This week we had a few minutes of downtime on an internal service because of a node rotation that triggered an alert. The responding engineer started to put together a plan to make the service HA (which would have tripled the cost to serve). I asked how frequently the service went down and how many people would be inconvenienced if it did. They didn't know, but when we checked the metrics it had single-digit minutes of downtime this year and fewer than a dozen daily users. We bumped the threshold on the alert to longer than it takes for a pod to be re-scheduled and resolved the ticket.
This is most sensible thing I’ve read on here in a while. Engineers’ obsession with tinkering and perfection is the slow death of many startups. If you’re doing something important like banking or air traffic control fair enough but a CRUD app for booking hair appointments will survive a bit of downtime
Except according to Graeber those jobs exist because leaders, companies, and society like having lots of employees doing this work for various reasons and we all more or less tacitly agree that the output of those jobs is useless and only exists because the last 50 years of productivity gains mean there isn't enough real work to keep everyone busy for 40+ hours 50 weeks a year.
I really enjoyed DoW2 as an action RPG but share your disappointment with it as a sequel to DoW1. I think it would have been received better with a different title.
Those features are mostly being added to existing products and therefore aren't supporting new revenue streams. It remains to be seen if these features are popular enough to become table stakes for the existing OS and productivity software businesses and justify continued investment.
However, they require constant human monitoring and interventions from those humans every few miles to work properly - and it's not clear that the need for those interventions will be solved with more training data.
Why wouldn’t they? This technology is not a competitive advantage for their company, wouldn’t make sense for them to sell as a standalone product, and it helps their engineering department attract good talent.
I expect that, over the next few years, companies that need to lay off workers will spin their mismanagement by claiming they are replacing those jobs with "AI".
I drive a Volt and I’m convinced this configuration of car is what many Americans should be buying until battery manufacturing ramps up and EV fast charging infrastructure is widely deployed. It gets 45-60mi range but it charges just fine overnight from a 120v plug. Most of the time it’s an EV, but we need the extra range several times a month for longer local trips or to visit family in a nearby city. The gas engine requires very little maintenance because it runs infrequently and at optimal RPM and load, it weighs less than a 200mi+ range battery, and (for now) it’s easier to manufacture from more common materials.
I agree. I also drive a volt and 98% of the time it's driven with the battery, but those 2% of the time where I need/want the engine (like a camping trip this past weekend), it's really great.
I don't every want a 100% electric car. We're a 1 car household so I really want the flexibility of going wherever without having to plan around the charger network.
