A feature that makes it easier for their users to migrate to a competitor? Blockchain Capital invests $15M in BlueSky. Insert that Anakin / Padme meme:
Anakin: Now that we’ve invested, let’s make that federation feature priority 0
Padme: As in highest priority, right?
Anakin:
Padme: As in highest priority, right?
Fuck the poor, fuck the old, fuck the environment, fuck soldiers and veterans, fuck the sick, fuck food safety…
My mom is so stupid she’s a fucking hazard.
If there’s a club for that, I’m in it too.
I literally don’t understand how my mom gets through day-to-day life. It’s just a matter of time before her bank accounts are drained by a scammer because no matter how many times I try to explain it to her, she believes everything she sees online as long as it reinforces something she already believes. If it challenges her beliefs she ignores it.
She got an email that said she owed money to an internet service provider she doesn’t use, and hasn’t ever used. Obvious scam, right? She knows she doesn’t use them, but the email seemed “Truthy” so she was really worried that she owed them money. There’s no way to convince her that it’s a scam because even facts like “that’s not your ISP, you don’t and have never used that ISP” can’t penetrate.
She trusts memes more than family members who have degrees in something and are willing to patiently explain it to her. She spends a lot of money buying snake oil, or overpaying for things she can get essentially for free (i.e. buying bottled water because she’s afraid of fluorine in municipal water). This has made me realize what a huge amount of the world’s economy isn’t people buying things they need, or even things they want because it makes their lives better, it’s people buying things they don’t need because they’re afraid of something that isn’t real.
Anyhow, yeah, Trump won the idiot vote, and he’s going to make changes to the US that will increase the number of idiots. Things are going great.
Online? Yes.
In person to friends while chest bumping and hooting? Yes.
In person to a woman they don’t know in all seriousness, and not just to antagonize? I sure hope not.
It definitely looks like you are.
Someone in their late 40s is not a girl.
It’s amazing the stories that Americans tell themselves about the American Revolution. They pretend that the “founding fathers” were heroic idealists standing up for honorable values against an evil despotic regime. The truth is much more complicated.
A major goal of the 7 Years War was about controlling the colonies in the Americas. Had the French won those wars, the modern people of North America would probably speak French. Look at how many US places still have French names, and especially are named after the French king: Louisiana, Louisville, St. Louis, Mobile, New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Detroit, Lafayette, Arkansas, Illinois, Calumet, Decatur, Boise, Montpelier, etc. But, the French lost the war, so the English took over all that territory. Fighting that war was incredibly expensive, but it was worth it for the English because they now controlled a whole new continent with all its resources. To pay for that war, they levied taxes. The English colonists in the US, who were largely the beneficiaries of that part of the war, decided they didn’t want to pay those taxes, so they rebelled. They got the benefit of a continent won for them by English armies, but without having to pay the bill for that fight. Now, again, it’s complicated. The English armies were integrated with the colonial armies. George Washington was initially an officer in the British army (and was part of starting the French and Indian wars, which became the 7-years-war). The US colonists were part of the force that fought against the French and their native allies.
Anyhow, it was complicated. But, the end result was that after a war that took place both in Europe and in the Americas, the British crown had a huge debt. I have no idea what proportion of that debt was due to the part of the war fought in Europe vs. the part of the war fought in the Americas, but overall there was a big debt and the English crown tried to tax whoever they could to pay for it.
Was the English king a tyrant? Sure. Did the Americans have fair representation in the English parliament? Probably not. But, their main reason for rebelling was the same one that is nearly always the cause of rebellions: the rebels are in an area that’s wealthy for some reason, and they don’t want to have to share that wealth with the rest of the country / empire. In fact, it was suspected that the colonists chose not to send representatives to the colonial assembly partially because they knew that if they did that it would undermine their “without representation” argument, and the real issue was that they simply didn’t want to pay taxes.
As for the English system being tyrannical, the reality is that it has been a very slow, gradual change from an absolute monarchy to a ceremonial one. The English crown is significantly less wealthy than Elon Musk, and arguably has a lot less influence on British politics than Musk does on American politics.
By the letter of the laws, the British system is still more classist and controlled by money than the American system. But, is that true if you look at the actual real way that power is used? It doesn’t seem like it to me.
It is. It’s that plus an important process for living organisms rather than just burning something.
What makes you think there’s a threshold?
What’s interesting is that historically a lot of people never had children. But, by definition, none of your ancestors were among them.
So, even if being a childless femboy slut was incredibly common historically, that’s the one thing none of your ancestors would be able to understand.
It’s not just one generation receiving an education vs. another one that didn’t. It’s that the platforms the generations used are fundamentally different.
Gen X / Millennials grew up with Macs and PCs, computers that were fundamentally not locked down. You could install any software you wanted. You could modify the OS in many ways. DRM wasn’t really a thing in general, and there were almost always easy ways around it.
Gen Z / Gen Alpha grew up mostly with cell phones. The phones they had are much more powerful than the PCs from 20-30 years ago, but they’re incredibly locked down. The only applications you’re allowed to use are the ones that Apple / Google allow on their app stores, unless you root your phone which is a major risk. It’s very hard to even load up your own audio files, movies or images let alone “dodgy” ones. DRM is everywhere, and the DMCA means you risk serious prison time if you bypass access controls.
Gen X / Millennials grew up at a time when there were still more than 5 tech companies in the world, and the companies out there competed with each-other. There were plenty of real standards, and lots of other de-facto standards that allowed programs to interoperate. Now you’re lucky if you can even use an app via its website vs. using a required app.
It’s not just a difference in education. It’s that companies have gained a lot more power, and the lack of antitrust enforcement has made for plenty of walled gardens and “look but don’t touch” experiences.
Or, what if a government granted a monopoly on sidewalks within the city to SideWalking Inc. SideWalking spent all kinds of money setting up turnstiles all over the busiest sidewalks equipped with NFC readers, then ran an ad campaign telling people where to buy their sidewalk authorization cards, etc. And then they realized that people were just hopping over the turnstiles! Who recoups the cost to put up all the turnstiles and install all the NFC readers?
Hey, you’re that guy who doesn’t know anything about copyright, but has strong opinions, right?
In other words “You’re right, I don’t know anything about copyright.”
All that’s happening here is a bunch of computer nerds have figured out how to get things for free
No, all that’s happened is that the state has convinced you that it’s reasonable to grant someone a monopoly on the expression of an idea that lasts something like 120 years. I bet you’ve never even stopped to question that, or that you even know what the length of the original copyright term is. I bet you don’t know the history of Hollywood, and how it ties in with copyright infringement. Or, how when the US was a new country it immediately ignored all the copyrights imposed by the British monarch.
Same thing as all the looters in California who know that they can steal up to $1,000 of merchandise from any brick and mortar store, with no consequences
Suuuuure… That happened. And now you’re conflating theft with copyright infringement again. They’re not at all the same.
and running out the door
Why would they be running out the door if there are no consequences? It’s almost as if there would be consequences if they were caught.
Is this the kind of world you want to live in?
You mean, the current world? The one that works according to the rules you’re advocating?
Movies, video games and music aren’t “products”.
If I want something, I need to pay for it. That’s how the world works.
Yes, it is. Isn’t that a shame? They’ve convinced you that that’s normal, when it isn’t. We could make the world a better place.
It’s worse than that.
https://toad.social/@davetroy/113476797192400901
Dorsey’s already out, the people running the project are from the TESCREAL gang.