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Pieces of Shit

geohot.github.io

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Re: Pieces of Shit

#41

Post by rspoerri »

yarcob wrote: post #29
mmarq wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does it even mean to separate capitalism from government?

I assume they mean to make sure the people who make the laws don't profit from them. Kinda hard to do in practice.

It would also mean that it's impossible to gain power in goverment by money or by owning "things" (factories etc.).

Afaik historic greek democracy was more like that. People got into goverment by lottery. If you were chosen, you had to attend a 2 year training and then your spent 4 years in goverment.

Re: Pieces of Shit

#42

Post by bsenftner »

funwares wrote: post #6

> I wish you short sighted fucks in the PMC could actually do something about it. What is the PMC the author is referring to here?

I doubt the suck-ups of the world have the bravery to risk their incomes.

Re: Pieces of Shit

#43

Post by tomxor »

> I don’t think they see themselves as scammers, I think they actually think quite highly of themselves [...] “Perception is reality”

Wilfully deceitful people are rare, the rest of us are exceptionally good at justifying our actions to ourselves - Undiluted honest self judgement can be self destructive, but eating gobfuls of bluepills is also extremely dangerous to society - I believe there is a middle-ground, awareness of this "cognitive bias" is the first step.

Re: Pieces of Shit

#44

Post by cheschire »

antattack wrote: post #25

From the blog: "Three policy proposals: A 500% tax on advertising. It’s a zero sum game with no benefit to society. If you are paying for eyeballs, you pay a 500% tax. Force companies with these trash addictive business models to find a way to work for the average person, not pimp them out. 1% tax on the full amount of every trade. Fuck off worthless HFT mega brain drain. Fuck off short termism in markets. Separation…

Perhaps it's a reference to the Yale and Harvard Divinity Schools? Federal school funding paying for things like this, then that leads to... anti-sexual discrimination rules being enforced?

I am now very interested in what event happened as well.

Re: Pieces of Shit

#45

Post by lyaa »

antattack wrote: post #25

From the blog: "Three policy proposals: A 500% tax on advertising. It’s a zero sum game with no benefit to society. If you are paying for eyeballs, you pay a 500% tax. Force companies with these trash addictive business models to find a way to work for the average person, not pimp them out. 1% tax on the full amount of every trade. Fuck off worthless HFT mega brain drain. Fuck off short termism in markets. Separation…

I'm also curious, what has Title IX got to do with the rest? It has nothing to do with churches, does it?

Re: Pieces of Shit

#46

Post by beepbooptheory »

istinetz wrote: post #32
djbebs wrote: post #19

I read it. Its at best unhelpful and misguided and at worst actively harmful to the stated goals. Ultimately he is advocating for a political solution for what he believes is an economic problem. The issue here is that the cause of the problems he wants to resolve is not an economic problem at all, but a political choice. The proposal of preventing companies from purchasing property, for example is a clear cut exampl…

>Ultimately he is advocating for a political solution for what he believes is an economic problem. >Three policy proposals: >A 500% tax on advertising. [...] >1% tax on the full amount of every trade. [...] How is that a "political solution to an economic problem"? What would a non political solution look like to you? Why is it bad that it's a political solution to an economic problem? If it works, it works.

A non political solution would be the transition away from capitalism to a different kind of relation between labor and society.

It should be clear at this point that capitalism can tolerate a pretty broad spectrum of political arrangements, from 'socialist' countries to dictatorships, and especially everything in between.

You can change your frontend to be all kinds of ways, and that will create vastly different user experiences. But at the end of the day we are still tied to the backend, the infrastructure, the "business logic".

Re: Pieces of Shit

#47

Post by j7ake »

mmarq wrote: post #24
rspoerri wrote: post #22

And i thought separation of church and goverment has mostly been archived. At least in Switzerland. I would advocate separating capitalism from goverment. But thats equally unrealistic as church/gov separation was 200 years ago.

What does it even mean to separate capitalism from government?

For example, working in certain positions of government for a few years can often land very lucrative jobs in finance companies like Goldman Sachs. There is a corrupting influence of finance companies on government civil servants to sway legislation towards the companies by hinting they will be rewarded later for it by employing them later in senior positions.

A way to limit this corruption is to ban government civil servants from being able to take private jobs after their service.

Re: Pieces of Shit

#48

Post by nosianu »

tentacleuno wrote: post #4

> Continue to let huge ad companies (stop calling them tech companies) rent seek and nickel and dime you on everything What is he referring to here, out of curiosity? Does a company like Google own an apartment complex, or is it some sort of on-site housing programme?

"Rent" as a word here refers to "regular payments to use something", of which rents for housing are only one specific example. For example, printer manufacturers who force you to buy only their (incredibly expensive) ink, or razor makers who benefit from regular purchases of blades.

The term "rent-seeking" has an even broader scope:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking

> Rent-seeking is the effort to increase one's share of existing wealth without creating new wealth. Rent-seeking results in reduced economic efficiency through misallocation of resources, reduced wealth-creation, lost government revenue, heightened income inequality, and potential national decline.

In the case of the razor manufacturers they can at least claim that it's completely natural (I'm not sure how far they go to prevent cheaper blades to be made available for their particular razors?), but often the regular payments are artificially forced through contract clauses, laws, patents, copyright (I guess?), and/or through technical means. In the case of printer manufacturers, they started adding electronics to the cartridges that force you to buy only cartridges made by that specific printer manufacturer.

Basically, it is a goal of many businesses to end up as a "rent-seeker". Have a wall that keeps out competition and a large number of customers forced to regularly buy from you ("regularly" is key, for constant predictable cash-flow and an easy life free of competitive pressure and uncertainty - for the rent-seeker).

Re: Pieces of Shit

#49

Post by AussieWog93 »

Wronnay wrote: post #17

WTF? That guy is literarry a capitalist himself with a company full of shitty gatekeeping tactics ("solve a programming challenge before you even apply") and now he writes some communist shit? Please - take his money away till he finds to himself again.

His complaint wasn't about capitalism existing (he explicitly mentioned that he "liked capitalism"), but the fact that people are getting very very rich from zero-sum (HFT) or negative-sum (advertising) games. Most justifications for capitalism rely on the assumption that commerce is an overall positive-sum game.

Re: Pieces of Shit

#50

Post by Igelau »

antattack wrote: post #25

From the blog: "Three policy proposals: A 500% tax on advertising. It’s a zero sum game with no benefit to society. If you are paying for eyeballs, you pay a 500% tax. Force companies with these trash addictive business models to find a way to work for the average person, not pimp them out. 1% tax on the full amount of every trade. Fuck off worthless HFT mega brain drain. Fuck off short termism in markets. Separation…

I think he's using "church" to mean any institution that's not the state itself. Which is a quite a stretch.

Less likely, it could be some weird comparison of the Ivy League to some special priesthood that gets you extra privileges.

Crunchier still, it might be an attack on secret societies like Skull & Bones.

Whatever it is, it seems very confused.

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