So not giving away 15GB of free storage is evil? How does that even work…?

I thought being evil was about doing, like, evil things?

Submarine cables exist because it is superior

Submarine cables are usually cheaper and simpler at intercontinental scale, especially because they avoid negotiating rights-of-way across many countries. But unlike oil tankers, internet traffic is not physically constrained to the Strait of Hormuz itself. Capacity could be rerouted over terrestrial fiber links around the Gulf if the economics changed enough.

The bigger issue would probably be the time, permits, and infrastructure investment needed to build enough alternative land routes. Not any physical impossibility of carrying the signals over land. The cables themselves are likely pretty cheap.

And permits should be quite easy to come by, in the empty desert of the Arabian peninsula.

But Iran would be pissing off everybody - for example China and India. Not just the US.

War is pissing other people off. But does Iran want to be at war with all other countries in the world?

Seems pretty short term gain for Iran by pissing everybody off.

Because surely the cables can relatively easily be rerouted over land, instead of paying Iran’s tolls. Unlike the tankers, the Internet signals do not need to go though the water.

And how would Iran even justify forbidding the cables from going through the part of the strait which is not their territorial waters? The same way Iran “justifies” forbidding ships from doing that? - as in, no real attempt at a moral or legal justification.

The article says “partly joking”, but it would be insane to not take the US President seriously when he says stuff like that.

Not really. Iran are blockading non-Iranian ships. The US is only blockading Iranian-bound ships.

So a priory there was no reason to think that the US would block the Russian ship. And it would be illegal under international law.

They’ve received all the best equipment and ammunition and they’ve made zero progress.

So Ukraine fighting the “second army of the world” to a standstill, instead of winning, can only be explained by extreme corruption?

And Ukraine did not receive the best equipment in the world. The US (and Europe) has refused to give Ukraine tons of the most potent weapons, like Tomahawk missiles.

Will be interesting to see the British mental gymnastics this time around.

What do you mean? The UK’s claim to the Falklands is ironclad, both legally and morally.

I’m sure King Charles will cozy up to Trump.

Trump is super easy to manipulate. Sending Charles to get free brown nose point, at no real cost to the UK, is the right thing to do.

That would be a direct violation of Article 5 of the NATO treaty.

Nope. NATO doesn’t cover wars in overseas possessions.

I assume the threat is that the US would not support the UK military or in the UN, if Argentina attacked.

Since Argentina is not going to attack in either case, so it is moot. Argentina simply don’t have the military capable to launch a 500km amphibious landing, against a UK military which already reinforced the Falklands after 1982 to avoid repeats.

And then when the UK doesn’t feel eternal gratitude the next time the US needs help, Trump will again be surprised.

The US foreign policy/diplomacy seems to be a kakistocracy. If you literally picked a random person out of the phone book to be President, then it would with great probability be better than Trump.

That doesn’t make it OK to “hunt” them (or whatever they did), though.

Because they burn up before they hit the ground - why do you think they should care?

Also: Cigarette butt littering everywhere.

I am having a hard time mustering my sympathy for the freedom to slowly kill yourself.

Seems to be the same article from Ars Technica: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/04/indian-med-student-rakes-in-thousands-with-ai-generated-maga-hottie/

once they get the black market vapes!

Vapes are not banned under the law.

What do you mean? As far as I am aware, Australia has not created such a generational ban law yet, so how can it be a failure?

The unhealthiness of the chemicals in cigarette smoke is not subtle. I would be surprised if the vapes turned out to be just as unhealthy.

unnatural addictive chemicals

Using “unnatural” as the main adjective to argue for something being unhealthy is a huge red flag for pseudoscience. Unnatural is not a synonym for dangerous.

As an example, the 100% natural chemicals in even ecologically grown cigarettes are perfectly capable of being extremely dangerous.

But having to use a shitty black market for cigarettes every day would surely motivate most of them to try to learn to love the vape.

The black market would then only be supported by irredeemable vape haters. Who got hooked on cigarettes while never in their life being able to buy them legally. Which doesn’t seem like a big market to me - so might not be big enough to be profitable.