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Can we have the day off?

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Re: Can we have the day off?

#581

Post by bwhiting2356 »

Aurornis wrote: post #486
bwhiting2356 wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was in the musician's union for 12 years before I got into tech. There were some silly rules, like someone couldn't be both a musician and and orchestrator on the same show, because it's "doing 2 jobs". It's like saying you can't be full stack. You couldn't fire people who were bad at their jobs and stopped putting in any effort. There was a profit sharing agreement that the union rejected, because it would come at…

> If there's no startup capital, no one will have a salary or benefits for years until there's a profit (if at all). And capital comes in exchange for ownership of the future upside. The developer co-op projects I've seen have targeted consulting for this reason. The idea is that developers get together and start doing projects that can bill clients immediately, and then they'll pool the money back into developing th…

> Musicians can't do their performance over zoom and the job can't be outsourced to another country.

Recording is increasingly outsourced, unfortunately. There are great orchestras in Eastern Europe.

Re: Can we have the day off?

#582

Post by testing22321 »

yladiz wrote: post #495
manmal wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In some European countries, you can actually go on welfare and never work again. It takes some tricks because the state doesn’t like it; and maybe you‘ll want to do some undeclared side jobs for 15h a week and you’ll be comfortable. I don’t know how such people can live with themselves. But apparently, if you’re immune to the second factor, it is possible, nowadays, to work 15h or less, without any wealth, and lead a…

Which European countries?

Australia no problem. Most liberal welfare in the world

Re: Can we have the day off?

#583

Post by arkh »

paulhebert wrote: post #221
cattown wrote: post #33

This article is kind of playful, but I think there’s a serious point here that’s not discussed enough. We’re being asked to usher in huge productivity gains by introducing AI to our workflows, but we’re not asking how does it help us? Not a lot of us stand to directly gain from our employers becoming more productive. I know everybody is afraid of getting fired and replaced with AI or whatever right now. But we should…

Right, the AI companies don’t even try to pretend it’s good for the average person. The message could be “we’ll all do more by working less.” Instead it’s, “some people will lose their jobs while everyone else works the same amount or more”

What's crazy is the glee when saying that. It's like "fuck those uppity low class people who managed to move up socially thanks to an in-demand job requiring some skill". Now we're back to only who you know, skills are for the AI.

Re: Can we have the day off?

#584

Post by Dig1t »

This will never happen, the power dynamic between workers and employers is so skewed in favor of employers and it is only getting worse.

Don't like your job? Fine leave, there are tens of millions of H1B's who will do your job for less money and they won't complain because they can't easily leave.

Re: Can we have the day off?

#586

Post by bwhiting2356 »

komali2 wrote: post #563
bwhiting2356 wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe i’m a cynical capitalist, but I expect everyone to be operating in their own self interest. There are few true saints. Startups are high risk high reward. 9/10 fail. If a VC gets less upside when it works, the successes wouldn’t pay for the failures. Co-op for consulting actually seems like it could work.

> Maybe i’m a cynical capitalist, but I expect everyone to be operating in their own self interest. Down to explore this with me? I often wonder if this is self fulfilling. I'm not saying you're selfish, I mean, has capitalism trained people that all people are inherently selfish, and then, within this system where selfishness is rewarded, incentivized further selfishness and continued to sell this myth? How much mai…

I see this as a bunch of unsolved game theory problems. USA vs Soviet Union I just see as a battle of competing empires. There have been competing empires for all of history, we haven’t figure out how not to do that yet.

At the smaller scale, I’ve lived in coliving housing most of my adult life. Mostly positive, but problems that make people retreat away from cooperation. Once a week potluck but otherwise people cook their own food. Chronic mess/clutter/dishes/laundry headaches.

Re: Can we have the day off?

#588

Post by ares623 »

Thanemate wrote: post #575
fg137 wrote: post #296

I never understand why software engineers are so excited about AI as a whole. If you are excited about the technology, sure. But if you are excited about the increase in productivity, unless you are a manager, I don't really understand it. Like, why? You are not working one hour less than before. If anything, it's more likely you'll get laid off and have trouble finding your next job.

>I never understand why software engineers are so excited about AI as a whole. Dictating what to exist and what not to to the machine is a power fantasy that's not going to stick around for long, because we'll inevitably reach the point where no human is needed in the loop (or at least not as often as they needed today). Most people finally feel how they would've felt like if they actually put deliberate practice for…

rewriting something in Rust used to be "cool" because it was hard. What's the point in it now? How robust are the safety guarantees of something you didn't even write?

Re: Can we have the day off?

#589

Post by jeffreygoesto »

komali2 wrote: post #563
bwhiting2356 wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe i’m a cynical capitalist, but I expect everyone to be operating in their own self interest. There are few true saints. Startups are high risk high reward. 9/10 fail. If a VC gets less upside when it works, the successes wouldn’t pay for the failures. Co-op for consulting actually seems like it could work.

> Maybe i’m a cynical capitalist, but I expect everyone to be operating in their own self interest. Down to explore this with me? I often wonder if this is self fulfilling. I'm not saying you're selfish, I mean, has capitalism trained people that all people are inherently selfish, and then, within this system where selfishness is rewarded, incentivized further selfishness and continued to sell this myth? How much mai…

My personal mental model is that there is a quite bimodal distribution of people in the world. Many seem to see it as a zero-sum game, some others not. As father of a disabled child I come into contact a lot with the latter and can confidently say that there is a LOT to gain once you stop starting to stare at money only. Once your needs are basically covered, giving can give you so much.

Re: Can we have the day off?

#590

Post by EliRivers »

theptip wrote: post #247
cattown wrote: post #33

This article is kind of playful, but I think there’s a serious point here that’s not discussed enough. We’re being asked to usher in huge productivity gains by introducing AI to our workflows, but we’re not asking how does it help us? Not a lot of us stand to directly gain from our employers becoming more productive. I know everybody is afraid of getting fired and replaced with AI or whatever right now. But we should…

I think it’s pretty naive to ask your employer for a day off. As experienced by companies, the market is more competitive than ever. Whoever slows down will get eaten by some hungry upstart that is willing to work 996 to eat the incumbent’s lunch. It’s a Prisoner’s Dilemma. The only way to get this outcome is to coordinate at a level higher than individual market participants. In other words, get your government to i…

Whoever slows down will get eaten by some hungry upstart that is willing to work 996 to eat the incumbent’s lunch.

Is this true? There are a lot of low-productivity and zombie companies trudging through year after year.

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