I surprised myself at remembering this one. Possibly the mnemonic of a tasty square pie helped me remember all these years.

Those who read history are doomed to watch those who don’t read history repeat it.

Sounds like the management at Tiktok see it as politically expedient to fluff Trump to be able to continue to have access to the US market.

I think they mean “beaten badly” as in “lost control of all three branches of government” not so much “Trump landslide vote.”

The person you responded to even said “Dems got beaten pretty bad” not “Harris got beaten pretty bad.”

By the metric of losing the house, losing the senate, losing the judiciary, and losing the presidency is a pretty deep blow.

Why are the journalist bending over to Musk?

Because performative protest like wearing pussy hats isn’t actually as effective as general strikes or direct action.

The McResistance fades because that’s all it ever was.

I’ll be there for you

(In the bottom of your bag)

I’ll be there for you

(Shoved in your burger)

I’ll be there for you

(And give you a heart attack too)

Kallocain

However, unlike Brave New World in which a drug is used to suppress the urge to nonconformity generally, a drug in Kallocain is used to detect individual acts and thoughts of rebellion.

Interesting, shades of Severance. The severing of parts of their life achieves a similar result of preventing (instead of detecting) individual acts and thoughts of rebellion.

Black box algorithms should be banned.

Social media algorithms affect society deeply.

Why the fuck are they allowed to be black boxes instead of forced open for the scrutiny of legislators, the courts, and the public?

Nah, instead of doing anything fucking reasonable like regulating the algorithms, we’re just gonna ban ones we don’t like.

Are we in a simulation ? Controlled by some tech companies and political parties ?

No we are not. I recall Marshall McLuhan telling a story about early Egypt. Originally, the power in society was with the Priest caste, because they could write (heiroglyphics). Eventually though, papyrus was invented, and the Military caste began to use it to do things like document stores, send short messages, and so on. The language on papyrus was used in every day life, the heiroglyphics were not. So, over time the power in society moved from the Priest caste to the Military caste because they were in charge of the useful communication tools.

In the modern era, software code is quite literally language made manifest. Only a relatively small number of knowledge workers speak these lagnauges fluently, and it does give them deeper control over the world because now everything runs on computers and software code. We have handed control in society over to the techbros accidentally by centering software so much they essentially can put a gun to the head of society and say “Hey, without us, all this stuff stops working. Do as we say.”

Traditional media/communications was our Priest caste, and the tech community is the now the new Military caste, having developed and are in control of the dominant and important communications infrastructure/language.

Black box algorithms should be banned.

Social media algorithms affect society deeply.

Why the fuck are they allowed to be black boxes instead of forced open for the scrutiny of legislators, the courts, and the public?

Nah, instead of doing anything fucking reasonable like regulating the algorithms, we’re just gonna ban ones we don’t like.

Are we in a simulation ? Controlled by some tech companies and political parties ?

No we are not. I recall Marshall McLuhan telling a story about early Egypt. Originally, the power in society was with the Priest caste, because they could write (heiroglyphics). Eventually though, papyrus was invented, and the Military caste began to use it to do things like document stores, send short messages, and so on. The language on papyrus was used in every day life, the heiroglyphics were not. So, over time the power in society moved from the Priest caste to the Military caste because they were in charge of the useful communication tools.

In the modern era, software code is quite literally language made manifest. Only a relatively small number of knowledge workers speak these lagnauges fluently, and it does give them deeper control over the world because now everything runs on computers and software code. We have handed control in society over to the techbros accidentally by centering software so much they essentially can put a gun to the head of society and say “Hey, without us, all this stuff stops working. Do as we say.”

Traditional media/communications was our Priest caste, and the tech community is the now the new Military caste, having developed and are in control of the dominant and important communications infrastructure/language.

Good callout to Fahrenheit 451. I think Beatty’s monologues are pretty important because they’re strongly argued. His positions aren’t wholly irrational, he has given it careful, deliberate thought for a long time. The first time I read it I recall feeling compelled and almost convinced by his arguments, which is such a beautiful way to express it. Bradbury literally argues against the existence of the book Fahrenheit 451 itself, his own competing ideas that someone else would want to erase, through Beatty’s monologues. He made a compelling argument for it, too. All the books disagree, so what even is truth?

Knowing how to be psychologically resilient against such arguments is important, I think.

Yeah, more like this guy was right.

Every day Huxley is proven more correct than Orwell because through the magic of SOMA (addictive phones hitting dopamine rushes), people can be surrounded with the truth and completely ignore it, and as you said, pay for the privilege of being lied to because it feels nice. (And oh man, that’s a major industry on OnlyFans, being lied to because it feels nice)

Huxley understood our desires could break us more than our hate.

I can’t find it, but I recall an interview with Zizek around when Snowden dropped his leaks, and it was about how it really changed nothing, and he was noting how the revelations of torture during the Iraq War had changed nothing either. He thought disclosure was a moot point now, society was checked out. He was right.

It’s arguably already happening considering they’ve taken money from Blockchain Capital.

I mean, even Jack Dorsey left because he thought it wasn’t actually decentralized, and that guys a stupid asshole in it for all the wrong reasons.

And we’ll see that continue. LGBTQ folk will decide they need a gun and you can bet the cops and the chuds will be glad to open fire at protestors because “THEY HAVE A GUN!!!”

Exactly, the presence of a weapon just gives them a reason to pull the “THEY’RE COMIN RIGHT FOR US” bullshit from South Park Season Fucking One.

Slashdot never died, it’s moderation just failed to function at scale and speed it needed to and got flooded with nazi bullshit daily for years, making it largely irrelevant but still active.

Also it’s a techdirt article, which was a Slashdot staple for a long time, so like a callback to that, perhaps.

Oh everyone is fed up but we just elected a guy and government who is sure to make it all way way way worse.

He just helped put the nail in the coffin of the lie that crypto is for anything but scams, don’t worry, it’s gonna get real bad before it gets any better.

Maybe something like this:

Oh they remember, they just:

1. Don’t care

2. Think modern technology means they can control it

Excellent point but how would you do it without an app? Even if it was Open Source and for PC it would need to be sending data to a PC to put together as a legible note. The pen itself is too underpowered to do that all on its own, the pen is just the data capturing tool. It would be a similar situation for Open Source, too, an end to development could mean an end to the devices continued usefulness.

Okay wow this one is pretty interesting.

I actually love the idea of everything I write with a specific pen being synced digitally.

https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/elon-musk-buying-intel-could-be-poor-outcome-says-citi-1034241743

This is the only reputable outlet that had anything to say about it.

They reference SemiAccurate as the source, which I have not heard of before, but seems to have a solid track record with accurate reporting.

GET. FUCKED. MUSK.

I have to say, having an all-AMD setup makes me feel slightly okay today, even though AMD is just another shit company. At least it’s not in the running to be owned by that fucking tool.