corrys

There are many published studies highlighting the volume of Bitcoin transactions associated with illegal activities. For example, this one from the University of Oxford: https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/business-law-blog/blog/2018/02/sex-...

I don’t think people who are fleeing CA are in the 13% tax bracket. Federal + state tax is around 40% for most engineers I know.

Hand counting can be manipulated too [0], so the idea that we can just move back to it and save our democracy is not accurate (or at least not a complete solution). In other words, dishonest politicians will find ways to exploit our fears even if we use paper ballots.

[0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S02613...

Bitcoins have been confiscated by many governments. A quick Google search reveals many instances of that.

Perhaps one the main reasons is that a large number of people use multiple devices or even multiple browsers on the same device. Not sure how SSL client certificate authentication accommodates that.

This proposal is clear and thoughtful, I like it. However, I didn’t see an explanation of how this would help addressing abuse (or other illegal activity) directed at third parties - someone who is not participating in a particular group. E.g. a group that shares child pornography. It is obvious that the members themselves would not report it. Likewise, relying on reputation does not make sense - in fact, their reputation could be inflated by the satisfied members.

This assessment sounds correct. The silver lining here is that engineers will pay more attention to algorithm biases in the future.

I, of course, don’t have all the context of your wife’s situation. However, it seems like she could register a company that provides writing services - and, therefore, be unaffected by this law? If a person is actually engaged in a business independently, they won’t have to change their status. Lyft and Uber drivers don’t own independent businesses.

“The person is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, or business of the same nature as that involved in the work performed.”

Interesting... It does look like cops's salaries are below average in most states: https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/What-Is-the-Average-Av...

You can already do that right now. You can already file a lawsuit for a stupendous amounts because the cop looked at you the wrong way. Would the cop get prosecuted? No. Losing qualified immunity doesn't mean that cops will automatically be at fault for anything you desire. The laws would still exist.

From my (limited) understanding of the role of police unions in cases like that, they basically threaten local governments and demand no prosecution for their members. They hold the keys to more public oversight and accountability.

That is a very unusual speculation. Do lower paid people have less compassion? Do high school teachers have worse understanding and appreciation of ethics and morality than bankers?

You seem to equate high salary with compassion. What is this notion based on?

Help with what? Keep cops in shape? Absolutely. Make cops more compassionate? Possibly not (not sure). Would it help to hold criminal cops accountable? No relation to military training.

Yes, that's how responsibility works. Doesn't mean that cops will be sentenced and go to jail for every person they tased, just means they won't be immune by default.

Police unions are the real problem in this situation. There will always be criminal cops. As long as they are protected by corrupt and powerful unions - they will have very little incentive to change.

The duality of good/bad cops is absolutely a distraction. It would be great to have a society with only good people. No bad people. Is that a solution? Is that even an option? There will always be cops who break the law. Let's start with that. The next question is: what, as a society, do we do with that. Allow cops to commit crimes without repercussions? Well, then we get riots (with good reason). Police unions, attorneys, judges who protect criminal cops - these are the institutions and the people who make the unhealthy situation (aka "bad cops") much worse.

What are "higher quality cops"? People with more developed morals and ethics? Money does not necessarily attract more compassionate or kind people. There are plenty of other high paying industries where that's not the case (e.g. banks, real estate).

Your premise is wrong.

You are both right. However, in the article [1] a large number of police officers were either acquitted, are awaiting sentencing, or were not punished, what the general population would consider, fairly.

When we hear about police departments agreeing to settle - that does not give us, as a society, a closure. Individual police officers have committed crimes, but now the tax payers are paying for that? That's not accountability.

Microsoft is extending parental leave, not maternity/paternity leave. There is no country in the world that offers 12-24 months of a paid parental leave (in addition to the initial maternity/paternity leave).

I mostly agree with this sentiment. However, even in the pre-recorded music times there was a pretty clear separation between the music people would play themselves at home and the music they would actively seek out to hear in a more professional environment (churches, concerts etc). When first recording mediums were invented, people were really excited specifically about being able to preserve and listen to the greats, not just any music.

New songs do have an incentive to emerge - it’s just human creativity. In the last 2 decades distribution has been massively democratized, the opposite of what your fear is. Anyone can distribute their music online to billions of people for free (YouTube, SoundCloud, etc).

Strange to see Block Party in this list! Also post rock had its time in the late 90s / early 00s. Doubt we can put it in the category “what kids listen to these days”. This category today is more along the lines of Post Malone and Lil Yachty.

and he would like to censor every single word before it is public - that is not freedom, it is authoritarianism

He never said that. He said that a publishing delay just enough to filter out potential illegal content (snuff, hate speech are illegal under US law) would benefit the society overall.

It is illegal to both posses nuclear materials (U.S. Code § 831) and to "develop or possess a radiological weapon" (U.S. Code § 832)

Same old argument. Why isn't everything legal then? Why not make all explosives legal? Nuclear weapons?

Thanks for the suggestion. In the future I would like to add a dashboard where users would be able to see comments from all sources they are interested in. Just a single feed for all comments in the system might be overwhelming.

Thanks! I, too, value consistent and simple UI. Ideally when distributed web takes off Birdy should become completely distributed and encrypted.

Thank you for your thoughts - I appreciate this discussion. I think in the beginning it will best work on bigger websites with popular commenting sections and strict editorial policies. Take The Guardian for example. They disable comments very often, moderate them aggressively - I would love to be able to discuss their content on their website without their control. Another user case is reviews on websites that more savvy users find not trustworthy. Scam websites etc. Being able to read actual user reviews there could be invaluable.

I am curious to know which other apps you refer to. You answered you question yourself actually - mobile integration is key. iOS and Android extensions allow users to add comments not only to any page in the browser, but to all URLs that other apps share. Like Tumblr posts shared from Tumblr app. On another note - public comments do not necessarily mean that you need an active instant discussion. You can leave a review, for example.