mircea_popescu: The first time I taught undergraduates I was surprised to learn that most of the students had no ability to judge if their answers seemed plausible. [...] You could ask a question about a guy throwing a football, and answers would range from 1 meter/second all the way to 5000 meters/second. You could ask a question about how far someone can hit a baseball and answers would similarly range from a few meters to a few k
asciilifeform: they're also dumb << that's the interesting part, plenty of folks walking around who are not dumb in the usual sense - but grew up in this bizarre underground ww3 vault where of course the fucking sky is made of cement, what else could it be made of, and why do you use that weirdo archaic word 'sky' anyway, it's 'ceiling'
assbot: Doctor Grumpy in the House: Neurologists telling neurology jokes ... ( http://bit.ly/1xAeKEf )
BingoBoingo: http://drgrumpyinthehouse.blogspot.com/2015/03/neurologists-telling-neurology-jokes.html
mircea_popescu: they're also dumb.
asciilifeform: the folks born and raised on 'eat recycled phood, it's good for the environment And ok for you!' typically don't bother.
asciilifeform: re: square metrage: on a number of occasions i spoke with tourists and visitors of various kinds from 'orc' lands. who marvelled at hearing of 'american salary' etc. i patiently explained that it's rather like a shabbier version of where they came from with a zero or two welded on to both sides of the household balance sheet. like zimbabwe 'dollar'. normally folks grasp it and face lights up.
BingoBoingo: Etoh has blessed me with plenty of forward moving "time machine" jumps. Never given me the backwards jump to 2003 I'd make so much out of.
asciilifeform: if you get ^ this, you are qualified for the time machine excursion.
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: schnapps << i once suggested a drink, 'the kapo' - one part schnapps to one part 'manischewitz'
brendafdez: asciilifeform not sure if that's the proper word
mircea_popescu: very supportive home market. "oh, our empire building boys abroad found blue rocks ? FINE! we will make hats with them! they're very valuable now!"
mircea_popescu: add one and one. it's how they ended up drinking tea.
BingoBoingo: mircea_popescu: Sure. As in delivery and understanding the principle. Just don't understand the idea of Port.
mircea_popescu: brendafdez how about something simple like, bar and dancing pole ? that's 100sqm right there.
mircea_popescu: you can't have a basement in the swamp. or good cheese, for that matter.
asciilifeform: fortheloveofgodmontrezor! (tm)
mircea_popescu: haha not quite. but the thing did say 1893
mircea_popescu: basement isalso good for all the chained bitchez.
asciilifeform: you will run into folks, for instance, who will whisper to you that they would have pistol range in their house if they could (a mighty fine idea, if you take care to separate the air flow)
asciilifeform: brendafdez: i have entire things that i cannot do, for instance, because, while can afford the equipment - cannot, the space.
BingoBoingo: <brendafdez> what would be the point of 500swm all to yourself? << Vax powered steam table
brendafdez: what would be the point of 500swm all to yourself?
asciilifeform: thing is, the 'numeric wank' is just that. more interesting is what chunk of their meager daily coin the folks in each town get fleeced for by the land rackets
mircea_popescu: besides, something tells me you'll salivate after the vibe of any place that's not washington fucking dc.
asciilifeform still salivates after the 'vibe' of timis.
mod6: thanks BingoBoingo! although, it'd probably be better to link "first release" to this email: http://therealbitcoin.org/ml/btc-dev/2015-March/000069.html
mircea_popescu: my apologies for any popped eyes in the audience.
asciilifeform: 500 m^2 is ~6 times the space where i live now.
mircea_popescu: the girlies that lived alone in town generally got 500 sqm apts running 300ish a month.
asciilifeform: (that are b0rked half the time)
asciilifeform: in flats they are unheard of.
asciilifeform did not have 'own' washamat until the current ~2kBez bldg.
mircea_popescu: "For the first time in New York City, a multi-unit building will (legally) consist entirely of what the city has dubbed "micro units," which are apartments of between 250 and 370 square feet." << this is almost exactly it!
gabriel_laddel: I always wonder about the people who see this sort of thing everyday but never connect the dots, how do they internally deal with actual reality? I once flipped through the book Dangerous Thoughts by Yuri Orlov. He claimed that in the soviet collapse people would have multiple "selves". When they would break the law that would be their "off work" I, vs. the at work I who would report such a transgression to the poli
asciilifeform: phun phact (also noted by al) - fella who holds the 'stop' sign all day makes 2x what a typical postdoc makes.
gabriel_laddel: <asciilifeform> we have these here in abundance << I saw one outside the Palo Alto four seasons just the other day... 20 guys just standing around more or less.
mircea_popescu: dude, shakespeare had only part of it. not only is the world a stage, but the same old play is going on endlessly.
asciilifeform: we have these here in abundance
mircea_popescu: "construction zones that only constructed themselves" fuck, that's SO DAMNED SOVIET!
mircea_popescu: i'm curious if it's going to yield some sort of ragnarok-like "the world is doomed" (seems to jive with the "austerity won't work for us so it doesn't work period" self-seeking ignorance) or some sort of ultraviolent civil war of six sides, like in japan
gabriel_laddel: ^ what happens in the USA
mircea_popescu: there's a difference between "laughing is evil" (as aptly depicted by eco) and "we are wrong"
decimation: they aren't peasants who only roll shit uphill
decimation: also note that most of these millenials were raised in relative prosperity in the rich 'burbs of the 80's
mircea_popescu: but the us has been hating itself, quite loudly at that, for decades now.
gabriel_laddel: <mircea_popescu> what was the fucking soviet term for this, << kommunalki?
mircea_popescu: but god did romanians hate this stuff after the war.
mircea_popescu: five-six thousand years later you'll be launching the titanic!
mircea_popescu: incidentally : shared kitchens are absolutely the ONLY way to go high density. gotta let the women become friendly so the tribal structure re-emerges. once they're breastfeeding each other's babies you can start over with the moses desertwalk.
mircea_popescu: what was the fucking soviet term for this,
mircea_popescu: 'The authors of a new report from the Boston Foundation, a philanthropic organization that funds local nonprofits, prefer the phrase "millennial villages," dorm-like developments that maximize space by combining smaller living spaces with lots of common areas.
asciilifeform: yeah but in this case it is as if the occupant had been mummified and nothing detectably changed in the behaviour of the visitors pre- and post-mortem
assbot: Logged on 19-03-2015 04:23:25; asciilifeform: '"chumpatron X debt continues to drag on the young generation, limiting their ability to be milked in chumpatron Y," the analysts said.'
asciilifeform: in that a stable of parasites is still drawing fat salaries there, as if nothing whatsoever had happened
asciilifeform: in the usg sense
asciilifeform: aha mircea_popescu grasps the subtlety here
mircea_popescu: you can't have moral persons that have delegated their authority. everyone in the us agrees that they're obeying laws because they're laws, not because they're right. consequently, american citizens can not be moral agents.
asciilifeform: the 'adult dorms' are one form
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: usa has no 'austerity way' but does have the inevitable убеднение (orlov tried to introduce the term to engl., but it has no good ready translation)
mircea_popescu: the ridicule of this after their "austerity as only way out" consensus in the 90s is completely lost, also in typical usian fashion.
mircea_popescu: which is why, in typical usian fashion, they're claiming currently that "austerity is not a way out" in the general.
mircea_popescu: it can't stop. this is a foregone conclusion, the us has no austerity way out
decimation: meanwhile farther up the line, the bond & stock & currency markets wobbled wildly on news that the fed might this time really seriously stop printing money
asciilifeform: both are 'going concerns' in the sense that they keep a great many folks out of the organ market
mircea_popescu: when confronted with stuff such as, you know "quite a few 'civilians' don't believe me when i explain that the 'publishers' do not edit, or - in most cases - even typeset the submissions; and that not only do authors receive no royalties, but often -pay- page costs"
mircea_popescu: strange that anyone would even for a single second propose the usg even exists as a going concern,
asciilifeform: ouses by 85 percent since 2009, the report found.'
asciilifeform: 'Here's why millennial villages might be a good idea. Boston doesn't have enough small apartments to satisfy demand from young adults and their boomer-parents. Millennials in particular have responded to the small-unit shortage by doubling and tripling up in housing originally built for middle-income families. That trend has helped drive up the average sales price of a single unit in one of Boston's distinctive triple-decker h
decimation: asciilifeform: the inhabitants are expected to spend 100% of their income in 'consumption'
decimation: http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/politics/2013/01/7284318/bloomberg-unveils-those-tiny-tiny-manhattan-apartments < related "For the first time in New York City, a multi-unit building will (legally) consist entirely of what the city has dubbed "micro units," which are apartments of between 250 and 370 square feet."
asciilifeform: less space because the inhabitants are not expected to reproduce
asciilifeform: how they will be designed - is no mystery, there were already built here where i live
decimation: asciilifeform: perhaps the dorms can be designed like a soviet apartment block
decimation: " families that need them."
asciilifeform: '... In that light, building smaller units for cash-strapped millennials who need to live in a tight housing market sounds like a sensible solutionhelping young people find more affordable housing and preserving larger units for the families that need them. Still, as the single-family starter home becomes less viable, do initiatives like this doom millennials to spending their twenties living in dorms?'
asciilifeform: 'The authors of a new report from the Boston Foundation, a philanthropic organization that funds local nonprofits, prefer the phrase "millennial villages," dorm-like developments that maximize space by combining smaller living spaces with lots of common areas. Specifically, the report suggests building 10,000 units that make up for cramped living quarters by including shared lounges, health clubs, and shared areas for study, m
asciilifeform: '"chumpatron X debt continues to drag on the young generation, limiting their ability to be milked in chumpatron Y," the analysts said.'
asciilifeform: and where do these cheap clowns get off calling debt peonage 'ownership' ?
asciilifeform: the hidden text in this crap is 'let's print more hoap'
decimation: asciilifeform: the $maxint bubble is growing even larger > http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-03-18/young-adults-are-losing-all-hope-of-buying-a-starter-home > "The student loan debt burden rose 8 percent, to $1.16 trillion, last year. Most of that debt—65 percent—was owed by borrowers under 40 years old. "
BingoBoingo: <asciilifeform> the textbook racket is in some ways inevitable - the kids with access to $maxint in loans are walking bags of delicious meat from the standpoint of ten thousand kinds of flea << Not to mention many professors will accomodate students without $maxint doing otherwise.
asciilifeform: what's a $300 book compared to the $100k tuition.
asciilifeform: and given as they are virtually never spending money which is -their own- in any palpable sense - they don't resist nearly as much as might be expected
asciilifeform: the textbook racket is in some ways inevitable - the kids with access to $maxint in loans are walking bags of delicious meat from the standpoint of ten thousand kinds of flea
asciilifeform: hence incentive for the profs
asciilifeform: chumper has to register with publisher to do the exercises, yes
decimation: or do they use robo-grading?
decimation: are the homeworks online?
asciilifeform: the parasite scum went, 'fine, we don't care if you want the dead tree to carry around or not, but you'll pay.'
asciilifeform: where a used copy of the book literally doesn't let you pass the class because its homework account code (yes) is already spent.
asciilifeform: decimation: in one form or another, this has been going on for at least two decades.
decimation: asciilifeform: yeah I've heard the latest scam for undergrads is to 'custom publish' a book for each class, which consists of portions of older texts with all of the sections and excercises renumbered
asciilifeform: the basic 'zoological' observation here is that there is no such thing as a chumpatron of this size which stays 'single-layered' indefinitely. at a certain point, smaller fleas show up to go on the backs of the fleas, and so ad infinitum
BingoBoingo: <decimation> BingoBoingo: yeah that makes sense, I always wonder why the administration seems 'friendly' to spending large piles of money on the publishing scamzors << As a class nearly all librarians dislike this because even when they publish anything is too niche to win. Spending on this stuff is also an extraordinary part of their budget.
asciilifeform: the textbook divisions of the same houses rape the undergrads, also to the enthusiastic applause of the faculty (who get kickbacks)
decimation: BingoBoingo: yeah that makes sense, I always wonder why the administration seems 'friendly' to spending large piles of money on the publishing scamzors
assbot: Logged on 19-06-2014 01:51:51; asciilifeform: d co-authors continue. Academic science is only one such market; other familiar examples include rock music, professional sports, and national politics. '
assbot: Logged on 19-06-2014 01:51:50; asciilifeform: 'One of various ways of organizing work that economists have identified, a tournament market "offers participants the chance of winning a big prize--an independent research career, tenure, a named chair, scientific renown, awards--through competition," writes Richard Freeman and co-authors. Tournament markets amplify "small differences in productivity into large differences in recognition and reward,"
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: the term of art, iirc, is 'tournament market'
asciilifeform: quite a few 'civilians' don't believe me when i explain that the 'publishers' do not edit, or - in most cases - even typeset the submissions; and that not only do authors receive no royalties, but often -pay- page costs
BingoBoingo: decimation: It is more the University admins who budget for this hoping they might have someone on the faculty to wins their lottery ticket for them. It is essentially exactly a lottery mentality.
decimation: BingoBoingo: the libraries are in on it insofar as they are a funnel of cash to the journal houses
decimation: the other thing that annoys me is djb's complaint: http://cr.yp.to/writing/ieee.html < IEEE is more than happy to charge you for copyright-free papers
decimation: well, they have good group insurance rates
decimation: I'm a member of the communications society - you have to pay more to get access to their journal
decimation: I'm personally pissed that the IEEE (I pay for membership) only gives me a tiny, tiny slice of their papers
asciilifeform: and to the extent it isn't a problem, it is solely because academia is mostly dead as a going concern
asciilifeform: the same folks who were paying the parasites (i will not call them publishers, they withhold only - performing not a single one of the traditional functions of a publishing house save the physical printing) - will continue to pay.
asciilifeform: but even the linked item contains 'Be available for download, reading and analysis free of charge no later than 12 months after initial publication'
decimation: I'm sure that some kind of loophole will protect the existing publishing empires
asciilifeform: ben_vulpes: out of curiosity, what's the elisp doing in http://therealbitcoin.org/ml/btc-dev/2015-March/000070.html ?
asciilifeform: the 'gitignores' can go
ben_vulpes: http://therealbitcoin.org/ml/btc-dev/patches.html << please take a look at this list, and the patches we've rolled out with the 0.5.3.1 RI build. if you've time, inclination, and capability - review the patches and submit your sigs.
ben_vulpes: btw, we think this is the first publically-released static bitcoin build.
mod6: Thanks to TomServo && Punkman && danielpbarron && trinque && thestringpuller && BingoBoingo
BingoBoingo: ben_vulpes: per "asciilifeform: all kudos to mod6, all critiques to me" mod6 get the girls plural, you get singular girl. In the tradition of mp/kako BitBet tradition.
ben_vulpes: yeah asciilifeform thanks for holding our toes to the fire
mod6: you guys made this happen. you're the real bitcoin heros.
ben_vulpes: ah well, onwards and upwards, as they say.
mod6: thebitcoin.foundation/ml/btc-dev/2015-March/000069.html
asciilifeform: http://therealbitcoin.org/ml/btc-dev/2015-March/000068.html << congrats to ben_vulpes and mod6
BingoBoingo: * asciilifeform waits for the inevitable 'that's not shiva' nitpick << lol dong-nose
asciilifeform waits for the inevitable 'that's not shiva' nitpick
decimation: well, now is the time to buy
decimation: I wonder how much manipulation is going on before some of those ETFs hit the pink sheets
gribble: Error: This is not one of the supported markets. Please choose one of ['bcent', 'okc', 'btcn', 'coinbase', 'cbx', 'btce', 'butter', 'bfx', 'btcavg', 'krk', 'btcde', 'bitmynt', 'btsp'] or 'all'
mircea_popescu: actually clown car is probably the worst description. for one thing, b-a's not funny.
gribble: Error: For identification purposes, you must be identified via GPG to use the order book.
assbot: Logged on 13-03-2015 17:02:57; nubbins`: gabriel_laddel:Does anyone take issue with me describing the lordship as "the peerage" and #-assets as "earth's premiere commercial forum"? <<< ...
decimation: asciilifeform: the macrofab guy actually did an impressive amount of follow-up
mircea_popescu: for one thing, they know it's nothing short of abuse, hence the "educational training" gauche
mircea_popescu: http://40.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lz4ldoJGIh1qh70jeo1_1280.jpg << nice guys don't look at the boobage.
decimation: "We are in contact with the University chapter of Kappa Sigma and they have taken swift and decisive action in this matter. At their request, the University has committed to provide educational training on diversity and respect for the entire fraternity." << asciilifeform: I could imagine this exact phrase being written in the soviet union
ben_vulpes: (perhaps a link to the email list page for the email in which a given patch/signature was transmitted would be even better)
ben_vulpes: as in: i'd like the sole entry under submitted by to link to the appropriate sig, as well as all of the entries under 'signed by' as well.
ben_vulpes: http://therealbitcoin.org/ml/btc-dev/patches.html << jurov, would it be feasible to get links to the relevant emails in which patches were transmitted on this page
BingoBoingo: So the Vessenes Foundation is not as sophisticated at vote diddling as East StL http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/illinois/east-st-louis-mayor-files-as-write-in-candidate-for/article_e4966c68-f4ec-5964-8d75-cd8a226c3385.html
TheNewDeal: Hurricane insirance, theyve got it all
BingoBoingo: BitBet is the greatest provider of insurance BTC has ever seen
brendafdez: I read the trilema posts, that's a start
TheNewDeal: I was wondering how long it would take the No side to take https://bitbet.us/bet/1129/light-sweet-crude-oil-wti-to-drop-under/#b8
gribble: Error: You don't have the owner capability. If you think that you should have this capability, be sure that you are identified before trying again. The 'whoami' command can tell you if you're identified.
gribble: Error: The "Market" plugin is loaded, but there is no command named "-all" in it. Try "list Market" to see the commands in the "Market" plugin.
mircea_popescu: one of the lulziest miciurins of all time
mircea_popescu: btw re the entire satoshi thing : anyone ever considered it's maybe a homage to Satoshi Kanazawa ?
BingoBoingo: <mircea_popescu> danielpbarron well i certainly didn't go in as far as that << This is why we read. You've got more important stuff to read most of the time.
vorandrew: :) sorry - debugging some start scripts... will find other server
fluffypony: clearly I'm practicing for the upcoming conference circuit :-P
assbot: Ashley Judd to press charges against Twitter users over sexual harassment | Film | The Guardian ... ( http://bit.ly/1Esg0vN )
cazalla: http://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/mar/18/ashley-judd-to-press-charges-twitter-sexual-harassment
mircea_popescu: some signatures better than others.
mircea_popescu: i guess they didn;t teach perl.
asciilifeform: ben_vulpes: where i went it was the 'credit-hour'
mircea_popescu: Its not to say that we didnt have the right information but the problem was being able to produce it quickly and produce it in the format that the department wanted, Walker said.
asciilifeform: they, of course, would say 'we busted a sc4mz0r'
mircea_popescu: "Mid-Continent, which first opened in 1949 but received federal student aid only for the past decade or so, caught the attention of regulators at the Education Department in 2011, according to documents obtained by Inside Higher Ed."
BingoBoingo: College closed, but perviously had been faking Federal loans, nao wants the money back even though its closed.
mircea_popescu: what's next, someone brings you half a hambuger and you pay half the price forone ?
mircea_popescu: wait, someone actually pays a college that doesn't complete the program ?
mircea_popescu: "The closure of a college often leaves students in limbo. Without being able to finish a degree, students must scramble to transfer and to figure out how to deal with the debt they have racked up."
mircea_popescu: 'To mock or joke about the tragic events of that morning is morally reprehensible and Thew has rightly been convicted and sentenced for his actions.
ben_vulpes: i'm the idiot today
mats: ben_vulpes: i was responding to mircea_popescu there
ben_vulpes: last few lines of that article suggest there was a parole violation involved.
mircea_popescu: check out the uk lmao.
mircea_popescu: "Thew, of Radcliffe, Greater Manchester, admitted a Section 4A Public Order Offence (displaying writing or other visible representation with intention of causing harassment, alarm or distress) and was sentenced at Minshull Street Crown Court today."
mats: i thought the same thing
mircea_popescu: ben_vulpes saying they're behaving like a forumite scammer is being generous.
mircea_popescu: check it out, fed's reading the logs.
mircea_popescu: http://log.bitcoin-assets.com/?date=18-03-2015#1056654 << that's the correct name, how did you know ? got the same ?
ben_vulpes: i was thinking of the money sitting in NY, intended for bondholders.
ben_vulpes: clearly i don't understand the term of art.
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: cared because 'if you don't know precisely who at the table is the chump...'
asciilifeform: mike_c: the other half of that thread was that i had serious doubts re: whether the service offered by mf inc. was actually economically possible as described, and ergo i might be a chump
mike_c: i'm not interested in blaming anyone. but if these guys can speed up the schedule, let's keep them working.
asciilifeform: mike_c: the tale with the board house was simply a case of 'wunderwaffen' that did not fire to spec
asciilifeform: mike_c: understand, i cannot blame this particular vendor for the overall pace of the work - only self. (in particular, i am not clever enough to escape from having a fairly intense day job)
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform so tell them that you want them to rush the 2nd joib as much as humanly possible and fly it over.
mike_c: i didn't actually think I knew all the details. so schedule for getting it by c3 is blown?
mike_c: not empty-handed if they deliver though, right?
mike_c: this still seems promising to me. so new little shop had a bug in their order form. doesn't make them useless.
mircea_popescu: bout the same thing.
asciilifeform: 'they' make $maxint by sending cartloads of meat to get liquified in afghan, and the like
mircea_popescu: right. they just win wars in afghanistan.
asciilifeform: or ask around, futile, whether a hosting co. or manufacturing house somewhere might agree to take a little btc business
asciilifeform: 'they', for instance, don't have to split attention between N day jobs
asciilifeform: deliberately using the goxbubble numbers
asciilifeform: this is why i always say that victory is far, that 'we' are small and 'they' are - stupid, yes - but gigantic. the entire s.nsa ipo would not have bought a proper pick'n'placer, not even talking about real estate to house it in a place which i could economically get to, etc.
mircea_popescu: nor are the billions being spent his own personal pocket money he could buy icecream with otherwise.
mircea_popescu: but you don't need that. you merely need to be deemed by a major capital allocator worthy of the allocation.
asciilifeform: or the 'percent of pie' sense discussed in possibly same thread
asciilifeform: 'money' in the allocator sense (see old mircea_popescu thread about subsistence vs capital-allocator)
mircea_popescu: it's not a simple matter of money, as money's not invariant over the cases we discuss.
asciilifeform: see, if i were the kind of fella who has money, would not have been having any of the problem described in this tale. would have either seen the boards made within a week (actual business relationship with factory, sleep ad libitum and fly in to supervise in person with own eyes) or would have a legit conveyor with requisite machinery in-house, and same
mircea_popescu: sort-of like the stair of no return, once you left you can't walk back
asciilifeform: based on rough eyeball of the kind of things can and cannot afford
mircea_popescu: no, i know. the problem with gedanken experiments is that they necessarily won't fit the reality
asciilifeform: probably hanging from somewhere in that 19th, like that schmuck swinging from the last chopper out of saigon
mircea_popescu: if you're in the 1% that did then as it does now, the fact that there's a further aspirational 19% added to the pot does not help you
asciilifeform: but if playing that gedanken-game fairly, possibly the 'progress' is in my being able to get things at all without serious moneys
mircea_popescu: "it takes us a second to do things that took a lifetime before - and they come with the guarantee of being something else entirely!"
mircea_popescu: please to progress on the dotted line.
mircea_popescu: as the work works now, software makes everything much easier and faster. errors especially.
mircea_popescu: if the world was working as it did before computers, ascii would have been one of the few people with pen and paper, and wrote a description to one of the few people who made what he needed, and by virtue of that fewness they'd have actually been friends. the letter took a week to get there, the work took a week to be done, and so a month later alf has his peas or w/e he's needing for alchemy.
mircea_popescu: well hopefully they fixed it.
BingoBoingo: So, once you finalize a thing in their webapp you gotta sit on the page for a couple hours just to make sure the cache is sync'd or...
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform is this factually true, that you had the wrong part in there for a while, then switched it out to the right part and ordered immediately ?
mircea_popescu: but otherwise, most public-facing diff futures seems to happen on bitbet.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform aha! i wonder what the bug would have been
mike_c: it's nice that they figured it out.
mike_c: so normal fuckup then, not even massively incompetent.
asciilifeform: i did notice weird side terminals on the caps, thought it was a manufacturing artifact.