I've been working in industrial automation for 25 years, installing industrial robots and manufacturing machines and so on. All of these machines were only ever installed at companies that were growing and hiring more people. I've never seen a machine installed that was followed by lay-offs. Plants only close down because demand dries up, or because they can't compete with the cost of overseas labor. Faster automation is the only way to make American workers compete with workers in China for the same work.

I think what we're seeing is called "learned helplessness". They try, for all of 3 minutes, and don't see immediate improvement in their lives, and give up. We're conditioning people to expect immediate feedback. But all progress takes a long time. You have to stick with it. As someone once said to me, "if you want to dig a big hole, you need to stand in one place for a while." Also, the phone can be a useful tool, but it doesn't have the answers you need. Real people doing work out in the real world are the people you need to talk to, and the ones getting stuff done are making a living doing it, and don't need to post all their secrets online to get clicks. Work for someone who knows what they're doing, pay attention, and ask them some questions during the slow times when they take a break.

You know, I've been trying to replace myself with software for the last 20 or so years. The better I get at it, the more demand I have for my services.

What legal angle? Unless they're inciting violence, conspiring to commit crimes, or similar, these assholes have the same right to free speech as anyone else.

Which was pretty silly. Communism should have been framed more simply and accurately as the killer of massive numbers of people, mostly through starvation, but also through ideological purges. Fascism can't hold a candle to Communism in terms of death toll. Neither can religion, at least in absolute numbers. In the more distant past religion did some serious large-volume murdering on on a percentage basis, but the total numbers were smaller then.

Carriers are irrelevant now. It's the OEMs (especially Samsung) who have the power. Samsung would kick Google to the curb if Google tried to take over.

Similarly, just after the last US presidential election, my wife seemed to be literally losing her mind. Like... she thought the world was ending. I'm pretty moderate... I don't like the orange guy, but I try to appreciate what actual issues might be causing people to vote one way or the other. She would start flipping out about something like abortion, and I would say, "you know, the majority of Americans and even male Americans are actually pro-choice, but they rank it a lower priority than other issues like wages and house prices, so that probably affected why the vote went the way it did," and she'd just explode at me. This is a person with a Ph.D. and up until then I'd rate her communication skills as excellent. Finally she admitted that this constant negative emotional state wasn't good for her, and I just asked her to try not using Facebook, just for a week, and go talk to people face to face, and if they bring up politics then change the subject. She did, and after a week she said she felt much better. She's back on social media now, but I think she has some perspective on what it does to her emotionally.

To the extent that the situation you refer to is a problem, it's a problem of market share and the resulting funding for ongoing development of an open source OS. Google's ability to enforce requirements on Android OEMs is limited because the big players or any significant consortium of the smaller players can simply choose to cut ties with Google if Google is too pushy.

Yes, Chrome established a different business model from the outset. Android went a different direction because, rightly or wrongly, it was believed at the time that it was necessary in order to fend off other participants in the smartphone ecosystem, and over time it has gotten harder to change the model, not easier. In particular, one major Android OEM has amassed so much market dominance that they can and often do simply refuse Google's requests. Legally, Google could cut ties, but that would be bad for Google and i think it would be bad for Android users, since it would instantly fragment the ecosystem. IMO, Android users (and I am one) are better off with a slower-moving but relatively unified ecosystem.

No, this is about the merger of the platforms. It probably will eventually result in some reduction in staffing, but it's not happening now, and hasn't happened in any significant way. Both Android and ChromeOS have been relatively untouched by layoffs.

The goal is to reduce engineering effort. Even Google has to consider costs.

This was announced on June 12, 2024.

It doesn't mean Android and ChromeOS will share a common UI. Android already supports several distinct user interfaces for different platforms (mobile, wearable, auto, TV), and there's lots of customization even within those spaces. I expect that once the transition is complete, ChromeOS will still look and act much like it does now. It may run Android apps a little better than it does now (though it already runs them fairly well). It'll just share a lot of infrastructure with Android underneath the surface.

You're suggesting it's mostly good for making deepfake prawn? That would be a good reason to shut it all down from my perspective.

A data center is technically infrastructure. When the AI hype blows over, I guess there'll be lots of cheap computing to be had for a few years. Plus the electricity grid infrastructure they have to add to support it will still be available for other uses, like rebuilding manufacturing? Let's hope.

From what I find online, microdoses of psilocybin are generally 0.1-0.3 g of psilocybe cubensis, which would give a dose of about 1-4 mg of psilocybin, not 15 mg.

It seems a bit creepy, but the further you go back in history, the more everyone in town knows all your business. Walking into a restaurant and knowing the names of everyone in there, and the waitress knowing how you like your food cooked used to be the norm. This is just a matter of perspective.