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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 6th, 2023

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  • I understand that, but at some point they will hit a number where people in the area can’t afford the 1st month (or more) down or even monthly payments.

    I lived in a place where that happened. There were very obvious changes as the rent kept going up. (I stayed because everywhere else was going up just as much.)

    • Long-term tenants moved out.
    • A lot more one bedrooms had roommates.
    • People had less furniture. Sometimes just a mattress on the floor and a plastic chair.
    • A lot more three-day notices and eviction notices on people’s doors.
    • Some apartments turned into Airbnbs.
    • One apartment turned, very not surreptitiously, into a “massage” place.
    • More and more units stayed empty for months.

    None of that stopped the rent from going up. If anything, it went up faster.



  • People began to rejoice in their ability to speak freely. Furious debates over the country’s future ensued. In cafes, over cups of coffee and cigarettes, furious arguments were taking place about the direction the rebel-led government would take, voices raised as people tested the new limits of their freedoms.

    Still, it was not easy to shake off the idea that the regime was watching. During an interview with a public-sector employee who preferred to remain anonymous, the employee paused as they were asked about their opinion about the new government. They excused themselves and went to the next room, where they threw up.

    Returning to the interview with red-rimmed eyes, the employee apologised.

    “You ask me if I’m afraid? Of course, I am afraid. I am 53 years old. And in 53 years, this is the first time that I am speaking freely,” they said.



  • It’s a lot, but the sandwiches are huge. NYC is the only place I’ve been where the sandwiches are usually big enough for 2-3 people.

    It’s also one of the cheaper cities to eat as a tourist. No need for restaurants, just grab a sandwich that lasts all day. Or cheap street food, or something from a hole in the wall. I love it there.




  • They have been for a while now. It started before the API thing with subreddits that were basically mirrors of English ones. But (badly) auto translated into German.

    A few weeks ago, the Google results got flooded with auto translations. You can still find stuff that was written in German, but you have to limit the search to German subs (site:reddit.com/r/de, for example).

    Or check the sub name in the search results. If it’s in German, you should be good. If it’s in English, or if it doesn’t show up at all, it’s usually a machine translation.


  • Maybe it depends on what you watch. I use Youtube for music (only things that I search for) and sometimes live streams of an owl nest or something like that.

    If I stick to that, the recommendations are sort of OK. Usually stuff I watched before. Little to no clickbait or random topics.

    I clicked on one reaction video to a song I listened to just to see what would happen. The recommendations turned into like 90% reaction videos, plus a bunch of topics I’ve never shown any interest in. U.S. politics, the death penalty in Japan, gaming, Brexit, some Christian hymns, and brand new videos on random topics.



  • I haven’t been on since June, but I noticed it for the last 1-2 years or so. Especially on the smaller subs where any given comment would only get a handful of upvotes. Someone would write a long helpful explanation, I upvote, and nothing happens. The score would stay at 1 or whatever.

    It’s not like I was spamming votes either. I would make a point of only voting on one comment per post so my vote would count. But it was still usually 50/50. Vote fuzzing was there for years, but this was different. The comments that were less popular seemed to be affected the most.



  • Now, more than a decade after Sylvia’s death, their efforts have landed the Wildensteins before France’s highest court. The evidence she and Dumont Beghi brought forth has persuaded prosecutors that the Wildensteins are a criminal enterprise, responsible for operating, as a prosecutor for the state once put it, “the longest and the most sophisticated tax fraud” in modern French history.

    A trial this September will determine if the family and their associates owe a gargantuan tax bill. The last time prosecutors went after the Wildensteins, several years ago, they sought €866 million — €616 million in back taxes and a €250 million fine, as well as jail time for Guy. The consequences could do more than topple the family’s art empire. The case has provided an unusual view of how the ultrawealthy use the art market to evade taxes, and sometimes worse. Agents raiding Wildenstein vaults have turned up artworks long reported as missing, which fueled speculation that the family may have owned Nazi-looted or otherwise stolen art, and spurred a number of other lawsuits against the family in recent years. Financial distortions have saved the family hundreds of millions of dollars, prosecutors allege, but their treatment of Sylvia could cost them far more — and perhaps lead to the unraveling of their dynasty.

    What a story. It’s a long read, but fascinating.