I have to admit that there have been a couple times when a query punched into Google provided me with an AI answer (typically a one-line... "how do I format this date in a certain format") that was slightly faster than following the next link down to a StackOverflow answer and reading that one, but I really have to wonder if the unbelievable amount of human effort and capital that's been poured into this technology is worth it, when it doesn't really solve a problem that I had. It solves a problem that Google had (keeping me on their site). But it's only a short-term solution, because by cutting off the revenue stream for sites where content is created, then how are they going to get more content to index?

You forgot the most important thing... finding a spouse. Seriously, the two best places to meet people are church and university, so if you're not religious, and you don't go to college, then finding a long term partner in this environment after high school is almost impossible. Online dating is just fundamentally broken, workplace romances are heavily frowned upon, and nobody leaves their houses to do activities in the community anymore.

This is simply not true based on evidence and statistics. A college education is by far the best investment you can make. Sure, there are people who just get a psychology or gender studies degree and then go out into the workforce looking for a job and can't find one, but that's more than offset by people who take engineering or pre-med and go on to make high incomes. And my wife took psychology, but went on to get a Ph.D. and now earns a very respectable income as a licensed psychologist. There are also 2 year college diplomas, like in the trades, that cost very little and pay about double what you can get right out of high school. Don't buy into the misinformation. College is still the pathway to a better life for most people.

Which makes more sense than some government bureaucrat having to make a determination about what constitutes exceptional artistry, doesn't it?

The book "Snakes in Suits" shows that about 3% of senior management is a psychopath, which is about three times the population average of about 1%. So it's not just in government.

I was involved with Stackoverflow in the early days and it really was a gamechanger. It was so much better than trying to find your answer by slogging through forums, that it really took off. And gamifying the answering of questions really helped it grow fast. But there's always this point where the community gets swamped with rules-obsessed bureaucrats and drives the original contributors away, and that's what happened with me. The mods all became power-trippers obsessed with closing questions and keeping people in line, rather than the original purpose of helping people. And while Stackoverflow was in decline, LLMs are a massive nail in its coffin. Why would ask a question on Stackoverflow, only to be treated like garbage, when you can ask a chatbot the same question and have it confidently tell you a subtly wrong answer, but politely?

Before Gemini, at least if Google showed you a blurb from the search result, it was verbatim. Now it's just randomly incorrect, but is presented as if it's copying an answer from the linked page. I've followed those links a lot, and the AI summary is often wrong. It's wrong even about basic things like the score of a sports game, and the linked page actually had the correct score!

We shouldn't have to

I don't particularly "believe" anyone in this story 100%. But your idea that I should just believe this other supposed source of information that you have, because you say, 'trust me bro', is a little nonsensical. All any of us can do is try to gather information from varied sources and then run it through our own filter of experience and weigh the probabilities and come to a "most likely" situation. I would never say that Bari Weiss absolutely positively 100% buried the story because she's biased towards the administration, but on the balance of probabilities, that seems to be what's going on. If you have other *remotely credible* information sources, feel free to share them. But I suspect that on the balance of probabilities your sources are getting paid directly from the Kremlin.

It's pretty ironic that the US gets pissed at this when Bari Weiss is in hot water for burying a 60 minutes news story that the administration didn't like.

There's a lot of factors, and we're getting information that's coming from biased people (Weiss is clearly pro-Trump, and the reporter is obviously and understandably concerned about her own career). It's almost impossible for us to ascertain the complete truth in a situation like this. Is it plausible that Weiss is just being a good editor in chief? It strains credibility to say so. While I would take any media story with a grain of salt, and it's true that this particular news story didn't interview the administration, it's also true that the reporter did contact the administration for interviews and they were turned down, and it said so in the story. Based on the limited information we have here, I need to side with the people criticizing Bari Weiss. This looks really bad for her.

You're correct that you shouldn't necessarily balance one side (e.g. climate science) with the "other side" (e.g. climate denialism) but you should absolutely balance all reporting with healthy skepticism. Even looking at a news article where the reporter is trying to be honest, there's going to be things they get fundamentally wrong. All media consumption requires a sober second thought. The worst journalism is created when journalists drink their own Kool-Aid and believe they have a right to have everything they write believed simply because they're a member of some higher class of human. Weiss is clearly trying to hide the story, but that doesn't prove the story is 100% accurate. I've had the displeasure of being close to a few actual news stories in my life, and the articles published in the media were *always* missing fundamental and important elements of the real story.

This reminds me of the rush to build 3D televisions. It was pushed by industry like this is the next big thing, and you need to buy these new TVs to keep up, but the technology was underwhelming, most movies weren't shot in proper 3D (about the only one would be the original Avatar) and consumers didn't want to wear special glasses, where you had to sit almost straight on to the TV and couldn't lay down on your couch sideways, etc. We don't need 5K even for games. If you think you do, just wait a couple years and your eyesight will degrade enough that you can't see the difference anyway.

When Isaacman was originally nominated, the whole space community was like, "oh, that's an interesting pick." Yes, he's a rich guy and pays for private missions via SpaceX, but his credentials are pretty solid, and he really is a believer in the ideals of space exploration. He also sees the value in public/private partnerships. Nobody thinks NASA is doing anything close to what SpaceX is accomplishing. Trump reportedly yanked the original nomination because someone told him that Isaacman had some history of donations to democrats, and he didn't like that. Which is why Isaacman has since make some donations to MAGA stuff as well. I assume that was part of the deal. But really, take a look at this guy before you dismiss him out of hand. This isn't a JFK Jr. type of pick.

I just don't think many people want to watch an awards show where there's a bunch of angry people trying to push a political agenda. I mean, I support their right to free speech, and I've always felt like the games industry abused developers, but you're in the business of entertainment, and hearing people complain about their industry (an industry that I support with multiple game purchases per year) isn't what I'd call entertainment. At most I'd watch it to hear what the big games are, and maybe to see someone get some recognition for their hard work on a particularly well made title.