Man, you hit the nail on the head. It’s that slow creep of giving up bits of our lives without even realizing it. I had a similar gut feeling with a smart meter the utility company tried to install, like why does it need to report back every hour? Ended up saying no and keeping the old dial. It’s just getting harder to spot all the little ways they try to watch you, and trash bins should absolutely not be one of them. The whole thing is just creepy, full stop.

Learned that the hard way when a video missed a critical spec.

Honestly, @kai_king98, that's a pretty narrow view. The core skills totally cross over. Troubleshooting a bad signal in a plane's comms system uses the same logical process as chasing down a hum in a speaker wire. Reading schematics, understanding grounding issues, managing complex wiring harnesses. Saying a pro can't step down to basic home audio is like saying a master chef can't make a good sandwich. Yeah, the cousin's request was dumb, but the foundational knowledge is there.