If rich people are this stupid then they deserve to be parted with their cash.
If you invest money so mindlessly that you don’t even check what you buy, then no legislation in the world will manage to protect you from your own mind
It’s not just rich people though. Most people (at least in the US) have their retirements and the like in things like 401ks, tied to some kind of index like the S&P 500. A company doing bullshit to manipulate the stock affects pretty much anyone who uses an index fund or ETF, which is pretty much everyone in the US.
Guys you have no idea about these things and what you are talking about. source: I am a city plot owner.
No land owner will suddenly become a developer to build an apartment block.
A plot owner can sell land to a developer or form a joint venture with developer putting in their land as starting capital (much more risky) most people either keep land as gold or sell it when they need money.
I hope it is clearer now.
The very idea that everyone who owns land should build an apartment block is laughable, it is very complicated endeavour best not to get into it if you know nothing about it. Hell building a single family house is complex, let alone five story building.
So you either keep it if you don’t need money or you sell it if you want to buy something else or need to have liquidity. And you don’t even sell it to buy other investment vehicle because land is already better than gold.
My plot increased 3 times in price in 10 years. Try to beat that with SP500. It’s virtually immune to inflation no matter how the broader economy fares it will always shield from inflation because you cannot make more land hah.
Even in utopia of automation and post scarcity society good location land will be truly lucrative and unimaginably expensive if not outright prohibited to own by private individuals. The question is what will be a “good location” in 30 years.
> My plot increased 3 times in price in 10 years. Try to beat that with SP500. It’s virtually immune to inflation no matter how the broader economy fares it will always shield from inflation because you cannot make more land hah.
> Even in utopia of automation and post scarcity society good location land will be truly lucrative and unimaginably expensive if not outright prohibited to own by private individuals.
Indeed, there’s a reason you see silicon valley execs going all in all acquiring land to build fortresses. At the end of the day, regardless of the cold march of technological progress, land remains the root of all real power.
> No land owner will suddenly become a developer to build an apartment block.
No one is suggesting this.
> A plot owner can sell land to a developer or form a joint venture with developer putting in their land as starting capital (much more risky) most people either keep land as gold or sell it when they need money.
Most people don't own vacant lots, but some who do hold onto it as an investment. It's a pretty poor one on average over time, just like gold (which is a good analogy).
> The very idea that everyone who owns land should build an apartment block is laughable, it is very complicated endeavour best not to get into it if you know nothing about it. Hell building a single family house is complex, let alone five story building.
Again, no one is suggesting this. The assumption is that a developer would buy a lot to build on, because that's what happens in practice.
> So you either keep it if you don’t need money or you sell it if you want to buy something else or need to have liquidity. And you don’t even sell it to buy other investment vehicle because land is already better than gold.
Land and gold are not better than the stock market over time.
> My plot increased 3 times in price in 10 years. Try to beat that with SP500. It’s virtually immune to inflation no matter how the broader economy fares it will always shield from inflation because you cannot make more land hah.
The S&P 500 beats real estate over time. Congratulations on getting lucky with your plot of land. Land is a good inflation hedge, assuming you are in a growing area. Ask rust belt land owners how things worked out for them.
> Even in utopia of automation and post scarcity society good location land will be truly lucrative and unimaginably expensive if not outright prohibited to own by private individuals. The question is what will be a “good location” in 30 years.
Thanks for highlighting one of the many issues with communism, but we will never reach a post-scarcity society for many reasons, including this one.
You know what increased more than 3x in the last 10 years? The S&P 500 index (it went from $203.87 at the start of 2016 to $681.92 at the start of 2026). And your plot of land is a massive outlier to the upside in the US overall during that time.
Historically, undeveloped land basically tracks inflation. Obviously, there are specific plots of land that dramatically exceed that, and there are specific plots of land that don't keep up with inflation.
That's the only thing you got right: raw land is an inflation hedge.
What has potential AGI teached me is that no matter what I write, as long as I do it manually, it has value. Not because it is good but because it is genuine.
Before LLMs I would never think that what I have to say is valuable in any way. Now I realize my every comment, my every human input to the global internet and society is infinitely more valuable than ai slop.
This has really given me a jolt I needed and confidence to freely voice anything anywhere knowing that I make a difference against the flood of auto generated soulless garbage.
Flaws in human writing aren’t an issue, they are the very feature I look for. These exaggerations, hyperboles, emotions. It’s all unmistakably human.
Even 4chan is an oasis of humanity in that way. Indeed it is bristling with genuine creativity despite its sole ingredient is 100% human flaws. No preservatives, no artificial sweeteners.
Holy shit I really wrote it quite fun, I encourage everyone to do the same have some fun writing because each one of us is now highly valued artist in a flood of ai slop literally no matter what you type I want to read your flawed shit.
Look, you can make all the rules you want but in the end vibe check is the only way to have any sort of quality.
Look at Reddit… abundance of rules do not save that place at all. It’s all about curating what kind of people your site attracts.
Reddit of course is a business so they don’t care about anything other than max number of ad views.
Small non profit forums should consciously design a site to deter group(s) of people that they do not want.
It's not about the rules. It is about intent. The rules are just there to alert newcomers and repeat offenders to the fact that they are in fact not operating according to the rules. That way there is something to point to. Then they can go 'oh, I didn't know that, sorry', and then it is all fine or they can do an 'orf'[1] and persist and then you throw them right out.
I feel like you are being a bit contradictory: the suggestion is to dissuade AI content - isn't that "design[ing] a site to deter group(s) of people that they don't want"? I personally don't want to vibe check every HN comment if I can avoid it, I don't even think you can quantify that in any meaningful way. We can engender a site like that at least in spirit. It may be equally as difficult but it's still worth fighting for.
Rules aren’t known to be a. Easily enforceable in case of AI b. Very dissuading
I don’t think most people read any sort of TOS, site rules, end license agreements, when was the last time you ever did?
Besides, sometimes it’s worth it to keep a rule breaking user if they are interesting and have worthwhile things to say despite their… theoretical conflict with the site intended use. Rules are too crude of a tool. Especially in case of AI they are quite nebulous even in a world where detection would be perfect (it isn’t).
What you want is to design a site that pulls people that value genuine human interaction. Niche sites are already immune to commerce and adversary bots because no one cares/knows about them. Well this site isn’t that niche I guess, some corporate astroturfing happens.
I am on one niche subculture social media and it has suprisingly well made design that is paramount to who it caters and who it dissuades. The result is lack of text ai content even though it isn’t obvious at first glance. LGBT flags are everywhere to dissuade the chuds. Israel flags are present to dissuade the annoying politics ppl from reddit. Lots of artsy stuff to speak to the genuine creativity.
It looks stupid but it isn’t stupid. It’s actually quite ingenious.
HN is probably already dead as it is too high profile in certain circles to avoid mainstream adversarial AI content.
It sounds different but it is great in its own right and priced adequately to how amazing it sounds. Maybe 'alternative' is a wrong word. I think I meant 1:1 replica.
Also it doesn't come with ring modulator nor ribbon. I think black corp synthesizers are inspired by the original vintage devices and are great on their own but there are justified reasons to also avoid them mostly because of common issues that arise when you buy a niche product from a tiny company thousands of kilometers away.
>common issues that arise when you buy a niche product from a tiny company thousands of kilometers away.
Sorry, this is just negative - but anyway, have you played with both?
I have. There are differences but they are minor and you can very definitely accomplish an approximation of the CS80 'sound' with the DD. It sold out for a reason.
Either way though, if you have an opportunity to have a real CS80 in the studio, as I do, you are very right in saying that it is an amazing beast.
my high school had a cs-70 and it poisoned me for life. that being said, theres a pretty big leap in terms of accessibility vs a browser based synth and you dont need $10,000 to play it so that's nice
Interesting. In my little project I only need one generation of hex tiled terrain but based on certain lore and vision for thousands of objects with different lore. I tell LLM to research the lore and paint the terrain using json in chunks. Some results are shit, some results are great. Still, it would be impossible manually. I can always do another pass for unsatisfying results with different prompt engineering.
I don’t live in US or five eyes so I pirate all the stuff basically Scot free.
I understand that it’s not so easy for Americans whose internet activity is constantly scrutinized. I’ve had the privilege of choosing exactly who and what I pay.
I usually don’t subscribe to any streaming service, but when I do choose to pay for something, my money goes to smaller entities that I don’t actively want to see fail.
In my book, none of the Hollywood deserves a single cent. It’s an amazing feeling to be in the power to dictate this.
>In my book, none of the Hollywood deserves a single cent. It’s an amazing feeling to be in the power to dictate this.
Then you don't consume it...you boycott it. Freeloading on honest consumers isn't some kind of moral high ground. If Hollywood is corrupt and full of shitheads, letting someone else pay for your ticket doesn't make you a morally pure viewer.
It's fine if you just own that you don't want to pay for what you consume. But don't try and paint yourself like some kind of saint, lol
The whole concept of intellectual property rights is a social and legal construct designed to promote innovation in an economy. If you don't care about that, then there really isn't any moral or immoral aspect to it. The immorality of it and associating it with stealing was just MPAA propaganda to try to shame people into paying for stuff.
If I found some DVD lying on the ground and watched it and I didn't pay for it, it's really up to me to decide if I want to pay the creator so they can continue to produce content. If I don't pay then obviously it doesn't help them produce more content... but the consumption of the content itself neither felt nor heard by the creators.
The bedrock of the argument is that you give for what you take. This is very fundamental, not just some capitalist drivel. You'd be hard pressed to find a single level headed individual who could form a coherent argument against it (generally speaking, not just protracted edge cases). Even your most hippie communist commune requires giving in order to receive.
People act (many even think) like this doesn't apply to digital goods, since copying has no material cost. But producing that digital good costs time and money (anyone on HN care to disagree?). So then you have to decide who are the ones who pay and who are the ones who get free copies. Conveniently, everyone who is getting a free copy thinks that they have a rightful stake to it for free. And because nothing is actually free (see the first line), the ones paying are the ones also covering the cost for those who get is free.
I wouldn't expect teenagers to grasp this, after all we were the teenagers who devised this "piracy as a moral crusade" back in the 90's/00's (how convenient that a side effect of this moral crusade was all the free content your dead broke ass could imagine). But now, if you are in your 30's or older and still haven't logic'ed this out, it's time to catch up.
Simple: people who want it to exist can fund its creation. People who are indifferent or don't want it to exist can choose not to, and once it exists, there's obviously no moral question either way. We already have lifetimes of media available. It costs nothing to replicate infinitely. Do we need to specifically incentivize more?
I think the world would also be a lot better off if software could all be freely distributed and if warranty law required software sales to come with source as well. If you need the computer to do something, you pay a programmer to make it so. You or that programmer can then share the solution with others. The goal is to solve more problems and build a wealthier society for our children, not create rent extraction machines.
Likewise with things like the textbook racket. The government should just commission updates for k-12 books (including AP, so basic uni) every ~15 years or so. Most of this stuff is not changing. It should be "done".
> Even your most hippie communist commune requires giving in order to receive.
I was born into a hippie commune/network and the basic premise was that everybody gives voluntarily by mere existence and free desire to do so, and that whatever ends up being given can be taken/distributed. There was no “requirement to give” since what you provide often cannot even be identified or accounted for (and there was explicitly no interest in doing that). Maybe you’re a good listener, or good in helping with the kids. And so on. Actually, I know plenty of open communities that more or less work that way. In the US, they generally need a bit more safeguards against random external freeloaders (hurt people not familiar with community care) than in Europe but they exist just fine.
Apart from commune experiences: I do believe every human has a deep-seated desire and need to contribute positively and “give back” to their social environment. You don’t need to be forced or nudged to do it; you get sick/depressed if you’re not allowed to bring your talent to the table. (I understand that sometimes there’s too much pain/hurt on the surface that needs recognition before people can return to more natural ways of “giving back”; but more often than not, it is related to the desire to give but being rejected than any taking.)
And more back to your point: I disagree with the notion that every giving and taking is (or needs to be) a distinct and direct transaction. Even in capitalism. The money/time/talent a person “saves” on “freeloading” will be “spent”/given back elsewhere.
> But producing that digital good costs time and money (anyone on HN care to disagree?)
Not disagree, but it is more nuanced than this I think. I spend a fair amount of money going to movie theaters, usually independent movie theaters but sometimes big ones, to see new releases. As I understand it, the production and funding model relies almost entirely on the box office numbers. I think when dealing with older releases, the waters are much murkier.
I end up seeing new things in person and paying a huge premium to do so. I won't pretend I do it for moral reasons or even strictly to support the creators (although I do it in part to support the independent theater itself). It does keep me from feeling bad for also running a media server, on which maybe 1% of the content is newer than 5 years old, though.
I have almost never bought a physical copy of a movie -- and in my mind the IP holders are usually terrible curators of their own content. Physical media is provided in a horribly limited and anti-consumer format, tied to ephemeral standards and technology and often embedded with advertisements and few subtitle options. Digital products are, somehow, worse. Tied to a walled garden, with no true 'ownership', sometimes platforms like Amazon video will even make their own edits to movies, removing crucial parts for no apparent reason (the wicker man, avatar) and without marking it as abridged. They often make decisions that scream 'cash grab' (i.e. years ago when TNG came on netflix, I went to stream it and was shocked at the potato quality. Later re-releases were released in an un-cropped widescreen that included things like boom mikes because of the original intended aspect ratio of the show.) DRM is a nightmare. The product I want -- a file containing the media and only the media, which I can view however I want without logging into anybody's servers -- does not exist. And if it did exist, well, I do also take issue with paying full price for a file of a 40 year old movie, for example. I know there are costs associated with remasters, etc, but most of these are not remasters (and those costs are also much much lower than outright movie production).
A notable exception is outfits like Vinagar Syndrome, who as a labor of love dig up lost media and often re-cut or remaster / distribute it, and due to the low scale and lack of demand likely do not make much if any profit off it. I often do see showings of Vinegar Syndrome releases at my indie theater though or rent them from the one remaining video rental place (I'm unsure whether or not that benefits the production company).
It probably gets more hairy for people who watch a lot of new serialized media, which I do not.
I kind of wish people would think critically about the gradient of potential consumption habits when making their media choices rather than separating into pro / anti piracy stances, because it's an interesting and multi-faceted topic with a lot of considerations to be made.
I don't consume it because it's crap, but IMO someone who doesn't give money to Disney (a company that pushes gambling on people and is a major reason our copyright laws are broken in the first place) is more moral than someone who does, and the downloading itself is amoral. So if you're going to watch it, might as well pirate.
Any $10/mo VPN solves this, and probably advertises it as a selling point.
Of course, then you're spending $10 to save $10....
I have the whole *arr stack setup with Plex running in the US just fine, but that's for sure not for everyone and was a few headaches to get up and running
>Of course, then you're spending $10 to save $10....
Most VPN subscriptions are around $5, whereas netflix with ads costs $8, and $18 without ads. Even at $18 though, it's still not 4K, whereas you can easily pirate 4K versions with your VPN subscription.
Appreciate the reality check. Mullvad has been a bill I don't think about twice when it comes around, and I cancelled streaming services years ago.
To your point though, as I'm running my plex server on an old ~midrange laptop, 4K is pretty rough for me to stream as well. I'm sure better hardware fixes this, but that's higher cost. YMMV based on what hardware you have on hand to repurpose
>To your point though, as I'm running my plex server on an old ~midrange laptop, 4K is pretty rough for me to stream as well.
Unless you're doing reencodes processing power shouldn't matter. You can serve 4K video on a 2010s router if you wanted to. If you're doing reencodes, why bother? Download an encode that's appropriate for how you're watching it. 4K for the big screen and 1080p for mobile. Skip reencoding altogether.
Piracy is dead simple these days. Search for “[media name] free streaming” on Yandex and you get a high quality stream with subtitles and multiple audio choices. This works for most stuff, though not everything is available this way.
I don’t think it’s totally worthless. I think people who make it, producers, are extremely corrupted friends of Jeffrey Epstein with each one sooner or later turning out to be a sex offender.
There is a difference.
If you have any sort of conscience you simply don’t want to fund these people. Don’t enable them. Let it wither. Nothing of particular value will be lost.
>I think people who make it, producers, are extremely corrupted friends of Jeffrey Epstein with each one sooner or later turning out to be a sex offender.
This applies to everything that comes out of Hollywood?
Then why consume the stuff at all? What a weird stance. "They're all vile and evil, but I like watching shows, so whatever, tee hee - piracy is morally good now as long as I have this invented fiction in my head!"
This is a good question. If it is so cheap and easy then why not? I think it is a matter of american government and corporate terror tactic.
They make these few rare cases when they catch somebody so loud and showy that the rest of the flock prefers to sign all the TOS and don’t have this additional worry. It is a success story of manipulative scare techniques that copyright corpos mastered.
Most people prefer to be civilians than to be anti corporate combatants, even if it is perfectly safe in practice. This is normal.
I have this idea that probably violates some law of computing but I am really stubborn to make it happen somehow.
I want a game that generates its own mechanics on the fly using AI. Generates itself live.
Infinite game with infinite content. Not like no mans sky where everything is painfully predictable and schematic to a fault. No. Something that generates a whole method of generating. Some kind of ultra flexible communication protocol between engine and AI generator that is trained to program that protocol.
Develop it into a framework.
Use that framework to create one game. A dwarf fortress adventure mode 2.0
I have no other desires, I have no other goals, I don’t care. I or better yet - someone else, must do it.
It sounds doable. An AI can be made to keep modifying a game's codebase. I imagine it'd be easiest to separate out a scripting layer for game mechanics & behavior that AI can iterate quickly on, although of course it could more riskily modify the engine itself.
Then you could open voting up to a community for a weekly mechanics-change vote (similar to that recent repo where public voting decided what the AI would do next), and AI will implement it with whatever changes it sees fit.
Honestly, without some dedicated human guidance and taste, it would probably be more of a novelty that eventually lost its shine.
I appreciate them doing the right thing in this one particular instance but I can’t say that I feel anything but hatred toward the people who chose to enrich and empower themselves by casting the very existence of humanity at risk.
If you invest money so mindlessly that you don’t even check what you buy, then no legislation in the world will manage to protect you from your own mind
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