quadrangle

You are 99% misreading/misunderstanding the quote.

They said WORKERS not EMPLOYEES

Sure, Google puts a lot of its revenue to its EMPLOYEES. But most of the WORK is done by the rest of the public giving Google all the content and data via the way the products utilize the searching and driving around and so on.

The claim is not what's internal to Google's business accounting. The claim is that they have externalized almost all the work to the unpaid users of the systems who actually produce the value overall.

(the quote is a tad confusing because they said "employer's revenues", that seems like an error in speaking/writing; the next part makes it clear what they are aiming to say)

> paid labour performs only a fraction of the work that Big Tech benefits from

STAR Voting is the ideal if we're not going all the way to different democracy like Citizen Assemblies.

Approval voting is the best simple-next-step reform.

For clarity, Element is merely a client (the main one) for Matrix.org. What matters is whether people are on Matrix rather than whether they use the Element client. But most Matrix users surely do use Element.

That's not what the other comment was complaining about. If it were GitHub.io that would be fine.

They are saying that GitHub has had a long interest in people thinking that Git is something you only do with GitHub, reducing people from thinking about using Git without GitHub. Of course, to be clear, Git is a 100% independent project that existed before GitHub and GitHub has ZERO claim to anything about Git, it just uses it.

Okay, a minute might be too long. If you are thinking that you have some time to plan and decide what to do with it, you're not doing the exercise. It has to be such that you accept that there's nothing you can do to control what's happening and you give up your grasping for control. No point in using up your moments trying to decide what to do next.

Whatever you are doing right now, this could be it, and that's that. The magic is the chance to actually be present for an instant rather than just be lost in your anxieties and then be dead.

When you practice experiencing this as your last moments, you might just look out the window at the clouds and think about your most meaningful memories, but you also might as well keep washing the dishes and finally be really present with it.

If washing the dishes is your last moments, it can feel like a profound and meaningful experience of dish-washing. You can realize that you've been stuck in a judgmental low-level aversion to dish-washing and suddenly all the tension disappears, and you realize both the awesomeness and the mundaneness of it all at once. Water, sensations, plates are beautiful, you're living this life in some place, and it is what it is, and really it's amazing, we just constantly overlook it.

When you then do not actually die, you have the chance to prioritize being as grateful and loving as you possibly can in every moment going forward, at least whenever you can bring that presence back to mind. Whether that's when cleaning or being with others.

You might decide that there are activities you'd like to never ever do again.

But in the end, there's no right or wrong activities or context, there's only being present or not. We can be present even while the activity is making plans.

The real trick: expect to die in a minute.

No joke. The Buddhist perspective gets into that. The idea of dying tomorrow sets you up to worry about making the most of the future of the rest of the day, and you're still not really present. When we consider that these few breaths or bites or moments might be our last, we can release all the clinging and aversion because it's too late to do anything but be profoundly aware of being alive in this moment. And given that we usually don't just die, we get to experience that sense of life-flashing-before-your-eyes and immediate sense of love and compassion, and still an aspiration to make the very most of each moment (including planning for the future since that might be a thing).

This might be the final sentence you read. So, there's no reason to live each day as your last. It's okay to live each moment in whatever way it shows up. It's all we have, and there's nothing to do but to be aware of it. And, remarkably enough, once we stop striving and just let go, we magically find ourselves more attuned to our deepest values of love and compassion.

This writing might be the last action I ever do. Love to everyone and everything

I can understand peas, but avocado is fatty indulgent wonderful food. Not liking avocado is absurd. It's like not liking peanut-butter.

Side-note: I learned the most grotesque aberration that shows how the U.S. is orders of magnitude into complete dysfunction: there's something called "diet peanut butter" (learned about this because of a warning I saw online not to give it to dogs). WTF is "diet peanut butter"???? Peanut butter is this rich, delicious oily food. It doesn't need a damn thing to be a great treat. But in the U.S., it's not only typically salted, they add a large amount of sugar. That's already insanely stupid. You want to cut out the sugar? Just enjoy the plain amazing peanut butter on its own!! Nope, they made "diet" by swapping the sugar for xylitol or something. INSANE.

P.S. I live in and grew up in the U.S., I'm judging my own country.

You're right mainly. Self-assessment was a filter he used, it wasn't the definition in itself.

I see effort at nuance here, but the conclusion is both almost right and also not at all right.

America's deeply unequal political system WILL NOT ever get us better equality. It's *incidental*, a symptom of the political reality that discouraging cars would be done in a way that exacerbates inequality.

Almost any policy can be done in ways that exacerbate inequality. And a more equitable political system would be needed in order to have more equitable policies.

There's nothing specific to cars about this stuff. So, there's no point in focusing on discouraging cars as inherently part of this trend. Gentrification is a real issue. But don't blame yoga for gentrification just because yoga studios are in gentrified areas. Policies that encourage healthy tree canopy also exacerbate inequality because richer areas can hire urban foresters and so on. I mean, every single worthwhile thing you can think of exacerbates inequality if the policies are set up to make the worthwhile thing go along with already-wealthier places. None of the worthwhile things are themselves the cause of inequality.

I don't know what you're sorry about. There's nothing wrong with that idea. It just isn't feasible to have 8 billion people all living like that. If cars were only used by a sustainably small number of people who live like you, then it's fine enough.

The problem is the "lot of other people" issue. Your way of life works well only if most people forgo it. There's nothing inherently wrong with it in and of itself.

The study says that they haven't. It doesn't make claims about what the future will be. "They don't" is too timeless a claim.

We already regulate where cars are allowed to go (e.g. which direction in which lane on which streets). All anyone means around "banning" cars is to have changes (reductions) in which places we allow cars. There's no increase in authoritarianism with that.

I don't suppose you are suggesting that nobody was able to live a decent life 12 miles out of town until we had cars, are you?

But I suppose your point is more like: we've built lots of completely car-dependent situations in which people live very far from core necessities in life with no way to get them except by car. And that's clearly true. But the answer isn't teleporters or biking in -20 to got 12 miles. The answer is to stop living so far from essential resources. And that doesn't have to mean everyone moving to crazy-dense living around existing resources like grocery stores. It could just as well (better really) mean modest density in mixed areas where we have more medium-size grocery stores so that more people are close to them.

I'm not suggesting individuals just live in car DEPENDENT contexts and then forgo the thing you DEPEND on. I'm suggesting we have drastically fewer car-dependent places.

You mean most of America is designed to be car-dependent. So, yes, in the current design it needs cars.

I wasn't saying we could just suddenly ban them tomorrow.

The solution is hard because of how bad we've gotten things. But the solution has little authoritarian about it. We just change our priorities for the design of public infrastructure. We don't even need to actually ban cars at all. Make it practical and enjoyable to do everything by train, bike, or walking whenever possible and most people will happily do it. The result is a huge decrease in deaths both through healthier living and less cars.

https://www.youtube.com/c/NotJustBikes/videos describes things pretty well and accessibly. In short: the Netherlands was on track 40 years ago to be nearly as car-dependent as the U.S. and yet protesters blocked some highway proposals and the country went in a different direction. Today, it's the best designed place in the world, and its even better for drivers too.

What do you mean not sustainable???

If we limited and regulated car use pretty extremely and stuck with trains, bikes, and walking, we would be half the way there toward a completely sustainable society.

Cars are a major source of the least sustainable aspects of humanity on earth today.

Why are you correcting a video you didn't watch? Give it the 17min. You'll learn more about this topic.

You did not watch the video.

Video is specifically the claim that cities CAN be quiet, and it gives examples of quiet, dense cities. The title is "Cities aren't loud, cars are loud."

Watch it. You will learn something.

The analogy works because 99.9% of vegetarians don't even use words to directly tell others that they are unethical, they just assert their OWN vegetarianism as an ethical decision, and others go bonkers as though this is the most grotesque personal attack. This all happens without any red-paint-balloons or other extremist stuff.

In other words, when someone comes along and says what amounts to "for ethical reasons, I behave differently than you", people interpret it (understandably but unreasonably) as saying "you are an unethical person" (whereas the responsible reaction is, "hmm, maybe there's an ethical issue here that I should consider that I haven't yet"). Then, people focus all their attention on rationalizations to reject the other person, such as calling them "ideologues".

The Trisquel website doesn't say, "if you use or make proprietary software, you are evil". People react to the subtle implications as if that's what it said though. Maybe that's because people don't want to admit that they actually do act in ways that are ethical compromises?

There are vegans who encourage shunning animal products. And yes, there are critiques of people with the "gall" to eat meat. Those facts don't mean they are wrong. That's a matter of engaging with the actual arguments.

To say the RYF certifcation is hypocritical is a misunderstanding. They drew a line for certification that isn't 100% puritanical. They aren't absolutely impractical. They don't say that your points about firmware don't matter, they just wanted a line that could be practical for the certification.

I recognize your point, but your language and judgments are out of line. The FSF argues that embedded blobs that are completely unchangeable by anyone are similar to hardware. Now, I happen to agree with you that the lack of freedom is still a problem. But the distinction they make isn't totally illogical.

Vegan movements can be extreme too, and you can criticize them. But the level of animosity and defensiveness people get into shows that people are really sensitive about these things. It's as though they recognize that there might really be some fundamental issues with proprietary software or with meat, and the existence of the anti-proprietary or anti-meat views cuts people to the core. I mean, it's one thing to simply disagree, but it says a lot more when people are SO emotional about it.

What a reactive, defensive attitude.

Just try applying everything you wrote to the topic of being vegetarian. Vegetarians are indeed arguing against meat-eating, and you could talk about how you are just some pig farmer selling meat on the side, and the vegetarians are saying "F You!"

And then there's the practical problems with whether animal products are identified in various food products…

And people get super defensive about that stuff too. But this desire to reject the FSF or the vegetarians and call them extremists and hypocrites amounts to an emotional refusal to engage fairly with any of the actual issues or even what the people are actually saying or doing.

"Something is shitty, let's laugh about it" does NOT inevitably require "continue regardless"

The idea that you have to connect laughing with not fixing things is evidence of being in a triggered, reactive, threatened state.

Did I ever suggest that the problem shouldn't be fixed?

People who can laugh about something are people who aren't in a state of threat. And yes, those who don't care are less likely to be threatened. But we can also find ourselves in situations where we are willing to laugh and not be so defensive and self-righteous while we still care about things.

In our outrage-driven society, that's the real minority: people who CARE and are also willing to laugh and not be in a victim mentality. And to be clear, this isn't some fundamental feature like we simply are one way or the other. These are states we can shift between, and most people are shifting all the time.

If a car with a shattered window is completely unacceptable for some situation for some reason, a person could say (still hyperbolically), "it might as well be totalled". It's still stupid to say "it's totalled!" (and that's not because I'm objecting to the insurance definition).

The orange dot being unacceptable to some people and situations is never something I've doubted in the slightest.

Some people can't seem to grasp that it's perfectly consistent to say "you're being hyperbolic, but your objection is fully sound". It's as though after a crash that results in a shattered window, someone says "it's totalled!" and then if someone else says "it's NOT totalled" they take that to mean that a shattered window is no real problem.

The orange dot is totally stupid, unacceptable in many situations, the decision was atrocious, AND the language people have been using about it is hyperbolic.

Yeah, I get it. People can be really mad when systems they rely on get messed up. It makes PERFECT sense that people are really reactive about this awful design decision and are saying hyperbolic stuff. The part that doesn't make sense is the refusal to acknowledge that it's hyperbole. Although, to be fair, when people are triggered and reactive, we're rarely in the mood to acknowledge such nuance.

I think that's the point that people are objecting to.

The orange dot doesn't total the presentation the way a totalled-car in a crash does, certainly not necessarily. It's NOT worse than nothing. It's not like a shopping cart for commuting to work.

The point of the replies here overall is that those things are hyperbole. It's NOT about nit-picking the language. It's "well, technically, the car will still drive in this case", it's saying that the orange dot DOES NOT ruin presentations that badly. You can ACTUALLY and PRACTICALLY present with the orange dot.

A better analogy: your nice car gets a rock through a window with a noticeable hole and huge cosmetic crack. You say "I can't drive this now! My car is useless! It's totalled!" And people are like "Dude, it's not totalled." And you say, "This is my professional car for business, I can't show up with a cracked window!" and People are like, "well, you could actually…"

It's not like the software has a bug that inverts all the colors, and people are saying "you could in fact do an inverted-color presentation, it's possible". It's JUST a little dot, and it's bad, but it's NOT as bad as the hyperbole.

Honestly, I'm more interested in the way people aren't willing to laugh about it.

I mean, yeah, I don't want the dot there. It breaks the fourth-wall in a way. But there's something to that too. Society of the Spectacle and so on…

It's FUNNY to notice how a little orange dot is taken as such a profound threat. People could do well to reflect on the whole context a bit. Our dependency on tech and the way we depend on a few companies who force things on us, it's all serious, scary, and absurd. And this orange dot business is not the ultimate example of the problem, it's a silly one, that yes, I acknowledge is a huge problem for some people's jobs in practice.

I've been around show production stuff, and I don't respect the way everyone takes themselves so damned seriously in that world. The dadaists were onto something.

Yeah, I get it. Not gonna be accepted in practice. Could be accepted though, it's not literally useless. Being not as bad as literally-useless doesn't mean anything about the situation is good.

The quibble is people saying something similar to "this orange dot is as bad as having half the screen taken up by goatse!" and then when someone else says "it's not actually that bad though, right?" they say "it IS THAT BAD!!" And I'm like, "I get that you're mad, but it's really not actually as bad as you're saying". That's not a semantics debate.

Just mildly objecting to the strength of someone's hyperbole is life-threatening?

Just because other people are feeling super aggravated about this completely stupid design decision by Apple doesn't mean it's valid to project that on me as if I'm fighting some battle.

I don't really care about this. I get it, people are upset about a totally indefensible, short-sighted design that impacts people's ability to use Macs to do presentations that will be accepted in professional contexts.

Yes, there's some sense to the hyperbole that says something is "useless" when reality is "this will not be accepted in my field of work". It's still hyperbole. Admitting that it's hyperbole doesn't mean accepting the bad design.

Yeah, I get it. Apple's design is stupid and shouldn't have happened. But obviously Mariah Carey CAN sing on TV with a little orange dot. Obviously nobody wants that, and in practice nobody will accept it. But it remains completely possible and would not completely destroy her performance.

The hyperbole here is just so extreme.

You can use them for live visuals. You WON'T (and I don't blame you), but you CAN. "Absolutely useless" obviously is intended to be "I'm super mad about this" rather than literally true.