adamlett

Yes, commons, rotating field systems, and similar arrangements show that.

> But. There were plenty of others where land ownership worked almost exactly like today’s systems.

Not quite. Transactions existed, but they were embedded in systems of obligation and sovereignty — kings, emperors, or lords claimed ultimate rights. That’s a different structure from modern absolute private ownership.

> The oldest clay tablets talk about buying and selling land, systems of laws protecting land ownership, court cases involving land disputes, and surveyors laying out stone boundary markers that were meant to stay put for centuries.

Those records exist, but even in Mesopotamia rulers could reallocate or confiscate land. Ownership wasn’t as secure or absolute as a modern freehold title.

> Incan quipu cords were records of who owned which piece of land.

Quipus tracked obligations and allocations. Land under the Inca was held communally and redistributed, not privately owned.

> Asian rice terraces have been individually owned for thousands of years.

Some land was inherited and sold, but there were also systems of redistribution (for example, the Chinese equal-field system). That’s not the same as permanent, alienable freehold.

> This urban legend that private property is not an ancient concept is really wonky.

It’s not an urban legend. Property has always been a bundle of rights that varied across societies. The modern model of land as a freely tradable commodity giving the holder near-total monopoly is comparatively recent.

In feudal Europe, land could only be “owned” by a lord, and even then it was bound up in obligations both to their superiors and to the peasants working it. There were all sorts of customary rights layered on top: in Denmark, for example, nobles had a monopoly on hunting and timber in their forests, but peasants still had rights to gather firewood, berries, nuts, mushrooms, and so on.

Village fields were also often organized under the open-field system, where land was divided into strips. Each household got a mix of good and poor soil, and in some places those strips were even periodically reallocated to keep things fair. It’s a very different picture from modern private property.

If all Dang did was deny, then yeah, it would be quite reasonable to not trust him. But presumably Dang is able to provide a reasonable alternative explanation and has the receipts to back it up.

We treat everyone as an individual. We do not unfairly stereotype, tokenize, or otherwise treat anyone as a member of a demographic group rather than as an individual.

That sounds great and all, but how? How exactly do you ensure that you only hire the best person for the job? How do you prevent unconscious biases from causing you to unfairly stereotype, tokenize, or otherwise treat anyone as a member of a demographic group rather than as an individual?

There is a mistaken belief that meritocracy somehow conflicts with diversity.

I think there is a very well founded belief that organisations that claim to be pure meritocracies struggle with diversity.

I strongly disagree. No group has a monopoly on excellence. A hiring process based on merit will naturally yield a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and ideas.

That’s probably true, if the hiring process truly is based on merit and nothing else. We have no way to tell if that’s the case here.

MEI has gotten us to where we are today.

Or maybe it was just product/market fit.

...

Any actual lawyer would tell you

Assuming you're not yourself a lawyer, doesn't speculating about what an actual lawyer would say or do make you an armchair lawyer?

A couple of observations:

1. Players like OneTrust and the consultants who specialize in this, are highly incentivized to play up the risks of not being compliant. My layman’s estimation of the legal risks is that the risk for good faith actors is actually pretty low. If the authorities find that you are not in compliance, you will most likely get a chance to rectify this, and possibly a slap on the wrist. Those scary fines measured in percent of global revenue, is not going to be what you face for an honest mistake.

2. Those businesses that rely on invasive tracking, and therefore really must use these banners, benefit from everyone else mistakingly believing that they too must compromise their UX with these banners. It makes what they do seem normal and acceptable.

No, they just need a legally binding agreement.

It's quite a requirement that to be considered overall best, a product must be best at every conceivable niche. You wouldn't disqualify Lionel Messi from consideration of being the world's best football player by saying that he is (probably) not a very good goalkeeper? Not to say that a MacBook is the Lionel Messi of laptops, but just that a laptop can overall best, while also being a bad fit for a particular role.

I also think price while obviously relevant when it comes to a purchasing decision, is irrelevant when talking about which product is better. To determine which tool is best for hammering nails, it's irrelevant that a rock is cheaper than a hammer. The only relevant criteria is which you would pick if you were free to choose. And, it would frankly be strange if the better product weren't also the more expensive product.

My personal opinion is that Apple has been killing it with their laptops since the introduction of the first M1 MacBook Air. This seems to also be the universal sentiment in the Apple community. I'm aware of no product in the PC space that seem so universally acclaimed, let alone could plausibly serve as basis for a claim that Apple is somehow behind in this category.