Engaging with TFA's thesis: occasionally, it's correct for institutions to insist on law over lore. For one, that lore might be just as artificial or short-lived or "mistaken" (as much as these things can be) as anything seeking to replace it - as some comments have mentioned, the "customary" start of the year was itself imposed by Caesar amid a history of a March start. It might also be in society's best interests that cooler heads determine a particular course. The "lore" of the demihumanity of certain populations takes hold popularly, from time to time, for example. The law prevents, in the worst cases, slaughter (or builds parameters for punishment and future deterrence after the fact).
Readit Newskarmonhardan commented on How the lore of New Year defeated the law of New Year davidallengreen.com/2025/... · Posted by u/quickfox
karmonhardan commented on Is stuff online worth saving? rubenerd.com/is-it-worth-... · Posted by u/Brajeshwar
Sure, there are a ton of reasons to archive. And if it's cheap to do (in terms of money, yes, but also in terms of time, effort, mental health, etc.) then I am of the mind that we should archive everything.
But, it often isn't cheap to do, and in that case, it makes sense to prioritize. The high priority items for me are the things that I might want to share, the ideas I want to amplify for my contemporaries and future generations that might examine my life. Stuff like [1] [2] and [3] which has influenced my thinking fundamentally, that I hope to build upon so that others can build upon what I have built.
I'd argue that you do this intuitively: you're mentioning a letter from your family's past because it is a high priority item--it's relevant because it was the last written words of your great-grandmother's first husband.
But, there's a lot that isn't worth keeping. My first form of archiving as a teenager was keeping ticket stubs for movies and concerts--a decade later I was going through my pile and found that I didn't even remember most of them. The better movies, I remembered--and I had them on DVD. The better concerts, I remembered--and I also had journal entries and CDs to remember the experience and the music. It's not important to me where/when I saw Everything, Everywhere, All At Once in theaters, but I have it on DVD and I can't wait to show it to my niece when she's older. And sure, I saw Amigo the Devil live, but frankly, he's not an artist you need to see in concert--the greatest impact of Cocaine and Abel[4] on me was when I listened to it alone in my room. The ticket stubs simply don't matter to me.
[1] https://www.viridiandesign.org/notes/451-500/the_last_viridi...
[2] https://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_the_power_of_vulnerabi...
[3] https://digital.wpi.edu/pdfviewer/wm117p10z
[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzjtLm0G49E
EDIT: All the things linked above, I have backed up in one form or another. Notably, the Schutt paper isn't at its original URL.
It's funny you mention ticket stubs, because I also have a similar collection, and I kind of treasure it. Before my Google tracking my every step, before Twitter, as the years go by, I have some record of what I was doing at exceedingly specific times and dates. It helps to structure my memories a bit more than I'd otherwise be able to. I scanned them all at once (in several pages), and it's sort of a map of my adolescence. I can jump across time. I would be sad to lose it. (Along with the photo of the tickets for my make-shift - and first - double feature of Everything Everywhere/Dr. Strange. Multiverse-themed, doncha know?)
>What you're actually asking for is for America to finally undertake its own form of denazification
This is the kind of claptrap that makes it difficult to take the hard left seriously.
There is a direct line between the KKK, American Nazi Party, and Republicans and "moderate" Democrats who are just over the past few years aging (dying) out of office. The ideology of the latter is going strong. But I appreciate the insult; it's the kind of hysterical mischaracterization that tends to come out when one is close to prescribing the proper corrective action to right-wing malfeasance.
It's not just judges-are-human-beings.
In most other countries, if there's a difficult political decision to be made, it's made through the political process.
Society wants abortion to be legal/illegal? Political parties make it part of their election platform, and if elected they change the law. Judges then interpret the law as written, and any bugs are ironed out by the politicians amending the law.
But in America, they face this difficult political decision - and it gets punted to a bunch of elderly judges? Who are appointed for life? Then for half a century the legality of abortion is basically decided at random, depending on which party is in power when these septuagenarians die?
It's the kind of blame-ambiguifying ("Can't do anything, law says so," "Can't do anything, courts say so.") that happens when the opposition to a given reform are perfectly happy to beat, bomb, and shoot anyone who dares to try to [integrate schools/secure voting rights/offer reproductive care/marry two people of the same gender/etc.].
What you're actually asking for is for America to finally undertake its own form of denazification, and hoo boy, if you think that things are rough now...
Remember, there was an actual insurrection by these folks 4 years ago. They literally entered the building housing our legislature and threatened the lives of our lawmakers. There is, like, zero question of why there's been a chilling effect on finding legislative remedies to American issues, even if you cut out the massive influence of lobbyists. No one wants to get Abe'd.
The problem is the only suggestions for reform that I have heard from Musk and others are firing people and eliminating programs. If there is a push for other kinds of reform that makes things clearer and simpler then I would support them. However, since SpaceX and Amazon have argued the National Labor Relations Board is unconstitutional, I have little hope that the reforms they propose will be the kind I would like to see. https://www.npr.org/2024/11/18/nx-s1-5192918/spacex-amazon-n...
It's certainly funny how popular "Defund the" is when it ends with, "[agency with a track record of actually providing service and value to both individual Americans and the country as a whole]" instead of "police". Turns out, conservatism is selective when it comes to preservation of institutions. One guess what the qualifier is.
I was recently looking for an article I remember reading a bit over a year ago. I could even remember some exact phrases that appeared. I tried to find it on Google for more than 10 minutes, ultimately to no avail. I then went looking through chat histories and was able to find where I had shared it to someone.
I relayed this story to a friend who suggested I try Kagi. It was on the first page on my first attempt. I was also able to use it to find a different article I was sure I read even longer ago, that I didn't have as clear memory of.
I'm not sure what your positive experience has to do with GPs negative experience. Is the implication that it negates it? Because it doesn't.
> Just bring back the google from 5-10 years ago please
What you really want is the internet from 5-10 years ago (really even longer than that), and that's not coming back.
People need to stop saying this. The internet from 5-10 years ago was already post-social media revolution; it's not substantially different from today's internet, on the consumer side. Google has gotten substantially worse, however.
karmonhardan commented on Flipping FLIP ship saved from scrapyard at last minute newatlas.com/marine/flipp... · Posted by u/roenxi
I would have preferred a healthcare financing system, personally. But I guess we got technology instead.
Indeed, the moon landing wasn't the universally-lauded come-together moment people like to portray it as. MLK had been assassinated the previous year and the Vietnam War was in full swing; there were a lot of things on people's minds (and greatly varying opinions on what the government ought to be spending money on). The common memory of the event can mostly be chalked up to a combination of propaganda and the people who tend to be able to get their writing about it published (white Baby Boomers).
karmonhardan commented on Ticketmaster’s attempt to game arbitration services fails blog.ericgoldman.org/arch... · Posted by u/hn_acker
You basically cant use any services then. Every single website with a legal team now forces arbitration.
Except Valve, for their Steam service. But that's only because someone realized that you could Zerg rush them with arbitration claims, whose fees they were obliged to pay (since their ToS forced users into it). Their only option that wouldn't be massively disruptive financially, in that case, would be to agree to a settlement with the arb representatives. So, now, you're only allowed to sue Valve, in a specific court of their choosing.
I've been through this and sucked hard. Never will I use a decongestant nasal spray again.
If there was a way to somehow sum up all of the suffering caused by these sprays from dependency (which lasts weeks, months, years even) and compare that with the suffering alleviated from a cold (which lasts a fews days), my bet is these cause more harm than good.
The best thing I ever did for decongestion was to get outside and start wearing a mask during the winter. The air entering my nose is clearer and warmer, which causes less mucus production. The mucus that is produced is more likely to drain, rather than sit around thickening and waiting to be blown out. I wish I'd thought to wear a mask while out when I was younger; could have saved myself much suffering waiting at the bus stop and during the subsequent schoolday.