It’s a birth defect - Big Ed Brown from 90 Day Fiancé has Klippel-Feil syndrome, which makes his body look different from others.
I don’t watch it, but making fun of someone for his looks, which he can’t control, is a doozy, so I hope they laugh because of his antics and not his body. Would be kinda cheap otherwise.
In other words, media as a “service” makes more money than media as a one-point sale. Why should they sell you a one-point solution when the service model makes more money for the shareholders? I love the shareholder economy; it makes all our lives better and makes us focus on what really matters at the end of the day, which is, of course, profits for people who already have too much money. :) very cool
They have, but they are not in charge. Apple’s goal is to make money; everything else comes as an afterthought.
Well, it’s a bit surprising that Tesla is the worst-performing stock so far. I mean, the Boeing scandal was a disaster image-wise, and others are struggling real hard. But even with all that, Tesla is performing worse than the airplane manufacturer, who can’t build secure and quality-controlled aircraft. The tide is turning for Tesla. Competition is getting stronger and starting to roll out strategies like the BMW 50% 2025 Plan, which means Tesla as an electric automobile manufacturer has dire times ahead if they don’t start fixing things.
Tesla long stopped delivering on promises they, or rather Musk, made. They need something other than words and visions to sell, and fast, otherwise, the stock is going to normalize more and more, to a degree a mid-sized automobile manufacturer would be, as the shareholders slowly start losing faith and jumping ship, as long as the stock is overvalued and there are buyers.
It is a lot more complicated than that - since G/O media was bought out in 2019, it goes downhill. The new owner pretty much goes with the strategy of prioritizing advertisers and shareholders over workers.
So, they maximize revenue streams upwards to GHP, which is hard, but an easy way to do it is to minimize fixed costs like salaried workers and their benefits. If the revenue goes up or is stable but workers get laid off and salaries get squashed, and part-time or contract workers get hired to do the same job for even less, workers are not going to like this, especially workers who are organized in a union.
Looking at one revenue number as the sole indicator of “healthiness” is exactly the mistake that ends up with worker protests and dwindling quality.
In other words, the money for fair pay for all would be around, but the owners would rather have an even bigger piece of the pie.
History and context behind the situation:
G/O Media’s leadership, introduced after the purchase from Univision, has been subject to frequent criticism by employees.[9] Complaints include closer advertiser relationships, a lack of diversity, and suppression of reporting about the company itself.[9] In October 2019 Deadspin’s editor-in-chief, Barry Petchesky, was fired for refusing to adhere to a directive that the site “stick to sports.”[15] Soon after, the entirety of Deadspin’s staff resigned in protest, leaving the site inactive.[16] In January 2020 the GMG Union, which represents the staff of six G/O Media sites, announced a vote of no confidence in CEO Jim Spanfeller, citing, among other issues, a lack of willingness to negotiate for “functional editorial independence protections.”[17]
On February 4, 2021, the Writers Guild of America East filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board alleging that G/O Media told employees it had fired Alex Cranz for labor activism.[18]
In mid-October 2021, G/O Media removed all images from stories published before 2019 from the 11 websites it owns, including Gizmodo, Jalopnik, Deadspin, The A.V. Club, The Onion, and Jezebel.[19]
In November 2021, Gawker reported on substantial staff resignations at Jezebel over the course of 2021, comprising around 75% of staff. The resignations were reportedly related to a “hostile work environment” created by G/O’s management and the new deputy editorial director Lea Goldman.[20] In January 2022, another article detailed similar staff decline at The Root, with 15 out of 16 full-time staff having left throughout 2021 since Vanessa De Luca started as editor-in-chief.[21]
In January 2022, seven senior staff members at The A.V. Club left the site after management required them to move from Chicago to Los Angeles. According to the Chicago Tribune, the departing staffers cited a lack of salary increase to account for increased cost of living due to the transfer.[22]
On March 1, 2022, GMG Union members went on strike after failing to reach an agreement on a new contract.[23] The strike was resolved on March 6 with a new contract that included some of the members’ terms.[24]
On June 29, 2023, G/O Media implemented a “modest test” of artificial intelligence-generated content on its websites, in a move similar to BuzzFeed and CNET. The move sparked backlash from GMG Union members, citing AI’s track record of false statements and plagiarism from its training data.[25] The first AI generated articles on G/O Media sites appeared on July 5 and included a “chronological list” of Star Wars movies and television shows on Gizmodo’s io9 section that wasn’t in chronological order, omitted Andor and The Book of Boba Fett and stated that the events of the television series Star Wars: The Clone Wars came after those of The Rise of Skywalker; a list of the “best summer blockbusters of 2003” on The A.V. Club; and a list of “the most valuable professional sports franchises” on Deadspin.[26][27]
Nope, it’s not possible. The only way it wouldn’t be treason is if all states agree, or if they start a revolution and are successful; every other attempt would simply be treason. Hence, one nation indivisible. I’m sure they know that; they just want to push as far as they can to make the political situation even more absurd in America. They want to widen the gap between the people. I don’t know who exactly profits from this situation, but it’s not the American people.
Here’s a video that explains it quite well: [Legal Egal] (https://youtu.be/1dhvry6E0jA?si=H62qIoiHzaLdJHQF)
Oh, thanks for the information sir! I forgot that I tried that option to see what would happen, now I know. xd
If I’m interpreting the CEOs Post post correctly, the severance package is only applicable if your contract gets canceled prematurely or if you are being laid off. If your contract ends and is not renewed, all obligations are fulfilled, so there is no severance package since the contract simply ends. (Timel/Project based contract). I could be wrong though. It would make sense to have project or time-based contracts - these layoffs mainly affect the “permanent employees.”
Thanks. Yes, you’re right. I think this is the missing part: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/us-says-no-way-solve-israel-security-gaza-war-without-palestinian-state-2024-01-18/
These are the quotes this article is based on according to another news outlet, and it is unsure if the translation (especially the wording for the proclaimed statement in the title) is up for debate since there are multiple translations.
(“from the river to the sea,” according to an English translation on the Israeli news channel i24NEWS.
According to other translations, Netanyahu said that Israel “must have security control over the entire territory west of the Jordan River,”)
"Every area that we evacuate we receive terrible terror against us. It happened in South Lebanon, in Gaza, and also in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank] which we did it.”
“And therefore I clarify that in any other arrangement, in the future, the state of Israel has to control the entire area from the river to the sea.”
"This truth I say to our American friends,” Netanyahu said Thursday. “And I also stopped the attempt to impose on us a reality that will jeopardize us. A prime minister in Israel has to be able to say no, even to the best of friends. To say no when you need to and to say yes when you can.”
Does anybody know what “proposal” the USA made that he’s referencing?
I agree — some gamers do not understand that the gaming industry is grown up now, or at least old enough to play in the big boy money league. And the big boys are not in the business to make games; they are in gaming to make business. Inherently different decision-making process.
Also, before someone buys something, someone has to sell out. So why do we always have a problem with the buyers, aka investors, whose intentions are clear but not the sellers?
Yeah, I know that, XD but why?
What makes it so that you think you should be able to get creators and their content, server capacity, and storage for free? Who should be paying for it in your mind? Who should eat the cost? The creators, the platform, or the user? or all of them to a degree? And who should be able to profit?
I think it’s pretty clear that the end-user will carry most of the cost in the end.
YouTube cannot do that. YouTube’s content legal system does not allow this.
That said, I use SponsorBlock and love it to the degree of finding it necessary depending on what type of content I am watching.
Why do people hate YouTube Premium anyway? I don’t quite get it. I have had it since it was available in my country, and I love it.
Also, I have to say I use the YouTube Vanced app with SponsorBlock and custom layout (no shorts, no uploads, no etc.) and YouTube Premium subscription. I don’t like the default YouTube app.
So, I don’t know if I like YouTube or just the model and content/creators behind it.
I’m not so sure – YouTube is much larger than you might think. It’s not the video platform you grew up with anymore. No one in this world can match the backlog and content density/diversity of YouTube, not even all streaming services combined. People complaining that YouTube is dying because a few YouTubers “retire” from their main gig or that it’s not the same anymore don’t understand how YouTube works. They might not comprehend that the time of their “bubble” has come to an end. When this happens, there are already five new bubbles/niches that are even bigger, and you might not have heard of them, but they are more successful than their “predecessor.” The old bubble is still there to consume in the backlog. Someday in the future, AI will have a field day with the data accumulated via YouTube.
It is transforming, for sure, but I don’t think it will destroy itself completely. In a sense, you can say it will destroy whatever view you had of YouTube as a platform because it is not what it once was.
To my knowledge, YouTube will hit the billion-user milestone this year (Netflix currently at ~250 million paid users). If we look at other data trends from streaming services, it suggests that YouTube will grow more over the coming years. I don’t know how anyone can match YouTube as a whole. In certain niches, sure, but as a whole, it would be like fighting windmills. There’s a reason no one tries to tackle YouTube as a platform and only goes for certain niches.
Stupid question: What’s the point behind this? Is this actually financially viable for a company in the long run? Was this an attempt to get Reddit to crack down on those subs?
Isn’t this always a fight against windmills? i.e., you can’t fight a symptom without addressing the market as a whole?
I mean, if I were an investor looking at this, I would also get excited about making this change - much less risk, less cost, less customer support, etc., all for basically the same output in revenue. In other words, if I cut the small business (6% of value but over 100k accounts to handle) out of the model, I can make more money because the cost reduction is higher than the loss of revenue. And in the long run, when “big game customers” jump ship, I just downsize some more. I also don’t need to invest but can be sure it will generate a certain amount of revenue, as long as I do not squeeze the relevant customer groups too hard. This strategy is very feasible and relatively risk-free. I am not a fan of it, but I think a lot of software companies will go this way after they establish themselves in a market.
Well, I hope you are right. xd
It just seems to me like a monopolization of the market by the big tech corps, which won’t be beneficial to the majority, but at least a few billionaires will get richer.
I was recently invited to the Google research center where they presented their new AI assistant features, which should be coming this year. It was weird; it was at the same time more capable than I thought and more restrictive than one would assume. It’s like not even Google knows exactly what to do with it, or what it should be able to do, or what exactly it is capable of. I also once got to try an “uncensored” / “unrestricted” information model, which was actually a bit scary but far more useful than any of the current “restricted” chatbots. I’m sure AI will change things up, but how, when, and why I don’t know, and the more I find out, the more unsure I am about predictions, besides the one that big corps will try to monopolize the market.
Why do you care this much about online comments in such a niche community where only already opinionated people are?
Yeah, if I were a moderator and needed to go over 1000 comments in today’s climate, I would delete more than necessary just because you never know. They do not put as much thought into it as you think. It was most likely just like this:
A mod goes over comments that got reported, reads the first line of the comment, sees it has direct insulting language (the “fuck them” line), and deletes it.
No political intent or conspiracy, just a mod being a mod. Could be that there is some bias, but then you can do nothing anyway in that case; it’s just a small echo chamber then.
Hakuna Matata, my friend.
The funny thing is, copyright doesn’t even matter; at least half of the world’s market couldn’t care less about copyright, especially if it’s from the “west.” They certainly won’t suddenly start respecting copyright law. They will use and develop AI without the restriction of copyright. All this talk about copyright and the law, and all the copyright suits against AI and tech firms, will be fruitless since we either forget copyright like we used to know it, or we get left behind in development because we need to respect the copyright of everything and make contracts with every big outlet, etc. Big tech knows that, so they walk this gray zone walk to still train AI on copyrighted material but somehow proclaim they are not copyright-dependent.
I’m not saying this is a good development, just that I think we need to reassess how we treat copyright on a fundamental level under the current development structure of AI.
We need to slow down the development of AI and hinder monopolization of the market. My guess is it’s too late, but we can still hope that maybe this time it will be different.
"90 Day Fiancé star Ed “Big Ed” Brown is working on himself mentally and physically.
The interior designer, 55, opened up about his insecurities stemming from having Klippel Feil syndrome, how he’s been combating them and his fitness journey that resulted in a 21-pound weight loss."
https://people.com/health/90-day-fiance-big-ed-inspiration-people-with-klippel-feil-syndrome-21-pound-weight-loss/
“I grew up with the condition called KFS - Klippel-Feil syndrome- where it looks like I actually don’t have a neck,” Big Ed explained. “But I do. I have 3 vertebrates that are the size of 2 when most normal humans from this world have 7. And I have a bigger than normal chest cavity so I’ve been bullied all my life.” While some viewers have been cruel about Big Ed’s appearance, he is used to receiving criticism and standing out.”
https://screenrant.com/90-day-fiance-big-ed-neck-rare-disorder/