kjandersen

Including the fact that the smartlock _also_ has a keypad, and that the code is just 7 digits the author claims not to be able to memorize seems like a really easy way to undermine an otherwise solid story about dystopian crapware apps locking tenants out of their rented property.

Absolutely not, it simply means the payment must be done via the banking system. Electronic = mostly traceable.

Thanks for the link, the core idea of Warren presented there is exactly my sentiment. I am not at all surprised by the timeline of events on that page, though!

I liked this one:

> ... a humor website later commented on the fact that the stadium where the GOP hosted the "We Built It" theme at the convention was constructed using 62% taxpayer financing.

(I wrote this comment as a _reaction_ to yours -- it turned out not to be a _response_ to it, so I apologise if I seem to put words in your mouth.)

I have this idea rummaging about that I have never quite seen articulated in these discussions.

The earnings of "rich friends" are often seen as a singular, isolated achievement, and fairness is then discussed as relative to that: "they earned it, so is it fair to take X%?"

It seems to me that society at large facilitates those earnings. The roads that their workers drive on, the water facility that supplies the school that their employees send their children to. The unemployment safety net that lets employees take risks and take the job of the industrialist... The list is endless.

All this is the net sum of what was _also_ given to (taken by?) the person that makes a billion dollars. In this context I think the "fairness" argument against taxation becomes weaker.

Benevolent Dictator for Life, a governance model quite prominent in PL and OSS at large.

False. Decisions like this can be made at a higher level than the department. The mandatory courses in my programme were applied univariate calculus and an introduction to statistical modelling (with examples drawn from biology), imposed by the faculty of science on all science majors - all the while the CS professors were screaming for an introduction to logic and discrete maths to be added to the curriculum.