circuitfarmer @ circuitfarmer @lemmy.sdf.org

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2 yr. ago

Trump, Trump.... Oh! You mean the guy Elon bought?

Haven't thought about him or the sofa guy in a while.

I've been thinking of the "capitalism breeds innovation" thing a lot lately.

It may still be true, but the latest innovations are always in money making. There is no incentive to innovate in a way that serves a common good, but there is massive incentive to "innovate" in a way that drives profits up.

Subscriptions to everything and the erosion of ownership? Innovative.

Insurance companies taking your money and then denying your claims? Innovative.

Uncapped campaign finance and buying politicians? Innovative (well, it's been done before, but not to this scale in a very long time).

Compared to the US, Canada may as well be Japan in terms of rail.

It's ironic that the US was ultimately born and raised on expansion of rail, but because cars became so profitable and lucrative, US passenger rail is a constant afterthought, if it's even an option at all.

Exactly this. There was a meme (or maybe many) rolling around long ago about how the intention was not to have humans do all the jobs and AI do all the art: quite the opposite.

This is related to the growth in productivity we have seen across industries for the last 50 years. It is through the roof, but wages are lower per unit production and aren't showing any signs of ending their stagnation.

The problem there is the same with all this new tech enhancing lives and production, while people still have to work as much as before, if not more: the gains, monetary or otherwise, are being pocketed by someone else.

It's like wage theft, but "better": it's progress theft.

This is a good, nutshell explanation of late-stage capitalism.

As far as the answer to "what's the endgame", I do not know. I suspect that many or most of these rich folks are so moneyblind that they don't know either. Or, they simply don't believe that their collective actions will eventually cause the system to fail.

But most likely, I think, is that they believe someone else will bear the majority of any negative impact. Of course this makes less sense in the face of a systematic collapse, but again: it's probably very difficult to see when you have dollar signs in your eyes.

While this is a good thing, holy hell does it show the absolutely horrible state of health care in the US. Medical bills that can ultimately end a life (in a financial sense) simply should not exist.

But we clearly can't fix the for-profit system, so we band-aid it by excluding the unpaid bills from credit reports.

Meanwhile, the incoming US President wants to fix health care by "privatization". Someone should let him know that the system is (mostly) privatized already, which is the entire problem.

(Edit: last bit /s. He clearly knows, but wants to make him and his cronies even more money)

Incidentally, "Ditt" is also Elon's nickname for his penis

It's just a matter of time as so many corporate products and services enshittify. That, plus FOSS' main issue is the average person not having any idea what it is or what it means.

While I hope I'm wrong, I agree this thing will go the way of most Kickstarters. It is interesting, but it will never have appeal outside of the hobby space, and the cash needed to get this thing off the ground will be immense.

Yes, but 1080p content looks like dogshit on a 1440p display

If that keyboard module isn't extremely securely attached on there, I can 100% guarantee it is breaking in my pocket.

Would have much preferred if they were going to have just one base unit with keyboard. Other modules could fit over that.

I was probably 10 when my best friend (at the time) and I would play Super Contra on the NES for hours. We loved everything about it. We'd get as far as we could. We'd give each other lives. We could sing the soundtrack. When it was game over, we just restarted it.

Those days were simple and beautiful. I don't think another game could give me anything like that experience, since it wasn't really entirely about the game.

I haven't even gotten on the 4k bandwagon yet. I fully expected to by now, but then again, my eyes aren't getting any better and 1080p content still looks... fine.

I suspect, at some level, that the confusing naming is kind of the point.

What's the difference between Pro and Max? If the names were clearer, you probably wouldn't check the website to clear up the confusion.

It nudges potential buyers into interaction with company marketing.

This is really sad, tbh.

I personally would be freaking stoked. Would love to be a stay at home hubs, too.

We regret to inform you that MI5 and MI6 will now be designated MI1 and MI2 due to budget constraints

Can you explicate why I should want either SecureBoot or a TPM in a Linux environment?

Because the ones who own all worldwide media also really like Musk

One more example of a private service being used as if it were a utility.

This one is especially egregious considering it's an Amber Alert, but it isn't necessarily unique. Despite the internet being designed as open, it has been taken over by private entities, and any popular service is ultimately controlled by such entities.

It's a hard problem to solve. Look at federated platforms like Lemmy: they take a long time to populate, and their usefulness is partly a function of how successful that population is. By definition, a free, open platform will not have the advertising, reach, or "it factor" of a corporate service. When given the choice between an open platform and a corporate one, we see people choose the corporate one time and time again.

We have taken our open network and handed it, willingly, to private enterprise.

This is mostly immaterial given the way Trump seems to want to operate this time around. DOGE does not need to exist; Trump will push for whatever Musk and Ramaswamy say.

This is not the time for suggestions of "well, he can't do this because X, so we don't need to worry about it." We absofuckinglutely need to be worrying about all possibilities, even those which may seem impractical given the law.