ballenf

51 ms·

811.
by ballenf 6y ago
I get the antitrust case on iOS, but has the argument been widened to include regulating what Apple does with its PCs? Or are we saying that we want the federal government to regulate OSs generally?
812.
by ballenf 6y ago
The now-trite "if you're not the customer, you're the product" distinction just isn't helpful anymore. Youtube is a great example where creators, subscribers (both Premium and ad-watching) and advertisers are all
813.
by ballenf 6y ago
I'd argue this opens up a giant attack surface where malicious software will try to route its command and control communication through a protected service. Do we really want to trust that Apple will keep all 50+ of these privileged se
814.
by ballenf 6y ago
Thankfully we don't insist that every real life meeting room monitors and reports our activities. Kind of amazing to me that we don't insist on a better justification other than "because we can" when it comes to virtual
815.
by ballenf 6y ago
One of the core anti-capitalist aspects of hospitals are the guaranteed monopolies that many states grant hospitals, in the form of certificates of need. Searching for that term in the article resulted in 0 hits. Not sure how you can discus
816.
by ballenf 6y ago
We don't claim our resumes are unbiased platforms of user (employer) generated content. So it's a terrible analogy.
817.
by ballenf 6y ago
I try to frame those issues as "Is this within the bounds of the value I agreed to provide in return for this pay?" If "no", but my moral code demands I speak, then I'm out. Sorting out expectations directly with su
818.
by ballenf 6y ago
FWIW, if I thought any protected class (or even non-protected) was the basis for a lower-than-deserved pay, I would take that to HR and/or file a whistleblower report. You're talking about illegal activity. Casually surveying peop
819.
by ballenf 6y ago
Pertinent to this article, if there were antitrust regulations with teeth, you wouldn't have monopolies and their associated profit levels. This would both limit spending and limit the incentive for spending since they wouldn't ha
820.
by ballenf 6y ago
Been years since I read anything from National Review, so I was surprised to see them called a "conservative wing-nut website". Even the wikipedia entry for them seems to counter that assessment pretty strongly: https:/&#x2F
821.
by ballenf 6y ago
Just based on MacBook vs. iPhone sales numbers, Apple sells 40 iPhones for every laptop. Most iPhone owners don't have an Apple laptop. Numbers from 2018: 217M iPhones, 5M laptops: https://www.statista.com/topics/
822.
by ballenf 6y ago
That's increasingly not true with the single exception of the iPhone (and even it now uses USB-C for the adapter and Qi for the wireless charge protocol). Every other new device (iPads, laptop and desktop) is 100% USB-C. And, again, yo
823.
by ballenf 6y ago
Here are 5 YT channels covering technology, engineering and tools that feel much less monetization-focused, but still produce very informative content: - Tech Ingredients - DIY Perks - Brainiac75 - Project Farm (not really about farming --
824.
by ballenf 6y ago
Things like that are why I don't auto-update apps carte blanche. Except banking and security-related ones. I really would like to automate backup of every version of every app I own, so that I could pick and choose which to install. It
825.
by ballenf 6y ago
Could a Shortcut do that for you? Or a "scene"?
826.
by ballenf 6y ago
That's true, unless you have privacy options enabled in your Google account. In which case your Google Home becomes a doorstop. At least that was my experience before I gave away a gifted Google Home because it refused to let me procee
827.
by ballenf 6y ago
The failure mode on that game in Safari is quite interesting: the front wheels, car body and rear wheels travel at different speeds.
828.
by ballenf 6y ago
Yes, it was hyperbole. My point was that metadata combined with other data becomes a super powerful tool. You might guard your own privacy 100% but have a conversation with someone who doesn't. If you share interests, then your privacy
829.
by ballenf 6y ago
The chart showing worker's preferences seems awkward to me. At first it looks like "wow, people in the US really like working from home 4+ days a week." And then you wonder did they separate out "never" and "ra
830.
by ballenf 6y ago
If it's metadata plus content of your contacts' web searches, etc., then the distinction becomes meaningless. If you have a phone call with a friend about widgets and then they google for it just after the call, a wise marketer mi
831.
by ballenf 6y ago
How many high profile "misinformation" email campaigns until calls for google to explicitly include political perspective in its indicia of email spam? And then your "imagine a world..." would make sense as an analogy. A
832.
by ballenf 6y ago
I'd go further and consider just complimenting the person face-to-face and leave it at that. Help them understand their true value and that they should make sure they're not undervaluing themselves in terms of compensation or sati
833.
by ballenf 6y ago
Yale may choose whatever admission criteria it wants except for a handful of prohibited criteria. Race is one of them, according to the DOJ. Yale could presumably choose to admit only students scoring high but not too high if they wanted to
834.
by ballenf 6y ago
I think the playbook is just a bad analogy because it misses that point of what an interface is. It's the means of connecting two dissimilar mechanisms. A translation layer. I'd have argued it's more like copyrighting doorkno
835.
by ballenf 6y ago
FWIW, in programming languages we similarly fret over overloading of symbols. A common one is the '-' (minus sign) representing subtraction and negation. Or the '+' (plus sign) representing addition and number coercion (
836.
by ballenf 6y ago
I think a federal excise tax that is earmarked for educational efforts about privacy would be incredible.
837.
by ballenf 6y ago
Sincere question: why is purchasing power not the defining characteristic of wage growth at least post-gold standard? If I can buy more stuff with the same salary, hasn't my salary effectively gone up? Or is your point that only some
838.
by ballenf 6y ago
The gall of FB is amazing considering how recently they did the exact same thing: https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/29/facebook-project-atlas/ That's where FB paid teens to install a root cert on phone
839.
by ballenf 6y ago
All these arguments just feel like people wanting the benefits of owning a company without doing the work or taking the risk. When you accept employment at a company, you do so on their terms -- including whether political activism on the j
840.
by ballenf 6y ago
I don't think this was posted as "I would submit a PR with this code for prod" but more of a "here's a cool one-liner for fun" approach. I enjoy reading people's off-the-cuff code golf stuff and usually le

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