This seems pretty important to crowdsource and talk about, so I’m gonna go ahead and risk violating the no politics rule from a few days ago, because I don’t see a better community to ask this. My defense for it not “being politics” is, I’m asking you to keep it to purchasing decisions and how the details of how the tariffs are likely to work, as opposed to who did what. This thread has the potential to save people lots of money if it gets big!
Tariffs are gonna make things more expensive for Americans; what are you planning on buying now instead of later, or stockpiling a little of?
Been archiving a lot of my favourite shows. I expect a lot of them to either disappear in ten years, or sit behind some subscription.
This is probably a different discussion, but anybody with tips, tricks, and details of where and how to do this safely, this might not be a bad place to show off what you know.
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Can anyone recommend some stable general purpose instances that federate with dbzer0? I believe lemmy.world defederated, as the link doesn’t work for me. I had a kbin account, but that seems to be dead, and I’d like to minimize the number of accounts I have to use to access things.
How much does the setup cost? assuming I’m already self hosting and have some disk space.
VPN and a seed box?
Yes, you definitely need a good VPN service. I use Proton VPN and it works great. I don’t use a seed box or anything like that. I just see stuff right out of my media library that I keep on several external hard drives. So pretty low cost of entry and then you’re not paying any of the subscription costs for streaming or cable or any of that nonsense. Plus there’s movies they’re software there’s music there’s audiobooks there’s e-books. It’s a cornucopia my friend.
I’ve been using whatbox as my seed box for nearly 10 years now. I’m on their USD 15/month plan, and they’ve upgraded my storage & bandwidth twice now in that time without increasing my costs.
Step 1. Get a VPN. Probably a paid one that aligns with the needs of the client. Step 2. Get an app for p2p/torrent downloads to make things fast. Step 3. Configure your app of choice to strictly use the tun0 (VPN) only and nothing else. Just in case you get a lapse. Step 4. Do it like it’s 2008 again baby!
Use mullvad. Pay with a fresh crypto wallet. And use Usenet.
most crypto is useless and practically a scam, it’s a rabbit hole in itself to find a worthy one. paying for vpn with crypto only helps if you use an untraceable crypto
if I would recommend one, it’s Monero, because it’s private by default and untracable, but nobody should believe me without doing their own research. I mean it.
“Crypto” is such a vague term it’s almost comical to imply it’s private. Sure there are ways to use crypto privately, but it takes a lot of steps.
Grab a VPN
Fill up your pantry. Focus on grains which are labor intensive.
Once the deportations camps get rolling expect all the grocery prices to rise again. Having a full pantry will let you float for a while so you can adapt to newer recipes in your price range.
Yup, started focusing on that this week myself, just buying extra rice, pasta, canned goods at least until the inauguration.
If you are willing to grind your own grain, whole grains can be stored in plastic buckets for years without spoiling. You’ve probably got to like whole grain stuff, sifting to get white flour is a pain.
Panic buying like this only leads to more price increases. I just buy the minimum, like usual.
The real question is does panic buying now make goods cost more than a 100% tariff will?
In the short-term, absolutely. Look what happened when panic buying happened during the start of COVID.
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Canadian grocery prices have increased something like 20% since 2019. At this point I think we’re all buying less, eating less, and making sure we waste less.
It’s only going to get worse here.
Americans could stand to lose some weight.
I’m in the process of buying land to homestead on. Solar, rain water, green house, etc. my goal is to be as self sufficient as I can be.
godspeed
To prepare for food shortages/price increases: I’m buying seeds for things I know I can grow in our garden, and stocking up on one or two of each of the fungicides, pesticides, and soil amendments that we regularly use. I bought 30 pound sacks of rice and beans, two large boxes of shelf stable nutrition shakes, and shelf stable vacuum sealed bread. We’re considering buying half a cow with the neighbors, who have a deep freezer. I want to buy a pot plant, it’ll probably depend on how much they cost. I already have a good supply of sunflower lecithin so I can make my own edibles.
To prepare for the EPA being gutted or other impacts of climate change: we bought AA and AAA batteries and refilled everything in our bug out bags, including first aid stuff and emergency high calorie food (in case of natural disasters.) We’re installing a reverse osmosis filter in the kitchen sink (we’re concerned about water safety as there have already been problems in our area due to old infrastructure) and it comes with a storage tank. Made sure we had plenty of candles, matches, flashlights, charcoal, lighters and lighter fluid, and a small grill for outside. Have an adapter for the car so we can plug things in if the power goes out.
To prepare for FDA/insurance/medical issues: We bought extra vitamins, and we’re asking our doctors to prescribe as much of our necessary drugs as they are allowed to. I learned how to do all my physical therapy at home and have been collecting home exercise equipment for a while, unrelated to this but I’m grateful to have it all now. We also bought a few large bottles of rubbing alcohol and hydrogen peroxide. We already have a massive collection of OTC meds because I’m chronically ill and use them often. We plan to add a couple extra boxes of the most important stuff the next few grocery trips. Most important for us: painkillers, epi pens, allergy meds, inhalers, hydrocortisone, and diaper rash cream. No baby but it’s useful for a lot of skin irritations.
For general preparation: I looked at the labels on all our personal care products (lotion, face wash, etc) and if it’s made outside of the U.S. we ordered as much as we could afford, usually 1-2 of each. We’re low maintenance so thankfully it wasn’t too expensive. New undies for everyone, filters for everything that needs them (furnace, vents, pet fountains, etc.) Made sure we had needles, thread, super glue, duct tape, white vinegar, borax, and a couple things of Dr. Bronner’s soap. We’re also saving all our glass jars, packaging, etc (thank God we have a garage…) My grandparents lived through the depression and taught me how to make do and mend. That’s my mindset right now.
We have a bidet and already buy TP in bulk so I’m not super worried about paper products. All our pets got checkups and boosters. We made appointments to get all our boosters as well (tetanus, covid, flu shot, etc.) We got a pet first aid kit and book. I got some general house stuff like wood filler, wood conditioner, nails, screws, and cleaning supplies. We shop at costco so honestly it’s not much more than we usually have in the house.
I might be over prepared but I don’t care. We’ve only spent ~$500 and decided to skip Christmas gifts so thankfully we can afford it. I’m considering a few more things but as it stands I’m feeling prepared.
What water filter did you decide on?
We went with the APEC 5 stage RO filter. It was the best mix (for us) of easy to install and maintain, good reviews on multiple platforms, and affordable. We’re getting replacement filters for each other for Christmas 😂
Batten down the hatches!
I’ve got a big pile of lumber I had milled that is almost finished drying. I’m buying up the remaining woodworking tools I need to process it into various items. The American made options are out of my price range.
Tools are a good idea. Probably should follow your lead on that…
Nothing. These companies don’t deserve it, I’ll do without today and continue into tomorrow.
My personal desktop machine is a Linux box I assembled from $500 worth of parts about 14 years ago. I’ve increased RAM and added about 8TB of storage for an Emby instance.
It still manages to get the job done, but it is obviously way, way, WAY overdue for replacement. We’ve been struggling financially for about 25 years.
Now I’m thinking I need to finally pull the trigger and get it done before January.
IMO there’s little need to buy new in the computer world unless you want to do something silly like have a snapdragon x laptop or have the disposable funds to go the gaming rig route.
My desktop is a retired business workstation, a HP Z420. I bought it for $250, installed a smaller SSD ($100 new) for the OS + apps, upgeaded to the “best” Xenon that fit the socket ($150 used), upgraded to 64 GB RAM ($107 used, yay ECC memory being dirt cheap on the used market), and a 1070TI ($225 used, purchased just before covid).
It’s more than fast enough for my needs still.
This was all about 4-5 years ago, so you could probably do even better with more modern hardware.
Yep. Two weeks ago I was thinking I’d wait through at least one more gen of CPUs and GPUs before upgrading–I’ve got a 6700XT which works great, but everything else is basically 2012-era tech. Now I’m getting ready to pull the trigger on replacing basically everything but the GPU as soon as tomorrow. If the country is going to implode I may as well have some extra pretty distractions.
The easy way to save is to buy used. You can usually buy a super high spec one for 500 to 800 USD used. I think I spent 600 for mine with a 3070 (from hardwareswap, about 1k or so in parts)
Absolutely. Not because of Trump directly but because of Taiwan. China now has a card blanche basically.
Carte blanche, i.e. blank check. Just sharing in case that wasn’t a typo
Yeah, it was… autocorrect
Sorry to bother, autocorrect is dire these days isn’t it?
Got some kitchen appliances I’ve been putting off upgrading, buying a new TV now, new PC. Basically if theres electronics that probably won’t make it for four years, buy it now.
Get your garden going too. Been extremely poor, it helps a ton.
Oh just fyi, of you have to buy from a big box store, Lowe’s donate the most to Democrats and last to Republicans. Fuck home Depot.
I predicted this. I said if we ever tried to block politics it would devolve into nitpicking what is and isn’t political.
But to answer the question: If your computer shit is about due for a upgrade, don’t wait.
Grocery prices would probably keep going up no matter who got elected, so gardening supplies would be a good investment over time. Along with gardening comes the peripheral skills of cooking and preserving when it’ll hurt your soul to see any of your sweet baby tomatoes go to waste.
Its rough because your talking years. you might be able to stave off a little of the pain but eventually your going to feel it.
For a lot of things yeah, but not for like, a fridge or a couch. Was wondering about other things in that category I hadn’t thought of.
Oh shit, you just reminded me that I’ve been needing to buy a new couch.
Yeah if you have ones that need replacing or at least are close or at least are more energy efficient. If they are relatively new im now sure if you would still “win” out. I get what your asking, I think part of it is I have been thinking of it myself and in my case I have somewhat recently already done my fridge, washer/dryer, hot water heater, and stove. Which I mean is a good thing as some of them I even got before the last burst of inflation. I was sorta kicking myself for others as we had the large inflation but now it might end up being a great time to do it. I sorta wish I could have gotten my whole place renovated.
I’m American.
I dont have the money to stockpile anything.
as someone else said, plan for a long term(longer than four years). as for me I’m going to phase it out over three years to be reliant on the system as least as possible. the fourth year would hopefully be close to 80% self-reliant.
I’m planning on going all out on a garden next year. nothing fancy; potato, onion, carrot, tomato, squash (fall and winter), peas, string beans, misc herbs, sun flowers, maybe some corn(everybody grows it around here so bartering for some would be easy, besides corn is a pita to grow).
whatever I can’t dry, I’ll can.
my goal is to be at least 50-60% self sufficient after the first year. this should only require me to buy meat and seasonings mostly. then add on anything else I’ll need.
consumables like TP and tissues can’t really be stocked reliably as they degrade over time due to humidity.
I’ll also be stocking up on common medications for my kids for at least the four years. the last time we went through this there were many product recalls. this time there’s talk of defunding the FDA/CDC. I can only imagine the chaos parents will be in when a pandemic sweeps through again and you can’t even trust the medicine anymore. common things like cold/flu, fever reducers, epi-pens. (if you plan on doing this, don’t be a dick and buy everything at once. take a third so others can still get what they need and get more next week).
I also plan on stocking up on slingshot rubbers and maybe some more ammo. There’s a lot of wildlife around me that could either be eaten and/or used a fertilizer. I hope I’ll never need to resort to it, but would rather have it and hunt rather than not and starve. probably add some bow strings and arrows to the list for bigger game like deer.
I have kind of been planning for this for years so it’s not my first time doing this. my best advice, do anything you feel you can accomplish successfully. don’t waste time or resources growing food if you don’t have space for a garden (don’t experiment with hydroponics if you don’t have the time or resources to fail multiple times).
Find other ways to contribute to your community like; cleaning and maintaining weapons, fixing tools, home repair, technology/PC repair. anything you can do successfully will give you an edge that gives you an opportunity to barter for what you need, this includes credit in the community.
I once did tech support and one day someone couldn’t pay me. so they gave me some deer they had hunted recently. a year later that person called me and asked if I wanted a job making triple what I was making at my old job(not IT related). credit can’t be eaten, but it goes a long way and is indispensable.
stay strong, be smart, we’ll get through this yet.
Scotch
I finished my bottle of Laphroaig 10 on election night :-\
Oh fuck, seriously?
Well it is kinda in the name.
