Why does it usually imply extraction and externalities? What are those for Taylor Swift and Michael Jordan? The actual "usual" things in common between these and e.g. Amazon are massive value creation for consumers, economies of scale.
Focusing on completely optional and often imagined "externalities" just reveals a certain mindset (one could find some for cases like Amazon, but bezos became a billionaire in 1998 so whatever Amazon does after that doesn't directly apply, unless the goalposts are moved).
An example I love is hollowing out of this or that. The fact that people wanted to shop at Amazon (especially in 1998) and not a local bookstore, like the fact that people want to go to a Taylor Swift concert and not your indie band's is not an externality, it's a skill issue.
Yeah because collective ownership worked out so well for everything from Soviet cars to Venezuelan oil. Anyone speaking for "the people" is either an evil scumbag or a useful idiot for future ones. "People" are composed of individuals. Most individuals' content is nearly worthless for AI training (and some like Sanders' are probably harmful, they should own negative shares in this scheme:D).
Let individuals decide (including in the court of law like in those copyright lawsuits by those few that actually produce valuable content) how theirs is to be used.
I trust Anthropic, heck even Musk, more than I would trust some apparatchik legally empowered to decide for the "people".
So I used to hand code async http request based UIs when this feature first appeared, write cross browser css, etc. before moving to work on distributed systems backend. These days I think a blanket ban on browser scripting would be a lesser evil.
There are, roughly, 3 tiers of developers with regard to any such labor saving tech (js libraries etc.)
People who could do a good job low level and can do it faster with libraries. People who couldn't, or couldn't be bothered, before the libraries, but can now accomplish things. That is the good part. And then there are the unwashed masses, who couldn't dream of accomplishing anything on low level but now can, and who at least in case of JavaScript far outnumber the previous category. Like when I messaged a webmaster whose side would download an uncached 3mb script blob on every page load (it was their script, not ads), to render few paragraphs of text, and they responded that it was by design and the script couldn't be cashed because some variables in it changed based on time, and that is so large because it contains features necessary for other pages that have more than text. I think we'd all be better served if these people pursued a more appropriate career, for example in the roadside trash pickup.
It remains to be seen how it goes with llms, but personally I'm not optimistic.
I dunno, I think maybe that is a big part of why these countries are so safe? It is a form of meritocratic classism if you will. You are expected to be a certain kind of (law-abiding among other things) person. If you behave like you might not be the kind of person you get an implicit "social credit" downgrade and are treated like crap end to end. Sure, they might be "overreacting" all things considered, but in the US on the other hand there are examples of clearly dangerous people being catch and released because rights and dignity, until they actually murdered someone. There's a tradeoff, but the Japanese approach appears to be closer to the optimal point.
Heh, I remember using my first machine, a 486 for a long time after it was obsolete and reading system requirements like, what do you mean pentium recommended and why the hell do you need 16Mb of RAM. It's interesting to reflect that the old games like Settlers, HoMM 2 or Warcraft 2, that are no worse than modern ones gameplay wise, used to run on something that is so vastly underpowered by modern standards the numbers don't even feel like a real spec.
Doesn't this also apply to new housing? Strain on services per job created is probably even higher. The benefits are for someone currently not living here, just like data centers used for remote users. And if cheaper housing is available obnoxious poor people might move in. I think there should be a moratorium. Not in my backyard!
I’m not sure who you’d expect to sway equating data centers to east coast urban housing during a giant, sustained housing crisis, but your obviously disingenuous argument is completely ridiculous.
At least my comment is not completely content free. How is it different?
First, the gp comment says the data center is not good for existing residents - obviously true for housing too, which you didn't refute.
Then it assumes statewide ban should be based on personal preference of local residents. That is just a definition of nimbyism. While in reality I am a YIMBY and the end was part sarcasm, I would genuinely prefer living next to a data center, rather than next to non immigrant poor in the US. I grew up lower middle class or poor by US standards, and also live in Seattle, lots of experience. So I say along with data centers we have a statewide ban on anyone who is lifetime net consumer of tax money anywhere near my backyard.
That doesn't appear to be a common story. I now have to schedule phone calls with my retired mother because between my sister and her partner who both work, and her, with 2 kids - one small but active that needs constant minding and one that needs chaperoning to activities - she often doesn't have one uninterrupted hour in the evening for an entire week.
Nearly everyone I know with kids is more similar to this story than yours.. to each their own but it's certainly not for me:)
One positive consequence of AI is for people working on old, constantly updated codebases. Especially the stuff created in a data scientist development paradigm (my adhoc python script produces good results, let me clean up a bit and merge into prod codebase).
There's suddenly much more interest in refactoring, test coverage, etc. and more space for this work, both because it enables more AI work and because AI on clunky code makes it even clunkier much faster than human developers (who are not data scientists ;))
In addition AI makes it easier. Tell me which ones of the 70 fields in this monster class are not used for anything of consequence anymore, this kind of stuff .
Fidonet was really big in Russia when the internet was too expensive for many people, and some made it tongue in cheek matter of principle that Fidonet is anyway superior. I remember (in the late 90ies/early aughts) standing around with a bunch of people near a subway station before an in-person gathering (of Fidonet users), everybody discussing computer stuff. An older passerby asked us "Hey guys, so are you like, supporters of the Internet?" (sounded just as weird in Russian too), and after a pause someone responded "No! We oppose the Internet! The only use of the Internet is to download drivers!"
Interestingly googling my numbers now and some echo "forums" I was part of I cannot find much... if the Russian segment was archived it's sure not indexed very well.
I'm not the kind of person to wear those, but if I was and someone tried to slap them off me I might feel really threatened if you catch my drift. And since I won't be able to see too well, it will take some extra effort... Was that remaining movement the next punch, or death throes? Can't see too well, better safe than sorry!
Focusing on completely optional and often imagined "externalities" just reveals a certain mindset (one could find some for cases like Amazon, but bezos became a billionaire in 1998 so whatever Amazon does after that doesn't directly apply, unless the goalposts are moved).
An example I love is hollowing out of this or that. The fact that people wanted to shop at Amazon (especially in 1998) and not a local bookstore, like the fact that people want to go to a Taylor Swift concert and not your indie band's is not an externality, it's a skill issue.
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