Most of the tech unicorns are like this. Zuckerberg caught lightning in a bottle one single time and everything they’ve tried since has sucked. Instagram was an acquisition. So were oculus and WhatsApp. By contrast their next in-house flagship was temu Wii avatars.
Amazon hasn’t built anything innovative since the Kindle.
Surely it’s a consequence of being publicly traded that these companies cease to be able to develop good novel products rather than acquire competitors or iterate on past successes.
Why would it be a consequence of being publicly traded? Apple has less concentrated ownership than Facebook or Google and has been far better at developing novel products.
It integrates with Apple's pass system and the app they have to let users collect their cards, passes and tickets in one place (whatever it's called), it's not about creating a PNG.
In some cases, yes, but I've used a digital ticketing system (Ticketmaster) where the barcode changes about every 20 seconds. Short of reproducing that barcode generation algorithm, Claude or Codex wouldn't help.
I think the point is that in an article about Nazi Germany, editorializing "Hitler" to add "Adolf" is probably not required because almost every adult in the English-speaking world knows who Hitler was.
You joke, but Destined to Witness is a really interesting memoir of German-Liberian Hans-Jurgen Massaquoi growing up in the rise of Nazi Germany as a young kid and then experiencing WWII as a civilian German teen. I ended up learning how the Nuremberg laws came down on kids at playgrounds, etc., something I'd never considered. Sure it pales in comparison to everything else, but it's always interesting to learn one more way the Nazis were just awful.
>For that matter, what sort of livelihood could there be? Are you planning on some resurgence of Canadian manufacturing? Steel maybe? Textiles? Maybe a film industry? Will you all be lawyers?
That's right only America is capable of providing a livelihood and productive economy for its citizens. Silly Canada, just become a client state and let America make all those hard decisions for you.
>As a US citizen, I just want to add that I hope some day we can reestablish a healthy relationship with our neighbors. These articles are saddening.
Canadian here. It'll be at least a generation, if it ever happens at all. I have two kids in elementary school and every single one of their peers is talking about America as a threat. More than once I've had one of my kids ask me if it's true Donald Trump wants to take over Canada. It's a whole generation of children growing up resentful of America, viewing it as a threat rather than an ally. Those attitudes aren't going to just evaporate after Trump leaves office.
I took no end of downvotes and snarky comments from arrogant Americans on this fucking website for suggesting that the old days are not coming back, largely because Canadians have realized that Trump is broadly representative of Americans. He is a symptom of an underlying sickness. The problem is Americans themselves.
To wit: Harris got 75 million votes in 2024[0]. The total voting-age population is roughly 270 million [1], which means less than a third of the US electorate voted against Trump. The remaining two thirds either voted for him or were sufficiently unbothered so as to not vote at all. So we see a bunch of Americans in the media or on socials crying crocodile tears about how tHeIr AlLiEs ArE sO vAlUaBlE tO tHeM and traitors in the Alberta government notwithstanding I think broadly speaking Canadians realize it's bullshit and have moved on. Any treaty the US signs is not worth the paper it's printed on.
This schism is permanent, and I think Americans have yet to comprehend just how much foreign attitudes towards America have moved over the last year and a half.
> states like California decide that those under 18 are too young to make a decision on marriage, but old enough to decide that they want to have sex change surgery.
I don’t think this is factually accurate.
Sex-reassignment surgery (or whatever we are calling it these days) requires parental consent in California if the person seeking it is a minor.
>I'm OK with a state deciding it either way, but I'm looking for a little consistency.
If that's your true intent, what specific problem do you have with this surgery? If it's not with this specific surgery, what other types of surgery do you think we should ban for minors "for a little consistency"?
I think the real story is just how easily people believe that purported conspiracy theory. It speaks to how little trust there is in these AI companies, and in Big Tech in general, that this "conspiracy" theory is perfectly plausible to lots of people
Amazon hasn’t built anything innovative since the Kindle.
Surely it’s a consequence of being publicly traded that these companies cease to be able to develop good novel products rather than acquire competitors or iterate on past successes.
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