> being familiar with cryptographic protocols and formats where the hash algorithm is usually a parameter that can vary for each concrete hash.

This flexibility ("agility") in cryptographic protocols is often seen as a mistake today, actually.

Cryptographic protocols have been moving towards something of a compromise in flexibility. "Everything flexible" is a security risk, especially when "everything" includes "fallback to nothing secure". "No flexibility" is a security risk because you can't upgrade. The middle path is something like "version numbers" with hard breakpoints. "I only support v2 of this cryptographic protocol and will not fallback to v1."

Which is sort of the hash algorithm approach git is taking with incompatible versions and a version break.

Well, also the dating market is illiquid, with high transaction costs and incomplete information.

1 in 100k risks (0.001%) aren't an argument against something that would benefit double digit percentages of the population.

It is necessarily so if you're using Gale-Shapley for heterosexual matching, yes.

Yeah, so, who are the proposers and who are the receivers?

Which is kind of wild, because generators powered by combusting fuels are also giant fire hazards (and produce noxious CO and other gases), of course.

Generators are generally used outside. There are some rated for use inside, but they also have strict regulations on how that is done. (there are also some used inside but they will kill someone soon)

Batteries can also be located outside, of course. There's still fire risk (from both) due to proximity.

Maybe where you live, but where I live the temperature outside is bad for batteries.

Though what is "inside" is debatable. My car can sit outside because it has the batteries in a case that is climate controlled when needed, and so the batteries count as inside even though they are in a car that is outside.

Right, very fair.

I would be much more nervous about a 13+ kWh battery than a natural gas generator.

The generator is generally only risky when in operation. For natural gas units, a normally-closed solenoid keeps the gas off unless the controller actively commands it. A battery is constantly in a state of non zero fire risk when charged.

> Does anybody at the BBC actually understand what batteries are, and why they cannot possibly compete with power plants!?!?

VPPs displace more expensive generation capacity at the margin. Because your marginal loads are for relatively short durations. It's actually quite smart, especially if you can get end consumers to subsidize it.

Well that's fine if the goal is to use it to protect against brownouts like a large-scale UPS but the article discusses it in terms of a protection against blackouts which often are not relatively short durations.

It is actually a pretty great way to address marginal demand spikes without overbuilding generation capacity. With the fringe bonus of local protection from short outages.

Disingenuous sells more clicks, of course.

If that's the meaning, the article is uninteresting and meaningless -- telling us nothing new.