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Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

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Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#131

Post by groby_b »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #63
abirch wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In addition to these scientists, I heard from my friends in academia that they will be taking fewer PhD students because they're unsure of the funding. We may be looking at a lost decade.

> We may be looking at a lost decade. We're looking at the US wilfully letting go of the possibiility of remaining the most powerful nation in the world. Reduced health, reduced education, reduced funding for research, reduced international aid programs (which both garner goodwill whilst also creating a bulwark against those who profit from misery), reduced oversight / regulation of the power of capital, alienation o…

This is not "letting go", this is "deliberately giving away and dismantling".

Nobody is that incompetent to do this accidentally.

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#132

Post by stonogo »

devmunchies wrote: post #90
dqv wrote: post #59

Interesting approach to competing with China on wireless technology. I would have thought the US having a competitive edge over China in terms of research and development would be important to Republicans.

The federal govt can’t be the majority of technological innovation. If we’re lucky this vacuum will be filled by an even larger private sector innovation hub like Xerox park and bell labs.

Every single American cellular operator was part of this program.

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#133

Post by 20after4 »

setikites wrote: post #108
carterschonwald wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My fear as well. I’m not sure if even a magic wish to rearrange stuff back to the before January state of affairs is possible at this point. Write to your representatives. I fear that if they don’t pull off something the only ethical and responsible thing is civil war. This shit is insane and will destroy everything I like about our government. Also to quote every true patriot: the only good Nazi is a dead Nazi. I’m…

Calling your elected representatives daily is more effective. The app 5 calls makes it easy.

5 * 0 is still 0. They aren't listening.

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#134

Post by amluto »

bruce511 wrote: post #121
andix wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forgot "wilfully letting go of democracy". US democracy is far away from dying, but who knows how much longer it can keep holding up.

Bearing in mind that this administration won the election and a lot of what they are doing is more-or-less what they campaigned on, I'm not sure democracy is at risk. One can pick around the details, but for example with regard to the firings, voters clearly approved of the concept of smaller, cheaper government. Which is basically what's happening. This is essentially democracy in action. Yes, the voters may come to…

This:

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/19/donald-trump-king-i...

doesn’t really sound like democracy.

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#135

Post by bruce511 »

trhway wrote: post #104
BLKNSLVR wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We may be looking at a lost decade. We're looking at the US wilfully letting go of the possibiility of remaining the most powerful nation in the world. Reduced health, reduced education, reduced funding for research, reduced international aid programs (which both garner goodwill whilst also creating a bulwark against those who profit from misery), reduced oversight / regulation of the power of capital, alienation o…

>We're looking at the US wilfully letting go of the possibiility of remaining the most powerful nation in the world. many here see it way (me too, though i'm well aware that many times whenever i was critical of Musk, he happened to be right, and in this case - Musk is naturally not anti-science guy, so i'd guess there must be some other reason for him doing that which i'm just not able to see). I wonder whether some…

Musk's motivations are simple; the rich have been promised tax breaks, which means deep spending cuts. So gutting the parks service means no parks open to the public, but balances a tax break to billionaires.

Same for "science". That's a long term investment with long term returns. Kill that now for immediate tax breaks. Let someone else worry about the fallout 10 years from now.

Then there's direct interest. The CFB regulates companies processing payments to protect consumers. X wants to process payments without that pesky oversight. CFB is gone.

Musk and Trump sell this to the masses as saving money. Which the masses assume means lower taxes for them. Whereas the billionaires understand it's to remove services from the masses to route more money to themselves. The masses are easily duped - this is literally democracy in action.

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#136

Post by scarface_74 »

bruce511 wrote: post #121
andix wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forgot "wilfully letting go of democracy". US democracy is far away from dying, but who knows how much longer it can keep holding up.

Bearing in mind that this administration won the election and a lot of what they are doing is more-or-less what they campaigned on, I'm not sure democracy is at risk. One can pick around the details, but for example with regard to the firings, voters clearly approved of the concept of smaller, cheaper government. Which is basically what's happening. This is essentially democracy in action. Yes, the voters may come to…

Trump specifically disavowed Project 2025 when he ran and now is embracing it. He never said he was going to put an unelected billionaire in charge and disregard the Constitution.

> And the lack of reaction by Republicans in congress suggests that they feel the best way to be reelected is to go along with it.

They are worried about getting primaried and their primary opponent being financed by Musk.

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#137

Post by mikeyouse »

guywithahat wrote: post #93
cavisne wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Non-probationary employees can't be fired (and even voluntary resignations are rate-limited by the Iron Mountain mine shaft elevator). So every day that process takes lowers the number of employees that can even be fired. Once it gets to a year (very easily) they would all have come off probation so nothing could be done. Everyone saying "oh something should be done but just do it slower" is actually saying do nothin…

I didn’t realize that; this is a really good point

(It’s not true)

https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/workforce-restruct...

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#138

Post by rfw300 »

late2part wrote: post #114
thrfedsci022425 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Federal scientist here. The situation is dire, and this is only the beginning. We've lost all employees with < 1 year of service, which has halted the new projects they were hired to work on. Leaders of 100 employee offices were booted since they had less than 1 year of federal service--back to another interim director. Those of us left are hamstrung since all travel has been canceled, and our credit cards will have…

[flagged]

Is it "sensible oversight" to shoot first and ask questions later—to shut down all payments on a whim and then implement a review process (assuming it actually exists) afterwards which will be immediately overloaded?

You might as well starve prisoners and then say sensible calorie management is not in and of itself foolish.

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#139

Post by edward28 »

01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote: post #84
sneak wrote: post #50

Consent matters. There is no worse tyranny than to force someone to pay for something they do not want to buy, simply because you think it would be good for them. I am vehemently pro-research and pro-education, but these tax-funded programs are not it. There must be some meaningful connection to the delivery of value, otherwise this stuff is just public-private wealth transfer. This seems obvious to me. Why should th…

[flagged]

Is this the same Kara as Kara Sternquist the convicted felon charged with "possession of fraudulent badges and credentials for federal agencies" and when their house was searched multiple firearms were found including two fully automatic rifles? [0][1]

[0] https://casetext.com/case/united-states-v-sternquist

[1] https://www.motherjones.com/criminal-justice/2023/01/mdc-bro...

Re: Everyone at NSF overseeing the Platforms for Wireless Experimentation is gone

#140

Post by MyOutfitIsVague »

btilly wrote: post #123
trhway wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>We're looking at the US wilfully letting go of the possibiility of remaining the most powerful nation in the world. many here see it way (me too, though i'm well aware that many times whenever i was critical of Musk, he happened to be right, and in this case - Musk is naturally not anti-science guy, so i'd guess there must be some other reason for him doing that which i'm just not able to see). I wonder whether some…

Trump I have no explanation for except corruption. But Musk and DOGE, there is a simple explanation. Musk has learned that you take a chainsaw to sacred cows, then fix the 10% that were really bad mistakes, and that is the easiest way to cut through bureaucracy. So he's trying that, at scale. Unfortunately it doesn't seem like he'll notice most of his bad mistakes. Because it is at scale, and his attention doesn't go…

Yeah, this slash and burn approach is legitimately good in many circumstances. You cut through cruft, break down old unneeded processes, and things that are needed but were undocumented become quickly documented and maybe refurbished. Things that break are quickly noticed and reinstated.

It really doesn't work for huge complex systems where the breakages aren't felt fully for many years, and building the systems back up take decades, and things break so far down the line that it's impossible to even tell what needs to be fixed.

I have to hope that the intentions are actually good, because the appearances from the outside look a lot like the start of a dictatorship.

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