Yeah referencing existing flag colours with the shape referencing mountains & marae wharenui

I’ve seen this comment a few times now and I’m pretty conflicted, especially as I’m the white coloniser and can’t speak for Māori.

I think it’s important to point out that Māori have worked incredibly hard to reclaim and preserve their language, culture and this particular Haka seems to have resonated with a lot of Māori. It’s not a land acknowledgement from a blackrock CEO, or the Democrats kneeling for George Floyd.

But… The cynic in me says: It is performative. As are all parliamentary speeches and rituals. As is the bill itself which is right-wing virtue signalling. The lib in me: It has brought a lot of attention to the bill, and made it clear to “well meaning anglos” that it’s fucked up. The materialist in me: The treaty barely impacts capital’s ability to make profit, so overturning it seems quite far down the list (for now) for the local borg.

The blue and white fern was an abomination

Red peak objectively better

Smaller than the average mcmansion

The Hīkoi mō te Tiriti arrived in Wellington NZ today. The haka went viral the other day, but this is the bigger story of the public mobilisation against the bill introduced by our right-wing, reactionary, ACT party.

The other right wing parties in coalition have said they won’t support it past the first reading. But they probably would if they thought it would be easy for them.

Māori party has mobilised a series of protests and now this to get the bill in the news cycle. Which actually seems like a reasonable electoral strategy when the right wing government doesn’t seem that motivated to push it through.

100% this. I feel like I haven’t discovered any new artist since what.cd went down

If businesses could pay women less to do the same job they would preferentially hire women and the pay gap would disappear.

Yes I think perfectly rational actors is a valid assumption to base my whole field of study on why do you ask?

Imane Khelif won gold, the most satisfying Olympic win.

I’m a

But yea I saw people posting about it and that was the easiest reference to find on my phone

IRGC report that Haniyeh killed by short range missile. Maybe a shoulder launched missile? https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/8/3/haniyeh-killed-by-short-range-projectile-fired-from-outside-home-irgc

That certainly seems like the idea most techbros have, turn white-collar workers into quality checkers rather than producers. The thing is I’m not sure the output of a lot of white collar jobs can be treated the same as manufacturing output.

If you replace half your labour in manufacturing a TV, the value of a TV drops and with competition between firms prices & profits tend to drop too. But you can slow down this profit loss due to competition with anti-competitive behaviour: patents, cartels etc.

If you replace your graphic designers with AI, the value of graphic design drops but what you were really trying to “produce” with your fancy branding and packaging was a sense of perceived quality (value). Now that this is lower, consumers adjust their perceptions quickly and you have to demonstrate your product quality by spending money on things AI can’t replicate yet e.g. in-person experiences, or even just video promotion (in the short term at least).

I quite like Ed’s writing for a cathartic rant against the stupidity of AI.

Has anyone got any reading recommendations on the LLM insanity from a marxist perspective though? Assuming AI can replace labour in some industries, it immediately comes up against the LTV, with the value of the output immediately going to almost zero. Companies therefore have to maintain monopolistic false scarcity, which of course tech companies are already trying to do, but it seems to have wider implications for the economy - technofeudalism I guess.

1. No
2. No, not to my knowledge

Sorry to hear that

So far in my tech bubble I haven’t seen lay-offs explicitly due to AI, but there’s been increasing usage of it to produce more content. So it’s reducing the demand for contract writers and producers.

Tech does seem cooked at the moment, but I assume that’s mostly due to no more free money.

I really wish Graeber was still here, I need the Bullshit Jobs vs AI synthesis.

https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/29/24167072/openai-content-copyright-vox-media-the-atlantic

Expect [Article produced using AI] tags on your “Why bombing children is sometimes acceptable” very soon

Shit sucks. I’ve been sick for like 3 weeks

I ended up renting a byd a few weeks ago, felt luxury as hell, for I assume much less than western brands. although I’m not a car guy.

Wtf is this dumb AI image everyone is sharing for all eyes on rafah. Is there not something better to indicate you’re against genocide than the most trash image of all time