Readit News logoReadit News
actionablefiber commented on How do cars do in out-of-sample crash testing? (2020)   danluu.com/car-safety/... · Posted by u/surprisetalk
singleshot_ · a year ago
It’s a terrible metaphor but if everyone had to stab someone in the morning and the evening in order for the economy to even begin to function, we would pretty soon get over it. Upton Sinclair and all that.
actionablefiber · a year ago
We had a perfectly functioning economy prior to car domination and all the alternatives have progressed by incredible leaps and bounds in the time since as well.
actionablefiber commented on How do cars do in out-of-sample crash testing? (2020)   danluu.com/car-safety/... · Posted by u/surprisetalk
DiggyJohnson · a year ago
Point taken. But I do think it’s wrong to put no value on the reason behind the popularity of that visceral reaction. Unless safety and efficiency are the only things we are optimizing for.

Being able to drive what you want, where you want, when you want, and how you want, within reason, is one of the emergent freedoms ever granted by the progress of civilization.

actionablefiber · a year ago
I've been to two funerals in as many years for personal friends who died when drivers killed them with their cars. I'll make sure to throw in a good word for "emergent freedoms" and "the progress of civilization" at the next funeral I end up at.
actionablefiber commented on 'I grew up with it': readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel   theguardian.com/technolog... · Posted by u/iechoz6H
chaps · a year ago
Worked for a company whose automated options trading system was an.... excel spreadsheet. Every now and then I would need to RDP to a machine to RDP into another machine to restart it. Pain. So much pain.
actionablefiber · a year ago
I think it's important to think of Excel as a tool for modelling reality and not a tool for changing it. IMO Excel should not be producing data feeds that other tools expect real time access to, nor should it make API calls that mutate state on other platforms.
actionablefiber commented on Gross Apple Marketing   jonathanbuys.com/Gross_Ap... · Posted by u/mrzool
michaelt · a year ago
> What you're calling "compelling" and "funny" seems very much also like messages telling you to that it's ok to lie to everyone around you including your family and friends.

Eh, "lovable but lazy dumbass forgot something and has to lie their way out of it" is a pretty standard trope of boomer sitcom humour.

Just imagine these ads, but the person using AI was Homer Simpson.

actionablefiber · a year ago
A lot of sitcom tropes involve behaviors that are repulsive in real life.
actionablefiber commented on T-Mobile, AT&T oppose unlocking rule, claim locked phones are good for users   arstechnica.com/tech-poli... · Posted by u/LorenDB
mattmaroon · a year ago
I don’t know, my phone carrier charges me zero interest to “buy” my phone on a 36 month loan because of it. It’s not a huge financial windfall by any means, but it’s absolutely money in my pocket.
actionablefiber · a year ago
My family (parents, siblings) are asking me "How did our T-mobile phone bill balloon so much in the past decade?" and I can point to the slow creep and the plan changes they made that (without them knowing or anyone telling them) un-grandfathered them out of a favorable promotional plan. For instance my sister needed to increase her data cap about a few months before they moved our data to unlimited. It pushed her out of the promo and now the family plan costs $35/mo extra even though her line is getting the exact same things as mine, which is still on the promo pricing.

Then I tell them they'd be better served by switching to an MVNO offering significantly better rates and they come back and tell me they're locked in for a while because they just financed new devices.

I'm souring on the ways we create systems where you have to be super savvy and walk on eggshells with how you use the service and utter the right incantations or else you get hosed.

actionablefiber commented on Caroline Ellison sentenced to 2 years in prison   nytimes.com/2024/09/24/te... · Posted by u/gniting
throw310822 · a year ago
Are you saying that if SBF had cooperated in the same way, he would also have gotten 2 years instead of 25? Then he was really badly advised by his lawyers.
actionablefiber · a year ago
SBF didn't have anyone bigger to flip on.
actionablefiber commented on The Double Irish Dutch Sandwich: End of a Tax Evasion Strategy   conversableeconomist.com/... · Posted by u/speckx
immibis · a year ago
How many computer programmers moonlight as tax avoidance accountants?
actionablefiber · a year ago
Tons of people who get degrees in technical fields work outside that field. There are many people who have have spent at least part of their studies or career in hard science, SWE, IT, management consulting, law or finance before switching to something else in that list to improve their work/life balance, to make more money, to find employment more easily, or simply because learning the field and cracking its puzzles is engaging work for them no matter the exact technical field it's in.
actionablefiber commented on Have ‘hobby’ apps become the new social networks?   theguardian.com/technolog... · Posted by u/throwaway55479
Gualdrapo · 2 years ago
I do use Strava a lot to record my rides and stuff, and even more since I could afford a Wahoo - but I really hate the 'social' side of Strava. It tries to make you 'competitive' so hard.

Granted, as a professional loser I'd like to find someone that likes cycling too, though cycling alone is great too - still, I'd rather find that person in one of those rides than in some weird thing like Strava fly-by's or something.

actionablefiber · 2 years ago
> It tries to make you 'competitive' so hard.

I've found that it's really what you make of it. My city has a bunch of cycling subcultures - social slow rolls, fast road riding, sightseeing and exploration, commuting and errand-running - and different people like to see and talk about different types of rides and sometimes dabble in different subcultures, but generally people care way more about seeing the rides, and whatever fun banter or background context you add when you post it, than analyzing your speed and elevation.

I really love the social aspect of Strava because I'm friends with all the other people I follow on it. In some way I think it is more intimate than traditional social media. You could get a better picture of my life and how I spend my time from seeing my physical displacements during the day than by seeing the super filtered Instagram stuff that I only choose to share when I'm having a good time and doing something interesting.

actionablefiber commented on Anatomy of a credit card rewards program   bitsaboutmoney.com/archiv... · Posted by u/disgruntledphd2
listenallyall · 2 years ago
And do you go to these restaurants just as often as you did in the past? Or have you reduced your patronage?
actionablefiber · 2 years ago
Overall, I eat out less, but "drink out" more and never get more than one drink at the establishment. I can't claim to be able to uniquely isolate any of my behavior to fees because a lot has changed in my life. Before covid I was a student and now an FTE, I was shy and lonely and now I have an active social life, I lived in a very big city and now live in a big city, but I can tell you I get an ick about going out, and when I'm proposing to go out I am mindful of costs and fees and propose places that I consider to be cheaper and more forthright about pricing.
actionablefiber commented on Anatomy of a credit card rewards program   bitsaboutmoney.com/archiv... · Posted by u/disgruntledphd2
listenallyall · 2 years ago
Extra fees of any kind just really, really annoy people. This is true at restaurants but also plenty of other industries. In the majority of cases, the loss of business from patrons who avoid your establishment due to the extra fees outweighs the revenue generated by the fee. Of course, you are welcome to test out your theories, but you're unlikely to find many people who predict they will be successful.
actionablefiber · 2 years ago
I'd like to believe this is true but in my metropolitan area, it's quite common to see e.g. a covid recovery fee, inflation recovery fee, iniative 82 service fee, and autograt when you are checking out. It's extremely bad for price transparency but the practice seems very popular among merchants who are betting that customers will still show up as long as the menu prices appear low.

u/actionablefiber

KarmaCake day1256April 15, 2022View Original