lintful's recent activity
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Comment on React, Electron, and LLMs have a common purpose: the labour arbitrage theory of dev tool popularity in ~comp
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Comment on Reddit, AI spam bots explore new ways to show ads in your feed in ~tech
lintful (edited )Link ParentGreat post, and I'll add something I find both galling and motivating. Most usecases, except for some like video and search that are more capital-intensive (and unlike the real-world bar, but like...Great post, and I'll add something I find both galling and motivating. Most usecases, except for some like video and search that are more capital-intensive (and unlike the real-world bar, but like many physical examples), the costs of operation for most of these social spaces are very low, at least in centralized or small-scale contexts. (e.g. large-scale federation can get more expensive quickly) To me this gap presents a loud opportunity. Disintermediation of the profiteers is economically feasible. It's also pretty important because these forces broadly control how we use technology to connect with each other.
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Comment on Unity appoints former EA and Zynga executive Matthew Bromberg as its new CEO in ~games
lintful Link ParentGiven the company's antics I assume he'll be tasked by the board with squeezing the ecosystem for revenue in the short to medium term. It's not primarily about building the best future of the...Given the company's antics I assume he'll be tasked by the board with squeezing the ecosystem for revenue in the short to medium term. It's not primarily about building the best future of the technology. Not an enviable position for anyone who values the game developers and players more than shareholder value. He sounds like a good fit.
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Comment on The real danger to civilisation isn't runaway AI it's runaway capitalism (2017) in ~misc
lintful Link ParentA key similarity may be that corporations are goal-directed entities whose reward function is reduced to an overly simplistic metric that is decoupled from human wellbeing. Most other groups don't...A key similarity may be that corporations are goal-directed entities whose reward function is reduced to an overly simplistic metric that is decoupled from human wellbeing. Most other groups don't optimize for profit like that. This reward function underlies enshittification.
This article weirdly dodges discussion of technical merits, ecosystem alignment, and network effects. It abstracts out a theory without engaging with the content.
Here's an example:
No mention of ES6 or what TypeScript did well, instead it tries to generalize patterns as if the technical details, developer incentives, user demographics beyond managers, and many other contextual factors don't matter.
The better starting points IMO are the technology adoption curve and the technology itself in the ecosystem's context. I wasn't looking to be negative and I'm politically sympathetic but this reads to me like thin punditry from motivated reasoning. I'm not denying that labor arbitrage happens but the story does not land for me - as others pointed out, technology adoption is not as simple as this suggests and the agents in play are not represented in a way that matches my work experience.