kkdsafjid's comments

Diaspora thought like you and went the length. Not sure how it played out, but iirc in the beginning they found it more work than they had expected. https://diasporafoundation.org/

I think there may be a lot more aspects to it that need attention than one anticipates at first.

Nobody says you have to be (fake) close friends to the people you network with on social media.

I follow Paul Graham on Twitter. I don't think he is my friend (if only because he doesn't know I exist).

Are you sure social networking is not expensive to provide? What makes you think so?

I appreciate your concerns, but I think they are mostly propaganda. Without the industries, there would be no jobs and no workers that could be deprived of their power.

If you want to strengthen workers, create more demand for jobs, so that workers have options. By for example creating a successful VR industry, you create demand for more jobs that haven't previously existed, thereby empowering workers. Somebody who has previously been exploited to manufacture fridges can now give their boss the finger and go manufacture chips for VR headsets instead. One easy way to create more jobs is to hire a cleaning person, by the way. Everybody who is concerned about "living wages" and things like that should start by hiring cleaners and possibly gardeners for their homes.

I personally think the whole concept of "workers" is bunk. Everybody is a free agent entering contracts with other market participants. That's it. "Worker" is a social construct, actually, a socialist construct. More so, being a "worker" does not sound like a very desirable state of affairs, so I think society should work towards getting rid of workers.

I don't think you have a proper concept of "wealth".

People can now buy a haedset for 400$, rather than 100000$. That creates wealth.

That you personally care more about starting a business than about using a VR headset is not really relevant.

Being able to buy a VR headset for 400$ is "real wealth".

Um, it is simply very expensive to create a good VR experience. It's not expensive BECAUSE of network effects and economies of scale and corporations. It is only POSSIBLE and AFFORDABLE because of those things.

For another example, to make a modern movie can cost hundreds of millions of dollars. It is only possible to make them because there are many people who will possibly watch it and pay for it. Nobody would be able to film the Lord of The Rings trilogy in their own basement just for their own entertainment. Not yet, anyway - tools of the future may make it possible ("GPT-300, make me a good movie based on the LOTR books").

Ah didn't know that story, thought it was just about the first book.

Isn't a paper book also kind of DRMed? It's pretty difficult to copy? You could put it on a photo copier, but then I guess you could also tape record an audible book to copy it.

I respect that he wants his books to be available without DRM, but why not simply offer a way for audible shoppers to download a DRM free copy from another source?

Shouldn't it be available as a free download somewhere?

May be worthwhile to read, but Solzhenitsyn is renowned world literature. Also I doubt Guantanama reached the same level of desolation.

Let's not forget about the pleasures of communism. "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" by Alexander Solzhenitsyn might be a worthwhile read.

"Freiburg: the German citiy whose politics align best with our (the BBC's) ideology" would have been a more accurate title.

They have some bicycles and some solar cells, and the major is from the leftist Green party.