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Posts posted by choripan
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51 minutes ago, Captainant said:
The fact of the matter is, any nation operating a nuclear reactor can pretty easily breed plutonium out of U238 and then chemically separate it, rather than dealing with the comparatively extremely difficult isotope separation. That's how we ended up with Little Man - it's far easier to breed plutonium from depleted uranium via neutron bombardment than to separate and enrich U235.
Like we all didn't already know this.
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19 minutes ago, Beau Vine said:
@Beau Vine Your meme game is strong
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1 hour ago, Duane Moore said:
Holy shit, Chris Murphy is stealing your material!
I fail to see the problem here.
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10 hours ago, bschoolprof said:
sounds like a great design, much like a "wings fly off" button.
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4 hours ago, Captain Ron said:
I will give it credit, the car does good. But with lives on the line, the car has to do excellent. And too many people demonstrate it does not.
This is the thing that people miss, and the most important point. It is good, and very few would deny that, but it needs to be damn near flawless.
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1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:
Look at how the Russians handled the Kursk invasion. There is a possibility, and I would not be surprised, that Moscow rations missiles and drones over the next few weeks and then hits Kyiv in a month or so with a lot more than the normal attacks. But ironically Moscow May have lost quite a few of the missile delivery systems in those destroyed aircraft.
I'm going to try to post this in as not douchy of a manner as possible -- "Oh, but it's not as good as the gathpacho I had in Barthelona!" -- but I think a substantial portion of the attacks (most? almost all?) are either via Shaheds or ground-launched S300/S400/Iskanders. In my experience being bombed in Ukraine (munitions AND alcohol, holler!) once I hit "translate" on the Ukrainian AF/monitor channels in Telegram to see what they said was incoming, it was essentially always one of those things and never Kinzals or Kalibrs or whatever the hell the orcs fire from jets. Not trying to be contrarian or anything like that, but that's what I saw and now, as I still wistfully check Telegram once in a while wishing I were back there.
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fuck i just bought a cybertruck last night.
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America is so fucked. Over and over, I think that we are the modern equivalent of killing cats that represent the devil only to allow the rats to bring plague. Just ignorance everywhere.
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16 minutes ago, InkaUtexas said:
Coup.
Many coups have found their impetus through coupes, though.
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Okay, first, and far more important, LET'S FUCKING GO! 40+ bombers knocked out is huge!!
For those that are interested, here's my post on my impressions of Ukrainians:
SpoilerCulturally, there seems to be a pretty big difference between younger Ukranians and older Ukranians, especially those that spent their formative years under Soviet rule. The younger folks almost all speak some English, are vibrant, cosmopolitan, and knowledgeable of the broader world, and are more western-facing – for example, during one workday, about half the songs that the twentysomething girl DJing via a Bluetooth speaker put on were in English, or were reggaeton – while the older folks are more Russian-speaking and more distant or socially cautious. For example, there was this packed club a couple blocks from my apartment where they played Turn Down for What and No Lie by 2 Chainz/Drake when I was walking by.
And this is a cocktail bar that was 2/3 full on a Wednesday. It had all the classics and some creative twists. If you’re wondering, that was a Last Word – they actually had Green Chartreuse on hand!
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/nTfBE3earhA?si=MtSnUizJh3Uf2Pjz" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Also, the younger folks are generally larger and “healthier” seeming, being meatier with better skin and teeth. I’ve heard this about Chinese folk, and it may be the same thing here tied to nutrition and that kind of stuff. Sample size of only like a couple thousand people, probably, but those are my observations. I’ll be honest, a lot of the older people look kind of rough and I feel bad for them. Here’s the “line” of folks waiting to get food, clothing, and other essentials on the day I volunteered with a group distributing that kind of stuff.
Also, as a personal observation, the people looked like me and I looked like them! 3 of my 4 grandparents are either from Ukraine or Eastern Poland, and I fit right in. As a lighter-skinned black woman (her, not me), my ex always talked about how comfortable she felt in the Bronx, or New Orleans, or other places where she just blended in. I intellectually understood, but never “felt” it. This was the first time I felt it in my core, and let me tell you, it felt kind of good. (Side note/background, I grew up as an ethnic, Catholic white in a northern city, and like many families, my grandparents had portraits on the wall of John Paul II and JFK. And they never let you forget that the only time “they” [Protestant folk of British, Dutch, German, etc. heritage] gave “us” [Catholics/ethnics] a chance was with JFK, they shot him, and then it was right back to people named Carter, Bush, and Clinton.) So it was nice to be surrounded by it and, for example, be asked by old babushkas to help get something down from a high shelf at the grocery store. First, that told me that I look like I belong, in contrast to where I usually travel in Latin America, and, second, it implies that the general underlying culture is one in which it’s okay for an old lady to ask for help and it’s expected that the “youngster” will help out. For example, I was taking a selfie in front of St. Andrews and someone was quick to offer to take this picture for me.
Regardless of whether more cautious or warm, everyone was welcoming and open to help with questions. When they learned that I was in town to volunteer, they would light up and go above and beyond to help like, for example, often INSISTING they walk you to the place you asked about. The Google Translate conversation feature was spectacular, by the way. How amazing is it that we live in a world with something that approximates Star Trek’s universal translator? Speaking of directions, I imagine you may be thinking “just use your Maps app, dummy,” but electronic warfare and GPS jamming stuff is so common around that your GPS location on your phone is often unreliable, so it’s back to looking at your map, street signs, and occasionally asking a passerby for help. For example, here is from when a new friend was giving me the rundown on what the other side of the Dnipro is like, how people commute, etc.
Another interesting thing is that she (and I’d guess an actual majority of younger people) smoke these hybrid e-cigarettes. It’s like an e-cig in that you have to charge it, but it uses tiny (maybe like 2-3 inches) “real” cigarettes that go into it. Seemed like the worst of both worlds to me, but they are incredibly popular there.
And since I ain’t no yellow-bellied nancy, I had to at least try it, and she was happy to share.
Not gonna lie, it hit like a freight train compared to a cigarette or a vape, and it took everything I had to keep my fragile masculinity intact and not cough in front of her.
And there’s something to be said for the resolve of the typical Ukrainian. People are fed up with the war, but they realize it’s a war for survival and that there’s no choice but to fight. They are resilient and live a “normal life” during the day and up to around 10-11pm, by which many folks are sure to get home to beat the midnight curfew, because consequences are serious if you’re out after midnight without papers. Here’s a video of what would otherwise seem like normal life in Shevchenko park.
And, I’m not going to lie, the saddest and most angry I got was about 5 minutes after that video, when I walked by a kids’ playground and saw dozens of kids playing on structures, swings, etc. I just stood there for 3-4 minutes and watched the kids play (no R Kelly) and thought, “Fuck. This is normal life for them, but normal life also includes hiding in a basement or a shelter almost every night. They are totally innocent and their normal includes being scared and bombed because of a madman thousands of kilometers away.” I did speak with a few parents while in Kyiv and, inasmuch as I mentioned how a lot of people are numb to it and don’t seek shelter anymore, every single parent with younger (12U) kids said they go to shelter every time, and they and their kids are tired. For example, this new friend of mine has an 8yo daughter and lives out by the airport, which has a fuel depot nearby, and says her building shakes every night from the attacks, and that she’s with her daughter in the building’s basement pretty much every night that it’s her custody night.
As for outward-looking, the general consensus about foreign governments seems to be a mix of thankful, dismayed/disappointed, and confused about herky-jerky, unreliable support. In contrast, the folks I talked to are deeply appreciative of individual foreigners that are coming; first, for the direct impacts of their volunteering and, second and one I didn’t think about, it brings in a substantial amount of additional money to an economy which is deeply affected by the war. For example, I ate at restaurants, drank at bars, paid for a place to stay, bought stuff, and so on, and all that is probably about $1000-1500 that wouldn’t have been there. Multiply it by tens of thousands of volunteers and visitors and it makes an impact on a country that was not that wealthy even before the Russian aggression.
Finally, a bit of a fun one. Guys are macho everywhere, but probably a little more in Slavlandia. Some dude brought out one of those punching games you see at bars, set it up on the sidewalk, and was charging people to hit it. He was PRINTING money. There was always a small, ever-changing crowd of spectators around the machine, judging and signaling approval or disapproval after a punch, and men would come up and take their swing. I doubt the machine got a break for more than 30 seconds. Just a total public dick-measuring contest and, I mean, let he who has not put tens of dollars into the punching machine at the Beach on Bourbon Street cast the first stone.
Future installments will be food and drink, the volunteering experience, and a special Krakow side quest post.
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On 5/19/2025 at 10:03 PM, choripan said:Okay, I am going to split this into parts and put each part under a Spoiler so it's not super TLDR.
First part, a sort of overall review:
As for the travel:
More to come later but it's time to get ready for bed:
- Impressions of Kyiv/Russian Aggression
- Impressions of Ukrainians
- Volunteering
- Bonus Krakow Content
Okay, onto impressions of Kyiv/Russian Aggression. Under a spoiler so it's not a super long post.
SpoilerKyiv reminds more of Buenos Aires than any other city I can think of. It is a grand dame with wide boulevards, beautiful architecture at large scale, and greenery abounds. It has that city smell and honking of horns that reminds me of Buenos or Mexico City. I’d describe it as a not completely combusted fuel smell mixed with the aromas of street/restaurant food and the random passerby’s cigarette. I love it. 😊 However, you can tell that, like Buenos, it’s a place of fading grandeur. Things like unrepaired sidewalks or buildings with chunks of plaster or paint falling off, that kind of stuff. No big deal to me – in fact, I’d argue it adds a bit of character because it hasn’t overwhelmed the city – but I could see a fussy or stuck-up traveler being turned off.
And then, of course, there are the random buildings that have been hit. Below are pics of a tower and some buildings near it that got hit near my apartment before I got there (not surprising, they were near a power or steam plant looking complex).
And about a hundred feet from my balcony is a building that my neighbor told me was hit by debris from a Shahed drone like a month earlier, and which is in the process of being renovated back.
Getting around Kyiv is very easy. Where I was staying in the Shevchenkivskyi District was pretty centrally located to most things, and I did a lot of walking. When I had to go to farther out places, I took the metro and it’s super easy. You can just pay with your phone with Apple/Google Pay on your way through the turnstile and the signage is prominent and in both Cyrillic and Latin letters. The stations are deep, and Kyiv had the deepest metro station in the world for decades.
One thing that I didn’t consider going into the trip is that with all the electronic warfare stuff, GPS is absolute shit. After a day or so, I mostly gave up on using it except for very general location. Instead, I relied on old fashioned (predownloaded digital) map-and-street-signs method to figure out where the hell I was and to navigate. It worked fine.
Also interesting is that you see a lot of civilian vehicles repainted into olive greens or camo patterns. A few people mentioned that it’s all-hands-on-deck for vehicles same as people, given the limited resources in country, and you can tell.
Also, my ex and I had a litmus test for gauging the safety of cities we visited: "Can a woman walk alone after dark safely?" That’s a resounding “yes” in Kyiv, though it does fail the less-common “are kamikaze drones or ballistic missiles en route every night?” test. Speaking of which, most locals I talked to are sort of grimly resolved to ignore the air alerts best they can, with the most common approach being to go back to sleep if it’s Shaheds/UAVs, since they don’t do as much damage and are usually intercepted. What happens is the air alert app goes off kind of like an emergency/amber alert (loud and annoying!) and then you check the Ukrainian Air Force and “monitor” Telegram channels that are really popular and tell you what kind of attack is coming to your location, so you can respond as you wish.
In contrast to the Shaheds/UAVs, it was about 50/50 if they seek shelter when glide bombs/missiles are en route, since a lot of times they arrive before you can even get to shelter, anyway, if shelter is not in your building’s basement or something super close. The approach I settled on after the second night was to move my mattress to a place in my apartment with “two walls” of protection (https://www.google.com/search?q=two+walls+rule) and to delete the air alert app from my phone, put in my earbuds with white noise, and (hopefully) not hear the sirens or occasional explosions.
It worked, I slept through it most nights, I lived. One night they woke me up at like 4am with 5 minutes or so left in the Pistons-Knicks game, so I got to see my Pistons flame out. Here’s the sirens, btw. They sounded like tornado sirens, but louder.
Overall, I'd say that I saw many of the highlights of Kyiv. I'd characterize it as a large city that functions pretty well, even in spite of nightly orc attacks. Given my general wanderlust and desire to see new places, it's probably not worth another visit without volunteering again, or having another reason to go, but it was nice.
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Yes, that will SHO the Russian's who's boss.
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The plane crash president strikes again. Damn.
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Okay, I am going to split this into parts and put each part under a Spoiler so it's not super TLDR.
First part, a sort of overall review:
SpoilerThis was a great experience overall. I felt like I moved the needle at least a bit each day toward making the world a little bit better, saw some amazing things (the Ukrainian Motherland Monument is jawdropping, IMO), met interesting people, and got in touch with my roots. I also grew quite a bit because this was the first time I’d traveled in a while to a place where I could neither communicate beyond the basics nor read the majority of the signage, given the Cyrillic script used in Ukraine, at least. Here's the monument:
If you have the opportunity to volunteer, do it! I do a fair amount of volunteering, and sometimes it seems like “well, this good stuff would have happened just the same with or without me here.” In this case, with so many able-bodied people scooped up for military roles or lost entirely because they emigrated or died, it’s all hands on deck for the rebuilding and volunteer type activities. I really felt like I was helping rather than just being a body. Here's a typical scene as part of a job where we were doing demo on an old Soviet-era hospital so it could be renovated into a mental health center for veterans.
If you don’t have the opportunity or desire to volunteer, I encourage you to donate to these two groups. The first group is called Brave to Rebuild (https://bravetorebuild.in.ua/en). Out of the two “building/rehab/demolition” type groups I worked with, they were more organized and did a much better job of leading, directing, and motivating their volunteers. Only downside is that a lot of the leadership has day jobs, so they usually just work on weekends. The second group I can recommend is called Без Дому (Without Home) (https://www.instagram.com/bez.doma.ua/?hl=en / https://www.volunteeringukraine.com/en/volunteer-opportunities/ngo-without-home). I also worked with Dobrobat and it was okay. General consensus from talking to people is that if a group makes the Volunteering Ukraine site, they’re pretty vetted and legit: https://www.volunteeringukraine.com/en.
As for the travel:
SpoilerOutbound flights: Worth it to pay for the overnight lie flat seat in this case, given that I only had a hair under two weeks and wanted to minimize adjustment to the new time zone. FWIW, the new Delta One suites on their 350-900 are nice. Google them if you want a detailed Youtube review or something like that. They’re nice. After a couple hour layover in Amsterdam, I had a short KLM flight to Krakow that was uneventful. Overall, a nice experience and about as good as air travel gets. I had a couple hours to kill in Krakow, and Old Town Krakow is nice:
Outbound Trains – After killing a couple hours in Krakow, I hopped a couple hour train to Przemyśl, a Polish town about 20 minutes from the border. Once there, you go through outbound EU/Polish customs and are herded directly onto the Ukrainian overnight train by customs people and a couple armed guard types. Once the train is loaded, it goes for about 20 minutes until you are at the Polish-Ukrainian border and then they lock the doors to leave the cars and lock the doors to go between cars and then go suite-to-suite (4 bunks per “suite”). The train *to* Ukraine was pretty empty and I only had one other person in my suite on the way out, a Canadian scholar going to interview leaders of the government and military. He was cool. We shared numbers via Whatsapp and grabbed a beer in Kyiv one night. Anyway, aa gruff Ukrainian soldier then takes your passports and disappears. About a half-hour later, they give you the usual customs questions (Where you going? Why you here? Etc.) and our guy ended our interview with a scoff and a the most dismissive “Good luck” I’ve ever gotten in my life! Regardless, we had passports stamped and were cool to stay in Ukraine for up to 90 days. Here’s what the suite looked like:
Return trains: Overnight train was the same thing in reverse. This time, though, my suitemates were three Ukrainian women. One babushka that I would say was like 70, and two 50ish woman, one who was a smokeshow. Not sure what to call her. Older than a MILF but younger than a GILF. Anyway, the two younger ones hustled on two bottles of sparkling wine and a makeshift charcuterie. They invited me to join after learning I came all the way to Ukraine to volunteer. We all got a nice buzz and flirted and giggled while translating via Google Translate’s conversation feature (pretty neat, btw. Star Trek’s universal translator is basically here). Eventually, the older woman chastised us, the younger women started talking back to her, and the conductor came and yelled at all of us and told us to shut up or we were getting kicked off at the next stop. I didn’t understand shit until they explained the next morning, but I had my head on a swivel watching the animated discussions between the women and then eventually the women and the conductor. A fun evening all around, and I was ready to pass out. Same thing in reverse with respect to stopping the train at the border, and going through customs. BTW, Kyiv’s station was nice but not the Soviet-era opulence I expected:
Return flights – Here, the lie flat was super clutch on the return. I had a 6:00am flight out of Krakow on Friday, so I decided to just stay out all night on the night before I left in order to reacclimate to my home time zone. Thanks to meeting the Bulgarian chick, who took me to a couple really cool clubs, it was easy to stay up, head back to the apartment for one last shower, and catch a cab to the airport. Once I got to the airport, though, I was dog tired. I slept about an hour on my Krakow-Amsterdam flight, rented a sleep pod in the KLM lounge at AMS for 2 hours, and then slept 4 hours on the plane, which gave me about 7 hours that roughly aligned with my home time zone. That’s a win by any measure, especially following a good night out. Here's my drunk ass saying goodbye:
More to come later but it's time to get ready for bed:
- Impressions of Kyiv/Russian Aggression
- Impressions of Ukranians
- Volunteering
- Bonus Krakow Content
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On 5/13/2025 at 10:56 AM, MissingInAction said:
I'm going to assume the Polish friendship was one of the special ones.
In my experience those folks cherish friendship like no other. You're family whether you like it or not. Also you will be drunk and well fed. Very very drunk.
Yes, a very special friendship with the Pole and the Ukrainian. Only special (making out, light petting) with the Colombian and Bulgarian. 1-3-2-4, although the Bulgarian had just a knockout personality. I would party with her at any time.
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11 hours ago, royiv said:It’s been a week since we’ve heard from @choripan. Should we be concerned or is he distracted trying to figure out how to get a Ukrainian lass into the country?
I'm back in the States alive. Made it home for Mother's Day with my mom and ex and then crashed. Yesterday was that first day back to work with shit piled up. I want to make a "put a bow on it" post when I have time, though. Work shit and finalizing divorce shit have me busy most of this week tho. Thanks for thinking of me.
And interestingly enough, my special friendships over my trip were Ukrainian, Colombian, Polish, and Bulgarian. Only two of which were very special.
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I haven't seen anything about rare earths. That's potentially more important to a lot of supply chains than tariffs, since the former can utterly shut down production, while prices can be raised to account for tariffs, though not ideal.
Anyone that is following this more closely than me see anything on rare earths? What a stupid own goal.
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9 hours ago, Zepol87 said:Not the spoiler update I was hoping for lol.
Good shit man this is pretty fucking awesomeOkay, you fuggin degenerate...
SpoilerTatiana was a cutie. We met up and walked through Kyiv for about an hour, then had dinner at a good Ukranian restaurant named Kanapa. Dinner and conversation were good, and I scored major bonus points when I helped her put her coat on, and knew I was in good shape -- "you are gentleman, not like American." After that, we walked St. Andrew's descent doing the "arms locked" date strolling thing, and toured the Podil neighborhood and grabbed a coffee. By then it was getting late and she had like a 20 mins ride from where she parked her car and she'd be cutting it close on curfew, so we hopped a Bolt/Uber back to the center and had a nice passionate kiss outside of her car and said we'd see each other again. We did see each other again a couple days later and it was fun.
Also, sample size of one, but it seems like East Slavic chicks deploy tongue later than usual when kissing, at least compared to Americans and Latinas.
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Lol nevermind, these videos should work now.
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6 hours ago, SquishMitten said:You have a 5 and 7 yo back here? Man, you’re much more brave than me.
You know, that sounds an awful lot like my ex-wife. She was down to pick up the extra custody days as a favor until Kiev got hit hard on 24 April and then she tried to welch. But, to her credit, she stuck to her word and here I am.
Here's a few pics/vids of the demolition/prep work we've done to convert an old hospital into an inpatient mental health center for veterans, under a spoiler alert:
Spoiler<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <body><div style="position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0;"><iframe id="js_video_iframe" src="https://jumpshare.com/embed/kPJDx0Zr9HRzNjR6aOtD" frameborder="0" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen style="position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%;"></iframe></div> </body> </html>
<div style="position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0;"><iframe id="js_video_iframe" src="https://jumpshare.com/embed/sdYT2oZVKN9YkjDNfrh8" frameborder="0" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen style="position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%;"></iframe></div>
<div style="position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0;"><iframe id="js_video_iframe" src="https://jumpshare.com/embed/kPJDx0Zr9HRzNjR6aOtD" frameborder="0" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen style="position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%;"></iframe></div>
I usually only get my HR up to the mid-160s when I'm hooping or on the Peloton. I worked hard! Downside is all the drankin' I've been doing here has my RHR in the 60s instead of the usual mid-50s. Oops.
And here's the group, with your homie front and center:
Finally, it turns out that the attacks of the night of 3-4 May caused some damage in my neighborhood. I'd like to act like I'm a hoss about it all but, honestly, after the air sirens wake me up, it often takes me a while to get back to sleep. Last night, I finally just moved my mattress to the foyer in my Airbnb, which is the only place I have that follows the "two walls rule" (<--context) and put my earbuds in playing white noise and said "fuck it, I ain't seeking shelter no matter what Putin sends." It worked, and I'm doing it for the remainder of my time here.
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Update:
- This volunteering experience has really been a good one. People are really grateful and the volunteer teams have been about 60-70% locals with the remainder foreigners like me. It is really inspiring to see how the Ukranians are like "Fuck it and fuck you, Putin. We rebuild." Being a little part of that feels really fucking good, given my family history fleeing Ruzzn oppression, my feelings on this war and what i know about it through this thread, and, now, actually meeting the people.
- I am so sick of air alerts every night. Can't imagine what it'd be like in the Kharkiv direction for example. Sounds like a tornado siren. Usually they just throw some Shaheds at us, which is no big deal, but a couple nights ago and tonight it was ballistic missiles like Iskander/S300, which can make it through the Patriots. Regardless, those hoes always attack at night which ducks up my sleep schedule because i start work at 8 or 9. Fuck you, Putin. I imagine my 7 and 5 year old living through this and how to explain it to them so the understand the gravity of it and take cover, but it doesn't taint their childhood.
- Tinder date was great but was no more than some passionate kissing bc we were in public places all night and she needed to get home before martial law curfew kicked in. My understanding is that Ukrainians are not big on PDA so I'll take a conditional W there. We have plans to meet up again tomorrow night, her kiddo will be with her ex, and we've talked about a sleepover. She was comparable to her pics, too, which is nice.
More substantive update to come with observations and whatnot.
But fuck Putin and Slava Ukraini!
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Not sure if the above works. It's from my same balcony. Putin's bitchass sent some stuff that set off the air alert sirens at 4:30 and now I've been awake for an hour. Figured I'd throw my pistons on with a few mins left in the game and they blew it. Fuck you, Putin, I could have just woken up and checked the score!
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6 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:I've trained well on tóxicas, my man. And I've seen the destruction my grandmas (one Ukrainian, one Polish) and mom (Ukrainian) can do.
Ask me whether I have both kidneys in a couple weeks, though.
Off to bed now, though, y'all. We meet early tomorrow and have a long day of work in Demydiv
Spoiler-
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Brief update:
I have arrived in Kyiv on the overnight train. Tomorrow, I will be going with the group Dobrobat (https://www.dobrobat.in.ua/en/) to do construction for a veteran's home in the village of Demydiv. And over the weekend, with another group called Brave to Rebuild (https://bravetorebuild.in.ua/en), I will be doing demo and prep work on a site that will become a veteran's mental health center. Today I've been ambling around the city getting my bearings, went to a grocery store and stocked up a bit, and, tonight, I am doing an Airbnb experiences food/drink/history walking tour.
This is the first time in a few years I have traveled to a non-English or Spanish speaking country, both of which I'm fluent in, or French, which I can muddle through. I have no context for communication beyond the basics like "hi," "please," and "thank you" type stuff and I can only barely read a lot of the Cyrillic-style alphabet on signs. It reminds me of previous travels to China or Japan, where I don't know shit for the language and can't read the signs except for in those not-common instances where there's an English equivalent. I think this kind of travel is really good for personal growth.
And for you horndogs, I have my first date tomorrow night with Tatyana. I have focused on matches that have "short-term" as one of their options, and she's one of them. Tomorrow night it's a stroll so she can show me some of Kyiv and a dinner/drinks afterwards.
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Elon Musk: Nazi traitor piece of shit [Confirmed]
in Daily Texan
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Ford CEO shuts down Tesla Full Self-Driving deal, says Waymo is better
Ford has long been rumored to be in discussions with Tesla about licensing its Full Self-Driving technology, but CEO Jim Farley has now shut down those rumors. Farley confirmed that Ford talked with Tesla, but he believes Waymo has a better solution.
Back in 2021, Tesla CEO Elon Musk mentioned that he had early discussions with other automakers about licensing self-driving technology, but these discussions didn’t lead to any agreements. In 2023, the CEO announced that Tesla would be open to licensing Autopilot and FSD to other automakers. [rest of the article under spoiler...]
However, a few months later, Musk said “automakers don’t believe Tesla Full Self-Driving is real”, but he claimed they will soon.
In 2024, Musk claimed that Tesla was in discussions with “one major automaker about licensing Full Self-Driving.”
Ford was rumored to be the automaker in question due to its limited effort in autonomous driving and the fact that it was the first automaker to initiate the adoption of Tesla’s charge connector as the new North American standard.
The rumors might have been true, as CEO Jim Farley confirmed that Ford was in talks with Tesla about self-driving during a talk at the Aspen Ideas Festival last week.
He said that he talked with Musk and admitted that both Waymo and Tesla have made progress toward self-driving, but he sees LIDAR, which Waymo uses but Tesla does not, as a critical part of self-driving.
Farley was directly asked what approach made more sense (via Fortune😞
Ford invested approximately $1 billion in Argo AI, a self-driving startup in partnership with Volkswagen. However, it ceased funding the company in 2022, and Argo AI was subsequently dissolved, with the two automakers integrating their technology.
After this setback, Ford said it would partner with self-driving companies once the technology is further developed.
Waymo has first been focused on developing its own vehicles for autonomous ride-hailing, while Tesla has been trying to bring consumer autonomous vehicles to market.
These different approaches have been reversing lately with Tesla launching a pilot program for its own autonomous ride-hailing fleet after years of failing making its consumer vehicles self-driving.
Meanwhile, Waymo has recently been securing deals with Toyota and Hyundai about integrating its self-driving technology into their consumer vehicles.
Electrek’s Take
Tesla shareholders have been hoping for those talks that Musk has been teasing for years to come to fruition, and have an automaker validate Tesla’s approach to self-driving.
It looks like it won’t be Ford and it looks like Ford might have been that “one major automaker” in discussion with Tesla.
As Farley put it, they want to take a careful approach to self-driving, and if that’s your goal, Tesla might not be the best partner.
I guess all I can say is, "duh." The thing I wonder more is whether Tesla's already at it's dead end with cameras. I think we all, except for the most Tesla-optimistic, have known for some time that there's a ceiling on what you can do with a camera-only approach. This makes me think that we are already there, or damn close to it, with Tesla stuck at SAE Level 2+ and no way to climb higher, even if some reckless Tesla owners treat it like Level 3/4 in practice.