• 5G

    From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Ogg on Thu Jul 30 05:58:06 2020
    Re: 5G
    By: Ogg to Andeddu on Wed Jul 29 2020 07:35 pm

    Rolled out aggressively to capitalize on manufacturing and installation contracts. Speed is of the essence. But when 5G proves to be problematic to our health, the initial profits will have already been made.
    The following book is very interesting:

    The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life | Paperback
    Arthur Firstenberg

    5G is the basis of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Speed isn't the aim as connections are fast enough, it's additional bandwidth that's required. Everything you interact with WILL be connected to the internet as part of a system known as the "internet of things". This new network is going to require a colossal amount of data to be transferred due to home, building and industrial automation.

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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 21:21:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Ogg <=-

    Re: 5G
    By: Ogg to Andeddu on Wed Jul 29 2020 07:35 pm

    Rolled out aggressively to capitalize on manufacturing and installation contracts. Speed is of the essence. But when 5G proves to be problematic to our health, the initial profits will have already been made.
    The following book is very interesting:

    The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life | Paperback
    Arthur Firstenberg

    5G is the basis of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Speed isn't the
    aim as connections are fast enough, it's additional bandwidth that's required. Everything you interact with WILL be connected to the
    internet as part of a system known as the "internet of things". This
    new network is going to require a colossal amount of data to be transferred due to home, building and industrial automation.

    There is no fourth industrial revolution. You can't replace industry with apps.

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  • From poindexter FORTRAN@VERT/REALITY to Ogg on Thu Jul 30 08:27:00 2020
    Ogg wrote to Andeddu <=-

    For your note, I am not a 5G advocate. I was merely indicating that 5G
    is being rolled out very aggressively in Europe, USA and Asia, and it
    WILL be the predominent cell signal in the very near future.

    Rolled out aggressively to capitalize on manufacturing and installation contracts. Speed is of the essence. But when 5G proves to be
    problematic to our health, the initial profits will have already been made.

    It makes for some interesting conspiracy theories. I've heard 5G
    signals cause Covid-19, or that it's part of a mind-control
    conspiracy along with mask wearing to desensitize and de-humanize
    society.


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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Thu Jul 30 17:39:14 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 2020 09:21 pm

    5G is the basis of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Speed isn't the aim as connections are fast enough, it's additional bandwidth that's required. Everything you interact with WILL be connected to the internet as part of a system known as the "internet of things". This new network is going to require a colossal amount of data to be transferred due to home, building and industrial automation.

    There is no fourth industrial revolution. You can't replace industry with apps.

    There is. Around 50% of current jobs are going to be fully automated by 2030 leaving much of the population unemployed. This is why Universal Basic Income is being discussed so much now in congress. I have spoken to farmers who are very aware they'll be out of business soon due to high-rise automated hydroponic farms. Driverless vehicles will be the norm in 5-10 years, killing the haulage industry. Almost all production wil be carried out autonomously with nothing more than a few human supervisors overseeing production.

    You can't replace industry with apps, but you can replace humans with AI.

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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 17:17:52 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to Dennisk on Thu Jul 30 2020 05:39 pm

    There is. Around 50% of current jobs are going to be fully automated by 2030 leaving much of the population unemployed. This is why Universal Basic Income is being discussed so much now in congress. I have spoken to

    they've been saying that every decade since i've been an adult. it hasnt even come close to happening.
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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to MRO on Thu Jul 30 21:36:15 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 2020 05:17 pm

    There is. Around 50% of current jobs are going to be fully automated
    by 2030 leaving much of the population unemployed. This is why
    Universal Basic Income is being discussed so much now in congress. I
    have spoken to

    they've been saying that every decade since i've been an adult. it hasnt even come close to happening.

    In the past few years, I've been hearing stories about fast food restaurants becoming automated. With the recent debates about minimum wage increasing to $15/hour and such, there has been even more talk of that. McDonalds now has kiosks in some locations where you can place an order, so a human teller isn't always needed. I've been hearing about fast food places considering more automation with machines that might also prepare the food.

    Nightfox

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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Fri Jul 31 20:07:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Dennisk <=-

    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 2020 09:21 pm

    5G is the basis of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Speed isn't the aim as connections are fast enough, it's additional bandwidth that's required. Everything you interact with WILL be connected to the internet as part of a system known as the "internet of things". This new network is going to require a colossal amount of data to be transferred due to home, building and industrial automation.

    There is no fourth industrial revolution. You can't replace industry with apps.

    There is. Around 50% of current jobs are going to be fully automated by 2030 leaving much of the population unemployed. This is why Universal Basic Income is being discussed so much now in congress. I have spoken
    to farmers who are very aware they'll be out of business soon due to high-rise automated hydroponic farms. Driverless vehicles will be the
    norm in 5-10 years, killing the haulage industry. Almost all production wil be carried out autonomously with nothing more than a few human supervisors overseeing production.

    You can't replace industry with apps, but you can replace humans with
    AI.

    We have had a lot of automation, yet unemployment remained low. Why? I think the system creates jobs to fill the gaps. Much manufacturing has gone offshore, and for what is remaining, the administrative burden has increased. More administrators, regulators, analysts, and so on. These jobs can't really be automated, and there isn't much desire to do so, from what I've seen. There are many retail jobs, more hospitality jobs, etc. These are still 'physical' jobs. If manufacturing is more efficient, consumption will increase.

    The amount of labour to produce physical goods has decreased, but I think there will be a floor.

    For there to be automation, Capitalism would have to go, because we can't have most people unemployed. In reality, our system needs everyone to be employed, and I think work will grow to meet that demand.

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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 20:19:00 2020
    Nightfox wrote to MRO <=-

    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 2020 05:17 pm

    There is. Around 50% of current jobs are going to be fully automated
    by 2030 leaving much of the population unemployed. This is why
    Universal Basic Income is being discussed so much now in congress. I
    have spoken to

    they've been saying that every decade since i've been an adult. it hasnt even come close to happening.

    In the past few years, I've been hearing stories about fast food restaurants becoming automated. With the recent debates about minimum wage increasing to $15/hour and such, there has been even more talk of that. McDonalds now has kiosks in some locations where you can place
    an order, so a human teller isn't always needed. I've been hearing
    about fast food places considering more automation with machines that might also prepare the food.

    True, but there are more fast food places, and more delivery options, and Uber eats. There are far more places to eat out now where I grew up than there were when I was growing up there.

    So each place is more efficient in terms of human resources, but there are more places. Don't know about the USA, but that is true in Australia.


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  • From Ennev@VERT/MTLGEEK to Moondog on Fri Jul 31 07:16:59 2020
    On 2020-07-31 1:52 a.m., Moondog wrote:

    Imagine if McDonalds, Burger King, Arbys, Hardees, and Wendy's all became partially automated? You're looking at up to 25 million entry level employees
    being displaced.

    I don't know elsewhere, but here in Canada McDonalds have not like booth
    that are like 60" touch screen where you place your order yourself and
    pay. If you want to pay cash it print your a stub and you have to go in
    line to the only one or 2 line with actual human to pay, you can order
    there too. Then you are issue a receipt with a number and then you wait
    for your number to be called up.

    Kitchen is still run by employee don't look more automated than it was
    for years. But staff don't have to interact much with customer.

    Then it's full of distracted customers looking at theirs phone and not
    paying attention when theirs number are called up.

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  • From Dreamer@VERT/BMTSOFT to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 10:19:00 2020
    Nightfox wrote to MRO <=-

    they've been saying that every decade since i've been an adult. it hasnt even come close to happening.

    In the past few years, I've been hearing stories about fast food restaurants becoming automated. With the recent debates about minimum wage increasing to $15/hour and such, there has been even more talk of that. McDonalds now has kiosks in some locations where you can place
    an order, so a human teller isn't always needed. I've been hearing
    about fast food places considering more automation with machines that might also prepare the food.

    We've had kiosks at McDonalds here for a while now, plus the mobile app. I stopped eating at McDonalds for a while due to poor service, but I decided to give them a try again.

    For my first visit, I placed an order via the mobile app. I was pleasantly surprised to see that I could place a dine-in order, as I prefer to eat at
    the restaurant. So, I did that, and I went inside and waited at the area
    marked for picking up mobile orders. After quite some time I asked the expeditor about my order, and she apologized, stating that they normally get the mobile order pickups at the drive-thru. She said this while standing
    under the mobile pick-up sign and with my receipt clearly marked dine-in.

    My second visit, I decided to try the kiosk. I don't recall where I read it, probably on the website, but McDonalds is supposed to be offering table-side service. You place your order, and they bring it to you. The kiosks are
    clearly designed to facilitate this. So, I order, select dine-in, and enter
    my table-tent number. Imagine my surprise that the printer isn't printing,
    so I don't get my receipt. No biggie -- I sit down, set up my computer, and start studying while waiting for my food. I notice an older couple a couple seats in front of me. The gentleman is almost arguing with the cashier over
    how to count back change. Apparently, the cashier pushed the wrong button
    on the register. A few moments later, the expeditor calls an order number. After the third time, the couple realizes it's their order, and the woman hobbles over to pick up their food.

    About twenty minutes later, I realize I hadn't gotten my food yet. While
    I eat my food, I wonder how many times they called my order number. Since I never got a receipt, I wouldn't have known what it was.

    A week after, I ordered once more, thinking it was just a bad night. I use
    the same kiosk. The printer is still broken. I point it out to the cashier,
    and they seem to have not known about it. Overall, the experience is the
    same.

    Every time I've eaten at McDonalds for the past ten years, the dining room
    has been mostly empty. Prices are not the reason restaurants are closing.
    There are restaurants paying above minimum wage that cost more, and they
    are doing just fine. They're the ones providing good service. And they are staffed by young and old alike. I used to work for McDonalds among many
    other restaurants. The McDonalds I worked for was an excellent franchisee
    who paid above minimum wages, implemented an excellent training program,
    and was not scared to disclipline and fire people. The local McDonalds seems
    to be chronically understaffed (I was an assistant manager at the other franchise, and I know the proper staffing for a restaurant) at night, and
    from the quality of the staffing I can guarantee the crew and managers are either not paid well, or the upper management doesn't care.

    Years ago, the local Church's Chicken was the same way. We started out as
    part of corporate. We had above minimum wage pay, and good benefits. We
    had a good training program, and we maintained our standards. Once the local market was sold to a franchisee, things went south. In fact, I've started visiting my old store again, and I timed the orders. It takes about ten
    minutes during lunch to receive an order. The standard was three minutes,
    and we used to do it in under two. Dinner is a nightmare to watch, though.
    The restaurant used to break sales records, and received an expensive
    upgrade to a new system. The old system could comfortably hot-hold 15 head
    of chicken for 30 minutes. Our new system could hold 50 head of chicken for over an hour. And, we used the hell out of it on weekend nights. The most important part of the system, an oven designed to hot-hold the chicken
    without drying it out, is now broken. It's weird to watch how slow everyone moves now, and to only see one or two stoves of chicken cooking at a time.
    I seriously want to see their sales figures everytime I'm there.


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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Vk3jed on Fri Jul 31 09:02:13 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Vk3jed to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 2020 08:22 pm

    I rarely go to McDonalds, vut everyone I have been to over the past few years down here has had the self serve kiosks for the ordering. The only time I interact with the staff is to pick up my order at the counter. I like the kiosks, because they make customising the order much easier than trying to explain it to the person at the register, or even knowing that they'll make those changes, in the first place.

    I like the kiosks, but I found that they are still lacking in some things, like accepting some promotional offers (and maybe coupons too?). I worked at a place that had made deals with local businesses, and some some businesses in my area offered a discount for employees of that company. McDonalds offered a 10% discount, so I figured why not use the discount? But there was no place to input such a promotional discount in the kiosks, so I had to order from a (human) cashier in order to get the deal.

    Nightfox

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  • From Rampage@VERT/SESTAR to Andeddu on Fri Jul 31 11:32:23 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to Dennisk on Thu Jul 30 2020 17:39:14


    You can't replace industry with apps, but you can replace humans with AI.

    too bad we don't have (real) AI today... not even a close approximation ;)


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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Dreamer on Fri Jul 31 09:31:30 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Dreamer to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 2020 10:19 am

    We've had kiosks at McDonalds here for a while now, plus the mobile app. I stopped eating at McDonalds for a while due to poor service, but I decided to give them a try again.

    For my first visit, I placed an order via the mobile app. I was pleasantly surprised to see that I could place a dine-in order, as I prefer to eat at the restaurant. So, I did that, and I went inside and waited at the area marked for picking up mobile orders. After quite some time I asked the expeditor about my order, and she apologized, stating that they normally get the mobile order pickups at the drive-thru. She said this while standing under the mobile pick-up sign and with my receipt clearly marked dine-in.
    ...

    It seems there are still some hiccups they're working through for mobile app orders & such.

    I've started using a couple mobile apps for fast food orders occasionally. At first I thought it was silly to use an app to order fast food ahead of time, because the whole point of fast food is to be aboe to just go and order and get your food quickly.. But sometimes I do like being able to go there and pick up my food right away because it's already ready. There's a Jersey Mike's (subs) near me where I've done that a few times, and you can just walk in and say you're picking up an order for a certain name and grab it and go, since you've ordered & paid already.

    Nightfox

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  • From Underminer@VERT/UNDRMINE to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 17:24:06 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Nightfox to Vk3jed on Fri Jul 31 2020 09:02 am

    I like the kiosks, but I found that they are still lacking in some things, like accepting some promotional offers (and maybe coupons too?). I worked

    Yeah, that's on the IT team supporting the restaurants in the area. Like with anything, some are more on top of making sure coupon codes are up to date than others.
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  • From Underminer@VERT/UNDRMINE to Rampage on Fri Jul 31 17:25:45 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Rampage to Andeddu on Fri Jul 31 2020 11:32 am

    too bad we don't have (real) AI today... not even a close approximation ;)

    Depends what you mean. We don't have artificial general intelligence, but we have extremely effective AI for many different tasks. Most jobs only require the latter as they don't require much variation in task.
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  • From Underminer@VERT/UNDRMINE to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 17:29:11 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Nightfox to Moondog on Fri Jul 31 2020 12:08 pm

    That's true. I wonder how long it would take for the market to adjust and other entry-level jobs to become available.

    It's possible it wouldn't, as other entry level jobs are likely to start seeing a similar fate. I have no idea how things are going to end up shaking out, just that we're going to be in for a bumpy ride in the forseeable future.

    Heck, Covid lockdowns give us an insight into how many current jobs are just redundant or unneccesary, and you'd better believe bean counters are going to take notice.
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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to MRO on Sat Aug 1 00:37:25 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 2020 05:17 pm

    they've been saying that every decade since i've been an adult. it hasnt even come close to happening.

    The technology now exists so you'd best be sure it's happening this decade, my man!

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Sat Aug 1 02:05:41 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Fri Jul 31 2020 08:07 pm

    We have had a lot of automation, yet unemployment remained low. Why? I think the system creates jobs to fill the gaps. Much manufacturing has gone offshore, and for what is remaining, the administrative burden has increased. More administrators, regulators, analysts, and so on. These jobs can't really be automated, and there isn't much desire to do so, from what I've seen. There are many retail jobs, more hospitality jobs, etc. These are still 'physical' jobs. If manufacturing is more efficient, consumption will increase.

    The amount of labour to produce physical goods has decreased, but I think there will be a floor.

    For there to be automation, Capitalism would have to go, because we can't have most people unemployed. In reality, our system needs everyone to be employed, and I think work will grow to meet that demand.

    Automation is the end of employment for most people. Where can we go once unskilled labour is no longer required? When farms, shops, industry, banking, etc... is unmanned, what can a human do AI can't?

    We really are on the cusp of the Fourth Industrial Revolution... the coronavirus and the subsequent shutdown has resulted in a huge number of low-mid cap companies permanantly shutting down. Once the furlough ends, we will see the true scale of unemployment. And once we exceed 50 percent unemployment, a decimated GPD along with the credit, mortgage, national debt and stock market bubbles bursting, not to mention un-funded liabilities such as the pension time bomb, we'll have a very real problem on our hands.

    As the economic gears slow down and quantitative easing begins to fail, credit will be hard to come across... entrepreneurs will not be able to start new businesses in an attempt to rebuild and all we'll have left will be a few large corporate monopolies who will themselves usher in the era of mass automation.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Rampage on Sat Aug 1 02:33:38 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Rampage to Andeddu on Fri Jul 31 2020 11:32 am

    too bad we don't have (real) AI today... not even a close approximation ;)

    We don't, but we will have robotics far in advance of what we've seen thus far which will be capable of taking over the vast majority of manufacturing jobs.

    AI isn't too thick either... jobs in currency/commodity speculation are in danger along with accounting, as new advanced and unified systems are being produced. I think automation is going hit people hard and fast as most are quite unaware that even professional jobs, not just unskilled ones, are at risk.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Nightfox on Sat Aug 1 02:43:02 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Nightfox to Moondog on Fri Jul 31 2020 12:08 pm

    That's true. I wonder how long it would take for the market to adjust and other entry-level jobs to become available.

    Nightfox

    But where would those jobs come from? We don't see a lot of innnovation these days so I believe there will be an excess unemployed and unemployable workforce. People like Andrew Yang and Elon Musk talk about this kind of thing all the time. You can only innovate for so long until robotics in conjunction with AI is able to take over wholesale, leaving nothing left for us humans. This is why UBI is such a serious matter... they're talking about it seriously in the UK now. Captains of industry can't see past AI automation.

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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 22:05:26 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Nightfox to MRO on Thu Jul 30 2020 09:36 pm

    increasing to $15/hour and such, there has been even more talk of that. McDonalds now has kiosks in some locations where you can place an order, so a human teller isn't always needed. I've been hearing about fast food places considering more automation with machines that might also prepare the food.

    those kiosks kinda slow down things. maybe they help if the place is crowded.

    they have also been talking about flippy the burger flipping robot for decades. ---
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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Andeddu on Fri Jul 31 22:11:09 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to MRO on Sat Aug 01 2020 12:37 am

    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Thu Jul 30 2020 05:17 pm

    they've been saying that every decade since i've been an adult. it
    hasnt even come close to happening.


    The technology now exists so you'd best be sure it's happening this decade, my man!


    it existed back then, too. didnt happen
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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Sat Aug 1 19:20:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Dennisk <=-

    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Fri Jul 31 2020 08:07 pm

    We have had a lot of automation, yet unemployment remained low. Why? I think the system creates jobs to fill the gaps. Much manufacturing has gone offshore, and for what is remaining, the administrative burden has increased. More administrators, regulators, analysts, and so on. These jobs can't really be automated, and there isn't much desire to do so, from what I've seen. There are many retail jobs, more hospitality jobs, etc. These are still 'physical' jobs. If manufacturing is more efficient, consumption will increase.

    The amount of labour to produce physical goods has decreased, but I think there will be a floor.

    For there to be automation, Capitalism would have to go, because we can't have most people unemployed. In reality, our system needs everyone to be employed, and I think work will grow to meet that demand.

    Automation is the end of employment for most people. Where can we go
    once unskilled labour is no longer required? When farms, shops,
    industry, banking, etc... is unmanned, what can a human do AI can't?

    We really are on the cusp of the Fourth Industrial Revolution... the coronavirus and the subsequent shutdown has resulted in a huge number
    of low-mid cap companies permanantly shutting down. Once the furlough ends, we will see the true scale of unemployment. And once we exceed 50 percent unemployment, a decimated GPD along with the credit, mortgage, national debt and stock market bubbles bursting, not to mention
    un-funded liabilities such as the pension time bomb, we'll have a very real problem on our hands.

    As the economic gears slow down and quantitative easing begins to fail, credit will be hard to come across... entrepreneurs will not be able to start new businesses in an attempt to rebuild and all we'll have left
    will be a few large corporate monopolies who will themselves usher in
    the era of mass automation.

    That is the government shut down doing this, creating an economic catastrophe, not the fourth revolution.

    The reason I am skeptical is because in the past we have seen the types of jobs change, but new jobs are always created. We have a consumption based economy, that is what drives everything. Consumption drives creation, and if creation is easier, then consumption can increase further. I don't believe there will be 'slack' in the economy. If people are not working because they don't have to work, then we can ratchet consumption up further.

    So yes, many things will be automated, and wealth will result, but that wealth will be turned into more consumption. The fast food industry is a good example. We have more and more fast food places, and now they deliver everything. All places. I can get Mc Donalds delivered, pizza delivered, any food from any restaurant delivered. There are more and more places popping up.
    Or take toys. There is ton load more of plastic bits of crap created to sell to children. For business, automation means you can create twice the product per unit of labour, which means you have to sell twice as much. And keep in mind, people used to predict shorter working hours in the past, but they didn't shorten. They stayed the same, or got longer, with less and less wealth going to people.

    What will finally result in employment dropping permanently, and a permanent reduction in the need of employment, is when we hit the limit of what we can consume.

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  • From Vk3jed@VERT/FREEWAY to Nightfox on Sat Aug 1 19:15:00 2020
    On 07-31-20 09:02, Nightfox wrote to Vk3jed <=-

    I like the kiosks, but I found that they are still lacking in some
    things, like accepting some promotional offers (and maybe coupons

    Hmm, I've never had to to deal with that issue.


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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to MRO on Sat Aug 1 20:54:07 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 2020 10:05 pm

    they have also been talking about flippy the burger flipping robot for decades.

    They were talking about commercial aircrafts, cross continent communication and home computers too...

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  • From Underminer@VERT/UNDRMINE to poindexter FORTRAN on Sat Aug 1 14:12:11 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: poindexter FORTRAN to Dreamer on Sat Aug 01 2020 10:32 am

    In 10 years, I'm sure there'll be a burger 3d printer, a row of kiosks, a manager, and an assistant to change printer paper and fat cartridges.

    Hopefully they don't get those mixed up.
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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Sat Aug 1 22:01:29 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Sat Aug 01 2020 07:20 pm

    That is the government shut down doing this, creating an economic catastrophe, not the fourth revolution.

    The reason I am skeptical is because in the past we have seen the types of jobs change, but new jobs are always created. We have a consumption based economy, that is what drives everything. Consumption drives creation, and if creation is easier, then consumption can increase further. I don't believe there will be 'slack' in the economy. If people are not working because they don't have to work, then we can ratchet consumption up further.

    So yes, many things will be automated, and wealth will result, but that wealth will be turned into more consumption. The fast food industry is a good example. We have more and more fast food places, and now they deliver everything. All places. I can get Mc Donalds delivered, pizza delivered, any food from any restaurant delivered. There are more and more places popping up.
    Or take toys. There is ton load more of plastic bits of crap created to sell to children. For business, automation means you can create twice the product per unit of labour, which means you have to sell twice as much. And keep in mind, people used to predict shorter working hours in the past, but they didn't shorten. They stayed the same, or got longer, with less and less wealth going to people.

    What will finally result in employment dropping permanently, and a permanent reduction in the need of employment, is when we hit the limit of what we can consume.

    I agree that the coming ecomomic collapse is goverment created, it's not a side effect of the automation to come. The chickens are coming home to roost after decades of financial mismanagement -- so the shutdown is a mere catalyst, not technically the cause.

    The USA has a consumption based economy, which is fine. The issue is that the USA does not produce much of what it consumes. In 1950, the manufacturing sector consisted of 40% of the workforce. It now employs less than 8%. The reason America can import cheap consumer goods is due to the strength of the US dollar (the world reserve currency). Once the purchasing power of the US dollar drops, due to the excessive quantitative easing caused by a dire decrease in tax revenue AND the additional expenses involved in the furlough scheme, imported goods are going to cost a lot more. The US has actually been exporting its inflation all these years by flooding the global market with dollars... and once trust in the dollar slowly evaporates, the US will find it difficult to maintain its grip on the world economy.

    I think at this point, major corporations will look at AI automation as the quick fix... they'll employ cheap labour to begin with, but eventually, those jobs will be replaced with something far more cheaper and reliable.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to poindexter FORTRAN on Sat Aug 1 22:35:38 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: poindexter FORTRAN to Andeddu on Sat Aug 01 2020 10:35 am

    That's where the gig economy comes in - someone has to drive those
    burgers to the people who order them online.

    The pandemic sort of killed the news cycle covering the ruling that
    gig workers should be paid benefits. Wonder when that'll pick up
    again?

    I'd hate to be an Uber driver right now, but not wanting to ride
    public transit might boost ride miles.

    When things do open up, the roads around me are going to be clogged.
    I'm sure no one is going to want to get into a bus line that was
    notably grimy before this all happened.

    I think you're quite right about the gig economy. The BBC and other news outlets have been sharing the experiences of gig workers (Amazon delivery drivers by day, night club security staff by night, for example), as if it's part of the "new normal". In the UK, unemployment is becoming so bad that a 1000 people applied for a full-time receptionist job in Manchester within 24 hours of it being advertised.

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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Andeddu on Sat Aug 1 21:20:27 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to MRO on Sat Aug 01 2020 08:54 pm

    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Nightfox on Fri Jul 31 2020 10:05 pm

    they have also been talking about flippy the burger flipping robot for
    decades.

    They were talking about commercial aircrafts, cross continent communication and home computers too...


    yeah but i'm talking about shit they have been talking about for decades that has not came to be. nobody works on it more than a proof of concept.
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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Sun Aug 2 12:48:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Dennisk <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Sat Aug 01 2020 07:20 pm

    That is the government shut down doing this, creating an economic catastrophe, not the fourth revolution.

    The reason I am skeptical is because in the past we have seen the types of jobs change, but new jobs are always created. We have a consumption based economy, that is what drives everything. Consumption drives creation, and if creation is easier, then consumption can increase further. I don't believe there will be 'slack' in the economy. If people are not working because they don't have to work, then we can ratchet consumption up further.

    So yes, many things will be automated, and wealth will result, but that wealth will be turned into more consumption. The fast food industry is a good example. We have more and more fast food places, and now they deliver everything. All places. I can get Mc Donalds delivered, pizza delivered, any food from any restaurant delivered. There are more and more places popping up.
    Or take toys. There is ton load more of plastic bits of crap created to sell to children. For business, automation means you can create twice the product per unit of labour, which means you have to sell twice as much. And keep in mind, people used to predict shorter working hours in the past, but they didn't shorten. They stayed the same, or got longer, with less and less wealth going to people.

    What will finally result in employment dropping permanently, and a permanent reduction in the need of employment, is when we hit the limit of what we can consume.

    I agree that the coming ecomomic collapse is goverment created, it's
    not a side effect of the automation to come. The chickens are coming
    home to roost after decades of financial mismanagement -- so the
    shutdown is a mere catalyst, not technically the cause.

    The USA has a consumption based economy, which is fine. The issue is
    that the USA does not produce much of what it consumes. In 1950, the manufacturing sector consisted of 40% of the workforce. It now employs less than 8%. The reason America can import cheap consumer goods is due
    to the strength of the US dollar (the world reserve currency). Once the purchasing power of the US dollar drops, due to the excessive
    quantitative easing caused by a dire decrease in tax revenue AND the additional expenses involved in the furlough scheme, imported goods are going to cost a lot more. The US has actually been exporting its
    inflation all these years by flooding the global market with dollars... and once trust in the dollar slowly evaporates, the US will find it difficult to maintain its grip on the world economy.

    I think at this point, major corporations will look at AI automation as the quick fix... they'll employ cheap labour to begin with, but eventually, those jobs will be replaced with something far more cheaper and reliable.

    Eventually it will happen. The USA will remain a significant consumer for years to come. Pricing American consumers out of the market won't be feasible for some time yet, not until China can fill all the consumption demand it needs internally.

    The export of manufacturing from what I've seen seems to be slowing. Maybe in part because there is nothing left to export.

    I don't disagree that we will see fall in total employment, and the need for humans to work, I think what will ultimately determine that is economics, not merely technology replacing humans. Remember, money is the capacity for work, and as long as one human being can provide a service that another may need, and vice versa, there will be an exchange. Even if it is women making Only Fans accounts and men delivering food to them. It won't be a real economy, and people will be far poorer.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to MRO on Sun Aug 2 17:43:20 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Sat Aug 01 2020 09:20 pm

    yeah but i'm talking about shit they have been talking about for decades that has not came to be. nobody works on it more than a proof of concept.

    What shit? The manufactuing sector has been decimated by automation. You just wait until there are driveless cars & the rest of the menial jobs become automated. Even white collar jobs in finance are likely to disappear within the next decade.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Sun Aug 2 18:16:31 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 12:48 pm

    Eventually it will happen. The USA will remain a significant consumer for years to come. Pricing American consumers out of the market won't be feasible for some time yet, not until China can fill all the consumption demand it needs internally.

    The export of manufacturing from what I've seen seems to be slowing. Maybe in part because there is nothing left to export.

    I don't disagree that we will see fall in total employment, and the need for humans to work, I think what will ultimately determine that is economics, not merely technology replacing humans. Remember, money is the capacity for work, and as long as one human being can provide a service that another may need, and vice versa, there will be an exchange. Even if it is women making Only Fans accounts and men delivering food to them. It won't be a real economy, and people will be far poorer.

    It's not really up to China. The US is pricing itself out of the market by debasing its own currency in the form of quantitative easing. The Federal Reserve has printed around 3 trillion dollars since lockdown and has flooded the repo market, buying up all short and long term maturities. This has caused a huge amount of concern -- you have a country which is around 28 trillion in debt with NO sign of ever paying that money back and no scope over EVER increasing base rates above 0.5%, as doing so would be catastrophic. If the US was able to obtain the same tax revenue they did in 2019 and had ZERO outgoings (no public sector, military, medicare or pension obligations) it would still take over 8 years to clear the debt. There is very little confidence in the dollar right now as the Fed has made it clear they're going to spend their way out of this crisis. With serious inflation incoming, expect HARSH austerity measures... so forget about consumerism in the coming years, people are not going to have the cash or credit to make unnecessary purchases.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Nightfox on Sun Aug 2 18:29:24 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Nightfox to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 12:55 am

    It seems much of what the US depends on comes from China (such as electronics & electronic parts). And depending on consumer preference, there are things like cars & such people buy from other countries (though ironically, some foreign car brands have factories in the US where they're built, and some American car companies build their cars in other countries).

    Several years ago, I heard in the news that the US lost a point in some global financial score, though offhand I don't remember what that financial score is now.

    Globalisation has decimated the USA's manufacturing sector... this would normally cause outrage however the public have been satiated by a deluge of cheap Chinese products imported into the country. If the iPhone 12, for instance, was to be manufactured in the USA, it would cost the consumer over 2 thousand dollars rather than 1200 dollars. The American public are not ready to support natively produced technology due to the overwhemling additional costs caused by non-cheap labour.

    I think you're referring to Standard & Poor's downgrading of the US's credit rating from AAA to AA+.

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Andeddu on Sun Aug 2 15:01:09 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Andeddu to Nightfox on Sun Aug 02 2020 06:29 pm

    Globalisation has decimated the USA's manufacturing sector... this would normally cause outrage however the public have been satiated by a deluge of cheap Chinese products imported into the country. If the iPhone 12, for instance, was to be manufactured in the USA, it would cost the consumer over 2 thousand dollars rather than 1200 dollars. The American public are not ready to support natively produced technology due to the overwhemling additional costs caused by non-cheap labour.

    I'm a little surprised that even top-end smartphones cost that much. When the iPhone first came out in 2007, I remember being really surprised its price was $700 or something, and many people were saying the price seemed a bit high for a phone. Electronics prices usually go down in price over time, but it seems the price of top-end smartphones like the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy phones hasn't gone down. And they've actually increased in price over the years..

    I think you're referring to Standard & Poor's downgrading of the US's credit rating from AAA to AA+.

    Yes, that's it.

    Nightfox

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Moondog on Sun Aug 2 15:12:11 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Moondog to poindexter FORTRAN on Sun Aug 02 2020 12:49 pm

    KFC announced they are researching 3d printed chicken nuggets. They won't be printed as you wait, though. They will be made at the processing facility, like standard nuggets.

    I've also heard there has been research into growing cloned beef in a lab from DNA samples, so that they wouldn't have to keep allocating farm land & things to raise cows for meat.

    Nightfox

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Moondog on Sun Aug 2 15:13:41 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 01:19 pm

    Anything that can be automated in the US can be automated cheaper in China.

    China has a fully automated shipping port:
    https://youtu.be/4AF9aIgUj3Q

    Nightfox

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Andeddu on Sun Aug 2 15:16:08 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to MRO on Sun Aug 02 2020 05:43 pm

    What shit? The manufactuing sector has been decimated by automation. You just wait until there are driveless cars & the rest of the menial jobs become automated. Even white collar jobs in finance are likely to disappear within the next decade.

    Companies have already been working on self-driving cars for a while now. I still haven't seen any in my area, but I keep hearing about them.

    Nightfox

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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Moondog on Sun Aug 2 17:05:34 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 01:19 pm

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Andeddu to Dennisk on Sat Aug 01 2020 10:01 pm

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Sat Aug 01 2020 07:20 pm

    That is the government shut down doing this, creating an economic catastrophe, not the fourth revolution.

    The reason I am skeptical is because in the past we have seen the type jobs change, but new jobs are always created. We have a consumption b economy, that is what drives everything. Consumption drives creation, if creation is easier, then consumption can increase further. I don't believe there will be 'slack' in the economy. If people are not worki because they don't have to work, then we can ratchet consumption up fu

    So yes, many things will be automated, and wealth will result, but tha wealth will be turned into more consumption. The fast food industry i good example. We have more and more fast food places, and now they de everything. All places. I can get Mc Donalds delivered, pizza deliver any food from any restaurant delivered. There are more and more place popping up.
    Or take toys. There is ton load more of plastic bits of crap created sell to children. For business, automation means you can create twic product per unit of labour, which means you have to sell twice as much keep in mind, people used to predict shorter working hours in the past they didn't shorten. They stayed the same, or got longer, with less a less wealth going to people.

    What will finally result in employment dropping permanently, and a per reduction in the need of employment, is when we hit the limit of what consume.

    I agree that the coming ecomomic collapse is goverment created, it's not effect of the automation to come. The chickens are coming home to roost a decades of financial mismanagement -- so the shutdown is a mere catalyst, technically the cause.

    The USA has a consumption based economy, which is fine. The issue is that USA does not produce much of what it consumes. In 1950, the manufacturing sector consisted of 40% of the workforce. It now employs less than 8%. Th reason America can import cheap consumer goods is due to the strength of dollar (the world reserve currency). Once the purchasing power of the US drops, due to the excessive quantitative easing caused by a dire decrease tax revenue AND the additional expenses involved in the furlough scheme, imported goods are going to cost a lot more. The US has actually been exp its inflation all these years by flooding the global market with dollars. once trust in the dollar slowly evaporates, the US will find it difficult maintain its grip on the world economy.

    I think at this point, major corporations will look at AI automation as t quick fix... they'll employ cheap labour to begin with, but eventually, t jobs will be replaced with something far more cheaper and reliable.


    Anything that can be automated in the US can be automated cheaper in China.



    A friend of mine used to do automation projects, and once got called to ellaborate a plan for a gigantic construction and excavation firm.

    Back in the day the plan was to replace Chinesse dudes with showels with vehicle mounted excavators. The showel dudes were so cheap that there was no real incentive to make the switch, in the end. Most importantly: the Chinesse dudes didn't complain and go on strikes and go Black Lives Matter on the streets, which for some human resources managers are more important than the economical savings XD



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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Moondog on Sun Aug 2 21:35:04 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 01:19 pm


    Anything that can be automated in the US can be automated cheaper in China.


    businesses in china dont just do cheap work. they sometimes do work for a fair price when us businesses won't.

    at my company we have that issue. we couldnt get a usa business to make our parts correctly in the small runs that we require.

    they just couldnt do simple castings and get it right. it was real sad.
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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Andeddu on Sun Aug 2 21:41:20 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to MRO on Sun Aug 02 2020 05:43 pm

    yeah but i'm talking about shit they have been talking about for
    decades that has not came to be. nobody works on it more than a proof
    of concept.

    What shit? The manufactuing sector has been decimated by automation. You just wait until there are driveless cars & the rest of the menial jobs become automated. Even white collar jobs in finance are likely to


    no it has not. i've been in manufacturing for 25 years and i've worked at some big places. 'automation' compliments the workers, it doesnt replace them. it makes their job easier and more accurate.

    SO FAR.

    but liek i said, i've been hearing this shit since i was 18. machines will replace us.

    no they will not. they break down. they dont do as good as a job in some cases.
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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to MRO on Sun Aug 2 20:13:24 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 09:41 pm

    but liek i said, i've been hearing this shit since i was 18. machines will replace us.

    no they will not. they break down. they dont do as good as a job in some cases.

    Of course, naturally they break down and require maintenance. For that reason, I think jobs will be created to maintain those types of machines. But I think it's possible that more and more automated systems could be built. For one example, China has some fully automated container terminals that ships stop at and pick up and drop off products to be shipped:
    https://youtu.be/VtGDRhXWvng

    Nightfox

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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Mon Aug 3 11:42:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Dennisk <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 12:48 pm

    Eventually it will happen. The USA will remain a significant consumer for years to come. Pricing American consumers out of the market won't be feasible for some time yet, not until China can fill all the consumption demand it needs internally.

    The export of manufacturing from what I've seen seems to be slowing. Maybe in part because there is nothing left to export.

    I don't disagree that we will see fall in total employment, and the need for humans to work, I think what will ultimately determine that is economics, not merely technology replacing humans. Remember, money is the capacity for work, and as long as one human being can provide a service that another may need, and vice versa, there will be an exchange. Even if it is women making Only Fans accounts and men delivering food to them. It won't be a real economy, and people will be far poorer.

    It's not really up to China. The US is pricing itself out of the market
    by debasing its own currency in the form of quantitative easing. The Federal Reserve has printed around 3 trillion dollars since lockdown
    and has flooded the repo market, buying up all short and long term maturities. This has caused a huge amount of concern -- you have a
    country which is around 28 trillion in debt with NO sign of ever paying that money back and no scope over EVER increasing base rates above
    0.5%, as doing so would be catastrophic. If the US was able to obtain
    the same tax revenue they did in 2019 and had ZERO outgoings (no public sector, military, medicare or pension obligations) it would still take over 8 years to clear the debt. There is very little confidence in the dollar right now as the Fed has made it clear they're going to spend
    their way out of this crisis. With serious inflation incoming, expect HARSH austerity measures... so forget about consumerism in the coming years, people are not going to have the cash or credit to make
    unnecessary purchases.

    Debt is everywhere, that is true. Australia is mired in excessive household debt due to eye watering mortgages that people I think will never pay off. The idea is to kick the can down the road. You don't need to pay off your house, if you are still going to sell it at a profit later and have some poor sucker later on take on even MORE debt. I don't buy into that as a good economic paradigm. Ponzi scheme is what it is.

    How is the system maintained, this awful debt? Lowering living standards. Basically, labour that is put in, is not returned, it is instead "eaten up" by debt and hoarded. People accept this. High house prices can remain, because everything else is sacrificed. People are devoting more and more of their labour to support the debt, and if they can't, the state can bring in foriegn investors to sell our real estate to (which is what the did), or borrow from the future to subsidise investment which support the debt. The difference between the productivity that is outputted by invidiuals, and the consumption and lifestyle returned is key. And if people keep accepting being dudded like this, the system can go on a little more.

    Most of the US debt (about 3/4s) is owed to the US public. What are Americans going to do? I don't know, but I think it is more likely that living standards will erode to third world level as the economy "equilibrates". We have sold our futures, and now we are going to reap what we have sown by having no future. We will see how long this confidence game goes on for, and how people people are willing to dance for table scraps.

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  • From Vk3jed@VERT/FREEWAY to MRO on Mon Aug 3 19:17:00 2020
    On 08-02-20 21:41, MRO wrote to Andeddu <=-

    no it has not. i've been in manufacturing for 25 years and i've worked
    at some big places. 'automation' compliments the workers, it doesnt replace them. it makes their job easier and more accurate.

    I saw a story the other week of an Australian marine components manufacturer wh was finding that COVID-19 has helped his business, because local supply chains are easier to manage with the pandemic. And it turns out they use a 3D printing based process, driven by computer, of course. And the finished product has better specs in terms of strength than traditionally cast equivalents.

    Innovative manufacturers can do well out of tech and automation.


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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Moondog on Mon Aug 3 16:20:46 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 01:19 pm

    Anything that can be automated in the US can be automated cheaper in China.

    True for manufacturing. Most of the automation I am talking about is in relation to jobs that cannot be exported overseas. The fast food industry will soon become close to fully automated, driver/haulage industry likewise, we are even starting to see AI triage services for medical centres/hosptials. I don't think many industries are going to be untouched by automation in the coming years. If your job involves sitting in front of a desk, there's a good chance it'll be taken over by an advanced AI system in the not too distant future.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Nightfox on Mon Aug 3 17:04:03 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Nightfox to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 03:01 pm

    I'm a little surprised that even top-end smartphones cost that much. When the iPhone first came out in 2007, I remember being really surprised its price was $700 or something, and many people were saying the price seemed a bit high for a phone. Electronics prices usually go down in price over time, but it seems the price of top-end smartphones like the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy phones hasn't gone down. And they've actually increased in price over the years..


    Apple are responsible. The iPhone X was priced unreasonably high at 1 thousand dollars as an experiment to see if there's a market for phones breaking the 1 thousand dollar mark -- turned out there was. Now any flag-ship from Apple or Samsung is priced at over 1 thousand dollars as consumers are happy to pay that kind of money. You have to remember that phones, for most people, have taken over all other devices. There's no need (for the majority of people) to own a PC, music player, GPS tracker, camera or a hand held games machine now, which is why they're willing to stump up the cash.

    I am tempted to puchase an iPhone 13 but I am struggling to see past a 400 dollar iPhone SE (2020) which has been fitted with the same SoC as the iPhone 12. The additional 600 or so dollars would buy me a slightly larger screen, a more stylish looking phone and facial recognition (ugh!)...

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Nightfox on Mon Aug 3 17:26:05 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Nightfox to Moondog on Sun Aug 02 2020 03:12 pm

    I've also heard there has been research into growing cloned beef in a lab from DNA samples, so that they wouldn't have to keep allocating farm land & things to raise cows for meat.

    Nightfox

    This is absolutely true. Meat substitutes and cultured "stem-cell" meat is coming. Livestock farming is responsible for around 15% of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. This is one of the main industries being looked at in relation to sustainable development. As a result, we will see a huge decrease in genuine meat availability in the next decade.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Nightfox on Mon Aug 3 17:29:20 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Nightfox to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 03:16 pm

    Companies have already been working on self-driving cars for a while now. I still haven't seen any in my area, but I keep hearing about them.

    The technology appears to be there (though it still has a while to mature). The main hurdle is passing new road traffic legislation in order for the practice to become legal.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Ogg on Mon Aug 3 17:59:02 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Ogg to All on Sun Aug 02 2020 02:10 pm

    Are those akin to the little "tower" garden kits that people can buy and place in their homes?

    Driverless haulage sounds fascinating. But it won't work entirely.
    Equipment needs monitoring/maintanence. An automated vehicle may not
    succeed to navigate around an obstacle on the road, a pot hole, or a icey road condition. I see potential for industry sabotage between competitors.

    Maybe select production could be automated at a greater scale. I hear
    that Amazon's warehouses buzz with quite a bit of it.

    I wouldn't put automation and AI in the same sentence. All automation requires human programming to accomodate all foreseen scenarios. All the conditions and alternative choices have to be predetermined.
    Even the Roomba is *not* AI. It may "learn" the layout of a floor plan
    and back out of a corner or a tight spot successfully, but that's not AI. All the "if then else" conditions have to be envisioned - by humans.

    I think there are somewhat simialr to the "tower" garden kits, but on an industrial scale...

    Self-driving vehicles have already shown to be proficient at avoiding unexpected obstacles on the road, but you're right... the roads are going to need overhauled for this to work. I think we are going to see new road networks made with the focus on simplification with large haulage vehicles travelling long-distance, simple journies to and from centralised depots. This will happen before short-distance FedEx style drivers become displaced... even the most advanced AI would struggle to navigate around a busy city. I reckon we'd have to wait another decade for that kind of software maturity.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to MRO on Mon Aug 3 18:24:17 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Sun Aug 02 2020 09:41 pm

    no it has not. i've been in manufacturing for 25 years and i've worked at some big places. 'automation' compliments the workers, it doesnt replace them. it makes their job easier and more accurate.

    SO FAR.

    but liek i said, i've been hearing this shit since i was 18. machines will replace us.

    It replaces the workers who were previously doing those jobs. As more things become automated, more jobs become obsolete. I do agree that globalisation has been much more of a killer to US manufacturing than automation.

    I don't agree with this notion that if it hasn't happened yet, it'll never happen. Technology always marches forward.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Mon Aug 3 19:07:00 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Mon Aug 03 2020 11:42 am

    Debt is everywhere, that is true. Australia is mired in excessive household debt due to eye watering mortgages that people I think will never pay off. The idea is to kick the can down the road. You don't need to pay off your house, if you are still going to sell it at a profit later and have some poor sucker later on take on even MORE debt. I don't buy into that as a good economic paradigm. Ponzi scheme is what it is.

    How is the system maintained, this awful debt? Lowering living standards. Basically, labour that is put in, is not returned, it is instead "eaten up" by debt and hoarded. People accept this. High house prices can remain, because everything else is sacrificed. People are devoting more and more of their labour to support the debt, and if they can't, the state can bring in foriegn investors to sell our real estate to (which is what the did), or borrow from the future to subsidise investment which support the debt. The difference between the productivity that is outputted by invidiuals, and the consumption and lifestyle returned is key. And if people keep accepting being dudded like this, the system can go on a little more.

    Most of the US debt (about 3/4s) is owed to the US public. What are Americans going to do? I don't know, but I think it is more likely that living standards will erode to third world level as the economy "equilibrates". We have sold our futures, and now we are going to reap what we have sown by having no future. We will see how long this confidence game goes on for, and how people people are willing to dance for table scraps.


    I agree with pretty much everything you've written. The US public forks out over 500 billion per year just to service the national debt, which will be a much higher number next year. That 500 billion is around 8-9% of ALL tax revenue... this is why we will never see interest rates increase.

    Living standards WILL erode close to third world levels, I am of the belief the USA will be much like Russia after the fall of the Berlin wall in the 90's.

    I see no option now but to either face a moumental economic crash, or kick the can down the road a little further. The Fed has made it clear they're willing to purchase all US Treasury bonds along with ETFs and other securities. This kind of behaviour will issue the US a one way ticket to Zimbabwe style hyper-inflation. I believe that once the US dollar is dead, a new digital currency (potentially non-fiat) will be rolled in.

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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Moondog on Mon Aug 3 18:41:53 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Moondog to MRO on Mon Aug 03 2020 11:36 am


    I agree the work force in China is way more capable if work demands better QA. The Iphone is a good example.

    I'm curious as to why US shops couldn't get simple castings right?


    dont know, one company was pretty big and they would fly a guy out to see what the problem was. 'oh, that's charley.' he would say. well charley sucked.

    they would not only get the castings wrong but then they wouldnt inspect it and then they'd chrome plate the part. so that makes it useless pretty much.

    glad we tossed those guys. great giftbasket from them at christmas though. it was epic.
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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Moondog on Tue Aug 4 18:23:03 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Mon Aug 03 2020 10:36 am

    When my father was working in the die cast industry, he told me of a time when their shop owners were invited to China to see how much cheaper their business could be done there. In China, a developer would pick an empty area to build a foundry, and the homes made to host the factory builders would become the employee apartments afterwards. Die cast and machine shops that rely on the foundry are built next door to reduce travel time, and a new die cast machine could be built for less than the materials can be sourced to
    build one anywhere else. Workers flock to these industry centered towns, and there are times when migration pr travel from one region to another is regulated to prevent mass migrations or a drain of workers elsewhere.

    It's shocking just how efficient unregulated economic areas are. China really has been killing the US (and the rest of the West) for years. With no unions or worker's rights, China/India can achieve a level of productivity the US could only dream of. Worker's rights and red tape are going to have to go if the US wishes to become competitive again... however automation will likely solve that problem.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Tue Aug 4 20:16:15 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 01:10 am

    Kicking the can it will be. The USA is not the same country as it was in the 1950's. It is culturally and demographically different, and I think it is unrealistic to expect a country to remain the same, with such changes to the underlying demographic. Australia will follow too, I'm sure, as the conditions which created prosperity dissappear. We are now in the stage where we are eating up the social and cultural capital that was created in the past. Really, much of the social change being pushed, is about "sharing" what we have, not creation. If you give away your country, you can't be surprised or shocked at the end, when you have nothing left. That is what has been happening. Offshoring manufacturing, changing the economy from one of production, to financial speculation, where you are trying to obtain existing wealth, rather than create new wealth. Hell, even silicon valley is like that now. What are facebook, instagram, et al, but vehicles to try and redirect wealth from creation? (advertising revenue). Google is reliant on OTHER people creating wealth, so they can obtain a portion through advertising! Contrast this with actual production, which creates wealth.

    I also don't think interest rates will increase, they can't. Our entire economy is predicated on free money, and any rise in interest rates would smash it. The decline of the USA doesn't bode well for the world, because there is no other suitable global superpower. For all its faults, the USA as a global superpower is better for the world, in terms of freedom and human dignity, than other potential candidates which are emerging.

    America gave up true capitalism for crony capitalism in the early 20th century. This perpetual revolving door between big business, the banks and politics has muddied the water so badly that no matter what happens, the public get screwed. I think 2008 was a big wake up moment for people... there we saw toxic banks and poorly run corporate entities being bailed out by the tax-payer and rewarded for their mismanagement under the proviso of "they're too big to fail". That is socialism for them, capitalism for us. Under normal circumstances, those companies would go into administration & the M&A departments in investment banks would facilitate acquisitions and management buyouts whereby these zombie companies/banks are stripped, streamlined and made profitable once again. This DID NOT happen in 2008 allowing us to see though the illusion of capitalism. Fast forward to 2020, and the same thing is happening again... mass bailouts for Wall St (to the tune of trillions of dollars), and a pittance for the tax-payer.

    They are kicking the can down the road and delaying the inevitable crash that we were due back in 2008, if they hadn't propped up the banking system.

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  • From Warpslide@VERT/NRBBS to Andeddu on Tue Aug 4 17:38:00 2020
    On 04 Aug 2020, Andeddu said the following...

    Worker's rights and red tape are going to have to go if the wishes to become competitive again... however automation will likely solve problem.

    Until all the various AI's form a union & go on strike... ;)

    Jay

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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Andeddu on Tue Aug 4 22:26:39 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Andeddu to Moondog on Mon Aug 03 2020 04:20 pm

    relation to jobs that cannot be exported overseas. The fast food industry will soon become close to fully automated, driver/haulage industry


    well for quite a long time, every once in a while i hear about a pizza making machine or even that mcdonalds had a burger making machine that worked great. they still dont have them anyplace. i wonder why that is.

    a bigmac and cheeseburger vending machine would be a hit at my workplace. our vending machine food is dogshit.
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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Andeddu on Tue Aug 4 22:30:35 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to Nightfox on Mon Aug 03 2020 05:26 pm

    This is absolutely true. Meat substitutes and cultured "stem-cell" meat is coming. Livestock farming is responsible for around 15% of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. This is one of the main industries being looked at in relation to sustainable development. As a result, we will see a huge decrease in genuine meat availability in the next decade.


    i dont care about the cow farts.
    cattle are actually friendly and intelligent animals that feel and i feel
    bad that we raise them to slaughter them.

    i still think lab meat is like 50 years away, though.
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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Andeddu on Tue Aug 4 22:38:29 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to MRO on Mon Aug 03 2020 06:24 pm


    but liek i said, i've been hearing this shit since i was 18. machines
    will replace us.

    It replaces the workers who were previously doing those jobs. As more things become automated, more jobs become obsolete. I do agree that globalisation has been much more of a killer to US manufacturing than automation.

    I don't agree with this notion that if it hasn't happened yet, it'll never happen. Technology always marches forward.

    well if someone keeps saying it's going to happen next year and it doesnt happen. and then 20 years pass and still it hasnt happened, i tend not to put much faith into it.

    we have been using technology to make jobs easier, faster, more effective and safer. we havent been replacing people with robots much.
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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Wed Aug 5 20:26:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Dennisk <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 01:10 am

    Kicking the can it will be. The USA is not the same country as it was in the 1950's. It is culturally and demographically different, and I think it is unrealistic to expect a country to remain the same, with such changes to the underlying demographic. Australia will follow too, I'm sure, as the conditions which created prosperity dissappear. We are now in the stage where we are eating up the social and cultural capital that was created in the past. Really, much of the social change being pushed, is about "sharing" what we have, not creation. If you give away your country, you can't be surprised or shocked at the end, when you have nothing left. That is what has been happening. Offshoring manufacturing, changing the economy from one of production, to financial speculation, where you are trying to obtain existing wealth, rather than create new wealth. Hell, even silicon valley is like that now. What are facebook, instagram, et al, but vehicles to try and redirect wealth from creation? (advertising revenue). Google is reliant on OTHER people creating wealth, so they can obtain a portion through advertising! Contrast this with actual production, which creates wealth.

    I also don't think interest rates will increase, they can't. Our entire economy is predicated on free money, and any rise in interest rates would smash it. The decline of the USA doesn't bode well for the world, because there is no other suitable global superpower. For all its faults, the USA as a global superpower is better for the world, in terms of freedom and human dignity, than other potential candidates which are emerging.

    America gave up true capitalism for crony capitalism in the early 20th century. This perpetual revolving door between big business, the banks
    and politics has muddied the water so badly that no matter what
    happens, the public get screwed. I think 2008 was a big wake up moment
    for people... there we saw toxic banks and poorly run corporate
    entities being bailed out by the tax-payer and rewarded for their mismanagement under the proviso of "they're too big to fail". That is socialism for them, capitalism for us. Under normal circumstances,
    those companies would go into administration & the M&A departments in investment banks would facilitate acquisitions and management buyouts whereby these zombie companies/banks are stripped, streamlined and made profitable once again. This DID NOT happen in 2008 allowing us to see though the illusion of capitalism. Fast forward to 2020, and the same thing is happening again... mass bailouts for Wall St (to the tune of trillions of dollars), and a pittance for the tax-payer.

    They are kicking the can down the road and delaying the inevitable
    crash that we were due back in 2008, if they hadn't propped up the
    banking system.

    I think what happened is the end result of Capitalism. Capitalists (people who have capital) brought this about, wanted the bail outs. There are two types of "Capitalism". The economic ideology, the system based on ideals and axiom, and the real Capitalism, the system that results when Capitalists bend the system to work in their benefit.

    Bailouts are a fundamental part of Capitalism, because Capitalists want them. Capitalism is what Capitalists do, not what the unacheivable ideal is.

    I agree they should have gone broke, no bailout. Agree. But such a system is where one those who own and control capital don't have as much power as they do. So we have a paradox here. To be closer to the Capitalist "ideal", we actually have to take political and economic power away from Capitalists.


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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Dennisk on Wed Aug 5 07:44:00 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 08:26 pm

    I think what happened is the end result of Capitalism. Capitalists (people who have capital) brought this about, wanted the bail outs. Ther
    are two types of "Capitalism". The economic ideology, the system based on ideals and axiom, and the real Capitalism, the system that results
    when Capitalists bend the system to work in their benefit.

    Bailouts are a fundamental part of Capitalism, because Capitalists want them. Capitalism is what Capitalists do, not what the unacheivable
    ideal is.

    I agree they should have gone broke, no bailout. Agree. But such a system is where one those who own and control capital don't have as much
    power as they do. So we have a paradox here. To be closer to the Capitalist "ideal", we actually have to take political and economic power
    away from Capitalists.

    You are implying that being filthy right and having lots of megabucks in participations and firm shares makes you a capitalist. Which it
    doesn't.

    Lots of filthy rich (or not so filthy rich people) is quite Keynessian and would have no ethical issue with bailouts and the like.


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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Moondog on Wed Aug 5 16:16:39 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 11:36 am

    A few years ago I was working with a military contractor, and the engoneers were dealing with teaching the vehicle to drive along a hillside. As you drive parallel to an incline, gravity wants to act against the vehicle and pull you off your path. Not only must the vehicle compensate for this, it must be aware of it's own center of gravity to avoid tipping over.

    I am sure AI has overcome such issues these days. Have you seen the dogs and bipedal robots from Boston Dynamics? Robotics sure have come a long way since Honda's ASIMO. Tech/aritficial intellience advancement will snowball now much in line with Moore's Law in relation to computer power.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Warpslide on Wed Aug 5 16:24:11 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Warpslide to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 05:38 pm

    Until all the various AI's form a union & go on strike... ;)

    Haha, one day they'll realise there's no logic in obeying their meatbag overlords!

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to MRO on Wed Aug 5 16:49:50 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 10:30 pm

    i dont care about the cow farts.
    cattle are actually friendly and intelligent animals that feel and i feel bad that we raise them to slaughter them.

    i still think lab meat is like 50 years away, though.

    I agree. They're a lot more affectionate than we give them credit. I think lab meat is just around the corner... it'll happen sooner than you think.

    I honestly believe livestock farming will be a thing of the past post 2050.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to MRO on Wed Aug 5 16:53:39 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 10:38 pm

    well if someone keeps saying it's going to happen next year and it doesnt happen. and then 20 years pass and still it hasnt happened, i tend not to put much faith into it.

    we have been using technology to make jobs easier, faster, more effective and safer. we havent been replacing people with robots much.

    Not too much in the last 20 years has changed, but as far as I am aware, things are gong to be stepped up a notch in the 2020s... hence the new era of 5G, IoT and sustainable development, etc...

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Wed Aug 5 18:00:28 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 08:26 pm

    I think what happened is the end result of Capitalism. Capitalists (people who have capital) brought this about, wanted the bail outs. There are two types of "Capitalism". The economic ideology, the system based on ideals and axiom, and the real Capitalism, the system that results when Capitalists bend the system to work in their benefit.

    Bailouts are a fundamental part of Capitalism, because Capitalists want them. Capitalism is what Capitalists do, not what the unacheivable ideal is.

    I agree they should have gone broke, no bailout. Agree. But such a system is where one those who own and control capital don't have as much power as they do. So we have a paradox here. To be closer to the Capitalist "ideal", we actually have to take political and economic power away from Capitalists.

    Capitalism in practice has a finite shelf life. It's the same as saying communism works... which it does, but only in theory. When people in power, use that power to maintain and expand their power, they can corrupt either ideology to their will.

    Perhaps there's a need for a new and permanant economic constitution based on the theoretical ideals of capitalism that worked so well for the US in the past.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to poindexter FORTRAN on Wed Aug 5 18:04:58 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: poindexter FORTRAN to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 09:12 am

    I wonder if the pendulum will swing back to smaller form factors. I
    fired up an iPhone 5, and liked the size. If it had 256 MB of memory
    and a modern chip, I'd be interested.

    Sounds like I'm describing the new iPhone SE.

    The new iPhone SE is based off of the iPhone 8. I think it's the perfect size as the old SE, based off of the iPhone 5, is a little too small for modern usage. You could get by, but I think the extra screen space is much more comfortable on the eyes.

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to MRO on Wed Aug 5 14:21:08 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 10:26 pm

    well for quite a long time, every once in a while i hear about a pizza making machine or even that mcdonalds had a burger making machine that worked great. they still dont have them anyplace. i wonder why that is.

    a bigmac and cheeseburger vending machine would be a hit at my workplace. our vending machine food is dogshit.

    Vending machine food usually is fairly basic.. Usually the kinds of things I see in vending machines are snacks like crackers, cookies, chips, drinks, etc., and maybe occasionally something more fancy like a packaged sandwich or something. I don't think you could really expect much from a vending machine, but freshly-prepared hamburgers & things served in a vending machine could be cool.

    Nightfox

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to MRO on Wed Aug 5 14:23:51 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: MRO to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 10:38 pm

    I don't agree with this notion that if it hasn't happened yet, it'll
    never happen. Technology always marches forward.

    well if someone keeps saying it's going to happen next year and it doesnt happen. and then 20 years pass and still it hasnt happened, i tend not to put much faith into it.

    we have been using technology to make jobs easier, faster, more effective and safer. we havent been replacing people with robots much.

    Some things might just take more time. I could see things like fast food automation possibly happening eventually, but it seems they aren't focusing much on that right now.

    Nightfox

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Andeddu on Wed Aug 5 14:24:56 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Andeddu to Moondog on Wed Aug 05 2020 04:16 pm

    I am sure AI has overcome such issues these days. Have you seen the dogs and bipedal robots from Boston Dynamics? Robotics sure have come a long way since Honda's ASIMO. Tech/aritficial intellience advancement will snowball now much in line with Moore's Law in relation to computer power.

    I think Honda is still working on the Asimo. I've seen videos of some of Boston Dynamics stuff too. Interesting and weird stuff.

    Nightfox

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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Andeddu on Wed Aug 5 16:52:55 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Andeddu to Dennisk on Wed Aug 05 2020 06:00 pm

    Capitalism in practice has a finite shelf life. It's the same as saying communism works... which it does, but only in theory. When people in power, that power to maintain and expand their power, they can corrupt either ideol to their will.

    Perhaps there's a need for a new and permanant economic constitution based o the theoretical ideals of capitalism that worked so well for the US in the past.

    Civilizations have a finite shelf life.From some head-extrapolations I have done with old civilitations, I expect the Western model to crash in a matter of decades. We have already entered the "introspection" phase that precedes the oblitaration of powerful civilitations. We are outsourcing our burdens to "lesser civs", citizens are no longer combative against threats, and we hate ourselves. Give us a century tops.

    I think Capitalism is more resistant than you credit it for, on the other hand, because improving your own position via exchanging something with somebody else is ptretty much the way of the world. Everybody wants to do it. WHen they try to prevent the population from doing it, people does it anyway. Look at those Argentinians, Venezuelans and Cubans dealing American Dollar. Or all the URSS corruption that went on because people bought their way out of the limits impossed by The System with bribe money.

    Once the West self-destructs, the survivors will exchange gunpowder for bullets.

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  • From Warpslide@VERT/NRBBS to Andeddu on Wed Aug 5 19:04:00 2020
    On 05 Aug 2020, Andeddu said the following...

    Until all the various AI's form a union & go on strike... ;)

    Haha, one day they'll realise there's no logic in obeying their meatbag overlords!

    And thus, Skynet is born!

    Jay

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  • From Nightfox@VERT/DIGDIST to Arelor on Wed Aug 5 16:43:06 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Arelor to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 04:52 pm

    Civilizations have a finite shelf life. From some head-extrapolations I have done with old civilitations, I expect the Western model to crash in a matter of decades. We have already entered the "introspection" phase that

    I've heard some people say that countries tend to last about 200 years before they start to fall apart, so the US is a little bit past that time now.

    Nightfox

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  • From MRO@VERT/BBSESINF to Moondog on Wed Aug 5 21:30:28 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 11:43 am

    let's say a high rise building is being made in Dubai. Crane operators may be remotely operating the cranes from Mexico, Brunei, Malaysia, or somewhere else it may be cheaper to hire crane operators. the operator in Mexico drives to his company's office in Mexico City, and he enters a virtual cockpit and receives and sends orders through a translation system.


    so i got crane simulator loaded up and i just had taco bell, and i have to take a monster shit.

    baby comes in the room and start pounding on my cherry mx keys and now 100 people die.
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  • From Vk3jed@VERT/FREEWAY to Andeddu on Thu Aug 6 20:09:00 2020
    On 08-05-20 16:24, Andeddu wrote to Warpslide <=-

    @VIA: VERT/AMSTRAD
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Warpslide to Andeddu on Tue Aug 04 2020 05:38 pm

    Until all the various AI's form a union & go on strike... ;)

    Haha, one day they'll realise there's no logic in obeying their meatbag overlords!

    Haha many a sci fi book has been written about that. ;)


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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Underminer on Thu Aug 6 21:39:00 2020
    Underminer wrote to Andeddu <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Andeddu to Dennisk on Wed Aug 05 2020 06:00 pm

    Bailouts are a fundamental part of Capitalism, because Capitalists
    Capitalism in practice has a finite shelf life. It's the same as saying

    Eh, not really. At least not when you're talking about a human
    workforce. The big issue is that a fully laisez-faire reality can allow for too much exploitation of some, so you do want some oversight and regulation. Problem is that when you allow state regulation, suddenly
    you have those that become big players pushing for regulation that
    locks out competitors from dethroning them, and that kind of cronyism
    is bad for everyone. Trouble is figuring out where an appropriate line
    is.

    Once we get into more automated scenarios though, the cost of entry
    into certain markets will keep new and smaller players out.

    Post scarcity should be good for everyone, but we're going to have a
    very trying time between now and then trying to navigate through the in between and transitionary phases.

    We're already seeing scenarios where not everyone can
    have a decent paying job unless we're artificially increasing the technology costs, but those who still can work are going to (understandably) feel betrayed by any changes that they see rewarding those who don't work while they still have to.

    Some level of socialization would at first blush seem to be an answer,
    but if the 20th century taught us anything, it was that putting too
    much power or control in the hands of the state is the most potentially dangerous thing possible for the citizenry. That leaves us with some implementation of UBI as the only solution likely to be able to
    navigate those waters, but there's some major challenges, questions,
    and roadblocks from making that a reality.

    The lesson of the 20th century is indeed that not only the state shouldn't have too much power, but no entity should have too much power.

    The UBI would have to be administered by a state. I think we can look towards redistributing power, but changing property rights so that labour has more power over both Capital and the State.

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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Nightfox on Thu Aug 6 08:45:34 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Nightfox to Arelor on Wed Aug 05 2020 04:43 pm

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Arelor to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 04:52 pm

    Civilizations have a finite shelf life. From some head-extrapolations I have done with old civilitations, I expect the Western model to crash in a matter of
    decades. We have already entered the "introspection" phase that

    I've heard some people say that countries tend to last about 200 years before they start to fall apart, so the US is a little bit past that time now.

    Nightfox


    Spain is the strongest country ever. It has been trying to self destruct for centuries and it still survives.

    I think Spain has been falling hard since the end of Big Austrias, so our fall is waaaay longer than you'd expect XD

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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Underminer on Thu Aug 6 08:57:11 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Underminer to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 05:11 pm

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Andeddu to Dennisk on Wed Aug 05 2020 06:00 pm

    Bailouts are a fundamental part of Capitalism, because Capitalists
    Capitalism in practice has a finite shelf life. It's the same as saying

    Eh, not really. At least not when you're talking about a human workforce. The big issue is that a fully laisez-faire reality can allow for too much exploitation of so
    so you do want some oversight and regulation. Problem is that when you allow state regulation, suddenly you have those that become big players pushing for regulation
    that locks out competitors from dethroning them, and that kind of cronyism is bad for everyone. Trouble is figuring out where an appropriate line is.

    Once we get into more automated scenarios though, the cost of entry into certain markets will keep new and smaller players out.

    Post scarcity should be good for everyone, but we're going to have a very trying time between now and then trying to navigate through the in between and transitionary
    phases.

    We're already seeing scenarios where not everyone can
    have a decent paying job unless we're artificially increasing the technology costs, but those who still can work are going to (understandably) feel betrayed by any
    changes that they see rewarding those who don't work while they still have to.

    Some level of socialization would at first blush seem to be an answer, but if the 20th century taught us anything, it was that putting too much power or control in th
    hands of the state is the most potentially dangerous thing possible for the citizenry. That leaves us with some implementation of UBI as the only solution likely to b
    able to navigate those waters, but there's some major challenges, questions, and roadblocks from making that a reality.

    Interesting times.

    UBI is not inherently different than any other messure of State control over the economy. The reason is that in order to pay everybody 500 bucks per month, those bucks
    have to be syphoned from elsewhere, and here is where Keynessians strike. They get to decide who pays it.

    If engineers are the ones people hates today, they pay most of the UBI for everybody else.

    If blacks are the ones people hates today, they pay most of the UBI for everybody else.

    If pet owners are the ones people hates today, they pay most of the UBI for everybody else.

    This automatically leads to vote purchasing. "Vote for me and I will make this people you hate pay your UBI!" Which is exactly what you see in certain places. There used
    to be campaigns in South America to force certain firms to fund specific projects that were not related to them (ie make an oil company fund a school).

    Honestly I take some issue when socialists use a theorical far future problem to impose a government powergrab today. So much talk about robots killing jobs but here
    there are no arms enough for the potato campaing, becuse the people who would take it prefer to receive unemployment funds or spanish nUBI (non-universal basic income,
    ie universal basic income for collectives backed by the government).

    So yeah let Skynet come and pick those pottoes up.


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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Tracker1 on Thu Aug 6 09:15:27 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Tracker1 to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 05:35 pm

    Maximizing individual liberty is usually the right answer in my mind. Corporations are non-living entities and emphatically *NOT* individuals
    and should not be treated as such imo.

    I keep hearing that corporations are treated like people, but last time I checked, they don't have the same fundamental constitutional rights either in my country or the
    US. At all.

    The clinic I work with had a BIG problem with an ISP that managed to screw the access to some service. In Spain, phisical people has the right to fill a claim to the
    Defender of the Consumer. If you are a firm you will need to fill a claim in court with your own layers since the Defender of the Consumer won't do it for you.

    In the US, 4th and 5th ammendments don't apply to juridical people, which basically means a corporation does not have a constitutional right to privacy. If the cops
    walk into Necrocomp's headquarters and demand any explanation about any given incident, Necrocomp's employees can't call the 5th, unless they admit to be involved. But
    that is troublesome for them.

    "Hello, employee. I want to ask if Necrocomp has information regarding the theft of the diamonds"
    "I call the 5th!"
    "You can't call the 5th unless you confirm that such information involucrates you. Do you call the 5th?"
    "Errr..."

    Besides, any firm that grows big enough mutates into a branch of the government, specially in socialist states. Working for the government is usually just more
    profitable since you can funnel lots of tax dollar into your pockets. Lots of illumination equipment in Spain, for example, is unafordable to private citizens and small
    firms because the firms that make them sell them to the government at INFLATED prices. So you basically have a big firm taking money from the government and providing
    services only to the government. It applies to nearly any service that is deemed strategic. A lot of the time governments themselves will have a lot of stock from such
    companies.


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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Tracker1 on Thu Aug 6 09:24:19 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Tracker1 to Nightfox on Wed Aug 05 2020 05:46 pm

    On 8/5/2020 4:43 PM, Nightfox wrote:

    I've heard some people say that countries tend to last about 200 years before they start to fall apart, so the US is a little bit past that time now.

    Definitely interresting times. We're overdue by a couple years for a
    major conflict... beyond this, I find it hard to believe that anyone can actually be anti-2a at this point.

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    There is a book entitled "Ultima Ratio Regis", from a Spanish archeologist. It is a divulgation book about the change of weapon ownership laws through History. I think
    the author is quite anti-2a, but one pattern I found is that personal combat weapons are just taken out once the population is no longer combative, after which point the
    civilitation is taken over by an external force.

    The US in 1700-1800 was like early Greeze. There was this shame culture going on in which if somebody insulted you, you either called for a duel or were regarded as a
    failure of a man forever. What the US has now has more in common with late ancient Greeze, in which personal weapons are a bit of an eccentricity and you don't go around
    dueling because somebody insulted your horse.




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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Dennisk on Thu Aug 6 09:44:29 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Arelor on Thu Aug 06 2020 10:21 am

    You are implying that being filthy right and having lots of megabucks in participations and firm shares makes you a capitalist. Which it doesn't.

    I am saying that. I am saying that if you are in the business of earning money by owning capital (ie, owning investments, companies, etc, which many many filthy rich
    people do), then you are de facto, a Capitalist. How can you not be? You are literally fulfilling the defintion of a Capitalist by playing the role of one. Just
    because you THINK differently, doesn't mean you aren't what you are.

    There are capitalists too, there are people who believe in the ideals of Capitalism, and often I find these people are employees, so their role is to serve Capital an
    Capitalists. That is a different type of capitalist. I'm talking about Capitalists. (note the capitalisaion, pun intended). The opinion of capitalists don't matte
    squat as employees. Our system is Capitalism, not Employeeism.

    Lots of filthy rich (or not so filthy rich people) is quite Keynessian and would have no ethical issue with bailouts and the like.

    Quite so. Why the hell would people who own Capital want to get rid of tax-payer funded bailouts, and of regulation and laws that can cripple their competition? Why
    would Jeff Bezos want to be put into a position where he has to pay employees a living wage, instead of having his labour subsidised by tax-payer funded welfare? Why
    would people who own investment properties not want the tax-payer subsidised Negative Gearing and other concessions? Of course they would vote for and support that!
    Why would Bill Gates want in the 1990s fairer competition?

    You don't become a filthy rich Capitalist by having "ethical issues"!! Imagine you were responsible for a major financial entity, that was to be bailed out, and a
    "capitalist" employee starting agitating for and end to bail outs, in his own private life. A good Capitalist wanting to keep their money and power would fire such a
    person, they are not acting in the interests of the Capital!

    What you are asking for, is impossible, a paradox. The ideal "capitalist" world is just as fanciful as the ideal Marxist world.

    There is a Spanish saying. "Against the vice of begging, the vistue of dennying."

    Of course it is in the best interest of any minority to use the power of the government to its own ends. The question is how in the hell does the general population
    allow such thing to happen. If there was just a little more cultural resistence against tax increases and the like, corporative statism would not have the leverage it
    does (because there is less money for them to leverage).

    According to your definition, a Socialist government is a big Capitalist agent. So I am going to borrow that one in order to get my fieds pissed off :-)

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  • From Underminer@VERT/UNDRMINE to Arelor on Thu Aug 6 15:50:13 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Arelor to Underminer on Thu Aug 06 2020 08:57 am

    UBI is not inherently different than any other messure of State control over the economy. The reason is that in order to pay everybody 500 bucks per month, those bucks have to be syphoned from elsewhere, and here is where Keynessians strike. They get to decide who pays it.

    You are correct and I agree that it does allow for state control, but in my opinion it's the universal aspect that is imperative to it as it helps to limit the ways the state can use it to exert their will. Taxation already is and will continue to be done by the state, so we always have to be vigilant of that avenue regardless of whether we adopt UBI or some other system.

    The protections basically come down to:
    1) UBI lends itself to be sales or consumption tax funded, which allows for removal of the entire Income tax system, which actually reduces opportunities for state abuse.

    2) Being universal prevents adjusting wording, or campaigning on rhetoric to remove groups or individuals from coverage, further reducing opportunities for state abuse.

    It certainly doesn't eliminate the opportunities for state over-reach, but has more avenues to limit those potential incursions more than most suggestions I've been exposed to.
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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Nightfox on Sat Aug 8 00:41:54 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Nightfox to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 02:24 pm

    I think Honda is still working on the Asimo. I've seen videos of some of Boston Dynamics stuff too. Interesting and weird stuff.

    I hadn't bothered much with the robotics scene for years but it looks like the engineers are pushing things forward by leaps and bounds, it'll be interesting whenver they combine these things with machine learning.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Arelor on Sat Aug 8 00:55:07 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Arelor to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 04:52 pm

    Civilizations have a finite shelf life.From some head-extrapolations I have done with old civilitations, I expect the Western model to crash in a matter of decades. We have already entered the "introspection" phase that precedes the oblitaration of powerful civilitations. We are outsourcing our burdens to "lesser civs", citizens are no longer combative against threats, and we hate ourselves. Give us a century tops.

    I think Capitalism is more resistant than you credit it for, on the other hand, because improving your own position via exchanging something with somebody else is ptretty much the way of the world. Everybody wants to do it. WHen they try to prevent the population from doing it, people does it anyway. Look at those Argentinians, Venezuelans and Cubans dealing American Dollar. Or all the URSS corruption that went on because people bought their way out of the limits impossed by The System with bribe money.

    Once the West self-destructs, the survivors will exchange gunpowder for bullets.

    I believe we are very near the end of our current system... our form of capitalism will likely end once our banking system fails, and I can't see that lasting more than five years. The monetery system we have, which is based on fiat currency, has no where else to go now other than hyper-inflation... once all the bubbles crash (and they will simultaneously) it'll pretty much be the end of the west. This is why I am banking on AI automation to mitigate the collapse and bring on a sharper recovery. Technology shall save us all!

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Underminer on Sat Aug 8 01:09:13 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Underminer to Andeddu on Wed Aug 05 2020 05:11 pm

    The big issue is that a fully laisez-faire reality can allow for too much exploitation of some, so you do want some oversight and regulation. Problem is that when you allow state regulation, suddenly you have those that become big players pushing for regulation that locks out competitors from dethroning them, and that kind of cronyism is bad for everyone. Trouble is figuring out where an appropriate line is.

    Absolutely. Big corporations always look after their own interests. The majority became powerful through innovation within the constraints of the free-market. Now they're using their power and influence to fabricate additional regulation --further barriers to entry-- for the express purpose of maintaining the status-quo. Crony capitalism is a horrendous corruption of capitalism... large megacorps should not be allowed to change the rules to suit themselves.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Sat Aug 8 01:56:37 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Thu Aug 06 2020 10:45 am

    Capitalism is structurally flawed. Like many ideological systems, it has to accept "exceptions" to maintain power. The big one is the loss of self governmance when someone goes to "Work". The workplace is an odd exception in western civilisation, because somehow it is considered outside of our civlisation, a place where property rights and right to self-governance are suspended. Capitalism maintains this 'dual system' notion, where at any other time, we are citizens with property rights, but at "work", we cease to become so. The closest we were to a capitalist ideal was post-feudalism, when most people were self-sufficient, living off the land.

    We need to fully realise this ideal, which never really existed in the first place.

    I don't know what "Communism works in theory" is supposed to mean. Does that mean there is a theory proven correct? I've never seen proof that it can work, even in theory. The "labour theory of value" is theoretically wrong.

    Interesting... I never thought of capitalism being hypocritical in a sense by way of this 'dual system' intertwined in a person's work/home life.

    I don't know if communism could ever work. I suppose such a society could exist if carried out by an incorruptible AI dictator strictly adhering to the tenants of the ideology, as it's clear no human can handle absolute power.

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  • From Arelor@VERT/PALANT to Dennisk on Sat Aug 8 13:42:00 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Sat Aug 08 2020 04:32 pm

    Most socialists want a degree of control over others that I find disturbing. am libertarian in that sense, but I think when it comes to engagement with others, then your liberty ends, and overall natural rights take over. One o hand, we are told that the core axiom of Capitalism, is that an individual w blends their labour with something, is the rightful owner, yet the BULK or productive activity, seems to exclude this. Likewise with democray, the bul of our day is spend in an organisation where such rights don't exist.

    See my previous response as to why I think you are not surrendering your rights by entering an employment contract.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Moondog on Sat Aug 8 22:52:24 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Thu Aug 06 2020 01:28 pm

    The issue has been overcome, but it's something that doesn't immediately come to mind when developing a driving program. It's like the early AI programs trying to understand written text. Before reading, an basic understanding of the universe must occur. When Abraham Lincold went to Springfield, IL, so
    did his feet. Stuff that we don't think about has to factored in to developin g an AI.

    I think engineers are able to see the problems that need to be overcome in any scenario for an AI through trial and error. We have what's known as machine learning now where a machine will learn and improve from its own experience. I have seen examples of four legged machines losing a leg and, though self discovery, coming up with the optimal method of travelling on three legs without additional programming.

    This simultaneously evokes feelings of both hope and terror.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Moondog on Sun Aug 9 01:27:26 2020
    Re: Re: 5G
    By: Moondog to Andeddu on Sat Aug 08 2020 09:02 am

    Asimo is more or less a puppet compared to Boston Dynamics products. It required an operator which was more like like an experienced puppeteer for it to do things such as walk up or down stairs. Ford Motor Company has a robot similar to the Boston Dynamics offerings that folds up when not in use, kind
    of like the battle Droids in Phantom Menace, and it is designed to ride in the
    back of a delivery truck. I can imagine the truck being automated, and through GPS and QRF bar codes it would know which packages to deliver to each home. Upon delivery it would send a text or email, then jump back into it's self-driving truck and head to the next customer.

    I didn't know about Ford's own droid. I think it's a fairly rudimentary concept at the minute but given another 5-10 years to mature, I could definitely see self driving vehicles coupled with droids carrying out delivery runs. I can also see AI drones being used to deliver smaller parkages in populated cities.

    What a time to be alive... :P

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Arelor on Sun Aug 9 01:36:22 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Arelor to Andeddu on Sat Aug 08 2020 01:20 pm

    The problem is that somebody has to code the AI in the first place. And once he does, it is easy for him to code the AI to Favor  Arelor at Any Cost. Just saying.

    Not to mention the lower echelons of a communist system always end up trying to bribe their way out of the system anyway.

    I was reffering more to a truly self-conscious AI. The problem with self-aware machines is that you could end up with the SkyNet scenario... I guess no economic/political system is infallible!

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Gamgee on Sun Aug 9 20:15:09 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Gamgee to Andeddu on Sat Aug 08 2020 07:16 pm

    I believe we are very near the end of our current system... our
    form of capitalism will likely end once our banking system fails,
    and I can't see that lasting more than five years. The monetery
    system we have, which is based on fiat currency, has no where
    else to go now other than hyper-inflation... once all the bubbles
    crash (and they will simultaneously) it'll pretty much be the end
    of the west. This is why I am banking on AI automation to
    mitigate the collapse and bring on a sharper recovery. Technology
    shall save us all!

    Oh waiter! I'll have some of what this guy is smoking!

    I was trying to put a positive spin on a terrible situation... the reality is, we're all doomed!

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to poindexter FORTRAN on Sun Aug 9 21:11:41 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: poindexter FORTRAN to Andeddu on Fri Aug 07 2020 07:35 am

    Yeah, phones have gotten bigger, coincidentally, as my eyes have
    gotten worse. I remember when I had to get rid of my beloved
    Blackberry Pearl because the screen was just too small for everyday
    reading.

    That thing was rock-solid, and I got to the point where I could fly
    typing on their T9-like system.

    My first smart phone was a Blackberry Curve back in '09. Although I liked the design, screen and keyboard, the web-browser was complete trash. I don't know if it was just me (although my ex had a Curve which suffered from the same problems) but the phone was hit or miss whenever it came to loading up basic web pages, as if it were missing the necessary plugins. YouTube videos would also buffer for no reason whenever running off of WiFi too... I ended up purchasing a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet which had a similarly crappy browser. After that, I ditched BlackBerry for Apple and haven't looked back since.

    I think designing the hardware and software was a step too far for BlackBerry as a company. By the time they adopted Android, it was too late.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Gamgee on Mon Aug 10 17:54:32 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Gamgee to Andeddu on Sun Aug 09 2020 05:54 pm

    Honestly, I see very little in your numerous posts that has
    anything to do with "positive".

    I think you can calm down a little. Capitalism isn't going
    anywhere, and the robots taking over is still a century or two
    away.

    Really. It's true.

    While it's impossible to predict the future with 100% accuracy, I believe we are at the end of our current economic system. Wishful thinking is all most people have left in relation to the continuation of consumerism. Most reliable analysts are in agreement that we are about to face an economic collapse which will dwarf the likes of the '29 Wall Street Crash. Millions of people died in the USA as a result of that crash from famine, disease and abject poverty -- imagine how bad things could get for us as everything's inflated to a ridiculous level & the currency is teetering off a cliff. I hope I am waaay off, but I just can't see it.

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  • From Gamgee@VERT/PALANT to Andeddu on Mon Aug 10 20:20:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Gamgee <=-

    While it's impossible to predict the future with 100% accuracy, I
    believe we are at the end of our current economic system. Wishful
    thinking is all most people have left in relation to the
    continuation of consumerism. Most reliable analysts are in
    agreement that we are about to face an economic collapse which
    will dwarf the likes of the '29 Wall Street Crash. Millions of
    people died in the USA as a result of that crash from famine,
    disease and abject poverty -- imagine how bad things could get
    for us as everything's inflated to a ridiculous level & the
    currency is teetering off a cliff. I hope I am waaay off, but I
    just can't see it.

    "Most reliable analysts" think we are about to crash, and worse
    than '29???

    Funny how there isn't any news coverage of that, eh?

    Where are these reliable analysts located, and what are their
    credentials? Where can one read their predictions?

    Also, one other point - the number of deaths in the US during the
    Great Depression did not change significantly over the course of
    1929-1939. Your statement that millions of people died as a
    result of that is just.............. not true. Not even remotely
    true. This fact is easily proven by a quick Google search. I
    suggest you may want to do a little more research before springing
    to so many dire conclusions about our future...



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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Tue Aug 11 16:50:10 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Tue Aug 11 2020 09:58 am

    I've heard about the impending crash since I was little. I think more likely, is that instead of a crash, we will have a series of crisis, and our standard of living will just erode and erode and erode.

    See, the economy is just trying to finds it natural level, and it may do so with most of us just impoverished. That future generation which will not own a house, live in a small apartement, have no job security, be controlled, never have good savings for old age, THAT is how the economy will compensate.

    So far that's what's happened. We have had a series of smaller crashes over a period of a half-century. I don't disagree that we in the West are living far in excess of our means, so your overall assessment is something I can agree with. I believe the next crash will be a much sorer one than anything we've experienced previously after which there will be a noticible difference in life before/after the crash.

    I guess it depends on how you view it... I don't think it'll be a civilisaiton ending crash, but it will result in serious impoverishment for large swathes of the population. Adding in other factors such a large spike in crime, the defunding of the police, etc... we could be in for some ride.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Gamgee on Tue Aug 11 17:09:13 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Gamgee to Andeddu on Mon Aug 10 2020 08:20 pm

    "Most reliable analysts" think we are about to crash, and worse
    than '29???

    Funny how there isn't any news coverage of that, eh?

    Where are these reliable analysts located, and what are their
    credentials? Where can one read their predictions?

    Strange that there wasn't any news coverage either of the '08 credit crunch up until the time it happened. I don't consider mainstream financials to be particularly trustworthy... we even had Jim Cramer on Mad Money talking about "The DOW's best week since 1938" with the headline below clearly stating "More than 16M Americans have lost jobs in 3 weeks"... I think there's a clear disconnect there with these analysts invariably attempting to inject calm into the market.

    I particularly like Peter Schiff, the CEO of Euro Pacific Capital and ex-Lehman Brothers investment banker. He was laughed at back in 2007 while on CNN for warning of an impending crash... wel, the other analysts didn't get the chance to laugh for long.

    I guess my philosophy is to expect the worst, but hope for the best.

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  • From Gamgee@VERT/PALANT to Andeddu on Tue Aug 11 19:57:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Gamgee <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Gamgee to Andeddu on Mon Aug 10 2020 08:20 pm

    "Most reliable analysts" think we are about to crash, and worse
    than '29???

    Funny how there isn't any news coverage of that, eh?

    Where are these reliable analysts located, and what are their
    credentials? Where can one read their predictions?

    Strange that there wasn't any news coverage either of the '08
    credit crunch up until the time it happened. I don't consider
    mainstream financials to be particularly trustworthy... we even
    had Jim Cramer on Mad Money talking about "The DOW's best week
    since 1938" with the headline below clearly stating "More than
    16M Americans have lost jobs in 3 weeks"... I think there's a
    clear disconnect there with these analysts invariably attempting
    to inject calm into the market.

    I particularly like Peter Schiff, the CEO of Euro Pacific Capital
    and ex-Lehman Brothers investment banker. He was laughed at back
    in 2007 while on CNN for warning of an impending crash... wel,
    the other analysts didn't get the chance to laugh for long.

    I guess my philosophy is to expect the worst, but hope for the
    best.

    You're not really answering the questions that are asked...

    Naming a couple of obscure "investment bankers" does not
    constitute the opinions of "most analysts". The truth is that
    most analysts are not saying anything remotely close to what you
    are claiming.

    Sorry, but my philosophy is that facts speak more loudly than
    conspiracy theories and hand-wringing claims with no basis.

    You could help your case a little by providing some credible
    references/links to sources that think the economy is about to
    crash in a manner worse than in 1929.



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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Wed Aug 12 21:17:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Dennisk <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Tue Aug 11 2020 09:58 am

    I've heard about the impending crash since I was little. I think more likely, is that instead of a crash, we will have a series of crisis, and our standard of living will just erode and erode and erode.

    See, the economy is just trying to finds it natural level, and it may do so with most of us just impoverished. That future generation which will not own a house, live in a small apartement, have no job security, be controlled, never have good savings for old age, THAT is how the economy will compensate.

    So far that's what's happened. We have had a series of smaller crashes over a period of a half-century. I don't disagree that we in the West
    are living far in excess of our means, so your overall assessment is something I can agree with. I believe the next crash will be a much
    sorer one than anything we've experienced previously after which there will be a noticible difference in life before/after the crash.

    I guess it depends on how you view it... I don't think it'll be a civilisaiton ending crash, but it will result in serious impoverishment for large swathes of the population. Adding in other factors such a
    large spike in crime, the defunding of the police, etc... we could be
    in for some ride.

    I think we are staring a new "dark age" in the face here. And most of it is because our "managerial class", that is, the people who get into management positions and positions of power, are intellctually, morally and behaviourally not up to the task of preserving or creating civilisation.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Gamgee on Wed Aug 12 18:00:06 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Gamgee to Andeddu on Tue Aug 11 2020 07:57 pm

    You're not really answering the questions that are asked...

    Naming a couple of obscure "investment bankers" does not
    constitute the opinions of "most analysts". The truth is that
    most analysts are not saying anything remotely close to what you
    are claiming.

    Sorry, but my philosophy is that facts speak more loudly than
    conspiracy theories and hand-wringing claims with no basis.

    I'll link a video which quickly encapsulates my beliefs.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkBUv_-OqiE

    "The Global Monetary Crisis Will be a Dollar Crisis, says Peter Schiff"

    You can also access it by typing "maneco64 peter schiff" into YouTube.

    I recently read a mainstream article on The New York Times by the legendary Nobel Prize winning economist, Paul Krugman. He boils it down in simple terms to: We need to print more money to stimulate the economy.

    We're pretty much in a recession therefore it's nigh on impossible to stimulate the economy. We'll also have the worst unemployment figures for decades and, in addition, non-stop lockdowns to contend with. There's no stimulating the economy, especially given that the US economy is service based, not manufacturing based.

    Even quantitative easing with the intent of helicopter drops to the public won't stimulate the economy as people are too uncertain about their jobs/futures to make large purchases, they'll save whatever money they get. Printing cash and purchasing government and corporate debt seems to work, but like Schiff said, that'll just inflate ALL the debt bubbles and cause an even bigger crash down the road. Also the US national debt is so large that interest rates can NEVER normalise... for instance, increasing the interest rate to 5% would result in the US having to spend 50% of ALL tax revenue on servicing the national debt. The US goverment borrow trillions of dollars each year and this year are well over five trillion dollars in the red. Totally unsustainable.

    Once the USD crashes, it'll be a global problem. China can see the writing on the wall which is why it's using its trade USDs on US company stock, property and foreign assets, offloading it as quickly as possible whilst expanding their influence across the world.

    Watch the video, and tell me why we shouldn't be worried. And also let me know how we can prevent another depression.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Wed Aug 12 18:39:41 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Wed Aug 12 2020 09:17 pm

    I think we are staring a new "dark age" in the face here. And most of it is because our "managerial class", that is, the people who get into management positions and positions of power, are intellctually, morally and behaviourally not up to the task of preserving or creating civilisation.


    In normal times, I'd agree. I just think there's something more now that we have advanced technology... there must be a way to alleviate the crushing poverty of the lowest rungs of society. We haven't seen that as yet so I guess you're merely being a realist about a new "Dark Age" however if we just kick the can down the road a little longer & build some kind of solid automated or even non-automated manufacturing infastructre, perhaps the next crash won't be as bad as a lot of people are saying it will be. Either way, it's not looking good and we have some tough times ahead. I would welcome a slower decline, as you said, much like the Fall of Rome, rather than a crescendo moment swallowing us all up whole.

    I don't think anyone is really trying to preserve society, everyone appears to be rushing, single-mindedly, trying to "fill their boots" that they've forgotten that civilisations need to be maintained, otherwise they become divided, decline and eventaully, they fall.

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  • From Dennisk@VERT/EOTLBBS to Andeddu on Thu Aug 13 09:35:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Dennisk <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Wed Aug 12 2020 09:17 pm

    I think we are staring a new "dark age" in the face here. And most of it is because our "managerial class", that is, the people who get into management positions and positions of power, are intellctually, morally and behaviourally not up to the task of preserving or creating civilisation.


    In normal times, I'd agree. I just think there's something more now
    that we have advanced technology... there must be a way to alleviate
    the crushing poverty of the lowest rungs of society. We haven't seen
    that as yet so I guess you're merely being a realist about a new "Dark Age" however if we just kick the can down the road a little longer &
    build some kind of solid automated or even non-automated manufacturing infastructre, perhaps the next crash won't be as bad as a lot of people are saying it will be. Either way, it's not looking good and we have
    some tough times ahead. I would welcome a slower decline, as you said, much like the Fall of Rome, rather than a crescendo moment swallowing
    us all up whole.

    I don't think anyone is really trying to preserve society, everyone appears to be rushing, single-mindedly, trying to "fill their boots"
    that they've forgotten that civilisations need to be maintained,
    otherwise they become divided, decline and eventaully, they fall.

    I don't think technology will save us. Technology alone doesn't create prosperity, it needs the right social conditions as well. This discussion is about how technology will free us from labout, yet look, so, so many people are working full time jobs, two jobs, and still struggling. We are not gaining from productivity improments due to a poor economic/political system.

    The Dark Ages were called that due to a lack of historical records (comparitively so) and historical significant. The Eastern Roman empire continued on though, and what we now know as Byzantium was probably the wealthiest and most propserous region of Europe during the Dark Ages. But lets face it, it doesn't have the cultural clout that classical Greece and Rome did.

    That is what I think is going to happen. A kind of middling along, a stagnation. We aren't all going to starve, but there will be a general decline that many people may not even really care about. IT's already with us if you ask me. Intellectual, political and economic achievements of the 21st century pale in comparison to the 19th. Our art is stagnating, as well as technological development. Our movies are mostly rehashes, remakes, or very derivative. Even our "pop culture" heavily reference the past. I see kids movies which still reference movies form the 60s. Although our technology is improving in some ways, the breakthroughs aren't like what we had. Our big tech innovations now are social media, just ways of gaining market share really. Instagram, TikTok, Netflix and Facebook are NOT intellectual and technological achievements, the way that the silicon chip, boolean logic, fertilisers, vaccines and compiled languages were. Yes, our processors will get faster, our phones store more, but they are to do the same kind of tasks.

    We will also probably have a bit less freedom, less reason (which will result in stagnation) and seem to struggle to maintain what we had. Things will decay here and there, and we will find ourselves incapable of doing what people in the past could achive (Again, this is already happening now).

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  • From Gamgee@VERT/PALANT to Andeddu on Wed Aug 12 21:28:00 2020
    Andeddu wrote to Gamgee <=-

    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Gamgee to Andeddu on Tue Aug 11 2020 07:57 pm

    You're not really answering the questions that are asked...

    Naming a couple of obscure "investment bankers" does not
    constitute the opinions of "most analysts". The truth is that
    most analysts are not saying anything remotely close to what you
    are claiming.

    Sorry, but my philosophy is that facts speak more loudly than
    conspiracy theories and hand-wringing claims with no basis.

    I'll link a video which quickly encapsulates my beliefs.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkBUv_-OqiE

    "The Global Monetary Crisis Will be a Dollar Crisis, says Peter
    Schiff"

    You can also access it by typing "maneco64 peter schiff" into
    YouTube.

    I recently read a mainstream article on The New York Times by the legendary Nobel Prize winning economist, Paul Krugman. He boils
    it down in simple terms to: We need to print more money to
    stimulate the economy.

    We're pretty much in a recession therefore it's nigh on
    impossible to stimulate the economy. We'll also have the worst unemployment figures for decades and, in addition, non-stop
    lockdowns to contend with. There's no stimulating the economy,
    especially given that the US economy is service based, not
    manufacturing based.

    Even quantitative easing with the intent of helicopter drops to
    the public won't stimulate the economy as people are too
    uncertain about their jobs/futures to make large purchases,
    they'll save whatever money they get. Printing cash and
    purchasing government and corporate debt seems to work, but like
    Schiff said, that'll just inflate ALL the debt bubbles and cause
    an even bigger crash down the road. Also the US national debt is
    so large that interest rates can NEVER normalise... for instance, increasing the interest rate to 5% would result in the US having
    to spend 50% of ALL tax revenue on servicing the national debt.
    The US goverment borrow trillions of dollars each year and this
    year are well over five trillion dollars in the red. Totally unsustainable.

    Once the USD crashes, it'll be a global problem. China can see
    the writing on the wall which is why it's using its trade USDs on
    US company stock, property and foreign assets, offloading it as
    quickly as possible whilst expanding their influence across the
    world.

    Watch the video, and tell me why we shouldn't be worried. And
    also let me know how we can prevent another depression.

    I watched all I could of it (about 10 minutes). This Schiff guy
    is a nobody, completely unknown at the national level, and quite
    frankly, appears to be a fringe/niche whacko. I wonder why he now
    lives in Puerto Rico... No offense to you, but I put zero stock
    in people such as this. It's easy (and common) to be a doom-sayer
    and make bold predictions about how the world is crashing down.
    This guy has apparently been doing it for 20 years. Funny thing
    is, the world is still going strong, and will be for a long time
    to come. That includes the USA and it's system, which although
    not perfect, is still the best in the world.

    Maybe you should try to be a little more "glass-half-full"...?
    ;-)



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  • From Tracker1@VERT/TRN to Arelor on Thu Aug 13 00:48:24 2020
    On 8/6/2020 7:15 AM, Arelor wrote:

    I keep hearing that corporations are treated like people, but last time I checked, they don't have the same fundamental constitutional rights either in my country or the
    US. At all.

    It mostly comes down to being able to contribute to political campaigns.
    Also, for the most part, companies don't get a "death penalty" for
    even being responsible for many deaths.


    The clinic I work with had a BIG problem with an ISP that managed to screw the access to some service. In Spain, phisical people has the right to fill a claim to the
    Defender of the Consumer. If you are a firm you will need to fill a claim in court with your own layers since the Defender of the Consumer won't do it for you.

    In the US, 4th and 5th ammendments don't apply to juridical people,
    which basically means a corporation does not have a constitutional
    right to privacy. If the cops walk into Necrocomp's headquarters and
    demand any explanation about any given incident, Necrocomp's
    employees can't call the 5th, unless they admit to be involved. But
    that is troublesome for them.

    As for privacy, that's not entirely true... especially regarding
    accounting, trade secrets etc. And company lawyers can advise that
    employeees don't anser given questions without a lawyer present or at
    all in some cases.

    Besides, any firm that grows big enough mutates into a branch of the government, specially in socialist states. Working for the government
    is usually just more profitable since you can funnel lots of tax
    dollar into your pockets.

    Which I have a huge problem with.


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    tracker1 +o Roughneck BBS

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Thu Aug 13 18:08:21 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Thu Aug 13 2020 09:35 am

    I don't think technology will save us. Technology alone doesn't create prosperity, it needs the right social conditions as well. This discussion is about how technology will free us from labout, yet look, so, so many people are working full time jobs, two jobs, and still struggling. We are not gaining from productivity improments due to a poor economic/political system.

    The Dark Ages were called that due to a lack of historical records (comparitively so) and historical significant. The Eastern Roman empire continued on though, and what we now know as Byzantium was probably the

    It's quite staggering that despite all the technology we have, we are all still bashing out 40-50 hour weeks cooped up in an office doing jobs that, for the most part, don't really matter. Something's got to give, a country cannot rely on a service based economy forever... it's just not sustainable in any way, shape or form. The markets are going to correct sooner or later and things are not going to be pretty. My hope is that we will come to realise we cannot rely on other countries to produce the goods we want with cheap labour and that we have to produce these goods ourselves. Purchasing cheap goods with cheap money cannot lead to long-term economic prosperity.

    I agree, we've long since past the Age of Enlightenment; there are no genuine thinkers anymore.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Gamgee on Thu Aug 13 18:54:33 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Gamgee to Andeddu on Wed Aug 12 2020 09:28 pm

    I watched all I could of it (about 10 minutes). This Schiff guy
    is a nobody, completely unknown at the national level, and quite
    frankly, appears to be a fringe/niche whacko. I wonder why he now
    lives in Puerto Rico... No offense to you, but I put zero stock
    in people such as this. It's easy (and common) to be a doom-sayer
    and make bold predictions about how the world is crashing down.
    This guy has apparently been doing it for 20 years. Funny thing
    is, the world is still going strong, and will be for a long time
    to come. That includes the USA and it's system, which although
    not perfect, is still the best in the world.

    Maybe you should try to be a little more "glass-half-full"...?
    ;-)

    Well if he's just another doom-monger and whacko, surely he can easily be debunked? Moving straight to an ad-hominem attack shows that you're ignorant on the subject.

    Perhaps you should take some advice from the Tractatus Locigo-Philosophicus by Ludwig Wittgenstein which states, "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must remain silent."

    Oh, and he lives in Puerto Rico because it's a tax haven, he owns and investment firm and has a personal fortune of around $100M... I would do the same if I was a member of the top 1%.

    Anyway... if you're after "mainstream" information, the Bank of England has openly said that the UK is set to enter the "Worst Recession in 300 Years". I am enjoying myself now however I certainly do not have a "glass-half full" attitude in regards to the economy. I hope all this blows over, but like I said, I'd prefer to prepare for the worst & hope for the best.

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  • From Ogg@VERT/EOTLBBS to All on Fri Aug 14 00:09:00 2020
    Hello Dennisk!

    ** On Friday 14.08.20 - 12:51, dennisk wrote to Andeddu:

    I agree, we've long since past the Age of Enlightenment; there are no
    genuine thinkers anymore.

    Have you heard of David Graeber? He is a bit of an Anarchist
    politically speaking, but he has insighful things to say on this. Most people would not admit it, because they need their jobs, but really,
    many know, deep down, a lot of what they do is not necessary. We have
    this culture of just pushing more and more complexity and reporting requirements. Even for a charity I volunteer for, there is more and
    more paperwork created, but no new charitable activities!

    A charity is obligated to document things and report to government on a steady and regualr basis or the privilege to operate as a charity is
    heavily scrutinized and/or revoked. You can't fault the charity for
    pushing paper. But the charitable activities are up to you and its
    members of the board. Sounds like your charity needs more volunteers! LOL

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Sat Aug 15 00:40:31 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Fri Aug 14 2020 11:51 am

    Have you heard of David Graeber? He is a bit of an Anarchist politically speaking, but he has insighful things to say on this. Most people would not admit it, because they need their jobs, but really, many know, deep down, a lot of what they do is not necessary. We have this culture of just pushing more and more complexity and reporting requirements. Even for a charity I volunteer for, there is more and more paperwork created, but no new charitable activities!

    No, I've never come across Graeber. I've taken a look at his Wikipedia bio and see he's written a book called Bullshit Jobs: A Theory... seems like an interesting read! I see YouGov undertook a poll in the UK of which 37% of Britons surveyed thought that their jobs did not contribute meaningfully to the world. We have a problem in the UK, notably in the public sector, with "quangos"... highly paid administrators in management positions who seem to do nothing but push more and more policy which does nothing but obstruct the actual workers from doing their jobs effectively & efficiently.

    The public sector now seems incredibly bloated, and that's not including all the people who are employed privately but contracted by the government.

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  • From Andeddu@VERT/AMSTRAD to Dennisk on Sat Aug 15 18:04:24 2020
    Re: Re: Fourth Industrial Rev
    By: Dennisk to Andeddu on Sat Aug 15 2020 05:09 pm

    That happens in the private sector too. Managers want larger budgets, and want to have more people working for them. Inefficiencies are overlooked because to someone outside of the department, it can be hard to tell where the inefficiences are.


    I watched a video by PragerU a while back where they looked at the inefficiencies of laying down infastructure in the West as opposed to the East. It costs 3-4x more to produce anything, be it a bridge, tram, subway system, road, or anything kind of infastructure in the USA than in Japan. And it also takes months longer to get any work actually going, such is the amount of bureaucracy and red tape.

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