Like most things, I imagine there are multiple audiences for Ubuntu. But for me:
- Inertia, I've used it for a long time.
- It's based on Debian. I like Debian and use it on servers.
- I chose it originally because it had better desktop support than Debian. It's possible that Debian is now also good, but see above...inertia.
- It (mostly) just works on a wide range of hardware, whilst remaining up-to-date with the latest Linux developments.
- I like the release cycles. Debian stable is too stable. Arch/Fedora/Debian-testing are too volatile. Ubuntu allows me to choose whether to follow the 9-month support window of a normal release; or the 5-year window of the LTS.
Everything above is highly subjective and by no means are other preferences invalid. All Linux distros are awesome in their own unique way.
She shared her motivation, which was a simple project to get into electronics to sate her curiosity. And as she concluded, had fun and learnt something new. And as a cherry on top, reduced the amount of waste that went to a landfill, bravo.
Of course, you can't expect prices as cheap as China. There are shipping costs, local regulation compliance overheads and increased labour costs (for dealers, sales/marketing, servicing etc).
But as an example, Australia is a highly developed country with high labour costs/standards -- similar to Canada in many ways (though closer to China geographically). But without a local car industry to protect, there are no tariffs nor quotas on Chinese cars.
I expect Canada in the short-term to have prices similar to Europe/UK. With car manufacturers focusing on the premium models (which are the highest priced and hence greatest profit). But there's no reason they can't drop further as trade barriers are lifted and manufacturers are subjected to greater competition.
Alternatively, they might train in a different manner than what you expect.
They might have determined that your canaries (whether it is a unique string, URL or similar) have a low signal-to-noise ratio and not worth following up.
Unless you provide more details, it's difficult to ascertain whether your conclusion is correct.
Because only one lucky person can own `fraser.name` at any one time in your model. And whilst that lucky person might be able to register their family members for free. There will be countless more (unrelated) Frasers who won't be able to register (even for money) their own `FIRST.fraser.name`.
So the argument goes, society as a whole gains more if we prevent anyone from owning `fraser.name`.
A legitimate alternative though, is to register `FIRST-fraser.name`
I fear that the long-term result might be a small cartel of "trusted" companies that holds the private keys which can attest and lead to the death (or at least limiting widespread adopting) of open-source operating systems.
It won't stop fraud by governments and/or determined/well-resourced attackers, but it'll make it difficult enough for 99.99% of the public. And as usage drops over time, it becomes more socially acceptable to justify further limitations.
Governments and corporations (e.g. banks) will require that you use a "trusted" (meaning locked-down) devices to interact with their services. We're already seeing some companies block GrapheneOS/LineageOS.
> what should be done about open weight bioweapon and cyber-offense capabilities? Is it simply the cost of freedom that we should allow attackers to access these tools?
In short, yes, it's the price of freedom. As others have said, blocking these models won't stop the "bad guys", but will hinder defenders researching/responding to bioweapons and cyber-offenses.
But you're right that there's a lot of difficult nuance aand we should think carefully about its implications. So here's another nuance to think through.
If AI is as powerful as some believe, then there's much greater danger to give a small subset of society the privilege to gate keep who has access to these tools.
"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Lord Acton
As an aside, because of this Technology Connections video, particularly from: https://youtu.be/0KoeY54M5VA?t=746
I now better understand the voir dire scene from My Cousin Vinny: https://youtu.be/1QrTzTe90QA?t=200
I had always loved that scene (as well as https://youtu.be/CFdJza0AbeA ), but I now love it a little bit more. :-)