exocortex

joined 2 years ago
[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 1 week ago

I hate that every known company has to suddenly exploit their "brand recognition" and expand into unrelated areas. It's completely logical from a short-term-profits-from-uninterested-in-anything-besides-profits shareholders but destroys the value people ascribe to a certain brand in the long run. My favourite example: Marshall. They've been known for loud and DISTORTED guitar amplifiers for decades. They shaped the sound of so many famous bands. Their amps would last a lifetime and sound great! So someone thought "Hey let's make shitty headphones and Bluetooth speakers that will - by nature - not be durable, will have to excell in an area that Marshall never was interested in: amplifiers that do not distort the source material and that sound neutral. They had to rely on completely new technology like Bluetooth (which changes it's standard over time) or be dependent on shitty Internet companies like Spotify (who decide suddenly to brick devices by not supporting them anymore). It's almost the complete opposite of everything Marshall stood for IMHO. The only thing they have in common is that they make sound. The effect is that people buy products that break, decay or deteriorate on timescales much much shorter than the original brand would be expected. The thing that Marshal will be known for in the future is these speakers or breaking headphones with OK-sound quality. But a few management people will have made a lot of money of course.

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 11 points 2 months ago

25 years ago Dave Barry wrote about "smart appliences" and said everything there is to say. His foresight was impressive - and extremely funny, like all his columns.

https://www.deseret.com/2005/9/18/19912434/smart-appliances-are-a-bad-buy-for-half-wits/

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 5 points 3 months ago

The big difference that I see is that they investes in people for a long while now. They did what they can so people can get a decent education. That's also the reason why they don't allow kids to use tiktok and so on - it's hindering the next generation's ability to think. They know that you need many intelligent people to drive whatever other innovation you want to have later. That's why they're pulling ahead so fast while we are collapsing. I am not even living in the US, but even here the education system is crumbling.

The west has trapped itself in the thought of technology without people. The idea that few clever people can design perfect systems that drive everything for us. That we just need to support those few individuals to get maximum return. China is supporting the broad masses. It's like creating a fertile soil.

Who knows what all the asterisks are causing in the future. But at the moment it's just no comparison. We've gone backwards, while they're so far ahead we barely see them.

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 25 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It's used like sweating. We lose heat by havibg water evaporate off our skin. Right now get warm water and put it on your arm, then blow on it. It gets cold until it is fully evaporated. For water to change from the liquid to the gaseeous phase it needs energy. Think like water molecules are holding hands in a liquid. If one of them wants to come free and fly through the air it needs to somehow get the energy to break free from the grip of the others first. When water evaporates from your arm it tales this energy in the form of heat. It turns heat and uses it to get to the gaseous phase. As long as there is water on your arm it can be cooled that way.

That's what data centers do as well. They take water to cool their processors and the let part of it evaporate into the air. That way the parts of the water that remain are like your arm - the get cool quickly.

It's very effective. But if you live in a small town and next door there's a massive datacenter that takes out all the groundwater and basically just boils it until it disappears, you might get angry after a while.

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Moneyball - very good choice. I'd like to add "The Big Short" as well.

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 6 points 5 months ago

Dammit, we all think alike nowadays.... XD

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 7 months ago (2 children)

Captain Obvious would like to chime in: (sorry 😅)

Every color that we see is created by different types of receptors being stimulated together. A linear combination of three of these types. Arguably there isn't really a wavelength that only stimulates one type of receptor exclusively as their absorbtion areas overlap - so it isn't even that precise to call one receptor the "green" receptor as it sees a continuum of wavelength (of which a lot are also detected by the (so-called) "red" receptor.

It's a little egg-and-hen-problem with the naming here.a way out of it would be to only speak about spectra if it's in the physical realm and color of its in the percetral realm.

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 40 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (4 children)

That happens when a brand is about one person. Musk made Tesla all about himSelf. In a way he was the product - you could buy his cool car. Be a part of the company with that cool weird funny CEO. He posts memes just like you!!! Loom at his funny flamethrower! How random! Hahaha! He would also lie about so many features that nobody could actually believe it was a lie (full self driving next year(tm), battery range etc). So they still went ahead and bought it - and had a lot of sunken cost associated to his cool image.

But oh no! It turns out the guy is actually an asshole, a racist, likes nazis, is an delusional and unpredictable drug addict, not that smart, born with money from aparthheit-enabled-exploitation - who could've known!?!?

now people don't like him, so they stop buying his product.

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 0 points 9 months ago (1 children)

How big are your hands???

[–] exocortex@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I agree, but as long as we still have capitalism I support measures that at least slow down the destructiveness of capitalism. AI is like a new powertool in capitalism's arsenal to dismantle our humanity. Sure we can use it for cool things as well. But right now it's used mostly to automate stuff that makes us human - art, music and so on. Not useful stuff like loading the dishwasher for me. More like writing a letter for me to invite my friends to my birthday. Very cool. But maybe the work I put in doing this myself is making my friends feel appreciated?

Edit: It's also nice to at least have an app that takes this maximalist approach. Then people can choose. If they're half-assing it there will be more and more ai-features creeping in over time. One compromise after the next until it's like all the other apps. It's also important to have such a maximalist stand in order to gauge the scale in a way.

view more: next ›