Interesting Links for 14-11-2025

[andrewducker]

1. 'Segregated facilities' are no longer explicitly banned in federal contracts

(tags:usa racism )

2. Lupus may be caused by the common Epstein-Barr virus (as well as MS)

(tags:disease virus immune_system )

3. Waymo robotaxis are now giving rides on freeways in LA, San Francisco, and Phoenix

(tags:automation driving usa )

4. The last-ever US penny was minted today in Philadelphia

(tags:usa money cash )

5. Inside China's Mini PC Production: How Tiny Computers Are Made (a 22 minute factory tour)

(tags:computers video manufacturing )

6. Marble: generating 3D scenes from text and imagery prompts

(tags:3d design ai )

7. GOOD LUCK, HAVE FUN, DON'T DIE (apocalyptically strange looking film, I rather fancy it)

(tags:movies trailer weird video )

8. 5 key points as legal experts grilled by MSPs on indyref2

(tags:scotland independence law )

9. Drop in U.S. Religiosity Among Largest in World (down 17% in a decade, to less than half)

(tags:religion USA )

10. UK tax calculator showing tax rates and marginal rates under various suggestions by different groups/parties

(tags:tax UK visualisation )

Comments

[simont]

#4: it sounds from that article (and I feel as if I probably 'ought' to have known already) that the US doesn't have a 2¢ coin, so the (eventual) effect of phasing out 1¢ will be that everything you can do with cash is a multiple of 5¢?

That's less weird than it would be if the UK phased out the penny. At least in the future US there will still be a coin with value equal to the highest common factor of all coins. If you had to prat about exchanging 5ps and 2ps to settle a 1p or 3p imbalance like one of those water-jug puzzles, it would be much sillier!

[andrewducker]

I hadn't even thought of that!

But yes, switching to 5p as the smallest denomination definitely feels like it would make more sense!

[armiphlage]

That's what Canada has right now - the rounding rules are codified, all cash payments have to be multiples of 5 cents. Electronic transactions can still use cents.

Well!

[lsanderson]

There goes our favorite sale price, $5.99! $5.95 just ain't got no pizzazz.

Re: Well!

[darkoshi]

That was one of my first thoughts. But since varying sales taxes get applied in various locales, the initial prices of things don't determine whether the total will be a multiple of 5 cents or not. So there's no real reason to change the prices to be multiples of 5 cents, except perhaps in places without sales tax.

It could provide impetus to change how sales tax is handled - if businesses were to switch to including the tax in the displayed prices, as part of that they could adjust the total item price to be a multiple of 5 cents.

In the end I think consumers will end up paying the price (pun intended), with higher prices.

[armiphlage]

#5: What goes on in my factory is from 8:07 onwards, but with more fixtures and robots.

[andrewducker]

Very hypnotising to watch.

[bens_dad]

4. Simpler than the last time the UK removed the lowest value coin.

When we removed the halfpenny from circulation (in 1984 ?) the sixpence continued to be legal tender. We had a coin which was not a multiple of the smallest legal quantity of money; so sixpences could still be used in pairs.

Wikipedia says that 6p (not 6d) coins have been minted since 2016. These are silver and legal tender, but are not put into circulation !

[andrewducker]

You can absolutely buy them though:
https://www.royalmint.com/gifts/sixpence/2025-silver-sixpence/

Of course a 6d coin would have been worth 2.5p, so without a half penny you wouldn't be able to use them, that makes sense. I don't remember them, as they went out of circulation when I was 8 (1980). I do remember the old 5p and 10p, which were the same size as the old shilling and florin coins.