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Cake day: July 3rd, 2023

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  • I was amazed by the transformation in Amsterdam when I visited last summer. I’ve been visiting Netherlands for 40 years and always admired their cycling culture but lately they seemed to have almost eliminated cars from the city. As a result it is incredibly quiet, serene and there is no vehicle soot on the buildings, as is the case in London. I could often choose among many different modes of alternative transport in any given location.

    The English solution to this problem is ever more stringent penalties on the driver (e.g. ULEZ) which may be profitable but they have been ineffective at reducing the volume of vehicular traffic, pollution, accidents, ad nauseum. We pay a huge price for car culture.


  • It’s a similar problem to lead acid batteries. 2V cells are arranged in a way that will deliver 12V at sufficient current for a particular application. However the solution we have landed on is completely different to li-ion because you can take any suitably sized car battery from one brand of vehicle and put it in another. The reason for that is the interface is common to virtually all cars. This technology pre-dates enshitification. There is no good reason to tie any battery to any device other than it helps the shareholders. They are busy inserting barriers to re-use and modularity everywhere in technology, particularly software.