That’s always the hard part of these “government fraud” narratives. It’s the insidious shit, the ineptitude, incompetence. Not something you can walk into the FDA and find a filing cabinet labeled “deliberate and known waste contracts”.

I work in aerospace and the worst engineers I’ve had the displeasure of working with were on cost+ contracts (the money keeps rolling in until the job is “done”).

The only real way to track down abuses like that is to stick an oversight committee on each and every contract, watch them like a hawk. But who watches the watchers? You run the risk at every stage, eventually you either need to trust or gamble

I think a better definition would be “achieve something in an unintended or uncommon way”. Fits the bill on what generally passes in the tech community as a “hack” while also covering some normal life stuff.

Getting a cheaper flight booked by using a IP address assigned to a different geographical location? Sure I’d call that a life hack. Getting a cheaper flight by booking a late night, early morning flight? No, those are deliberately cheaper

Also re: your other comment about not making a reply at all, sometimes for people like us it’s just better to not get into internet fights over semantics (no matter how much fun they can be)

That’s kind of the point though, isn’t it?

If I were to post with “Extend the plank!” there’s a near zero chance that even fans of the movie, or even the franchise, I’m thinking of will get the movie right. If I instead say “Who am I to argue with the Captain of the Enterprise” a normie might guess Star Trek, a true nerd and fan of the franchise will peg that instantly as from Star Trek Generations

Edit: That said, there are several lines in this thread that aren’t necessarily only recognizable to fans or people familiar with the movie, but instead just pop culture references.

Most definitely. The fact that the four door 5 foot box exists is hilarious to me in a sad kind of way.

I occasionally get made fun of for owning a 22 two door Ranger, that I bought a “tiny” truck. Honestly I hate how big it is, but I wanted a truck that would be my single vehicle, something I can use for DIY house projects, commute in, go camping/off roading, and take on cross country road trips. Custom ordered it with the specific features I wanted all for ~40k, meanwhile the guys giving me shit for it are paying just as much for a truck with less features, it never leaves the city, and waaaaay more expensive at the pump.

Morons

For these kinds of comparisons people have to cherry pick and cannot compare similar class trucks because similar class trucks haven’t really changed in 30 years

If you compare the size of a base 1990 F150 https://www.edmunds.com/ford/f-150/1990/features-specs/

To a base 2025 F150 https://www.edmunds.com/ford/f-150/2025/features-specs/

The 2025 is 6 inches shorter, barely an inch taller, and barely an inch wider. Or in terms of percentages: -3.1%, +1.1%, +1.2% respectively

What has changed in 30 years is it was common back then for an average consumer to buy a “regular” cab two door truck with a 6 foot box, four door behemoths were rare. If you wanted a 4 door truck you had to get the F350

Today it’s the other way around, it’s rare to see a single cab F150 and now you can get a 4 door F150