An intelligent, considered approach to regulating large internet companies. These are ideas that I feel like I am open to and can actually engage with. A refreshing divergence from most of what passes for analysis on the subject. Still, I have absolutely zero confidence in our government actually enacting any such policies fairly or effectively.
There are plenty of complicated problems in the world that don't have easy solutions. This is not one of them. How many more billions of dollars and millions of lives must be wasted before people realize that prohibition doesn't work?
This was a great article, I wish it got more reads as AOTD! I'm definitely not in the Burning Man demo but still really enjoyed it. A very well written piece on suicide prevention and human connection.
I read this article twice but I'm still missing the point. I propose a new rule that whenever someone says "we need new rules" (five time in this article) they have to state what those rules would actually look like.
Yes, the author is correct that facial recognition is but one of many ways individuals can be identified and tracked. What really disturbs me though are lazy, non-specific cries for authorities to regulate the free flow of information in order to address a poorly defined problem.
Lots of interesting history and lessons to be learned. We need to make sure Readup becomes the Spotify of stories and not the Grooveshark. I can't believe they had signed a contract with EMI but failed to make it work due to a lack of proper analytics and accounting.
Another great example highlighting the absurdity of the government telling adults what they can and cannot put into their own bodies. Endlessly frustrating.
Wow, this was eye-opening. I guess I always took it for granted that phonics was just the only way to learn how to read. After reading this article I'm feeling very lucky about that. These educators that are pushing back against the cueing system are doing amazing work.
I love the convenience of superspaces and efficiency of non-places but the author does a great job of articulating some of what has been lost to progress. It takes real effort to not just Netflix and Fresh Direct one's life away. With these great amenities comes great responsibility.
Leonard Read's pencil question is my favorite thought experiment ever. Perhaps mostly for that reason I enjoyed this article overall, though I still found it a bit handwavy, especially concerning the history of energy revolutions.
Government policy and public opinion have always been and will continue to be huge factors in determining how we produce and consume energy. If not for those two factors, we might have found ourselves currently in the midst of a nuclear revolution with no worries of runaway greenhouse gas emissions to speak of.
This is sad, fascinating and at times hilarious. Despite all the pain that might be behind them, some of the quotes are just so over-the-top that I laughed out loud after reading them. After all, what more can a puppet do? Consciousness without appropriate levels of dopamine and other neurotransmitters certainly does sound like a disease, an evolutionary mistake.
I just watched this excellent talk on depression by Robert Sapolsky and he touched on the fact that the most severely depressed individuals are not at the highest risk of suicide because they can't even summon the motivation for it. It makes sense then that someone who is completely anhedonic would go on living, but how does a person like Ligotti manage to be such a prolific writer in such a state? I think Splintering Bone Ashes Alex might be on to something with the inverted libido.
An enthralling account of the formation and uncovering of a CIA assassination plot. There is so much important history here. I can't recommend this one enough.
I could genuinely use some help with this one. I'm trying to read through the cool professor schtick to see if this guy's actually saying there's anything wrong with what's happening with FedEx or not.
If Walmart or Shopify can acquire FedEx to better compete against Amazon how is that a bad thing? Anti-trust legislation is meant to protect consumers, not big businesses and more competition for Amazon is certainly a good thing for consumers.
This is an absolute must-read; a brilliant look at the impact of modernity (especially the American variety) on mental health and the implications it has for society as a whole. How can we address any of the immense challenges we face when such a large portion of the population has such difficulty coping with day-to-day life?
I don't view the mental health crisis as an indictment of the American ethos, but rather as an indication that ultimate freedom is not an end in and of itself. Ardent individualism isn't incompatible with a sense of community and collective belonging, but it does mean that you might have to search such things out for yourself. Likewise, the freedom to obsessively pursue a goal doesn't mean that everyone has to structure their life in such a way in order to feel fulfilled.
I honestly think that just reading and sharing articles like this one can make a big difference. I feel like any kind of positive change has to start with awareness. People need to be educated not only about the drugs they're taking but also the risks and responsibilities that accompany maximum personal autonomy.
The author does a great job of presenting a captivating historical overview of the Protestant Reformation and connecting those events to the evolution of modern civil society. This is great stuff.
Yes, I do think Belle Delphine is one of the greatest trolls on the internet. I also think she's an example of how trolling can be both an art form and a business. Same goes for all the people making reaction videos, especially the guy who pretended to vape the bathwater. Internet culture is amazing.
Super interesting insights from the people who worked there at the time. I love this format where multiple interviews with different individuals are woven together to tell the whole story.
I was left with some questions about the legality of gender discrimination after reading about the Wing and their membership policy. This is a solid article that explains the differences between private clubs and places of public accommodation and what laws apply to which.
Well this is absolutely terrifying! Since when is the military-industrial complex something to be celebrated, replicated and doubled down on? It isn't a fix for capitalism, it's the epitome of crony capitalism and we certainly don't need any more of that.
Mazzucato keeps hearkening back to the Apollo program (which cost $152bn in today's dollars) as a model for mission-oriented initiatives but completely ignores the opportunity cost of such programs. All those tens or hundreds of billions of dollars being allocated by decree siphon resources away from and prevent the development of competing alternatives. She also misrepresents the benefits derived from such programs by trivializing the productization of research developments and discoveries; an oversight that only an academic who has never brought a product to market could make.
There is also conveniently no mention of any examples of these initiatives going sideways. No mention of the billions wasted on programs like The Human Brain Project, bad loans to the Solyndras of the world or massive projects like ITER that span decades, cost billions and move ahead with designs and technology that are already becoming obsolete due to the momentum of government sponsorship.
Here's my proposal to fix capitalism: We remove the subsidies and either give the money back to the people who earned it in the first place or reallocate it to underfunded government departments that actually serve the public.
“Those profits could be used to fund research and training for workers,” Mazzucato says. “Instead they are often used on share buybacks and golfing.”
Right. Let's get the tax payers off the hook. Of course they're not going to spend it on research when the government is offering to foot the bill.
Damn this was fascinating and kind of scary. The new research in support of sunlight makes a lot of sense. I know I'm not getting enough now and I can remember getting burned really badly multiple times in my earlier years.
Reading this, reflecting on big sunscreen propaganda, made me think of some strange spoken word song that I remember hearing as a kid with the refrain: "Wear sunscreen." Apparently it's Everybody's Free to Wear Sunscreen by Laz Luhrmann. It's even weirder than I remember and very trippy to be listening to for the first time in probably 20 years!
This article isn't very exciting or even especially interesting but it's great journalism. I'm not an AI expert but I've had enough experience as a programmer to see through the hyperbolic reporting that the field has been garnering in reputable publications. It's unfortunate and makes me very skeptical whenever I read something about some new development in an industry that I'm not familiar with at all.
I think this article is high-minded and moralistic. I feel conflicted after reading it because while I sympathize with the plight that journalists face, I also just see so many problems with this author’s analysis and questions.
There is a fundamental distinction between the internet and radio/broadcast television in that the usable spectrum of airwaves is a finite public resource. If I’m broadcasting on 700 AM then you’re not. The licensing and regulatory structure that is (debatably) appropriate for public broadcast has no application to the internet. There is room for everyone to publish what they want.
The advertising model is not broken. The wealth of information and services available to users at zero monetary cost is a miracle of the “free-market free-for-all” and is most beneficial to those with the least amount of disposable income. Coining “surveillance capitalism” as a pejorative term to describe the success of this model is ridiculous.
While it’s true that public service media like Wikipedia have had to share the landscape with increasingly sophisticated commercial companies, it’s also true that they fill a void in the marketplace.
Wikipedia is not a “public service” media organization. The author uses the same term to describe the BBC. If that were the case, then the sale of every internet-connected device would be taxed to fund Wikipedia and the organization would be run by the government. Instead Wikipedia is funded by voluntary donations from millions of individuals. The fact that it fills a void in the marketplace is a testament to the success of the free market approach to the internet.
We’ve grown so used to the idea that social media is damaging our democracies that we’ve thought very little about how we might build new networks to strengthen societies.
Built into this is the assumption that social media is doing more damage than or is more susceptible to malevolent influence than state-run news organizations or the monopolistic broadcast and print publications of the 20th century and I reject that. If you don’t like Twitter and Facebook, then stop using them. Asking the government to get involved is the least productive thing anyone can do. Increased regulation will only serve to further cement the current crop of companies in their dominant position and we don’t need any more Quaeros. The alternatives are out there, you just have to be willing to put in the effort to find them and be an active participant instead of passive consumer.
Positively gripping read! The short introduction is a little slow but you'll immediately get sucked in after the first couple minutes. Another incredible story from the the author of The Lonely Death of George Bell.
Wasn't expecting much given the title but was pleasantly surprised by the depth and thoughtfulness of this article. Friendships can be tricky. I just started re-watching Seinfeld and had forgotten that the very first (non-pilot) episode was "Male Unbonding." The show did such a great job exploring the difficulties and intricacies of both same and different-sex friendships throughout its run.
A timeless rant about software usability from 2003. A lot has changed since then but the propensity for software to get crapped up over time remains the same.
