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Comment Re:Wow (Score 1) 46

Apple has enough money to invest in additional production capacity. No one wants to dump billions investing in new manufacturing capacity that will take at least a year to come online and may only start producing when the market returns to normal though. Apple certainly can afford to take that risk and if the memory market continues like it is for the next few years then Apple would make an absolute killing with such a move.

Comment Re:Correction (Score 1) 85

You can do that whenever you want. You own your own labor and you can sell it to whomever you choose. You could even find other individuals and jointly form a collective singular entity (ie, incorporate) if you don't want to go it alone. If you're successful you could even hire other employees to work for your organization assuming they could use the company and don't want to similarly go it alone. Historically speaking the upsides of doing this are astronomical, but there is the chance it might not work out and you'll lose any investments you made into the venture. Unfortunately there will always be some that want to blame all of society's problems on you for even doing this. They'll make ridiculous statements about making capital their bitch online, but they're mostly harmless until they take control, purge anyone (including their friends) they don't like, and starve themselves do death.

Comment Re:Also known aw a "slop fest"... (Score 2) 18

Did they have any to begin with? I don't think this will help them at all, but their alternative is to drown anyway. For reference, their stock is down 85% over a 5 year period. Maybe this will keep them afloat for a while longer (or more likely make them a more attractive buyout target) or it's just a last gasp for air on the way out (which is where they're less attractive buyout target, but eventually become cheap enough for someone to scoop up).

Comment Re:If I ruled .. (Score 1) 226

Presumably it's possible to have freedom of movement while still prohibiting people from establishing residence there. Crossing into Mexico from the U.S. is as hassle free as getting across the border (getting back in is another story) but if I tried to live there without authorization the Mexican government would deport me.

Comment Re:Christmas (Score 1) 26

Just tell her to buy you a nice shirt. Then when she visits make sure to wear it. She'll appreciate it at lot and if you're anything like me she has better fashion sensibilities and will pick out something nice. One or two new shirts per year is enough to maintain a wardrobe. Your mom is going to want to get you something regardless of you having outgrown birthday or Christmas presents decades ago and their wiring will make them disappointed if you tell them to stop.

Mom is happy that she gets to give a thoughtful gift even if baby is all grown up and if you're like me you'll be grateful that it saves you the time having to look for new clothes yourself. Maybe it's unthinkable when you're younger, but clothes for Christmas is the biggest win-win I've ever stumbled into. Younger readers can double dip and get socks and underwear from grandma.

Comment Re:Translation (Score 2) 48

The upper management at Microsoft is stupid enough to do that, but it won't fix their problems. They have some valuable IP that can sell millions of copies, but they bought a lot of past-their prime studios and have stuffed them with even more bloat to try to churn out sequels faster. Either they never read or understand the Mythical Man-Month. The people are n charge have no real understanding of games' development and treat like something akin to a factory job that can be scaled by adding more lines and workers.

Letting (or making) the developers use AI might make them more productive, but if the only thing it does is allow them to churn out uninspired crap that no one wants to play faster than otherwise, it won't fix their revenue problem. It'll only allow the gradual decline to go on for a bit longer.

Comment Was anyone looking to build there anyway? (Score 4, Insightful) 32

Was anyone looking to build a data center in Seattle in the first place? Unless they were going to build something small, there's not enough space to build a new one and repurposing existing buildings for a data center might not be possible even if the rent weren't prohibitively expensive compared to building outside of the metro area. Even if a company like Microsoft wanted to build close to their campus, they'd be building a data center in Redmond instead of Seattle proper. There's still have a much easier time building outside of town because finding a few hundred acres that aren't already developed in a metro area is difficult as well as hideously expensive.

Comment Re:I don't like bending spoons, but... (Score 2) 25

Some of those things are probably profitable if they can gut most of the staff and centralize the maintenance work while cashing the cheques from old people who signed up and keep paying. AOL has been coasting on that for decades already, so it's little wonder they and similar sites have wound up on the island of misfit internet companies. They're not making very much money for the valuation they're after though. The notion that the dozens of millions in profit will be able to turn into hundreds of millions or billions is a pipe dream. This IPO is the private investors trying to get out before the customer base dies off and the cheques stop clearing.

Maybe this is better than the Google approach of killing it off entirely even if it could eke out a meager existence, but it's a business that has no future. Dead or dying internet platforms don't come back. This company is just a hospice for websites and tech companies some people remember from years ago and haven't used in almost as long. There might be money to be made there, but it's not a billion dollar company.

Comment Re:A human Algorithm? (Score 3, Interesting) 193

He's probably using the term more loosely, but it is impossible. The human brain works in ways that no Turing Machine and therefore no algorithm can replicate. I think that it's possible to build something that can function that way using existing computer hardware that's really just simulating a human brain if such can't be directly implemented in hardware, but we're a long way off from being able to do that even if the current crop of LLMs have fooled a lot of people into believing they can already replace a human.

Assuming that he or anyone else does succeed, they'll have no better understanding of how what they made actually works than we do of how our own brain actually works. Whatever it is that's going on up there, it certainly isn't algorithmic in nature.

Comment Re:cull the weak (Score 1) 110

And give up on all the potential revenue they can suck out of these students through the student loans they receive just by being admitted. The universities will kick out the ones that are just there to party, but they'll gladly string along those who can just barely make it. Those are the students who fall into a sunk cost trap and will spend six years getting a degree so it's even better. The universities don't have to deal with the financial consequences and because they're all doing it to some degree it never causes serious reputational problems.

The universities will not fix the problem themselves because it would require the administration taking an axe to the university administration itself. If you look at the graphs the ratio between students and professors has remained stable over the last several decades as U.S. universities expanded, but the size of the administration has grown disproportionately and keeping it fed requires ever more revenue to support the ever expanding administration.

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Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith. - Paul Tillich, German theologian and historian

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