The Internet created the backbone that allowed for rapid experimentation in communications technologies, and created the ability for anyone to create and share technologies and reach a huge audience very quickly.
Without the Internet, most consumer electronics would have been far more expensive to build, and would have been strictly controlled walled gardens, but the Internet in general and the Web in particular allowed so many inventors to flourish. Ever since that Genie was let out of the bottle, corporate and government interests have been trying to put it back in, and most companies are trying to build and reinforce walled gardens under the banner of unified app stores that extract insane rents.
Having worked in streaming media and entertainment for the last several years, I am solidly convinced that most of the streaming media services are built by people who essentially turned the tools they built to manage their pirated libraries into a saleable product :P
Not American, but as I understand it, 401k's are tied to your employers 401k implementation and while you are employed you have little choice in how the funds are managed. If you are contributing to a third party managed fund (employer or otherwise) that is not being matched, then you are ceding control of your retirement funds for no practical benefit. You would be better off putting your savings into another tax shelter appropriate to your needs that you can control.
If you aren't getting a matching benefit or other reward for using an employer managed investment, then you shouldn't. If someone doesn't have the time, inclination, or knowledge to understand the difference then investing in an unmatched 401k is still better than not saving at all :S
This is incorrect. First off, you do control your retirement funds. The amount of control varies, but at the very least you are offered dozens of mutual funds, indexed funds and bond funds to choose from. Some companies allow offer Fidelity BrokerageLink which allow you to invest in anything including individual stocks.
Secondly, as far as "another tax shelter" there aren't any. For most people the only tax shelter available is 401(k). And the tax shelter is a very good reason to contribute to 401(k), even if there is no company match.
Right, it is much lower, and also there is this: If your company offers a 401(k), the IRS limits your ability to deduct Traditional IRA contributions from your taxes based on your income.
Tacking on, in evangelical circles Dave Ramsey's financial peace university talks about saving 15% of retirement when getting out of debt and generally working through that list, then once you have paid off the house, build more retirement wealth as you desire...most of us don't get to that point until later in life.
There is also the rent vs buy calculation to take into account, depend on where you live, it might make more sense to rent and invest the difference than buying.
Every 401K I've been in has had some choice in investments. Even if they don't, you'd have to assume that you could do better actively managing your own funds in another tax shelter than the "S&P 500 index" or whatever the 401K is doing. For most people, this is unlikely.
I think it's generally accepted that at a high level being in the top quartile is considered very good. Not excellent. Not unicorn. Just very good.
Beyond that, it's not about becoming very good at two different, completely orthogonal things, it's about becoming very good at two things that are complementary in some way that is of value to others. Being good at PacMan and Bouldering is only particularly valuable if you are competing for opportunities to participate in a hypothetical mixed reality video game, or perhaps a very niche streaming channel. Being the top quartile of embedded c code, and flora identification could result in building software/hardware tools to identify flora, which is a niche that currently has multiple competing products that are high value to those interested.
> A system that works 90% of the time but hallucinates or leaks data the other 10% isn't an 'agent', it's a liability.
That strongly depends on whether or not the liability/risk to the business is internalized or externalized. Businesses take steps to mitigate internal risks while paying lip service to the risks with data and interactions where high risk is externalized. Usually that is done in the form of a waiver in the physical world, but in the digital world it's usually done through a ToS or EULA.
The big challenge is that the risks that Agentic AI in it's current incarnation or not well understood by individuals or even large businesses, and most people will happily click through thinking "I trust $vendor" to do the right thing, or "I trust my employer to prevent me doing the wrong thing."
Employers are enticed by the siren call of workforce/headcount/cost reductions and in some businesses/cases are happy to take the risk of a future realized loss as a result of an AI issue that happens after they move on/find a new role/get promoted/transfer responsibility to gain the boost of a good quarterly report.
As a hobbyist, it's not about being able to buy it faster, cheaper, or better. It's about learning how to tinker, making something work, and building something that is effectively the artistic expression of my technical skills.
YMMV, but if you aren't loving the hobby element anymore and the itch can be scratched by reaching for a product, that's a shift in what you are enjoying, not an indictment of hobbies :)
> I do not think that home ownership is what most people want.
I think this is a ridiculous statement. I don't know your background, but I grew up in extreme poverty (by Canadian standards). In the welfare complexes I lived in growing up, living in a home you owned seemed like an unattainable dream. The ability to choose between owning a home and renting a home is representative of a degree of economic freedom that is becoming unattainable for many, many people.
There is absolutely merit to the idea that choosing to rent is a good choice for many people, but in most cases the people who would make that choice are inclined to do so because they either desire or require mobility in terms of relocation, and frequently the reason people desire that is the opportunity to pursue better economic opportunities (jobs, investments, etc).
I get what you're saying, I also grew up below the poverty line for all of my childhood. My point was pretty unclear. I don't think that people want to "own a home" in that it's not home ownership that they're after but an asset.
The amount of people I grew up with who viewed having a house as a way to become wealthy was large. Which is silly. (Real housing prices : median income) cannot continue to climb in a society that has decreasing population without some sort of external intervention. Poor people spending the entirety of their money on a house will be the ones left holding the bag, which is part of why it irks me so much.
Yes. There are e-bikes that look like motorcycles or mopeds that can be pedaled, but are uncomfortable, and there are e-bikes that look vespa style scooters that have pedals but it's completely impractical to pedal them - the pedal operation is there to qualify under specific requirements to be classified as an e-bike.
Bases must be tagged in order by runners. And they can safely wait at a base without getting tagged out as long as there is not a runner behind them that must advance. Anytime they are offbase they are at risk.
Yes, natural sounds do trigger it (for me). The difference is that if it is a natural sound, it becomes a problem to be solved - intermittent dripping from taps, the noise of the wheel in my daughters hamster enclosure, or something tapping a window are specific cases I can cite. Those incidents resulted in a) me learning how to replace a leaking faucet assembly (the taps and faucet were one unit) , b) upgrading to a better, quieter hamster wheel, and c) trimming a tree.
When people are the cause it becomes more challenging. People feel attacked when you tell them they are chewing loudly, or they think you are weird when you complain about the sound of the specific pen they are using makes when they are writing on the paper bothers you. Couple misophonia reactions with ADHD justice sensitivity and the emotional reaction can overload my rational comprehension that it is quite normal to make, tolerate, and ignore those sounds to make the stupid fucking meat between my ears feel like I am being targeted by whoever is making the noise. 95% of time I can manage it, but when it gets overwhelming my reactions can be suboptimal (like, wildly inappropriate when I was a kid, but as an adult pulling an Irish goodbye and just leaving, which can be a career limiting move when you are in the workplace).
Without the Internet, most consumer electronics would have been far more expensive to build, and would have been strictly controlled walled gardens, but the Internet in general and the Web in particular allowed so many inventors to flourish. Ever since that Genie was let out of the bottle, corporate and government interests have been trying to put it back in, and most companies are trying to build and reinforce walled gardens under the banner of unified app stores that extract insane rents.
reply