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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: August 27th, 2023

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  • Look, if the minimum wage is half a dollar, I doubt the doctors are making 100k a year. I don’t consider us a great country, but it’s easier to immigrate here than Luxembourg which is my point. It’s not the best but it’s easily better than half the world, and the best places have stricter requirements that make it impossible for most. Mind you, even immigrating here was hard before trump, just easier than better places.

    It just seems hollow to tell people to stay home and find somewhere better, when their choice are between here and Iran for example.

    I also don’t think it’s fair, the current state of the world is a direct consequence of the colonial and imperialistic mindset. You still have to be realistic and honest about it.





  • I misspoke when I said “most”. I’m just saying that with all its faults, there are many worst places to live in.

    Certain countries are in the middle of civil wars, even genocide. Being gay is a death sentence in others while women rights in many basically don’t exist.

    We also don’t have open borders, it’s not like people get a list with every country and all they have to do is pick.

    It strikes me as first world problems and not understanding the actual living conditions in half the world or how immigration works to say “why would anyone come here”.





  • It’s beside the point. I’m simply saying that AI will improve in the next year. The cost to do so or all the others things that money could be spent on doesn’t matter when it’s clearly going to be spent on AI. I’m not in charge of monetary policies anywhere, I have no say in the matter. I’m just pushing back on the fantasies. I’m hoping the open source scene survives so we don’t end up in some ugly dystopia where all AI is controlled by a handful of companies.







  • Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, has two cards to play that might pop the AI bubble. If she does so, Trump’s presidency will be thrown into crisis.

    First, Dutch company ASML commands a global monopoly on the microchip-etching machines that use light to carve patterns on silicon. These machines are essential for Nvidia, the AI microchip giant that is now the world’s most valuable company. ASML is one of Europe’s most valuable companies, and European banks and private equity are also invested in AI. Withholding these silicon-etching machines would be difficult for Europe, and extremely painful for the Dutch economy. But it would be far more painful for Trump.

    The US’s feverish investment in AI and the datacentres it relies on will hit a wall if European export controls slow or stop exports to the US – and to Taiwan, where Nvidia produces its most advanced chips. Via this lever, Europe has the means to decide whether and by how much the US economy expands or contracts.

    Second, and much easier for Europe, is the enforcement of the EU’s long-neglected data rules against big US tech companies. Confidential corporate documents made public in US litigation show how vulnerable companies such as Google can be to the enforcement of basic data rules. Meanwhile, Meta has been unable to tell a US court what its internal systems do with your data, or who can access it, or for what purpose.

    This data free-for-all lets big tech companies train their AI models on masses of everyone’s data, but it is illegal in Europe, where companies are required to carefully control and account for how they use personal data. All Brussels has to do is crack down on Ireland, which for years has been a wild west of lax data enforcement, and the repercussions will be felt far beyond.