Double check Amazon to make sure they didn't charge you for those.

Yeah, the IRS now requires you to pay taxes on any corporate perks. Years ago, I worked for McNeil Pharmaceuticals, which was a division of J&J. They used to run a company store that sold J&J products at cost. You could buy a giant bottle of Tylenol for $1.99. Diapers and baby power were dirt cheap. Supposedly, when the law went into effect, they were supposed to track employee purchases and if the total discount exceeded $100 throughout the year; they were supposed to include it in your W2. The company didn't want to go through the effort. The company store broke even. With these new rules and the additional paperwork, it would have operated at a loss. So, they shut the store down.

I had a friend who worked for American University in DC. Low salary, but he was getting his Masters Degree for free. Law went into effect, and the school yanked the free tuition because of the new IRS regulations.

Yeti mugs are nice.

If they give you a gift card, they have to tax you on it now. Very frustrating and why a lot of companies don't do it any more. They don't want to have to track it.

My work gave me a really cheap water bottle that didn't even make it a year,

There's nothing more annoying than getting a water bottle, coffee cup or a travel coffee thermos. They're all going to be cheap crap and probably own plenty of them already. I recently took a dozen water bottles to Goodwill. My son got one for joining the scouts. He got one for joining the National Honor Society. He got one as a gift for getting into high school. The other son got one for marching band, for joining the school e-sports team, for joining the concert choir. That's 6 water bottles just for my 2 kids. Then I had a half dozen work had given me over the years from various events.

All of these are cheap plastic water bottle with no insulation that sweat all day. Rounded them all up, took them to Goodwill, and bought 4 nice insulated water bottles that are well built. Told everyone not to accept water bottle any more.

I also have an entire shelf of branded ceramic coffee mugs. Coffee mugs are really BIFL items. Unless you drop it, it's going to last forever. But do I really need that many coffee mugs? There are 1 or 2 I might keep, like one with the 90s rainbow Apple logo. But what do I do with a coffee mug from a company I worked for 20 years ago that doesn't even exist?

It's hard to refuse stuff that's shipped to your door, sadly. I'm tempted to just give this thing to a thrift store. For now, it's on a hook in my closet. I'd like to say that it's there as a backup. But all my other backpacks are Jansport, so I don't need a backup.

Leave it to the IRS to f*ck things up.

A LOT of companies got rid of benefits such as tuition reimbursement and other small perks because now it's taxable and they don't want to track it.

My wife was the treasurer of my kids' PTA. They used to give the teachers a $100 staples gift card in August to let them buy supplies for themselves. They had to stop doing that because that was taxable income to the IRS.

I have a few other examples of the IRS getting rid of corporate perks by making them taxable.

I would ratrher get an Amazon gift card for $10 or $20 than some piece of shit item that's going to get thrown away.

Years ago I bought my whole team Fisher Space Pens for Christmas. It's been almost a decade and they all still use them.

I'm not a fan of branded merchandise. But if it was actually quality branded merchandise, I would be OK with it.

I think Jansport is one of those "bang for your buck" brands. I bought my son a red Jansport backpack when he was in 7th grade. He's senior in college now and still uses it. He bought himself one for his D&D stuff when he was a freshman. Still using it.

I buy used Jansport backpack off Craigslist all the time to have as backups when needed.

Ogio backpacks are nice.

These Leed's brand backpacks are pretty crappy. It's all about the corporate branding. If they give you anything for free, it needs to have the company logo on it, so you can be a walking billboard as you walk around.

>The Tactile Pro for PC has been retired and is no longer available.

Well, they are dampened. The click switches feel way better. But I'll take a Quiet Click over a rubber dome.

My latest Tactile switch purchases were lubed Glorious Pandas and Boba U4T. They're nice. But I really like Matias switches more.

I've used Box Jade and Box Navy. They're OK. But they're not as good as Matias Clicky switches.

I wish I could get a Tactile Pro for Windows.

I am all Mac and Linux at home, but my work computer is Windows 10.

I have a full-size Tactile Pro for Mac hooked up to it and I love it.

I have a pile of keyboards, but the only ones I want to use are Matias and my Model Ms.

Really hard to go back to Cherry-style switches once you use Alps or buckling springs.

I just finished charging mine. 5 hours is a long time to charge. But if it lasts a year on a charge, well worth it. I'm using this on my laptop on my dining room table. The Tactile Pro was a bit too loud for my wife watching TV.

This thing was not used. It was NIB.

I think the guy has some left.

Says he has more than 10

https://www.ebay.com/itm/295459621953

Hop on the Keychron Discord. Someone there may have a build of VIAL for that keyboard.

Check out Keychron.

https://www.keychron.com.au/products/keychron-v6-qmk-custom-mechanical-keyboard

https://keychron.com.au/products/keychron-v5-qmk-custom-mechanical-keyboard

They're a Chinese company, so you should be able to order them online for shipping to Australia.

These keyboards run QMK/VIA. I think there may be community VIAL builds.

The other option is to keep your existing keyboard and buy a programmable macro pad.

It's a Firefox issue. And a good one. Firefox doesn't support WebHID. And I hope they never do. I don't think I want a web browser to have direct access to my keyboard firmware. Sounds like a good way to get a keylogger installed in your hardware without even knowing it.

I launch apps with it.

I use it to enter my strong and complicated password into my password manager. Before VIA/VIAL, I used a weaker, but still somewhat secure password. Now it's 100 characters of pure random garbage.

I have a bunch of text files for work that I do routine search and replace in. Now I can do that by pressing one key that launches the app, loads the file, does a replace and saves the file.

You need to reflash the keyboard with a firmware you build from the VIAL source tree.

I have QMK/VIAL on my Keychron K8 Pro. It's a custom build someone made.

And have a ADB to USB adapter for my Apple Extended Keybooard II that I flashed VIAL onto.