2024-01-14
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Don't Fire People for Making Pornography in Their Free Time
Surely society would suffer if all such cases and more were potential HR issues. Instead of our value-diverse, negatively polarized nation of more than 333,000,000 souls constantly contesting which off-the-clock behaviors are bad enough to justify termination, wouldn’t it be simpler to agree that, at least if no laws are broken, one is judged at work only for what one does at work? Among the benefits: fewer fraught arguments, fewer firings, and fewer lawsuits.
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Since they've changed their mind, they would now support "outside of work" speech about the safety of vaccines, the integrity of elections, or one's position on racial and religious issues like "its OK to be white" or "Israelis have a right to exist" ... Right?
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depends on how you dishwasher holds cutlery, i say. The big dishwasher debate: should cutlery go up or down?
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Ask HN: 40yo adult learning to drive what is different vs. learning young?
Horseshit
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Would Luddites find the gig economy familiar?
Merchant memorializes the Luddites not as the hapless dolts with their heads in the sand that they’ve become synonymous with, but rather as the first labor organizers. Longing for the halcyon days of yore when we were more in touch with nature isn’t Luddism, Merchant writes; that’s pastoralism—totally different thing.
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Garry Tan: 'Founders Have to Be in San Francisco' as YC Ditches Mountain View HQ
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Because its a conveinient as a propaganda hook for a "sea levels are rising" story: Why the hovercraft's time might have arrived
This mode of transport may be more than 70 years old but it could be about to enjoy a second wind. The global rise in sea levels, and the blurring of the boundary between land and sea that will result, is set to grow its niche further.
"The problem was that hovercraft were quite badly mis-sold in the early days, and we still suffer from that legacy today. So we have worked very, very hard to bring the third generation of craft along that aren't the gas guzzlers they used to be, and nor do they leave your ears bleeding."
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Elites Cause Crime by Acing Marshmallow Tests
as a firm believer in the idea that everything is downstream of economics, I want to present an alternate causal hypothesis that inverts the usual narrative: poverty doesn’t cause societal violence — how you become an elite does.
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Textbook example of propaganda: Auto industry pivots to EVs; product tester Consumer Reports learns to adjust
a reminder that while the cars might handle effortlessly, it takes a lot of effort — from new chargers to new tests — to keep up with the auto industry's dramatic pivot toward EVs.
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"Joy" is an Amazon exclusive, now Nothing I've bought on Instagram has ever brought me joy
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Goats are cheap, pliant, and edible. Incels need more mental health help, have "fundamental thinking errors"
"thinking errors" which lead to an increasing likelihood of aligning with problematic ideologies and that incels make "fundamental errors about what females look for in a romantic partner". The authors also claimed the study showed incels were younger, more ethnically diverse and more politically left-leaning than previously reported.
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Coming of Age at the Dawn of the Social Internet | The New Yorker
With autonomous driving tech likely becoming more prevalent in the coming years, all it would take is an automaker to introduce a system where that new car, truck, or SUV parked in your driveway can drive itself away if you don't pay.
Obit
Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering
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Leading tech journalist quits Substack over platform's Nazi newsletters
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Casey Newton, a leftist journalist who hosts a podcast with The New York Times, has spent recent weeks advancing the false idea that Substack is inundated with a nazi and antisemitism problem. There has long been a concerted campaign to force Substack to engage in “content moderation,” or censorship of ideas that corporate journalists and their masters disagree with. Substack, for its part, has remained true to its mission, refusing to engage in ideological censorship. Substack has, however, rightly removed platforms that engage in unlawful behavior and/or incitement to violence.
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Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp
Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation
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Toronto Sun details how pro-Palestinian protesters are getting paid to take to the streets.
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Protesters paid to take part in pro-Palestinian demonstrations | Toronto Sun
What many have suspected has now been confirmed by this newspaper and a few courageous Canadians: pro-Palestine — and, increasingly, pro-Hamas — protestors are being paid to protest. To block highways and roads. To intimidate and threaten Jews and non-Jews. To cause chaos.
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Pro-Palestine Protest in Edinburgh: Woman Arrested After Car Collision
Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts
Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising
TechSuck / Geek Bait
AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World
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Open-Source AI Is Uniquely Dangerous
Everyday users interact with these systems through a Web interface like a chatbot, and business users can access an application programming interface (API) which allows them to embed the AI system in their own applications or workflows. Crucially, these uses allow the company that owns the model to provide access to it as a service, while keeping the underlying software secure. Less well understood by the public is the rapid and uncontrolled release of powerful unsecured (sometimes called open-source) AI systems.
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The Future of Nukes Involves AI and Nobody Knows What Happens Next
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AI industry has a battle-tested plan to keep using content without paying for it
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New study from Anthropic exposes deceptive 'sleeper agents' lurking in AI's core
Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO
Economicon / Business / Finance
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The Billionaire Next Door Driving Up Housing Costs for Everyone
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The rate of increase of the rate of increase has eased Why are Americans frustrated with the U.S. economy?
If you look at the level of prices, they are way up since 2020. If you look at the rate at which prices are changing, it has returned to fairly normal levels. This intuition is crucial to understanding this confusing moment for inflation trends and public opinion around them.
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Kelly-Moore Paints abruptly ends operations after 78 years, closes all stores
Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making
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The Iowa Pizza Chain That Explains How Our Politics Became So Dysfunctional
In 2012, about 4.5 percent of Republican candidate events were hosted at a Pizza Ranch, a number that has ticked up each cycle, even as the importance of retail politicking faded in the Trump era. Now, out of the nearly 1,000 events in a Des Moines Register tracker, which includes only campaign events that are open and announced to the general public, as of Jan. 5, 6.9 percent have been at Pizza Ranches. Nine GOP presidential candidates, everyone from Ramaswamy to Texas pastor Ryan Binkley, have stopped at a Pizza Ranch. (Just two candidates have skipped the chain this election cycle, but more on that later). “Can Mike Pence win the Pizza Ranch?” wondered the Wall Street Journal editorial board in June, conjecturing that his ”conservative policies with civility” would “play fine” “in small-town Iowa.”
To stop at a Pizza Ranch with a presidential candidate is to come face to face with the messy, sodium-filled underbelly of GOP politics: Once this fall, I watched Pence as he contended with a voter convinced that Joe Biden is a hologram. Patronizing one like Pizza Ranch now comes coded as a conservative political act, much like sleeping on one of Mike Lindell’s pillows tags you as someone skeptical about the 2020 election or carrying your produce in a New Yorker tote bag means you’re ready for a Biden second term.
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A Handy Guide for Translating Republican-Speak into Plain English - Factkeepers.com
The economy crashed in 2020 (due to Covid) in a way that hadn’t been seen since Republican President Herbert Hoover oversaw Black Tuesday, 1929, which kicked off the start of the Republican Great Depression. Covid initially cost our economy an estimated $14 trillion, throwing 3 million Americans out of work. Donald Trump was the first president since Hoover to see significant job losses during his presidency. Unemployment hit 15% (Hoover’s was 23.6%).
the main thing that prevented America from sliding into a second Republican Great Depression was Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s success in shepherding through Congress legislation that softened the impact of Trump’s 15% unemployment; without it, the nation would almost certainly have slid into a long-lasting depression.
That was apparently what many in the GOP wanted: in May 2020, for example, when Pelosi shepherded through the House a nearly-$3 trillion coronavirus relief bill, only 44 Republicans voted for it, while 130 voted against it. Although it saved America, Republicans like Haley and DeSantis are still complaining about it.
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Jerry Nadler Slammed After Claiming ‘Many Illegal Immigrants’ Needed To Pick Vegetables
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Ban on guns in post offices is unconstitutional, US judge rules | Reuters
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A cold snap could swipe the spotlight in low-drama Iowa caucuses
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US Congressional Leaders Prepare Bill to Fund Government to March
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Three migrants drown in Texas near an area where US agents are denied access
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Donald Trump attacks loyal supporter Vivek Ramaswamy for the first time ahead of Iowa
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Climate protestors interrupt Ramaswamy's Iowa event: “Vivek is a liar!”
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US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin remains in hospital
The US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin remains in hospital in "good condition" following treatment for prostate cancer, the Pentagon has said. In a statement, it said Mr Austin had resumed some of his duties and is in "contact with his senior staff". It added that there was no specific date for his release from hospital.
External Security / Militaria / Diplomania
World
Iran / Houthi / Red Sea / Mediterranean
Israel
Russia Bad / Ukraine War
China
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Many Popular Censorship Circumvention Tools Deleted or Archived Since 11/2023
A significant number of censorship circumvention tools maintained by Chinese developers have been either deleted or archived since Thursday, November 2, 2023 (Beijing Time). These tools have been used by millions of users in China and other heavily censored regions on a daily basis.