sbv @ sbv @sh.itjust.works

Posts

127

Comments

3,465

Joined

2 yr. ago

I guess we'll find out in a few weeks.

That original strategy was a good one - I think it was used to strong effect during the first Trump presidency. I hope these tariffs are equally effective, but I haven't heard too much since they were implemented.

There was a lot of talk about elbows up, but I'm unclear what is being taxed and how. There's a list, but I don't know what that represents in terms of financial cost to Canadian buyers and US producers.

Like, is it a tiny bit of posturing for the home crowd, or is it something that will hurt US industries (and Canadian buyers)? I don't know.

I'm not too familiar with the NAFTA negotiations, but it seems on-brand.

Fair enough. There's a push and pull in negotiations that we (generally) don't see. I'm trying to read the tea leaves to figure out why Carney would ditch the DST, and this is a possible reason. I can't know if it's the reason. But it's interesting to think about.

We aren’t unique in having a tax like this,

I think we're unique in that we made our tax retroactive.

and the US has no place saying it’s unfair when it’s not even only foreign companies paying.

Generally, I agree that the US has no place dictating our tax policy, but they are within their rights to control their trade with us. 90% of the companies paying are US tech companies (I think that's in the Globe explainer), so I can see why poking us to see what they can get. I don't like it, but that's (sadly) irrelevant.

Nothing beyond the link in the post. It's consistent with what I've heard in other media, the Bloc's supply management trade bill, and Maxime Bernier's recent political success (🤣).

I wouldn't be surprised if it's a push poll from the dairy industry, but it represents the goals of notable Quebec constituency.

I suspect the PM doesn't want to alienate other voting blocks by saying it out loud. Just like he really didn't want to piss off older Canadians by saying his policies would lower house prices.

I agree with you, but he's smart enough to know that an embarrassing sound bite will play forever in CPC ads, along with a scary voice over like "he's willing to screw over Canadian businesses for dirty yucky Quebec, so why won't he bend over for Alberta's Big Beautiful fossil fuel producers?"

Supply management on dairy. The yanks have hated that for a while, but there's a bunch of Quebecois dairy farmers who really like it. I'm guessing that Carney is giving up the DST since it doesn't have a constituency - if that allows him to keep supply management on dairy, it'll be easier to keep Quebec's support during the next election.

I'm guessing the reason is supply management on dairy.

There's a large rural Quebecois voting block that really likes supply management. By dropping the DST, Carney can cede something to Trump without pissing them off. The DST doesn't have the same constituency, so it'll hurt the LPC less during the next election.

Last month, the U.S. and Britain announced a trade deal related to a range of products. But Britain’s 2-per-cent DST was not affected.

In a statement at the time, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said the U.S. “is disappointed that Britain was unwilling to agree to fully address its discriminatory Digital Services Tax.”

Britain kept theirs. They'd probably argue that they aren't European, but y'know.

Repetition repetition repetition

I feel like this is the default. Many of the people in my life don't want to make decisions. They just want to do the simple things that bring immediate contentment and avoid everything else.

That's a really weird way of looking at it.

That's how I roll.

Without the database, there's no central ledger to consult as to whether or not you're legally a person.

We're already seeing them do that without a database. 🤷‍♂️

Other countries are able to maintain internal databases without using them to screw over their own citizens (except when they do). The problem isn't the database.

Three of the 10 members of CPPIB’s board of directors also sit on the boards of fossil fuel companies. The CDPQ, by contrast, does not have any board directors who also sit on the board of a fossil fuel company. CPPIB’s board includes Barry Perry (former CEO of Fortis) who now sits on the board of Capital Power; Judith Athaide who also sits on the board of Kiwetinohk Energy, and Ashleigh Everett who is also the president and a director of Royal Canadian Securities, a holding company for Domo Gasoline Corporation.

See the UK Post Office accounting scandal, in which a persistent computer error went unfixed for decades and caused hundreds of post office employees to be fired and dragged through courts for corruption that never happened. A good chunk of them committed suicide.

The database is the least important part of the system: the organizational structure, rules, and procedures are way more important, because they actively help or harm people.

no no, it's an input to a Palantir database

"I stay in constant prayer that they get seized," she said. "I don't want to know that I'm responsible for somebody losing their life."

Betcha she is.

As someone in the software/networking space, I have a hard time with the author's lack of attribution of the control/evasion characteristics of networks to people (developers of protocols, network operators, and users). Yeah, he admits the MPAA exists, but dude doesn't mention Bram Cohen.

Describing files as "artificial life" in

Because peer-to-peer networks on which all files replicate are unpredictable complex systems, the files themselves can be seen as a form of nonorganic life. The reproduction of files can be described with a family tree in the same way that genetic family trees show the relationships between biological relatives.

is tortured.

Yeah, control/evasion is an arms race, but it isn't meaningfully described as interactions within file sharing networks. It's interactions between people, institutions, laws, legislators, courts, and software owned by different actors.

Generally speaking, no programmable networked device is guaranteed to be under your control.

You can make strong arguments about certain types of hardware and software, but it is always possible that it contains a backdoor from the manufacturer, and it is almost guaranteed that it has multiple vulnerabilities that would give a remote attacker full control.

Related

Edit: Generally, I agree with the sentiment that things shouldn't be this way, but that's the world we live in. Given how we build software and hardware, we need to be able to update our devices to fix vulnerabilities. As long as that requirement exists, no device can be considered trustworthy.