Why will it be "winner takes most"? AI isn't like the Internet where there are network-effects that make first-mover status a huge advantage -- e.g. if I could write a better Facebook than Facebook today, it still wouldn't get used by anyone, since Facebook's advantage comes from its huge user base and my new platform wouldn't have one.

With AI, OTOH, anything the first-movers do, Apple can (eventually) copy and improve upon, a strategy they have used successfully many times in the past. Stepping back and letting others figure out what the works and doesn't work, on their own dime, seems like a good approach. Why burn money on what might be a dead-end, when others are happy to burn their own money for you?

Apple isn't doing nothing -- it's continuing to do the things that it has always done, like selling iPhones and computers and streaming services. Those things have always been profit centers for Apple, and they continue to be.

The other thing that it's doing correctly at this point is not losing its head and betting the farm on AI. Other companies would be wise to follow Apple's example.

We are not slow, we are just "bubble-aware".

> USENET was never this bad

Um, not sure I concur. I encountered nasty trolls and doxing there.

If we start losing a war we will resemble them.

...paid off. Our Bribeocracy in action.

Actually he tried and partly failed because it was only partly legal.

That might not stop him from trying, and unless Congress or the courts rein him in, it won't stop him from doing it. As I pointed out above, in this case it's unclear that anyone would have standing to sue (not taxpayers; it wouldn't be tax money -- maybe nVidia or China, but they like the deal), so stopping him would probably require Congress to act. And what are the odds that the Republican Congress would grow a spine?

"Not be possible" is too strong.

It's clearly possible unless Congress or the courts prevent it, even though it is clearly illegal. But Trump is doing lots of things that are clearly illegal, which is why the courts keep issuing injunctions to stop him (and then SCOTUS keeps staying the injunctions to let him go ahead and do it anyway, at least for a while). In a sane world, the fact that an action is illegal would be a stronger constraint because the president would have to be concerned that Congress would impeach and convict him, and he would have to be concerned about potential criminal liability. In the world that exists, the GOP leadership in Congress refuses to do their job to rein in the executive, and SCOTUS has declared the president above the law so there are few practical limitations on his power.

So far, the only thing that seems to really make Trump back off is when the stock market crashes.

Nevertheless, a slush fund of several billion dollars per year that the president is truly able to spend with complete discretion would be a significant additional increase in power because it's not clear that anyone would have standing to sue, so courts could not intervene regardless of constitutionality. Congress would be able to intervene, of course, but, again, the GOP-led Congress has almost completely abdicated. I had to add "almost" only because they actually did stand up to him on the Epstein files (sort of; the bill left Pam Bondi with near-total freedom to withhold anything she wants, not legally, but practically).

No, Trump is more secretive than most other presidents. You're confusing "unfiltered and disorganized" with "transparent". I do have to grant that he's incredibly transparent about his corruption. Well, maybe. He has been transparently corrupt in lots of ways, but it still seems likely that there's more corruption which he's keeping hidden.

Time for Slashdot to wake up. Along with the Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Rightly or wrongly the vast majority of the world's nations don't believe in any kind of climate crisis. They don't believe there is any 'accelerating rate of climate change'. They don't believe anything much is going on. This includes the ones whose emissions are greatest and fastest growing. And even within the nations whose political leadership does still claim to believe in it, their populations increasingly do not.

Then you have to look at the measures proposed by those of the activist persuasion. They mostly boil down to electrify every use of energy, and get your electricity from wind and solar. Its not happening, and its not going to happen, at least not on any scale that will make any material difference to emissions. Even if you could convert generation to wind and solar, which you can't because of intermittency, that would only reduce 20% of so of emissions. Trying to electrify everything at the same time is just going to produce blackouts and rising prices, and no non-democratic country is going to try it, because they are terrified of the resulting unrest. And because they think its pointless. As for the democracies, any government trying it will just be voted out of office for a generation when the results become clear.

For a case history of how this will play out everywhere its tried, look at the UK.

What do you do about the UN if you are one of the biggest and fastest growing emitters? You send delegations to the climate conferences with a simple set of instructions: to prevent any significant and binding agreements on emission reduction. In which they have succeeded ever since Paris, and they aren't going to stop now.

My suggestion to Slashdot editors is that its time to wake up. First, there is no crisis. But second, even if there were one, there is no program to do anything about it, and there is not going to be. This last is just a fact about the way the world is. You may not like it, but there is no sense denying the undeniable. Its similar to proposing to cut teenage pregnancies by promoting celibacy while leaving current social mores unchanged. Its not going to happen. You may not like it, but if you really want to cut teenage pregnancies, you have to start from the way the world is, not from how you may wish it was.

If you really want to safeguard your population against the supposed climate crisis, do something that is achievable and effective if achieved. Moving your country to wind and solar is not going to work, and if it did would make little or no difference. And stop endlessly lamenting how we are all doomed from emissions with the implication that if we save a few million tons it will make a difference. It won't. Instead figure out what the real danger to our population is, and what is cost effective to do about it.

Ay Ay...

Now I interview graduates who canâ(TM)t explain what a HAVING clause does in SQL

I avoid using HAVING when possible, it's screwy to troubleshoot, especially when dealing with nulls. Instead I break the query into multiple sub-queries (CTEs) via WITH statements.

That's DOGE's side of the story. Many employees found out they had to use their personal card for work travel and then file paperwork for reimbursement. That extra paperwork is created and processed on tax-payer's dime.

Cut-first-and-think-later...or quit.

If the crypto pop coincides with the AI pop, 1930's 2.0.

...cheap Russian oil. Profit!

"It looks like you are attempting grift, would you like help with that?"