Living in the middle of a dense city does improve quality of life for many people via access to amenities and jobs with a very short commute. A hypothetical 50 story skyscraper can provide these benefits to 50 times as many people as a single story building could.
You're right that light and sky visibility are finite resources that require more land. 100+ story buildings can feel oppressive to people. The question to ask then is why we allocate so little land to mid-rise development and force it all into Manhattan and small downtowns. That's the biggest reason we have such tall buildings there.
"Homebuilders don’t seem to think the burdens of OSHA and other safety regulations are all that high. Complying with OSHA is the second lowest category of perceived jobsite regulatory costs."
A few differences compared to other commercial iPhone-based capture techniques:
- Whole-clip solve instead of noisy frame-by-frame streaming
- Automatically generating a face model to calibrate the rig
- Solving from raw sensor data instead of Apple ARKit pose data
VFX studios typically develop proprietary solutions a few years in advance, so it can be hard to say what is truly "new and different."
There is the widest variety of deep cultural experiences, events, and food next door to you than anywhere else in the world. You never have a reason to drive, but are still in the US; no traffic jam, instead reading hacker news on a relaxing subway ride or walk into work. Retail businesses are no bullshit fast and efficient. Every type of job opportunity surrounds you. It's the safest comparable city in the US.
The only things on your list that you can't get in every other city with more than a couple hundred thousand people is specific museums, seeing Broadway shows immediately upon release, and ultra-high end restaurants.
I wouldn't brag about NYC's beaches and skiing.
I’m not hating on the city, just pointing out that New Yorkers often believe that only NYC has stuff and every other city is a barren wasteland.
Sounds quite measurable actually, so forgive me if I don't take your word for it. A promising new drug with a hidden side effect that is, for example, only observable 10-20 years later, could conceivably kill far more people than all the good drugs waiting to be approved could save.
I agree things could be sped up for things that treat terminal conditions, but that's not the majority of pharmaceuticals and even there, the situation isn't that simple.
Exactly this. One of the reasons Maya remains favored in studio environments is its strong API stability guarantees. Python is excellent for automation when performance is less of a concern.
The Chinese situation is caused by government rather than by their culture. Chinese corporations are forced into inefficient state-mandated investments and provide meager rates of returns for shareholders. They get tons of shiny public infrastructure while savers are given nothing, and are not allowed to invest internationally. In other words, it is pure financial repression.
Incentivizing people to own their primary residence tax-free kills almost 90% of the Georgist incentive structure. The only justification for doing that is if you consider homes an investment asset. Almost all homeowners own only one home and would have the exact same incentives to advocate development restrictions. Governments would forego almost all of the land value tax and be forced to continue with high levels of other less efficient taxes.
Healthcare in this country is so broken. This industry should be made as simple efficient and affordable as visiting Walgreens. The regulations, the cartel-like barriers to competition, the behemoth corporate powers. The only way to get adequate care is to become so rich you can escape the whole thing.
I've received COVID vaccinations at Walgreens, but nothing else you'd call health care. I would imagine that if the industry limited itself to filling prescriptions (though prescribed by whom?) and selling aspirin etc., it could be very simple, efficient, and affordable.
You're right that light and sky visibility are finite resources that require more land. 100+ story buildings can feel oppressive to people. The question to ask then is why we allocate so little land to mid-rise development and force it all into Manhattan and small downtowns. That's the biggest reason we have such tall buildings there.