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> children at Tiananmen Square. The US is descending into totalitarianism, but it hasn't reached that level yet.

Ask that question of the American Indians the USA genocided.

I do not see why USAnians killing Iranians is better than being killed by other Iranians. Dead is dead

The bombs that implemented the genocide in Gaza were dropped by the IDF but supplied, paid for and profited from USAnians

Not really so clear


> [AI customers] are using considerable time and resources to evaluate how expensive high-end models perform on certain tasks compared to cheaper alternatives.

That!

There are viable business models, at reasonable cost. But because there are now so many models available, and it is the way you use them that makes the difference, there is no moat for the big AI companies.

This is an industrial revolution. There are huge benefits available. They will not accrue to the "first movers"


> The bigger agcorps have tones of integration.

Yes, but how useful is the integration?

The sprayers/spreaders can be connected cheap computer to achieve most of what you describe.

I used to do literally that but in aircraft. Must be easier and cheaper in tractors


It's not complex if you have like three machines.

But if you're observing a fleet of 100+ machines you kinda need some integration and a central location. Which in turn connects to multiple other services like weather, crop markets, fuel prices etc.


I think that is a different market than the market for dumb tractors. There might be some overlap, but I doubt the people who want to fix their own tractors are different than the corporations that are tracking 100 tractors across hundreds/thousands of fields.

The best defense policy for the USA, any country really, is to be a good neighbor, good "world citizen" and reliable friend

One can dream


> Microsoft Copilot fetched the page as plain Chrome 135 on Linux x86_64, with a full browser-style Accept header and the usual burst of CSS,

Microsoft pushing up the Linux Desktop count.

I doubt that is corporate policy!


What is the counter factual to "virtue signaling"?

I think you need to rethink what you expect!


The counterfactual to virtue signaling is genuine, anonymous, or quiet action—acting on moral convictions without seeking public recognition or social status.

While virtue signaling is a public, often insincere display of moral superiority (a "recognition desire"), the true alternative is "walking the walk" through tangible deeds.


Be patient with Australians. They have have a terrible tradition of vicious racism.

The indigenous people of Australia were only considered part of Australian society (e.g. counted in the census) in 1967. As a New Zealander visiting Australia the casual racism of white Australians is mind blowing. New Zealand is not free from racism, far from it. Australia is next level

It will take a few generations for Australians to come to terms with living on stolen land, and to adjust to being colonisers. (White New Zelanders, Pākehā have been doing this for over thirty years, it is a process)

It is odd to put that declaration on a web page, how a digital asset is comparable to standing on land is clearly something the Australians are working on. Good luck to them, move on and let it be.


Acknowledgements of Country are not uncommon on Australian web sites, especially with arts organisations. Sometimes they're in the footer, sometimes as an interstitial. They're also common in speeches/formalities.

Edit: I'd agree though that NZ has a more mature perspective, stronger Maori population and that the condescension is probably fair.


What exactly is supposed to happen though? "Don't be horribly racist" is a nice idea, but it's not like we see people who put these acknowledgements up actually attempting to return the "stolen land"

I think it makes sense to put it on the website if you're going to do it though, since it's a website about, basically, a building in melbourne.


Well, similarly to how the neo-right slowly shifted the social frame with frog memes and screaming slurs at children on online FPS game lobbies, things like land acknowledgments slowly shift the reference frame of society towords a place where some good outcomes might actually be possible.

> it's not like we see people who put these acknowledgements up actually attempting to return the "stolen land"

It's a humiliation ritual that legitimizes claims of theft and invites stochastic violence against the people outing themselves as colonizers.

It's like apologizing for dubious rape allegations; once you apologize for it you've admitted guilt, and invite retribution from everybody positioned to impose it.

Forgiveness is never offered so there's no point to going along with any of these charades. They condemn you either way.


Let he who is without sin cast the first stone

States, generally, have to combat corruption.

This is an example. The corrupting influence of "Big money" up against transparency

Transparency helps, especially in Europe where civil society runs deep.

My mind is blown by the USAnian president blatantly grafting, out in the open, and it is not a political liability. Many political analysts think that is what cost Orbán the Hungarian election


Unsurprising

Did Amazon think they were too big to convict?

I wonder if they will meet the fate of Standard Oil, back in the day.


No, Antitrust law was effectively neutered by the Chicago School and their agent Robert Bork.

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/robert-borks-america...

(BTW that source is right-wing and can hardly be said to be biased against Bork).


That's fascinating. Bork was denied being on the supreme court but his ideas shaped current antitrust laws. It feels a bit like the old Standard Oil argument: It's ok to have a huge market share so long as pricing for goods gets cheaper even if it hurts competition overall. *edited* for grammar.

Yeah. Heather Cox Richardson was arguing about this today, saying that historically the job of the government was to decide that cheaper but gutting a local economy, or cheaper but taking enough market share to be able to heavily raise prices in the future was bad. But due to Bork that capacity of the government to actually help drive good outcomes for the bulk of the population has been gutted.

local small business should offer local specialty, if it's doing the exact same thing as the big business but with higher overhead, then why not find something much more productive for the folks there?

small local economies that are stagnating already for decades are not great for anyone. people who live there are struggling, no upward mobility, anyone a bit more successful leaves, the usual urban rural polarization intensifies, yadda yadda.

obviously one of the big drivers of this is the completely fucked up housing policy. (which itself is driven by public safety and public transit issues.)

education is a close second. then the return to office mandates. the all the discontinuities and disincentives of the braindead wrong implementation of welfare (and other social support/payments).

the real economy deadweight loss is easily 2-3% of GDP (per year of course)


Remember, Bork was the third guy who supinely did Nixon's bidding when Attornet-General and his deputy resigned rather than fire the special prosecutor investigating Watergate.

I thought this would be helpful for those who are not used to the way people from the Mother Country speak.

Being from a loyal colony myself, I want to be helpful for the USAinian rebels


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