nine_zeros

Now, the administration will keep doing illegal things, and every individual affected will have to file lawsuits to invalidate the illegal thing - after the damage is already done - because nothing is preventing the government from doing illegal things.

The fact that management issues are so persistently reported and so widespread in tech, should be a strong signal that management practices in tech have failed - measured by the number of non-faang companies that lost their trajectory by copying corrosive FAANG practices.

> - the way you experience work culture at a company is much more determined by your director/vp (e.g. the 50-200 person group you're most closely tied to) than the overall company culture.

> many reports of a toxic work culture are really just cultural mismatches. At scale, this means it's easy to read 100 stories of a bad match and treat it as toxicity.

And you get both of these nuggets of actionable info in watering holes - which was the original point.

There is some truth to avoiding whiney echo chambers. But these watering holes also give insights into the dirty.

E.g. Amazon, Meta etc. have terrible work cultures. Their terribleness got exposed via whiney digital watering holes, at scale. This is useful information for anyone considering jobs at these places. Without these insights, you wouldn't know that you are merely being hired to be fired.

Avoid whiney watering holes but after collecting required information.

Are you not excited to see a Facebook feed full of AI generated ads?

> Who uses their passport for domestic travel?

You need it in countries with haphazard kidnappings - like the US.

> Consent is an informed, intentional decision. Anything else doesn't count.

From a legal perspective, consent is merely a database entry with t on it for that user_id.

There is a big difference between English language consent and tech company manufactured consent.

Oh they understand consent. They also want to make people accidentally give consent or to mislead them into consent. Their entire business model relies on exploitation of people - and consent is merely a roadblock in exploitation efforts.

Yep. Fundamentally, tech R&D requires management that will be ok with trial and error, and ambiguous timelines.

The predictable unit production/sales way of management works for duplicatable, repeatable goods.

When you dig into all the points, you'll notice that the root cause of all of them is detached, meaningless, corporatized management.

> What actual value do they provide? (esp. in light of the housing crisis proving they weren't providing any value at all?)

A significant amount of retail and institutional investment still use these ratings as a guiding indicator.

Not everyone does due diligence. If you have ever worked for a corporation, you know that they love cutting corners. And one corner they'd happily cut is time on due diligence - even if it causes a crash later on. It is not a problem for this quarter.

Yeah, workers can be property too amirite? /s

> The problem is the policy is following exactly what Hitler did.

Yep. And this is what caused the exodus of people like Einstein to the US.

America is straight up on the path followed by Hitler and Nazis.

> I'm surprised that the administration didn't understand this.

Curious why you are surprised at incompetence being unable to understand complexity.

"Criminals" is a meaningless word in Trump's America.

And remember that all this is to give a tax cut to the rich.

Compliance? What's that? Sounds too lawful. Must be a relic of the past.

> Turns out all the cuts are only a fraction of a percent of the federal budget. It's an ideological purge, nothing to do with efficiency at all.

It always ways. It is a media campaign where significant damage is caused to a large number of programs - with the claim that they are cutting expense. But actually none of these cuts will cause any meaningful reduction in government or deficit because these programs never were the big ticket items. The biggest ticket item is tax handouts to the rich. They are not touching that.

Many people can see through this presidential scam. But the MAGA cult is so full of vitriol and hatred for others that they don't see the scam. They don't realize that MAGA voters are themselves being scammed by their beloved Trump.

And thus, we still have always Trumpers. America is just a sad country right now.

> I mean, genuinely, the problem here is not that Trump is a convicted criminal. There are many people who are "convicted felons" who are far more ethical, intelligent, and possessed of better leadership qualities than he is.

Convicted criminal + blatant lies = disregard for society, disregard for people, disregard for rules/norms/laws. It all adds up to who he is and what he values and represents.

NOBODY should be surprised at this administration's disregard for society. You should be actually surprised if he does anything good/lawful.

Yes my example was smallish. Laptop itself doesn't matter as much as the general cost of doing anything in America due to tariffs. And yes, that includes higher health insurance costs, higher server costs due to cloud providers raising prices, and higher cost of literally holding office space.

All of these would be cheaper in any other country. The choices are endless.

If other countries are sensible, they'd tax (er tariff) American software companies - because a large amount of software is less useful than goods.

A 20% tax on Facebook and Google isn't going to do anything. A 20% on Office 365 is meaningful but only until they find software alternatives from anywhere else in the globe.

As for the US, O365 will not be more expensive but the cost of producing O365 will be. It will be up to execs to determine if they want to pass the costs to the shrinking number of businesses or if they want to eat the cost of production at the expense of shareholders.

Either way, American society is going to eat the cost, either in loss of customers or in loss of 401k.

What's remarkable is that the cost of software companies will rise dramatically simply because cost of laptops, office chairs, tables, electric cables will rise.

At that point, it might just be worthwhile to develop 100% abroad and then sell in the US with a one-time tariff rather than pay for itemized tariffs/US greedflation.

Every supervisor ever: Look my team is just an awesome team that achieves all goals by breaking rules. I was the fearless leader to lead them.

Same supervisor when caught breaking rules: Rogue employee. Nothing to do with me. Will fire them.

> Why is the billionaire class so dead-set on tearing down scientific institutions?

Because they are mentally ill. They need more because that's who they are.

And at this point in time, their biggest risk is not being able to get their desired 7% return yoy. They can't get it via innovation because they are not innovative. They can't get it via fed printing money. They can't get it via general investment.

They can get it by exploitation or by robbing/scamming. See Trump coin or buying elections.

And no, they are not interested in making the world a better place. Their sickness wants just more more and more for themselves.

Yep. They got scammed by their own president - a convicted felon who caused a coup.

America is well and truly doomed thanks to apathy of the people.

> Americans are still, overall, quite personally comfortable. I don't anticipate actions at capitals until that comfort is en-masse threatened.

I suspect you are right. It will probably take a full recession, much like COVID, for people to slam brakes at the travesty.

Yes, misinformation won. But when Trump actively cuts benefits, cuts jobs, cuts research, asks for bribes openly, quid pro quo everywhere, town halls unanswered - do voters in America feel willing to change their votes?

Are voters willing to strike until the President resigns? Or are people ok with the country being sold to third world style corruption that is happening right in front of their faces?

I find it remarkable that Americans are ok with rule by executive order instead of rule by congressional law.

I also find it fascinating that no federal judge has held any Trump administration officers in contempt or imposed sanctions/bans on officers who are continuously hurting constitutional rights.

I assume that Americans have been sleeping at the wheel, unaware of the threat of slide into fascism. But is the voter-base and judiciary just unaware/unwilling to throttle persistent attacks?

The only reliable action by voters has been demonstrations outside Tesla stores. But look at Turkey, Serbia etc. - people have taken over their capitals and are striking en masse.

Are Americans unwilling to protect what makes America special?

> The difference is that China has a dictator who needs to continually prove to the Chinese people why they shouldn't overthrow him, while the US has a dictator whose democratic election gives him the permission to do whatever the hell he wants to for 4 years.

Do you remember that China only allowed its dictator to rule for 10 years and that the current dictator/sycophants removed that term limit?

Do you think America is on the same trajectory where the 4 year term limit could be amended via politics and coups? Like the one attempted on Jan 2021?

> Some would say that the difference is the USA (for now at least) has a free press?

Does it? Because the white house has been retaliating against any press that doesn't show them in a good light - like Associated Press.