skybrian's recent activity
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Comment on ‘This unlawful impost must fall’: Conservative group sues US President Donald Trump claiming tariffs are ‘unconstitutional exercise of legislative power’ in ~society
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Comment on Taking stablecoins seriously, with Haseeb Qureshi in ~finance
skybrian LinkThis is a transcript of a podcast where Patrick McKenzie interviewed a partner at a VC crypto fund. Here are some quotes I thought were interesting from the interview: ... ... ... ...This is a transcript of a podcast where Patrick McKenzie interviewed a partner at a VC crypto fund. Here are some quotes I thought were interesting from the interview:
Haseeb: [...] probably the oldest very significant use case for crypto, is basically a way of facilitating capital flight. [Patrick notes: Not what I would have expected an advocate to lead with, and props for candor.]
So this is, you're a Chinese wealthy person, you're Russian, you're in Indonesia, you're in India, whatever, and you want to get out of your local currency. And these are all countries that have pretty restrictive capital controls.
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[P]eople use Tether or use USDC, but mostly Tether, as a way to get out of the local currency and get into dollars. And most of the time, this is illegal. They're doing this against the interests of the Chinese government. [...] On the one hand, we know that the Chinese government is trying to reduce their reliance on US treasuries. So the Chinese government was the largest seller of treasuries last year. I think they sold something on the order of like $40, $50 billion of treasuries.
At the same time, Tether was the seventh largest buyer of treasuries internationally, like relative to countries. And I think Tether bought something like $30 billion of treasuries while the Chinese government sold roughly 50 billion. ...
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Patrick McKenzie: [...] there's any number of people in the world that end up having a US bank account [...] because they spent some time in the US. We give out bank accounts to pretty much anybody here.
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[S]o the amount of like Zelle traffic in non-United States countries, particularly ones that have a liquid black or gray market for US dollars is very substantial. Not calling Zelle out specifically there. They were one that came to mind because they've been publicly reported. But one would assume that happens on almost all US-based payment systems. Anyhow, fun little fact about the world.
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Haseeb: [...] where were stablecoins being used first in these kind of international B2B payments? The first place was actually in the Russia-China corridor. And this was because Russia got hit with sanctions [...]
Haseeb: [...] But increasingly, you're starting to see all sorts of businesses around the world that actually can get euro-dollar banking or even US dollar banking start to be using stablecoins for payments and settlements.
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Taking stablecoins seriously, with Haseeb Qureshi
5 votes -
Comment on How dairy robots are changing work for cows (and farmers) in ~enviro
skybrian LinkFrom the article: ... ... ... ...From the article:
Founded in 1948 in Maassluis, Netherlands, Lely deployed its first Astronaut milking robot in the early 1990s. The company has since developed other robotic systems that assist with cleaning, feeding, and cow comfort, and the Astronaut milking robot is on its fifth generation. Lely is now focused entirely on robots for dairy farms, with around 135,000 of them deployed around the world.
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Lely requires that dairy farmers who adopt its robots commit to letting their cows move freely between milking, feeding, and resting, as well as inside and outside the barn, at their own pace. “We believe that free cow traffic is a core part of the future of farming,” Jacobs says as we watch one cow stroll away from the milking robot while another takes its place. This is possible only when the farm operates on the cows’ schedule rather than a human’s.
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For most dairy farmers [...] making more money is not the main reason to get a robot, explains Marcia Endres, a professor in the department of animal science at the University of Minnesota. Endres specializes in dairy-cattle management, behavior, and welfare, and studies dairy robot adoption. “When we first started doing research on this about 12 years ago, most of the farms that were installing robots were smaller farms that did not want to hire employees,” Endres says. “They wanted to do the work just with family labor, but they also wanted to have more flexibility with their time. They wanted a better lifestyle.”
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Of the 25,000 dairy farms in the United States, Endres estimates about 10 percent have robots. This is about a third of the adoption rate in Europe, where farms tend to be smaller, so the cost of implementing the robots is lower. Endres says that over the last five years, she’s seen a shift toward robot adoption at larger farms with over 500 cows, due primarily to labor shortages. “These larger dairies are having difficulty finding employees who want to milk cows—it’s a very tedious job. And the robot is always consistent. The farmers tell me, ‘My robot never calls in sick, and never shows up drunk.’ ”
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Like many mobile robots, Lely’s dairy robots include contact-sensing bumpers that will pause the robot’s motion if it runs into something. On the Vector feeding robot, Lely product engineer René Beltman tells me, they had to add a software option to disable the bumper. “The cows learned that, ‘oh, if I just push the bumper, then the robot will stop and put down more feed in my area for me to eat.’ It was a free buffet. So you don’t want the cows to end up controlling the robot.” Emergency stop buttons had to be relocated so that they couldn’t be pressed by questing cow tongues.
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How dairy robots are changing work for cows (and farmers)
11 votes -
Comment on A colossal squid is filmed in its natural habitat for the first time in ~enviro
skybrian LinkFrom the article:From the article:
The squid, measuring about one foot in length, was seen nearly 2,000 feet below the surface in March, in the South Atlantic Ocean, the Schmidt Ocean Institute said in a statement. The footage was recorded by an underwater vehicle operated remotely by a crew with the organization.
"It's exciting to see the first in situ [on site] footage of a juvenile colossal and humbling to think that they have no idea that humans exist," said Dr. Kat Bolstad, an associate professor at the Auckland University of Technology who helped verify the footage. "For 100 years, we have mainly encountered them as prey remains in whale and seabird stomachs, and as predators of harvested toothfish."
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A colossal squid is filmed in its natural habitat for the first time
46 votes -
Comment on US abortions hold steady but fewer cross state lines for procedure, study finds in ~health
skybrian LinkFrom the article: ...From the article:
About 155,000 Americans crossed state lines in 2024 for an abortion, a 9 percent decrease from 2023, the Guttmacher Institute found. There were 1,038,100 abortions last year in states where the procedure is legal, an increase of less than 1 percent from 2023.
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Telehealth providers can prescribe and mail patients abortion pills. These types of abortions rose nationally from 4 percent of all abortions in April 2022 to 20 percent in June 2024, according to an October report from the Society of Family Planning, a nonprofit that tracks reproductive care. The group reported an average of more than 19,000 telehealth abortions per month from April to June 2024.
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US abortions hold steady but fewer cross state lines for procedure, study finds
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Comment on Waymo to operate on car-free Market Street in San Francisco in ~transport
skybrian LinkFrom the article: Apparently there is pushback: Rideshare companies and safe-street advocates are fuming that the mayor is playing favoritesFrom the article:
Waymo will start mapping the corridor in the coming days, and the driverless service is expected to launch there as early as this summer, according to city officials.
East of 10th Street, Market Street is off-limits to private cars, Ubers, and Lyfts. But the partially car-free downtown stretch of Market Street is open to buses and taxis. Lurie said the initiative with Waymo will complement existing transportation options and make it easier for residents, workers, and visitors to access downtown businesses.
Apparently there is pushback:
Rideshare companies and safe-street advocates are fuming that the mayor is playing favorites
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Waymo to operate on car-free Market Street in San Francisco
15 votes -
Comment on How to ‘Gray Rock’ conversations with difficult people in ~life
skybrian LinkIt sounds like influencers are rebranding various forms of politeness?It sounds like influencers are rebranding various forms of politeness?
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Comment on Sodium-ion battery firm shuts down due to bad economics in ~tech
skybrian LinkFrom the article: …From the article:
Bedrock Materials is pausing our development of sodium-ion batteries and returning the majority of the capital we raised to our investors to redeploy into other ideas.
This isn’t the typical story behind a wind-down. We’re not out of cash. We’re not facing internal conflict. […]
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[L]ithium prices crashed by more than 85%. Battery pack prices are set to fall by half. And the policy tailwinds we were counting on have shifted, as federal support for electric vehicles faces growing uncertainty.
Our modeling pointed to a clear outcome: in a world where lithium remains abundant, today’s sodium-ion batteries can’t compete on cost—even at commercial scale. Independent researchers at Stanford reached the same conclusion, noting that for sodium-ion to succeed, it would need either a breakthrough in energy density or to carve out niche applications based on unique performance traits.
We explored both paths. The road to higher energy density came with steep technical, market, and environmental tradeoffs. Even in the best case, it didn’t yield a product meaningfully better than today’s lithium iron phosphate. As for sodium-ion’s supposed performance advantages, we found that many could be matched by modest tweaks to existing lithium-ion chemistries.
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Sodium-ion battery firm shuts down due to bad economics
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Comment on Harvard hit with $2.2 billion funding freeze after rejecting US President Donald Trump’s demands in ~society
skybrian Link ParentUpdate:Update:
Hours later, the multiagency Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism responded by announcing a freeze on $2.2 billion in multiyear grants and $60 million in multiyear contract value to Harvard.
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Comment on There must be Nazis in the White House. EO 14188 -> 14/88. in ~society
skybrian Link ParentNot what I was asking - I meant, why should we give it attention? But that seems like a plausible explanation.Not what I was asking - I meant, why should we give it attention? But that seems like a plausible explanation.
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Comment on When can we call this a dictatorship? in ~society
skybrian Link ParentThe courts move rather slowly. Many lawsuits are still in progress. I don't think we know yet how that will play out. I'm particularly interested in seeing whether Trump's tariffs will be ruled...The courts move rather slowly. Many lawsuits are still in progress. I don't think we know yet how that will play out.
I'm particularly interested in seeing whether Trump's tariffs will be ruled illegal. I don't think that can be determined in advance?
It will seem clearer in hindsight.
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Comment on When can we call this a dictatorship? in ~society
skybrian Link ParentThat's true as far as it goes, but I don't think it applies in this case. Sometimes vocabulary use gets pretty political. It isn't purely descriptive. It's used as a form of political expression....That's true as far as it goes, but I don't think it applies in this case. Sometimes vocabulary use gets pretty political. It isn't purely descriptive. It's used as a form of political expression. And I don't like the vibes.
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Comment on When can we call this a dictatorship? in ~society
skybrian LinkYou can say what you want, but I wouldn't use the term because I'm not a doomer. I still expect elections to happen on schedule and I think the Democrats have a good chance. It seems too early to...You can say what you want, but I wouldn't use the term because I'm not a doomer. I still expect elections to happen on schedule and I think the Democrats have a good chance.
It seems too early to give up hope. Why give in to despair?
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Comment on There must be Nazis in the White House. EO 14188 -> 14/88. in ~society
skybrian Link ParentMaybe, but if as you say, we don't know what it really means, why dwell on it? It's at best a hint of ... something bad. But we already knew there were trolls. The vibes were already bad. Who...Maybe, but if as you say, we don't know what it really means, why dwell on it? It's at best a hint of ... something bad. But we already knew there were trolls. The vibes were already bad.
Who benefits from sharing such hints? They might lead some investigator to something more important, but in themselves, I don't think they're useful to those of us following along at home.
California sues Trump administration to block tariffs
They seem to be using the same legal argument.