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Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

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Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#81

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

nostrademons wrote: post #74
bluGill wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I learned long ago (when my company decided they couldn't give me options because we were too big so they did these "I can't believe it isn't an option", which expired worthless): until cash is in my bank account it is just a promise waiting to be broken. If I want to invest I want it my choice. In any case, it is a bad idea to invest in the company you work for - unless you are high enough up in the company that you…

> In any case, it is a bad idea to invest in the company you work for I'd question this conventional wisdom, simply because you have a lot more information about the company as an employee than a random investor does, even if you are not in possession of things like financials that the SEC considers "material non-public information". Things like culture, intelligence of your coworkers, whether or not you're actually…

No you don’t. If you did, you would be subject to lock outs. The average rank and file employee at any BigTech company knows only a minuscule more than the general public.

Amazon for instance has over 1 million employees. You know nothing about most of your coworkers or whether other teams are delivering featured

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#82

Post by wat10000 »

sublinear wrote: post #9

> My reasoning was that Powell, Bush, Straw, etc, were clearly making false claims and therefore ought to be discounted completely, and that there were actually very few people who knew a bit about Iraq but were not fatally compromised in this manner who were making the WMD claim At the risk of missing the point, I have to say that knowing what we know now, this is a very poor heuristic. Predicting a lack of WMD was…

How was predicting a lack of WMD correct by mere coincidence? He ignored the blatant liars, believed people with a good record on the subject, and got it right as a result. That's not coincidence, that's an excellent heuristic.

It is a bit of a weird article, though. Correctly predicting Iraq isn't some amazing feat. All it required was being paying some vague attention to the available facts. The question is not, how did some people get it right. The question is, how did so many people not?

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#83

Post by youarentrightjr »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #81
nostrademons wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In any case, it is a bad idea to invest in the company you work for I'd question this conventional wisdom, simply because you have a lot more information about the company as an employee than a random investor does, even if you are not in possession of things like financials that the SEC considers "material non-public information". Things like culture, intelligence of your coworkers, whether or not you're actually…

No you don’t. If you did, you would be subject to lock outs. The average rank and file employee at any BigTech company knows only a minuscule more than the general public. Amazon for instance has over 1 million employees. You know nothing about most of your coworkers or whether other teams are delivering featured

> The average rank and file employee at any BigTech company knows only a minuscule more than the general public.

Huh? We're not talking about the custodial staff.

> Amazon for instance has over 1 million customers. You know nothing about most of your coworkers or whether other teams are delivering featured

This is a hilarious example; especially at Amazon, "rank and file" employees are privy to $100M+ AWS deals, they have to implement them after all.

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#84

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

youarentrightjr wrote: post #83
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No you don’t. If you did, you would be subject to lock outs. The average rank and file employee at any BigTech company knows only a minuscule more than the general public. Amazon for instance has over 1 million employees. You know nothing about most of your coworkers or whether other teams are delivering featured

> The average rank and file employee at any BigTech company knows only a minuscule more than the general public. Huh? We're not talking about the custodial staff. > Amazon for instance has over 1 million customers. You know nothing about most of your coworkers or whether other teams are delivering featured This is a hilarious example; especially at Amazon, "rank and file" employees are privy to $100M+ AWS deals, they…

I worked for AWS in Professional Services (full time blue badge employee). Part of “sales”. Even when we talked internally asking for advice from the service teams (the people who worked on the various AWS services) or even internally within ProServe outside the project team, when we spoke on Slack, we didn’t mention the customers in Slack channels outside of a need to know basis and used the acronym “IHAC” (I have a customer) when referring to the customer.

I assure you the random developer on the EC2 service team for instance knew nothing about the sales deals.

Also a “$100 million dollar sales deal” is nothingburger for AWS not enough to move the market.

Do you think someone on the Alexa team in the retail division (“CDO”) knew anything about what was going on within AWS?

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#85

Post by thaumasiotes »

asdff wrote: post #33
rawgabbit wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the danger of AI is that it enables the surveillance state through facial recognition and the instantaneous aggregation of all my data. For "national security" reasons, I may be detained and denied of my rights if Palantir hallucinates. Who do I sue if Palantir decides I am an illegal?

The thing is a government never needed technology to be authoritarian. The government today already has all the tools to ruin your life. It had them in 1940. It had them in 1840 and it had them in the year 40 as well. And that tool is known as the monopoly on violence. It can be wielded in many ways good and bad.

> The government today already has all the tools to ruin your life. It had them in 1940. It had them in 1840 and it had them in the year 40 as well. And that tool is known as the monopoly on violence.

There are a couple of problems with this:

1. As a matter of raw empirical fact, a government around the year 40 wasn't too likely to possess a monopoly on violence.

2. A monopoly on violence isn't necessary to ruin your life. A simple nonexclusive license, which governments of the period did have, is sufficient.

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#86

Post by youarentrightjr »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #84
youarentrightjr wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The average rank and file employee at any BigTech company knows only a minuscule more than the general public. Huh? We're not talking about the custodial staff. > Amazon for instance has over 1 million customers. You know nothing about most of your coworkers or whether other teams are delivering featured This is a hilarious example; especially at Amazon, "rank and file" employees are privy to $100M+ AWS deals, they…

I worked for AWS in Professional Services (full time blue badge employee). Part of “sales”. Even when we talked internally asking for advice from the service teams (the people who worked on the various AWS services) or even internally within ProServe outside the project team, when we spoke on Slack, we didn’t mention the customers in Slack channels outside of a need to know basis and used the acronym “IHAC” (I have a…

> Do you think someone on the Alexa team in the retail division (“CDO”) knew anything about what was going on within AWS?

Hmm, no?

As a solutions architect at Amazon I was very much a "rank and file" employee, and privy to large deals, so I'm not sure what you're on about. I haven't heard of Professional Services, presumably you guys had different responsibilities.

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#87

Post by KennyBlanken »

convexly wrote: post #58

The flip side is that good ideas with honest framing often lose to bad ideas with better marketing. Being right isn't enough if you can't communicate it and most people don't have the patience to evaluate the honest version.

Is "better marketing" a euphemism for "more willing to misrepresent the other side, turn a practical issue into an emotional one, and generally trot out every logical fallacy they can think of"?

Because that's what I see constantly on social media in response to progressive ideas the rest of the world has largely accepted but apparently just can't possibly work in the United States...

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#88

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

youarentrightjr wrote: post #86
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for AWS in Professional Services (full time blue badge employee). Part of “sales”. Even when we talked internally asking for advice from the service teams (the people who worked on the various AWS services) or even internally within ProServe outside the project team, when we spoke on Slack, we didn’t mention the customers in Slack channels outside of a need to know basis and used the acronym “IHAC” (I have a…

> Do you think someone on the Alexa team in the retail division (“CDO”) knew anything about what was going on within AWS? Hmm, no? As a solutions architect at Amazon I was very much a "rank and file" employee, and privy to large deals, so I'm not sure what you're on about. I haven't heard of Professional Services, presumably you guys had different responsibilities.

So you worked at AWS as an SA and never tried to sell its own internal consulting services?

https://aws.amazon.com/professional-services/

But either way, it’s monumentally a kind of weird statement to think that anyone besides “janitors” would know anything about the deals that would go through or to think a “$100 million sales deal” would move the needle especially as we see right now that AMZN is tanking because they reported they will spend more than all of their free cash flow on CAPEX for AI. You couldn’t have predicted that

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#89

Post by youarentrightjr »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #88
youarentrightjr wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you think someone on the Alexa team in the retail division (“CDO”) knew anything about what was going on within AWS? Hmm, no? As a solutions architect at Amazon I was very much a "rank and file" employee, and privy to large deals, so I'm not sure what you're on about. I haven't heard of Professional Services, presumably you guys had different responsibilities.

So you worked at AWS as an SA and never tried to sell its own internal consulting services? https://aws.amazon.com/professional-services/ But either way, it’s monumentally a kind of weird statement to think that anyone besides “janitors” would know anything about the deals that would go through or to think a “$100 million sales deal” would move the needle especially as we see right now that AMZN is tanking because th…

> So you worked at AWS as an SA and never tried to sale its own internal consulting services?

Not sure I understand the value proposition here, but then again Amazon is known for having redundant teams every now and again.

Re: Good ideas do not need lots of lies in order to gain public acceptance (2008)

#90

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

youarentrightjr wrote: post #89
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you worked at AWS as an SA and never tried to sell its own internal consulting services? https://aws.amazon.com/professional-services/ But either way, it’s monumentally a kind of weird statement to think that anyone besides “janitors” would know anything about the deals that would go through or to think a “$100 million sales deal” would move the needle especially as we see right now that AMZN is tanking because th…

> So you worked at AWS as an SA and never tried to sale its own internal consulting services? Not sure I understand the value proposition here, but then again Amazon is known for having redundant teams every now and again.

SAs are not allowed to give the customer code or actually do anything. When a customer signs a contract (SOW) with ProServe, they are billable consultants who actually do implementations. Even they can’t touch production workloads and basically do everything in non production environments and teach the customer hope to do the work and move it into production
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