dabraham1248

> I can't wait until AI helps us remove multiple layers of middle men across Sales in general.

Based on how things are moving, I think it's more likely that AI will _replace_ the layers of middle men (with layers of "middle AI"), then that those layers will be _removed_.

To rip off my own comment from a couple of months ago:

This kind of reflexive both-sides-ism works to obfuscate the _huge_ difference in scale, _and_ the occasional, small-but-real attempts of mostly democrats to do something about it.

Now, if the democrats had more big donors than republicans, maybe they wouldn't? But that's a counterfactual that we can't know. But we do know that Bush 1 vetoed a soft money limit passed mostly by democrats, and that Clinton pushed for one, but didn't get it done.

McCain-Feingold passed the Senate with 48 out of 50 D votes (96%), and 11 of 38 R votes (29%) (and one I (100%)), the House with 198 of 210 D (94%), and house, 41 out of 217 R (19%), 1 out of 2 I (50%). Then it was a mostly R appointed Supreme Court that gutted it. Then a _more_ R appointed court that has continued to whittle it down.

For all that the Democrats don't go far enough, there is a _huge_ difference between the parties on this.

Mostly to be a pedantic devil's advocate here, I'm going to argue with something you're not saying. I've heard a _lot_ of people argue that the visit is _proof_ of corruption. You're just pointing out the possibility and I'm hoping to head off a bad path.

Anyway, if a company is being declared the source of a multi-state outbreak, that company _should_ be talking to the WH. And it's possible that some of those discussions would present evidence that _should_ result in a retraction.

For example, during heartbleed my grand-boss was in on calls with the WH (I don't work on openssl, at the time I worked on a product that _used_ openssl a couple of layers down). AIUI, official guidance changed because of those calls.

If we want to find proof of corruption, this is a place to start looking, not a place to stop.

I mean, _kinda_? This kind of reflexive both-sides-ism works to obfuscate the _huge_ difference in scale, _and_ the occasional, small-but-real attempts of mostly democrats to do something about it.

Now, if the democrats had more big donors than republicans, maybe they wouldn't? But that's a counterfactual that we can't know. But we do know that Bush 1 vetoed a soft money limit passed mostly by democrats, and that Clinton pushed for one, but didn't get it done.

McCain-Feingold passed the Senate with 48 out of 50 D votes (96%), and 11 of 38 R votes (29%) (and one I (100%)), the House with 198 of 210 D (94%), and house, 41 out of 217 R (19%), 1 out of 2 I (50%). Then it was a mostly R appointed Supreme Court that gutted it. Then a _more_ R appointed court that has continued to whittle it down.

For all that the Democrats don't go far enough, there is a _huge_ difference between the parties on this.

I'm going to assert that Tesla's FSD™ does not, in fact work on city streets and highways.

Or, if you want to loosely define "work", Ernst Dickmanns had self driving in the 80s, and put in on the autobahn in the 90s. I'd rather define it more tightly as "statistically at least as safe to be in _and_ to be near, as a human driver".

Tesla claims to have achieved that, but I don't believe them. That's because the data they report 1) omits a fair bit of critical info, and 2) frequently changes definitions. Both serve to make comparisons difficult. If it was clearly safe, I think they'd put effort into making the comparison transparent.

Bear in mind that Musk has been claiming "Full Self-Driving" since at least 2016, and people involved have asserted that he wasn't wrong, he was lying.

> Sounds like that would severely decrease what authors can earn, especially older ones.

I mean, I know a bunch of authors. All of them wrote because they needed to write (even the textbook authors). And almost none of them earned much of anything from it (even the textbook authors). One English prof told me that he received almost enough for his morning coffee for about three years. Then he didn't. And he drank just plain coffee.

"The problem for most artists isn't piracy, it's obscurity." "Less copyright" != "piracy", but I think it has the same effect in this case (theoretically less value placed on the work of an author, but not practically).

Also, this might be coincidence, but copyright has gotten extended at the same time as most authors have received less from publishing.

All that said, I want society as a whole to be better, people to have more opportunities to grow, good ideas more of a chance to flourish. I think that overly strong copyright fights against that. And IME (ok, secondhand experience) that 99.9% of the profits added by strong copyright goes to the publishers, not the authors.

While I _absolutely_ agree with those sentiments, I have seen nothing like consensus on them myself (in mostly tech startups, but also fintech, and financial (yes, those are different things)). If I limit it to programmers I respect, the percentages go up, but to _maybe_ 75% tops.

I mean, I dispute your implication that he's not destroying twitter (I mean, ever since he took it private we don't have hard numbers. But that itself doesn't suggest _good_ things).

But aside from that, and the two examples above, 1. x.com (the original) 2. tesla has been killing way more people since he retroactively became a founder (there was a delay while existing products moved through the pipeline) 3. solarcity 4. optimus 5. neuralink (well, ok, it hasn't failed yet. But _I'm_ not betting on it...) 6. the Tham Luang cave rescue 7. crypto 8. his relationships with his kids / exes

TBF, spacex appears to be his baby, and it has done _much_ better than I ever thought it would. There are rumors about the existence of a whole team there preventing him from breaking things, and personally, I believe them. But I have nothing _remotely_ like proof. And even if those rumors are true, spacex appears to have been his idea, he hired the first batch of people, etc. He can definitely take loads of credit for it, even if I don't think he deserves as much of said credit as he clearly thinks he deserves.

A modern kitchenaid isn't really better than a cuisinart. Back when they were made by hobart, yes, they were amazing (and, inflation adjusted, something like three times the price).

These days they have plastic (I'm sorry "composite") gears, and do not appear to be designed to be serviced, just replaced. My ex broke three of them attempting to make bagel dough.