I think something similar to the original Hyperloop proposal can work, but I'm not going to actually believe it until I see at least one real world implementation.
Yes, the great failure of the internet is that it is lacks of standard mechanisms that exist in polite society to exclude the assholes. Being an asshole is cheap on the web and so you get lots of assholes. IRL being an asshole (at least in some states) has very high consequences and so you get civilization. Fixing the web is just a matter of rediscovering appropriate mechanisms to correct, silence, and ultimately exclude those who have nothing to contribute and no value to add. Google, Facebook and Twitter will inevitably clean up their spaces and new norms will ultimately be enforced. At that point things will mostly return to normal.
Of course the great thing about the web is also that it's so big. We don't need to literally silence the assholes. They should feel free to congregate in various Youtube comment threads and on boards like 4chan and voat.
> the great failure of the internet is that it is lacks of standard mechanisms that exist in polite society to exclude the assholes.
American society no longer has those mechanisms either. They were dismantled in the 50s and 60s under the opinion that they were too restrictive and stifling.
I don't think it's the exclusion of assholes that's the problem.
It's the inclusion.
Before, if you had a really socially unacceptable opinion, you couldn't really voice it without attracting a lot of heat. Now, you can throw your voice into the aether and get back thousands of people across the world who feel the same way you do. Whether if you're into collecting stamps, ancient alien conspiracies, or Nazi furry cosplay.
Everything becomes normalized to a degree. The motto "strength in numbers" becomes the issue.
However, there are some good things that have come from this. Gay people, transgender people, people with various mental illnesses all have a place to come together without having to face the judgment of the people in their communities. It's the largest alcoholics anonymous meeting you could want.
Has Elon Musk lost his marbles, or has his broad public platform just magnified his, to be frank, strange personality? I remember that footage of him getting delivery of some million dollar car and thinking that this guy is kinda off center:
I'm no fan of Musk, but its not unusual among the super rich to not have insurance. They frequently post a bond with the state in lieu of insurance. Perfectly legal in fact in California.
So is this another example how the super rich can sideline laws that need to be followed by the not super rich? Like for example, anything that's not allowed, but the only repercussion is a fine? (let's say, littering, just as a concrete example) If I'm super rich, that basically means I can do it, but a poor person would think twice.
Also see companies dealing in business malpractices that only receive a pittance of a fine as the outcome of losing the legal trial. ie: "cost of doing business"
In California for example, You post the bond in the amount required by the state (35k), that acts as your certificate of insurance. Purchase a surety bond from a company licensed in California, or file a certificate of self insurance (only for motor carriers, and requires a 300-750k deposit), or you can purchase traditional liability insurance.
It’s been discussed to death, and every time the discussion is the same. There’s no intellectual satisfaction in a noh play of hyper-partisan bickering between people who think that Musk is a charlatan, or a prophet.
Meanwhile the article here is full of good information. I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m amazed this rescue ended with only a single death, and learning about how it was pulled off and discussing that with a bunch of technically inclined people is a lot more promising than another round of Musk.
He is absolutely a part of the story of the rescue though, he made sure of that himself by loudly proclaiming his pie in the sky solutions and then getting pissy when the actual domain experts rejected them.
He literally accused a man of being a pedophile for disagreeing with him.
That's libel, plain and simple. I like space and I like what Elon's companies do, but he needs to learn to filter himself before he goes on Twitter and spouts unfounded, harmful bullshit.
Donald Trump rightfully cops a lot of flak for his Twitter habits; Musk should be held to the same standard.
I think the tweeter may end up having problems over the fact that she did try to exploit the tweets for fame and advantage. If it had been just sharing observations about something happening around her, she'd likely be fine. Trying to gain personally from the story makes it much more shaky on an ethical level for me.
And there's no excuse for encouraging people to seek out the subject's identity. Awful idea all around.
Fake advertising for the purpose of creating discord is as old as political advertising.
I had a friend run for state legislature in the 1990s, his opponent sent people around targeted neighborhoods passing out fake flyers for my friend's campaign. They used his name and photo, but attributed positions he did not hold to him.
I imagine before cheap printing, it was gossip. I'm sure it's been the case since democracy started.
People often suggest that the Internet is a problem in terms of disinformation, but I'd argue in many cases that the Internet actually helps.
In pre-Internet days, it was difficult to get someone's views in their own words, especially in real-time. All information was filtered through various sources before being passed onto the consumer. Now, it's straightforward to check their website, or their twitter, or their youtube.
This, of course, is not perfect and requires a root-of-trust involving Google and DNS, but I'd certainly take that tradeoff versus Guy On The Street asserting things.
It's called agree of misinformation because it's become increasingly easy to produce convincing fake footage.
It's entirely possible to fake a real-time video interview for instance using voice synthesis and mapping the face of your target upon your face. It's frighteningly convincing.
I don't think that footage is frighteningly convincing.
It's pretty good, but not difficult to tell that it's not real. The bridge between pretty good and perfect when doing this type of thing is a very, very difficult problem.
It also requires substantial amounts of high quality, up close footage of the person. This may be work for major politicans, but is much more difficult for the vast majority of people.
I don't disagree that it will become more of a problem in the future, and in many cases "pretty good" will be sufficient, but I think people are overstating how much of a problem it will be.
It's frightening because this is a the work if students with consumer hardware.
Video material can be produced at will if a wealthy nation or corporatiom wants it and the model will be significantly better if they train it on specialized hardware.
I don't think that the average person has to worry about his face being stolen. I think that it's possible to produce extremely good footage if somebody is sufficiently motivated to fund a smear campaign. It won't hold up in court, but it doesn't have to either.
