Ad Hominem would be saying "well Musk is a gross weirdo with a breeding fetish and why would you want to agree with a gross weirdo like that?"

But showing that Musk is an unreliable source **because he has been unreliable in the past** isn't ad hominem at all. The argument isn't about tearing down Musk as a person as a proxy for tearing down his argument; it's about saying "look, Mr Musk, you're asking us to take you at your word that you're the victim of illegal actions by Apple but your word hasn't historically been worth a whole lot."

We could agree that IF what Musk is saying is true, Apple's behavior sounds sketchy, but if we can't agree that Musk is telling the truth (and right now the validity of his claim hangs on his own credibility) then we can't draw any conclusions about Apple's behavior.

There are a lot of jobs posted out there in the computing sciences but there are also hundreds or even thousands of applicants to those jobs. I've got the seniority and the leadership pedigree but even for me, a job search right now amounts to throwing hundreds of resumes against the wall looking for a match. The reality is that, because of the enormous applicant volume -- qualified or not -- the odds of even a company getting back to you, even one that's a really great fit, are low and down to luck more often than not.

The biggest driver is speed of application. If you get your resume in within the first day or so of the position being opened there's at least a reasonable chance that someone will read it and get back to you.

That forces applicants to lean into a bulk application approach. You can't invest a bunch of time in any given application because you're unlikely to see a return on that investment and every moment you spend honing your resume is a moment other people are getting in the resume queue in front of you. And realistically, the hiring manager is going to get sick of reading resumes eventually; you just hope it's after he reads yours.

So yea, the market is terrible right now and the same things that are making it terrible are the things that people are using to cope with it being terrible. Because the moment it doesn't cost me anything to apply to a position with an AI crafted resume that makes sure to tick all of the boxes this company is likely looking for... well... why wouldn't I apply? Sure, there's only a 0.1% chance my application converts to an interview but I can take that gamble if it's two mouse-clicks to put my name in the hat.

This is WILDLY different from the experience of job hunting in CS back in the late 20-teens and early 20s. The combination of hiring pull-back, AI uncertainty, and applicant profusion has completely changed the game.

The "are you 18" questions were such a cool idea and it's wild how they've aged.

OJ Simpson is

a. an R&B singer
b. under indictment
c. embarrassed by his first name (Olivia)
d. no one to fool with

Yes, obviously the entire critique of "state A will dump toxic waste B into hole C, poisoning people in state D" is entirely and specifically limited to Wyoming and PCBs. No other state and no other chemical could possibly be of concern under the aforementioned model.

Come on. This is a basic market externality. When was the last time a US company was fined in excess of the amount of money their malfeasance made them? It basically never happens.

Without a federal agency empowered to actually DO something to protect these waters they're going to be systematically exploited and people are going to suffer and die.