a lil bee 🐝

It’s 2050. Every computer scientist is named Conway. ChatGPT releases its new version of Conway4, which scrapes every ounce of private medical data we have.

Well, TIL! Darn famous computer scientists sharing last names. This Conway is still an icon.

I cite Conway’s Law (and it’s reverse corollary) multiple times a week. I’m sorry to hear this, but her contributions were many and 85 is not a bad run. I hope she was happy and fulfilled, in the end.

Ugh this sucks, but no, not really. LinkedIn isn’t just a platform, it’s the people on it. No other site exists that will get you the same amount of exposure. There are definitely other sites and non-internet options for networking in general though.

To be fair to you, I thought they were talking about AWS S3 at first and was very confused until I read the article.

There is a lot of nuance to that. If Trump appeals on constitutional grounds, the Supreme Court can choose to hear it. State cases can be appealed to the SC if their interpretation of federal law or the constitution are in dispute. They normally just outright deny hearing most cases decided by state courts. A good chunk of the supreme court is likely to grant whatever the hell he wants though, so I’m not so certain anything that boils down to interpretation is safe.

Ah, good call, I forgot the context. Does this apply if he escalates to supreme court and they grant certiorari?

That wouldn’t be necessary. Presidents have the power to pardon and nothing says it cannot be used on the self.

Oh, oh! I have a more recent example of a cringy militant atheist now, do you need a link? Here ya go.

Oh cmon, being jailed by the Taliban has gotta be peak transition goals

I hope that gets to the point where major players are able and willing to use it. I only have so much sway with my clients when it comes to tooling choice and open source options can be hard to sell to some enterprises until they hit a certain proliferation point.

Most of my clients were not impacted by that change, since it was more related to building Terraform-adjacent tooling and not so much products built with Terraform. I was not a fan, but it didn’t necessarily kill it as an option for me. This though… IBM will absolutely fuck this up.

Oh christ, there goes Terraform… That really sucks.

…right, so you’re asking for all media orgs to selectively choose stories in an attempt to make the Overton window (one of the most overused and abused concepts in online political discussion right now, to be frank) what you want. I’m not cool with that, regardless of the underlying validity of the stance you want to push. You can call it fighting fire with fire or whatever, but I call it losing every principle you have in the pursuit of protecting those same principles.

End of the day, I want the news I’m reading to tell me the opinions of the citizens I share space with. It doesn’t matter if I like it or not, it is out there and I need to know about it. The news is responsible for reporting on where the Overton window is, not where it should be.

Edit: I also wanted to add this. This conversation was on my mind as I was reading some of my news feed today and I saw the following articles posted by NYT just in the last few days, that are also discussing the left or their points of view.

How ‘The Squad’ and Like-Minded Progressives Have Changed Their Party

The Small-Business Tyrant Has a Favorite Political Party

Rural Voters Are More Progressive Than the Democratic Party Thinks

And here are some rather right-wing perspectives, from actual conservative politicians, although Cheney is certainly no longer a darling for them.

Liz Cheney: The Supreme Court Should Rule Swiftly on Trump’s Immunity Claim

Mike Pence: Donald Trump Has Betrayed the Pro-Life Movement

I think it’s completely reasonable to share these views with everyone. We need to know what our fellow citizens are talking about and believing, even if it’s completely bonkers.

It’s an opinion article, so I don’t think NYT has committed any malpractice here. They published an op-ed from Pence last week about Trump not being harsh enough on abortion, but that absolutely does not mean they dislike abortion. There are people who wanted FISA renewed because they are in intelligence services and see the benefits directly. I’m also skeptical of mass surveillance laws, but I’m glad NYT posted this article so I could read an opinion from someone who disagrees, and I don’t think this establishes an opinion or stance on the part of NYT at all because it’s not what op-eds are for.

Can you please point out where I said anything against almost anything you said here? Are you here to have a discussion about your shower thought or just grandstand your political opinion to a group that by large already shares it? Thank you for starting the thread, but not sure I’m going to reply to any additional messages because I’m not sure that you’re actually reading any of mine.

Not sure anybody is really arguing in this entire thread. Just discussion of edge cases and the gray areas on an interesting shower thought.

My argument would be that by eliminating the means of wealth being an avenue to power, it will merely shift to the government that is enforcing those rules. Those same shitty people will infiltrate that government and use it to inflate themselves while oppressing others. There was no utopian society prior to capitalism and fiat currency, and there won’t be one after.

To be clear, I’m not arguing that this is an impossible problem to solve. I just do not think eliminating the notion of a billionaire is the cure for all of your listed ills. I agree with you that it would absolutely have impacts on all of them, but we would still wake up to world hunger, climate change, etc.

Each of your listed issues is a complex, multi-faceted problem. We cannot boil down that nuance just so we can point to our favorite enemy, deserving as they might be. Fight them too, but don’t lose sight of the bigger picture.

We’re looking at two extreme ends of the pole here. Zuck, Bezos, Musk are the shittiest public billionaires. There are also more secretive ones who are arguably even more destructive. These people have absolutely justified their own downfall, if it ever comes to pass. On the other side, Dolly doesn’t even technically count on this list because she has given enough away to not be a billionaire. Those are the easy cases where almost every reasonable person agrees on the “right” thing to do.

Now, we have to remember that there are people who exist at every little increment along that scale of giving back to general shittiness for the global population. Focusing on the billionaires themselves and their lifestyles or whatever is not the answer. We need to focus on making effective tax brackets, effective regulations on the avenues billionaires generally target for power (political institutions, media companies, etc), and effective spending of the increased income from those new taxes to help raise the lower class to a more equitable position. That’s a socdem perspective though, because I do not foresee capitalism collapsing in my lifetime and I like to be pragmatic.

Hate both, where it’s appropriate. Some of these players perpetuate the game that we all hate. Elon Musk is a player who has become part of the structure of the game, fighting regulations and damaging democracy for the sake of his own capitalistic endeavors. Someone mentioned below that Dolly Parton could be a billionaire. Not gonna hate on Dolly Parton who I assume did not come by her wealth through being an asshole, but more just being successful and our current “game” rewarding her with more than she would have in a better society. I would tax the absolute fuck out of her though.