Smart people can get away with tricks like that.
Yep. Eventually the businesses shut down the stores that have too much theft to be profitable; then people complain about problems like food deserts and accuse the businesses of isms; then well-meaning people elect…
I got high marks for cursive in grade school, but I switched to printing in high school when I took Latin, because it made the distinction clearer between m's and n's and things like that. Forty years later, I'm trying…
Aside from learning, I also find that pen-and-paper is much more effective for journaling, when I want to work through a problem or brainstorm something. Once I've worked it out, I'll often type it in so I've got it…
> Because the customer wasn't the user - it was their boss and shareholders. I'm starting to get asked, "Could AI help you do such-and-such faster?" At first I tried to explain why the answer is no, because…
I served on a grand jury a while back, and one of the few cases that wasn't a slam dunk was one where a woman's baby smothered while in bed with her and under the covers, possibly while the mother was using someone…
Right. The big lie of what's called Our Democracy (in the US, UK, and other Western nations) is that having 51% on your side and winning elections means you get some control over government. What recent years have made…
If it were highly effective, it already would have replaced importing the workers, since it's cheaper to hire them over there. But I've seen multiple companies go big on offshoring and then scrap it after a few years…
When you're tilling, planting, or harvesting, you're often trying to beat the rain or the season. You don't want to go any slower than necessary.
My town still has quite a few third places (the mall, bowling alleys, bars, etc.) and even some new ones like a trampoline place. Most of them are struggling because the young people don't go out. Go into a corner bar…
In fact, the petty criminal may benefit the regime, if his crimes damage those the regime sees as a greater threat to itself and its goals.
When you see a headline that starts with "Farmers [something]", it always refers to large farming corporations and the lobbying organizations like Farm Bureau they fund. It never means they went and interviewed Farmer…
How many minutes do you think it takes to pick an apple? The claim is always made that if Americans have to do the work, food prices will skyrocket, but it's just not true. Labor is a portion of the wholescale cost of…
Nothing new under the sun. Remember when NBC admitted to rigging a truck to burst into flames in a crash for Dateline, because it wouldn't do it on its own? Or when a jury found that Consumer Reports lied about how…
Probably. Whatever method I use, physical or digital, it tends to fade into the background after a while and I stop noticing it. My best bet might be to switch to a new method every few weeks, in which case it's…
Discussions like these show that some people really block out anything beyond their specific interests. I don't care about superhero movies, so I haven't seen any of the Marvel or DC movies, yet I still know they exist…
True. My town did that for Walmart 30 years ago, and recently did it again for Amazon. Meanwhile, small businesses that have served the area for decades get no breaks. They also tried to stick a massive apartment…
I lived in the country with pretty poor phone lines, so I'd send my 56k modem a command to limit it to 19.2. If it tried to train up to 28.8, there would be so many bad blocks it'd grind to a stop with all the…
You don't need to have a lawyer on retainer, but you should probably at least have the name and phone number of one you could call in a pinch. Most law-abiding folks aren't going to see that moment coming, so having a…
Yep. When we started an ISP about 1994, we gave the users a floppy that installed Trumpet Winsock, Netscape, and a handful of other programs for things like IRC and Usenet. Trumpet Winsock provided the dialup and…
Agreed. I used to hate going to funerals and skipped some, telling myself it was because I didn't know what to say, might embarrass myself, etc. After being in the receiving line of a couple, I realized someone else's…
I'll be borrowing "tech bro reductionism." That's the perfect term for something that's a scourge these days.
Right. Some of my programming work is done sitting back in my chair, a movie going on the TV for background noise, probably daydreaming a little while I write code or documentation or do basic tasks. Then there's other…
True. I built a web site for a local newspaper back in the late 90s. Their main concern was finding a way to charge for the content (difficult at that time) while making sure they didn't give anything away for free, so…
Yeah, I know several people who will turn on a streaming channel of old shows and watch whatever comes on, when they could just as easily pick their favorite episodes. I wonder if it's because we grew up with that,…
Smart people can get away with tricks like that.
Yep. Eventually the businesses shut down the stores that have too much theft to be profitable; then people complain about problems like food deserts and accuse the businesses of isms; then well-meaning people elect…
I got high marks for cursive in grade school, but I switched to printing in high school when I took Latin, because it made the distinction clearer between m's and n's and things like that. Forty years later, I'm trying…
Aside from learning, I also find that pen-and-paper is much more effective for journaling, when I want to work through a problem or brainstorm something. Once I've worked it out, I'll often type it in so I've got it…
> Because the customer wasn't the user - it was their boss and shareholders. I'm starting to get asked, "Could AI help you do such-and-such faster?" At first I tried to explain why the answer is no, because…
I served on a grand jury a while back, and one of the few cases that wasn't a slam dunk was one where a woman's baby smothered while in bed with her and under the covers, possibly while the mother was using someone…
Right. The big lie of what's called Our Democracy (in the US, UK, and other Western nations) is that having 51% on your side and winning elections means you get some control over government. What recent years have made…
If it were highly effective, it already would have replaced importing the workers, since it's cheaper to hire them over there. But I've seen multiple companies go big on offshoring and then scrap it after a few years…
When you're tilling, planting, or harvesting, you're often trying to beat the rain or the season. You don't want to go any slower than necessary.
My town still has quite a few third places (the mall, bowling alleys, bars, etc.) and even some new ones like a trampoline place. Most of them are struggling because the young people don't go out. Go into a corner bar…
In fact, the petty criminal may benefit the regime, if his crimes damage those the regime sees as a greater threat to itself and its goals.
When you see a headline that starts with "Farmers [something]", it always refers to large farming corporations and the lobbying organizations like Farm Bureau they fund. It never means they went and interviewed Farmer…
How many minutes do you think it takes to pick an apple? The claim is always made that if Americans have to do the work, food prices will skyrocket, but it's just not true. Labor is a portion of the wholescale cost of…
Nothing new under the sun. Remember when NBC admitted to rigging a truck to burst into flames in a crash for Dateline, because it wouldn't do it on its own? Or when a jury found that Consumer Reports lied about how…
Probably. Whatever method I use, physical or digital, it tends to fade into the background after a while and I stop noticing it. My best bet might be to switch to a new method every few weeks, in which case it's…
Discussions like these show that some people really block out anything beyond their specific interests. I don't care about superhero movies, so I haven't seen any of the Marvel or DC movies, yet I still know they exist…
True. My town did that for Walmart 30 years ago, and recently did it again for Amazon. Meanwhile, small businesses that have served the area for decades get no breaks. They also tried to stick a massive apartment…
I lived in the country with pretty poor phone lines, so I'd send my 56k modem a command to limit it to 19.2. If it tried to train up to 28.8, there would be so many bad blocks it'd grind to a stop with all the…
You don't need to have a lawyer on retainer, but you should probably at least have the name and phone number of one you could call in a pinch. Most law-abiding folks aren't going to see that moment coming, so having a…
Yep. When we started an ISP about 1994, we gave the users a floppy that installed Trumpet Winsock, Netscape, and a handful of other programs for things like IRC and Usenet. Trumpet Winsock provided the dialup and…
Agreed. I used to hate going to funerals and skipped some, telling myself it was because I didn't know what to say, might embarrass myself, etc. After being in the receiving line of a couple, I realized someone else's…
I'll be borrowing "tech bro reductionism." That's the perfect term for something that's a scourge these days.
Right. Some of my programming work is done sitting back in my chair, a movie going on the TV for background noise, probably daydreaming a little while I write code or documentation or do basic tasks. Then there's other…
True. I built a web site for a local newspaper back in the late 90s. Their main concern was finding a way to charge for the content (difficult at that time) while making sure they didn't give anything away for free, so…
Yeah, I know several people who will turn on a streaming channel of old shows and watch whatever comes on, when they could just as easily pick their favorite episodes. I wonder if it's because we grew up with that,…