MalReynolds

Is a VPN needed to keep your ip from being exposed ?

No more so than using any search engine directly, it's a nice to have. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good enough.

Is just using an existing searxng instance just less secure then?

By the time you've investigated it, you could have stood up your own instance...

Sounds like a them problem then.

podman exists and doesn't force root...

It's yours, no issues trusting a public instance with your searches. Pages full of settings to tweak as you like. Less problems with an algorithm 'helping' you. It averages searches over multiple search engines that you choose, you can set up your own (or a curated) block list of crappy AI slop sites, don't like fandom.com or something, gone. Manage your own bangs, e.g. !aa for annas-archive. Pipe it through a VPN with gluetun for better isolation. If you have your head around docker already it's more like half an hour to set up, so why not?

Can hook it up to perplexica and a local LLM for a fully local AI search that you define, use it as a MCP server, do deep research with it...

Surprised no-one pitched Elite:Dangerous. Certainly a labour of love to begin with, incredibly talented sound design, first space sim to VR, truly devoted to the original material... Still going pretty strong (had a few weak years) with updates (only 2 DLC-ish major updates of which were paid) a decade later...

Privately owned (no shareholders), small team that seems to love what they're doing, they can likely go on forever. Strange how a lack of shareholders correlates with good games (/platforms, Valve!) isn't it ?

I do it with a gluetun container (more versatile) zero issues, but you can just mainline wireguard as an interface if you prefer, also works fine, on bazzite.

know truth from fiction.

You jest, but...

You are aware that Netflix et.al. put compression on their streams (usually quite a bit in regards to bitrate) ? It is often the case that BluRay rips etc. are available better on the high seas...

While I generally agree and consider this insightful, it behooves us to remember the (actual, 1930s) Nazis did it with newspapers, radio and rallies (... in a cave, with a box of scraps).

Not sure I'd use either, but may I suggest both, with a clear caveat that one or both may disappear or change ? Throw stuff at the wall, see what sticks...

Thinkpads have long had first tier linux support, in fact many models have shipped with linux for at least a decade (?), checking that is a really good way to be sure, but you're going to be fine with W, P, T, X lines, many enthusiasts make light work. They were deployed (might still be) to Red Hat kernel devs for a long time, which helps things along. Fingerprint drivers tend to be proprietary and hit or miss, but passwords work.

Honestly learning to install linux yourself, and configure it to your liking, is actually, imo, a really important path to learning and you're likely doing yourself a disservice avoiding it. It's part of the avoidance of vendor lock in you want. Installation is surprisingly easy now, start with something simple, Mint is often recommended these days, find a decent, recent, youtube and you'll probably be up and running in an hour. Find the apps you need for your workflow (which will take considerably longer). Get familiar with the terminal. Best thing you can do after that is burn it down and install a new distro, leaving any mistakes behind, keeping your list of apps. Arch if you want to get really deep into it, or Fedora / Bazzite are good choices and very stable. Best of luck.