Time Theft at the Terminal

11 paulpauper 7 8/3/2025, 5:17:14 PM marginalrevolution.com ↗

Comments (7)

Arainach · 6h ago
>The lengthened times for showing up at the airport mean that it no longer even makes sense for many people to take shorter flights

Shorter flights should generally be rail anyway.

The math on "no longer makes sense" isn't run, but short flights were never cheaper - the benefit is that I either don't have to pay attention and drive for hours or that I don't need to be on a slower bus for more hours.

iKlsR · 6h ago
The first thought that popped into my head when I saw the post title was someone pressing the up arrow 24 times to find that `ls` they used a couple hours prior.
crote · 6h ago
You might be interested in the book "The Cuckoo's Egg"!

It describes how in 1986 the compute time accounting at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory was off by 75 cents - literal theft of compute time, in other words. Long story short: it was a hacker in Germany, compromising a large number of US government computer systems in order to spy for the KGB.

Cockbrand · 6h ago
This is an excellent recommendation for an excellent book. As the hackers were German, the hackers' perspective is somewhat well-known in Germany, and it's interesting to learn about both sides.

I just learned that a documentary on this topic with Cliff Stoll exists: The KGB, the Computer and Me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gHNVNRQTJg - I haven't watched it yet, though.

anonymousiam · 17m ago
Before TSA, I could arrive half an hour before my flight. Even though I've got TSA-PRE and Global Entry, I must still go through the theatrical screening processes. It's nonsense, and it has been responsible for massive economic losses, both from the TSA funding itself, and the burden placed on the traveling public.

I'm going to start flying JSX Airlines whenever possible to avoid this crap.

https://www.jsx.com

xnx · 6h ago
librasteve · 5h ago
time to spare? go by air