DualSportBiker

That certainly used to be the case. Young kids with fancy cars would meet at the petrol station and food court just after the 10 Baht toll heading north. Now I often see police parked there instead. I can hear them racing when they do, and I'd reckon it is less frequent these days, but not totally gone. Slow steady improvements...

How much power do you think a dash cam uses? You could leave it on for a couple hours and it would not dent the battery's ability to start your engine. I turn the screen off to reduce consumption, but mainly so it being on is not discernible. I have two cigarette lighter sockets, one via a relay that needs the engine on, and one direct to the battery. The joys of having an old car you can cut holes in and futz with as needed...

I leave my front and rear cameras on, but it would still be problematic for sure. Like I said, I don't do it often, and would not be gone far or for long...

I drive an old Land Rover with big crashbars on the front. Not often, but on occasion I just push the stuff out of the way, take a pic and walk off. When I come back I check for nails around my tyres!

You are right, but that still constitutes pressuring the rider to move. He was moving before the lights changed and had to stop when the bike failed to.

The driver with the dash-cam bears some responsibility by putting pressure on the rider. He was moving before the lights changed and by beeping his horn the rider react and didn't look. It might be a reasonable assumption that he would not have looked anyway, but he would have done so later when he realised he could move. The ambulance would have been closer and the result might have been different. Then after a few choice words, he seems to up and meander off. He was witness to an accident and is legally required to stop.

So do you think that their core message is 'times have changed' not 'in my day, we were tough'?

Those comments from old people saying "When I was 24..."? No, they are statements suggesting that times should not have changed.

I moved here aged 22 - had my moments! Still here and I have all my fingers and toes despite riding here! I don't get the 'when I was 24' comments. Times have changed, the ease of instant communications embeds expectations. If one interacts with a 24 year old child via social media daily or every couple of days then that stops. Who wouldn't be concerned? More so when that kid is in a country with a justifiable reputation for large numbers of accidents with, and deaths of tourists. I wrote to my parents less than once a month when I first lived here, I think we spoke by phone 4-5 times a year. Then, when my parents got on Skype, we chatted weekly. We all felt an uneasiness if we had not chatted in three weeks - we never felt any concern when there was a two month gap between letters. I hope he is off the grid and having great time. If you are reading this Tim, call your mother!

Thai schools are for-profit, non-tax paying businesses. I spent several years demonstrating to schools that they could save money and generate a healthy return on technology to reduce energy consumption. Even with clear evidence of savings they were not interested: 16 months to break-even was too long (unrealistic expectations of ROI on capital equipment) their engineers claimed existing equipment would be damaged (too lazy to deal with new stuff) "your product only works when demonstrating. Once installed for real it will not save." (abject lack of trust and fundamental failure to understand how stuff is made) "how do I benefit when my school saves money?" (my salary is too low, if you help me I can help you) When you add this approach with the 'preventative maintenance is for idiots' attitude to risk reduction, it does not surprise me that schools don't care about things that might happen. Only when it has happened will they take notice, and most likely only to say that it won't happen again. Schools here are run to print money as hard and as fast as possible. Protecting children is not a priority, whether short-term with tech like in the OP, or long-term by reducing environmental impact. The school's owners, their COOs, and the owners of the vans and the company that operates them all should be held liable for failures. The six deaths mentioned should have resulted in 6 groups of defendants in court, then prison. The 129 near-miss events should have resulted in fines of hundreds of thousands of Baht. I'll stop dreaming soon...

I'd warrant the ratio of will/will not use the meter to be 95 to 5. "Almost none." is not even close to me experience. Might be location based - I don't go to or get cabs from places tourists hang out.

There is no known lethal dose of mushrooms - understandable to try and instil fear, but best done with facts. Watch "How to change your mind" on NetFlix - clearly stated in Ep.01

These rankings need explanation. How does Armenia get 9th with 7.35 overall score when 17.1 per 100,000 die there? Compared with Israel in 10th, with just 4.2 deaths per 100K? Over four times the rate of death. Armenia also outranks countries with deaths per 100,000s in the 2.x and 3.x range! That is a seven times higher death rate in Armenia that Switzerland, ranked 13. It makes sense to have a basket of factors, but deaths / 100,000 and/or deaths / million car-km have to carry more weight in the aggregation. Thailand is #1 in the deaths/100K category, so they can claim a win in the most important category ????

I avoid minivans, however I've sat on Nok Air's vans to complete trips to Mukdahan... On every occasion I wear my seatbelt to the amusement of everyone else, regardless of age or superficial sophistication. With that kind of attitude, this story will repeat ad nauseam.

They are not hard to find. You can get 1:2 up to 1:8 VRV/VRF types. Generic retail shops are always maximise revenue per sq.m; find a specialist via manufacturers' websites.

I know a guy who was on that project, ex-USAF. He told me that the operators were told not to f&*k with the AC, but would bring their girlfriends in who would then complain it was too cold. Constant need to replace fried circuits due to heat-overload.

They certainly used to: https://www.irrawaddy.com/opinion/guest-column/thailands-special-envoy-risks-becoming-a-tool-of-myanmar-junta.html

The umpire might call it a wide...

It's not just the price, taxi drivers might be overly pushy and impatient, but they are qualitatively better drivers than the private drivers. I stopped because the first three grab car drivers I sat with were dodgy, dodgy, and outright scary! Many of the non-taxi Thais I have sat with over the years have been pretty rough drivers tbh.