The architecture of the agentic apps will force you to evolve your engineering platform and deployment story. Artificial intelligence is making a lot of people rethink the old CRUD interface to their business apps and agents take it a step further. Agents build on the advantages of AI interfaces (https://mikebz.com/llms-will-change-ux-of-business-apps-a9de... ) with a feedback loop that allows the agent to complete more sophisticated tasks.
a lot of debate here but one thing is not a debate: both parties want to portray the other one as a devil, in truth the actually both are going to be OK. We had Trump for 4 years, we basically had Harris for 4 years. We are not China or Venezuela. Everyone relax and figure out how to focus on similarities rather than difference. One Love!
Pretty low chance of that happening haha. The one similarity I see between both parties is they both have a ton of money in the stock market and so do the corporations that lobby them. So my political stance is to keep following their investments because they have both shown a willingness to do backflips to keep everything moving up.
More like, they're both equally shitty for the average person. We should focus on how little they've done collectively for the people. If people would just stop registering as one or the other they might be a little more objective about how shit they both are.
Who didn't have much of an answer when I asked him who it was that enacted Medicaid, which paid for the major surgery his son needed when he was born that the parents could not possibly have paid for. He also didn't have much of an answer when I asked him who constantly wants to nibble away at Medicaid, as a testimony to their fundamental opposition to such a "safety net".
The Democrats have lots and lots of problems, including deference to the rich and corporations. But for all their failings, they have consistently attempted to make the lives of regular people a little bit better and sometimes even succeeded.
The problem is we are not holding both parties accountable for not doing their jobs. They have stopped working together. That is a total failure. They all should be fired by all objective measure of doing your fucking job. Those of us who share some ideals with both parties have nowhere to turn. Having said that I can’t in good conscience vote for republicans this cycle. The democrats have finally seen the light and stopped highlighting some of their more polarizing agenda items, while the republicans just continue to double down on the extremism.
Parties don't have jobs in government. Elected representatives do. I don't believe that working together is necessarily a part of the job, though it can be productive and even nice when they do.
If you have nowhere to turn, start a new party, instead of imagining that the role of the existing parties is to cater to your particular political outlook. And yes, that won't work, so first work to change the electoral system.
Herein lies the problem, I want single payer healthcare, I don’t think guns are a problem on their own. I think we should have safety nets, but they shouldn’t be long term handouts. Both parties spend like drunken sailors whether it’s on social programs or the military. Our two party system is fucked.
Technology goes in waves, when a large breakthrough in technology then opens up an opportunity for a lot of small applications of that technology. I wrote some thoughts on Web 2.0 / SaaS startup wave: https://mikebz.com/tech-startups-and-railroad-tracks-d1d5948...
The Mobile wave and SaaS wave are gone, it's possible that AI will open up a lot of small applications or AI Bot economy, but we will see.
The low capitalization means that you are mostly writing gluecode and winning on UX, not really doing breakthrough technology innovation that has no revenue for 5-7 years.
Are we going to keep avoiding the fact that the population growth can not be the goal any more? In fact it's better for this planet if the number of people actually decreased? BTW no on is advocating doing it forcefully, but just through distributing contraception and educating women, that seems keep the population stable.
The "exponential growth forever" microsecond of human history will be looked on as a fever dream in the future, and hopefully the masses who support that ideology will be remembered with the same contempt as slavers.
Then we need to shut down the "Western world". A blanket ban on excess overbreeding and polluting technology. Maybe the NWO should consider using their stockpiles of sterilization drugs bound for the water supplies...
Degrowth as a concept is about economic growth. Not only is it popular with the far-left/environmentalist intersection, they don't seem to want to consider population at all. Part of this is because it feels incongruent with their stance on immigration, even though they aren't the same things.
Even those enthusiastic about economic growth are at least more likely to be honest with themselves that scaling up is creating pressure on the environment, despite the improvements in innovation. This is because of soaring global demand (particularly from the East). There are, of course, techno-optimists who want to believe that a sustainable future is a foregone conclusion. Even if we think we'll get there eventually, the damage in the meantime can be considerable.
we can support a larger population, but we can't support a larger population at the current meat consumption levels
I guess we'll find out if we're willing to eat less meat, or if we'd rather a certain % of the global population to starve... so far it's looking like the latter
> we can support a larger population, but we can't support a larger population at the current meat consumption levels
All environmental encroachment and emissions scale with demand. It's reductionist to only talk about meat; it's not the only reason people want to migrate to the West. Notwithstanding, demands for alternatives have shot up in Western countries and land-use for cattle has not actually increased in the US. As countries in developing world lift themselves out of poverty, they consume more meat (and fuel, gadgets, etc).
Even if you hypothetically cut down meat consumption in the West, emissions would still rise to levels that would exacerbate climate change. It's not enough. And "degrowth" is such an injust hardship to demand of developing countries that it's amazing people consider it an actual possibility. Some combination of tough policy measures (in the short-run) and innovation is what we can expect, probably after things get worse.
Ultimately global population growth is going to stall, in less than 100 years. by then whether people eat meat will be a moot point. Demand won't grow, and renewables will have taken over the market.
people who think it can’t be done are either rich, or terrified of the rich
the tax system can eliminate the extreme waste at the top and make the lives of vulnerable people better
we don’t need private jets, yachts, cruise ships, 3 ton personal vehicles, people who own multiple private homes, private golf courses, lawns in deserts, almond farms in deserts, iot garbage, plastic everything…
we refuse to stop opulent garbage, it’s mental illness
> people who think it can’t be done are either rich, or terrified of the rich
This is a wishful projection.
> the tax system can eliminate the extreme waste at the top and make the lives of vulnerable people better
I'm pro progressive taxation, but that really has no bearing here.
> we don’t need private jets, yachts, cruise ships, 3 ton personal vehicles, people who own multiple private homes, private golf courses, lawns in deserts, almond farms in deserts, iot garbage, plastic everything…
You don't need almost everything you own and take for granted to survive. Who's going to decide what people need, you? The great thing about liberal democracy is we can decide for ourselves.
At any rate, the increases in global emissions are owing to growing global demand particularly from East Asia as they are developing their middle class. You're overestimating the impact of things like private jets; the ultra-wealthy are few in number, and the new affluent class leans left (see: tech billionaires). Even if you put restrictions on these (and we can, why not), it would not make much of a difference.
Restrictions can be warranted (say, for SUV purchases, though this will be moot once they all switch to EV), but customers respond better to incentives. A good example of this is Green HOme subsidies in many countries, that give cash to citizens for improving their home insulation, which lowers heat/AC use, which lowers emissions. Milk alternatives and plant based products are also wildly popular with consumers even if they don't go vegan officially.
The simple issue is that in the calculation "amount_of_people * amount_of_consumption > carrying_capacity", only one of them is easily advocated for in an ethical manner. We have a loooooooong history of measure taken to reduce population always fucking over the minoritized. Ironically, those are the people least likely to have caused the problem in the first place.
TLDR: Veganism is easier to advocate for than not having kids. I say that as a childfree vegan.
Beautiful... except they can't even compete with Amazon on shipping (literally had to have 3 things re-delivered just in the last 2 weeks). I would focus on their current business first.
As usual, anecdotes are anecdotes. I consistently have a great experience with FedEx. It's almost like its a huge company that is only as effective as the humans that execute it's operations in a given area.
In other news, people in different areas share wildly different experiences with the quality of their local McDonalds service. The jury is out, is McDonalds service entirely and objectively good or entirely and objectively bad? We investigate at 11.
I dread receiving anything by FedEx. UPS is fine. I would frequently just get stuff not delivered by FedEx and then be expected to go to a warehouse to pick it up, which via public transportation is a two/three hour round trip.
In the past few years (including this past week) Fedex has lost or broken quite a few of the packages I've sent or received. They took no responsibility for smashing a monitor I shipped for RMA that their Fedex Store employees packed, using the box that those employees recommended. (I know better now. Do not trust them to pack anything fragile or important. Always take pictures before shipping.) I now actively avoid them as a choice if there's any other option.
This is actually a pretty interesting comparison. McDonald’s is franchised and so quality is highly dependent on the franchisee. FedEx is the odd one out in major delivery companies in that their model subcontracts to local companies in a similar fashion with the expected wild variance in quality. UPS is wholly owned and operated as a comparison.
Interesting, but I contend that even without a franchise model, you still have humans doing the work in the end, and human error and inconsistency varies greatly per human. You might say the bad workers would get fired in a well functioning company, but then if there's a high churn rate, that isn't a guarantee of high quality at that low a level in an organization.
The problem is that with how these companies are set up, if the humans are doing the work well they're basically doing it in spite of the company. Left to their own judgement, vanishingly few humans are going to (leave a package that's actively leaking oil paint; have a local terminal that can never be reached; leave packages down by the road instead of delivering them; falsely mark packages as delivered and then do it surreptitiously the next day). But the systems that command them highly incentivize such behavior in the name of never-ending "optimization" (aka corporate looting).
I also consistently have a great time working with FedEx, UPS, and USPS for both shipping and receiving. If something comes up for me, more than likely it's actually the shipper/receiver screwing something up with the paperwork on their end or the information provided to me.
Also, I'll mention that Amazon FBA isn't even competing for my money or time. I can't use them, since I don't sell anything through Amazon nor pay for Amazon Prime if I buy something from Amazon.
Meanwhile, FedEx and UPS are almost always available anywhere, and USPS also remains an option everywhere if the shipment is something they handle.
The FedEx driver for my route misdelivers constantly. I get deliveries for my house number but three streets away (1234 Foo St. instead of 1234 Bar Dr.) just about every couple of weeks. I've spoken to the driver and to customer support, but it still keeps happening.
I now know that "neighbor" and get greeted with a laugh every time I swing by to drop off their packages.
To be in that same boat as your story makes me wonder if it's a systemic bug. But also, holy hell, how is routing a truck to a street address not a solved problem in 2024?
I would also have accepted if they'd leave the EXIF data in their "delivery proof" images, so I can do my own GPS navigation, because the picture of some piece of grass with my box sitting on it, shockingly, is not a good way to track down lost parcels
If I could snap my fingers and end FedEx as a company I would do it without any hesitation. Hell, in a more constructive vein: if I could pay to ensure that no one ever used FedEx to ship something to me, I'd do that, too (even as I write that I'm cognizant that's perverse incentives for FedEx improving, but it would be a more likely fix than just praying for FedEx to go out of business anytime soon; it'd be like shipping insurance but in the other direction)
I wouldn't be happy about that. The innovation generally stops when the folks who really know the customer and have the audacity to pull the trigger on big changes are replaced.
I got it when it was in limited beta. It's underwhelming. First problem is that it's another app on your phone instead of using the Wallet app. It's not clear why you wouldn't just use the Android/Apple app.
The second problem is that even the SFO airport doesn't take them as legitimate IDs.
For the folks who are worried about giving your phone to the cop - I guess I am not worried about it much. The cop has the right to lethal force and probably knows more about the situation when you are stopped than you ever will. So they take a look at your phone? I don't assume they will just take and keep it.
If you need to call your mom, probably best not to call her when the cop is right in front of you. If you need to call your lawyer - you are permitted to do that by law. If you are Googling for what your rights are - you are doing it way too late.
If you hand the cop your unlocked phone, and they hop over from the ID app to other apps and find evidence they think implicates you in a crime, what happens?
If you hand the cop your phone, and then say “hey I need that back to call my lawyer” and they say “Sorry, no, I need to keep this for processing”, what happens?
There are cases every day where cops are just outright wrong about the law, your rights, or their own department’s policies. The law protects them from being either criminally or civilly implicated in most of those cases, because they’re not expected to be experts in the law. For most purposes, to have a case against a law enforcement officer for violating your rights, you’d need to show that their behavior was so egregious that it was crystal clear they should have known their action was a violation of your rights. And courts have looked very favorably on LEOs historically in this context: things that to a lay person would count as “obvious” have not met that bar.
So while you may, after spending a pile of money, time, and energy, find out that yes, the police officer overstepped, you’ve still been severely impacted by their action.
Yeah better hope you don't get a text message that gets the cops attention while he has your phone. Say... one that happens to contain one of the many hundreds of slang terms for drugs that the DEA maintains https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2018-07/DIR-022-18.p...
This feels like a weird pitch. Yes, the way it works right now is that it loads a fresh QR code every time. But that’s a design choice they made, and they could make a different one. We’ve managed to make secure payments work using phone Wallets, and for those, the phone is performing a handshake with the reader as opposed to sending fixed, static credentials. Likewise, when I add an airline ticket to my Wallet, it automatically updates periodically if my gate or flight time change. Why wouldn’t we be able to find a similar solution here?
