" the expectation that the government cannot legally track you absent reasonable suspicion" You can expect what you like, the government will do as it pleases, especially the current regime. Realistically, you should expect to be tracked and monitored for various reasons by everyone who has the capabilities, regardless of regulation, and act accordingly. That may include trying to change or block the monitoring, but definitely not trusting the other party to follow rules.

Reality doesn't care what you expect.

... they'll tell you. And if they want your opinion, they'll tell you what that is, as well.

The term is "careless" in its true definition. He's really not out to get you or anyone else (that I know of), he simply doesn't care ... about anyone, anything, outside his own interest. There's also a book Careless People (https://z-lib.fm/s/careless%20people) describing Facebook the same way, lots of examples. See also Hanlon's Razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence"

People, not necessarily. Some life forms will adapt, evolve for the current climate, and even thrive. Microscopic ones, most likely, their generations are short and change is fast. They may even evolve into dinosaurs again one day, but humans are not necessarily in the future if we keep the current trends. Even Billionaire Bunkers won't help (think small, isolated gene pools and finite resources). Perhaps I'm an optimist, but I don't think we'll kill ALL life on earth.

If the database is reporting that the government does a poor job (not informing reporters, very low accuracy rate), there are two choices: 1) Do a better job, or 2) Cancel the reporting. Of course, the answer is obvious ...

Rum rations were issued in the navy starting in 1655, later grog (diluted rum), to improve morale and break up the monotony of life at sea, so it was a great stress-reducer. If it reduces stress and fights, it's good for your health ... again in moderation.

What kind of coverage do you get? Will there be long distance charges with the current plan?

Nobody ever reads the whole document anyway, and ChatGPT is probably the one making the choice of who gets the contracts, so it's just an example of someone passing the information along to someone else (ChatGPT) of MUCH higher intelligence.

They don't need to keep the book, they paid the fee (purchase, not a license fee) and can do what they want with it after that. They didn't resell it, didn't donate it for a tax break, they paid the fees. Do the authors expect to be paid again each time someone quotes from a book that they've bought?

Anxiety, depression, and self-harm seem to be ingrained in human nature, but the way Meta manipulated them to cause addictive damage for profit certainly deserves whatever fines the courts can hand out, and more. Most psych experiments (even on animal subjects) would undergo an ethics review to prevent harm before being allowed; I doubt Zuck and his team ever considered ethics at all.

Currently, companies are classed as people ("legal entities"). If we ever integrate people-machines I'd like the result to be considered as at least semi-people. Would you accept your digitized AI-augmented mind as a program, or would it be a self-aware "being" in a digital world? There would have to be a qualifying test, though, to say that anything above this level is self-aware and a person, and anything below it is a robot slave. Could get very tricky.

Stop deploying Windows! Okay, I know that won't immediately work for most businesses, but it will get businesses to realize that Microsoft is controlling their entire operation, and consider backup plans and possibly OpenSource and its utilities. That's too much control from Microsoft, who will now demand a fee for the tools to distribute the apps you're locked into.

No argument. It's malicious.

Totally agree. Also, if it was user-based, they'd charge extra for storage instead of hosting at their expense.