bapbap

Ah, it makes sense to do so but I'd imagine this practice would affect consumer confidence in Sold by Amazon options given time.

I've wondered if Amazon co-locates its own stock with that of Fulfillment By Amazon stock which would mean you could end up with anything as long as it looks similar and has the same SKU.

I agree, something more like Volvo's "Pilot Assist" makes sense to me.

It may not be possible but you could ask if a small part of the office (in the corner or more secluded) could be earmarked as a concentration "zone".

It's not for people to sit there all day every day and take up residence in this area, it's for when you need to do something that requires concentration and those around are doing the same i.e. no phone calls, no conversations, no eating snacks, like a library really. If you need to do any of those things, you find yourself a spot in the rest of the office.

Failing that, it's either get used to it, try and find the quietest spot you can, or ask if you can work from home/elsewhere.

Is there any reason why I should have any sympathy? From my basic understanding, these companies engineer their structures and finances in weird and wonderful ways to reduce their tax bill. Fair enough, they have the global reach and luxury of doing so and some aspects legitimately occur in other tax jurisdictions.

However I have no sympathy for their complaints that it is too expensive to repatriate the money. It seems unfair to expect the law should change because you made the decision to accumulate money outside of the country to avoid paying taxes that would otherwise be due. I might be naive expecting parity but just like everyone else corporations should pay their way.

Yes, the way I imagine most people will take this story is that Apple avoided taxes but really Ireland allowed them to contrive a tax structure that resulted in a lower tax bill. Apple must have known this would happen some day, I'd imagine they would have taken advice on it at the time and someone somewhere calculated that even if this happened, it was still worthwhile. So Apple isn't completely innocent but it's really Ireland at fault here.

There is no direct impact for Ireland e.g. a fine but it will create uncertainty for others already operating in Ireland and those considering investment. This uncertainty can be very bad for Ireland for years to come, so there will almost certainly be a penalty, albeit an indirect one.

No fine for Apple. Apple can almost look entirely innocent on this, they asked Ireland to look at how they've structured their tax affairs knowing full well what impact this would have on their tax bill. However Ireland agreed to it, even though it shouldn't have.

The EU has now stepped in and clarified that Ireland should not have allowed this in the first place.

The money paid will go to Ireland. Ireland allowed Apple to structure its tax affairs in a way that reduced their tax bill which is a great incentive to maintain a presence there.

The EU has now determined this was an illegal tax benefit provided by Ireland, so Ireland must now collect the tax as if it had done so at the time. There is no penalty but interest must be paid.

This is not your normal run of the mill tax avoidance case (or a fraud as you've mentioned) although it appears to look the same. This was Apple benefiting from decisions taken by Ireland that Ireland should not have made.

It's worrying how much mileage "think of the children" and counter-terrorism gets.

I am not a battery or electronics expert but my understanding is that it is not ideal to simultaneously charge and discharge a LiPO battery, so most don't support passthrough.

I use a RAVPower Xtreme (26800mAh - though I'm not sure if I believe that rating) to power a dashcam and had similar requirements to you. However, I've implemented a DPDT relay and a 12V boost regulator to switch between the battery pack and car power (ACC), depending on the ignition status of the car. So when the car is on, the battery is being charged only and the dashcam is getting power from the car. When the car is off, the battery is only being used to power the dashcam.

I've not tested it with a Pi but there is not an interruption in power long enough to disturb the dashcam (the relay spec is 8ms operate time). The battery pack is charged using a 2A 5V charger. I can't properly assess the charge status/history of the battery as it only has 4 LED's and I don't want to take it apart but so far my commute and other driving is long enough to keep it ticking over.

I'm sorry if I'm misunderstanding but I don't think they charge to export your data any longer. I remember they did (I refused to pay) but I recently purchased a Charge HR and found I can export everything, going back to when I had a Flex in CSV or XLS.

I've no doubt this methodology can be effective but it's supremely irritating. Any company that uses methods like this immediately put me off.

One of my sites was a victim of the negative SEO trick, I kept getting warnings from Google (Site violates Google's quality guidelines) that there were links to my site that violated their guidelines.

It didn't matter what I said in my reconsideration request to explain I had no knowledge or control over it (I've no interest in spammy link sharing or buying links), I kept getting similar canned responses.

I gave up in the end.