>> ^mgittle:

The guy wrote "your fired"


... twice.

Thank you for the quality invocation.

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
*quality

This RSA video explains the problems with merit pay better than I could: http://videosift.com/video/What-motivates-us

Thank you kind sir!

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
*quality

>> ^Enzoblue:

Ok, so did he say that the reason democracy allows the freedom of assembly is so that the leaders can see all there enemies in one place?


No, he was saying democracies value freedom of assembly because democracies require freedom of assembly to form. Everyone needs to know that other people feel the same way they do because it gives you collective power. If a group of people want to form a different type of government, they must first collectively agree that the current government is crappy, and you can't do that without the freedom to group up and communicate.

Obviously, increasing connectedness through communications technology is having quite an effect on that whole "I know that they know that I know" thing. Not only does information spread quickly, but the knowledge that other people know the same things you know also spreads faster than it ever has in the past.

Your video, RSA: Steven Pinker - Language as a Window into Human Nature, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

This achievement has earned you your "Pop Star" Level 6 Badge!

>> ^blankfist:

There's a power vacuum now. I worry who'll fill it. Another puppet? Another extremist? Or can they truly have a representational government?


The vacuum is being filled by the army with high acceptance by the people. The behaviour of the Egyptian army over the past few weeks has been truly amazing. They read the people and the tide extremely well and should be commended for how they handled themselves.

It's a shame that the same could not be said of the police; who wasted 300 people's lives.

The internet played a massive role in this revolution; kinda ties in nicely with the recent Steven Pinker sift which covers mutual knowledge; which facebook and twitter provided in this instance.

Hopefully it also serves as a warning to other regimes, that if they're not serving their people; there is still a breaking point.

Mubarek's address yesterday was a total facepalm. The first half he almost sounded half convincing that he had the people's interests at heart (apart from the patronising "from a father to his sons" opening). Then any small chance he had he blew out of the water when he started talking about himself, and how great he was.

Nobody knows who will lead Egypt yet, and there's going to be lots of difficulties because of the region they are in; but I really hope it works out for them. I think the people will have very little tolerance for being hoodwinked.

Thanks bud!

In reply to this comment by enoch:
*promote

"There's going to be divine assistance"

People who think magically scare the shit out of me.

This vid didn't get a lot of votes, but it completely connects the Religious/FOX News/Corporate complex together in a pretty intuitive way:
http://videosift.com/video/RSA-Animate-Smile-or-Die-the-hazards-of-positive-thinking

2 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.

All of the smartest people I know don't have college degrees (or have jobs that don't directly utilize the degree they have)...and they think they're stupid because they were bad at tests in school and have poor writing/grammar skills.

I fucking love these RSA animation things.

Excellent!

For those who, like myself, did not know what the RSA is, it is the Royal Society of Arts.

>> ^RedSky:

I think it's difficult to dispute that you weren't arguing against free trade in your previous post even if that wasn't your intention. The first paragraph seems clearly about it when you talk about being up in arms about your job going overseas, and I think in the second you misunderstand how capitalism works. But anyway, I don't think that we disagree on a great deal then. Like I stated in my original post, I believe in necessary government regulation and oversight in a capitalist economy, preventing deterimental effects like market failure, and financial, environmental or other crises.



Yeah, I guess it wasn't that clear (not unusual for me).

I think our major disagreement isn't the need for oversight, but whether oversight is implicit in capitalism or required because of capitalism, so it's more of a semantic debate at this point. ; )

I think it's difficult to dispute that you weren't arguing against free trade in your previous post even if that wasn't your intention. The first paragraph seems clearly about it when you talk about being up in arms about your job going overseas, and I think in the second you misunderstand how capitalism works. But anyway, I don't think that we disagree on a great deal then. Like I stated in my original post, I believe in necessary government regulation and oversight in a capitalist economy, preventing deterimental effects like market failure, and financial, environmental or other crises.
>> ^Asmo:

>> ^RedSky:
Well, at this point you're simply arguing against free trade.
Would I be infuriated to lose a job because a firm has chosen to use cheaper labour from overseas? Sure. I go about preventing this from happening by studying about and working in an area that requires technical knowledge that cannot be easily substituted. As a comparison, would you be for sticking to old technologies purely because there are workers only trained in them? Should be have avoided embracing computation simply because previous generations were unfamiliar with them and stuck to letters and typewriters? Obviously given that these factors are mostly out of people's control, specific and unemployment assistance should be and is provided in most highly developed countries. The countries which don't have generous unemployment benefits are usually the ones that simply can't afford them. Typically though, they're the biggest relative beneficiaries of free trade though.
The better question should be, are willing up to give up the drastically lower prices, product variety and willing to scare of businesses who bring employment? Because you can bet that if you restrict companies from laying off workers in favor of cheaper employment overseas, they'll move overseas in droves to countries which do not and you'll have created a self fulfilling prophecy.
Free trade works two ways as well, which people seem to blissfully forget. Where do you think developing countries go to get their technical expertise?
Free trade leads to lower prices not higher profits. When all firms lower their wage costs, this creates the incentive to lower prices and capture more market share. Once one company in an industry does that, everyone follows suit. If that doesn't happen, it's a failure of competition policy and anti-trust and has nothing to do with free trade.
No offence, but I honestly think you should take Economics 101, or at least Wikipedia the basic concepts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_and_demand


None taken, but you've become so impressed with your own rhetoric (and wandered off in to free trade) that you've ignored the key element...
Exploitation. Foreign outsourcing was an example of 'free' trade (rather than 'fair' trade). But exploitation wears many coats. Usury rates on credit cards combined with stagnant wages, for example. Or sub prime mortgages for another. Destroying the environment to squeeze the last few drops of resources out.
And this is the core of the penultimate capitalist ideal (as opposed to individual flavours). Accumulate wealth. The more corners you cut, the faster you can accumulate wealth. Then you die and someone else get's it. Yay, you win.
Regulation, fair trade, competition laws etc are all ideals forced upon capitalists because people generally recognise that capitalism without checks = a disaster (BP + gulf, Union Carbide/Bhopal disaster etc). There is nothing wrong with working and expecting fair recompense for your labours but too often these labours aren't honest. They game the system and exploit (there's that word again) not only the workers but the customers as well so the man in the middle can make as much cash as possible.
ps. For the record, I don't have an issue with fair trade and the commensurate rise in prices if quality rises with it. That's the whole point of fair trade, not increasing wages for sweatshop quality.

>> ^RedSky:

Well, at this point you're simply arguing against free trade.
Would I be infuriated to lose a job because a firm has chosen to use cheaper labour from overseas? Sure. I go about preventing this from happening by studying about and working in an area that requires technical knowledge that cannot be easily substituted. As a comparison, would you be for sticking to old technologies purely because there are workers only trained in them? Should be have avoided embracing computation simply because previous generations were unfamiliar with them and stuck to letters and typewriters? Obviously given that these factors are mostly out of people's control, specific and unemployment assistance should be and is provided in most highly developed countries. The countries which don't have generous unemployment benefits are usually the ones that simply can't afford them. Typically though, they're the biggest relative beneficiaries of free trade though.
The better question should be, are willing up to give up the drastically lower prices, product variety and willing to scare of businesses who bring employment? Because you can bet that if you restrict companies from laying off workers in favor of cheaper employment overseas, they'll move overseas in droves to countries which do not and you'll have created a self fulfilling prophecy.
Free trade works two ways as well, which people seem to blissfully forget. Where do you think developing countries go to get their technical expertise?
Free trade leads to lower prices not higher profits. When all firms lower their wage costs, this creates the incentive to lower prices and capture more market share. Once one company in an industry does that, everyone follows suit. If that doesn't happen, it's a failure of competition policy and anti-trust and has nothing to do with free trade.
No offence, but I honestly think you should take Economics 101, or at least Wikipedia the basic concepts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_and_demand



None taken, but you've become so impressed with your own rhetoric (and wandered off in to free trade) that you've ignored the key element...

Exploitation. Foreign outsourcing was an example of 'free' trade (rather than 'fair' trade). But exploitation wears many coats. Usury rates on credit cards combined with stagnant wages, for example. Or sub prime mortgages for another. Destroying the environment to squeeze the last few drops of resources out.

And this is the core of the penultimate capitalist ideal (as opposed to individual flavours). Accumulate wealth. The more corners you cut, the faster you can accumulate wealth. Then you die and someone else get's it. Yay, you win.

Regulation, fair trade, competition laws etc are all ideals forced upon capitalists because people generally recognise that capitalism without checks = a disaster (BP + gulf, Union Carbide/Bhopal disaster etc). There is nothing wrong with working and expecting fair recompense for your labours but too often these labours aren't honest. They game the system and exploit (there's that word again) not only the workers but the customers as well so the man in the middle can make as much cash as possible.

ps. For the record, I don't have an issue with fair trade and the commensurate rise in prices if quality rises with it. That's the whole point of fair trade, not increasing wages for sweatshop quality.