The drone war in Ukraine has rearranged the tactics much like the machine gun did in WW I. Infantry is hunted down by drones that fly through open doors and windows. Armor is mobbed by multiple drones that eventual break something important.

Drones have deleted the Russian Black Sea fleet.

The U.S. Navy so far fought off the drones burning through large numbers of very expensive missiles that can not be replaced all that quickly. On top of that the destroyers have to return to a safe port to reload the vertical launch systems. The destroyer tenders that used to exist for such purposes were all scrapped decades ago.

The military has discovered once again it's ready to fight the previous war.

From OpenAI's engineers' perspective, the purpose of ChatGPT is to write things that appear to be similar to what humans have written, or would write. The ethics of this perspective are that OpenAI should have no liability. ChatGPT is for novelty purposes only, and it's as dangerous as Magic 8 Ball.

From a different perspective (including, possibly, OpenAI's own marketing team's perspective), the purpose of ChatGPT is to help solve problems, give people advice, etc. The ethics of this perspective are that OpenAI should be liable for what it "says." ChatGPT is more dangerous than Magic 8 Ball.

But from a user's perspective, the purpose of ChatGPT is whatever you want it to be. The ethics of this perspective are that OpenAI's liability is hard to determine, therefore, this perspective is wrong and reality should be shoe-horned into one of the above perspectives. ;-) Well, ok, I guess ChatGPT is about as dangerous as a BASIC interpreter or a screwdriver or a rock or a 30 JuggaloWatt mining phaser, which can be anywhere from not-dangerous-at-all to hey-you-just-murdered-ten-thousand-nuns-and-orphans. Since this is the hardest case to analyze, of course we're going to go this way.

But the opposite is what's happening right now: they are decreasing their coal imports, and increasing their natural gas imports.
https://www.wita.org/atp-resea...

Rats, no mod points, but you are correct.

It would be a problematic precedent if there were criminal liability

Here is a list of examples from the pre-AI era kindly put together for me by Claude... With the prosecuting attorneys' party-affiliations, because BeauHD felt it is important:

United States v. Google Inc. — Non-Prosecution Agreement (D.R.I. 2011)

Platform: Google (search/advertising)

Allegation: The DOJ's Office of Criminal Investigations (working with the FDA) investigated Google for knowingly allowing unlicensed Canadian online pharmacies to advertise prescription drugs and controlled substances to US consumers via its AdWords program since at least 2003. Google reportedly helped these advertisers optimize their illegal ads. The investigation was triggered when a cooperating fugitive revealed his use of AdWords to run illegal pharmaceutical sales.

Outcome: Google entered a Non-Prosecution Agreement and forfeited $500 million — one of the largest such forfeitures in US history. The lead prosecutor stated publicly that "Larry Page knew what was going on." No criminal charges were filed against individuals. Google was treated as an aider and abettor of illegal drug importation.

Prosecuting attorney: Peter F. Neronha, US Attorney, District of Rhode Island — Democrat (Obama appointee).

State of South Carolina — Criminal Threat Against Craigslist (2009)

Platform: Craigslist

Allegation: South Carolina AG Henry McMaster sent a formal letter to Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster threatening criminal prosecution under state law for knowingly allowing the site to be used to solicit prostitution, following a series of high-profile crimes linked to Craigslist's Erotic Services section (including the "Craigslist Killer" murders).

Outcome: Craigslist sued McMaster preemptively; a South Carolina federal judge issued a temporary restraining order blocking the threatened prosecution on Section 230 grounds. No criminal charges were filed. Craigslist eventually shut down its Erotic Services section nationally in September 2010.

Prosecuting attorney: Henry McMaster, Attorney General of South Carolina — Republican.

Multistate AG Coalition Criminal Pressure Campaign Against Craigslist (2009–2010)

Platform: Craigslist

Allegation: Following McMaster's lead, attorneys general from over 40 states issued coordinated demands threatening criminal prosecution of Craigslist executives for facilitating prostitution and sex trafficking through the Erotic Services section. The pressure intensified after the "Craigslist Killer" murders of Philip Markoff.

Outcome: No criminal charges were filed against Craigslist or its executives. Craigslist closed the Adult Services section in 2010 under sustained pressure, and in 2012 Illinois AG Lisa Madigan's office and Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart continued applying pressure. The campaign showed the limits of criminal threats constrained by Section 230.

Prosecuting attorneys: Multiple state AGs of both parties — notably McMaster (Republican, SC); Richard Blumenthal (Democrat, CT); Tom Miller (Democrat, IA); Roy Cooper (Democrat, NC); Lisa Madigan (Democrat, IL). Mixed partisan coalition.

People of California v. Carl Ferrer / Backpage (California, 2016)

Platform: Backpage

Allegation: California AG Kamala Harris obtained a criminal arrest warrant for Backpage CEO Carl Ferrer on three counts of pimping and conspiracy to commit pimping, alleging the platform knowingly profited from sex trafficking.

Outcome: Ferrer was arrested in Texas. The California pimping charges were twice dismissed by a Sacramento judge who ruled Section 230 barred the state prosecution. The case was later superseded by the federal Backpage indictment.

Prosecuting attorney: Kamala Harris, Attorney General of California — Democrat.

United States v. Michael Lacey et al. / Backpage (D. Ariz. 2018)

Platform: Backpage

Allegation: Federal grand jury indicted seven Backpage executives on 93 counts including conspiracy to facilitate prostitution using an interstate facility, and multiple money laundering charges. The indictment alleged Backpage knowingly hosted and edited sex trafficking ads and stripped identifying information ("Lolita," "new to town") from ads to obscure their illegal nature.

Outcome: The FBI seized Backpage.com. CEO Carl Ferrer pleaded guilty, acknowledging most adult ads were for prostitution. The trial of remaining defendants ended in a 2021 mistrial after prosecutorial misconduct. Retrial proceedings are ongoing. This is the most fully realized criminal prosecution of a major internet platform for facilitating crime in US history.

Prosecuting attorneys: Elizabeth A. Strange, Acting US Attorney, District of Arizona — Republican (Trump appointee). Jeff Sessions, AG — Republican.

State v. Drew — Missouri State Investigation and Lori Drew (2008)

Platform: MySpace (secondary target)

Allegation: After the Megan Meier suicide, Missouri authorities investigated whether to bring criminal charges under Missouri statutes. The local DA's office in St. Charles County declined to charge Drew, finding no applicable Missouri law. The case exposed a statutory gap that prompted new cyberbullying laws nationwide. MySpace was subpoenaed and cooperated.

Outcome: No Missouri state charges filed against Drew or MySpace. Led directly to federal prosecution (see above) and to Missouri and over 40 other states enacting criminal cyberbullying statutes.

Prosecuting attorney: Jack Banas, St. Charles County Prosecuting Attorney — Republican. Declined to prosecute.

After claude found the issues, humans could check and fix them

Claude can do the fixing too, just as easily, in most cases. Maybe, Mythos cannot — never tried it — but Opus or even Sonnet certainly can.

China is already the world's largest importer of natural gas. While they do have natural gas reserves, they don't have enough to replace their electrical generation. I expect they mostly are looking for an energy source they don't need to import.

2x seems possible if no government spending is replaced. However your 3x estimate is way too high, people living only on UBI would not be paying taxes (well federal and state) anyway, so you have double-counted them.

The hope (perhaps futile) is that they would remove other government programs (ie social security). Or make everybody get the same government programs (ie everybody gets SNAP and they can use it to buy food, everybody gets the same amount of housing assistance (which must be spent on mortgage/rent/property taxes/untilities/insurance). These would just be part of the UBI, with some restrictions on what you can spend that portion on.

I was able to get it to save all photos on Google Photos. But I seem to remember it was a pain, it took a long time before it threw away it's attempt to put all the photos into iCloud and stopped complaining in popups that I needed to buy more iCloud storage.

Free Google Photos is about 4x the size of what free iCloud is.

I'm pretty worried that all interdepartmental communication (those regulations, the forms for the regulations, invoices, contracts, lawsuits, etc) will transform into bloated gobbledygook that only AIs can read and write. They will have made their own language that we won't understand and will have to start trusting them to accurately translate between it and human language.

Automobiles employed a LOT of people, easily out numbering the ones that no longer picked up horse shit. That is a big difference from AI.

Every single one of us knew that eliminating workers was the primary reason for the worldwide interest in AI. Everyone who said anything to the contrary was lying, and everyone who heard them knew it. Absolutely zero people believed that AI was going to lead us to some strange utopia where everyone was paid for work they didn't have to do anymore. The article's tone "oh look, they made all this money and didn't hire more people and its because of AI and oh what hypocrites they are!" is just silly. This is exactly what literally everyone knew would happen.

Well, except those who believed, and still believe, that AI just won't work. That remains a possibility too. Maybe this will all fall apart. I can't see the future better than anyone else. But the one and only thing that would prevent AI-enabled mass layoffs would be AI's own failure to shoulder the load. If it can, it will, and the industry absolutely will let go of everyone they can, as soon as they can, without any inhibitions. That's just how humans work, so we can count on it.

Warnings about how this might result in a depression won't stay anyone's hand. Mocking the industry leaders for creating an economy where nobody can afford the stuff they produce; won't make them bat an eye. None of those words change their incentives, and their incentives will be acted-upon, even if it leads us straight into the greatest depression in world history.

Legal regulation might change things. But it is extremely hard to pass regulation that is not enthusiastically endorsed by the oligarchy that actually runs our government. So, it won't happen until the fallout from the depression hits the wealthy's financial base hard enough for them to want the regulation.

We are going to have to go through hell in order to get to heaven. Or even purgatory.

I already agreed with you that it would be difficult to return the payments to the consumers, and that it's a reasonable question to ask whether it's possible at all.

I'm not sure there's any point in further discussion here.

But there was also the visor thing and the car that never was. Nothing really remarkable has happened on the phone. Of course that's true for everyone else as well. The $129 Motorola I bought is entirely adequate.

Then Tim has overseen the flop of Siri and the great AI bungle. Then there is the feud with Nvidia.

Yes he got the transition to Apple Silicon done very well but at the cost of abandoning the workstations. His insistence in staying at 8 GB Ram and 256 GB storage as the standard configuration didn't endear him to anyone either, nor did Liquid Glass. Oh, and software quality is on its ass although that seems to be an industry-wide problem.

He was not perfect, but not totally horrible either. Running a company that big is not an easy task.

The question of the mechanisms for returning money to the people who ultimately paid the tariffs, and how, or even if, it's possible to return the tariff payments to the consumers now that it's been ruled that the tariffs were illegal is a different question.