arrosenberg
arrosenberg on Hacker News
Forced breakup of any company that gets too big to fail. Give them 1 year to produce and execute a plan or do so or the government takes receivership and does it for them.
I know, I know, I’m delusional.
That never works in the US, the monopolist will just wait it out 4-8 years until there is a friendly administration. You have to break them up any time you have the chance, it’s the only effective remedy.
Ah yes, Microsoft famously never made money off of Windows.
> I'm not sure being a monopoly alone explains Google's behavior here, but it could be as simple as that: who cares about one small customer... it's not like they have a viable alternative.
The last line contradicts the first line. Being a monopoly means they don’t have to care. If Apple and Google were required to allow competing app stores as first-class citizens then they would have to provide better service or no one would use their stores and they’d lose out on all of the rents they’re collecting from app developers.
A bunch of landlords all use the same software to tell them how to price rents. The software continually pushes prices higher and higher. The software requires landlords to use their pricing as a condition of use. Now you have a price-fixing cartel for rent.
It really wasn't, but in either case your answer takes us back to the original point being made...
> it [the US] is the biggest organizer of violence, arms dealing, murder, corruption and every single one of your leaders has been a scourge inflicted on the world
These aren't independent events. Every time we impose our imperial will on other countries, the echoes winds up being worse, with a very, very limited number of exceptions.
> but can't win'em all.
We barely win any of them, but if your attention span is only a single generation, then I can see how you might fail to notice.
I guess you'll be as disingenuous as needed to avoid mentioning America's involvement in overthrowing the legitimate government of Iran in 1953.
And what lead to Iran exporting Islamic revolution? Possibly something involving Kermit Roosevelt Jr and the CIA?
The oligarchs are gutting the regulatory apparatus that stops this stuff from happening.
"If you think AGI is imminent" is doing a
lot of heavy lifting. The rate of improvement has already leveled off significantly and there is little-to-no evidence that LLMs are close to or capable of achieving general intelligence.
If you assume we aren't going to create a singularity in the next few decades, then no, it doesn't make sense economically to do it. Even ignoring that we'd have to develop a design that works in space, and even if SpaceX is able to significantly reduce cost per kg to orbit, it would still cost 15-30x more to build the same data center, and you have to pay that premium every time a piece of equipment burns out.
It would be cheaper to build aircraft carrier sized ships to hold them or give every adult in the town where they are building a couple million dollars to fuck off. And again, that's only if SpaceX can produce an as-of-yet mythical level of scale. If they stop anywhere short of that, then we're talking about billions of dollars to build in space what you could build on earth for tens of millions.
The cost of getting them there will be absurd and even if someone was willing to fund it, where do you put the heat they will generate?
Two businesses merge, now one bigger enterprise has two plants, which they consolidate into one. Maybe they outsource instead (or “globalize” if you prefer, though I’m not clear on your distinction). Now some towns that previously had a business providing jobs doesn’t. Younger people leave since there is no opportunity there. Now repeat this for decades.
Libby very much exists, you just need to sign up through your local library.
That’s the proximate cause, but OP has correctly identified that finance capitalism, outsourcing industry, and corporate consolidation are the forces that have driven people out of small towns and into cities looking for economic opportunity.
I guess we will find out if it has stopped during the litigation of numerous lawsuits against your company for doing just that.
Not the person you are responding to, but the fact that Grok is being used to generate a ton of CSAM and pornographic deepfakes isn't great!
Taxing profits incentivizes reinvestment over reaping.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/dataviz/dfa/distr...Since 1990 the top 1% of wealth holders have seen their share of the wealth increase significantly, almost entirely on the backs of the middle class (and to a lesser extent, the upper-middle class).
The middle/upper middle class may have more collectively than the wealthy, but this is why the middle feels materially poorer and more reactionary than they were 30 years ago. They are being outcompeted in housing (unfairly, by people with vastly more wealth) and are being overcharged and underdelivered on medical care, education and food.
The rich need to be taxed back down to a reasonable share of wealth (<20%) or the politics of the country will continue to be unstable because the masses will continue to vote for change, every election, in search of that outcome.
While Matt is technically correct, it's much easier to maintain a conspiracy like this when you have a small number of participants with a high concentration of share.
If power is more diluted among a greater number of participants you are way more likely to see defectors, which would provide accurate pricing data to the market and cause the conspiracy to fail.
The point of democracy is consent of the governed. We very much do know the dumb or smart answer as to whether or not to vaccine the military.
The point is to bankrupt the country so the robber barons can buy up all the assets for pennies on the dollar.
Every cell in your body (excepting red blood cells) have a complete copy of your genome. What differs is which portions are activated.
Predatory pricing is illegal in the US, but difficult to prosecute under the existing laws.
The fear is being heavily stoked by agitprop on social media.
Lina Khan did try and regulate. She had some successes, but the major cases w/r/t concentration of power against Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Meta and Apple have all moved slowly and (so far) failed to result in break ups.
Antitrust laws were written in the early 1900s and updated through the 1950s. Credit cards weren't available until 1966 and didn't become widely used until the 1990s. Digital platforms weren't a thing until the late 90s/early 2000s and the Apple app store didn't exist until 2008.
The courts can only enforce the laws on the books. Congress needs to update the laws, but they won't because they are hopelessly corrupt :(
If they know about malfeasance and don't stop it, they are complicit; if they don't know about it, they are grossly negligent. In either case, they should be held accountable for the crimes. Maybe in an ideal world it would not be that way, but since we are seeing corruption run amok in corporate board rooms, it's clear they need a greater incentive to police their organizations.