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Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

nytimes.com

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Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#111

Post by IntronExon »

skybrian wrote: post #109
IntronExon wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sub to what? Their search engine? I’d rather use DDG most days without Google trying to charge me. To something like YouTube? How is YouTube Red going?

Search engine + maps + docs. Yes, there are others (just like there are alternatives to Amazon) but my bet is that most people would rather pay than switch. (That's entirely speculative on my part, but I don't think a few people preferring DDG is a compelling argument. There are alternatives to Amazon Prime too.)

You’re not really pretending that Prime isn’t first and foremost, about shipping products, right? Google exists because people are slow to associate non-monetary costs with their services. I mean, I think Bing is a bad joke, but Google erecting a paywall would be a gift to MS, and Apple.

Fortunately I can’t believe that anyone at Google believes more than a fraction of a fraction of their current user base would pay.

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#112

Post by dTal »

metavrsl wrote: post #86
stryk wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might be a mistake asking this, but what the heck is a 'chav' ?

It’s an English word for rougher lower class young men. People look down on them, it’s partially a class thing and partially how they dress and how they’re just boisterous. Don’t know what the equivalent word in the USA is but in Australia we say Bogan which is similar.

Chavs certainly don't have to be men. Also I'm pretty sure the youth requirement has atrophied now, and it's more of a direct class-epithet.

I don't think there's a race-neutral equivalent in American English, but "white trash" captures much of the spirit.

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#113

Post by filoleg »

woolvalley wrote: post #71

Not using facebook or a smartphone is the new 'I don't watch TV'. The parallels and complaints are fairly similar.

Don't even have to go far to see that. Open any thread on HN that is about Facebook or has it in the title, and you can already predict half of the comments, with a variation of "I quit facebook N months/years ago, and if you are still using it, you must be a sheep" being in the top 5. As soon as someone reasonably objects to this by saying that facebook is helpful to plan and coordinate events with friends, there will be the token reply saying "if they are real friends, they would reach out to you specifically through other means, no matter how impractical that is." It's as if some people live in this fantasy world where everything is binary.

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#114

Post by nicoburns »

kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #110
Chathamization wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much the push back against McDonald's is class based. It's not healthy, but the same can be said for a lot of the food we eat. A lot of fast casual burgers, which seem to hold a higher position in the public perception, have more calories. Of course, overall health is more complicated than just calories, but it's worth pointing out since that's one of the main complaints against McDonald's (including in…

This is very true. In India McD has a more prestige positioning (not extremely but it's a luxury for the lower class, a treat for most middle class families, and a non-shameful food destination for the upper-middle class, and no one shits on McD food as being particularly bad for you. It's put up there with the food you will get from other similar joints (KFC, Dominos, Papa Johns etc.)—not a bastion of good eating bu…

I find the comparison with KFC, etc as odd. From my european perspective, all of these places are seen as producing unhealthy food (not to mention destroying important ecosystems such as rainforests to produce cheap meat) McDonalds is the target of campaigns only because of it's prominence and brand recognition.

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#115

Post by gedy »

stryk wrote: post #83
walshemj wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I though that too "oh no look at those chavs" at MacDonald's Supersize me also did not see what happened to you if you eat a full xmass dinner every day for a month did it.

It might be a mistake asking this, but what the heck is a 'chav' ?

"Council Housed And Violent" (unless that's a backronym)

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#116

Post by [deleted] »

electricslpnsld wrote: post #108
gt_ wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no American counterpart for euro chavs, and it’s too late for that now. Euro chav fashion has been very influential in America over the last decade. A lot of Americans think chavs were hip as a result.

> Euro chav fashion has been very influential in America over the last decade. A lot of Americans think chavs were hip as a result. I don't think I've ever seen a hipster rocking the chav look.

[deleted]

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#117

Post by gt_ »

electricslpnsld wrote: post #108
gt_ wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no American counterpart for euro chavs, and it’s too late for that now. Euro chav fashion has been very influential in America over the last decade. A lot of Americans think chavs were hip as a result.

> Euro chav fashion has been very influential in America over the last decade. A lot of Americans think chavs were hip as a result. I don't think I've ever seen a hipster rocking the chav look.

To be fair, I lived in Portland from 2013-2017. But I don’t think it was a ever a staple as much as a statement.

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#118

Post by TheAceOfHearts »

fma wrote: post #56
nothrabannosir wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get ebooks and read. [edit] sorry for being curt, but seriously: that can be all there is to it. It changed the way I use my phone.

Nah, I didn't think you were curt. This was my solution for a while. Problem is when I read I hate to stop mid sentence or paragraph. While if on FB, or HN I can close without a care. I may need to take up less serious reading material I guess, hah. I will probably go back to this, though. Any books you can recommend that helps fill those few minutes of void?

Another option is reading web comics or manga. For me those tend to be easier to consume during shorter periods of time than ebooks.

When I'm reading I like being able to sit down and really get into it.

I'll usually end up on Hacker News if there's nothing on my queue, though. But HN is largely content focused.

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#119

Post by cocktailpeanuts »

gaius wrote: post #15
mstank wrote: post #8

Facebook and other social media platforms might be heading for the type of reckoning the fast food industry had in the late 90s and early 2000s. http://marko.la/facebook-is-mcdonalds/

McDonalds is still a viable business. When Facebook goes, it will evaporate like MySpace did. And not a moment too soon.

Don't know why this is so downvoted much. Just because Facebook evaporates doesn't mean the very concept of "social graph" will go down altogether with it.

Facebook will probably be replaced with more flexible identity and social graph architecture that's more decentralized.

It's different from McDonald's because humans have to eat, and McDonald's can always pivot or acquire other companies to provide the type of food that's more in vogue, but what Facebook has created is equivalent to a nightclub. When a nightclub loses its reputation it's very hard to recover.

Re: Early Facebook and Google Employees Form a Center for Humane Technology

#120

Post by sjg007 »

platz wrote: post #103
Chathamization wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much the push back against McDonald's is class based. It's not healthy, but the same can be said for a lot of the food we eat. A lot of fast casual burgers, which seem to hold a higher position in the public perception, have more calories. Of course, overall health is more complicated than just calories, but it's worth pointing out since that's one of the main complaints against McDonald's (including in…

Is an egg-mcmuffin with no cheese and no hash-brown really that bad for you? It's literally an egg on bread.

No it’s not that bad for you.
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