That’s Thread. Matter is an application layer standard, which currently supports running over WiFi, Ethernet or Thread.

Matter could run over new wireless systems in the future.

A few years ago the hose on our washing machine split and we didn’t realise until water started coming out from under the units. Thankfully damage was minimal but it was a big pain to dry out.

I’ve had some of those Aqara leak sensors in place since as a precaution.

Just remember to change the batteries regularly! Easy to forget them when they are out of sight.

They were still making MiniDiscs and MiniDV tapes? That seems more of a surprise than the Blu-ray discontinuation.

I’m also using iOS in the UK. I just tried searching for Pixelfed in the App Store and the ad was for some sort of golf tutoring app.

The top search result was the Pixelfed app and the others all other Fediverse apps.

The N-Gage had a bunch of bizarre design decisions.

The game cartridge slot was behind the battery - swapping games required disassembling the phone.

The revised QD version fixed a lot of the mistakes but it was too little too late by then.

Throwing money at AI seems a big gamble for productivity.

I’d rather see the UK invest in its human workers instead, with better education and training. IT skills for example as still lacking in the country. PCs have now existed for 30+ years yet so many still struggle with task like making simple spreadsheets.

If there is going be insistence on platforms being open there shouldn’t be these distinctions.

All of these devices are capable of general purpose computing at a hardware level, phones, tablets, PCs, headsets are now very similar and generalised in that regard. I don’t see why a phone platform should be forced to be open while a games console gets to remain closed, when there is now only a hair’s breadth separating an Xbox from a Windows PC.

Considering the latest changes at Meta, it seems their latest innovation is to transform social media into antisocial media.

USB-C has been a blessing and curse. One port that does everything, except when it doesn’t. Even charging is now complicated by the “guess the cable that supports the right PD type” game.

Not that the old days were much better. I don’t miss faffing around with the myriad of serial and parallel port modes and settings.

Take the AI crap out and give it an open display API and it would be a fun desk toy.

A rotating phone screen in a cylinder creating a hologram-like effect to display notifications/metrics/whatever else.

I have the G4 Doorbell, it’s worked well as doorbell and camera in both UniFi and Home Assistant.

I had no luck at all getting it to work with a chime though. I tried several different chimes and transformers and the chime would never work.

I ended up setting up automations to trigger device notifications and a bell sound on smart speakers to act as the chime instead.

I’m surprised they didn’t include an option to disable the backup encryption.

It’s a good feature to have but it’s probably overkill for users who only store backups locally. Encrypting backups increases security but also danger, lose the keys and lose the data. It should be up the user to decide on that tradeoff.

So the plaintiff’s are claiming Siri was recording them without consent, and that Apple were sharing those recordings with third parties including advertisers.

Apple claims they were sometimes wrongly keeping recordings for internal quality control/analytics but hasn’t admitted to sharing them, and have agreed to the $95m settlement.

The sharing with third parties is the most egregious part here, but it doesn’t seem to be addressed any further.

There are some Xiaomi Bluetooth temperature sensors available. I have a few of the LYWSD03MMC models. They are very cheap, have a LCD screen, and can also be flashed with custom firmware.

I have a few flashed with custom firmware and use them as general sensors around the home integrated with Home Assistant via ESPhome proxies.

I’m not sure how you could monitor them from both a phone and a Bluetooth proxy, but as they are so cheap and hackable they might be worth playing with.

For TVs now, by buying used. Help yourself and the environment by buying an unwanted “dumb” TV that’s free of this sort of crap.

Or if budget allows, look at industrial displays.

Supply answers demand, is we stop buying junk smart stuff and take our money elsewhere the market will eventually follow.

A while ago a company patented a method using eye tracking to monitor whether TV watchers were paying attention to ads.

It can always get worse.

Zuck bending his own knee in the vain hope he won’t get bent over Trump’s.

Maybe he should have spent a little less attention on Caesar and tried to learn a few other lessons from history.

Some Zigbee smart plugs and sockets have configurable calibration settings. I have some SmartThings smart plugs that have calibration settings, and I think the new IKEA smart plugs with power monitoring have calibration settings too.

There are some resellers providing generic Wi-Fi smart plugs pre flashed with Tasmota and calibrated correctly. Not sure where you are located but in the UK I can recommend Local Bytes.

I’ve also seen people recommend Shelly devices for power monitoring for accuracy. The Powercalc integration developer used to recommend Shelly devices for measuring power use of new devices to create Powercalc profiles.

I wouldn’t expect too much from accuracy from any of these smart devices though. They are intended for general consumer use to provide general ideas about energy use - they are not scientific instruments and probably shouldn’t be treated as such.

If you are looking to monitor homelab devices specifically perhaps you should look at a more professional/enterprise PDU instead.

Remember that to properly calibrate any of these devices you will also need an accurate reference device to calibrate against.

Power costs vary a lot around the world, depending on where OP lives every little saving can help.

I’ve had this debate with myself a few times. In my country air ambulances (helicopters) are often funded by a charity, while normal ambulances are funded by the state. Such essential services shouldn’t be relying on charity to exist.

In work I’ve also been involved in providing services to major national charities, and I’ve often been shocked by the amount of waste and inefficiency going on behind the scenes.

That said I also know plenty of local charity groups that are well runs and make a big difference to the area. I’m not anti charity, but I think it does deserve more accountability.