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Comment "Nuclear device" (Score 0) 42

Look, I know "nuclear device" is correctly generic, so that RTGs and things like them, legitimately count. But let's be serious: right around the very same time this real stuff happened, some really great fake stuff happened too: the movie Goldfinger.

And once you've watched Goldfinger, "nuclear device" is just a euphemism for a bomb. So don't go calling RTGs "nuclear devices," please.

Comment Re:We've done the experiment (Score 1) 152

Some good has come from promoting more user speech online, but also a lot of bullying, harassment, echo chambers, doxxing, stochastic terrorism, and so on.

You make it sound as dangerous as a 1775 soap box that people like Sam Adams would stand upon and shout from, or a pamphlet-printing-press that someone like Thomas Paine might use, where in both cases the goal was often to rowse the rabble into protest and action.

But is the internet really that dangerous?

Comment Save the Whales!!! (Score 1) 131

It's so weird that when I was a kid the Left had "Save the Whales!!" bumper stickers and now it's the Right-Conservationists.

They even dedicated Star Trek IV to the cause.

Maybe if the whale killers get reinstated we'll at least get case law to prohibit permitting denials for Integral Fast Reactors and that can at least clean up the Boomers' nuclear waste to protect the ecosystem long term.

Comment Re:"Free speech"? (Score 2) 152

"The platforms" are, at best, a percent of the internet.

Sign up for a linode, put up any sort of website you can imagine on it, and explain why you would choose for the algorithms you write or install, to work the way that you fear.

It doesn't have to be as bad as you say, unless you want it. That's essential freedom.

Comment Re:Repealing Section 230 ... (Score 3, Insightful) 152

This would result in suppression of anti Trump opinion

It will result in suppression of all anti- power/wealth opinion, i.e. all criticism of government or big-pocketed business.

This change is sponsored by litigious motherfuckers. Trump is only the instance-du-jour, a few percent of the overall threat, though very much a shining example of it.

Comment Financial Privacy (Score 1) 64

In my lifetime you could open a bank account with just a name, ditto for renting an apartment, and pay for everything in cash.

This guy is screwed unless he's only a guest of a patron.

Crime was lower and people were more responsible back then too.

All this control grid surveillance still hasn't caught the Building 7 people.

Maybe it's possible to decide a course of action was a bad idea and reverse it?

Comment Re:Okay. (Score 2) 129

With one important difference, this reminds me of the 1974 Emergency Highway Energy Conservation Act, which established a national speed limit of 55 MPH. States had to either adopt a state speed limit of 55 MPH, or else lose out on funding, i.e. get punished.

Of course, that was a law enacted by Congress, not an Executive order. I guess, traditionally, they say that for first quarter millennium of America, Congress held the purse strings because some inky piece of paper said they were supposed to, as if Congress could ever handle that much responsibility! Can you imagine?! Anyway, we've decided Fuck That Tradition, let's try something new and put a thieving tool in charge of the purse.

Comment Re:Can't Europe (Score 1) 125

The time has come for a European University CSE department group to reverse-engineer HDMI 2.1 and publish a compatible implementation on Github.

There's a solid history of this category of work going back 30 years.

They have certain legal protections for compatibility and public interest work.

This 1990's licensing model is antiquated and obsolete.

IEEE and ITU have abdicated their responsibility so sombody like Valve needs to do for transport spec what AV1 did for codecs and linux did for operating systems.

"A rising tide lifts all boats" is common among free marketeers and communists but opposed by fascists.

Comment Re:Real problem is criminal motivations (Score 1) 21

> Is there a huge difference between a criminal organization and a multinational corporation?

Yes, huge difference.

The common-law criminals running corporations get statutory protection from liability for the crimes they commit under corporate letterhead.

A regular mafia has individual liability.

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