wand3r

The same FTC that sued ABC/Kimmel for saying mean things about them?

> This is like a pen manufacturer not wanting their pens used to sign drone strike order

I am pretty receptive to the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" argument, but we are taking a big leap from pen to llms/artificial intelligence. I am sympathetic to some of your other points, but I simply must reject this analogy.

Yeah, it surprised me when I found out. I can intellectually understand why average people choose MAGA and try and be somewhat understanding even if I find it distasteful. My conclusion is that if you aren't personally worth at least $5M or have the direct phone number of someone who can get a Trump admin official on the phone, then it was probably a bad choice.

Of those who meet that criteria, and especially those with MUCH more money and closer connections, it actually is an extremely smart choice. However, it represents a level of reprehensible naked self-dealing and complicity that I simply can't condone. It really is comparable to the looting if public goods and coffers during and after the fall of the USSR. Nationalism and patriotism are dead.

The Chinese model fixes this problem, albeit with a heavy hand. The state's power can never be subordinated, billionaires are checked by the state and strict capital controls stop them from having a backup bunker of gold bars outside China. I think they also limit dual citizenship to some extent. Heavy handed though it may be, for 99% of Americans you would have 0 negative impact, but it would align incentives better. With a cooperative tax policy between states there would be less of a race to the bottom and tax-integrity could be maintained. A home would count as a residence regardless of whether you "reside" there. Maybe then we would promote both nationalism and state/community integration. Having to bear the full brunt of state residency tax ramifications could enforce less empty homes and more investment in states they reside.

I understand why LVT is compelling. Wealthy people can subordinate or borrow state capacity and monopoly on violence, while driving legislation. There needs to be some check on power.

In your example, you are 100% correct. It doesn't stop at Austin; we have a transnational class of people who no longer care about the nation itself.

I don't understand what you mean? For me, it appears all 3 students have been changed. The 3rd student is changed into a black female. I am not doubting they want to inject diversity (although i didnt say it above) my contention is they likely view the original as a blank background, which they inserted 3 "new" anonymized students into. Its not that they turned 1 person "black", its that they changed ALL 3 PEOPLE entirely

I am not a bot.

Really seems like they used it to anonymize the students, but that is a lot less polarizing. Does it matter if they swapped the race? They also swapped all identifying facial features of anyone in the picture. That might have even been the prompt they used in the first place.

I am not a big fan of gen ai, but freak outs about nothingness detract from the real issues. I would be more concerned if they swapped the 3 students into a background or setting they were never in, than use the public setting and swap out the students for ai models.

Edit: please stop saying I didn't read the article. The article is almost exclusively opinion based on the observers reaction. "Slimmed down" is what I an saying is anonymized. As I also said, they put letting on top, so it is a tiny tile in a much larger piece. No problem if people don't agree, but the contention the article gives a lot of info and supporting claims is not true. We only really learn Stanford took the photo from the article, the rest of the conclusions are drawn from the 2 pics

I am not defending this morally, but these are clearly a group of the least competent stewards of the military in a long while. They were "completely clear on OPSEC", with a left-leaning Atlantic reporter in the signal group chat. This bombing also coalesced support in Iran and had a big rally around the flag effect. Data in Iran is hard and the timetable was extremely fast, again, due to incompetence and the inability to constrain a vassal. So its appalling to say, but a bunch of morons with LLMS and outdated targeting, pushed to meet the objectives of corrupt idiots is almost certainly the cause. I personally consider it a war crime, but I am not sure if it meets the legal definition.

Exactly. It helps they also control who can even run for office in any meaningful way. Nobody fights the left harder than Democrats. Good luck finding a representative that is against data centers, flock, Israel, congressional stock bans and pausing and regulating AI, views overwhelming popular with the majority of the actual American public.

This is a very engineer-centric view. I studied economics in school, so an analogy in that realm is ironically how all countries should specialize and raise the PPC curve. The reality of the situation was that in 2010 not many people understood how powerful big data actually was. Data sovereignty is actually quite logical when you consider the scale and power of not only the company, but the US as a whole. I can assure you that lawmakers were not thinking about efficient disaster recovery plans or back ups when they made the laws. You can also create reasonably diversified data silos within a country.

As an aside, it is quite crazy the world we live in. I am with the majority where I expected Amazon to be more redundant, but I still marvel at the assumption that a US dev can spin up multiple redundant and data sovereign servers in dozens of countries with efficient caching, failover and redundancy (enough to survive an earthquake or targeted missile attack) from their own home. Even a few hours of outage in a foreign country is considered unacceptable.

Yea, that was the point I was making. Congress chooses to fuck over their own constituents intentionally. They sometimes pretend it is "hard" because of "the system" but in reality both parties are aligned against you. Trump has basically done whatever he wants while in office. It is possible to fix things but almost all politicians CHOOSE not to.

This is a remake of the 2019 film: Genuine Creativity Is Your New Moat.

But yeah, it would be ironic if this was posted by AI and it misunderstood the convention.

Yeah, this was pretty scum from my understanding. I think there are many things to criticize Elon about:

- Lack of free speech on X when it was a core part of messaging.

- DOGE / Data theft / corruption

- Election meddling

- narcissism

Just to name a few. I think telling the truth is important, which is why I have really been disappointed in Elon. It just irks me when we acknowledge a jr engineer is in "tech" and an "engineer". But we rewrite history to say Elon is a "non-technical business guy". People should admit it was an amazing immigrant story. A nerdy kid who was bullied all the time in apartheid south africa fled domestic abuse to Canada, eventually landing in the US with a scholarship to UPENN. He started 2 software companies that were amazingly successful and then went to give back via a passion for space, green energy and sustainable transportation. Then, because of various external and internal factors, he gradually became a serious villain hated by millions who embraced him. We don't have to invent some weird backstory that some relatively small stake in his estranged and abusive father had in a mine is the cornerstone of his success. If only I too was born in apartheid south africa to a wealthy but extremely fucked up family, I would be the richest person in America.

I guess it makes me mad because people don't value real success and overvalue fake success. We should want smart people to build companies and be successful. It is harder than it was in the past, but we can acknowledge that the American dream can still be possible, and should be celebrated. It doesn't matter that Taylor Swift's family were relatively well off. Sidenote: he was a wealth management advisor but people don't know what that is so they think he was Jamie Dimon. She still has an amazing story and we can acknowledge that. Yes, there was some privilege and luck, but she is extraordinary.

Tl;dr I guess I just wish we could be more honest and less likely to follow bullshit narratives. People are complex, you can acknowledge skill, hard work and the truth which will ultimately make valid criticisms go further because having a good honest reputation and dealing in good faith are important

The jobs numbers have been terrible and revised down. Huge amounts of people have dropped out if the workforce or are employed in multiple part times or struggling seriously in a single full time.

I saw an article here about the job market for writers. I can't recall, but I think it was a blog post saying like "AI is bad and has annoying prose so GOOD writers will thrive". The comments rightfully pointed out that not everything requires good writing and many companies will "buy" writing for llm prices as good enough to save money.

I bring it up because that is where someone simply articulated the obvious point I hadn't really thought through: the cascade. What happens when millions of copywriters, non famous journalist, average graphic designers, etc. get laid off. Millions of people will drive the price of labor WAY down as this wage bubble wanders through industries popping every few months. If the supply if labor becomes massive, we will have this debt spiral or stagflationary labor market that causes chaos. Ultimately, capital owners accrue the most value and can buy tons of assets for cheap. Unless, it turns out a middle classes consumption is like...important for our country to function.

I kind of agree, but I will push back just to work through my conflicted feelings. In America 50% of people basically can't read. I think the official stat is 48% read at or BELOW a 6th grade level. The average American reads 0 books a year, shamefully myself included. Especially post covid, there is a serious degradation in social skills and using a phone instantly makes people more comfortable and less likely to socialize. The mobile gaming industry is 148B this year.

All that is to say, I don't think this forum is indicative of wider behavior AND smart people definitely inflate the value of "work" and "productivity" they do on their phone. We will never know unless we get Apple data, but I suspect a phone might be like 90% entertainment and 5% communication for most people. Maybe 5% is semi-productive work email, reading an article, etc.

I guess I am not sure if it matters where their attention goes. Although, it might be a bit of selective memory in how social people were before phones.

Yeah same. I assume this is in response to LLM mass slop SEO hijacking or attempts to do LLM poisoning. It is a hard problem. New domains can launch every second with millions of words and pages. Unless you just moved an already existing wiki with thousands of pages and comments, it would definitely be "irregular" to have a millions of pages and content on a 1 month old site.

Yes. Obviously, I wasn't implying he never benefitted from the government. It is just a wild retelling that he started a rocket company, solar company and car company to make huge amounts of money. Also, he was largely estranged from his abusive father since he emigrated to Canada at 17. I am sure he received help and money from his mother at points, but this idea he is some trust fund kid like Donald Trump. People really believe they would be as successful as him if they grew up being abused in an upper class family in apartheid South Africa. It doesn't make him a good person, and there is so much to criticism about him, that I think it actually detracts from legitimate criticism.

Yeah, I really hate this revisionism of Elon as an extremely wealthy apartheid emerald mine heir who was a dumb guy who happened to get lucky at paypal and then stole all his money from the government while operating a car and rocket company. There is plenty to criticize about him, but SpaceX dramatically decreased cost to orbit which had reliance on Russian technology at the time.

Everything happening in America is a choice. Policy is a choice. Whatever you believe or values you have, what your congressmen, senators and president do, is a choice. Most things that benefit normal people are not "too hard". This country has a policy constructed to benefit 10,000 people at the expense of 330m. I am not a pessimist, but man, it is shocking. There is only like 1 out of 500 people in power that genuinely values democracy, this country or the people. I am sure it will be somewhat great for the people at the top, but I am curious what happens when say 100 million people can't meaningfully live in American society.

Yes, this is something more people really need to take to heart. As Americans are seeing, a lot of rules are unenforceable and really came down to norms and pressure. I have been thinking about this a lot over the last few years and it is roughly encapsulated in this tweet I saw a while back.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a police officer because I wouldn't have to follow any laws or rules. Then I got a little bit older and realized that wasn't how being a police officer actually worked in practice. Then, I got a little bit older than that, and realized that it actually does work like that.

This has always been true and there has never really been perfect justice. Ultimately, power and violence have always superseded the law. High trust societies with less corruption and a strong justice system try to limit these circumstances.

There is too much business risk in running on an American company. They can pull the model back or lobotimize it. No Alex Karp fan, but he was right: companies are worried about hyperscalers stealing their alpha. The lack of guardrails, data security and control really give these open models the edge. If you factor in that they appear to cost less, the hyperscalers are in big trouble. I don't see how this works out. Software was always supposed to be deflationary and collapse down to 0 marginal cost but this isn't remotely the case. It's truly amazing to see the state of open weight models

Did I miss the part of the article where they break down how they determined race? Is the algorithm blind to race? It looks like they specifically looked at 83k people applying to ~100 companies which notably were Fortune 500 companies. Could there simply be candidate discrepancies here? Hard for me to follow the full methodology but it doesn't necessarily seem either malicious or that well structured. Don't you need to have a control group of applicants who are similar on paper? To allege DISCRIMINATION is quite bold.

Definitely open to opposing or critical views

The author does mention it, they just don't deeply analyze it. Frankly, it goes without saying. If you are considering a framework and reading articles about it, you almost certainly understand the tradeoff and it was mentioned in the article. Given the build quality of Apple and the option to lock in Apple care vs. the insane cost of computer parts, it isn't that important. Especially for an entry level laptop.

Certainly in America but all over the west, people are significantly less capable of media literacy. Sometimes the obvious needs to be said.

This really doesn't have much to do with oil. This is because Marco Rubio and a cadre of wealthy elite immigrants who fled communism in the last half century have this grand vision of revenge and subscribe to an absurd notion of Domino Theory where communism will fall. Maduro already promised to stop trading with China and negotiate absurdly favorable mineral and energy deals. He even conceded to give up power on a 2-3 year timeline. Obviously, we will go in and control the nation and take a ton of resources. However, this was primarily about Marco Rubio living out his father's fantasy as outlined in his autobiography. It was sold to Trump as a drugs bust because he is an absolute moron and needed a distraction from Epstein.

Honestly, this is disgusting. Trump is personally renting and selling out America for personal profit. To Israel and now a cadre of South Floridians. He is selling passports and pardons and letting countries have trade deals or bases. I simply do not understand how everyone with power is letting this happen. This is not even ideological. The country is in recession and we are attached to 3 wars. WTF IS HAPPENING?

The board approved his pay package 2 times. The share price when the initial operating milestones were set was roughly $21 and he was able to raise the share price to >$450. Regardless of anyone's opinion on Elon Musk, the pay package was obviously valid. His performance was directly incentivized by tying it to business outcomes which at the time were considered completely impossible. The board approved this twice. This is politicized garbage. I am not a lawyer but it says the initial denial of his package were for procedural violations and undue influence. However, this is the case in all founder run companies. It seems pretty straight forward and fair, they set absurd milestones and quotas which, in the event they were met, would mean the company would be in tremendous and unthinkable financial position. All shareholders were handsomely rewarded.

If you didn't intentionally try and trick us, then yes, you used an LLM.

The hellfire missile video not striking a UAP is crazy.

Tesla isn't the best proxy for what is normal. While Tesla has had a lot of issues and the critiques and articles are valid, it definitely seems like the media coverage was much more widespread and pervasive because 1)Anti Elon sentiment sells ads and clicks 2) it was somewhat agenda based. I am not making a political statement, but I think what I said is objectively true.

Leaving aside the ranking this article itself employs, it does seem to track. I will arbitrarily and qualitatively try and touch on some perceived benefits of a US passport / citizenship that seem to be falling:

- Visaless entry

- Ability to skip lines or fast track through immigration

- Embassy services

- Marriage prospect: Often US citizens were desirable or at least neutral partners for international relationships. Foreign nationals considered the option of relocating to America favorably. A partner may not want to relocate to the US now, or want a relationship with an American.

- General disapproval of Americans abroad in some countries

- Likelihood the government would intervene on your behalf. Brittney Griner / Travis King.

The Trump government does not seem as capable at governing. The Democrats seem to be be better at governing and favor bureaucracy more, whether this is true or perceived, I will not claim to know. The government itself is not funded/shut down currently which may impact embassies and clerical services. There does seem to be a general dislike of America and frustration building in many populations and presumably governments. The standing of America has greatly fallen in the world. While hostilities seem to be rising, America's ability to project soft and real power seem to be falling. This can impact some of the points above.

I am sure there are other points I have missed and factors I have overlooked. I would say that the general perception of the "strength" of a passport has fallen.