Everything old is good and everything new is evil. The irony of this being posted online in written form is lost on the author. Socrates would probably have an aneurysm.
Seems to still depend on some state that they show on the display, makes it seems like you still need to hit "invisible" buttons in the iPad UI to start setting the temperature with the hardware "lever", kind of defeating the purpose. But maybe again it's just the website/images/videos being unclear.
I guess there is probably some easy and "no look" way to go to some default state where you control temperature etc. If you start fiddling with songs etc it's been distracting since forever anyway, physical knobs or not. Fine-tuning the frequency knob to get rid of the noise was always distracting.
For people who buy a Ferrari the price is not part of the equation at all.
Also Ferrari’s whole game is demand and supply manipulation - there are always more people who want a Ferrari than can actually buy one. These will all sell out whatever happens.
> retaliation would mean more anti-US people selecting themselves into these projects.
Very few people are martyrs or want to become martyrs. Even fewer in places where life is generally fine and for a cause that isn't dire to their loved ones.
The curve of willingness to oppose aggressive action rises significantly before it drops off at some safety threshold. I believe US-Europe relations are still well below that threshold and the rise in level of aggression is only stirring up more resistance, not less.
I think you highlighted something without meaning to. The core problem is that short of literally nuking Brussels I don't think the EU will ever think the threshold was crossed. Even then I'm not sure. The US has threatened to invade sovereign EU territory multiple times this week alone and we're still having this chat here. The US will keep pushing because the EU does basically nothing when it's literally threatened with invasion.
> The reason Germany didn't prepare for it was because multiple leading politicians were bought and paid for by Russia. Be totally clear about that. Former German president was working for Gazprom on the project whose stated aim was to facilitate an invasion of Ukraine at some point (which Trump pointed out, and EU politicians literally laughed at him).
To add to your point, despite this the German population seems to strongly believe there is no corruption in their government. Local minima, everything is fine, there is no fire, I'm going to make some tea while the tables turns to ash under the pot.
As the other answer says, surely this would always be the case. People do not deal with government regularly and there is a strong disincentive to report upon this.
I think you see the same thing in every Western democracy where people believe there is no corruption or believe in rather comical forms of corruption, but the corruption is actually systemic and a function of some political configuration that can't really stand change. This is certainly the case in Germany where you have this odd alliance between unions and billionaires that has basically led to, despite the amazing talent of their people, amazingly poor policy delivery.
And pray tell, what does the American or the Chinese worker in this case get out of their higher productivity and competitiveness? Because it really seems that it's not quality of life, that's for certain.
More money and material comforts? Well perhaps, but then again, I do wonder just how many would willingly take that rather than for example a proper work-life balance or clean environment. And we'll probably have to rethink the relationship of our societies with material consumption etc. in the coming decades anyway due to the climate emergency, and so maybe it'd actually be better for the US or China to adopt our "less competitive" stance rather than for us to try to agonise on trying to get ourselves competitive with them.
No one has yet figured out just what one's material possessions will do for them after they're dead. At best you can pass them to your next of kin, but that doesn't need the kind of hyper competitive, hyper capitalistic mindset espoused by the US or China.
> Nobody's bribing a councilmember in an 800-person rural township.
I suspect this happens a lot more often than people assume. It does not take much to bribe people to change their minds based on the publicly known international spy/espionage cases. People will sell out their country for like $5k.
And besides, these days no ones giving straight cash to bribe, it's always via other means that are harder to trace and maybe not even directly monetary (sending them on a vacation, golfing, donations to charity...).
It's weird that people seem to act like lobbying doesn't exist at the city council level.
I love how through the course of 3 comments, it went from "straightforwardly illegal" to "morally shady", then to "exactly how governments should work". What's the alternative here? Should people not be allowed to cultivate relationships with their representatives? Is it ethically dubious for you to go with a company with a responsive sales team that's friendly and answers your questions, compared to their competitor that takes 2 weeks to responds and sneers at you?
Yes, I’d say it is ethically dubious, especially when it goes against what the citizens were asking for. Definitely a fine line and a bit of a gray area but still, lots of gov officials don’t get caught up in this and manage just fine. It’s the ones that are easily swayed shouldn’t be in any position of power. Also IMO lobbying should be illegal.
I'm not sure what you're responding to. I'm just saying that you don't need to bribe people. Obviously while bribery is illegal, calling someone and listening to their problems, assuring them you're on their side, and telling them they are very smart is not illegal.
I think a lot about another comment from a while ago that donated 100 dollars or something to his city. That had his state govenor personally call him to thank him in a 5 minute call.
It's not a bribe, but if a govenor is placing his time @ 1200/hour for an individualized bow of gratitude, I can only imagine how cheap it is for a not good govenor to sell out for his own personal interests.
At the scale these tech trillionaires are working, why not throw a few pennies at some small councilman?
Those old enough will remember when Hare Krishnas proved that for a lot of people even a single cheap flower can trigger a feeling of reciprocity. It doesn't take much. The Airplane joke exists because the best way to avoid that is to not accept. Once you do...
First Law of Message Boards: bribery is fun to talk about, people just disagreeing about stuff and having little temper tantrums when they lose arguments is boring, ergo: bribery is everywhere.
I guess you never dealt with enterprise sales, lobbying or any of the hundred of ways we legally allow bribes. Or do you only consider it bribery if its illegal and otherwise it's all fine?
Just box office baseball tickets, just a $2k steak dinner with high end wine, just a phone call with the governor, just a gift card, just an advisor position with some equity, etc, etc, etc.
> The First Law: Every forum is always in a state of constant decline.
> All forums start off good, enjoy a "honeymoon period" in which they continue to be good, and then steadily decline... from the point of view of each individual observer...
"Temper tantrum" is a satisfying way to describe the speech of people we hate. Yes, sometimes it's an appropriate description, but it's also a big red flag. I think using that phrase flippantly on a forum in fact contributes to the degradation of that forum.
Middle management exists to turn conflicting marching orders from the directors into less conflicting marching orders for the line workers, and to keep any negative feedback on how fucking stupid the directors are from ever reaching them.
They don't cause the broken processes. They are the symptom of a broken executive process. A fish rots from the head down, and the people at the top get exactly the kind of company that they ask for.
> Like how anyone can basically take all you work & base a proprietary fork on it with maybe saying "thanks" (attribution) if they feel like it ? :P
I'd assume the Bun people got a bit more than a thanks when Anthropic acquired them. :)
You also can't take your GPL code (unless you do CLAs with all contributors), convert it to closed source yourself and make a massive VC funded startup around it. Which is about the only other way anyone makes better money from open source than by just working for a big tech company.
Please use the internet.
Please use search engines.
Please use AI.
Everything old is good and everything new is evil. The irony of this being posted online in written form is lost on the author. Socrates would probably have an aneurysm.
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