I’ll grant you that language is potentially a dogwhistle, but on their blog, they post about Earth day and Sustainability, which is currently vilified by MAGA.

If I had to guess, their marketing team is trying to play both sides.

Without more clear evidence of their politics, I’ll probably continue to recommend them if they get people to stick with saving water, as ultimately that’s the opposite of what Trump’s policies are trying to do.

As someone who dislikes traditional low flow heads that tend to icepick you with little streams, I highly recommend high sierra showerheads. I don’t know how they pull it off, but it absolutely blasts you with water while still being low flow. Like I prefer it to any other shower head I’ve tried, low flow or not.

They make one with an adjustable valve that let’s you dial in the perfect amount of flow too.

even with wine/yabridge getting paid ones with licence protection running is a mess.

Honestly, because I’m not a fan of intrusive DRM anyway, I say Yarr, matey 🏴‍☠️

I know that’s not a solution for some, but until there’s more Linux native VST’s, it’s a viable path for those willing to take it.

Running Windows VSTs (virtual instruments) in a DAW like reaper for making music.

Depending on the GPU, you may need to install a PPA and install a newer kernel to get access to more modern GPU drivers to play games, but only if it’s very new hardware.

I would suggest trying to start a grass roots movement to lower dental healthcare costs in the US to be closer to EU levels, as well as push for those subsidized fluoride rinses you mentioned. It’ll be a long road, but it has to start somewhere, and you seem passionate enough about the subject to lead the charge.

Rural areas tend to be socioeconomically disadvantaged, while also not being connected to a municipal water (it’s more economical to have your own well in rural areas).

Just because those people don’t have access to fluoridated water does not mean the solution is to then take away fluoridated water from the poor who do live in areas with municipal water.

You’re right it’s more expensive and the logistics are worse, but at the same time you could inculcate better habits in your population, and even subsidize proper mouth rinses.

The minute that’s successfully done across the country, I would be in favor of removing fluoride from water, but only after all economically disadvantaged have that better option in place, and they are adequately educated with better habits to utilize it. I think you’ll find that it is much easier said than done.

Dentistry in America is ludicrously broken, but Europe has had its own way for decades, and diverged in many important ways, while having a far smaller economic incentive.

I don’t disagree with that at all. The amount of false dental procedures done in the US for monetary gain is quite high, making it a hassle to find an ethical dentist.

Providing free dental rinses to kids at school seems like it would solve this better

I think that would be a better solution in theory, but the cost of doing that en-masse across the country would be quite a bit higher than putting it in the drinking water (Single bulk purchase of fluoride with only a single person needed to be hired to add it to the water supply Vs. Millions of bottles of fluoride rinse being either being created by the government or contracted out to a company, which is then regularly distributed to schools, likely via truck, requiring hundreds to thousands of new employees to manage and run an operation of that size).

I can’t imagine a bill for that program being passed in this political climate. I mean, we can’t even get lead out of the water in many communities, and that’s far, FAR more dangerous. Not to mention PFAS now being in the water supply. Also, while that solution would help children, what about adults who cannot afford to buy fluoride rinses?

We have pretty solid evidence that shows when a community stops fluoridating their water, the poorest in that community have a pretty steep increase in preventable dental and oral health outcomes.

There is also some tentative evidence that high levels of fluoride could have negative effects to pregnant women, babies, and small developing children (potential lowering of IQ), but it’s pretty weak evidence that hasn’t been verified, and there is no evidence that it is harmful to adults.

So we have to choose between a 100% known bad outcome for poor people and a potential bad effect for young people from a poorly done study. I don’t think it’s too crazy of a decision to go with the option that does a significant amount of known good to the most disenfranchised part of the population, personally.

The places that do fluoridate their water do so publicly, is regulated and tested (and can be personally verified at home with a test kit), and adds the least amount possible to achieve the positive outcome, which comes out to a very small dose (many communities have naturally occurring fluoride in their water at higher levels)

If the state can add compounds to water, why not other compounds that reduce aggression?

That part is going a bit too far into conspiratorial thinking, IMHO, coming from someone who used to be a full on religious conspiracy theorist prepper. If we begin to assume that the government is going to start manipulating the water supply secretly, you would then have to assume that any water that you didn’t personally purify is suspect, and at that point water fluoridation is the least of your concerns.

The risk to a government doing that is absolutely immense, as the now modified water would be accessible and testable by the entire population that drinks it, and unless there are suddenly new chemicals that are undetectable by known scientific methods, the chances of a government being able to pull that off are below nill, and detection would result in a scandal beyond imagining.

There are many recent studies on the efficacy of flouride, both mouth rinse and paste from the last two decades, as well as studies on the efficacy of essential oil rinses (Listerine) and stabilized chlorine (Closys).

There have been developments in flouride compositions as well, such as Stannus flouride, which has been fully stabilized and no longer stains the teeth like it once did. It brings with it advantages over the older Sodium Flouride, such as better resilience against low pH, reduction of temperature sensitivity from its ability to fill in the microtubules of the teeth, and an antibacterial effect from being stabilized to zinc, which remains on the teeth and kills caries causing bacteria for many hours after use.

I highly disagree that science is not advancing regarding dental solutions, we are very much not playing with voodoo. I would suggest instead that advancements in dental technology and science is not pushed harder due to financial interests, as wide adoption would drastically reduce the income of dentists. It’s capitalism, basically.

To give a highly encapsulated version of an ideal dental regimen based on modern science, it would be thus:

1. Begin with a small rinse of Closys, which is effective at penetrating biofilm in the mouth, and raises the pH of the mouth to protect the teeth from abrasion for the next step (teeth enamel becomes softened in an acidic environment).
2. Brush with a Stannus flouride toothpaste. The action of brushing itself even without toothpaste is beneficial, as it mechanically disturbs the colonies of bacteria on the teeth, which mouthwash alone cannot achieve. Leave the toothpaste on for a couple minutes if possible.
3. Without rinsing with water, spit out the remaining toothpaste and begin a rinse of classic Listerine (or off brand). The essential oils will finish off all the bacteria that the brushing dislodged, as well as get between the teeth to act as a liquid flossing.
4. Finish, again without rinsing with water, with a standard ACT mouth rinse (or off-brand).

This last step is is important for a few reasons.

• First, it is a high pH, and will neutralize the acidic nature of the Listerine.
• Second, it rinses out the alcohol of the Listerine, which if left in would have a detrimental effect on saliva production and dry mouth, which prevents the teeth from remineralizing from the phosphorous and minerals in your saliva.
• Third, it introduces yet another source of flouride after the acidity of the Listerine etches the enamel, which strangely increases the absorption of the flouride (flouride is most effective in an acidic environment, but that can only be taken advantage of with a liquid, as the brush would be harmful in that environment).
• Fourth, the ACT type rinse contains another antibacterial (cetylpyridinium chloride) that studies have shown stick to the enamel, killing yet more caries creating bacteria.

If this protocol is followed diligently twice a day, you will effectively entirely prevent caries causing bacteria from being able to proliferate enough to actually cause plaque buildup whatsoever, and you will likely never get another cavity for the rest of your life. Especially if combined with xylitol mints after meals, which caries causing bacteria uptake thinking it’s a sugar they can digest and use as fuel, but in fact cannot be, causing them to die. It also promotes saliva production, which increases pH and flushes the teeth with minerals.

Lastly, the reason we treat water with flouride is for the sake of those unable to afford access to, or proper knowledge of, flouride containing dental products as described above. If everyone did the above protocol, there would be no need to fluoridate water, but as that is unlikely, water fluoridation is a compromise.

I’m not suggesting hydroxyapetite is without merit for dental purposes, it absolutely is useful, and I agree combining it with flouride would likely be optimal (I recall reading a study that seemed to suggest HA can actually remineralize deeper into the tooth than flouride can).

I was just pointing out that the woman in the article didn’t seem to know what hydroxyapetite is actually used for, despite trying to seem like a source of knowledge.

I don’t dispute her lead findings, but her statement about Hydroxyapatite shows she’s willing to give comment on things she knows nothing about.

Hydroxyapatite is extracted from cow bone and added because it allegedly helps teeth absorb calcium, though Rubin said she doubts it does.

Hydroxyapatite is used as an alternative to flouride, as it’s able to attach to the enamal and act as a barrier similar to how flouride does.

Research has shown it’s less effective than flouride overall (it can’t withstand as low a pH/acidity before dissolving), but it’s not added to increase calcium absorption, like she claims.

Thrift stores almost always have desk or standing lamps. Combined with cheap, warm colored low wattage LED bulbs (25w equivalent or lower), they add wonderful ambiance without breaking the bank.

And Microsoft.

I hadn’t heard of Jami, but that looks excellent, cheers for sharing!

Unfortunately it does not currently support audio sharing, but I’d recommend keeping an eye on Bananas Screen Sharing, as it may support it soon, from what I’ve seen in their Discord discussions.

I point it out because it shows how psychopathic he is to cut out a close family member from his life over nothing. He’s a heartless asshole, and I think that documentary shows most rich people fall from the same tree, to varying degree.

I always like to mention Warren Buffet completely disowned one his grand daughters for appearing in a documentary about rich people made by the heir to the Johnson & Johnson fortune.

I disagree that stable distros aren’t good at general purpose gaming systems, they work fine unless you have very new hardware.

And sometimes the newer stuff csn bring more problems than a stable distro, depending on your hardware.

As an example, my system is an nvidia laptop with an external monitor. Unfortunately, the Nvidia driver is absolutely unusable under Wayland with this setup, which was a bummer for me, as I wanted to use Fedora with it, but starting with Fedora 41, X11 was completely phased out, so I couldn’t fall back to it.

I’m not a fan of openSUSE tumbleweed or Arch based distros, which do still support X11, which left me with the more Stable distros. Mint worked flawlessly with my setup, and I have no issue gaming.

Tl;dr there’s more nuance to stability vs bleeding edge, and both have their place.

Only issue with uBlue distros is the lack of documentation and limited help resources (many questions in the forum are left unanswered, as the uBlue team is quite small and likely can’t get to them all).

Premiere --> Davinci Resolve (Openshot or Kdenlive for FOSS)

Illustrator --> Affinity (Inkscape for FOSS)

Photoshop --> Affinity Photo (GIMP w/ PhotoGIMP & Resynthasizer for FOSS)

Whatever Adobe has for painting --> Krita (FOSS)