This.

Most of my friends aren't Linux/tech enthusiasts at all, but they do build their PCs because it's cheaper, and they're all over intel and nvidia. One even asked me for an advice on what GPU to get under a certain budget, and the fucker wouldn't listen to my AMD recommendations, despite the very obvious advantage to his wallet and performance he was looking for.

Intel + Nvidia pretty much dominate the pre-built market, too. I was in a tech store recently and, as usual, gazed at some PCs and laptops they had over there just for the sake of it, and nearly every single one of them was intel+nvidia, for the very exception of a full AMD laptop.

I'm sure this kind of concerns is one of the prime reasons that seems to "slow down" the support. I don't want to whitewash anyone, but I'll give credit when credit is due - the officials in the western(-oriented) countries do realize that they're a temporary asset in their position, with a goal to contribute to the society that enables their entire lifestyle. While some may not be a proper fit for the position of such power, today many, if not everyone, realize that they're going to have to step down sooner rather than later, and if they want to enjoy the benefits, they better make the electorate happy - today, this surely includes making sure that none of the electorate has to go die because Putin wanted some landgrab out of some pissy revenge and power-hunger.

We all want this war to end as soon as possible. Even Putin wants to, undoubtedly, but he's too stupid and arrogant to withdraw and admit he made a mistake.

I don't think that's what they meant.

Judging by the "long range targets" mentioned, I'd assume they're talking about the precautions many Ukraine supporters are voicing, such as that providing Ukraine with proper longer-range equipment would be seen by Russia (Putin, more specifically, and some other old farts) as existential threat, leading to them actually nuking someone, or something along these lines. Basically the same old appeasement and careful treading around an old and delusional dictator.

Like you said, you hope you won't have to go and fight for Ukraine (I don't mean to sound offensive in any way, I just don't know how to frame it better), and I think this is similar to what the leaders of the western nations have been feeling as well - hoping that they won't have to send anything more than equipment and ammo that won't provoke an even larger conflict.

But in all honesty, we've seen action in Russia for quite some time anyway, now with merciful drone attacks on Moscow and active combat in Belgorod (if I'm not mistaken). There's a reason people like me don't lead nations, but to me it seems like Ukraine is both capable of bringing war onto the Russian soil anyway, and has shown to do so in a strategic and insanely restrained way (I can easily imagine the drone attack on Moscow going a very different way than it did).

To me, it seems like giving Ukraine proper long-range equipment is not going to result in anything more than unambiguous defense, without avenger strikes that Putin can use for... whatever. And, well, after almost 1.5 years of war, one would think that if Putin was capable of doing something that the western leaders fear so much, he would already do it, as an unhinged tyrant like he is. Putin seems to care about his life, maybe his immediate family's life, too, knowing full well that a nuclear strike is a sure way to make their life either extremely difficult in whatever way, or even end it prematurely (most likely, in extreme pain and/or fear). Not to mention that launching nukes takes way more than just one man pressing the button, or even three men - the people directly responsible for executing the order always have a change of turning out to be more sensible and not committing to the procedure; in the end, Russia must have more people willing to live, even among the nuclear personnel, rather than die for some absurd ambition that only one old sorry fuck shares.

Oh, and judging by the actual state of the Russian military that was revealed to us all after they invaded Ukraine, I seriously doubt they have anything worthwhile left in stock - might've ended up as a liquidated asset in a form of some general's palace, yacht, or several apartments somewhere in the western world.

Not to mention that the discussion is almost guaranteed to consist of similarly short (or even shorter) witty one-liners. Twitter format is just horrible, and its restrictions promote equally horrible behavior where you have to look for ways to convey ideas and feeling in a short manner, which almost never results in more polite and sophisticated conversations.

Never used Twitter for anything more serious than some announcements from the game devs I follow. Anything else is just plain stupid, which makes me really surprised over the wide-spread adoption of Twitter by officials and ministries and the like.

And raising the character limit is going to be even more absurd, because then it's going to be reminiscent of an actual forum, just less structured and sensible.

Twitter, as a format, is the worst option between messengers like Matrix and proper forums of any kind.

Holy shit, I thought I was alone in the big gaming world!

The reason I never played it is because at the time the game was out, my PC couldn't handle it, so I gave up after my sad attempts to sit through the unplayable frames. And by the time I upgraded, there were simply too many games to steal my attention entirely - that's how it been ever since.

I want to play it, though. I never considered it boring - I liked it even when I wasn't that interested in fantasy, and now I'm gravitating even more towards it. Hope to get my hands down to it one day, but with Starfield (hopefully) coming out this year, and with The Outer Worlds to beat before that happens, I think I'm not slaying any dragons any time soon.