Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
The other thing is support life. For comparison, see below. Note that no M series has come to end of support yet.
Model version
Chip type
First appeared
OS support ceased
Support lifetime (yrs mo)
Last supported macOS
MacBook Pro (13" Mid 2010)
Intel
Apr 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 6 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15) (est)
MacBook Air (Late 2010)
Intel
Oct 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 0 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Early 2011)
Intel
Feb 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 8 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2011)
Intel
Jul 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 3 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Air (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2012)
Intel
Oct 2012
Oct 2023 (est)
11 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2013)
Intel
Oct 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2013)
Intel
Jun 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2014)
Intel
Jul 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 3 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2014)
Intel
Apr 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 6 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2015)
Intel
May 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 5 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2016)
Intel
Apr 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 6 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (Touch Bar 2016–17)
Intel
Oct 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook (12" 2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Air (2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (2018–19 Intel)
Intel
Jul 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Retina 2018)
Intel
Oct 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Pro (16" 2019)
Intel
Nov 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 11 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (2019)
Intel
Jul 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
6 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Intel 2020)
Intel
Mar 2020
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 7 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (13" M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (14"/16" M1 Pro/Max)
M1 Pro / M1 Max
Oct 2021
–
3 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Air (M2)
M2
Jun 2022
–
2 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (M2/M3 family)
M2 / M3
2022–24
–
≤3 yrs (ongoing)
–
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
But the battery life is longer than most Windows laptops' working life. Plus any decent high street repairer will replace the battery for you if you need it done... I had my 2010 Macbook battery replaced after 12 years for £60 IIRC.
Edit: the 2020 M1 Macbook Air I am typing this on has been used for several hours every day on battery and I have just checked - battery has 83% of capacity when new.
The repairers wouldn't touch my MS machine ... too difficult to tear down without breaking screen, etc. etc. Though I gather they have improved (MS I mean). Even so it's left a permanent scar, and I never buy a laptop or phone that isn't at least with a user-replaceable battery.
Well you're excluding yourself from the best laptop experience available then.
I guess it depends what you mean by 'user-replaceable' Personally I'd rather pay someone £20 to do this but, you can do it yourself if you want (not that you'll ever need to):
User replaceable to me means not messing around with hot air to try and melt glue.
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
From what I remember of cassette battery laptops you'd need to do that after 30 minutes as it'd be dead already...
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
I don't agree about locking people away, nor forcing medication upon them. It should only be done in extreme circumstances, but if it must be done to protect the public, it must be done. It's completely inchorent philosophically to suggest otherwise, because it introduces a hierarchy of human rights - the human rights of the insane to freedom being placed above those of the sane to life.
If they have committed no crime then yes of course their liberty comes first.
If they commit a crime, they should be incarcerated.
The idea that the homeless are a danger to the public is very American. If you look at the stats, it simply isn’t so, in the U.K.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
From what I remember of cassette battery laptops you'd need to do that after 30 minutes as it'd be dead already...
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
Interesting discussion though - some people seem much more willing to accept stuff which is on the verge of being single-battery-life disposable. And that Mac seem to have gone the other direction from MS (much as I rightly complained about their first laptop).
Wow! Yesterday, the WaPo came down hard on New York's mayor-elect:
Mamdani ran an upbeat campaign, with a nice-guy demeanor and perpetual smile papering over a long history of divisive and demagogic statements. New Yorkers periodically checking in on politics could understandably believe that he simply wanted to bring the city together and make it more affordable. That interpretation became much harder after his victory speech.
Across 23 angry minutes laced with identity politics and seething with resentment, Mamdani abandoned his cool disposition and made clear that his view of politics isn’t about unity. It isn’t about letting people build better lives for themselves. It is about identifying class enemies — from landlords who take advantage of tenants to “the bosses” who exploit workers — and then crushing them. His goal is not to increase wealth but to dole it out to favored groups. The word “growth” didn’t appear in the speech, but President Donald Trump garnered eight mentions.
A New York City politician fibbing during their campaign? I am shocked, shocked!
(I'll let others listen to that speech, since I have much else to do these days.)
Wa(shington) Po(st) went really pro-Trump when its owner Jeff Bezos kissed the Trump ring. It is not capable of describing any anti-Trump politician in an objective manner. It's like quoting the Daily Mail on Meghan Markle
In terms of defection watch, it is very much an insiders market. Also more likely to be some obscure back-bencher than someone like Braverman.
There may also be other defections, for example Labour to Green, or Your Party to Green, Your Party seeming to be as rancourous as Reform.
One could posit a correlation between more ideological politics and more infighting, on the basis that practical, moderate pragmatic politicians are more used to compromises with others and with the world as it actually is.
The demise of the Tory Party essentially derives from the triumph of ideology over pragmatism, the irony being that its replacement on the right looks more ideological still - and may of course finish up going the same way.
@isam posted recently about his bad bet on Starmer winning seats last year, because Starmer is so lacking in either charisma or coherence. An example perhaps of the betting corollory to the stock market aphorism "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent".
I think we all know that Farage will be a disaster as PM but that doesnt mean that he won't get the gig. Sensible Tories would never support him in the event of a Reform minority government. It would be the end of them.
(If you are triggered by what appears to be my catchphrase, look away now)
What the "Starmer is awful, he'll never be PM" bet missed was that someone had to win in 2024, and everyone else was clearly even worse. That was as true on the Labour benches as in the other parties.
Starmer has no fans, which is why none of his fans have tried to explain his poor polling. Heck, I don't think he expected, or particularly wanted, to be PM in 2020. It was only the multiple pileup of clown cars by the Conservatives that gave him the opportunity. And that opportunity was always a chalice with unusual skull-and-crossbones markings.
Right now, his job is to absorb as much of the toxicity heading the British government's way, and see which of the next generation of ministers is any good. They can take over in 2028, and then the game is afoot again.
Until then, we all have to wait. Unfortunate for us, and for him, but there we are.
Well, I had the bet before partygate was revealed for the second time (the first was in The Times the day after the cake, but no one cared then), so the incumbent had a great chance of winning. I ran into a black swan which allowed Starmer a walkover, but it happens
Which black swan? There was a whole flock of them surely?
I do wonder why the term "black swan" for an unexpected unknown is still in use. They are quite common. One showed up at our local lake last year, seemed to get on OK with the flock of juvenile mute swans, and no disasters occurred
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
From what I remember of cassette battery laptops you'd need to do that after 30 minutes as it'd be dead already...
They've obviously been improved since your time!
I'm trying to remember how far back in time I need to go to when I had work laptops like that! I just remember they were gash
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
Quite a few of the homeless people we support have been helped into housing but the mundane business needed to stay in housing is utterly beyond them. A lot of ongoing support is needed and all too often it's more than local council can manage.
Wow! Yesterday, the WaPo came down hard on New York's mayor-elect: 'Mamdani ran an upbeat campaign, with a nice-guy demeanor and perpetual smile papering over a long history of divisive and demagogic statements. New Yorkers periodically checking in on politics could understandably believe that he simply wanted to bring the city together and make it more affordable. That interpretation became much harder after his victory speech.
Across 23 angry minutes laced with identity politics and seething with resentment, Mamdani abandoned his cool disposition and made clear that his view of politics isn’t about unity. It isn’t about letting people build better lives for themselves. It is about identifying class enemies — from landlords who take advantage of tenants to “the bosses” who exploit workers — and then crushing them. His goal is not to increase wealth but to dole it out to favored groups. The word “growth” didn’t appear in the speech, but President Donald Trump garnered eight mentions.'
A New York City politician fibbing during their campaign? I am shocked, shocked!
(I'll let others listen to that speech, since I have much else to do these days.)
Isn't it also that the WaPo has gone more-or-less Tonto in the last year and a bit?
Bezos will be raging that his paper has departed from impartial analysis.
In terms of defection watch, it is very much an insiders market. Also more likely to be some obscure back-bencher than someone like Braverman.
There may also be other defections, for example Labour to Green, or Your Party to Green, Your Party seeming to be as rancourous as Reform.
One could posit a correlation between more ideological politics and more infighting, on the basis that practical, moderate pragmatic politicians are more used to compromises with others and with the world as it actually is.
The demise of the Tory Party essentially derives from the triumph of ideology over pragmatism, the irony being that its replacement on the right looks more ideological still - and may of course finish up going the same way.
@isam posted recently about his bad bet on Starmer winning seats last year, because Starmer is so lacking in either charisma or coherence. An example perhaps of the betting corollory to the stock market aphorism "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent".
I think we all know that Farage will be a disaster as PM but that doesnt mean that he won't get the gig. Sensible Tories would never support him in the event of a Reform minority government. It would be the end of them.
(If you are triggered by what appears to be my catchphrase, look away now)
What the "Starmer is awful, he'll never be PM" bet missed was that someone had to win in 2024, and everyone else was clearly even worse. That was as true on the Labour benches as in the other parties.
Starmer has no fans, which is why none of his fans have tried to explain his poor polling. Heck, I don't think he expected, or particularly wanted, to be PM in 2020. It was only the multiple pileup of clown cars by the Conservatives that gave him the opportunity. And that opportunity was always a chalice with unusual skull-and-crossbones markings.
Right now, his job is to absorb as much of the toxicity heading the British government's way, and see which of the next generation of ministers is any good. They can take over in 2028, and then the game is afoot again.
Until then, we all have to wait. Unfortunate for us, and for him, but there we are.
Well, I had the bet before partygate was revealed for the second time (the first was in The Times the day after the cake, but no one cared then), so the incumbent had a great chance of winning. I ran into a black swan which allowed Starmer a walkover, but it happens
Which black swan? There was a whole flock of them surely?
I do wonder why the term "black swan" for an unexpected unknown is still in use. They are quite common. One showed up at our local lake last year, seemed to get on OK with the flock of juvenile mute swans, and no disasters occurred
In terms of defection watch, it is very much an insiders market. Also more likely to be some obscure back-bencher than someone like Braverman.
There may also be other defections, for example Labour to Green, or Your Party to Green, Your Party seeming to be as rancourous as Reform.
One could posit a correlation between more ideological politics and more infighting, on the basis that practical, moderate pragmatic politicians are more used to compromises with others and with the world as it actually is.
The demise of the Tory Party essentially derives from the triumph of ideology over pragmatism, the irony being that its replacement on the right looks more ideological still - and may of course finish up going the same way.
@isam posted recently about his bad bet on Starmer winning seats last year, because Starmer is so lacking in either charisma or coherence. An example perhaps of the betting corollory to the stock market aphorism "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent".
I think we all know that Farage will be a disaster as PM but that doesnt mean that he won't get the gig. Sensible Tories would never support him in the event of a Reform minority government. It would be the end of them.
(If you are triggered by what appears to be my catchphrase, look away now)
What the "Starmer is awful, he'll never be PM" bet missed was that someone had to win in 2024, and everyone else was clearly even worse. That was as true on the Labour benches as in the other parties.
Starmer has no fans, which is why none of his fans have tried to explain his poor polling. Heck, I don't think he expected, or particularly wanted, to be PM in 2020. It was only the multiple pileup of clown cars by the Conservatives that gave him the opportunity. And that opportunity was always a chalice with unusual skull-and-crossbones markings.
Right now, his job is to absorb as much of the toxicity heading the British government's way, and see which of the next generation of ministers is any good. They can take over in 2028, and then the game is afoot again.
Until then, we all have to wait. Unfortunate for us, and for him, but there we are.
Well, I had the bet before partygate was revealed for the second time (the first was in The Times the day after the cake, but no one cared then), so the incumbent had a great chance of winning. I ran into a black swan which allowed Starmer a walkover, but it happens
Which black swan? There was a whole flock of them surely?
The collective nouns for swans in the UK vary depending on their location: a bevy or herd for swans on the ground, a bank for those at the water's edge, and a wedge for those in flight. Other terms include a flight or game.
Not a flock.
It is a well-known fact that 99 per cent of collective nouns were made up by bored lexicographers at the OUP staff Christmas party. No-one in real life talks about a murder of crows or a gate of former prime ministers.
You need to use the correct proper noun when referring to multiple lexicographers: it's a clatter of lexicographers.
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
I don't agree about locking people away, nor forcing medication upon them. It should only be done in extreme circumstances, but if it must be done to protect the public, it must be done. It's completely inchorent philosophically to suggest otherwise, because it introduces a hierarchy of human rights - the human rights of the insane to freedom being placed above those of the sane to life.
If they have committed no crime then yes of course their liberty comes first.
If they commit a crime, they should be incarcerated.
The idea that the homeless are a danger to the public is very American. If you look at the stats, it simply isn’t so, in the U.K.
The mad stabby types aren’t street people.
I was responding to your statements about the ineligibility of locking anyone up, not suggesting incarceration as an all-purpose solution for rough sleeping.
As far as a solution to that goes, there are a few things that we know improve mental health. They include work, especially meaningful work, fresh air, excercise and good food with the right micronutrients. Any real solution I think would include all those, along with warm, clean and safe accommodation.
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
Quite a few of the homeless people we support have been helped into housing but the mundane business needed to stay in housing is utterly beyond them. A lot of ongoing support is needed and all too often it's more than local council can manage.
Even in managed, sheltered accommodation they don’t last. Fall asleep smoking and start fires, drugs, fights etc.
I’ve heard it suggested that a percentage of humans just can’t deal with spending most of the day in a box.
In terms of defection watch, it is very much an insiders market. Also more likely to be some obscure back-bencher than someone like Braverman.
There may also be other defections, for example Labour to Green, or Your Party to Green, Your Party seeming to be as rancourous as Reform.
One could posit a correlation between more ideological politics and more infighting, on the basis that practical, moderate pragmatic politicians are more used to compromises with others and with the world as it actually is.
The demise of the Tory Party essentially derives from the triumph of ideology over pragmatism, the irony being that its replacement on the right looks more ideological still - and may of course finish up going the same way.
@isam posted recently about his bad bet on Starmer winning seats last year, because Starmer is so lacking in either charisma or coherence. An example perhaps of the betting corollory to the stock market aphorism "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent".
I think we all know that Farage will be a disaster as PM but that doesnt mean that he won't get the gig. Sensible Tories would never support him in the event of a Reform minority government. It would be the end of them.
(If you are triggered by what appears to be my catchphrase, look away now)
What the "Starmer is awful, he'll never be PM" bet missed was that someone had to win in 2024, and everyone else was clearly even worse. That was as true on the Labour benches as in the other parties.
Starmer has no fans, which is why none of his fans have tried to explain his poor polling. Heck, I don't think he expected, or particularly wanted, to be PM in 2020. It was only the multiple pileup of clown cars by the Conservatives that gave him the opportunity. And that opportunity was always a chalice with unusual skull-and-crossbones markings.
Right now, his job is to absorb as much of the toxicity heading the British government's way, and see which of the next generation of ministers is any good. They can take over in 2028, and then the game is afoot again.
Until then, we all have to wait. Unfortunate for us, and for him, but there we are.
Well, I had the bet before partygate was revealed for the second time (the first was in The Times the day after the cake, but no one cared then), so the incumbent had a great chance of winning. I ran into a black swan which allowed Starmer a walkover, but it happens
Which black swan? There was a whole flock of them surely?
The collective nouns for swans in the UK vary depending on their location: a bevy or herd for swans on the ground, a bank for those at the water's edge, and a wedge for those in flight. Other terms include a flight or game.
Not a flock.
It is a well-known fact that 99 per cent of collective nouns were made up by bored lexicographers at the OUP staff Christmas party. No-one in real life talks about a murder of crows or a gate of former prime ministers.
You need to use the correct proper noun when referring to multiple lexicographers: it's a clatter of lexicographers.
Isnt it a corner of lexicographers a la Channel 4?
In terms of defection watch, it is very much an insiders market. Also more likely to be some obscure back-bencher than someone like Braverman.
There may also be other defections, for example Labour to Green, or Your Party to Green, Your Party seeming to be as rancourous as Reform.
One could posit a correlation between more ideological politics and more infighting, on the basis that practical, moderate pragmatic politicians are more used to compromises with others and with the world as it actually is.
The demise of the Tory Party essentially derives from the triumph of ideology over pragmatism, the irony being that its replacement on the right looks more ideological still - and may of course finish up going the same way.
@isam posted recently about his bad bet on Starmer winning seats last year, because Starmer is so lacking in either charisma or coherence. An example perhaps of the betting corollory to the stock market aphorism "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent".
I think we all know that Farage will be a disaster as PM but that doesnt mean that he won't get the gig. Sensible Tories would never support him in the event of a Reform minority government. It would be the end of them.
(If you are triggered by what appears to be my catchphrase, look away now)
What the "Starmer is awful, he'll never be PM" bet missed was that someone had to win in 2024, and everyone else was clearly even worse. That was as true on the Labour benches as in the other parties.
Starmer has no fans, which is why none of his fans have tried to explain his poor polling. Heck, I don't think he expected, or particularly wanted, to be PM in 2020. It was only the multiple pileup of clown cars by the Conservatives that gave him the opportunity. And that opportunity was always a chalice with unusual skull-and-crossbones markings.
Right now, his job is to absorb as much of the toxicity heading the British government's way, and see which of the next generation of ministers is any good. They can take over in 2028, and then the game is afoot again.
Until then, we all have to wait. Unfortunate for us, and for him, but there we are.
Well, I had the bet before partygate was revealed for the second time (the first was in The Times the day after the cake, but no one cared then), so the incumbent had a great chance of winning. I ran into a black swan which allowed Starmer a walkover, but it happens
Which black swan? There was a whole flock of them surely?
The collective nouns for swans in the UK vary depending on their location: a bevy or herd for swans on the ground, a bank for those at the water's edge, and a wedge for those in flight. Other terms include a flight or game.
In terms of defection watch, it is very much an insiders market. Also more likely to be some obscure back-bencher than someone like Braverman.
There may also be other defections, for example Labour to Green, or Your Party to Green, Your Party seeming to be as rancourous as Reform.
One could posit a correlation between more ideological politics and more infighting, on the basis that practical, moderate pragmatic politicians are more used to compromises with others and with the world as it actually is.
The demise of the Tory Party essentially derives from the triumph of ideology over pragmatism, the irony being that its replacement on the right looks more ideological still - and may of course finish up going the same way.
@isam posted recently about his bad bet on Starmer winning seats last year, because Starmer is so lacking in either charisma or coherence. An example perhaps of the betting corollory to the stock market aphorism "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent".
I think we all know that Farage will be a disaster as PM but that doesnt mean that he won't get the gig. Sensible Tories would never support him in the event of a Reform minority government. It would be the end of them.
(If you are triggered by what appears to be my catchphrase, look away now)
What the "Starmer is awful, he'll never be PM" bet missed was that someone had to win in 2024, and everyone else was clearly even worse. That was as true on the Labour benches as in the other parties.
Starmer has no fans, which is why none of his fans have tried to explain his poor polling. Heck, I don't think he expected, or particularly wanted, to be PM in 2020. It was only the multiple pileup of clown cars by the Conservatives that gave him the opportunity. And that opportunity was always a chalice with unusual skull-and-crossbones markings.
Right now, his job is to absorb as much of the toxicity heading the British government's way, and see which of the next generation of ministers is any good. They can take over in 2028, and then the game is afoot again.
Until then, we all have to wait. Unfortunate for us, and for him, but there we are.
Well, I had the bet before partygate was revealed for the second time (the first was in The Times the day after the cake, but no one cared then), so the incumbent had a great chance of winning. I ran into a black swan which allowed Starmer a walkover, but it happens
Which black swan? There was a whole flock of them surely?
I do wonder why the term "black swan" for an unexpected unknown is still in use. They are quite common. One showed up at our local lake last year, seemed to get on OK with the flock of juvenile mute swans, and no disasters occurred
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
The other thing is support life. For comparison, see below. Note that no M series has come to end of support yet.
Model version
Chip type
First appeared
OS support ceased
Support lifetime (yrs mo)
Last supported macOS
MacBook Pro (13" Mid 2010)
Intel
Apr 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 6 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15) (est)
MacBook Air (Late 2010)
Intel
Oct 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 0 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Early 2011)
Intel
Feb 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 8 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2011)
Intel
Jul 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 3 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Air (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2012)
Intel
Oct 2012
Oct 2023 (est)
11 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2013)
Intel
Oct 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2013)
Intel
Jun 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2014)
Intel
Jul 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 3 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2014)
Intel
Apr 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 6 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2015)
Intel
May 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 5 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2016)
Intel
Apr 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 6 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (Touch Bar 2016–17)
Intel
Oct 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook (12" 2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Air (2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (2018–19 Intel)
Intel
Jul 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Retina 2018)
Intel
Oct 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Pro (16" 2019)
Intel
Nov 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 11 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (2019)
Intel
Jul 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
6 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Intel 2020)
Intel
Mar 2020
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 7 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (13" M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (14"/16" M1 Pro/Max)
M1 Pro / M1 Max
Oct 2021
–
3 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Air (M2)
M2
Jun 2022
–
2 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (M2/M3 family)
M2 / M3
2022–24
–
≤3 yrs (ongoing)
–
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
But the battery life is longer than most Windows laptops' working life. Plus any decent high street repairer will replace the battery for you if you need it done... I had my 2010 Macbook battery replaced after 12 years for £60 IIRC.
Edit: the 2020 M1 Macbook Air I am typing this on has been used for several hours every day on battery and I have just checked - battery has 83% of capacity when new.
The repairers wouldn't touch my MS machine ... too difficult to tear down without breaking screen, etc. etc. Though I gather they have improved (MS I mean). Even so it's left a permanent scar, and I never buy a laptop or phone that isn't at least with a user-replaceable battery.
Well you're excluding yourself from the best laptop experience available then.
I guess it depends what you mean by 'user-replaceable' Personally I'd rather pay someone £20 to do this but, you can do it yourself if you want (not that you'll ever need to):
User replaceable to me means not messing around with hot air to try and melt glue.
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
The point you're missing is that you actually need to do that for a Mac - you just keep using the same battery.
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
I don't agree about locking people away, nor forcing medication upon them. It should only be done in extreme circumstances, but if it must be done to protect the public, it must be done. It's completely inchorent philosophically to suggest otherwise, because it introduces a hierarchy of human rights - the human rights of the insane to freedom being placed above those of the sane to life.
If they have committed no crime then yes of course their liberty comes first.
If they commit a crime, they should be incarcerated.
The idea that the homeless are a danger to the public is very American. If you look at the stats, it simply isn’t so, in the U.K.
The mad stabby types aren’t street people.
But seeing them (rightly) makes the rest of us feel uncomfortable, guilty and sad. Ralph McTell sang about it, and that was over fifty years ago.
In terms of defection watch, it is very much an insiders market. Also more likely to be some obscure back-bencher than someone like Braverman.
There may also be other defections, for example Labour to Green, or Your Party to Green, Your Party seeming to be as rancourous as Reform.
One could posit a correlation between more ideological politics and more infighting, on the basis that practical, moderate pragmatic politicians are more used to compromises with others and with the world as it actually is.
The demise of the Tory Party essentially derives from the triumph of ideology over pragmatism, the irony being that its replacement on the right looks more ideological still - and may of course finish up going the same way.
@isam posted recently about his bad bet on Starmer winning seats last year, because Starmer is so lacking in either charisma or coherence. An example perhaps of the betting corollory to the stock market aphorism "the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent".
I think we all know that Farage will be a disaster as PM but that doesnt mean that he won't get the gig. Sensible Tories would never support him in the event of a Reform minority government. It would be the end of them.
(If you are triggered by what appears to be my catchphrase, look away now)
What the "Starmer is awful, he'll never be PM" bet missed was that someone had to win in 2024, and everyone else was clearly even worse. That was as true on the Labour benches as in the other parties.
Starmer has no fans, which is why none of his fans have tried to explain his poor polling. Heck, I don't think he expected, or particularly wanted, to be PM in 2020. It was only the multiple pileup of clown cars by the Conservatives that gave him the opportunity. And that opportunity was always a chalice with unusual skull-and-crossbones markings.
Right now, his job is to absorb as much of the toxicity heading the British government's way, and see which of the next generation of ministers is any good. They can take over in 2028, and then the game is afoot again.
Until then, we all have to wait. Unfortunate for us, and for him, but there we are.
Well, I had the bet before partygate was revealed for the second time (the first was in The Times the day after the cake, but no one cared then), so the incumbent had a great chance of winning. I ran into a black swan which allowed Starmer a walkover, but it happens
Which black swan? There was a whole flock of them surely?
I do wonder why the term "black swan" for an unexpected unknown is still in use. They are quite common. One showed up at our local lake last year, seemed to get on OK with the flock of juvenile mute swans, and no disasters occurred
Black swan events seem to be becoming more common too.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
The other thing is support life. For comparison, see below. Note that no M series has come to end of support yet.
Model version
Chip type
First appeared
OS support ceased
Support lifetime (yrs mo)
Last supported macOS
MacBook Pro (13" Mid 2010)
Intel
Apr 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 6 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15) (est)
MacBook Air (Late 2010)
Intel
Oct 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 0 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Early 2011)
Intel
Feb 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 8 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2011)
Intel
Jul 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 3 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Air (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2012)
Intel
Oct 2012
Oct 2023 (est)
11 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2013)
Intel
Oct 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2013)
Intel
Jun 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2014)
Intel
Jul 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 3 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2014)
Intel
Apr 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 6 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2015)
Intel
May 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 5 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2016)
Intel
Apr 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 6 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (Touch Bar 2016–17)
Intel
Oct 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook (12" 2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Air (2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (2018–19 Intel)
Intel
Jul 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Retina 2018)
Intel
Oct 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Pro (16" 2019)
Intel
Nov 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 11 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (2019)
Intel
Jul 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
6 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Intel 2020)
Intel
Mar 2020
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 7 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (13" M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (14"/16" M1 Pro/Max)
M1 Pro / M1 Max
Oct 2021
–
3 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Air (M2)
M2
Jun 2022
–
2 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (M2/M3 family)
M2 / M3
2022–24
–
≤3 yrs (ongoing)
–
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
But the battery life is longer than most Windows laptops' working life. Plus any decent high street repairer will replace the battery for you if you need it done... I had my 2010 Macbook battery replaced after 12 years for £60 IIRC.
Edit: the 2020 M1 Macbook Air I am typing this on has been used for several hours every day on battery and I have just checked - battery has 83% of capacity when new.
The repairers wouldn't touch my MS machine ... too difficult to tear down without breaking screen, etc. etc. Though I gather they have improved (MS I mean). Even so it's left a permanent scar, and I never buy a laptop or phone that isn't at least with a user-replaceable battery.
Well you're excluding yourself from the best laptop experience available then.
I guess it depends what you mean by 'user-replaceable' Personally I'd rather pay someone £20 to do this but, you can do it yourself if you want (not that you'll ever need to):
User replaceable to me means not messing around with hot air to try and melt glue.
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
The point you're missing is that you actually need to do that for a Mac - you just keep using the same battery.
Not missing it at all, just that sometimes the battery goes and has to be changed.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.
"For the Fallen" by Laurence Binyon, 1914.
Lest we forget.
Amen to that.
As direct memories of war fade in the UK, with only 8,000 WWII veterans still alive and with more recent British wars fought only by professional armies, sadly for many of us war has been a little too close to home in the last few years.
War memorial in Zhytomyr, Ukraine. August 2025, in a city of 250,000 to the West of Kiev outside the war zone.
There’s more than 500 photographs on display, many of them younger than me, many of them young enough to be my sons, and I say a prayer for them today.
I remember when I worked in Mertzwiller I visited a German war grave and what shocked me was the ages of the dead soldiers. It was the scene of a battle just before the end of the war and most of the graves I saw were kids in their mid teens. Tragic waste of young life.
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
I don't agree about locking people away, nor forcing medication upon them. It should only be done in extreme circumstances, but if it must be done to protect the public, it must be done. It's completely inchorent philosophically to suggest otherwise, because it introduces a hierarchy of human rights - the human rights of the insane to freedom being placed above those of the sane to life.
If they have committed no crime then yes of course their liberty comes first.
If they commit a crime, they should be incarcerated.
The idea that the homeless are a danger to the public is very American. If you look at the stats, it simply isn’t so, in the U.K.
The mad stabby types aren’t street people.
But seeing them (rightly) makes the rest of us feel uncomfortable, guilty and sad. Ralph McTell sang about it, and that was over fifty years ago.
Strong message follows
I’d rather they were on the street than drugged up against their will or imprisoned for the crime of being untidy and upsetting people.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
The other thing is support life. For comparison, see below. Note that no M series has come to end of support yet.
Model version
Chip type
First appeared
OS support ceased
Support lifetime (yrs mo)
Last supported macOS
MacBook Pro (13" Mid 2010)
Intel
Apr 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 6 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15) (est)
MacBook Air (Late 2010)
Intel
Oct 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 0 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Early 2011)
Intel
Feb 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 8 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2011)
Intel
Jul 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 3 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Air (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2012)
Intel
Oct 2012
Oct 2023 (est)
11 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2013)
Intel
Oct 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2013)
Intel
Jun 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2014)
Intel
Jul 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 3 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2014)
Intel
Apr 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 6 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2015)
Intel
May 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 5 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2016)
Intel
Apr 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 6 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (Touch Bar 2016–17)
Intel
Oct 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook (12" 2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Air (2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (2018–19 Intel)
Intel
Jul 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Retina 2018)
Intel
Oct 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Pro (16" 2019)
Intel
Nov 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 11 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (2019)
Intel
Jul 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
6 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Intel 2020)
Intel
Mar 2020
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 7 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (13" M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (14"/16" M1 Pro/Max)
M1 Pro / M1 Max
Oct 2021
–
3 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Air (M2)
M2
Jun 2022
–
2 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (M2/M3 family)
M2 / M3
2022–24
–
≤3 yrs (ongoing)
–
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
But the battery life is longer than most Windows laptops' working life. Plus any decent high street repairer will replace the battery for you if you need it done... I had my 2010 Macbook battery replaced after 12 years for £60 IIRC.
Edit: the 2020 M1 Macbook Air I am typing this on has been used for several hours every day on battery and I have just checked - battery has 83% of capacity when new.
The repairers wouldn't touch my MS machine ... too difficult to tear down without breaking screen, etc. etc. Though I gather they have improved (MS I mean). Even so it's left a permanent scar, and I never buy a laptop or phone that isn't at least with a user-replaceable battery.
Well you're excluding yourself from the best laptop experience available then.
I guess it depends what you mean by 'user-replaceable' Personally I'd rather pay someone £20 to do this but, you can do it yourself if you want (not that you'll ever need to):
User replaceable to me means not messing around with hot air to try and melt glue.
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
The point you're missing is that you actually need to do that for a Mac - you just keep using the same battery.
Not missing it at all, just that sometimes the battery goes and has to be changed.
Fair enough, but you're looking for the best laptop not the best battery holder. How easy is it to change the battery on your smartphone btw?
I appreciate you have been stung by this before. My old work Thinkpad was an absolute cinch to change the battery - and I know because I had to do it regularly; my Macbook is probably a bit tricky to change the battery on - but I don't really know because...
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
Quite a few of the homeless people we support have been helped into housing but the mundane business needed to stay in housing is utterly beyond them. A lot of ongoing support is needed and all too often it's more than local council can manage.
Even in managed, sheltered accommodation they don’t last. Fall asleep smoking and start fires, drugs, fights etc.
I’ve heard it suggested that a percentage of humans just can’t deal with spending most of the day in a box.
When I worked in a Jobcentre I lost count of the times I was told "I can't work inside". OK I think it was sometimes code for "I will only accept a job doing what I normally do" but I think for a lot of people it is an issue.
I watched that and that has to end her career if she does what is reported
Can we end her career first? Pretty please?
Not sure when that was first broadcast, but it's amusing to see the strapline at the bottom - Lisa Nandy saying that the Government was getting to grips with the prisons crisis.
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
Quite a few of the homeless people we support have been helped into housing but the mundane business needed to stay in housing is utterly beyond them. A lot of ongoing support is needed and all too often it's more than local council can manage.
Even in managed, sheltered accommodation they don’t last. Fall asleep smoking and start fires, drugs, fights etc.
I’ve heard it suggested that a percentage of humans just can’t deal with spending most of the day in a box.
When I worked in a Jobcentre I lost count of the times I was told "I can't work inside". OK I think it was sometimes code for "I will only accept a job doing what I normally do" but I think for a lot of people it is an issue.
Humans didn’t evolve to live in boxes. Especially small boxes.
I’ve seen plenty of people who are visibly stressed by living in small spaces. One in particular - she moved from a shoe box to a spacious flat. And changed into a different person.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
The other thing is support life. For comparison, see below. Note that no M series has come to end of support yet.
Model version
Chip type
First appeared
OS support ceased
Support lifetime (yrs mo)
Last supported macOS
MacBook Pro (13" Mid 2010)
Intel
Apr 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 6 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15) (est)
MacBook Air (Late 2010)
Intel
Oct 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 0 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Early 2011)
Intel
Feb 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 8 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2011)
Intel
Jul 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 3 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Air (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2012)
Intel
Oct 2012
Oct 2023 (est)
11 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2013)
Intel
Oct 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2013)
Intel
Jun 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2014)
Intel
Jul 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 3 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2014)
Intel
Apr 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 6 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2015)
Intel
May 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 5 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2016)
Intel
Apr 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 6 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (Touch Bar 2016–17)
Intel
Oct 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook (12" 2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Air (2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (2018–19 Intel)
Intel
Jul 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Retina 2018)
Intel
Oct 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Pro (16" 2019)
Intel
Nov 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 11 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (2019)
Intel
Jul 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
6 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Intel 2020)
Intel
Mar 2020
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 7 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (13" M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (14"/16" M1 Pro/Max)
M1 Pro / M1 Max
Oct 2021
–
3 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Air (M2)
M2
Jun 2022
–
2 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (M2/M3 family)
M2 / M3
2022–24
–
≤3 yrs (ongoing)
–
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
But the battery life is longer than most Windows laptops' working life. Plus any decent high street repairer will replace the battery for you if you need it done... I had my 2010 Macbook battery replaced after 12 years for £60 IIRC.
Edit: the 2020 M1 Macbook Air I am typing this on has been used for several hours every day on battery and I have just checked - battery has 83% of capacity when new.
The repairers wouldn't touch my MS machine ... too difficult to tear down without breaking screen, etc. etc. Though I gather they have improved (MS I mean). Even so it's left a permanent scar, and I never buy a laptop or phone that isn't at least with a user-replaceable battery.
Well you're excluding yourself from the best laptop experience available then.
I guess it depends what you mean by 'user-replaceable' Personally I'd rather pay someone £20 to do this but, you can do it yourself if you want (not that you'll ever need to):
User replaceable to me means not messing around with hot air to try and melt glue.
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
The point you're missing is that you actually need to do that for a Mac - you just keep using the same battery.
Not missing it at all, just that sometimes the battery goes and has to be changed.
Fair enough, but you're looking for the best laptop not the best battery holder. How easy is it to change the battery on your smartphone btw?
I appreciate you have been stung by this before. My old work Thinkpad was an absolute cinch to change the battery - and I know because I had to do it regularly; my Macbook is probably a bit tricky to change the battery on - but I don't really know because...
Oh, I'm sure it is a matter of luck. Neither Mrs C nor I have had to change the Lenovo batteries after quite a few years and she is a heavy user ...
And the smartphone? Doddle, cos it's a Fairphone - and I can change most of the bits myself.
Though this reminds me I didn't explain one further reason btw why I loathe glued in batteries - it makes it often impossible for me to safely dismantle at end of life and remove the memory for percussive disassembly with my hammer. Nuking from orbit is the only way to be sure the data are erased, especially for SSD memories where the Win 10 software supposed to do this wimps out and says maybe it can't cope with SSD rather than hard drives, the ones with the silvery disc going round and round ... I'm feeling a bit sensitive at the moment as I've been clearing out our accumulated laptops of various ages and softwares following on Mrs C finally retiring!
Today’s Rawnsley, rushed out while the sky is still blue, on the lessons from the NYC mayoral election:
The trick is working out which are the correct lessons to take away from what is undoubtedly a stunning achievement by someone who started the campaign as an obscure member of the state assembly and was a household name only among his own family. The wrong place to start is with his ideological complexion. The right place to begin is with his campaign character. He is an eloquent and energising personality who can connect with voters, turn a phrase and perform eye-catching stunts.
Today the more effective communicators tend to be produced by the populist right. Like them or loathe them, Donald Trump and Nigel Farage know how to connect with audiences. The left can be suspicious about the performative dimensions of politics. Mr Mamdani’s victory underlines why it is a mistake to be sniffy. As successful politicians through the ages have demonstrated, Mr Mamdani had an acute understanding of his electoral market. He spoke to New Yorkers who find their city excruciatingly expensive…[although] A lot of what he has promised is not in his power alone to deliver, so it is moot how much of his economic populism will withstand contact with reality.
Another lesson for the left on both sides of the pond to note is that his campaign largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years. His pitch relentlessly emphasised bread-and-butter issues.
The conclusion to be drawn from all this is not – sorry, Zack, and regrets, Zarah – that tomorrow belongs to the Polanski or Sultana versions of the radical left. The message from America is a reminder that charismatic leadership counts. So does knowing your electorate and understanding how to connect with it.
Sure Mamdani focussed on bread and butter issues but far from avoiding "identitarian issues" he was open in his support of Trans-rights, as listed here. His youtube ad in the link was from October.
And I am not convinced by the last paragraph. Corbyn and Polanski certainly have charisma, and Sultana has a massive social media following for a back-bencher.
Yes, I found that strange also. Mamdani didn't "largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years", he doubled down on them, including trans rights
Yes, I think that the lesson of Mamdani's win is more subtle. It is possible to win in NYC with its large LBGTQ+ community with this sort of "identitarian" politics. Mamdani got 84% of the vote in that community, and managed a similar share of the under 24's. It is possible to win on the same day State Senators in Alabama with more conventional views.
The key is to be a broad and tolerant party capable of pitching a large tent, and not try to drive out one or the other group. Its horses for courses and diversity as a strength. The heart of Liberalism is to live as you choose and let others live as they choose.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
The other thing is support life. For comparison, see below. Note that no M series has come to end of support yet.
Model version
Chip type
First appeared
OS support ceased
Support lifetime (yrs mo)
Last supported macOS
MacBook Pro (13" Mid 2010)
Intel
Apr 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 6 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15) (est)
MacBook Air (Late 2010)
Intel
Oct 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 0 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Early 2011)
Intel
Feb 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 8 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2011)
Intel
Jul 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 3 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Air (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2012)
Intel
Oct 2012
Oct 2023 (est)
11 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2013)
Intel
Oct 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2013)
Intel
Jun 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2014)
Intel
Jul 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 3 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2014)
Intel
Apr 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 6 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2015)
Intel
May 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 5 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2016)
Intel
Apr 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 6 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (Touch Bar 2016–17)
Intel
Oct 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook (12" 2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Air (2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (2018–19 Intel)
Intel
Jul 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Retina 2018)
Intel
Oct 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Pro (16" 2019)
Intel
Nov 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 11 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (2019)
Intel
Jul 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
6 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Intel 2020)
Intel
Mar 2020
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 7 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (13" M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (14"/16" M1 Pro/Max)
M1 Pro / M1 Max
Oct 2021
–
3 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Air (M2)
M2
Jun 2022
–
2 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (M2/M3 family)
M2 / M3
2022–24
–
≤3 yrs (ongoing)
–
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
But the battery life is longer than most Windows laptops' working life. Plus any decent high street repairer will replace the battery for you if you need it done... I had my 2010 Macbook battery replaced after 12 years for £60 IIRC.
Edit: the 2020 M1 Macbook Air I am typing this on has been used for several hours every day on battery and I have just checked - battery has 83% of capacity when new.
The repairers wouldn't touch my MS machine ... too difficult to tear down without breaking screen, etc. etc. Though I gather they have improved (MS I mean). Even so it's left a permanent scar, and I never buy a laptop or phone that isn't at least with a user-replaceable battery.
Well you're excluding yourself from the best laptop experience available then.
I guess it depends what you mean by 'user-replaceable' Personally I'd rather pay someone £20 to do this but, you can do it yourself if you want (not that you'll ever need to):
User replaceable to me means not messing around with hot air to try and melt glue.
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
The point you're missing is that you actually need to do that for a Mac - you just keep using the same battery.
Not missing it at all, just that sometimes the battery goes and has to be changed.
in my experience the charger/charging port far more likely to fail than the battery
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.
"For the Fallen" by Laurence Binyon, 1914.
Lest we forget.
Amen to that.
As direct memories of war fade in the UK, with only 8,000 WWII veterans still alive and with more recent British wars fought only by professional armies, sadly for many of us war has been a little too close to home in the last few years.
War memorial in Zhytomyr, Ukraine. August 2025, in a city of 250,000 to the West of Kiev outside the war zone.
There’s more than 500 photographs on display, many of them younger than me, many of them young enough to be my sons, and I say a prayer for them today.
I remember when I worked in Mertzwiller I visited a German war grave and what shocked me was the ages of the dead soldiers. It was the scene of a battle just before the end of the war and most of the graves I saw were kids in their mid teens. Tragic waste of young life.
That's what happens when a country is losing, and the older lads have already gone. The tragedy is that such young men die needlessly in a losing cause
Wales 3-1 to beat Argentina doesn't seem like bad odds to me. New coach, unpredictable, home advantage.
Not that I'm a betting person so don't blame me.
It's available on the BBC iplayer with welsh commentary.
Not bad odds at all. Argentina are a decent side and have beaten the All Blacks, Aussies and S Africa in the last couple of years. Playing in the rugby championship has improved them no end. But they don’t travel too well.
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The homelessness - people without a permanent home - yes
Rough sleeping is harder. Essentially it’s drugs + alcohol + mental health + {something} that makes people pretty much incapable of steadily living inside. Just talk to people who run shelters about what happens.
In The Goode Olde Dayz, people like that were locked up when the place was getting untidy. Otherwise they were Tramps & Vagabonds.
Bombing them up on pharmaceuticals to make them docile won’t work - the drugs don’t make them feel good. The reverse in fact. So they stop taking them. And forcing people, against their will, to take such drugs is pretty much impossible, legally. At least these days.
So we can’t shove them in a madhouse (prison for the mentally unfixable) can’t turn them into zombies…
What’s left is trying to provide an avenue off the street for the small number who can/will get out if that life.
Which is why I support the charities that do that
Quite a few of the homeless people we support have been helped into housing but the mundane business needed to stay in housing is utterly beyond them. A lot of ongoing support is needed and all too often it's more than local council can manage.
Even in managed, sheltered accommodation they don’t last. Fall asleep smoking and start fires, drugs, fights etc.
I’ve heard it suggested that a percentage of humans just can’t deal with spending most of the day in a box.
When I worked in a Jobcentre I lost count of the times I was told "I can't work inside". OK I think it was sometimes code for "I will only accept a job doing what I normally do" but I think for a lot of people it is an issue.
My former brother in law was like that. He’d get jobs in warehouses or factories and last a week, maximum. Get him working on the roads or on a farm he’d be as happy as a pig in muck.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
Yes they were awesome at the time.
Today’s choice is, roughly, a cassette battery that last 4 hours, an easily-replaceable-with-a-screwdriver battery that lasts six hours, or a glued-in battery that lasts 10 hours.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
From what I remember of cassette battery laptops you'd need to do that after 30 minutes as it'd be dead already...
They've obviously been improved since your time!
I'm trying to remember how far back in time I need to go to when I had work laptops like that! I just remember they were gash
They haven't been available for over a decade. Even Lenovo abandoned user-replacable batteries. This is why I keep buying refurbished mid-2010s laptops and Windows 11 can go hang. They are heavier and awkward but if you are stuck in weekday digs writing an important report and it goes down, you can force a reboot by switching it off, unplugging the battery, replugging it and back on again. Russian reliability: easy to repair.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.
"For the Fallen" by Laurence Binyon, 1914.
Lest we forget.
Amen to that.
As direct memories of war fade in the UK, with only 8,000 WWII veterans still alive and with more recent British wars fought only by professional armies, sadly for many of us war has been a little too close to home in the last few years.
War memorial in Zhytomyr, Ukraine. August 2025, in a city of 250,000 to the West of Kiev outside the war zone.
There’s more than 500 photographs on display, many of them younger than me, many of them young enough to be my sons, and I say a prayer for them today.
I remember when I worked in Mertzwiller I visited a German war grave and what shocked me was the ages of the dead soldiers. It was the scene of a battle just before the end of the war and most of the graves I saw were kids in their mid teens. Tragic waste of young life.
My Sister in Law comes from a small German fishing town on the Baltic. The size of their war memorial in such a small town was sobering. The last recorded deaths were 1956 too, as German POWs were still held by the Soviets in Siberia. Most had joined the Kreigsmarine and died in the U Boats. U Boat crews had a 75% death rate, by some measures worse than the kamikaze pilots.
Today’s Rawnsley, rushed out while the sky is still blue, on the lessons from the NYC mayoral election:
The trick is working out which are the correct lessons to take away from what is undoubtedly a stunning achievement by someone who started the campaign as an obscure member of the state assembly and was a household name only among his own family. The wrong place to start is with his ideological complexion. The right place to begin is with his campaign character. He is an eloquent and energising personality who can connect with voters, turn a phrase and perform eye-catching stunts.
Today the more effective communicators tend to be produced by the populist right. Like them or loathe them, Donald Trump and Nigel Farage know how to connect with audiences. The left can be suspicious about the performative dimensions of politics. Mr Mamdani’s victory underlines why it is a mistake to be sniffy. As successful politicians through the ages have demonstrated, Mr Mamdani had an acute understanding of his electoral market. He spoke to New Yorkers who find their city excruciatingly expensive…[although] A lot of what he has promised is not in his power alone to deliver, so it is moot how much of his economic populism will withstand contact with reality.
Another lesson for the left on both sides of the pond to note is that his campaign largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years. His pitch relentlessly emphasised bread-and-butter issues.
The conclusion to be drawn from all this is not – sorry, Zack, and regrets, Zarah – that tomorrow belongs to the Polanski or Sultana versions of the radical left. The message from America is a reminder that charismatic leadership counts. So does knowing your electorate and understanding how to connect with it.
Sure Mamdani focussed on bread and butter issues but far from avoiding "identitarian issues" he was open in his support of Trans-rights, as listed here. His youtube ad in the link was from October.
And I am not convinced by the last paragraph. Corbyn and Polanski certainly have charisma, and Sultana has a massive social media following for a back-bencher.
Yes, I found that strange also. Mamdani didn't "largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years", he doubled down on them, including trans rights
Yes, I think that the lesson of Mamdani's win is more subtle. It is possible to win in NYC with its large LBGTQ+ community with this sort of "identitarian" politics. Mamdani got 84% of the vote in that community, and managed a similar share of the under 24's. It is possible to win on the same day State Senators in Alabama with more conventional views.
The key is to be a broad and tolerant party capable of pitching a large tent, and not try to drive out one or the other group. Its horses for courses and diversity as a strength. The heart of Liberalism is to live as you choose and let others live as they choose.
If you think the politics of Mamdani have anything to do with liberalism I have a bridge to sell you.
Today’s Rawnsley, rushed out while the sky is still blue, on the lessons from the NYC mayoral election:
The trick is working out which are the correct lessons to take away from what is undoubtedly a stunning achievement by someone who started the campaign as an obscure member of the state assembly and was a household name only among his own family. The wrong place to start is with his ideological complexion. The right place to begin is with his campaign character. He is an eloquent and energising personality who can connect with voters, turn a phrase and perform eye-catching stunts.
Today the more effective communicators tend to be produced by the populist right. Like them or loathe them, Donald Trump and Nigel Farage know how to connect with audiences. The left can be suspicious about the performative dimensions of politics. Mr Mamdani’s victory underlines why it is a mistake to be sniffy. As successful politicians through the ages have demonstrated, Mr Mamdani had an acute understanding of his electoral market. He spoke to New Yorkers who find their city excruciatingly expensive…[although] A lot of what he has promised is not in his power alone to deliver, so it is moot how much of his economic populism will withstand contact with reality.
Another lesson for the left on both sides of the pond to note is that his campaign largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years. His pitch relentlessly emphasised bread-and-butter issues.
The conclusion to be drawn from all this is not – sorry, Zack, and regrets, Zarah – that tomorrow belongs to the Polanski or Sultana versions of the radical left. The message from America is a reminder that charismatic leadership counts. So does knowing your electorate and understanding how to connect with it.
Sure Mamdani focussed on bread and butter issues but far from avoiding "identitarian issues" he was open in his support of Trans-rights, as listed here. His youtube ad in the link was from October.
And I am not convinced by the last paragraph. Corbyn and Polanski certainly have charisma, and Sultana has a massive social media following for a back-bencher.
Yes, I found that strange also. Mamdani didn't "largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years", he doubled down on them, including trans rights
Yes, I think that the lesson of Mamdani's win is more subtle. It is possible to win in NYC with its large LBGTQ+ community with this sort of "identitarian" politics. Mamdani got 84% of the vote in that community, and managed a similar share of the under 24's. It is possible to win on the same day State Senators in Alabama with more conventional views.
The key is to be a broad and tolerant party capable of pitching a large tent, and not try to drive out one or the other group. Its horses for courses and diversity as a strength. The heart of Liberalism is to live as you choose and let others live as they choose.
If you think the politics of Mamdani have anything to do with liberalism I have a bridge to sell you.
(narrator: there are multiple different definitions of the word "liberal" and its derivations in the US and UK)
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
The other thing is support life. For comparison, see below. Note that no M series has come to end of support yet.
Model version
Chip type
First appeared
OS support ceased
Support lifetime (yrs mo)
Last supported macOS
MacBook Pro (13" Mid 2010)
Intel
Apr 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 6 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15) (est)
MacBook Air (Late 2010)
Intel
Oct 2010
Oct 2022 (est)
12 yrs 0 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Early 2011)
Intel
Feb 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 8 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2011)
Intel
Jul 2011
Oct 2022 (est)
11 yrs 3 mo
macOS High Sierra (10.13)
MacBook Pro (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Air (Mid 2012)
Intel
Jun 2012
Oct 2022 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Catalina (10.15)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2012)
Intel
Oct 2012
Oct 2023 (est)
11 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Late 2013)
Intel
Oct 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 0 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Mid 2013)
Intel
Jun 2013
Oct 2023 (est)
10 yrs 4 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2014)
Intel
Jul 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 3 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2014)
Intel
Apr 2014
Oct 2023 (est)
9 yrs 6 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Pro (Retina Mid 2015)
Intel
May 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 5 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook Air (Early 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2015)
Intel
Mar 2015
Oct 2023 (est)
8 yrs 7 mo
macOS Monterey (12) (est)
MacBook (12" 2016)
Intel
Apr 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 6 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (Touch Bar 2016–17)
Intel
Oct 2016
Oct 2024 (est)
8 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook (12" 2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Air (2017)
Intel
Jun 2017
Oct 2024 (est)
7 yrs 4 mo
macOS Sonoma (14) (est)
MacBook Pro (2018–19 Intel)
Intel
Jul 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Retina 2018)
Intel
Oct 2018
Oct 2025 (est)
7 yrs 0 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Pro (16" 2019)
Intel
Nov 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 11 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (2019)
Intel
Jul 2019
Oct 2025 (est)
6 yrs 3 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (Intel 2020)
Intel
Mar 2020
Oct 2025 (est)
5 yrs 7 mo
macOS Sequoia (15) (est)
MacBook Air (M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (13" M1)
M1
Nov 2020
–
4 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (14"/16" M1 Pro/Max)
M1 Pro / M1 Max
Oct 2021
–
3 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Air (M2)
M2
Jun 2022
–
2 yrs (ongoing)
–
MacBook Pro (M2/M3 family)
M2 / M3
2022–24
–
≤3 yrs (ongoing)
–
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
But the battery life is longer than most Windows laptops' working life. Plus any decent high street repairer will replace the battery for you if you need it done... I had my 2010 Macbook battery replaced after 12 years for £60 IIRC.
Edit: the 2020 M1 Macbook Air I am typing this on has been used for several hours every day on battery and I have just checked - battery has 83% of capacity when new.
The repairers wouldn't touch my MS machine ... too difficult to tear down without breaking screen, etc. etc. Though I gather they have improved (MS I mean). Even so it's left a permanent scar, and I never buy a laptop or phone that isn't at least with a user-replaceable battery.
Well you're excluding yourself from the best laptop experience available then.
I guess it depends what you mean by 'user-replaceable' Personally I'd rather pay someone £20 to do this but, you can do it yourself if you want (not that you'll ever need to):
User replaceable to me means not messing around with hot air to try and melt glue.
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
The point you're missing is that you actually need to do that for a Mac - you just keep using the same battery.
Not missing it at all, just that sometimes the battery goes and has to be changed.
in my experience the charger/charging port far more likely to fail than the battery
Which is why Mac bought back the MagSafe ports for charging - after briefly dropping them. You can also charge through the USB-C ports.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
Yes they were awesome at the time.
Today’s choice is, roughly, a cassette battery that last 4 hours, an easily-replaceable-with-a-screwdriver battery that lasts six hours, or a glued-in battery that lasts 10 hours.
Fair enough: the one in the middle is what I want, but then most of our laptop use is at home - mine as a backup for the desktop, and Mrs C's on the kitchen table overlooking the bird table.
Today’s Rawnsley, rushed out while the sky is still blue, on the lessons from the NYC mayoral election:
The trick is working out which are the correct lessons to take away from what is undoubtedly a stunning achievement by someone who started the campaign as an obscure member of the state assembly and was a household name only among his own family. The wrong place to start is with his ideological complexion. The right place to begin is with his campaign character. He is an eloquent and energising personality who can connect with voters, turn a phrase and perform eye-catching stunts.
Today the more effective communicators tend to be produced by the populist right. Like them or loathe them, Donald Trump and Nigel Farage know how to connect with audiences. The left can be suspicious about the performative dimensions of politics. Mr Mamdani’s victory underlines why it is a mistake to be sniffy. As successful politicians through the ages have demonstrated, Mr Mamdani had an acute understanding of his electoral market. He spoke to New Yorkers who find their city excruciatingly expensive…[although] A lot of what he has promised is not in his power alone to deliver, so it is moot how much of his economic populism will withstand contact with reality.
Another lesson for the left on both sides of the pond to note is that his campaign largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years. His pitch relentlessly emphasised bread-and-butter issues.
The conclusion to be drawn from all this is not – sorry, Zack, and regrets, Zarah – that tomorrow belongs to the Polanski or Sultana versions of the radical left. The message from America is a reminder that charismatic leadership counts. So does knowing your electorate and understanding how to connect with it.
Sure Mamdani focussed on bread and butter issues but far from avoiding "identitarian issues" he was open in his support of Trans-rights, as listed here. His youtube ad in the link was from October.
And I am not convinced by the last paragraph. Corbyn and Polanski certainly have charisma, and Sultana has a massive social media following for a back-bencher.
Yes, I found that strange also. Mamdani didn't "largely set aside the identitarian politics, which has often been a quagmire for the progressive cause in recent years", he doubled down on them, including trans rights
Yes, I think that the lesson of Mamdani's win is more subtle. It is possible to win in NYC with its large LBGTQ+ community with this sort of "identitarian" politics. Mamdani got 84% of the vote in that community, and managed a similar share of the under 24's. It is possible to win on the same day State Senators in Alabama with more conventional views.
The key is to be a broad and tolerant party capable of pitching a large tent, and not try to drive out one or the other group. Its horses for courses and diversity as a strength. The heart of Liberalism is to live as you choose and let others live as they choose.
If you think the politics of Mamdani have anything to do with liberalism I have a bridge to sell you.
(narrator: there are multiple different definitions of the word "liberal" and its derivations in the US and UK)
{other narrator : Liberalism and Socialism have always been different things. You get Liberal Socialists, but you tend to find more Authoritarian Socialists}
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
Yes they were awesome at the time.
Today’s choice is, roughly, a cassette battery that last 4 hours, an easily-replaceable-with-a-screwdriver battery that lasts six hours, or a glued-in battery that lasts 10 hours.
Fair enough: the one in the middle is what I want, but then most of our laptop use is at home - mine as a backup for the desktop, and Mrs C's on the kitchen table overlooking the bird table.
Some of the business ranges are pretty good for battery replacibility.
For example, here’s Lenovo’s own instruction video for battery replacement on their T14 model.
Returning to Macbook Airs, is there much difference between one with an M2 chip and an M4 chip? Everything else is identical - memory size, display etc.
The former are available at £699 refurbished, the latter £879 new.
My gut feel is that the new one would be worth the 25% extra.
(snip)
Is the battery user-replaceable? Got caught out on that with Microsoft with their first Surface Book laptop. The bastards glued it in.
No - the recent Macs don't have user replaceable batteries.
Interesting. And to me a major reason not to buy, on first sight. How long do they usually last?
Good luck trying to find any laptop with a replaceable battery nowadays and even if you did I suspect it would be cheaper to get you Mac one replaced either at apple or on the high street
Our Lenovos take about 30 sec to replace their batteries. Unscrew a panel, pull out old battery, slip new one in, replace panel. I checked before buying.
I still have a mid-2010s Lenovo laptop. Cassette battery. Can unplug and replug in less than 30 seconds.
Yes they were awesome at the time.
Today’s choice is, roughly, a cassette battery that last 4 hours, an easily-replaceable-with-a-screwdriver battery that lasts six hours, or a glued-in battery that lasts 10 hours.
Fair enough: the one in the middle is what I want, but then most of our laptop use is at home - mine as a backup for the desktop, and Mrs C's on the kitchen table overlooking the bird table.
Some of the business ranges are pretty good for battery replacibility.
For example, here’s Lenovo’s own instruction video for battery replacement on their T14 model.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
No doubt a few here will find this another example of the WaPo "going Tonto":
A Washington Post analysis of multiple video feeds found that Trump spent nearly 20 minutes apparently battling to keep his eyes open at the Thursday event. It was a seemingly stark illustration of the strain of the presidency on a 79-year-old who typically keeps a vigorous travel schedule that even his aides say they struggle to keep up with — and who has reveled in calling his predecessor “Sleepy Joe” Biden.
Sitting behind the Resolute Desk on Thursday, the president displayed a constellation of movements familiar to anyone who has attempted to stay awake during a work meeting. He closed his eyes. He put his hand to his temple. He slouched in his chair.
(For the record: I prefer that the Loser sleep in meetings and play more golf, for the same reason that I prefered that Obama play more golf, while he was president.)
About this homelessness and needing more homes lark. Seems this generation are wimps if my sojourn into genealogy is anything to go by. One grandfather had 8 children in a 2 roomed flat somewhere way up north. In looking at my wife's side it was similar but she is clearly of better stock as they had 3 rooms for 9 children.
Thought this might be something that MalcolmG would agree with.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
It doesn't feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months, Reeves HAS been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
With all the predicted detrimental effects on business investment and pension planning.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
My dislike of Reeves was kindled when I heard her pre-election chit-chat with Bad Al and Rory Stewart.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
We have had months of speculation and negative headlines which have seriously damaged sentiment and investment. We are in this mess because the budget last October really did not come close to addressing our problems. Spending, already well beyond what we can afford, was not controlled. No margins for disappointment were left. The productivity increases were no more than wishful thinking and not clearly linked to any actual policies. The cuts that were floated were not delivered because the Labour party as a group are wholly delusional and Starmer is weak, bordering on pathetic.
So, it became inevitable that rather than setting us up for the Parliament we would have to go through the same again 13 months later. And what is truly depressing is that we look like repeating the exercise with public spending continuing to rise faster than the economy can grow or throw off tax receipts. So we face the risk of another repeat next year and all the negative headlines and sentiment all over again.
We need substantial decreases in borrowing, so much that it requires both tax increases and spending cuts. Seriously difficult as NATO falls apart, the price of borrowing from the market continues to increase sharply on rolled over debt and the NHS, as usual, is falling apart. We need a Chancellor who is willing to be both honest and educational with the British people. Reeves is not that Chancellor and Starmer is not the PM to demand it.
Decompensating: the final functional collapse of a declining bodily system that has previous been kept running by compensatory actions or medications.
E.g. You can compensate for the effects of aging by injecting your President with stimulant drugs for a while, but eventually their cognitive decline will be too advanced for those treatments to have any positive effect.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
Personally I would phone Putin and tell him that I’ve got the boys at Minot Air Force base spinning up some Minutemen IIIs and “Let’s play some Global Thermonuclear War. Right now.”
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
Just about the only way to persuade Putin not to use nukes, is to be a slightly crazy and unpredictable old guy living in a big White House in Washington DC.
With enough nukes to turn the whole of Moscow into glass in about 30 seconds flat.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
It’s about as plausible as Gandhi’s belief that if Jews went willingly to the gas chambers, it would represent a moral victory over Nazism.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
It’s about as plausible as Gandhi’s belief that if Jews went willingly to the gas chambers, it would represent a moral victory over Nazism.
There was an alt-history story, where the Nazis made it to India. The Nazi general listens to Ghandi, politely. Then orders him shot. In a “also, order more paper clips” kind of way.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
About this homelessness and needing more homes lark. Seems this generation are wimps if my sojourn into genealogy is anything to go by. One grandfather had 8 children in a 2 roomed flat somewhere way up north. In looking at my wife's side it was similar but she is clearly of better stock as they had 3 rooms for 9 children.
Thought this might be something that MalcolmG would agree with.
There is a lot of truth to this. While your examples are rather overcrowded it is obvious that many British homes are under occupied. We have a vast number of single person households and many more like mine with Mrs Foxy and I in a 4 bed detached, all double bedrooms. There is little financial incentive to downsize even if we wanted to do so.
My dislike of Reeves was kindled when I heard her pre-election chit-chat with Bad Al and Rory Stewart.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
She's bitter that she never held a real job in the city and I think she not so secretly hates the economic engine of the UK because it chewed her up and spat her out early in her career and shunted her into a customer service role for a retail bank.
The rumour is that the top rate or tax will go up to 49% (47% IT and 2% NI) or a 64% marginal rate in the £100-125k income band. Any of the last few Labour supporters want to tell me that either of these rates aren't work disincentives?
This country is a joke and the Laboir party are having a laugh at our expense.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
That’s because they believed in actually doing something. See Ed Yoctoband in this government - he is doing stupid stuff (in part) but he is actually doing *something*
The rest believe that governing is about making some speeches and wondering why the Civil Service hasn’t fixed everything already.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
It’s about as plausible as Gandhi’s belief that if Jews went willingly to the gas chambers, it would represent a moral victory over Nazism.
There was an alt-history story, where the Nazis made it to India. The Nazi general listens to Ghandi, politely. Then orders him shot. In a “also, order more paper clips” kind of way.
Being meek did not save a single Jewish life, in WWII.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
We live in an era of non-serious politicians.
When one politician is non-serious, it's the fault of that politician.
When all of them are like that, it's the fault of the electorate.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
It’s about as plausible as Gandhi’s belief that if Jews went willingly to the gas chambers, it would represent a moral victory over Nazism.
There was an alt-history story, where the Nazis made it to India. The Nazi general listens to Ghandi, politely. Then orders him shot. In a “also, order more paper clips” kind of way.
Being meek did not save a single Jewish life, in WWII.
A distant relative got out of the camps, with his sister. Teenagers.
Somehow made it back to the family home in Poland.
The NKVD put them on a cattle car train for being “ruling class” - like the Germans the Russians wanted to decapitate Polish society to create their own ruling class.
So at the first stop, his sister distracted a Russian soldier. And then he bashed the soldiers head in with a piece of metal. And they left the train.
Ended up in America. The family has the piece of metal - broken fishplate I think.
My dislike of Reeves was kindled when I heard her pre-election chit-chat with Bad Al and Rory Stewart.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
She's bitter that she never held a real job in the city and I think she not so secretly hates the economic engine of the UK because it chewed her up and spat her out early in her career and shunted her into a customer service role for a retail bank.
The rumour is that the top rate or tax will go up to 49% (47% IT and 2% NI) or a 64% marginal rate in the £100-125k income band. Any of the last few Labour supporters want to tell me that either of these rates aren't work disincentives?
This country is a joke and the Laboir party are having a laugh at our expense.
A lot more people working 4 day weeks incoming particularly if pension sacrifice schemes, cash ISA limits etc is hit...do wonders for productivity numbers.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
That’s because they believed in actually doing something. See Ed Yoctoband in this government - he is doing stupid stuff (in part) but he is actually doing *something*
The rest believe that governing is about making some speeches and wondering why the Civil Service hasn’t fixed everything already.
Ed Milliband should't have resigned in 2015. He'd have led Labour to victory in 2017 and stayed as PM right through Covid.
Decompensating: the final functional collapse of a declining bodily system that has previous been kept running by compensatory actions or medications.
E.g. You can compensate for the effects of aging by injecting your President with stimulant drugs for a while, but eventually their cognitive decline will be too advanced for those treatments to have any positive effect.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
It doesn't feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months, Reeves HAS been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
With all the predicted detrimental effects on business investment and pension planning.
And she did the same last year as well.
You don't think it a bit sus that all the budget leaks have been to the right wing press? Not Reeves, and probably not even leaks so much as CCHQ or the press brainstorming what taxes could go up. Let's face it, we could all do the same on pb.
My dislike of Reeves was kindled when I heard her pre-election chit-chat with Bad Al and Rory Stewart.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
She's extremely bitter.
She sees her job as Chancellor as one of personal revenge.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
We live in an era of non-serious politicians.
When one politician is non-serious, it's the fault of that politician.
When all of them are like that, it's the fault of the electorate.
Actually, I blame Mark Zuckerberg. And the human payche. And, fuck it, Peter Thiel too.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
It doesn't feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months, Reeves HAS been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
With all the predicted detrimental effects on business investment and pension planning.
And she did the same last year as well.
You don't think it a bit sus that all the budget leaks have been to the right wing press? Not Reeves, and probably not even leaks so much as CCHQ or the press brainstorming what taxes could go up. Let's face it, we could all do the same on pb.
Not all. But either the Telegraph has a mole* or its deliberate anchoring in terms of the significantly more "scoops" the Telegraph has got. I suppose it drives clicks, but they ran loads last time and had clearly been duped in the extent of the changes so looked silly.
The IC changes don't look like vaporware as OBR leaked requests for analysis on all of this to the Times.
* very little was made of the fact the Telegraph clearly had a mole inside Plasticine Action. They got lots of accurate scoops there.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
It doesn't feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months, Reeves HAS been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
With all the predicted detrimental effects on business investment and pension planning.
And she did the same last year as well.
You don't think it a bit sus that all the budget leaks have been to the right wing press? Not Reeves, and probably not even leaks so much as CCHQ or the press brainstorming what taxes could go up. Let's face it, we could all do the same on pb.
The budget is still two weeks ago and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Shall I put you down as a maybe?
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
As for Polanski’s policy that he will “try to persuade Putin not to use nukes”, I don’t have words to fully articulate my contempt.
It’s about as plausible as Gandhi’s belief that if Jews went willingly to the gas chambers, it would represent a moral victory over Nazism.
There was an alt-history story, where the Nazis made it to India. The Nazi general listens to Ghandi, politely. Then orders him shot. In a “also, order more paper clips” kind of way.
Being meek did not save a single Jewish life, in WWII.
A distant relative got out of the camps, with his sister. Teenagers.
Somehow made it back to the family home in Poland.
The NKVD put them on a cattle car train for being “ruling class” - like the Germans the Russians wanted to decapitate Polish society to create their own ruling class.
So at the first stop, his sister distracted a Russian soldier. And then he bashed the soldiers head in with a piece of metal. And they left the train.
Ended up in America. The family has the piece of metal - broken fishplate I think.
They did right. IIRC, Ingrid Pitt and her mother acted similarly, to escape a death march from Stuthoff.
There are times when advocating non-violence is immoral. Gandhi’s advocacy was immoral, like Peter Hitchens’ today.
My dislike of Reeves was kindled when I heard her pre-election chit-chat with Bad Al and Rory Stewart.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
She's bitter that she never held a real job in the city and I think she not so secretly hates the economic engine of the UK because it chewed her up and spat her out early in her career and shunted her into a customer service role for a retail bank.
And in the way she introduced VAT on independent schools retrospectively too. With no details no ability to plan and no concessions or transition.
All because a couple of public school boys once laughed at her playing chess as a teenager.
Ireland is considering asking larger EU nations for security assistance during its forthcoming EU presidency, including sending a warship to Dublin for air defence. https://x.com/NavyLookout/status/1987508681190060419
Joe couldnt play golf because he had advanced dementia, but this was covered up by as massive conspiracy from journalists and newspaper organisations, his wife for at leas the last twelve months was functioning as the Commander in Chief. Much of this was fully known by those that cover the news and hidden from the American public.
Suella's greatest crime seems to have been being right.
She's a nasty woman, her homelessness is a lifestyle choice comments were vile, given the number of people with mental health/ex military people who are homeless, very few people choose to be homeless. I know somebody who was made homeless through no fault of her own, her partner had got himself into debt, and they banks/lender repossessed the property, she was 'lucky' because her family and friends stepped up, not everybody has that support system.
I told Boris Johnson that one of his proudest achievements as PM was to end rough sleeping at the start of the pandemic, one of his biggest failures was to ensure rough sleeping was a thing of the past.
A couple of points
- ex-military rough sleepers. A couple of years ago, a military charity, working with the military did a survey. What they found was - of the genuine ex-military, something like 95%+ among rough sleepers had been let go during *training*. For having suspected mental health issues. That’s interesting because that suggests an opportunity to help earlier.
- simply stuffing rough sleepers into hotels etc does very little. The issues that lead to people sleeping in cardboard boxes are not easy to solve
- the bigger problem is homelessness. Which isn’t rough sleeping. But not having a permanent home - see rooms in shitty “B&Bs” paid for by the council.
It’s almost as if a significant part of the problem can be fixed by allowing a lot more houses to be built.
The problem with this solution is it will take millions upon millions of houses to get to a situation where someone who is destitute and unable to work is able to afford one. Someone like me is far closer to buying a second home than many people are to buying or even renting a first - and we are already a country with 26 million spare bedrooms.
It's also economically unviable - the cost of materials and labour is so high that the equilibrium cost of housing is always going to be too high for these kinds of individuals, so givernment intervention is always going to be necessary. The real issue is economic inequality and lack of opportunities rather than housing per se.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
We live in an era of non-serious politicians.
When one politician is non-serious, it's the fault of that politician.
When all of them are like that, it's the fault of the electorate.
Said it before and I’ll say it again. Society gets the politicians it deserves and the police force it deserves.
My dislike of Reeves was kindled when I heard her pre-election chit-chat with Bad Al and Rory Stewart.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
She's bitter that she never held a real job in the city and I think she not so secretly hates the economic engine of the UK because it chewed her up and spat her out early in her career and shunted her into a customer service role for a retail bank.
The rumour is that the top rate or tax will go up to 49% (47% IT and 2% NI) or a 64% marginal rate in the £100-125k income band. Any of the last few Labour supporters want to tell me that either of these rates aren't work disincentives?
This country is a joke and the Laboir party are having a laugh at our expense.
I think there is a bigger problem lower down in the payscale.
From my anecdotal experience the people dropping to 4 day weeks are typically people on £50k - £80k who are paired up, have a mortgage, and/or have kids, so the leisure/work balance has hit the top rate of tax at 45% here in Scotland and the decision is obvious. Those on £100k in my line of work tend to be highly driven and for them, frankly, the cash is only a small part of why they work so hard - it's more about prestige/power. I think this is why the £100k band effect is difficult to discern in the data.
Essentially the Treasury is taking advantage of the hustle of people working for their first flat or are highly driven, and the inversion point on the laffer curve is actually very high for these individuals - possibly even as high as 70%. If I were Reeves, I'd be much more concerned about how to keep parents and people with mortgages working 35+ hours, where the point could be as low as 30%.
Ireland is considering asking larger EU nations for security assistance during its forthcoming EU presidency, including sending a warship to Dublin for air defence. https://x.com/NavyLookout/status/1987508681190060419
My dislike of Reeves was kindled when I heard her pre-election chit-chat with Bad Al and Rory Stewart.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
The thing that we inevitably overlook which actually explains her attitude and performance in government is she is incredibly stupid. Probably more stupid than Lammy. Unfortunately no-one has ever bitten the bullet and pointed out to her that she is incredibly stupid.
I assume she was put into the Chess thing as a kid because she couldn't handle the thing she had the greatest aptitude for, failure and wasn't bright enough to study anything worth studying.
I mean, how stupid do you have to be to have a corporate credit card removed for over spending ? How stupid do you have to be to claim to be an economist when you aren't ? How stupid do you have to be to rent your house to your sister at an over-inflated rent so the taxpayer pays parliamentary allowance way over the odds, and then fall down over the licence to rent ?
The only person she seems to have taken in is Starmer, himself self-evidently dis-numerate.
Personally I think she should be held to account for what she has done, tried to do. It is one thing to claim you can hypnotise a woman and make her tits bigger. But what she is trying to do is just as malicious, and as evil as someone claiming to be a Surgeon because they dissected a frog in O Level Biology, or claiming to be able to drive a five axle lorry because she rode a push bike once. You would be locked up for those, and rightly so. And you would have to pay a hell of a lot of compensation to your victims. Medium Term doesn't look good for her, or her vile husband.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
Blair, I’d agree, but I’m too young (even though I’m retired now) to really remember much of the other two.
The budget is still two weeks away and it feel like Reeves has been leaking rumours of tax grabs for months.
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
I really don't recall Tony Blair's government behaving like this in 1998! Or either of Harold Wilson's in 1964 or 1974.
We live in an era of non-serious politicians.
When one politician is non-serious, it's the fault of that politician.
When all of them are like that, it's the fault of the electorate.
Said it before and I’ll say it again. Society gets the politicians it deserves and the police force it deserves.
Who did you vote for in the last general election?
About this homelessness and needing more homes lark. Seems this generation are wimps if my sojourn into genealogy is anything to go by. One grandfather had 8 children in a 2 roomed flat somewhere way up north. In looking at my wife's side it was similar but she is clearly of better stock as they had 3 rooms for 9 children.
Thought this might be something that MalcolmG would agree with.
There is a lot of truth to this. While your examples are rather overcrowded it is obvious that many British homes are under occupied. We have a vast number of single person households and many more like mine with Mrs Foxy and I in a 4 bed detached, all double bedrooms. There is little financial incentive to downsize even if we wanted to do so.
There's a lot of dead costs that are incurred which discourage people from downsizing. There's me and Mrs Gap in a large three story period house, with two offices, a pet room,a bathroom larger than the biggest two bedrooms put together in a new build. We have looked at moving somewhere smaller, but once you pay everything out, you just end up with a smaller house but little saved.
A controversial idea, an inversion of the housing benefit reduction for under occupied housing.. That Council tax includes a multiplier for every spare bedroom...
So the oldest person ever to become president keeps falling asleep in his office during public events and there’s no big public discussion on how this is a coverup or how republicans are lying to us about how this government is running?
Comments
And all I need to do for muy Lenovo Yogas is to get a replacement from a specialist shop and that is typically 2/3 of the price of the Mac batteries and doesn't take 38 steps. Just open up, slip out and in, and close up.
The mad stabby types aren’t street people.
Not that I'm a betting person so don't blame me.
It's available on the BBC iplayer with welsh commentary.
https://www.waterfowl.org.uk/wildfowl/swans-geese-allies/black-necked-swan/
As far as a solution to that goes, there are a few things that we know improve mental health. They include work, especially meaningful work, fresh air, excercise and good food with the right micronutrients. Any real solution I think would include all those, along with warm, clean and safe accommodation.
I’ve heard it suggested that a percentage of humans just can’t deal with spending most of the day in a box.
I’d rather they were on the street than drugged up against their will or imprisoned for the crime of being untidy and upsetting people.
I appreciate you have been stung by this before. My old work Thinkpad was an absolute cinch to change the battery - and I know because I had to do it regularly; my Macbook is probably a bit tricky to change the battery on - but I don't really know because...
I’ve seen plenty of people who are visibly stressed by living in small spaces. One in particular - she moved from a shoe box to a spacious flat. And changed into a different person.
And the smartphone? Doddle, cos it's a Fairphone - and I can change most of the bits myself.
Though this reminds me I didn't explain one further reason btw why I loathe glued in batteries - it makes it often impossible for me to safely dismantle at end of life and remove the memory for percussive disassembly with my hammer. Nuking from orbit is the only way to be sure the data are erased, especially for SSD memories where the Win 10 software supposed to do this wimps out and says maybe it can't cope with SSD rather than hard drives, the ones with the silvery disc going round and round ... I'm feeling a bit sensitive at the moment as I've been clearing out our accumulated laptops of various ages and softwares following on Mrs C finally retiring!
The key is to be a broad and tolerant party capable of pitching a large tent, and not try to drive out one or the other group. Its horses for courses and diversity as a strength. The heart of Liberalism is to live as you choose and let others live as they choose.
Argentina 4/1 on, I’d want better odds than that.
If so we’ll be seeing a lot more of it.
Today’s choice is, roughly, a cassette battery that last 4 hours, an easily-replaceable-with-a-screwdriver battery that lasts six hours, or a glued-in battery that lasts 10 hours.
"UK military to help protect Belgium after drone incursions"
Is today, of all, days, one on which this headline should be alarming?
(Apols if posted before.)
For example, here’s Lenovo’s own instruction video for battery replacement on their T14 model.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMCvZ_6pNmY
I buy these at work, they’re damn good laptops in general but you do pay for the quality.
https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3m57bbcxvwk2c
- decomposing
- composting
- ?
I am surprised there is any economy left in the UK.
The general impression is of a scandal-ridden retirement home with a country attached.
Reeves looks and sounds like a grudge-carrying HR apparatchik intent on closing down the afternoon tea service because of “colonial overtones”. Starmer appears to be essentially redundant, sequestered from reality and having outsourced his social media output to AI.
Lucy Powell appears have decided her role is essentially to speak in opposition to current leadership. Perhaps she should consider resignation!
Also, since everything is the Tories fault, they are actually still in power.
(For the record: I prefer that the Loser sleep in meetings and play more golf, for the same reason that I prefered that Obama play more golf, while he was president.)
Thought this might be something that MalcolmG would agree with.
With all the predicted detrimental effects on business investment and pension planning.
And she did the same last year as well.
In a generally soft-ball interview, Stewart innocently asked whether her tax plans would be sufficient, and Reeves jumped down his throat and started ranting about Tory effrontery.
She’s obviously quite a bitter individual, and as we’ve now discovered, destructively useless as well.
So, it became inevitable that rather than setting us up for the Parliament we would have to go through the same again 13 months later. And what is truly depressing is that we look like repeating the exercise with public spending continuing to rise faster than the economy can grow or throw off tax receipts. So we face the risk of another repeat next year and all the negative headlines and sentiment all over again.
We need substantial decreases in borrowing, so much that it requires both tax increases and spending cuts. Seriously difficult as NATO falls apart, the price of borrowing from the market continues to increase sharply on rolled over debt and the NHS, as usual, is falling apart. We need a Chancellor who is willing to be both honest and educational with the British people. Reeves is not that Chancellor and Starmer is not the PM to demand it.
E.g. You can compensate for the effects of aging by injecting your President with stimulant drugs for a while, but eventually their cognitive decline will be too advanced for those treatments to have any positive effect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decompensation
The commentators are discussing the call to boycott the 1936 Olympics due to the rise of fascism...
Sooooooo close to getting it
With enough nukes to turn the whole of Moscow into glass in about 30 seconds flat.
https://www.datawrapper.de/_/DaEoP/?v=2
The rumour is that the top rate or tax will go up to 49% (47% IT and 2% NI) or a 64% marginal rate in the £100-125k income band. Any of the last few Labour supporters want to tell me that either of these rates aren't work disincentives?
This country is a joke and the Laboir party are having a laugh at our expense.
The rest believe that governing is about making some speeches and wondering why the Civil Service hasn’t fixed everything already.
When all of them are like that, it's the fault of the electorate.
Somehow made it back to the family home in Poland.
The NKVD put them on a cattle car train for being “ruling class” - like the Germans the Russians wanted to decapitate Polish society to create their own ruling class.
So at the first stop, his sister distracted a Russian soldier. And then he bashed the soldiers head in with a piece of metal. And they left the train.
Ended up in America. The family has the piece of metal - broken fishplate I think.
Edit: still one of the most remarkable pieces of footage from WWII.
https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn1004475#:~:text=Excerpt from the last Wochenschau,the boys wearing their medals.
https://bsky.app/profile/joncooper-us.bsky.social/post/3m554mtnvwc2m
She sees her job as Chancellor as one of personal revenge.
The IC changes don't look like vaporware as OBR leaked requests for analysis on all of this to the Times.
* very little was made of the fact the Telegraph clearly had a mole inside Plasticine Action. They got lots of accurate scoops there.
There are times when advocating non-violence is immoral. Gandhi’s advocacy was immoral, like Peter Hitchens’ today.
All because a couple of public school boys once laughed at her playing chess as a teenager.
https://x.com/NavyLookout/status/1987508681190060419
From my anecdotal experience the people dropping to 4 day weeks are typically people on £50k - £80k who are paired up, have a mortgage, and/or have kids, so the leisure/work balance has hit the top rate of tax at 45% here in Scotland and the decision is obvious. Those on £100k in my line of work tend to be highly driven and for them, frankly, the cash is only a small part of why they work so hard - it's more about prestige/power. I think this is why the £100k band effect is difficult to discern in the data.
Essentially the Treasury is taking advantage of the hustle of people working for their first flat or are highly driven, and the inversion point on the laffer curve is actually very high for these individuals - possibly even as high as 70%. If I were Reeves, I'd be much more concerned about how to keep parents and people with mortgages working 35+ hours, where the point could be as low as 30%.
I assume she was put into the Chess thing as a kid because she couldn't handle the thing she had the greatest aptitude for, failure and wasn't bright enough to study anything worth studying.
I mean, how stupid do you have to be to have a corporate credit card removed for over spending ? How stupid do you have to be to claim to be an economist when you aren't ? How stupid do you have to be to rent your house to your sister at an over-inflated rent so the taxpayer pays parliamentary allowance way over the odds, and then fall down over the licence to rent ?
The only person she seems to have taken in is Starmer, himself self-evidently dis-numerate.
Personally I think she should be held to account for what she has done, tried to do. It is one thing to claim you can hypnotise a woman and make her tits bigger. But what she is trying to do is just as malicious, and as evil as someone claiming to be a Surgeon because they dissected a frog in O Level Biology, or claiming to be able to drive a five axle lorry because she rode a push bike once. You would be locked up for those, and rightly so. And you would have to pay a hell of a lot of compensation to your victims. Medium Term doesn't look good for her, or her vile husband.
A controversial idea, an inversion of the housing benefit reduction for under occupied housing.. That Council tax includes a multiplier for every spare bedroom...
So the oldest person ever to become president keeps falling asleep in his office during public events and there’s no big public discussion on how this is a coverup or how republicans are lying to us about how this government is running?
https://bsky.app/profile/mollyjongfast.bsky.social/post/3m57adte4ck2l