What missing is that code being written by AI may have less of an impact than dataset that are developed or refined by AI. Consider examples like a utility function's coefficients, or the weights of a model.
As these are aggressively tuned using ML feedback, they'll influence far more systems than raw code.
Place and routing compilers used in semiconductor design are not. Ironically, simulated annealing is the typical mechanism and is by any appropriate definition, imo, a type of AI.
Whatever you do in your life using devices that run software are proof that these tools are effective for continuing to scale complexity.
Annoying to use also ;)
They made it ridiculously convoluted to order. You need to use the awful MyChevrolet app, and click your initials in the corner. From there, select "Public Charging". After it loads, there should be a Tesla-related option to click towards the top. (If it's missing, force-kill the app and relaunch and try again. I had to do that, even though I was already running the latest version of the app.)
Next you'll need to enter a credit card, and then X out of the confirmation screen. Finally you'll get a link to order the adapter, which you can only access in a web view inside the MyChevrolet app.
The web view will show multiple discount codes regarding parts, but none of the %-off ones do anything for this order, only the free shipping one works on this. Also don't click the outermost X during the order process, since this will close the web view and make you start over. At times you'll need to click an "inner" X below that. It's one of the worst order interfaces I've ever seen.
Oh, and the first time I actually made it through the full checkout process, it gave me an error and said to try again later. But it wouldn't let me try again later (couldn't resubmit my order/cart) so I had to start from scratch for like the third time.
Also the adapter is already on backorder, so there's no estimation of when this will actually ship.
Sigh. GM. I was so happy with my Volt. Was going to keep it until it rusted away. Until my wife totaled it last Friday. Now I'm shopping for a new car with the measly amount insurance will pay me out. And... what a sad state of affairs with GM. Discontinued the Bolt, and never evolved that line further, and the only thing in their lineup now are big honkin' trucks and SUVs. And I hear they're dropping Android Auto / CarPlay support.
Way to blow their early mostly decent efforts in EV territory.
I'd pick up a second hand Bolt if it wasn't for the fact that the fast charging situation with them is... not competitive.
I barely drive these days since WFH. But when I do more than go get groceries or school drop off, it's for a 7-10 hour drive for a ski trip to Vermont or Quebec. Which would have to involve fast chargers.
Granted, I could probably just drive my wife's Outlander PHEV in that case. But seeing as she just totaled my Volt...
the 2021 Bolt that I drive could probably do that trip with a single 45-minute charge stop in the middle. I know that’s slow compared to a Tesla, but it ends up being fine most of the time
Honestly in your situation I'd wait it out and try to work with one car. The new Ioniq 5 models will have NACS, and plenty of other good things to look forward to for other cars.
yeah we live rural with two teens, so no car isn't much of an option but I'm thinking I'll just buy a cheap used ICE to tide me over until interest rates drop and I can save some $$ and go buy a new EV :-(
had my eye on a used polestar 2 or mustang mach-e, but not sure I can justify debt for that
thank you. I was able to follow these instructions. One must wonder how they managed to sell out of these adapters while making it so difficult to place an order.
It asked me if I wanted to fill out a customer satisfaction survey, but the form to enter my phone number was broken so I was not able to.
their rewards program login is also broken, and I tried talking to their support chatbot and it told me to try during business hours and disconnected?? none of this inspires confidence
Yeah, pretty much every single interaction I've ever had with GM/Chevy has gone this way :/ Feels like it's either an absolutely staggering level of incompetence, or the world's most effective team of sadists over there.
“ The obvious loss is to government revenue, but the more subtle and still very real loss is the diversion of high-powered talent from what could have been gains in efficiency and productivity to focus instead on corporate reorganizations and tax evasion games.”
I’d expect very little overlap between those talent pools.
Tangential, but a pet project I've been working on has been doing exactly that! Looking at US federal tax laws and using constraints solves to find optimal paths to the lowest taxes.
I don't really do anything besides play with it, my taxes are very simple and boring, but it's been a fun project to play around with.
Those two concepts are very much the same thing. There is no literally distinction between legally minimising the taxes you have to pay, and legally avoiding a tax that you would otherwise have to pay. You just want to have a different word to use to criticise people/groups/companies you don’t like doing something you seem to otherwise approve of, so you don’t look like a hypocrite.
My accountant defined it this way… minimization is legal, avoidance is not.
Minimization is just taking advantage of the tax loopholes and strategies that are within bounds. Avoidance is lying or ignoring.
Yes it’s possible to minimize your taxes down to zero legally in many cases, but you’ll pay a good percentage of that savings to accounts and lawyers for managing that structure.
I’m struggling to believe that a qualified accountant said that. Tax avoidance is completely legal, if it becomes illegal, then that’s called tax evasion.
Avoidance and “minimisation” are the same thing, evasion is a crime.
I think of minimization as doing things like taking deductions, and avoidance as creating confusing structures of new entities in order to take advantage of gray areas and deciding that the cost of getting caught is not material.
Yeah, that's fair enough; outside of keeping as much money as I can in ETFs and index funds, my tax strategies are pretty much non-existent since I don't have enough money for it make a huge difference.
If there are any novel or situation-specific conclusions drawn, that sounds like an easy sell to CPAs and independent tax preparers. Maybe even individual tax optimizers.
My naive assumption is that sophisticated analysis will return the same few well-known recommendations almost all the time -- the taxation variant of eating properly, sleeping regularly, and getting appropriate exercise.
Certainly for anything I actually do, I've not found anything that is better than something like TurboTax gives me.
The scope of what I'm working on is trying to build strategies for holding and selling stock as well in order to minimize taxes. I've only ever used it on paper trades.
How many people pursue business or accounting degrees instead of mechanical engineering or biotechnology degrees? The talent flows to what policy incentivizes, over the long run.
Your point, that people can't just switch careers willy nilly, actually reinforces the point of the article -- that incentivizing accounting games actually reduces time spent on impactful pursuits in the long run.
More like how many people with degrees in Business go into Management Consulting, would like to join a startup as a Product Manager, or accountants that want to be Associates at a VC firm rather than work a big 4.
But even for programmers, plenty of people make the decision to go into programming or medicine or law because they are well paid and respected careers. And interests in secondary school and university are influenced by parents, teachers and the culture promoting certain directions. Kids these days are bombarded by STEM everything.
Interesting enough I read an article that there is going to be and there is to some degree, a large shortage of accountants over the next 10-20 years as people entering the profession are at record lows and retirements are at all time highs
Tons of people who get degrees in technical fields work outside that field. There are many people who have have spent at least part of their studies or career in hard science, SWE, IT, management consulting, law or finance before switching to something else in that list to improve their work/life balance, to make more money, to find employment more easily, or simply because learning the field and cracking its puzzles is engaging work for them no matter the exact technical field it's in.
High finance and crypto are two places where a high concentration of technical skills intersect with using those same skills to game our financial and legal systems.
If there were no need for tax avoidance accountants, they very well might have chosen to study to become software engineers instead. It's not like they were born a tax avoidance accountant and would be sitting in the field rotting if they couldn't find work avoiding taxes. Many would at least be regular accountants (efficiently allocating money is still more useful to all of us than efficiently avoiding taxes), or maybe some other sort of lawyer (your city's prosecutors AND your city's public defenders are both sorely overworked).
Yes and those few software devs who work in the accounting sector on facilitating tax evasion aren't exactly changing the world for the better. Not exactly the best use of their skills.
Tax avoidance is a legal problem instead of a tech problem, but it has many parallels wherever there are bad incentives. These are fundamentally not pro-social activities, but trying to get an unfair advantage through loopholes.
More computer programmers might moonlight as SEO gurus, if search engines didn't put up at least a token amount of resistance against scummy low-effort SEO tactics.
Fewer tax avoidance accountants would still be tax avoidance accountants, if we made a bigger effort to prevent it. (And that doesn't mean accountants would have to be programmers instead, there are many other kinds of talent)
Wow. I can't believe people believe this is still true in 2024.
I worked in crypto sector which paid really well in some cases... Though compensation had little to do with talent and more to do with focus on political bs and alignment with the needs of corrupt authorities. Some could argue there was an inverse correlation between talent and compensation as the most corrupt people are often that way because they lack talent to begin with.
I've observed similar dynamics in big tech corporations, unfortunately. People are promoted on the basis of their incompetence and capacity for self-delusion as it creates the necessary blind-spots which allow organizations to occasionally poke their toes beyond red lines to reap massive profits.
Stupidity and incompetence are useful attributes within corporations because they instill a feeling of insecurity in the minds of the affected employees and this makes them highly loyal and controllable. Sometimes I think one of the main reasons these companies hire actual intelligent people is to make the incompetent people feel insecure 'imposter syndrome' and increase their degree of loyalty/compliance. They don't actually need intelligent people to run things because they have monopolies and the big profits are to be reaped in maintaining their monopolies which is achieved via dirty politics; not achieved via innovation.
I think many intelligent people have observed this reality in companies they worked for. We've seen the HR manager who will bend over backwards to deny reality to align with the goals of management.
Interesting anecdotal response but it’s pretty obvious that top pay attracts top talent, basic market dynamics. Obviously grifters gravitate to where money is, that doesn’t mean all to talent at high pay is a grifter. Correlation != causation
Tax law is the highest paid field within law. High pay attracts smart people. Smart people could do something more beneficial to society with their time. (Source: I'm married to a tax lawyer)
Reading that, seems like RealPage could protect itself from similar problems if they simply avoid using the same sales rhetoric, and don't do explicit recommendations. "You are paying way more for this position than others... hmmmm."
Surely they are aware of the similarities and are strategizing.
It was disconcerting to arrive home to that many news vans in front of my house.
reply