• 3 Posts
  • 19 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: August 29th, 2023

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  • I always thought the “see something, say something” tag-line was creepy as fuck and don’t understand why everyone doesn’t get the same vibe. It’s common sense that if you see someone being harmed or in a harmful situation you speak up. But this is just a blanket “see something” which feels like a dog whistle for all the nosy and paranoid people to spy on everyone and it’s for the best. I guess we’ll have the same personalities in search algorithms going forward -_-



  • Cataphract@lemmy.mltoComics@lemmy.ml“Communism bad”
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    18 days ago

    oh wow, ok. Thought you posted links for actual discussion and would’ve been interested in someone reading through wanting to talk about it lol. This just a copy/paste warrior kinda thing you’re doing? Weird way to try to insult back after everything you posted, thanks for letting me know not to continue the conversation!


  • Cataphract@lemmy.mltoComics@lemmy.ml“Communism bad”
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    18 days ago

    It’s hard for me to look at % increases or “X out of poverty” or “This person makes 1+ what they did before!”. I get fed the same stuff about how great America is doing because of our “numbers”. Without being there it’s hard to grasp if what you’re saying is anything better, worse, or just par for the course of a developing nation with such a high output with manufacturing.

    90% of families in the country own their home giving China one of the highest home ownership rates in the world. What’s more is that 80% of these homes are owned outright, without mortgages or any other leans. https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2016/03/30/how-people-in-china-afford-their-outrageously-expensive-homes

    Seeing this statement and reading the link, they have absolutely nothing to do with each other and you make it seem like it’s a “quote” from the article (I’m guessing it’s from the 93 page research paper I’m reading through). They would’ve just been better off publishing whatever data they talked about researchers definitely having, the whole thing read like an Elon Musk press conference…

    “To sustain poverty reduction gains, China will focus more on achieving endogenous development in areas that have been lifted out of poverty and introduce vigorous measures to support rural revitalization. Our goal is to achieve common prosperity and high-quality development including through the rural revitalization strategy with a focus in five key areas: industry development, human capital, culture, ecological environment and local governance.”

    It’s interesting and kinda disconcerting reading through the policies and how no real figures are presented for what the policy should be, such as the “common prosperity” they hope to achieve be 2030 (link page 15)

    China has set a new goal of achieving significant progress toward common prosperity by 2035.1 While no particular income target or poverty threshold is attached to this goal, it can help keep the policy focus on the vulnerable population over the coming decade.

    It makes me wonder if setting an elusive “goal” of a policy is better to get members on board and then slap them with the real numbers after they have already signed on and can’t openly complain about (bad for corrupt sectors of government though). There’s also just not enough information as stated in the paper to actually understand what is going on,

    Finally, this review of China’s poverty reduction experience leaves a number of questions open for further research…

    • the interplay between poverty reduction and growth deserves further analysis to understand the extent that poverty reduction measures may, in turn, help less-developed areas grow faster
    • a deeper analysis of China’s use of policy experimentation at the local level combined with high-powered performance incentives may contribute to our understanding of models of decentralization and public service delivery
    • an evaluation of China’s targeted poverty alleviation experience in recent years would benefit from further analysis of individual policy interventions and their interactions to better understand not just the effectiveness but also the efficiency and sustainability of the program.
    • An analysis of the costs and benefits of policy intervention would also be warranted in a broader sense, helping to systematically account (suan da zhang in the Chinese term) for factors such as the impact of infrastructure investments on poverty reduction or the merits of the hukou system and man- aged urbanization policies. In all these areas, active exchanges between researchers within and outside of China, and between academics and policy makers, should be encouraged, and the data needed for high-quality empirical work should be made more widely available. These actions will help ensure that China’s poverty reduction achievements get the attention and understanding that they deserve.

    Just now seeing and trying to wrap my head around the Hukou system. I’m not here arguing good/bad communism, I just like the information and think that many forms of government can work out with protections in place (regulations, corruption detection, etc). I just wanted to point out your article mention and link didn’t really fit together with how you presented it. I did enjoy the reading and will continue today, but I take it all with a grain of salt. I don’t really 100% trust any source these days, which in this technological era should really be the default for everyone. Definitely let it sink in and contemplate the realities of others, but you only have your own reality to work within for any type of effective action.


  • The problem with your premise is that it’s a private company who’s goal is profit structure not community support and is also being funded with public funds from the government to remain “Private”. Brightline from orlando to boca raton costs 100$ for the basic fare, or 309$ for the premium ride. That’s the same cost for a train between Paris and London. The same trip on bus is 30$ or 36$ taking amtrak (another train service that’s a public service). Can’t wait for the new pricing for the california-vegas run.


  • Cataphract@lemmy.mltoAmtrak@lemmy.worldMusk Lied to Kill High Speed Rail
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    19 days ago

    It gets worse, for the national HSR they’ve doubled down with a privatized high-end train line (think first class, private lobbies for premium etc) with a horrible “track” record in Florida.

    Dubbed the deadliest train per mile in America by the Associated Press, Brightline has killed dozens of people (link)

    New York-based Fortress Investment Group, which owns Brightline via its Florida East Coast Industries (FECI) unit, has pursued a strategy of mixing its infrastructure play with large-scale, real estate investments. Coral Gables-based FECI has developed multifamily and office buildings near Brightline stations and sold most of these projects to institutional investors at nine-figure prices. It also has a sizable portfolio of land and real estate holdings along the train line… “I think Brightline was a real estate play. I think it always has been,” said Bradley Arendt (link)

    So a deadly company that refuses safety precautions (forced the government to fund further safety regulations), and is managed and owned by huge financial companies that own the real estate making their own government funded mini-monopoly rail line and estates! Oh yeah, they’re way over budget and losing money fast, but if they can just get that sweet “build back America” funding they can squeeze the company for a few more years before the high priced investors can cut ties and run with their profits.

    I could go on for days probably talking about Brightline, might have to do a complete write up one of these days to show how nasty and deep all the crap goes with our politics and influences. Just make it a national service, this “private” sector for public utilities has got to be moved on from.




  • Here’s a short animated Ted Talk about co-ops without CEO’s. Decisions can be decided by the workers, I think there’s some disconnect on what you’re imagining a CEO is. If you’re needing to make decisions everyday for the company to work… well you’re looking at something like Twitter which isn’t a stable company in a lot of ways. The video goes on to explain how co-ops operate and perform successfully through the centuries and a good starting point if you haven’t been introduced to the business model before.

    Managers or “presidents” do exist, but the big difference is their role is to implement the decisions made by the group and does away with the usual power structure that influences and hurts the workers (usually through wage theft like the record bonuses CEO’s collect while making decisions for the share holders, not the consumers or employees).








  • All valid points made in an academic setting. I think the general consensus, and the points other users are trying to make, involve more transparency and proper presenting of the facts in their statements. I have parroted the “oh you should try proton, they’re more private and secure” to other people. This is a factual but misleading statement without the nuance of higher OPSEC fundamentals.

    Just look at their main landing page for proton mail.

    • Proton Mail’s end-to-end encryption and zero-access encryption ensure only you can see your emails. Not even Proton can view the content of your emails and attachments.

    • Proton Mail protects you from these digital spies and prevents companies from monitoring you.

    • your data is protected by some of the world’s strictest privacy laws.

    • From newsrooms, activists, and international organizations to academics, Nobel Prize winners, and movie characters, Proton Mail is the trusted choice for secure and private communication. Join over 100 million people worldwide who believe their online privacy is worth protecting.

    A common user will look at this and believe that by just having this account, they will be protected. There is no asterisk* beside e-mail recovery explaining the dangers of linking to another e-mail. In fact, a lot of their services promote linking e-mail because you can’t use third party verification if you haven’t setup your recovery e-mail and/or cell phone verification. I ran into this trying to help an older relative who’s paranoid about online accounts, ended up being more hoops and they were dissuaded because it always come down to “enter more information to continue…privately ;)”

    The front landing page should have a section explaining everything that’s being said here with vpn’s, alternative e-mails, and how to really protect yourself with anonymity. To a lot of people, Private+Secure=Anonymous. It’s not accurate, but unless you already know the things you have to do to protect your identity, it’s not very clear on what the average person should do.


  • From a link someone provided above it seems legit.

    the motorcycle used 28% less fuel than the comparable decade car and emitted 30% fewer carbon dioxide emissions, but it emitted 416% more hydrocarbons, 3,220% more oxides of nitrogen and 8,065% more carbon monoxide. The MythBusters’ conclusion: ‘At best, it’s a wash. Motorcycles are just as bad for the environment as cars,’ Savage said on the show. ‘At worst, they’re far worse.’

    I recognize it’s not an official study, but seems to be more concrete than anecdotal evidence and changed my perspective some. The article also quotes a researcher at UC Riverside which makes more sense on what’s going on

    ‘We’ve been working to clean up passenger vehicles since the ‘70s,’ said Kent Johnson, who’s on the research faculty at UC Riverside and is director of its emissions lab, where the MythBusters’ numbers were analyzed. ‘We’ve been putting on catalytic converters and sensors to improve their ability to control emissions. We didn’t start doing that on motorcycles until the 2000s. It just shows you how far we’ve taken passenger vehicles and how difficult it is to do the same thing with motorcycles. First of all, there’s no room. And the incremental cost might double the price of a bike.’

    (link)




  • Cataphract@lemmy.mltoAsk Electronics@discuss.tchncs.deHow should I get started?
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    1 year ago

    That's a really tough and broad question to ask. I would start with something you're interested in and dive down the rabbit hole from there.

    • Physical feats (led, cosmetic builds, arduino like other's have stated)
    • Gaming Centric (start your own cheap server, mod creation, and plunge into distros!)
    • Academic Learning (take a free course online on the basics of something like Python)
    • Home Networking Server (start hosting your own NAS (network attached storage/media) and add security to your network).

    If you narrow it down some then you'll probably get more useful tips/links for what you're looking for.

    edit: formatting