Народ выставил на фейсбуке подборку картинок из альтернативной реальности. Если бы перестройка не случилась, и советский народ продолжил строить коммунизм.
Добыл редкую книжку: описание вызовов биоса с кучей примеров на Си. Дискета с исходниками, приложенная к книжке, успешно прочиталась. Я выложил на Гитхаб:
Here is his Wikipedia page, he also has served as Vice Chancellor of Fiji National University, and worked extensively as a development director for Cambridge. Here is his personal home page.
Big infrastructure projects in the developing world for things like water and electricity are under-pressure. Chinese and US funding is down and these projects often fall apart due to corruption and political incentives to build but not maintain. It is possible to break old institutions and establish new ones, but “there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.” Connor Tabarrok gives a great example. Ek Son Chan in Cambodia:
In 1993, the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority was a catastrophe. The city was emerging from decades of war and genocide. Only 20 percent of the city had connections at all, and water flowed for just 10 hours a day. 72 percent of the water was non revenue water. It was lost to leaks or stolen through illegal connections.
Into this mess walked Ek Son Chan, a young Cambodian engineer appointed as Director General. Over the next two decades he executed an incredible institutional turnaround.
Chan replaced corrupt managers with qualified engineers. He got rid of unmetered taps. Every single connection received a meter and was billed. The old system of manual billing was replaced with a computerized system, which cut down on low level employees giving out free water and receiving kickbacks. Bill collection rates went from 48 percent to 99.9 percent. These changes were intensely unpopular, and Chan faced fierce resistance from rent seekers, from freeloading customers to his own employees. He established an incentive system based on bonuses among the workers, introduced an internal discipline system with a penalty for violators, and set up a discipline commission for all levels of the organization to deal with corruption
He divided the distribution network into pressure zones with flow monitoring. A 24 hour leak detection team walked the streets at night with listening bars to identify underground leaks.
The institutional change dwarfed the infrastructural change, but was absolutely necessary to make the infrastructure investment worthwhile….
This commitment would not be untested. When Chan tried to enforce bill payment on Cambodia’s elite, and sent his team out to install a water meter on the property of a high ranking general who had been freeloading. The general refused the installation of a meter, so the team attempted to disconnect the water. The general and his bodyguards ran them off the property. When Chan heard of this, he decided not to back down, and mobilized his own team to dig up the pipe and install the meter. Always a leader from the front, Chan jumped in the hole to take a shift at digging. When he looked up, his team had fled, and he was facing down the general himself, pointing a gun at his head. In Cambodia in the 90s, consequences for such a high ranking official were unlikely. CHan didn’t give up. He mobilized the local armed police and returned with 20 men to standoff against the general, disconnected him from service and left him out to dry. Chan said this about the dispute:
”He had no water. My office was on the second floor and the general came in with his ten bodyguards to look for me. I said, “ No. You can come here alone, but with an appointment”. He couldn’t do anything. He had to return. He said, “Okay”! At that time we had a telephone, a very big Motorola. He came in to make an appointment for tomorrow. I said, “ Okay, tomorrow you come alone”. So he comes alone, we talk. “Okay. I’ll reconnect on two conditions. The first condition is that you have to sign a commitment saying that you will respect the Water Supply Authority and second, you need to pay a penalty for your bad behavior and you must allow us to broadcast the situation to the public, or no way, no water in your house”. So he agreed. “
….By 2010, coverage in the city went from 25 percent to over 90 percent with 24 hour service. The utility became financially self sustaining and turned a profit. It was listed on the Cambodia Securities Exchange in 2012. Chan won the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 2006.
By separating the utility company from the low-capacity local government, Ek and PPWSA proved that:
Functional infrastructure relies on institutional quality and mechanism design.
Back in the heady days of macOS 14, you could customize the default reset-to environment of the "guest" user (Safari bookmarks, items on Dock, etc.) by copying stuff into "/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/". And of course macOS 26 seems to have completely fucked this. How do you accomplish this now?
The establishment of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in July 1948 was one of the most consequential health policy interventions of the twentieth century, providing universal and free access to medical care and substantially expanding maternal and infant health services. In this paper, we estimate the causal effect of the NHS introduction on early-life mortality and we test whether survival is selective. We adopt a regression discontinuity design under local randomization, comparing individuals born just before and just after July 1948. Leveraging newly digitized weekly death records, we document a significant decline in stillbirths and infant mortality following the introduction of the NHS, the latter driven primarily by reductions in deaths from congenital conditions and diarrhea. We then use polygenic indexes (PGIs), fixed at conception, to track changes in population composition, showing that cohorts born at or after the NHS introduction exhibit higher PGIs associated with contextually-adverse traits (e.g., depression, COPD, and preterm birth) and lower PGIs associated with contextually-valued traits (e.g., educational attainment, self-rated health, and pregnancy length), with effect sizes as large as 7.5% of a standard deviation. These results based on the UK Biobank data are robust to family-based designs and replicate in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing and the UK Household Longitudinal Study. Effects are strongest in socioeconomically disadvantaged areas and among males. This novel evidence on the existence and magnitude of selective survival highlights how large-scale public policies can leave a persistent imprint on population composition and generate long-term survival biases.
Брала сегодня билет на поезд. Всё меняется буквально на глазах. Те поезда, которые раньше ходили каждый день, теперь ходят через день. 128-й поезд (который через Крыжополь) сократили до Днепра, уже не едет в Запорожье. До 20 марта он еще ходит через Кривой Рог, после 20 марта уже круг почета по Кривому Рогу не делает.
В Кривом Роге и окресностях постоянно обстреливают поезда и железную дорогу, электрички отменяют. Нет уже электричек из Кривого Рога через Апостолово в Никополь. И из Днепра не до Апостолово ходит, а только до Лошкаревки.
86-й поезд всё еще ходит до Запорожья. И даже иногда не высаживают людей на автобусы в Днепре, а именно до Запорожья довозят и из Запорожья везут поездом. (Вчера знакомый волонтер из Запорожья ехал).
На Самар (Новик) нифига не ходит, хотя пассажирский поезд из Львова зачем-то висит в расписании. Только электричка (пригородный поезд) на Красноград, который сейчас называется Берестином.
Но главная сейчас проблема - это то, что рашенские дроны летают над поездами, поэтому пассажиров эвакуируют в чистое поле и состав стоит несколько часов.
Borrowing a phrase from Emily Gerren, here is today’s addition to:
That was Donato Giancola??
My first video game cover, back in 1994, barely a year into my professional career. Created for the (un)forgettable game
‘Revengers of Vengeance!’
What a title. What quotes. What type design. A few more fonts could have been used.
A reinforcement of my principles to provide art to a client to the best of my abilities, but detach myself from how the final illustration will be used.
One might conjecture that there is an interesting fact concerning each of the positive integers. Here is a ‘proof by induction’ that such is the case. Certainly, 1, which is a factor of each positive integer, qualifies, as do 2, the smallest prime; 3, the smallest odd prime; 4, Bieberbach’s number; etc. Suppose the set S of positive integers concerning each of which there is no interesting fact is not vacuous, and let k be the smallest member of S. But this is a most interesting fact concerning k! Hence S has no smallest member and therefore is vacuous. Is the proof valid?
— Edwin F. Beckenbach, “Interesting Integers,” American Mathematical Monthly, April 1945
На прошлой неделе в Нюрнберге прошла выставка промышленной электроники, с уклоном в искусственный интеллект. От нашей конторы там было много всякого. Покажу один один из демонстрируемых девайсов с нашим чипом. Это австрийская фирма Kontron.
Germany’s remaining research strengths are disproportionately concentrated in fields with limited commercial value. Consider climate science. German institutions co-lead with the United States. The Max Planck Institute in Hamburg, the UK Met Office Hadley Centre, ECMWF in Reading: these are world-class operations. Klaus Hasselmann won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physics for climate modeling. Genuine excellence. But climate research doesn’t directly generate economic returns. The value lies in technology. And yes, while some of the most important assets of the near future are subsumed under “climate technologies”, they are essentially the product of other research fields. Batteries, solar cells, carbon capture, and grid technology are all technologies stemming from engineering and materials science. These require strength in chemistry, materials science, and engineering. The fields where Germany is losing ground.
The Max Planck Society is Germany’s highest-performing research body in the Nature Index. Its ranking fell from 4th place globally in 2021 to 11th in 2025, an “unusually large” decline according to Nature. Chemistry tells the starkest tale: Max Planck consistently ranked in the top 5 from 2015 to 2021, then dropped to 10th in 2022, and sits at 14th in 2025. Physical sciences show a similar pattern: Max Planck held 2nd place from 2015 to 2022 before falling to 4th, where it has remained.
German patents were cited 14 percent less than comparable US patents in the 1980s, and that this gap widened to 41 percent by the 2000s. This represented a steeper decline than that observed for both the United Kingdom and Japan. More recent studies do not use the same dataset or methodology, but they point in a similar direction.
One reason might be that the top research institutes disincentivise high-risk high-reward R&D by denying young talent scientific independence. In the United States, the system is built on the ‘flat’ Principal Investigator (PI) model. A talented scientist in their early 30s can secure a tenure-track Assistant Professorship, win their own NIH or NSF grants, and run a fully independent lab. They succeed or fail on their own scientific agenda.
Germany, by contrast, operates on a hierarchical ‘fiefdom’ model.
На сцені ваєнний завод. На стіні заводу висить годинник. Годинник показує 16:58. Під годинником на низькому старті стоїть купка мудил. Мудили дивляться то на годинник, то на двері.
МУДИЛО В ПУХОВИКУ Та пашлі уже.
МУДИЛО У ВУШАНЦІ Да ну, нєпаложена, давай падаждьом на всякій случай.
МУДИЛО В ПУХОВИКУ (Закатує очі) Та какая разніца, пака да прахадной дайдьом уже пяць будєт.
МУДИЛО В ОКУЛЯРАХ У мєня так с брата прємію снялі.
Тривала тиша, під час якої чути нетерпляче перетоптування мудил на місці.
Годинник з особим цинізмом так саме показує 16:58.
МУДИЛО В ПУХОВИКУ Да што такоє, может часи сламалісь? (Звіряється з телефоном)
How corporate lobbying, think tank infrastructure, competing model legislation, and obscured funding networks are shaping age verification policy across 45 states and Congress.
This investigation documents a national lobbying operation spanning corporate spending, think tank infrastructure, dark money networks, and competing model legislation templates. Meta spent a record $26.3 million on federal lobbying in 2025, deployed 86+ lobbyists across 45 states, and covertly funded a group called the Digital Childhood Alliance (DCA) to advocate for the App Store Accountability Act (ASAA). But the operation extends beyond Meta. [...]
This investigation traced funding flows across five confirmed channels, analyzed $2.0 billion in dark money grants, searched 59,736 DAF recipients, parsed LD-2 filings, and mapped campaign contributions across four states to document the operation.
"Getting laid off without warning from my copywriting job has done wonders for my work-life-bloodthirsty mob balance," reports Taylor Grayden, 35, of Vancouver. "Back when I had a job I never would've had the free time to organize an unruly rabble and march towards the beach house of (Open AI CEO) Sam Altman. But now I'm getting so much more violent retribution accomplished in a day." [...]
"I felt so lost after I was let go at my analytics firm so my whole department could be replaced by Claude AI," explains Sarah Brightwell, 42, of Kingston, ON. "But then I started learning how to use AI as a tool -- specifically for planning a multi-week siege of the sprawling compound of Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei."
"Granted, the attack plans Claude spit out were full of hallucinations, but it got the ball rolling for me to organize my fellow unemployed humans and get marching," Brightwell adds, tightening the bolts on her homemade trebuchet. "After all, AI can't throw a molotov cocktail!" [...]
"Sure, we probably could have avoided this if we'd accompanied our artificial intelligence products with any kind of workable universal basic income system," explains Altman from one of his currently-burning $12.8 million San Francisco homes. "But I'd still rather die with all this money."
The reality is reassuringly mundane. Antimatter emitters are readily available at supermarkets in the form of bananas, which emit antiparticles through the radioactive decay of potassium. Sadly, they have limited value for understanding the universe. The device on Cern's truck will carry about 1,000 antimatter particles, weighing about a billionth of a trillionth of a gram. Should the containment fail, and the antimatter make contact with normal matter, the resulting pulse of energy would be so feeble, the load doesn't even warrant a radioactive label.
Since we had dozens of video game demo stations at our various GDC events this week, I snuck an XScreenSaver kiosk into the mix. I'm not sure anyone noticed it.
On Friday, government lawyers in the lawsuit filed a court record which said they asked the plaintiffs to remove the videos "from the internet due to concerns that the publication of the videos could subject the witnesses and their family members to undue harassment and reputational harm." The filing then said that Fox specifically "has been subject to harassment and has received a number of death threats since the videos and video clips were publicized and circulated."
Yes. South Africa really did have a tricameral Parliament under the 1983 Constitution, in force from 1984 until the democratic transition. But the phrase can mislead, because it sounds more pluralistic than it really was. The system created three racially separate parliamentary chambers: a House of Assembly for whites, a House of Representatives for Coloured South Africans, and a House of Delegates for Indian South Africans. The black African majority was excluded altogether from this Parliament.
The key to how it worked was the distinction between “own affairs” and “general affairs.” Each chamber could legislate for the “own affairs” of the racial group it represented; these included areas such as education, housing, welfare, local government, culture, and recreation. But the central levers of power—“general affairs”—remained matters such as defence, finance, foreign policy, justice, law and order, commerce, internal affairs, and agriculture. Those were handled at the center, not by the separate chambers acting independently.
Formally, then, it was a three-house legislature. In practice, it was a system of segregated representation plus retained white dominance. The constitutional text itself says Parliament consisted of the three Houses. But the white chamber was far larger and more institutionally powerful: the House of Assembly had 178 members, while the House of Representatives had 85 and the House of Delegates 45. The Constitution also vested executive authority in the State President, with different advisory structures for “own affairs” and “general affairs,” which further centralized power above the chambers themselves.
I'm going to be doing a little maintenance today. It will likely cause a tiny interruption of service (specifically for www.dreamwidth.org) on the order of 2-3 minutes while some settings propagate. If you're on a journal page, that should still work throughout!
If it doesn't work, the rollback plan is pretty quick, I'm just toggling a setting on how traffic gets to the site. I'll update this post if something goes wrong, but don't anticipate any interruption to be longer than 10 minutes even in a rollback situation.
Big coffee table size, it's got 400+ images, 100+ artists, lots of fun facts and jokes. It's a lot like this blog, but with some more context and history. Here are some nice photos of it from 50 Watts
Is there a way to find out who, having banned me, still comments my comments, and I can't read that comment and even figure out whom to mutually ban. It kind of gets on my nerves, although not much.
"Найвища честь, про яку може тільки мріяти чоловік — це можливість закрити своїм тілом рідний дім від того спустошення, яке приносить війна" Р. Хайнлайн "Зоряний десант"
Дякуємо всім побратимам і посестрам, всім Людям Доброї Волі, хто був із нами з перших днів, з того самого 2014-го.
А ще більше - тим, хто нині знаходить собі сили тримати стрій та продовжувати з честю виконувати свій чоловічий обов'язок та Присягу (байдуже, на "нулі" чи в тилу, зі зброєю в руках чи у забезпеченні - не суть). Нехай ми і надалі будемо достойні жертв тих, хто заплатив найвищу ціну за нашу Волю та Незалежність.
Ваш подвиг не буде забутий.
Продовжуємо працювати на нашу Перемогу! Працюємо, Хунто!
Current Location:Frontline of the Russo-Ukrainian War
Current Music:Sviatoslav (feat. Сергій Василюк) - Добровольці
One of the first stages of the [downward spiral] after alcohol [consumption]. This stage appears prior to 'Stinking' and is often characterised by [hunching] over bars and been sprawled out on chairs/sofas.
A shape [rotator] is someone with high visuospatial ability. Contrasts with with [wordcel], i.e. someone with high verbal ability.
It's a term [based on] puzzles used in some IQ tests that require the test-taker to mentally rotate or unfold a shape to see which shape it matches up with.
Reuters reports the rand ended 2025 nearly 13% stronger against the dollar, its biggest annual gain in 16 years, helped by a broadly weaker USD, an improvement in South Africa’s fiscal position, strong precious‑metal prices, S&P’s credit‑rating upgrade, and removal from the FATF “grey list.”
While it is now more expensive than before, Cape Town is one of the very best tourist experiences you can have right now, anywhere. For “social science interesting” it is A+, English suffices, it has some of the best scenery, near perfect weather, it has layers and layers of history, with many distinct neighborhoods and “worlds” contained within, and it can be done safely. The food is very tasty, but not original enough to be the reason to come here. Plus there is wildlife, most notably the largest penguin colony at Boulder Bay, or safari if you wish to go a few hours out of town. Zeitz art museum is excellent, and you will not see those works in any other countries. From Dulles you can fly here direct.
Многие играли в DOOM когда-то, но мало кто помнит, что там за история. Откуда взялись все те чудища и ужасы? Вот изложение от ИИ в стиле Шехерезады. К вопросу о целебном плове. 😀
...Я оказался на службе у великой корпорации UAC, чьи станции раскинулись на двух лунах Марса — на Фобосе и на его сестре Деймос. И скажу тебе, о терпеливый слушатель, что места эти были холодны и безжизненны, словно забытые стоянки караванов посреди каменной пустыни. Там не росла трава, не пели птицы, и лишь звёзды смотрели на нас с небес, как молчаливые свидетели человеческой дерзости. На этих лунах учёные — люди с глазами красными от бессонницы и умами острыми, как дамасские клинки — занимались делами столь странными, что даже старые мудрецы Самарканда покачали бы головами.
Они строили врата без дверей. И называли их телепортами.
— Пространство, — говорили они, — лишь ткань мироздания. Стоит проколоть её иглой науки — и можно пройти из одного места в другое быстрее, чем стрела, выпущенная из лука хана. Через эти врата они отправляли ящики, машины, животных… и иногда людей.
Но, как говорят мудрецы Бухары: кто открывает слишком много дверей, однажды откроет ту, за которой прячется беда.
Сначала беда пришла тихо, словно ночной вор. Люди, возвращавшиеся из телепорта, смотрели вокруг глазами пустыми, как высохшие колодцы в заброшенном кишлаке. Некоторые начинали шептать слова, которых не знал ни один земной язык. Другие сходили с ума, словно путники, потерявшие дорогу в песчаной буре. А потом пришли существа.
Учёные говорили: — Это ошибка координат.
Офицеры говорили: — Всё под контролем.
Но даже самый простой техник, человек без учёных степеней, понимал то, что иногда понимают только дети и старики: ворота открылись не туда.
Они открылись туда, куда не следует смотреть даже во сне. В ад.
И вот однажды мне приказали остаться снаружи базы на Фобосе. — Стой на периметре, — сказали они. — Обычная тревога.
Отряд вошёл внутрь. Я слышал по рации их шаги — тяжёлые, уверенные. Слышал короткие команды офицера. Потом раздалась стрельба. Сначала редкая, как первые капли дождя над степью. Но вскоре она превратилась в бурю. Автоматы гремели так, словно гроза разразилась внутри металлических стен станции. Потом послышались крики. Крики людей, которые встретили нечто, чего не должно существовать под милосердным небом. А потом наступила тишина. Такая тишина, что даже сердце в груди начинает биться осторожно, словно боится разбудить спящую беду.
Я сидел долго. Холод Фобоса пробирался сквозь броню, как зимний ветер через щели старого караван-сарая. И тогда я понял: если я не войду внутрь, никто уже не войдёт.
Я поднялся. Взял свой пистолет — единственного товарища в ту ночь. И подошёл к шлюзу базы.
Дверь открылась. О слушатель мой, клянусь пылью пустынь и холодом далёких звёзд: лучше бы она не открывалась. В коридорах лежали мёртвые солдаты. Кровь их текла по полу тёмными ручьями, словно арыки в ночном саду. Лампы под потолком мерцали, как свечи в заброшенной мечети. А из глубины станции доносились шаги. Шаги существ, которых не рождала ни земля, ни небо.
Так началась моя дорога — дорога через станции Фобоса, через исчезнувший Деймос, и дальше, туда, где ворота мира распахиваются в бездну.
И если ты спросишь меня, о внимательный слушатель, чем закончится эта история, я отвечу так: история ещё не закончена. Потому что в ту ночь, под холодными звёздами Марса, я сделал первый шаг — шаг прямо в ад.
Rio de Janeiro let its hillsides be filled in with lower-cost dwellings. The result was a significant increase in the crime rate. On the more positive side of the ledger, upward mobility increased too. If you live in a decent favela, you can get to a downtown job with not too much difficulty, albeit with some travel risk. Note however that some of those jobs include “theft.”
Cape Town has not filled in its hillsides, and you see empty, valuable land all over the place. The townships have remained remarkably segregated, both racially and spatially. The nicer parts of Cape Town also have remained relatively safe, both for whites and for upper class blacks.
One secondary consequence of this equilibrium is very high unemployment in the townships, staggeringly high in fact. It is expensive to get from most of the townships to a job in the nicer part of town. For South Africa as a whole, GPT Pro reports:
OECD reports that around 70% of discouraged jobseekers cite location as the main obstacle to looking for work, and that commuting can absorb up to 37% of post-tax income for the lowest quintile, or up to 80% once time costs are included. The World Bank estimate is even harsher for the poorest households: up to 85% of daily income once the opportunity cost of time is counted. In effect, many low-wage jobs are too costly to search for, reach, or keep.
And see this link. Young male workers in particular find it hard to get the experience that would enable them to prove themselves reliable and then keep on climbing a skills ladder. So they stay in the townships, maybe engage in some black or gray market labor, and collect some welfare payments. They also might commit crimes against each other.
Which in turn makes the notion of filling in the hillside with low-cost housing all the less appealing.
It is difficult to solve the problems of South Africa.
Addendum: Note also that South African agriculture is capital-intensive, as you might expect from a wealthier country. So subsistence agriculture is less of an option here, compared to many other African nations, and that leads to all the more overcrowding in the poorly located townships.
Hi, everyone! We've just released Chrome 146 (146.0.76380.119) for Android. It'll become available on Google Play over the next few days.
This release includes stability and performance improvements. You can see a full list of the changes in the Git log. If you find a new issue, please let us know by filing a bug.
Android releases contain the same security fixes as their corresponding Desktop releases (Windows & Mac: 146.0.7680.79/.80, Linux: 146.0.7680.79) unless otherwise noted.
The Stable channel has been updated to 146.0.7680.80 for Windows/Mac and 146.0.7680.80 for Linux, which will roll out over the coming days/weeks. A full list of changes in this build is available in the Log
Security Fixes and Rewards
Note: Access to bug details and links may be kept restricted until a majority of users are updated with a fix. We will also retain restrictions if the bug exists in a third party library that other projects similarly depend on, but haven’t yet fixed.
This update includes 1 security fix. Please see the Chrome Security Page for more information.
[N/A][491421267] High CVE-2026-3909: Out of bounds write in Skia. Reported by Google Threat Analysis Group on 2026-03-10
Google is aware that an exploit for CVE-2026-3909 exists in the wild.
We would also like to thank all security researchers that worked with us during the development cycle to prevent security bugs from ever reaching the stable channel.
Interested in switching release channels? Find out how here. If you find a new issue, please let us know by filing a bug. The community help forum is also a great place to reach out for help or learn about common issues.
New York, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Ohio and Kansas are just a few of the states continuing the lawsuit.
"The settlement recently announced with the U.S. Department of Justice fails to address the monopoly at the center of this case, and would benefit Live Nation at the expense of consumers. We cannot agree to it," New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement.
The Justice Department and some 40 attorneys general first launched the lawsuit against Live Nation in 2024 under the Biden administration, alleging the concert giant had built an illegal monopoly over live events by controlling ticketing, venues and artist promotion. In effect, they argued, Live Nation had pushed out competitors and locked venues into exclusive arrangements that harmed both artists and fans.
Baker, who oversees ticketing for Live Nation's venue nation unit, called some increased prices "fucking outrageous," with Weinhold replying that "I have VIP parking up to $250 lol."
"I almost feel bad taking advantage of them," Baker replied.
In another exchange, Baker shared a screenshot of premier parking costs, further stating "robbing them, blind, baby, that's how we do." Later in the exchange, Baker said, "I gouge them on ancil prices to make up for it," referring to extra ancillary fees on more standard tickets.
"Our platform optimizes for multiple devices logged in at once and spamming the queue," notes Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino. "Once ticket sales are live, that's when the bots buy up the max tickets per person until they are all sold out in under 1 minute, though our software engineers are trying to get that down to 30 seconds."
Rapino adds, "Yes artists send out codes and have fan presales, but we always ensure that all of the bots get those too, since it'd be really unfair if these hardworking robots had to wait until general sale day." [...]
The announcement has been met with widespread support from StubHub, Viagogo, and a series of shell companies that, when contacted for comment, all responded within 0.003 seconds with identical statements saying they were "just regular fans."
The list of Live Nation's sins will not be news to anyone who has been following this blog for any length of time:
Unfortunately, they kinda fucked up the explanation.
It has nothing to do with probabilities. The decision has already been made, the million is either there or not. Nothing you can do or not do can influence the outcome in any way whatsoever. So, rationally and logically, you have to take both and get either (1m+1k or 1k) instead of (1m or 0). Taking both boxes is always better for you.
Having said that, the robot has to expect you to take one box for the million to be there in the first place. By taking two you improve your own position a bit, but influence the robot towards predicting two and leaving the box empty in the future. A small personal gain at the expense of future generations. You might even think it's the tragedy of commons from a different angle.
Except no, of course it's not. Money doesn't work like that and strange robots lying in rooms distributing millions is no basis for a system of economy. Giving random idiots 1m each would inevitably inflate prices, eventually causing a cup of coffee to cost 1m, making it worse for everyone, including you. Economy-wise, it is your sacred duty to pull up the ladder and skew the prediction towards 0 for the greater good. Take what you can, give nothing back, as them pirates say.
Ah, and take the robot too of course. It's also a box after all, and with pricey RAM in it!
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