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chaotickasugaicrows · 3 months ago

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So the least voted for option on that poll was some serious Hollow Knight x Demon Slayer AU lore but there were still votes. We are changing the AU name to Void Born, Sun Bound (because it sounds cool and we are finishing up chapter one of a fic for it.) Lore under the read more cause kinda long.

Before the Kingdom of Caelestis was founded, there were many different and scattered tribes. These groups had different cultures, languages, and most importantly religions. They each worshiped their own deities and sometimes their leaders were deities themselves. Not all deities were equal. Some were merely powerful beings who could die, some were more abstract concepts than beings, and some were immortals. Nonetheless, the tribes enjoyed their ways of life and mostly kept separate. Skirmishes happened, as did limited trade, but the tribes remained separate in order to preserve their autonomy.

Then came the arrival of the Pale King, Muzan. He was different from the other deities/leaders. He desired a kingdom, a sprawling empire that would last for generations. He wanted all peoples to bow at his feet and worship one major deity, him. Muzan was a rare being of soul (a certain brand of magic) but all his soul and power came from a being far more ancient than himself. He was the successor, the lesser being. He was not immortal. However, he would never ever admit that he was less than perfect.

Unfortunately, Muzan was very politically savvy and powerful. He managed to consolidate the other groups of people, stealing worshipers and/or subduing other deities to his will. There were a few groups he missed but overall he did a pretty good job creating an empire for himself.

Muzan as a being of soul promised some of his new followers that he could unlock their potential to wield it. Of course they would always be kept at a level that was less powerful than his own mastery of soul. He let Enmu and their apprentices experiment with souls (this was done so that he could use their findings to strengthen himself). Muzan also ordered Nakime the Teacher to gather information and report to him. It was thanks to Nakime and also Yahaba the Watcher that Muzan managed to steal all of Hinokami’s worshipers. Using the research, Muzan sealed Hinokami away in the realm of dreams and then dusted his hands and mostly forgot about her (this was a mistake on his part.)

Years go by and the Pale King has done pretty well for himself. He has a large swath of worshipers that cheer his name and several loyal servants. There aren’t any outstanding threats to his power. Then he makes his second mistake. Muzan discovers the Void and decides he can use the abyss and the void pools to bolster his power even further. He allows experimentation with the void. Molds are created and bits of void are fashioned into new creatures to serve as guards for the Pale King’s palace, or servants, or warriors in his army. Muzan sees endless possibilities. Under Muzan’s orders, Enmu even attempts to fuse void and soul together (it could theoretically work but it also kills all who try). Attempts to inject void into Muzan’s followers also works to strengthen them (for a time but that too kills them). Still, the Pale King continues to experiment with little care for lives lost or rules broken.

Hinokami, though stuck in the realm of dreams, isn’t powerless. She discovers the void and soul experiments and considers them perversions of nature and its rules. Her followers are mostly eradicated and no matter how hard she tries to get people to listen to her in the dreams she enters, they all fawn over the Pale King and his seemingly endless power and grace. She becomes frustrated and determined to put a stop to things herself. Thus, the corruption begins.

Hinokami’s corruption takes over the wills of the people it infects, turning them into a hive mind that seeks to corrupt more people. Her goal is to bring all people under her control so that she can put a stop to the experiments, kill the Pale King, topple his kingdom, and free herself from the dream realm. Muzan panics because he thought Hinokami was no longer a problem. He orders his citizens to search for a way to stop the corruption. Hinokami wasn’t a super well known deity before she was sealed in the dream realm so the other deities/leaders see the corruption as a new and terrifying threat instead of realizing who is causing this.

Everyone deals with Hinokami’s corruption a bit differently. The group of warriors lead by the Mantis Lords (Akaza, Kyogai, Susamaru), stick to themselves and mostly close themselves off to the outside world except for the Traitor (Kaigaku) and his followers that willingly become corrupted. Enmu and his group increase the soul magic experiments, draining the souls of hundreds (maybe thousands) in order to increase their own soul and resist the infection. However, they only succeed in transforming themselves into horrifying soul creatures that go mad. Anytime the corruption reaches them, Hinokami kills them instead of taking control. Kanae, the leader of the Moss tribe, attempts to call her people back to her to protect them but hardly anyone heeds her call. The Flute tribe led by Managi (aka Gyokko) just parties because it's the end of the world and they don’t care. Lastly, Nakime the Teacher creates a horrifyingly brilliant plan to contain the corruption.

Questionable Plan and Results for a future post.

#Void Born Sun Bound #told you we had serious lore #kny #demon slayer #hollow knight x demon slayer #kimetsu no yaiba #muzan kibutsuji #kny hinokami #nakime #yahaba #enmu #kanae kocho #gyokko #kaigaku #akaza #kyogai #susamaru #future ao3 fic

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arizonaconservativegal · 1 year ago

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As you work in government, and think the government should be dramatically reduced, I was wondering where you think such cuts ought to start and how would you get enough people to agree with you? From where I stand, as someone who gained political consciousness in 2018(?) and has been leaning right libertarian ever since, it seems no one can agree even though we all see the same issue.

Well if I were dictator for a day, I'd eliminate the federal Department of Education because they pretty much do nothing of value.

But the real answer is that I wouldn't start by cutting any programs at all.

Sure I'm a libertarian who has a philosophical problem with pretty much every government program, and if I were building the system from the ground up, I wouldn't ever include most of what we ended up with, but since it's already there, that's not an option.

Besides, even as bloated as they are, most government offices/agencies/departments do have a handful of very necessary positions and good employees in them. They just also have an awful lot of jobs that no one would ever miss and a lot of employees who do nothing but take up space. You need to go through all of them with a fine tooth comb to figure out which ones should be kept, what can be consolidated, and what can be eliminated with no impact on services. And then you'd need to hang around long enough to figure out which individual people to keep (either in their existing roles or reassign them to more useful positions) and which ones are just dedicated to being useless.

The problem is that doing that properly takes a tremendous amount of time and you really can't leave it up to the bureaucrats within the departments. If you tell them to just cut staffing levels by a certain percentage, half of them will just go by last hired, first fired and the other half will deliberately cut critical and public facing positions to create political demand for their funding to be restored.

If I were really going to go through all that, I'd start by identifying the positions to cut and then let attrition do its thing. Useless positions do not need to be replaced when vacated. Not actually firing anyone gets you around civil service protections and if you do your targeting well, the only people who will really squawk will be union bosses upset about dwindling membership numbers. The two tricks here are a) you still have to replace the positions that are necessary and start consolidating responsibilities so you can't skip that first step of figuring out what those are and b) you cannot let politics determine which positions are cut. All services levels must be maintained, even in programs that we disagree with politically.

The next thing I would do - which would be much harder - is reform those civil service and union protections. We need to be able to fire people who do not do their jobs adequately or who are no longer needed. Right now that's pretty much impossible so instead of firing them, we shuffle them off to another position - and usually that comes with a promotion and raise so they can't claim they're being treated unfairly. Or we just hire a second person to do the job the first one won't or can't do but instead of replacing the first person with the second person, we just pay two people to do one job at the same time.

The trade I would make is to eliminate or drastically increase pay caps for high performing employees and for positions that we have trouble hiring/retaining qualified employees. Too often we lose highly effective employees because the only thing we can do to reward them is to promote them out of their area of skill. And we simply cannot hire a talented lawyer or tech worker for $75k when they could be making two or three or ten times that in the private sector. Sorry, I know no one wants to pay government employees more but when we have a team of ten shitty employees getting paid $50k each, that's a lot more expensive than getting one good one who will actually do the job for $200k.

(If I could, I'd also put new employees on a 401k style retirement plan - I'd even offer a very generous match - and never put them in the pension system. It would save us a ton of money and frankly, those employees would be better off in the long run for having control of their retirement funds. But that's a separate issue and possibly a bigger hurdle than cutting jobs.)

Only when all that was done, and after several years had gone by so the public would see that the reductions in workforce really didn't hamper the service they received, that's when I'd think about starting to cut actual programs.

And then I would start with the Department of Education.

#oops this got long

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lunarsilkscreen · 24 days ago

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Mobile Game design overview

A personal Journal Entry and pre-development path.

R&D Still Required based on style of game; touch screen and gyro controls. --preliminary research complete.

Design Overview;

Other Mobile games, no matter how well designed, have extremely cluttered interfaces. Some of this is because there are multiple games, mini-games, and events packaged into the game at any one time.

Some games have an coin based (energy use) version of their main game, and a sub-game that does not require energy.

Consider using this style for offline and online modes. It seems popular to use energy for the online. Portion, this way the player can enjoy the game as they wish without overloading the servers offline.

Other games have several Quest, Achievement, and Event menus that can be consolidated into a single main menu.

The reason they don't do this is still unclear to me; but is probably similar to the big flashy tags and sales sign at in-person retailers, and in the Sears magazine.

If so, they don't serve the purpose they're intended to.

However; it's probably more that the development team is inexperienced and using a framework or game template that they then reuse for added areas. Creating a package which is a copy of the template over and over again.

I had previously considered implementing an old-style arcade "life" system like Mario, but perhaps a more simplified energy system, perhaps one that tracks step through the accelerometer (or other apps) to refresh would be good.

Energy refreshments shouldn't be purchaseables except for in specific circumstances; Similar to Hearthstone's Arena Tavern Brawls that happen periodically.

Players seem to enjoy "Season Packs" to purchase, and dislike an RMT (Real-money Trade) currency.

It also reduces clutter and increases understandability by reducing the options that a player has for a single game.

"Gacha Summons" shouldn't be purchaseables. meaning Gacha, or loot boxes, if used should be separated from the RMT purchase portion.

Rewards for skill shown in the online portion should be considered and given to players that perform well in whatever the online portion might be

Minor connectivity for offline achievements should be included for verification, but more or less separated from the online game entirely.

Some specific achievements may reward Skins and other abilities for the online portion.

A small game studio shouldn't really go whale fishing like happens in many games today. (Packs valued by studios worth $100+ are common and give little. Seems more like a wishful thinking menu item)

Entry into a crypto-based achievement system, whichever company is able to make a stable one; is key in future development. Releasing of items and achievements into a startup ecosystem will help the game to grow.

Without going into depth on any specific game mechanics; this covers everything about the interface design research.

The question still remains how to address monetization and store based items. Aside from releasing things into a gaming ecosystem where they can be displayed and reused in other places; I'm not sure what to sell.

Gacha games are a dime a dozen and have seemingly all the same pricing scheme. Without a reason to have seasons, theres no reason a player might want to purchase one.

Here's what I think;

Hosting Price and monthly expenses need to be taken into account, but $1-10 depending on what % the hosting service might take, for a "Premium Account" badge, either a one-time, yearly or monthly seems key.

Re-curring costs may be implemented for "seasonal" reasons based on when the majority of players tend to be actively interacting with the game.

Lastly; Data needs to be reduced to a minimum. Part of these sizes are voiced lines, raster graphics for the dozens of different menus, CGI cutscenes, and music.

All of this will help to make a game that will be able to make it into anybody's pocket.

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mornington-the-crescent · 2 years ago

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I voted FDR in the poll because of well, the everything, and I was astonished to see how many people had chosen Nixon.

I know our education system is bad, but it was genuinely horrific to see all the other options in the single digits. For most of these people, the only bad thing they know about Nixon was watergate. I remember at least being taught about the internment camps in school, even if they neglected to mention who was president at the time.

FDR fancied himself king of America, and it's disheartening to know how few people realize how genuinely evil he was.

I mean, Nixon was on there mostly to prove that tumblr as a whole does not understand or remember history. Their knowledge of history comes from half-remembered public education, and from ahistorical and hysterical tumblr posts.

Don't get me wrong, Nixon did fucking suck.

He normalized trade relations with China, which ruined American manufacturing, sending countless American jobs overseas, and the rest of the world soon followed suit; that's why 90% of what you own is cheap and low-quality and made in China. Not to mention that the massive influx of foreign money is what led to the CCP being able to continue to prop itself up, when it otherwise would have collapsed under the weight of its own incompetence and inefficiency decades ago otherwise, like every other experiment with socialism inevitably does.

Then there's his taking America off of the gold standard, which permitted the massive expansion of the money supply, which led to the inflation of the 1970's, and all subsequent inflations, since the main safeguard and deterrent to inflationary monetary policy has been removed.

And then there's the incredibly underhanded tactics that he used to to get his political opposition: See, in spite all of his hatred for hippies and the Black Panthers, you can't ban ideologies or political movements. But, both groups tended to smoke marijuana. So what do you do? You stoke latent anti-Mexican sentiment in the American populace, and paint weed as a demon drug that makes people promiscuous and a danger to society. And once it was criminalized, well, now he had all the excuse he needed to crack down on certain groups who opposed him. He wasn't throwing them in jail for their ideology; he was throwing them in jail for the reefer! Totally different! The "War on Drugs" is total bullshit, and like all attempts at prohibition in this country, it just led to a greater amount of the "banned" item in increasing potency and availability, while creating a robust criminal underclass to supply the prohibited good.

And we can't forget that he ordered the bombing and invasion of Cambodia and Laos, two countries which had the misfortune of simply being next to Vietnam. He even ran on a platform of ending the war in Vietnam, and while the peace talks were already started by the time he was elected, it took four more years for America to finally withdraw from a war it had no business being involved with in the first place.

He weaponized the FBI and IRS against political enemies, keeping tabs on anyone that he thought was against him, spying on and even illegally wiretapping opponents. He, like so many others, tried to consolidate more and more power into the Executive branch of the government, outside the normal separation of powers. His election strategy was to openly court racists who were mad about desegregation.

And, of course, I'd be remiss if I forgot to mention Tricky Dick's Wet 'n' Wild Water Heist of 1967. Leave the water in the Reflecting Pool alone, man.

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anthonybialy · 10 months ago

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Bill of Wronged

Our rights have been taken to not be safe. People get every benefit otherwise. Attempting to manipulate the universe on our behalf is super kind of authorities who expect the gesture to compensate for not actually doing it. We only get a vote technically.

Wondering how could one be in favor of guns is popular amongst those not into free will. Sanctimony about how implements hurt bodies and feelings replaces not thinking out that naughty types might obtain them, perhaps even in defiance of legal restrictions. The mere existence of that choice dissuades villains from initiating nefarious plans.

Figuring what crimes never occurred is hard to measure. But it’s easy to see what happens when the only people restricted from bearing arms are those who comply with laws.

Trying to get virus season going again is for your benefit. You’re acting a bit too independently. A sequel scare might get you to remember who rules over you. Visionary faux epidemiologists have to plan panic ahead, as one can’t spring fear a month before an election. The timing of picking a new president is surely coincidental. Paranoia is a symptom immune to vaccination.

Thoroughness is not a virtue when the right to shop elsewhere is treated as a sin. The fear of an even worse shutdown sequel serves as an extension of the sickly notion that government should and can be responsible for one’s health. You don’t get a choice. That’s supposed to make you feel reassured.

Treating companies who heal you as Satan’s minions is lamentably consistent. Contempt is similar to what simply must be justified demonization of the gun industry, as they couldn’t merely be offering a product customers want. Shooting bowling pins in the woods is almost as fun as scaring off potential muggers and tyrants. But aspiring buyers are told they’re beholden to diabolical shootie-manufacturing conglomerates that would profit any way they could and truly enjoy doing so off suffering. Compensation for offering something we want is tough to accumulate, anyway, what with inflation remaining a stubborn problem ever since corporations realized they could exploit the populace for excessive profit just after Joe Biden took office.

Pretending money isn’t involved makes life costly. We’re trying complimentary living right now to see how much more expensive existence can get. You may notice your consent wasn’t sought. Being aware of losing liberty is the extent of rights. so be grateful perception remains legal. That’s only because it’s tough to ban. The Biden White House’s efforts to control social media narratives through coercion show they try their hardest. It’s too bad they couldn’t invest efforts to suppress narratives into learning trades.

A caring government lovingly protects serfs from the torture of choice. Politicians who’ve never run businesses dream of reducing options down to one. The ensuing dream world will just like what happens when government kindly consolidates industries and takes your money without asking.

Bad examples to avoid will have to count as progress. Your rulers show their contempt for profit by taking as much of it as possible. They spend it at will to illustrate the peril of greed. A biblical situation leads to losing niceties such as options. Imposing unwieldy burdens upon amalgamations is justified by demonizing them as cruel indulgers of decadence. Similar logic leads to thinking efficiency means reducing options, not multiple options reducing supply.

It’s their fault for both charging too much and not offering enough. Those who think the only crime is paying bills also coincidentally double as enemies of capitalism, which as a reminder is another name for trading. Dragging down others because they have nothing which would enable them to participate flaunts a distinct lack of empathy.

If you want to spend six or seven years which could be spent getting a plumbing business going instead majoring in political science, don’t expect to pay. College shouldn’t cost anything, at least according to attendees. Students who take classes in self-righteousness specialize in claiming they benefit society, which is a common delusion amongst the least useful graduates. Humans who actually help went into business for themselves and contributed to society functioning as a byproduct. I thought liberals believed in collective benefits.

Endless interventions are based in the seemingly reasonable and wholly delusional notion that life should feature protections. Wanting to be free of fear is as natural as it is impossible. Evidence isn’t going to deter a plucky hero like your incumbent executive. We’re learning the notion does indeed alter our world. The problem is it’s for the worse. Making an impact on the world is easy as long as you don’t care what kind.

Deciding which amendments they exploit while scoffing at them is how de facto autocrats respect our Constitution. They’re free to say any moronic thing they want while law-abiding firearms carriers keep them safe. You don’t have to worry about sluggish trials or, if you’re a Biden, testifying against yourself. Meanwhile, the country is presently propped up by states possessing the option to have rights. Liberals would quarter troops, but only if they work for the IRS. They endure the cruel and unusual punishment of having to live with themselves.

#rights #Constitutiion #guns #shutdowns #big government #gun control #free market #incentives

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tradingmarketsblog · 1 year ago

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Comparing the Top Online Trading Apps: Which One Is Right for You?

The online stock trading app industry has experienced a tremendous surge since the onset of the pandemic in 2020. Thanks to improved internet speeds and the growing interest in financial literacy, mobile-based stock trading has undergone a significant transformation. Each day, more Indians are experiencing the seamless shift towards incredibly smooth and flexible trading options, all available at the touch of a button.

As these apps continue to gain widespread adoption, even beginners can enter the world of trading with ease. These applications not only enable the buying and selling of financial assets but also offer a range of other valuable services. The only requirement is a reliable internet connection to ensure these trading apps operate smoothly.

This article has listed some of the best online trading apps so that you can choose any one of them.

Top Three Online Trading Apps

The list of the best online trading app is as follows.

1. Zerodha Kite

Zerodha boasts over 100 million active clients, contributing significantly to India's retail trading volumes, making up about 15% of the total. This app is highly recommended for both beginners and experienced traders and investors, thanks to its robust technological platform.

Zerodha's flagship mobile trading software, Kite, is developed in-house. The current Kite 3.0 web platform offers a wide array of features, including market watch, advanced charting with over 100 indicators, and advanced order types such as cover orders and good till triggered (GTT) orders, ensuring swift order placements.

Furthermore, users can also utilise Zerodha Kite as a Chrome extension, enabling features like order placement and stock tracking for added convenience.

2. Kotak Securities

Opening a trading account at Kotak Securities comes with the advantage of zero account opening fees. Additionally, there are discounted rates for investors below 30 years of age, making it a cost-effective option. The account setup process is streamlined, with minimal steps involved.

Kotak Securities enables users to engage in a wide range of financial activities, including trading in stocks, IPOs, derivatives, mutual funds, currency, and commodities. Furthermore, it offers opportunities for global investments through its trading app. This app is thoughtfully designed, featuring a user-friendly interface accessible on iOS, Android, and Windows platforms. It also provides valuable extras like margin funding, real-time portfolio tracking, and live stock quotes with charting options.

3. Upstox

Upstox PRO, supported by Tiger Global and endorsed by prominent investors like Indian tycoon Ratan Tata and Tiger Global Management, is a well-known discount broker app. It offers a range of trading and investment opportunities, encompassing stocks, currencies, commodities, and mutual funds. For experienced and seasoned investors, it is an ideal choice, featuring advanced tools such as TradingView and ChartsIQ libraries.

Online trading apps offer a diverse array of financial products and services, consolidating your investment and financial management in one convenient platform. You can engage in activities such as trading equities, participating in IPOs, trading derivatives, investing in mutual funds, placing fixed deposits, dealing in commodities, and trading currency.

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loopy777 · 1 year ago

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Whats your thoughts on the way aang, zuko and the earth king who's name i can never recall handled the former fire nation colonies? Cause frankly speaking looking at it objectively, it really does seem like the compromise route and let them become sorta independant was the worst of both sides.

Culturally speaking, like it or not the area had become fire nation dominant, which would be a very strong argument for them remaining part of the fire nation.

On the other hand, the earth kingdom is right that they took the land by right of force, with no casus beli, no marriage ties that bound the fire nation royalty and whoever was the lords of the land together. It was as clear cut a right by conquest and nothing more as you can get.

Finally the independent route seems to have just been a compromise to not allow either side to truly "win", rather than an actual, good solution.

And in the end it ended up with Aang's republic project(good job on being a neutral party aang ;D) ending up as an abyssmal failure, both during his own time as robber barons consolidated power during his reign, and then falling completely off the wayside after he died, then replaced with a just as bad successor after the first election.

While things does seem to kinda be looking up after the last election in the comics, it does seem like aang should have just taken a side, or if he was going to compromise, it should probably have been something along the lines of demilitarize the entire zone on a permanent basis, but allow the Fire nation to keep it. Or allow fire nation citizens to remain but let the Earth Kingdom retake political control(This is what I would have done by the way) over the colonies, with those who remained legally becoming earth kingdom citizens.

Yeah, there were no good solutions, but I feel like there were better compromises possible than what 'The Promise' claimed were the only possibilities. To summarize, here's what those options were:

The colonies go back to the Earth Kingdom and everyone either from the Fire Nation or of at least partial Fire Nation descent is deported back to the Fire Nation forcibly.

The colonies remain under full Fire Nation control and the ruling Fire Nation social class gets to stay on top.

The colonies all become independent, and on a case-by-case basis some of them might choose to hold elections and of those some of them might elect at least one person of Earth Kingdom descent to participate in the local government.

I like your radical and hard-to-conceive-of idea of putting the Earth Kingdom in charge and then not deporting people. Perhaps, in that scenario, we can even reduce the influence of the rich Fire Nation upper class types with taxes on wartime family/clan gains, or something like that. The money would be used to fund local stuff rather than merely inflating Ba Sing Se's coffers.

Or, the colonies could have been made independent, but the Fire Nation is given some kind of corresponding punishment so that it's not perfectly positioned to profit from the situation. Perhaps all Fire Nation residents can be banned from trading with any of the colonies for a century or something, giving the Earth Kingdom a chance to make practical and cultural in-roads. Or, just have the ban last for Aang's lifetime, and now he's the one dodging all the Fire Nation assassins! It would give Zuko a chance to sleep, at least.

Of course, both of those leave plenty of opportunities for cheats and corruption, which is where I presume Aang would have to keep an eye on things and fight the people making a mess of things. That sounds like something more out of one of F.C. Yee's novels, which I would be quite happy with. It's certainly a lot more interesting than having Aang deal with the same Bender Vs NonBender conflict that even LoK couldn't make plausible with twelve episodes and the best voice-acting in the business.

However, I'm not against the idea that the United Republic still eventually becomes a corrupt land where capitalism runs wild, no one believes in spirits, and organized crime is a more effective government than the actual ruling council. But I'd like the steps that lead to that to be framed as the gAang's failures. As it is, all of Aang's adventures in the former colonies conclude with what are presented as happy endings, and things only go wrong when bad people slip in while he's not looking. If Republic City is supposed to be so bad that LoK's happy ending is most of the city being rendered a wasteland, then why can't we see Aang losing when something about the former colonies is at stake? I mean, yeah, the 8-year-olds the comics are aimed at probably would be confused and stop reading, but they probably didn't like 'The Puppetmaster' either, so who cares about them? Give me the 12-year-olds starving for some tragedy in their family-friendly media.

Those are probably the kids destined for careers in politics, anyway, so they might enjoy taxation as a plot element.

#thekingofwinterblog #lok critical #gene yang critical

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mdlearning · 2 years ago

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dragonflycap · 4 months ago

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4 Trade Ideas for Caterpillar: Bonus Idea

Caterpillar, $CAT, comes into the week at short term resistance in a pullback and over the 20 day SMA for the first time in over a month. The Bollinger Bands® are squeezed in, often a precursor to a move and it has retraced 38.2% of the last leg higher. It has a RSI at the midline and rising, a positive divergence, with the MACD crossed up and rising but negative. There is resistance at 333.50 and 337.50 then 351.50 and 355.50 before 364 and 373 with the all-time high at 379.30 above that. Support lower is at 330 and 325 then 321. Short interest is low at 2.4%.

The stock pays a dividend with an annual yield of 1.69% and will trade ex-dividend n July 24th. The company is expected to report earnings next on July 30th. The July options chain shows biggest open interest at the 330 strike on the put side and at the 350 call strike. The August chain shows open interest spread from 330 to 280, biggest at 290 then 310, on the put side. On the call side it is biggest at 330 then fades to 370. The September chain has biggest open interest at the 290 put and the 330 call strikes.

Caterpillar, Ticker: $CAT

Trade Idea 1: Buy the stock on a move over 333.50 with a stop at 321.

Trade Idea 2: Buy the stock on a move over 333.50 and add an August 320/310 Put Spread ($3.00) while selling the September 380 Call ($2.90).

Trade Idea 3: Buy the July/August 340 Call Calendar ($6.80) while selling the July 325 Puts ($2.70).

Trade Idea 4: Buy the September 320/340/370 Call Spread Risk Reversal (30 cents).

Start of Summer Annual Sale! Hi all the Start of Summer Annual Sale is entering its last day at Dragonfly Capital. Get an annual subscription for 38.2% off or pay quarterly for 15% off. Both auto-renew at that discounted rate until you decide to leave.

After reviewing over 1,000 charts, I have found some good setups for the week. These were selected and should be viewed in the context of the broad Market Macro picture reviewed Friday which with the 2nd Quarter of 2024 in the books and heading into the holiday shortened week, saw equity markets showing resilience with a rebound from a pullback and large caps and tech names holding at the highs.

Elsewhere look for Gold to continue its consolidation after the record move higher while Crude Oil consolidates in a broad range. The US Dollar Index continues the short term move to the upside while US Treasuries continue in their secular downtrend. The Shanghai Composite looks to continue the downtrend while Emerging Markets consolidate under long term resistance.

The Volatility Index looks to remain very low and stable making the path easier for equity markets to the upside. Their charts look strong, especially on the longer timeframe. On the shorter timeframe both the QQQ and SPY are showing signs of a possible reset on momentum measures as both are extended. The IWM continues to lag in a long term channel. Use this information as you prepare for the coming week and trad’em well.

#$CAT

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mariacallous · 2 years ago

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In 2021, Shippensburg University won the NCAA Division II Field Hockey championship, completing an undefeated season with a 3-0 victory over archrival West Chester. The “Ship” Raiders also won it all in 2018, 2017, 2016, and 2013, which I know because I saw it written in big letters on a banner festooning the fieldhouse on Ship’s campus in south-central Pennsylvania when I visited last month.

Ship was in fine form. Young men and women wearing logoed Champion sweatshirts bustled between buildings. There was a line at the coffee shop in the student union. It was the kind of bright-blue autumn day that you would see on a brochure.

There was no way to tell, from the outside, that Ship was a shrinking institution. Or that the problem is about to get a lot worse — not just here, but at colleges and universities nationwide.

In four years, the number of students graduating from high schools across the country will begin a sudden and precipitous decline, due to a rolling demographic aftershock of the Great Recession. Traumatized by uncertainty and unemployment, people decided to stop having kids during that period. But even as we climbed out of the recession, the birth rate kept dropping,and we are now starting to see the consequences on campuses everywhere. Classes will shrink, year after year, for most of the next two decades. People in the higher education industry call it “the enrollment cliff.”

Among the small number of elite colleges and research universities — think the Princetons and the Penn States — the cliff will be no big deal. These institutions have their pick of applicants and can easily keep classes full.

For everyone else, the consequences could be dire. In some places, the crisis has already begun. College enrollment began slowly receding after the millennial enrollment wave peaked in 2010, particularly in regions that were already experiencing below-average birth rates while simultaneously losing population to out-migration. Starved of students and the tuition revenue they bring, small private colleges in New England have begun to blink off the map. Regional public universities like Ship are enduring painful layoffs and consolidation.

The timing is terrible. Trade policy, de-unionization, corporate consolidation, and substance abuse have already ravaged countless communities, particularly in the post-industrial Northeast and Midwest. In many cases, colleges have been one of the only places that provide good jobs in their communities, offer educational opportunities for locals, and have strong enough roots to stay planted. The enrollment cliff means they might soon dry up and blow away.

This trend will accelerate the winner-take-all dynamic of geographic consolidation that is already upending American politics. College-educated Democrats will increasingly congregate in cities and coastal areas, leaving people without degrees in rural areas and towns. For students who attend less-selective colleges and universities near where they grew up — that is, most college students — the enrollment cliff means fewer options for going to college in person, or none at all.

The empty factories and abandoned shopping malls littering the American landscape may soon be joined by ghost colleges, victims of an existential struggle for reinvention, waged against a ticking clock of shrinking student bodies, coming soon to a town near you.

Ship was founded in 1871 as the Cumberland Valley State Normal School, to train young women to be school teachers. It became the State Teachers College in 1927, and stayed that way until something happened that would transform higher education and much else: the baby boom.

Some 4.3 million American children were born in 1957, a number that would not be matched for another 50 years, even as the overall population almost doubled to over 300 million.

The relationship between demography and higher education is always a two-decade delay of cause and effect. The college years of one generation fall in the birth years of the next. The baby boom meant that by the 1970s, campuses were bursting as the children of midcentury fecundity reached early adulthood and women increasingly sought degrees in professions that were finally opening up to women.

This put college leaders in a difficult spot. In the short term, they needed dorms and classrooms and teachers to handle the boomer wave. But birth rates had been declining for nearly 20 years, and they saw what that would mean for them in the near future. The talk then was much like today: Future enrollment trends looked bleak, and some colleges were already struggling.

But the 1980s enrollment cliff never really arrived. Higher education was saved by tectonic shifts in the labor market. As predicted, the number of high school graduates declined, from 3.1 million in 1976 to 2.5 million in 1994. But college enrollment rates actually increased, driven by deindustrialization and the collapse of well-paying blue-collar jobs. In 1975, the percentage of high school graduates who chose to immediately enroll in college was only 51 percent. By 1997, it was 67 percent.

Colleges found themselves in the extraordinarily lucky position of being the only places legally allowed to sell credentials that unlocked the gateway to a stable, prosperous life. That was enough to smooth out the bottom of the demographic trough until the children of the baby boom arrived.

And sure enough, the millennial college years began as expansionary times for places like Ship. From 1985 to 2007, the total number of undergraduates nationwide increased from 10.6 million to 15.6 million. And while birth numbers had been cycling back downward from the early 1990s to the mid-2000s, they began to move up again in 2006 and 2007 as older millennials reached parenting age.

Then everything went to hell.

The immediate effect of the Great Recession on higher education was financial. State tax revenues cratered, and university budgets were slashed. From 2009 to 2012, Pennsylvania cut public funding for higher education by more than 19 percent, some $430 million. Nationwide, state funding for college dipped by 9 percent.

But the global financial calamity also created a bomb with an 18-year fuse: Birth rates immediately reversed course and began to plummet. From the early 1970s until 2007, the number of annual births per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44 stayed between roughly 65 and 70. Starting in 2008, the ratio went down, down, down, to 56 in 2020, the lowest rate in American history. There were 4.3 million births in 2007; last year, there were 3.7 million.

Colleges have been left to manage a complex mix of past, present, and future demographic trends. Early on, state funding cuts were offset by a surge in enrollment and tuition revenue, as laid-off workers went back to college for retraining and the millennial wave peaked in 2010, with a record 18.1 million undergraduates. For some community colleges, the big problem in the late aughts was too manystudents and not enough money to teach them.

But in the early 2010s, enrollment began to drop. In 2019, the last full year before the pandemic, undergraduate enrollment was down to 16.6 million. (That number could have been worse: Bush-era school reform policies contributed to a rise in the percentage of teenagers graduating from high school, which offset some of the demographic drop.)

The problem now is that colleges have likely hit a ceiling in terms of how many 18-year-olds they can coax onto campus. The percentage of young adults with a high school diploma has reached 94 percent. And the immediate college enrollment rate of high school graduates was flat, right around 70 percent, from 2010 to 2018, before dipping in 2019 and 2020 as the job market heated up for less-skilled, lower-wage jobs.

Some parts of the country are already experiencing an enrollment bust, mainly because of internal migration. According to the census, 327,000 people moved to the Northeast (which includes Pennsylvania) from elsewhere in the United States in 2018-19, while 565,000 moved out, for a net loss of 238,000 people.

By contrast, the South (which includes Texas and Florida) saw a net increase of 263,000 internal migrants, and another 447,000 people arrived from abroad, more than twice the number for the Northeast. Fertility rates are also lower, and falling faster, for white people, and the Northeast and Midwest have proportionally more white people. This was true before the Great Recession, too.

All of which made states like Pennsylvania a kind of canary in the demographic coal mine. In the 2010-11 academic year, Ship enrolled 8,326 students. Last year, the count was down to 5,668.

Nathan Grawe, an economist at Carleton College in Minnesota, has projected all of these trends forward to create what he calls the Higher Education Demand Index, a forecast of college enrollment that takes into account regional differences, various types of colleges, immigration rates, and differences in birth rates and the likelihood of attending higher education among demographic groups.

According to Grawe, highly selective colleges and universities will be least affected. They have power in the marketplace for students, and the United States’ very wealthy, very unequal society has produced a sizable upper class that is eager and able to buy access to sought-after schools. By immunizing themselves from the effects of enrollment decline, elites will shove the problem down the ladder of institutional status and make things worse for everyone else.

The future looks very different in some parts of the country than in others, and will also vary among national four-year universities, regional universities like Ship, and community colleges. Grawe projects that, despite the overall demographic decline, demand for national four-year universities on the West Coast will increaseby more than 7.5 percent between now and the mid-2030s. But in states like New York, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Louisiana, it will decline by 15 percent or more.

Demand for regional four-year universities, per Grawe, will drop by at least 7.5 percent across New England, the mid-Atlantic, and Southern states other than Florida and Texas, with smaller declines in the Great Plains. Community colleges will be hit hard in most places other than Florida, which has a robust two-year system with a large Latino population.

Immigration is a factor, and tricky to project far into the future. The Trump administration erected many barriers to legal immigration, while immigration seems to have bounced back under President Joe Biden. But it’s likely that under any circumstances, immigrants will arrive at higher rates in California and Texas than, say, the Northeast or Upper Midwest.

The economy is another headwind. Shippensburg is next to I-81, a pulsing artery of commerce for the Northeast. The first thing you see after turning off the interstate is a 1.7-million-square-foot Procter & Gamble distribution center. There’s an Amazon warehouse at the exit on the other side of town, five miles away. These giant companies have a version of the university’s problem: fewer people of typical employee age in the hiring pool. So they pay more: a minimum of $22 an hour at P&G.

Colleges are offering increasingly expensive, often debt-financed credentials with a long-term payoff that can seem uncertain compared to a steady, increasingly large paycheck in hand. The state of Pennsylvania has made matters worse by chronically underfunding higher education, forcing schools like Ship to charge tuition that doesn’t compare well to other states, or even some private colleges. All of this makes the shrinking pool of 18-year-olds even harder to recruit.

Meanwhile, the pandemic threw millions of students into online classes, and some of them seem to like it there. A recent survey found a small but noteworthy increase in the number of high school juniors and seniors aiming for an online degree. If this continues, it would further burden colleges that have enormous amounts of money tied up in their buildings and physical plants.

Birth rates did not recover after the Great Recession, even as the economy eventually did. Grawe notes that American fertility is now in line with comparable economically advanced nations, and is well below the level needed for the native-born population to sustain itself. The new normal is just normal now. Higher ed’s eight-decade run of unbroken good fortune — always more students, more money, more economic demand, and more social prestige — may be about to end.

As we walked across the Ship campus, president Charles Patterson pointed to the student union named after Anthony Ceddia, who led Ship for a quarter-century and built much of what was around us during the long boom years. Those kinds of presidencies are in the past, Patterson said. “Presidents these days are in the business of deconstruction,” he said — not in the sense of tearing down what their forebears created, but of rethinking and reconfiguring what universities have and who they are, for leaner times.

“Deconstruction” is about to become the watchword in campus boardrooms nationwide. How this affects you depends on whether your local colleges succeed or fail at it.

Public colleges and universities tend not to disappear entirely. They have the backstop of public funding and local political support. But they can diminish over time. Ship is part of the 14-campus Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE). As in the rest of the country, system enrollment peaked in 2010-11, 20 years after the top of the millennial birth wave.

But some campuses acted like the students would always keep coming. In 2007, Edinboro College, in the northeast corner of the state near Lake Erie, spent $115 million to construct new dorms. They opened in 2011, when Edinboro had 8,642 students. Last year, it had 4,043. The new dorms are empty, and for sale.

Private colleges are even more vulnerable. Many have small financial endowments and get by year to year on tuition revenue. Unluckily for them, private colleges are disproportionately located in the Northeast and Midwest — the same regions that will be hit hardest by declining enrollment. When they shut down, they leave a void of employment and tax revenue that local communities can’t easily fill.

Finding a good buyer for empty campuses can be difficult. The defunct Marlboro College in Vermont was sold in 2020 to a charter school entrepreneur whose plans to resell it at a seven-figure profit possibly in exchange for a new cryptocurrency called “Chronotanium” were interrupted by his arrest and eventual conviction on federal wire fraud charges. That same year, the former Green Mountain College, also in Vermont, was auctioned off for pennies on the dollar to a liquor entrepreneur whose previous claim to fame included hitting on Anna Kournikova and being fired by Donald Trump on The Apprentice. Neither campus has reopened as an accredited school.

At colleges that survive, as most of them will, the biggest effect of the enrollment cliff will be on how students experience higher learning. Administrators will be hustling to give them new reasons to turn down that $22-an-hour warehouse job. Sports will play a growing role. The biggest athletic schools in America, measured by the percentage of undergraduates who participate in a varsity sport, aren’t the Division I behemoths you watch play football on Saturday afternoons. They’re the Division II, Division III, and NAIA (National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics) schools that are most vulnerable to an enrollment shock. If you loved playing field hockey in high school, the chance to play for the national champions is a powerful draw.

Colleges will very likely step up their use of “enrollment management,” a controversial and sometimes exploitative technique for combining marketing, recruitment, and high-powered number-crunching to maximize tuition revenue from every student.

But the most powerful force driving the post-cliff transformation, by far, will be the labor market. First and foremost, students go to college so they can start a career. As tuition and student debt have increased, on-the-job training has declined, and as the unforgiving job market has raised the bar for well-paying careers, students have moved away from the traditional humanities toward degrees in business, health care, and IT.

The enrollment crisis will shift this trend into overdrive. Ship is responding to all the distribution centers out on I-81 by developing programs in logistics and supply chain management. It’s looking to create more short-term, job-focused certificates that lead up to a bachelor’s degree, and others that supplement BA’s after graduation. Other nearby colleges are expanding nursing programs, developing professional master’s degrees, and creating new courses for adults looking to change careers.

Colleges won’t just be going along with the strengthening alignment of the higher education experience with the labor market. They will be actively promoting it, jettisoning “unprofitable” majors that used to be sheltered inside universities with more than enough students. The next generation of higher education leaders will take scarcity as a given and “return on investment” as both sales pitch and state of mind.

This will be good in some ways and bad in others. Good, if it means colleges are more focused on helping students stay in college and graduate, instead of just maximizing the size of the freshman class. Bad, if academic standards are sacrificed to the “customer is always right” ethos. Good, if colleges build better relationships with local employers so students have a clear path toward a career. Bad, if they cut deals with for-profit companies to spin up overly expensive, debt-financed online degrees.

But there is no arguing with demography. Colleges are about to experience something outside of living memory, and not all of them will make it through.

Is there an upside to all of this? After all, a lot of the students who came through college during the early-century boom years were shackled with student loans and had a hard time launching their careers. Why force someone down a college path that isn’t best for them and load them up with debt when there are good jobs to be found?

These are fair questions, and it’s certainly true that college is not always worth it for everyone. Before the student loan collection system was frozen in 2020, a million people were defaulting on their loans every year.

But people who graduate from places like Carnegie Mellon and Swarthmore aren’t handing their kids a brochure for jobs at the P&G distribution center. They’re sending them back to Carnegie Mellon and Swarthmore, where the humanities are alive and well. The payoff to college, particularly bachelor’s degrees, comes less in the first job than the second and those that follow, on the path to graduate school and management careers.

The financially motivated vocationalization of less selective colleges and universities will further divide students by income and class. First-generation students are not going to discover their calling in academia at the local university if all the quiet and quirky majors have been eliminated in the name of financial efficiency.

If your political leanings are progressive, you may know that Democrats have a concentration problem, clustering in highly educated metropolitan areas in a way that puts them at an electoral disadvantage. People sometimes joke that 150,000 liberals should decamp to Wyoming and grab its two Senate seats. But the enrollment cliff will, no joke, likely make this problem worse, killing some colleges and shrinking others in many of the same Northeastern and Midwestern places that helped Donald Trump overcome a 2.9 million-voter deficit in the 2016 election, while pushing more college-educated voters into states and districts that are already safely in Democratic hands.

In the midst of all the enrollment doomsday prepping and general pessimism, there was a small piece of good news. After a steep 4 percent decline from 2019 to 2020, the number of births in America ticked up by 1 percent in 2021, with the largest increase among women ages 35 to 39.

Perhaps it was an artifact of the lockdown and the downward trend will resume, particularly with a new recession looming. Or it might be something longer-lasting.

Either way, its effects will not be felt for decades. The near future of higher education is one of decline, and its consequences will reshape the American landscape.

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jeffhirsch · 2 years ago

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Time to Feast Thanksgiving-Santa Claus Rally Trade

Market action this past week and today has set up this annual market feast. Stocks have consolidated October’s big gains in typical early-November fashion setting the market up for the perennial yearend rally.

Since 1950 S&P 500 is up 80% of the time from the Tuesday before Thanksgiving to the 2nd trading day of the year, average gain 2.7%. Russell 2000 is up 79% of the time since 1979, average gain 3.4%.

Thanksgiving kicks off a run of solid bullish seasonal patterns. November-January is the year’s best consecutive 3-month span (2023 STA p 149) and as we have been discussing all year we are at the outset of the “Sweet Spot” of the 4-Year Cycle (2023 STA p 34). Then there’s the January Effect (2023 STA pgs 112 & 114) of small caps outperforming large caps in January, which nowadays begins in mid-December.

And of course, the “Santa Claus Rally,” (2023 STA p 118) invented and named by Yale Hirsch in 1972 in the Almanac and often misunderstood, is the short, sweet rally that runs from the last 5 trading days of the year to the first two trading days of the New Year. Pop also coined the phrase: “If Santa Claus should fail to call, bears may come to Broad and Wall.”

So, we have combined these seasonal occurrences into one trade: Buy the Tuesday before Thanksgiving and hold until the 2nd trading day of the New Year. Our good friend and renowned technician and options guru Larry McMillan of the Options Strategist opened our eyes to this trade and runs it with options on iShares Russell 2000 (IWM) starting on the day before Thanksgiving.

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daveg65 · 3 days ago

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331 - New Mac Minis, GM and CarPlay, You Got Mail Silenced

The latest In Touch With iOS with Dave he is joined by guest Kelly Guimont, Marty Jencius, Jeff Gamet, and Ben Roethig. We discuss the Vision Pro's new Virtual Display capabilities, Belkin's affordable travel case, and Apple's retail strategy changes amidst sales slowdowns. The team reviews iOS 18.2 beta features, the excitement around M4 Mac Minis, and ongoing debates about Apple Watch functionalities. We also analyze GM's decision to phase out CarPlay and reflect on the future of streaming services, concluding with a tribute to tech icon Elwood Edwards. You Got Mail voice from AOL.

The show notes are at InTouchwithiOS.com

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In this episode of In Touch with iOS, we dive deep into the latest developments in Apple's ecosystem, guided by our host, Dave Ginsburg, alongside panelists Ben Roethig, Marty Jencius, Jeff Gamet, and a surprise guest, Kelly Guimont. The discussion kicks off with the buzz surrounding the newly released Vision Pro’s Virtual Display features, including the recently added wide and ultra-wide options that have excited beta users. I share my first hands-on experiences with the new functionality, describing how it effectively allows the Vision Pro to function as an external display for Macs, simulating the feel of multiple 4K displays right in your workspace. The enthusiastic reactions from the team, especially those who have been actively testing the features, highlight the potential impact this will have on productivity.

As we transition to upcoming accessories, we explore Belkin's newly launched travel case for the Vision Pro. At a more accessible price point than Apple's offerings, the Belkin case has generated positive feedback for its quality and design. Marty shares personal insights on headset cases and which options he prefers for travel, suggesting practical solutions tailored to frequent travelers.

The conversation shifts gears as we touch on the recent changes in Apple’s retail strategy for the Vision Pro demo areas. In light of some reports suggesting a slowdown in sales, Apple appears to be consolidating display setups in local stores. We analyze the implications of such a shift, especially in busy urban markets versus smaller retail locations, and the overall customer engagement in-store.

Shifting our focus back to software, we discuss the features introduced with the iOS 18.2 beta, such as enhanced support for image manipulation with Genmoji and the integrations with ChatGPT. The initial impressions emerge—while amusing, these features still feel like they are in infancy, and genuine utility might take a while to be realized. We recount hilarious attempts at generating images and the peculiar outputs they yielded, underscoring the quirks of AI-driven technology.

The discussion spins back to hardware with news of the M4 Mac Minis hitting stores, and I share my excitement over my reservation for the M4 Pro variant. Together with insights from various team members who plan to upgrade their machines, we reflect on the remarkable performance benchmarks and versatility of these new devices. Marty enthusiastically details the specs of his new setup while also expressing the anticipation for the next level—potentially the M4 Ultra.

In light of Apple's recent shifts in trading values and end-of-life decisions surrounding older models, we also talk about ongoing debates regarding Apple Watch features and the return of key functionalities in newer models. As we explore the collaborative tension between Apple and companies like Masimo, we emphasize the urgent need for resolution so that consumers could benefit from fully functional devices.

A lively dialogue ensues about GM's controversial decision to phase out CarPlay in favor of its in-house software system. The panel fiercely debates the consumer implications of this move and stresses the importance of software integration in modern vehicles, highlighting that the prevailing consumer preference lies firmly with established ecosystems like Apple’s.

As we wrap up, I offer my thoughts on the evolving nature of streaming services and the industry's crackdown on password sharing, allowing insights into how that could shape user behaviors moving forward. The discussion ends with heartfelt nostalgia as we remember Elwood Edwards, the voice of AOL's iconic "You've Got Mail," highlighting the lasting impact of technology on our lives even as it evolves.

In Touch With Vision Pro this week.

visionOS 2.2 Beta Adds Wide and Ultrawide Modes to Mac Virtual Display

Testing the Vision Pro With New Ultrawide Display Option in visionOS 2.2

Belkin Launches New Travel Bag for Apple Vision Pro

Hands on with Belkin's Vision Pro strap that Apple didn't want to make

Apple Consolidating Vision Pro Demo Areas in Stores Amid Rumors of Slowing Sales and Reduced Production

Case for Vision Pro Marty recommended. https://amzn.to/3UINW8H

Beta this week. iOS 18.2 Beta 2

Apple Releases Second Betas of iOS 18.2 and More With Genmoji, Image Playground and ChatGPT Integration - MacRumors

I put Apple Image Playground to the test, and it's much better than I expected

Everything New in the iOS 18.2 Beta

Apple Seeds First Public Betas of iOS 18.2, iPadOS 18.2 and macOS Sequoia 15.2 With New Apple Intelligence Features

iOS 18.2 Lets You Track Progress of Safari Downloads on Lock Screen

iOS 18.2 Could Show How Long Your iPhone Will Take to Charge

Apple Preparing for Upcoming Siri Onscreen Awareness Feature With New iOS 18.2 API for Developers

Find My Gains Option to Share Lost Item Location With an 'Airline or Trusted Person' in iOS 18.2

Apple Seeds watchOS 11.2 Beta to Developers [Download]

Apple Preparing to Add New Screen Savers to tvOS 18.2, Including Snoopy and More

tvOS 18.2 Beta Adds Support for 21:9 Projector Aspect Ratio

In Touch With Mac. The reviews are in all new Macs hit stores November 8, 2024 what's the consensus? Dave is picking up a Mac Mini tomorrow.

M4 Pro Mac mini review: Remarkably small and incredibly powerful

Review: M4 and M4 Pro Mac minis are probably Apple’s best Mac minis ever

Thoughts on the M4 iMac, and making peace with the death of the 27-inch model

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macOS High Power Mode comes to MacBook Pro and Mac mini with M4 Pro

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Apple Adjusts Trade-In Values for Select iPad and Apple Watch Models

RIP, Apple Stickers (Kind Of)

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GM Again Attempts to Explain Its Decision to Drop CarPlay in New EVs

Carplay Wireless Adapter mentioned https://amzn.to/3YMeerU

Max is about to tell password sharers they have to pay more

AOL’s ‘You’ve Got Mail’ voice, Elwood Edwards, dies at age 74 you've got mail - Instant Sound Effect Button

Announcements

Macstock 8 wrapped up for 2024. But you can purchase the digital pass and still see the great talks we had including Dave talking about Apple Services and more. Content is now available! . Click here for more information: Digital Pass | Macstock Conference & Expo with discounts on previous events.

Our Host

Dave Ginsburg is an IT professional supporting Mac, iOS and Windows users and shares his wealth of knowledge of iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV and related technologies. Visit the YouTube channel https://youtube.com/intouchwithios follow him on Mastadon @daveg65, and the show @intouchwithios

Our Regular Contributors

Jeff Gamet is a podcaster, technology blogger, artist, and author. Previously, he was The Mac Observer’s managing editor, and Smile’s TextExpander Evangelist. You can find him on Mastadon @jgamet as well as Twitter and Instagram as @jgamet His YouTube channel https://youtube.com/jgamet

Marty Jencius, Ph.D., is a professor of counselor education at Kent State University, where he researches, writes, and trains about using technology in teaching and mental health practice. His podcasts include Vision Pro Files, The Tech Savvy Professor and Circular Firing Squad Podcast. Find him at [email protected] https://thepodtalk.net

Ben Roethig Former Associate Editor of GeekBeat.TV and host of the Tech Hangout and Deconstruct with Patrice Mac user since the mid 90s. Tech support specialist. Twitter @benroethig Website: https://roethigtech.blogspot.com

About out Guest

Kelly Guimont is a podcaster and friend of the Rebel Alliance. She appears on The Incomparable network as well as hosts I Want My M(CU) TV. you can find her on Mastodon and Instagram @verso

Here is our latest Episode!

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inmarketo · 3 days ago

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Enhance Your Shipping Experience with Global China Suppliers

In today's globalized economy, shipping plays a vital role in connecting businesses with customers and suppliers around the world. With the rise of e-commerce and international trade, the demand for efficient and reliable shipping services has never been higher. For businesses looking to source products from China, finding a reliable shipping partner is crucial to ensuring a smooth and successful experience. In this article, we will explore the ways in which global China suppliers can enhance your shipping experience, and provide tips and best practices for navigating the complexities of international shipping.

The Importance of Reliable Shipping

Reliable shipping is essential for businesses looking to maintain a competitive edge in the global marketplace. Delays, lost shipments, and damaged goods can all have a significant impact on a company's bottom line, damaging relationships with customers and suppliers alike. Global China suppliers understand the importance of reliable shipping and have developed a range of services designed to meet the needs of businesses around the world. From express air freight to ocean freight and logistics, global China suppliers offer a range of options to suit every business need.

Streamlining Your Shipping Process

One of the key ways in which global China suppliers can enhance your shipping experience is by streamlining your shipping process. By leveraging the latest technology and logistics expertise, global China suppliers can help businesses simplify their shipping operations, reducing costs and improving efficiency. This can include services such as customs clearance, warehousing, and distribution, all of which can be tailored to meet the specific needs of your business. By outsourcing your shipping operations to a global China supplier, you can free up more time to focus on what matters most – growing your business.

The Benefits of Consolidation

Another way in which global China suppliers can enhance your shipping experience is through consolidation. By consolidating multiple shipments into a single container or shipment, businesses can reduce their shipping costs and improve efficiency. Global China suppliers offer a range of consolidation services, including less-than-container-load (LCL) and full-container-load (FCL) options, which can be tailored to meet the specific needs of your business. Consolidation can also help reduce the risk of lost or damaged shipments, as well as minimize the impact of customs delays.

Real-Time Tracking and Monitoring

In today's fast-paced business environment, real-time tracking and monitoring are essential for staying on top of your shipping operations. Global China suppliers offer a range of tracking and monitoring services, including GPS tracking and real-time updates, which can help businesses stay informed and in control. This can be especially useful for businesses shipping high-value or time-sensitive goods, where every minute counts. By leveraging the latest technology and logistics expertise, global China suppliers can provide businesses with the visibility and control they need to succeed.

Tips for Choosing the Right Shipping Partner

When it comes to choosing a shipping partner, there are several factors to consider. First and foremost, it's essential to research and carefully evaluate potential suppliers, looking for companies with a proven track record of reliability and customer satisfaction. It's also important to consider the range of services offered, as well as the level of customer support and communication provided. Finally, be sure to carefully review and understand the terms and conditions of your shipping agreement, including any insurance options and liability coverage.

Best Practices for Shipping with Global China Suppliers

To get the most out of your shipping experience with global China suppliers, there are several best practices to keep in mind. First and foremost, it's essential to clearly communicate your shipping needs and requirements, including any specific handling or delivery instructions. It's also important to carefully review and verify all shipping documentation, including commercial invoices and customs forms. Finally, be sure to stay informed and up-to-date on any changes or developments in the shipping industry, including new regulations and customs procedures.

Conclusion

In conclusion, global China suppliers can play a vital role in enhancing your shipping experience, providing a range of services and expertise designed to meet the needs of businesses around the world. By streamlining your shipping process, consolidating shipments, and leveraging real-time tracking and monitoring, global China suppliers can help businesses simplify their shipping operations, reduce costs, and improve efficiency. By following the tips and best practices outlined in this article, businesses can navigate the complexities of international shipping with confidence, and achieve success in the global marketplace.

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mtilogistics · 3 days ago

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Freight Forwarding for Small Businesses: Why It's Essential and How to Get Started

Freight forwarding is a critical component of global trade, especially for small businesses looking to expand their reach. This article outlines why freight forwarding is essential for small businesses and provides actionable tips on how to get started effectively.

Understanding Freight Forwarding

Freight forwarding involves coordinating the shipment of goods from one location to another, typically across international borders. It encompasses various logistics services, including transportation, customs clearance, and documentation management. For small businesses, partnering with a reliable freight forwarder can streamline operations and enhance competitiveness in the marketplace.

Why Freight Forwarding is Essential for Small Businesses

Access to Global Markets: Freight forwarding enables small businesses to reach international customers by simplifying the complexities of shipping across borders.

Cost Efficiency: By consolidating shipments and leveraging the forwarder's network, small businesses can reduce shipping costs significantly.

Expertise in Regulations: Navigating customs regulations can be daunting. Freight forwarders possess the knowledge and experience to ensure compliance with all necessary laws and regulations.

Time Savings: Outsourcing logistics allows small business owners to focus on core operations while experts handle shipping logistics.

Getting Started with Freight Forwarding

To successfully implement freight forwarding strategies, small businesses should consider the following steps:

1. Choose the Right Freight Forwarder

Selecting a freight forwarder is a crucial first step. Look for companies that specialize in your industry and have a solid reputation. Key factors to consider include:

Experience: Ensure they have experience with your specific shipping needs and destinations.

Services Offered: Check if they provide additional services such as warehousing or customs brokerage.

Communication: A good forwarder should maintain clear communication throughout the shipping process23.

2. Establish Clear Shipping Requirements

Communicate your shipping needs clearly from the outset. This includes details about:

Types of goods being shipped

Desired delivery timelines

Any special handling requirements

Providing comprehensive information helps the freight forwarder tailor their services to meet your needs effectively23.

3. Optimize Packaging and Consolidation

Efficient packaging can minimize costs and ensure goods arrive safely. Consider consolidating smaller shipments into larger ones to take advantage of economies of scale1. Discuss packaging options with your freight forwarder to enhance efficiency.

4. Understand Customs Regulations

Stay informed about export controls and customs regulations relevant to your products and target markets. Your freight forwarder can provide guidance, but it’s essential for you to understand your responsibilities as well25.

5. Leverage Technology

Utilizing technology can significantly enhance your freight forwarding experience. Implementing transportation management systems (TMS) allows for better tracking of shipments, automated reporting, and improved communication with your freight forwarder1.

6. Regularly Evaluate Performance

Monitor the performance of your freight forwarder regularly. Provide constructive feedback to help them improve their services, ensuring that your business needs are consistently met23.

Freight Forwarding Tips for Small Businesses

Build Relationships: Establish strong relationships with your freight forwarder; view them as partners rather than just service providers.

Stay Flexible: Be prepared to adapt your logistics strategy as market conditions change.

Invest in Training: Ensure that your team understands basic logistics concepts to facilitate smoother operations.

Stay Informed: Keep up with industry trends and changes in regulations that may affect your shipping processes.

By following these tips and understanding the importance of freight forwarding, small businesses can effectively navigate the complexities of international shipping, reduce costs, and enhance their overall supply chain efficiency. Embracing these strategies will not only support growth but also position small businesses competitively in the global marketplace.

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