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Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

maksimizmaylov.com

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Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#41

Post by freeone3000 »

Miraltar wrote: post #17
A_Duck wrote: post #11

Why is the iPad so addictive that children have to be kept away from it? Because every single person designing apps and websites is incentivised to try and win 100% of your attention. Reed Hoffmann put it nicely — "We're competing with sleep, on the margin." The default apps, browser excluded, are pretty harmless - their incentive is to create a device you decide to welcome into your home. I don't see children spendi…

> The default apps, browser excluded, are pretty harmless - their incentive is to create a device you decide to welcome into your home. I don't see children spending 4 hours doomscrolling the calculator. At least Facebook and Youtube are default apps nowadays

Not on Apple devices.

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#43

Post by Kvakes »

keybored wrote: post #29

Silicon Valley or SC-ideological technologists have this ideological short-circuit for social problems. Let’s call it the Law of SC since every short-circuit needs an authoritative-sounding name, I mean law. - The premise is that there is a social problem - There are some examples of this repeating through history - It always plays out this way - Therefore we will conclude that it is technological determinism - Bonus…

I think you're right on most accounts. What do we do?

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#44

Post by wil421 »

A_Duck wrote: post #11

Why is the iPad so addictive that children have to be kept away from it? Because every single person designing apps and websites is incentivised to try and win 100% of your attention. Reed Hoffmann put it nicely — "We're competing with sleep, on the margin." The default apps, browser excluded, are pretty harmless - their incentive is to create a device you decide to welcome into your home. I don't see children spendi…

YouTube kids was banned quickly in my house. My kids can select a movie and sometimes a kids show. They can also play this playground app, 2 iPads can connect and they can play together.

They also don’t have free rein over iPads and maybe they get access to once a week in the car or something. They are 6 and under so I’ll probably tweak rules as needed.

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#45

Post by cess11 »

Kvakes wrote: post #10
cess11 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you explain the saying 'sharing is caring'? If you're correct and people inherently enjoy the exploitation of others, how could such a saying spontaneously develop and resonate with rather large groups? And how did the feasts of large religions develop? Things like iftar, where you communally share lots of food with both people you know and strangers, including the impoverished and disadvantaged? There ought t…

There is a great book called The Dawn of Everything (Graeber and Wengrow) that talks about how cultures like that existed, and we (the Western civilization) decimated them.

Graeber's Debt has similar themes in some places too.

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#46

Post by the_snooze »

reaanb2 wrote: post #31
A_Duck wrote: post #11

Why is the iPad so addictive that children have to be kept away from it? Because every single person designing apps and websites is incentivised to try and win 100% of your attention. Reed Hoffmann put it nicely — "We're competing with sleep, on the margin." The default apps, browser excluded, are pretty harmless - their incentive is to create a device you decide to welcome into your home. I don't see children spendi…

If you don't pay for the product, you are the product.

A very outdated saying. Cars and IoT are very much things people pay for, but tech enables companies to double-dip and turn them into billboards for the highest ad bidder.

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#47

Post by cess11 »

_Algernon_ wrote: post #22
cess11 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you explain the saying 'sharing is caring'? If you're correct and people inherently enjoy the exploitation of others, how could such a saying spontaneously develop and resonate with rather large groups? And how did the feasts of large religions develop? Things like iftar, where you communally share lots of food with both people you know and strangers, including the impoverished and disadvantaged? There ought t…

Don't look at what people say, look at what they do. People like feeling virtuous, but rarely act that way unless they stand to gain from it.

Why does some states in the US punish generosity towards e.g. unhoused people if that's the case?

It's common for modern states to act violently to suppress empathy and generosity, and it's common to use the school system for the same purpose.

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#48

Post by freeone3000 »

FollowingTheDao wrote: post #25
A_Duck wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree with the conclusion of the article An invention comes as the solution to a problem. The qualities of the solution depend on the parameters of the problem. Many/most technologies have not scaled to the point where their negative externalities outgrow their benefits: GPS, Cordless power tools, OLED TVs, Contactless payments. Of course all have some negatives. We're learning that if the problem is 'make as mu…

> An invention comes as the solution to a problem. What is the problem that the invention of email solved? And what problems did the invention of email create? Inventions do not solve problems. An invention is a mental fabrication, nothing more.

It solved piles of papers and faxes for inter-office memoranda. It solved a 2-week delay for communications with customers (everything from “your order has been placed” to “you still owe us money” to “here’s our christmas catalog”). Email solved the problem of the physical post being (comparatively) expensive and slow.

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#49

Post by keybored »

Kvakes wrote: post #43
keybored wrote: post #29

Silicon Valley or SC-ideological technologists have this ideological short-circuit for social problems. Let’s call it the Law of SC since every short-circuit needs an authoritative-sounding name, I mean law. - The premise is that there is a social problem - There are some examples of this repeating through history - It always plays out this way - Therefore we will conclude that it is technological determinism - Bonus…

I think you're right on most accounts. What do we do?

Tech. companies left to their own devices will push technology that benefits them. People (the majority of society) have to take control over society so that we can find the proper balance: technology that makes our lives better/easier/simpler/more enjoyable and that doesn’t infringe on our attention and so on.

I’m already happy with a lot of software that I use that interfaces with the governmnet. The government wants to do less work. I want to do less work. The software ends up being less work than the prior technology was.

Why are you supposed to rely on Facebook for communicating with your local volunteer group? Why isn’t there a viable option (according to network effects)? Nothing says that we need predatory social media companies that sell people’s data in order to operate local volunteer groups. That’s absurd and and a falsehood that Bit Tech simply wants to convince people of.

Re: Eco Cycles or How I Feel About Technology

#50

Post by blacksmith_tb »

theoreticalmal wrote: post #27
_Algernon_ wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The challenge is the system of incentives around the technology The solution is simple: Outlaw advertising. It should have been done decades ago, considering the negative externalities it puts on society (in terms of visual pollution, and harmful incentives it creates). There is no real reason for it existing. The original argument was that it provides customers with information based on which to make purchasing dec…

> There is no real reason for it existing Except the fundamental human right to be able to say what you want, when you want, how you want, even (especially?) for commercial purposes.

That seems like it requires a notion of corporate personhood? I don't mind some neighborhood pizza place boasting in their front window that they're the best in town (even though that's unlikely). But targeted ads across devices don't strike me as the free expression of a person.
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