No, I think the funniest part is hearing from all the suckers who still can't admit they made any mistake supporting the YOB.

All of us tend to do (and say) a lot of stuff without thinking. When asked, most of us can say why, even if those me-side explanations sometimes include confabulations. But the YOB has always thought less than average and now his brain is so broken that his attempts at explanations are just strings of gibberish and lies--and yet the fools continue to believe. He is only creating new problems and not even solving any of the fake problems he's been screaming about for over 10 years now.

The story did get some Funny comments. But who's laughing?

s/Someone/Somehow/

Mod parent funny, though the stronger flavor of the joke I was hoping for would have included something about the endangered jobs list being written by a GenAI and the Microsoft researchers intervening to get themselves off of the list--but failing in their attempts to get themselves included on the list of safe jobs.

However, looking at the long term track record of Microsoft Research against the reported budgets, I suspect the whole thing might be an AI confabulation. "This is not the Microsoft Research you were looking for because it never existed." All of those researchers were just GenAI sock puppets?

I could reply in detail, but it appears I would mostly be repeating what I already wrote. I'm not saying you read poorly. If I wrote well then I would be able to write for various levels of readers, even at the same time. Nor am I accusing you of constructing a straw man, though that is a possibility. However, you have failed to motivate me to respond to any of your misperceptions. You can reread my comment if you wish, and perhaps ask for clarification.

(Ditto the other "reply".)

Someone I missed your constructive solution?

FTFM? Or for Confucius?

I'd mod a lot of Funny if I ever saw a mod point to give. Can't remember when the last one was, but certainly many years ago.

Share the sig?

Mod moderation censorious? But what part of that annoyed?

Better than the FP thread, but not that great. How about if you specifically consider better approaches to solutions?

On one hand I mostly agree with you, but in the other hand I have a giant can of worms...

But first a detour on the scenic route. I think your premise is broken. The Internet has never been anonymous. Just because the resources to nail people were out of your reach does not mean it was impossible to find you. Even if you were making deliberate technological efforts to hide, you can eventually be found, one way or another. Perhaps the best counterexample of your premise is the Unabomber. Yes, not on the Web--but I think that was half because of the timing and half because he understood the lack of real technology-based anonymity. But he tried quite hard to stay hidden. And died in prison.

I want to stay with solution-oriented thoughts. I have thought tracks on two aspects.

First, about age checks (nodding at the story). I think the best approach would involve probing childhood memories. The trick would be distinguishing between firsthand experiences as remembered from a child's perspective and various forms of secondhand information. But I do think that there are real differences in how children think and that it would be quite difficult to fake the massive body of "atmospheric" data. The attempts to create fake childhood memories would either link to known data (such as history books) or break down in contradictions as previous answers were explored. In essence I am arguing that the time of your childhood creates a unique signature on your personality. (Note that location is also crucial. Other factors include immediate family.)

Second track is about proving you are human. I think the best approach has to be based on your links to other real humans. Kind of like tracing security certificates. So how to prove each link in the chain? I imagine a system based on joint timelines. It would start with your memories of an event that you shared with another person. Your version would be used to build a kind of quiz that the other person would try to answer based on their memories of the same event. Of course I now imagine it as an AI application, where the AI is also tracking the flows of information (to detect reverse answer fishing) and trying hard to provide the best possible distractors for each question about the event (and considering likely mistakes in your own memories). Actually, the lack of perfect agreement would be evidence in favor of a real human being because our memories are flawed and each of us remembers things from a slightly different perspective and with a different context. I don't think the answers could be absolute, but each step in the chain could have a high probability, and as long as you stay within the infamous six degrees of Keven Bacon you could have a strong basis for believing an identity is a real human being.

So how do we get to Reykjavík with the real and verified human beings?

"First you go west about 10 clicks and turn left in front of a red barn, then... No, that won't work. Go north until you get to... No, that's no good. Sorry, folks. We can't get there from here."

What I really mean is that the google won't do it unless there's a profit. Ditto all the other evil corporate cancers. And the governments? Just minor subsidiaries now, but not even capable of solving any real problems. Then there's the ever-present time problem. In particular, I ain't gonna live long enough to laugh at the flop.

No, I don't need to give you apologies for my correct analysis of your behavior. If you go and shit in the middle of the street I judge you. If you go and hand over other people's data to the big corporates I judge you. No problem here. I'm not putting everyone else down, just those people that choose to do evil. Especially those people that do it so thoughtlessly that they probably aren't even aware of having done it.

It's not enough. The value of electricity is extremely variable based on both location, time and the extent to which it fits with previous plans for electricity. The price that they pay will vary depending on time but if they are coming in with new, unpredicted, demand then the cost of satisfying it becomes even higher and they should be paying even more per unit than the other people that are more or less following what was predicted.

On the other hand, if the AI people can move their demand to places and times with spare electricity, for example the North of Scotland when it's windy, that would mean they could quite rightly get very cheap electricity and not really cause any problem for anyone.

I guess this ends up as ethics vs law and how you see that. As I said, my decision has been that I don't enrich by not buying

Android itself is clearly owned by google in a privacy sense, but you do get the freedom to install your own software in a way that Apple never allows. Android devices with unlocked bootloaders and operating systems converted to one of the Android Open Source project based alternatives such as LineageOS are approximately owned by the person possessing them. GrapheneOS is reportedly privacy respecting, though I haven't used it yet so can't comment on usability. Whether that's worth the hassle, though, is a question only you can answer. You'd want to be quite experienced with them before starting recommending them to others I'd think.

Mod parent informative--but I haven't tested it yet, so mod this comment funny? This entire discussion might be an AI-generated confabulation?

My interpretation is somewhat different. The great craftsman/artist transcends the tools--but he still wants the best tools even as he creates masterpieces with whatever was at hand.

And the poor craftsman will still fail to produce a masterpiece no matter what tools he uses.

And of course most of the craftspeople are somewhere in the middle.