Oh give me a break. This argument that people's objections to advertising comes from some Pollyanna naivety over things being free is nonsense. Tell me the last time you have ever seen a company be upfront and explicitly offer a free tier where they tell you upfront exactly what they are harvesting about you and for what purpose (and no, "improving user experience" isn't being upfront) but also offer you a paid version where they explicitly promise not to do that.
"If the product is free then you are the product" is supposed to be a cautionary observation, not an axiomatic proscription.
Does anyone actually trust companies that offer paid services to not harvest their data? Whenever I see this trope I think to myself that whatever lack of regulation, oversight and enforcement lead to that being okay would equally allow for them to both take my money and harvest all my of data anyways.
This is akin to people who criticise socialised medicine or services and pejoratively characterize supporters as just wanting "free stuff", as if the concept of collective payment is naive or something
It's almost as if outside the tech bubbles most people don't understand the tech or implications. HN posters who live and breath in this space are so smug to pretend this esoteric knowledge about networking identifiers or fingerprinting is simple and that anyone can get it. These are the same people who will throw their hands up on any other esoteric topic and give up on it equally. For example, tech people so easily decry how "stupid" the law and legal jurisprudence is (because obviously if they don't understand it, it must be bullshit) but see zero irony in being smug pretentious assholes to regular people who didn't happen to major in computer science.
We shouldn't all have to be PhDs in law and jurisprudence to trust a legal system to look after our interests just like we shouldn't all have to be computer scientists to trust that technical stewards are not exploiting people's lack of knowledge.
Sick of this mentality. Oh these people are sheep idiots who don't understand the EULA euphemisms of "improved user experience " means adtech and behavioural tracking.
Yeah but see, we're talking about a functionality that is inherently visual. Ergonomics has nothing to do with esthetics, and it's such a dumb excuse to hand wave aside interface issues as of they are just about "making things look pretty"
I mean, if they aren't even willing to download the one app that actually gets them the content they want to see, then *no* software will ever be something that this type of user will be interested in. Not everyone has to use an app, so why try and cater to an audience who clearly has zero interest? You're not gonna magically make it somehow even easier than "go to app store, download app" to the point that they'll use any piece of software.
No, the browser version of Plex is much simpler because you can just send a link. The receiver only needs to go through a simple "type your email and password" sign-up process, and that's it. Nothing to install, works everywhere.
Tailscale is exponentially worse, though. Not only would I have ask them to go to Jellyfin and sign up and log in, I would have to explain that they can't do that until they've installed the Tailscale app (which I have to explain because most non-techies do not know what a VPN is). Tailscale requires its own account, so they have to first sign up to that, and I have to add them as an external user first.
I will never understand the point of teaching languages that aren't actually used. To me it just seems like its intended to be easier for the teacher rather than being beneficial for the student.
Python is already a super simple language and has enough functional plus OOP orientation that it can be used to showcase every concept and still be useful for the student.
It's because Western governments do a much better job of legitimizing their corruption or just doing it "transparently" (which makes it okay, you see?).
Best example is registered lobbying. If you have the money, you absolutely can brazenly bribe politicians and not only is it okay, in the United States its been backed by the highest courts as a form of "expression".
Bribing is okay in the West because its not bribing, its legitimized entirely with weasel words like "lobbying" or "fundraising". As long as you're "transparent" about it then its fine.
i actually don't think you can tell immediately at all. Being an expert at a thing and also being a good communicator or teacher of that thing is absolutely not the same thing.
One can be an expert on a topic and produce research, or tools, or predictions, but could be terrible at pedagogy or communicating those thoughts to those outside of the field.
People are really quick to forget that there is an entire field of study dedicated to teaching people, and the reason there is this field of study is because its a lot more complex then people would like to think. Lots of smart people fall for this trap constantly thinking that "well I'm smart, so what I say must be smart", but then completely missing that their communication or output is off the mark entirely for an intended audience. Those people tend to then just shrug it off as "well they're stupid" (on the harsh end) or "well they don't know enough about X to understand this..." (on the less harsh end) rather than ever considering "could I have delivered or explained this better"?
It is very difficult to explain complex things in simple terms. It's probably the most complex thing humans cognitively do (synthesis vs analysis). Synthesizing a complex and very dynamic system or topic into analogies that are both (a) accurate models/shapes of the original and (b) understandable for non-experts is its own challenge separate from even understanding the topic itself at an expert level.
Those are good points. Seeing experts that are also experts in explaining things could just lead to a confirmation bias.
I am however not convinced that having deep and broad knowledge is a field (aka being an expert) is independent of the ability to explain it in simple terms.
Knowledge is a network. Facts that relate to each other. The connection can be horizontal or vertical. Connecting low level understanding with high level understanding to me always seemed to be at the very core of being an expert and with that simple explanations evolve naturally.
I think it's hard to discuss the topic because it's hard to define what it means to be an expert.
It should be a useful definition and what you are pointing at (producing results) might be more useful or it might not be strict enough (for me), or both.
What about this is unique to Palantir at all? As far as I'm aware, there are many, many more companies deeply embedded with the US intelligence community and law enforcement and Palantir isn't all that special here. Microsoft, Amazon, IBM, etc. all have massive contracts directly supporting the same thing. I don't understand what makes Palantir special here.
I'm not sure bow many special services the big tech companies provide.
Palantir's demo videos are very "we filtered down this list of people, here's the satellite imagery now, and we integrate well with your repaer drones and missiles systems to complete the kill chain! One click kill!" They probably patented & trademarked exactly that terminology. The Amazon of barely reviewed murder.
The data its built on. Science goes where the data is and all of metas/googles social network data, aka all of human behavioral data builds the actual basis for Sims. The palantir in the company name is a reference to cellphones. Seeing stones to look into the heart of the man of the west and east..
Its basically a privatized science. With that you can give accurate scenario tree modeling and predictions to governments free of the retardations, idealizations and ideologies that plague the open source "sciences" that actually don't even want to know.
They also sell Datamining related tools that allow to implement policies.
Before 2008 - 2012 there buisness base just didn't exist.
My guess is that it works so well that actual criminal enterprises and foreign adversaries found it a risk - so they send bots to brigade every comment section.
they dont need bots. all normal people know that total usa and big tech domination would turn the world into the worst dictatorship in history. alex karp wants a future where anyone who speaks out against the government gets tracked down and threatened with a drone strike on their home.
if fighting against it means supporting cartels and china then so be it.
"If the product is free then you are the product" is supposed to be a cautionary observation, not an axiomatic proscription.
Does anyone actually trust companies that offer paid services to not harvest their data? Whenever I see this trope I think to myself that whatever lack of regulation, oversight and enforcement lead to that being okay would equally allow for them to both take my money and harvest all my of data anyways.
This is akin to people who criticise socialised medicine or services and pejoratively characterize supporters as just wanting "free stuff", as if the concept of collective payment is naive or something
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