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is it really 4D chess to imagine that a man under investigation by the federal government would desire to benefit from being given express permission to reduce force and efficacy of agencies directly threatening him?

I don't think Musk having bad faith intent shows him to be intelligent, more just greedy and selfish, but I think it's actually more irresponsible to believe that he had absolutely no idea what he was doing


Under investigation for what? Like the self driving claims thing or something nefarious?


https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/apr/28/elon-musk...

False claims of self driving is half of it, at 1B


That falls under “dishonest stuff companies do all the time”. Unless there are major political points to be scored by nailing him (which there may be now, don’t get me wrong), this would get a slap on the wrist. The cars do drive themselves, they have for awhile, Tesla never claimed it was perfect, they only claimed it would be perfect in the near future and musk plausibly could have (delusionally) thought this so there is no case (not saying he isn’t dishonest, though, that’s just not how the legal system works).

So I don’t think being looked at for the kind of stuff many companies do all the time explains <checks notes> infiltrating the government and personally disrupting the people investigating him, in public. If he’s worried about a financial hit, souring Tesla’s reputation as he has is obviously not worth it. If he’s worried about prosecution, surely he would be better off being nice to everyone in politics, not pissing anyone off and strongly supporting choice causes off the mainstream radar that happen to be in the interest of politicians.

So if he is doing it on principle, he just needs to be hubristic and reckless and possibly very autistic. If he is doing it to mess with the people investigating him, he needs to be outright stupid.

Hubristic and reckless (and autistic) are much, much more realistic adjectives for Musk than “outright stupid”. I know a lot of people will just assert that he is stupid, but if you yourself are sufficiently intelligent and you listen to the guy talk for a long time, you can at least tell he isn’t stupid. You can tell because he doesn’t do the rhetorical things stupid people need to do in order to mask contradictions or logical holes in what they are saying. They always do it. Even smart people sometimes do it quite a bit, like Steven Pinker for example m. Musk very rarely does it, and when he does it’s so completely obvious you can tell he’s bad at it and didn’t get where he is by being good at it.


Add to this the appeal of a live service model:

* Committed playerbase that stays around for a long time

* Dev time focused on making new assets and gamemodes etc. rather than needing to develop entire new games

* Designed with an intentional grind (leveling systems, battle passes, random drop chances) which slows down player progression to acquire before-mentioned aesthetic items or even mechanically important upgrades, can provide shortcuts via payment

Of course, new live services are sinking now because each one depends on attention economy. If potential players are already committed to a different live service, they don't have the time or interest to re-commit to some other new one.

We've been watching for years now as major companies sink millions into games that are DOA because they never actually had an audience willing to commit to yet another major continuing time investment that these games represent.


Already been happening. This is exactly what's been going on for over a year now at the company I was most recently working for.

When I check in with folks still there, they mainly talk about how the time difference and distance has done nothing but add churn to the entire process both between devs but also between devs and management. Hopefully higher ups will recognize these inefficiences too, but that's wishful thinking.


> When I check in with folks still there, they mainly talk about how the time difference and distance has done nothing but add churn to the entire process

I don't buy that. Saudi Arabia and the United States, via Saudi Aramco, have figured out a solution to that long ago. Business "flows" unimpededly between the two for decades.


One of my best friends when she transitioned literally did change her name to Cassandra because of this


You can be honest and critical with someone and still be coming from a place of kindness. To be kind is not the same as being nice. Being kind is acting for the best interests of another person, which sometimes means being honest if it will help that person improve or gain a better perspective.

In addition, you can keep kindness as a guiding principle and still recognize the people who will take advantage of that kindness, and adjust yourself accordingly. You do not need to live to appease people who are never going to be appeased.


I think you're conflating "leftist" with "voting Clinton in order to avoid a Trump presidency". You're also conflating Hillary Clinton with leftism, when she is a centrist whose policy could have lined up with Reagan in the 80s.


If it's censored so effectively, how do you expect people to find it via googling based on vague allusions? If you believe this is so important, why be so vague in the first place? This is not how speaking in good faith looks.


I think that I recognize the parent's allusion. The film is Ukraine on Fire, directed by Igor Lopatonok.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukraine_on_Fire

The executive producer (better known for his work as a director) was Oliver Stone. You can buy it on DVD from several major retailers or pay to get it instantly via streaming on Amazon Prime.

The reason "few US citizen seem to know about it" is probably because most US citizens don't watch political documentaries.


Thank you. I'd agree with that presumption. It should also be clear that events in Ukraine have definitely evolved since 2016. Reception seems to imply that multiple sources dismissed the film as Russian propaganda at the time as well. Of course I can't say that for myself without watching it, but I'm noting it as significant.


How else am I to demonstrate that the information has been removed clean from the internet? If that makes me a bad actor in your opinion, in my opinion you have your reasoning screwed up somewhere, because I'm not following that logic at all. Please refrain from such redditish personal attacks. If you want to aggravate me, disprove my points. Unfortunately I'd more likely thank you than being mad in that case. If you're actually into making people mad, you should stick to reddit.

I don't think there's a single person on this forum that's not an ace at googling. So I take it you didn't google it for other reasons. Which is also a point I'm making and has been additionally explained in the post you're replying to.


I did attempt to search it based on the information you provided, but unfortunately couldn't find anything particularly relevant when I can't search in reference to the A-list Hollywood director you're alluding to and with any searches about Ukraine optimizing to being about the war with Russia which is obviously at the forefront of results.

You are being needlessly obtuse in your responses and in providing any clarifying information, which is either acting in bad faith or arrogance. If you believe me calling that out as such is a personal attack, then I suggest you provide sources so your points actually can be accessed and addressed.


There you go: https://reclaimthenet.org/youtube-removes-ukraine-on-fire-do...

I already explained my motivations behind what you describe as "acting in bad faith or arrogance" and would rather not be going in circles.


Thank you for providing a source. Although, the claims of censorship here appear hollow per checking currently -

- It's available on youtube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKcmNGvaDUs and was posted in April 2021

- It's searchable on Amazon currently despite being blocked in March of this year per the archived result in the article: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Ukraine+on+Fire&rh=n%3A2625373011...

This feels out of date; the movie is not being censored now. It was blocked by private companies likely as a quick response to the beginning of the war, and has since been made accessible again.


the claims of censorship here appear hollow

Please do realize you didn't check any of my points. Found any footage of Merkel in Kyiv that millions remember from weeks of news coverage, but apparently never happened? What percentage of the global economy is the weapons industry? I could continue with more concrete examples of censorship, but we can't even tackle any basics as they are getting ignored.


I can't imagine that anyone would ever disagree that tiktok serves a more ephemeral usecase; I don't see what you get from comparing the two.

You would probably make your point more strongly comparing books to online libraries like JSTOR which contain huge amounts of valuable research but restrict its access.


Weirdly enough, I went through school before then and learned cursive and I only use it on receipts and the occasional bank check. It has little to do with cursive being taught and more to do with cursive, and handwriting in general, being irrelevant.


You're probably right, besides aesthetic value, writing on paper has little utility left


Faster and with better retentIon when taking notes in meetings (or classes).


Same here! And I used a typewriter for my essays at university. These days if I scribble things down its just a scrawl (not really printing or cursive to be honest).


Are you saying you believe Project Veritas is left-wing? They're explicitly a far-right group, funded by conservative donors


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