Eji1700's recent activity
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Comment on Cuba’s Communist Party approves opening economy in unprecedented move in ~society
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Comment on Cuba’s Communist Party approves opening economy in unprecedented move in ~society
Eji1700 (edited )Link ParentEh. While on the one hand, I think there's lots of actual and theoretical evidence against planned economies (looks at...basically any corporations planning and assume it will be worse. Agile for...Could be one of the few positive results of Trump's presidencies. Obviously the method wasn't great, but at least it's not nothing.
Eh. While on the one hand, I think there's lots of actual and theoretical evidence against planned economies (looks at...basically any corporations planning and assume it will be worse. Agile for Maslow needs is not a fun idea.), I do agree that Cuba's planned economy is in its own way, I'm skeptical this is going to do much but make things worse.
A big problem of planned economies, be it causation or correlation, has been a huge pairing with intensely damaging corruption. EVERY system has corruption, but Cuba is unfortunately a country known for it.
Those corrupt people are unlikely to just suddenly say "oh okay now things work the way I hoped" and stop being corrupt. It's a bit like the "just legalize drugs, then the drug lords will go legit" stuff. Once you have a major corruption problem it's hard to get out of that situation, and I feel that Cuba has a corruption problem first and foremost.
I do hope that something, honestly anything, helps them all because it's a tragedy how much shit the average Cuban puts up with, but i'm not sure this is it.
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Comment on Iran war live: US, Tehran confirm ‘peace deal’ reached in ~society
Eji1700 Link ParentI don't get why people take these actions at face value. Not some 4d chess trick, just...trump does what's best for trump...full stop. A peace treaty is a long, difficult, process involving many...I don't get why people take these actions at face value. Not some 4d chess trick, just...trump does what's best for trump...full stop.
A peace treaty is a long, difficult, process involving many different people. Trump's mentality and behavior is literally anathema to that.
So yes, he'll sign an MOU saying Iran gets every dollar and weapon the US has, and then the moment that's not in his favor, he'll flip and do something else.
I just...don't get why everyone keeps reporting these things as if they're a done deal. A lot of it seems to be people trying to win arguments or gotcha's or whatever (ah ha! The war is/isn't over!), but really, every headline should basically be "here's what he said today, none of it matters unless it actually goes into effect".
Markets move on it because if you're stuck in the unenviable position of pricing futures or something like that, you must take into consideration what's been said, but at the same time even that seems to be wavering as the market "prices in" the worthlessness of Trump's claims.
So point being:
Running with a peace deal that depends on the actions of other parties who aren't even part of the deal is... certainly a choice.
I mean, of course he did. Of course it didn't work. Of course it's a "peace deal" only in name and even that only just.
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To put it another way, most of all tump related media reads like "Boy who cries wolf announces wolf's coming again! Lets discuss the possible implications".
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Comment on Don’t call it a sequel. Or a reboot. Or a remake. Why certain words trigger Hollywood. in ~movies
Eji1700 Link ParentThere's plenty of one shot stuff that does well in other mediums that could be adapted. Nothing about it is inherently related to sequels.There's plenty of one shot stuff that does well in other mediums that could be adapted. Nothing about it is inherently related to sequels.
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Comment on Hollywood diversity report: Streaming films have abandoned women and people of color in ~movies
Eji1700 Link ParentI don't have time to fully go into this right now, but to at least handle the quick one Think you're missing the part i'm focusing on, to elaborate. It has nothing to do with Latina's. It has to...I don't have time to fully go into this right now, but to at least handle the quick one
More importantly, how would your analysis not apply to Latinas given the conditions of many Latin-American countries in the 20th and 21st centuries. Honestly, I'm very interested in your rationale here.
Think you're missing the part i'm focusing on, to elaborate.
First, what is the hypocrisy? I mean, I get what you're saying about how Asian-Americans come from different cultures and that they wouldn't all necessarily be drawn to the Korean influences of KPDH, but how does that make the author a hypocrite for being interested that Latinas were especially into the movie?
It has nothing to do with Latina's. It has to do with saying it's surprising that Latina's as a whole(or any group) rate the film higher as a whole than "Asian Americans" which in this context, is borderline racist given you're commingling Chinese and Indian's who are the vast majority of that number (as far as I can tell from the study). The context literally assumes Asian Americans would love this? Why? Most Asian Americans are not Korean?
Why would you expect the Chinese and Indian's to like KPop more? What explanation can you give that doesn't devolve into "well they're all from Asia right?". They are just as likely to like or hate it as Latina's. Latina's loving it IS an interesting statistic and of note, saying it's interesting they love it more than "Asian Americans" and that makes it interesting is wildly tone deaf.
More than Korean Americans would be interesting as it's obviously about their culture which is the point of representation. More than Chinese Americans might be interesting if they were found to be a large % of general kpop fandom but for some reason rejected the movie.
None of that is in the article, none of that is in the study.
Second, how does the "VERY violent and relatively recent history" have anything to do with whether or not a young American girl wants to see a cartoon about pop music and demon hunting?
Because people are raised by parents who lived through that history? WWII, Chinese Civil War, Vietnam, The Korean War, India/Pakistan relations, etc, and this is just with a US history slant.
It is, again, wildly tone deaf to assume every Asian American is going to love Korean culture/representation when they may very well be raised in an environment that has issue (legit or otherwise) with South Korea. It would be insane to say "gosh Asian Americans seem to hate Japanese anime, how surprising" given the demographics that covers and the still very relevant history and politics there.
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Comment on Don’t call it a sequel. Or a reboot. Or a remake. Why certain words trigger Hollywood. in ~movies
Eji1700 Link ParentHell you could even, hear me out, adapt something that already worked and just stick to the source material. There's a PILE of stuff to screw with like Backrooms, and not just in horror, but given...Hell you could even, hear me out, adapt something that already worked and just stick to the source material. There's a PILE of stuff to screw with like Backrooms, and not just in horror, but given they briefly figured out how to shave off the right amount of stupid from Marvel and then forgot, I have low hopes.
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Comment on Hollywood diversity report: Streaming films have abandoned women and people of color in ~movies
Eji1700 (edited )LinkOkay, my personal view is this is a pretty expected contraction. Some things work, some things don't, the things that work stick around. Shows have to make money, and we absolutely had a period of...Okay, my personal view is this is a pretty expected contraction.
Some things work, some things don't, the things that work stick around. Shows have to make money, and we absolutely had a period of pandering where stuff that wouldn't get made normally did, and after a LOT of failures in that area stuff is settling. Just throwing women and PoC or whatever you're shooting for and not actually having a good script or production is a problem, and it shows. This trend chasing happens a lot.
The authors of the study blame backlash against DEI, industry contraction, and overall belt-tightening for the reversal of fortune. They believe diversity is treated as expendable or optional with budgets are cut.
I mean...again hit shows don't go away, fringe ones do. There's a hell of a "well except K Pop Demon Hunters" in the title here which is fucking WILD given how much of a phenomenon that is from every possible angle. Very likely a lot more money is being funneled into projects akin to that.
One especially interesting statistic that jumps out about KPop Demon Hunters is that a larger percentage of households with Latinas watched the Netflix original movie than households with Asian women, UCLA found. Though made for a U.S. audience, KPop Demon Hunters leans heavily on Korean culture — and not just its pop music.
Fucking hell the hypocrisy is staggering. "Asian Women" would include women from:
China
India
The PhilippinesWhich I list in that order because its the top 3 ancestries that make up Asian American, and is a huge part of the problem, even if you just bounce out India, with stats on Asian Americans because it's co-mingling not just large swaths of cultures and countries, but ones with some VERY violent and relatively recent history to go along with it.
So maybe the study is better about it (UCLA so i'd hope so), but given the article isn't really well made or making it easy to find, I would say no, it's not surprising that a larger % of households with Latina's are watching KPoP demon hunters than "asians" given China and India ESPECIALLY have strong media cultures which are popular in those households (doubly so with India's Bollywood actually having lots of musical competition).
So while hyperbolic this does read a bit like "surprisingly the new pro Margret Thatcher film was not well received across the entire country of the United Kingdom despite them all being sad weather island people"
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Since literally every link on that website only links to searches for those words on that website, here's, I believe, the actual study https://socialsciences.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/UCLA-Hollywood-Diversity-Report-2026-Streaming-Film-6-17-2026.pdfEdit 2-
Reading the study is more interesting and I don't think supports many of this article's claims, but i'll let you all decided. However on Kpop specifically, some rather important quotes in my eyes (both from page 58):The juggernaut of KPop Demon Hunters permeated the cultural zeitgeist in 2025. It was such a tremendous streaming hit on Netflix that its rating of 100 points was nearly three times the rating of the second-ranked film, Happy Gilmore 2 (33.66 rating points), among total households.
I sincerely doubt any amount of "cultural backlash" (which I still think is mostly a mix of loud minorities and justified backlash against a spewing of low quality products) is going to outweigh a 3x performance of your next highest revenue generator.
The intersectional nature of this film and how it connects with women of color cannot be ignored. Our analysis (in Table 4, “The Bottom Line”) showed that females within a Latinx household matched this film’s highest rating of 100 points, and the next two highest ratings came from females within Asian (77.33 points) and Black (72.85 points) households. Furthermore, for the fourth year in a row, a young woman of color led the most watched streaming film. The previous three films and the corresponding years when they took the top spot were as follows: Encanto (2022), Turning Red (2023), and Moana (2024).
I'm going to leave it alone from here because I'm just so tired of all data being weaponized, or at least dramatized. Draw your own conclusions i suppose.
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Comment on Access to Fable and Mythos 5 cut off after US government order in ~tech
Eji1700 Link ParentNot really? It's the same mechanics and works out the same way. Play by our rules or else. This is common in anything touching the military, and the same bridge was crossed when dealing with...Not really? It's the same mechanics and works out the same way. Play by our rules or else. This is common in anything touching the military, and the same bridge was crossed when dealing with search engines internally as well.
Yes by the absolutely letter of the law my example with china doesn't track, but they'll solve it the same way. This doesn't change the AI business model much at all, or at least not anymore than having an unhinged admin changes any business model.
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Comment on Access to Fable and Mythos 5 cut off after US government order in ~tech
Eji1700 Link ParentThis already happened with search engines. China has been requiring companies like google to play ball or get out for years. This is the same game. What's annoying in my eyes is that if we had a...What impact will this have on the valuations of US AI companies, many of which are being priced on the basis of widespread adoption and constant improvement?
This already happened with search engines. China has been requiring companies like google to play ball or get out for years. This is the same game.
What's annoying in my eyes is that if we had a sane admin there might actually be layers and boundaries where this could be a reasonable reaction, but it's impossible to tell with this one.
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Comment on Elon Musk net worth estimated at $1.1 trillion in ~finance
Eji1700 Link ParentYeah you kinda get to a spot where “you and what army” is the measure. What are you “buying” for 25 billion? Not many things have that kind if value nor could you spend it all in one go (space and...Yeah you kinda get to a spot where “you and what army” is the measure.
What are you “buying” for 25 billion? Not many things have that kind if value nor could you spend it all in one go (space and nuclear power are example markets where it could happen ).
Some massive Louisiana purchase style thing is extremely unlikely in the modern era, and given that money is mostly an abstraction of work and sway in a specific economy, you obviously run into the edges at that level of wealth.
It’s kind of the other problem with things like “Musk is stealing everyone’s money to be a trillionaire ” because while absolutely some truth in it, it’s really closer to just pretending there’s more money, not that there actually is.
No one is saying no to Musk/Bezos/Gates because they can’t afford it, so if you suddenly say “well that trillion could’ve gone to X” well…oddly not really because it basically doesn’t exist. It’s only so high because everyone agrees it doesn’t exist and is gambling on if it will eventually exist.
If you were to try and pay payroll or buy food or basically convert the value of the stock into something tangible then it plummets. That’s a huge part of the problem even discussing this because people treat it like it’s money in a budget or a bank account going somewhere else and it’s just not.
It’s a lot more accurate to treat these things as if you got a rigged appraisal on a house or collectible card or something. You can point to that number and maybe even get loans off it, but if you go to sell it suddenly the market determines what it’s worth.
So ultimately the most valuable commodity in the world is the means to produce or the means to seize. Money is just an abstraction of that and countries don’t need to deal in abstractions when they don’t want to.
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Comment on Elon Musk net worth estimated at $1.1 trillion in ~finance
Eji1700 Link ParentAre these people the problem? If they have nice houses, yachts, cars, parties, food, travel, whatever, a tax on spending would capture that. There’s plenty of other solutions as well that aren’t...I think my skepticism stems from the fact that I’ve known some incredibly wealthy people who lived even more frugally than my poor ass did. The millionaire next-door and that sort of thing
Are these people the problem? If they have nice houses, yachts, cars, parties, food, travel, whatever, a tax on spending would capture that.
There’s plenty of other solutions as well that aren’t wealth tax or spending tax.
I’m not sure people are actively campaigning for a wealth tax because they’re worried about some dragon horde billionaire (buffet is the closest I can think of) who only wants to see the number go up and lives in a shack
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Comment on Elon Musk net worth estimated at $1.1 trillion in ~finance
Eji1700 (edited )Link ParentI'm aware of what you're referring to, and the "die" part is a key portion of this playbook. Believe it or not, Banks don't want to just be stiffed for a $1.2b loan on a collateral of $500b. Yes...I'm aware of what you're referring to, and the "die" part is a key portion of this playbook. Believe it or not, Banks don't want to just be stiffed for a $1.2b loan on a collateral of $500b.
Yes there's a loophole here that works out very roughly to where a group is basically agreeing that overinflated asset A justifies loan B, so asset owner gets their loan and the bank gets their monthly payments on the loan, and the government doesn't get taxes unless asset A is actually sold.
The owner of the asset actually needs to make loan payments though. You could try paying loans with other loans but while the wealthy can do that better than the average person, it's more of a stalling tactic than a long term solution. Banks WILL take their money, and often these loans are backed with the asset as collateral, in which case there's some other interesting situations.
It is 100% a loophole how it's used at the top levels, and parts of it haven't been tested heavily and could lead to major down the road problems (if TSLA just dumps tomorrow there's a lot that kinda goes with it, and we see how realistic it is for creditors to actually get value out of an over inflated stock).
All of this has absolutely nothing to do with what most people mean when they say wealth taxes, other than "well i want rich people to pay more tax".
You would be far better off fixing the loopholes than you would attempting a wealth tax. There's plenty of evidence out there of just how poorly almost ever attempt at a wealth tax has performed, and how completely illogical most propositions are from a fundamental "math, economics, and laws do not work that way" level.
So if you're using wealth tax as shorthand for "these people need to pay more tax, by whatever means work" sure I agree.
If you actually mean some plan to try and value an asset and then pay yearly tax on it when the asset hasn't actually generated any real revenue, sorry but it's mostly a fairy tale that distracts from real solutions. The people you think it will hurt likely won't be, and the people you want to help will take most of the damage, and it's not because "evil people stop it" so much as you're wasting your time proposing things only slightly more believable than perpetual motion, and like perpetual motion, it distracts from lots of very real, doable, and proven solutions.
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In fact if you read the book/study that your link references, you'll see the author doesn't propose a Wealth Tax either, but a tax on spending. This interview is a nice summary:
https://press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/555607in.html -
Comment on Elon Musk net worth estimated at $1.1 trillion in ~finance
Eji1700 Link ParentThat's also not really how either of those work, but i've been over this before.That's also not really how either of those work, but i've been over this before.
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Comment on Elon Musk net worth estimated at $1.1 trillion in ~finance
Eji1700 Link ParentNot exactly how it works. Private Equity is a thing, but at the same time this always comes back to "they're only rich on paper". Musk is one of the richest people on the planet, but it's not like...Not exactly how it works.
Private Equity is a thing, but at the same time this always comes back to "they're only rich on paper". Musk is one of the richest people on the planet, but it's not like he can actually cash out for 1 trillion (just a couple hundred billion which is still insane, but you get my point).
Thing is to be worth that much this way it pretty much MUST be public.
However, at some point you have to ask what is money for and who could possible have more, and the answer to that is mostly state leaders. Putin/Xi/Trump are the obvious examples of people can, (and for debatable amounts do), use their countries GDP as a slush fund.
Musk can offer someone $750b in China for land, and they can tell him no and he could never come up with that anyways. Xi can have that tomorrow by nodding at the right person AND could probably have the money in their account as well if he felt so inclined.
Again though, we know these people exist. You can't move that level of money without being readily identifiable. You might not be rage posting on twitter and Nazi Saluting at the inauguration, but you can't "illuminati" trillions of dollars.
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Comment on Any fellow software engineers using paid GitHub copilot? in ~comp
Eji1700 Link ParentManagement has been instructed by top level to make sure it's used. Someone somewhere said "buy this product" and they're high enough up the chain to ensure that everyone in the company has to use...Has management (in the aggregate) really learned nothing, or alternatively, forgotten every lesson from that time?
Management has been instructed by top level to make sure it's used.
Someone somewhere said "buy this product" and they're high enough up the chain to ensure that everyone in the company has to use the product, making sense or not.
That way in the short term while prices are low and effects are hard to prove, things look, at worst, like it's helping.
Management is mostly well aware of how stupid this all is, and it's going to take some sacrifices at the alter of stupidity before it gets rolled back. We did it with LOC, we did it with cloud, we're doing it with AI. So long as marketing/sales types wind up higher than engineering it'll keep happening.
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Comment on Google Chrome to fully remove legacy support for manifest v2 in ~tech
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Comment on AI is bringing my friend out of retirement in ~comp
Eji1700 LinkI've seen it, i'm just not sure how long it's going to last. Opus is still "cheap". Github copilot's costs went from too good to be true to 60x overnight. I'm curious to see how much more of that...There are a lot of AI doomers and haters. In person I mostly see people doing the same thing they've always done, but now saving time on various tasks. But this is the first time I've seen someone go from grumpy and checked out to giddy and optimistic thanks to LLMs.
I've seen it, i'm just not sure how long it's going to last. Opus is still "cheap". Github copilot's costs went from too good to be true to 60x overnight. I'm curious to see how much more of that will happen. Given your friend is retired at 40, they've probably got the money to burn on something like that, but I'm not sure how long it's going to stay remotely affordable for the rest of us.
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Comment on Brave Origin, a paid, premium version of Brave is now available in ~tech
Eji1700 Link ParentI mean...what are you worried about? It works and does anything I've ever needed.Firefox isn’t what it used to be
I mean...what are you worried about? It works and does anything I've ever needed.
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Comment on Google Chrome to fully remove legacy support for manifest v2 in ~tech
Eji1700 Link ParentOhhh yeah. I think it was brave or something else I tried first that was a chromium off shoot and I just forgot.Ohhh yeah. I think it was brave or something else I tried first that was a chromium off shoot and I just forgot.
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Comment on Google Chrome to fully remove legacy support for manifest v2 in ~tech
Eji1700 Link ParentAnd that's a problem, but it's not a problem that's solved by using chromium.And that's a problem, but it's not a problem that's solved by using chromium.
I mean....depending on your definition's here (and i believe roughly by the definition of the article/proposition) this covers nearly all other real estate on the planet.
I'm not aware of some country that's doing fantastic because it doesn't have private real estate development. Even other "communist" or the socialist/capitalist(basically the nordic) countries mostly have private real estate development.