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Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

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Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#111

Post by joejerryronnie »

Kalium wrote: post #89
brighteyes wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The homeowners have much of the blame, you're right, but tech has made things worse by rapid job growth that contributed to rising rent costs.

You're absolutely right! Tech has made things worse! With that said, it might be worth discussing where the blame for the problem that has been made worse might lie. To aggravate an underlying problem, one has to already exist. So let's talk about that problem, and its causes, rather than casting aspersions on every group who contributed marginally after the fact - that's a very long list, and it's not even a useful…

Or we could talk about the real underlying cause of the one issue you are referencing (cost of housing) - vastly more people moving to the Bay Area than there are houses available. Since it doesn't matter how fast we can actually build homes as we will never catch up to the current demand, we should implement a new resident tax. Let's say everyone who has not been a Bay Area resident for at least 10 years contributes a little to alleviate the problems they are helping to exacerbate.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#112

Post by watwut »

neuland wrote: post #62
shadowtree wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good test is your view on the 2nd Iraq War. For background, as facts matter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War "After 9/11, the Bush Administration national security team actively debated an invasion of Iraq. On the day of the attacks, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld asked his aides for: "best info fast. Judge whether good enough hit Saddam Hussein at same time. Not only Osama bin Laden."[72] President Bu…

I'm not really sure how the 2nd Iraq War is a testament to American evil. It sounds to me like you're saying the invasion was unjustified? But, is there really anyone who thought Saddam was a good guy? He was very obviously a brutal dictator. So, at the very least there's one fewer of those around. Sure, WMD turned out to be a total fabrication and the Iraq War ended up being a misguided attempt at democracy building…

> Even if the only outcome (as it seems to be) is getting rid of a dictator, that seems like a good thing.

It also empowered radicals and created perfect conditions for them to thrive. By radicals I mean terrorists, proponents of Islamic state and such. Guns and ammunition ended in their hands that would not ended there.

Regardless of results, calling it merely misguided honest mistake in search of democracy building is naive or a lie. The war was not motivated by altruism and so called mistakes were simply lies. There us such thing as too much of benefit of doubt.

That does not mean other countries leaders are less cynical or more altrustic through, merely they have less power.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#113

Post by timr »

nerfhammer wrote: post #82
brighteyes wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The homeowners have much of the blame, you're right, but tech has made things worse by rapid job growth that contributed to rising rent costs.

job growth is supposed to be a good thing...

Job growth is a good thing only if it benefits the people who live in a place before said growth occurs. Otherwise, you're incentivized to just keep shifting high-paid populations around and calling it success.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#114

Post by JBReefer »

afpx wrote: post #53
21 wrote: post #7

> the United States as a whole is depicted as evil by default So true. The USA is viewed worse than China, Russia or Saudi Arabia. I also see a lot of it on HN.

By Americans or non-Americans? I am an American, in SF about half time, and I don’t hear this. But, my friends are mostly American.

The people that tend to think America is awful in my experience overwhelmingly tend to be American. Most non-Americans seem to have good things to say.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#116

Post by Kalium »

joejerryronnie wrote: post #111
Kalium wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're absolutely right! Tech has made things worse! With that said, it might be worth discussing where the blame for the problem that has been made worse might lie. To aggravate an underlying problem, one has to already exist. So let's talk about that problem, and its causes, rather than casting aspersions on every group who contributed marginally after the fact - that's a very long list, and it's not even a useful…

Or we could talk about the real underlying cause of the one issue you are referencing (cost of housing) - vastly more people moving to the Bay Area than there are houses available. Since it doesn't matter how fast we can actually build homes as we will never catch up to the current demand, we should implement a new resident tax. Let's say everyone who has not been a Bay Area resident for at least 10 years contributes…

I understand why you feel that way. People are moving here so fast! They're changing everything, and there's no way we could ever keep up with how large the hordes of new migrants are.

However, I think it might actually be possible to build homes rapidly enough to meet demand. We should at least try, and if we fail we'll have a lot of new housing. That's a nice prize no matter the outcome. What's convenient about this approach is that if we get rid of the political obstacles to construction, we almost certainly can build enough housing!

Failing that, how about we tax people who have helped perpetuate this state of affairs and benefit the most to help address the problem? How about a "created this mess" tax on everyone who has been in the Bay for ten years or more? Maybe they can contribute a little to solving the problem they created, rather than inflicting pain on other people and shouting "STOP HITTING YOURSELF!".

No, that's not a serious proposal. It makes more sense than slapping people with taxes for the privilege of moving to one of the most expensive places in the world, but that is not a high bar.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#117

Post by joejerryronnie »

arethuza wrote: post #40
zerostar07 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sarcasm and humor are a big deal. They are active attempts to identify resonance with a crowd and common ground, and can be used to assess if there is a strong cultural basis in a community. In the internet it's become very hard to have cohesive communities, so sarcasm has to be labeled (perhaps hoping that it will help people learn to identify it without labels in the future - in vain, i think).

"Sarcasm and humor are a big deal" - I would say practically a way of life here in the UK.... [Edit: I got a severe telling off once from an Intel lawyer for using very mild humour in a conference call.... I learned my lesson. I think in the middle of a multi hour conference call of mind numbing tedium I said 'I'm not sure what a Quad Pump AGP Port is but I want one...' - I got a bollocking for a good 15 minutes].

That's the man trying to keep you down. You should have made it a point in every subsequent meeting with that lawyer to ask about the progress on getting you that Quad Pump AGP Port.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#118

Post by joejerryronnie »

Semirhage wrote: post #19
projectramo wrote: post #11

"I am unprepared for people who don't understand jokes" -- Anton Troynikov I don't know who he is but I really like this quote. That's consistently my biggest surprise on the internet. The #1 question I get for my posts is "Is that sarcasm?" I never answer.

Ironic that this is getting so much traction on HN, where humor is actively crushed with downvotes and flags most of the time. I’m not even disagreeing with the rationale of keeping the site for intellectual inquiry rather than endlessly nested references and jokes. A lot of what people think of as humorous is inherently off topic or frankly not very funny or relevant. Sadly though, I’ve seen some genuinely funny and…

Your dissent is quickly being crushed into oblivion.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#119

Post by RestlessMind »

coldtea wrote: post #28
jpzisme wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll go ahead and say the United States is the greatest country the world has ever seen. It's not perfect, but once you live in other countries for a bit, even if you enjoy the experience, you appreciate the U.S. a lot more.

> I'll go ahead and say the United States is the greatest country the world has ever seen. It's not perfect, but once you live in other countries for a bit, even if you enjoy the experience, you appreciate the U.S. a lot more. Depends on whether you have lived in an advanced Western European country. It also depends of your tolerance of rednecks, prudes, puritans, and ignorant people (which exist everywhere in the wo…

As an Asian, I have been to 10+ cities each in the US and Western Europe, and have spent considerable amount of time on both continents. While being a data point of one, here are my observations:

- Residents of European cities were less welcoming to foreigners like me. (Maybe due to language issues? I speak accented German, a bit of Spanish and English, which can explain why Parisians were rude).

- Immigration to USA, along with path to its citizenship, was a hard but straightforward process (6-7 years once you get H1B). In Europe, I found that UK and Switzerland has a simpler process, but other countries (eg. France) make it very hard to be their citizen.

- Stereotypes abound on both sides of Atlantic (eg. "socialist countries stuck with horrible economies", "rednecks, puritans, prudes, ignorant" as your comment says), which seem highly exaggerated.

- both US and Western Europe offered a far better quality of life compared to my home country. And such debates (USA vs Western Europe) seem farcical from that perspective, or "first world problems" as they say.

Re: Things That Happen in Silicon Valley and Also the Soviet Union

#120

Post by ummonk »

joejerryronnie wrote: post #111
Kalium wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're absolutely right! Tech has made things worse! With that said, it might be worth discussing where the blame for the problem that has been made worse might lie. To aggravate an underlying problem, one has to already exist. So let's talk about that problem, and its causes, rather than casting aspersions on every group who contributed marginally after the fact - that's a very long list, and it's not even a useful…

Or we could talk about the real underlying cause of the one issue you are referencing (cost of housing) - vastly more people moving to the Bay Area than there are houses available. Since it doesn't matter how fast we can actually build homes as we will never catch up to the current demand, we should implement a new resident tax. Let's say everyone who has not been a Bay Area resident for at least 10 years contributes…

Build a wall around the Bay Area?
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