc. on their plates, their system can probably handle Æ, Ø and Å as well.
Edit: Obviously, they don't bother to a degree; severe infractions will obviously make local law enforcement do something, but it's a rather manual process. Most countries are signatures to a treaty, that recognises other countries' plates.
In Denmark, you can buy a vanity plate (ønskenummerplade) for 8'000 DKK (needs renewal every 8 years), and it can be between 2 and 7 characters long; but the best part is that they permit all Danish letters, including Æ, Ø and Å. One could likely write a script quickly to check these platforms for short combinations, such as ØÅ, which appears to be available.
Amusing the title is the "Copenhagen Trap" (I know it's a reference to the Copenhagen Interpretation), since Denmark actually have laws about duty to help.
The Danish penal code § 253[1] punishes people with up to 2 years in prison, those who - without high risk to themselves or others - intentionally do not help someone after ability, who is clearly life threatened.
Additionally, the Danish rules of the road § 9[2] have rules for acting in the event of an accident; specifically, that they have a duty to help.
[1] https://www.retsinformation.dk/eli/lta/2025/1294#P253 [2] https://www.retsinformation.dk/eli/lta/2024/1312#P9
With the invention of steam ships, railways, aeroplanes and the automobile; travel became almost trivial. In conjunction with those inventions, states also became a lot more involved in people's lives; culminating in large welfare states. 3-4 centuries ago, a state did not care much about who lived in in their territory; these days, they are likely to provide them benefits, and have certain obligations according to international treaties about how to treat people within their own borders. These state operations, along with obligations, makes states care a great deal about who enters or leave their territory.
Except the Supreme Court deemed the case to be of a principal nature, and granted relieve (i.e. no cost to either party), since it was disputed whether a fake SMS train ticket counted as document fraud.
Whether internet is covered by § 72 seems undetermined; as far as I can tell the Supreme Court hasn't made a decision on it; but considering that it considered fake SMS train tickets to be document fraud, even though the law text never explicitly mentions text messages: it seems clear that internet communication ought to be covered, if challenged.
Regardless, this wouldn't run afoul of this. This is similar to restricting who can buy alcohol, based purely on age; the identification process is just digital. MitID - the Danish digital identification infrastructure - allows an service to request specific details about another purpose; such as their age or just a boolean value whether they are old enough. Essentially: the service can ask "is this user 18 or older?" and the ID service can respond yes or no, without providing any other PII.
That's the theory at least; nothing about snooping private communication, but rather forcing the "bouncer" to actually check IDs.
I've been using XFCE for the better part of two decades now (I still run into people upset about the changes XFCE made in 2003, i.e. 4.0), and I am perfectly satisfied. Though as the saying goes: what I don't know I don't know; so I may be missing out on a better experience, but at least I am content enough that I don't bother seeking it out.
Though, my monitors are also from 2010, so a lot of the visual problems people have with XFCE, I don't.
Tall buildings are banned in Denmark so its actually surprisingly imposing.
False. Buildings higher than 5 stories require municipal council approval (whereas normally it's a functional approval, not a political one), but that's only in Copenhagen. Other municipal councils do not have the same restrictions, and there are plenty of examples of tall buildings in Denmark.
The restriction in Copenhagen is historical, due to the fires that consumed the city; so to increase fire safety, buildings were height restricted. That most of Denmark otherwise don't have a lot of tall buildings is primarily due to a lack of demand.