11 Apr 23
@wildgrass said“ What is transport navigation?”
Well maybe your opinion of rideshare needs another thread because you're extremely wrong.
What is transport navigation?
Seriously, err, geo location devices incorporating road maps for getting from A to B, you’ve heard of driverless cars as well I expect.
11 Apr 23
@wildgrass saidI remember when MapQuest happened and we could print out detailed directions with time estimates!
I still keep an atlas... in my trunk.
It was weird. We used to write down "left turn on Maple, right turn at the gas station". Anyone under 30 never had to do that.
I guess that's .... good? Maybe not. We don't know or care where we're going, just mindlessly typing in the nearest Subway sandwich shop and following the arrows.
11 Apr 23
@athousandyoung saidI assumed Silicon Valley was shorthand for computer related tech innovation in general, I don’t know diddly squat about the place but the first one of those I used was AutoRoute really handy for expenses forms as well
I remember when MapQuest happened and we could print out detailed directions with time estimates!
11 Apr 23
1 edit
@kevcvs57 saidI THINK that it is an area near San Francisco which had a remarkable surge of extremely successful tech companies over the last 50 years or so. Many people have wondered how and why it happened where it did and have tried to replicate the phenomenon elsewhere and failed.
I assumed Silicon Valley was shorthand for computer related tech innovation in general, I don’t know diddly squat about the place but the first one of those I used was AutoRoute really handy for expenses forms as well
Usual explanations include being close to Stanford and UC Berkeley which are world class technical schools - not too far from Cal Tech either. The closeness of the Pacific allows for easy business connections with east Asia in particular Taiwan and we get a lot of intellectual capital from Asian immigrants. Also there is a lot of money in CA which loves to fund tech startups for whatever reason. Considering the one of a kind nature of the place, the California laws and culture that everyone loves to hate must have something to do with it too.
12 Apr 23
3 edits
@athousandyoung saidThese tech startups developed slick interfaces with the internet that average users could get addicted to. 6+ hours per day average spent on entertainment. The business model relied (and still relies) almost entirely on advertising revenue, so whether its spacebooks or RHP your click is your acknowledgement as a customer in their systems. Now they're bloated machines that harvest data, sell ads and data, and harvest real and fake money from gullible users. It's a cesspool.
I THINK that it is an area near San Francisco which had a remarkable surge of extremely successful tech companies over the last 50 years or so. Many people have wondered how and why it happened where it did and have tried to replicate the phenomenon elsewhere and failed.
Usual explanations include being close to Stanford and UC Berkeley which are world class techni ...[text shortened]... , the California laws and culture that everyone loves to hate must have something to do with it too.
Yes they've made computer applications accessible to the masses and put one in every pocket, but if we turned them all off tomorrow we would be a lot more productive as a society. It's 95% entertainment.
Except ride share. That's incredible.
12 Apr 23
@athousandyoung saidYes it was definitely the forerunner of the tec hub phenomenon and still what people think of when they hear the term but there are a lot of silicon valleys / glens etc on the go and if San Francisco sank into the pacific the tec revolution would carry even if people did not want to share a car with a complete stranger.
I THINK that it is an area near San Francisco which had a remarkable surge of extremely successful tech companies over the last 50 years or so. Many people have wondered how and why it happened where it did and have tried to replicate the phenomenon elsewhere and failed.
Usual explanations include being close to Stanford and UC Berkeley which are world class techni ...[text shortened]... , the California laws and culture that everyone loves to hate must have something to do with it too.
15 Apr 23
@kevcvs57 saidWhy are you so anti rideshare? That's weird. You just don't like carpooling?
Yes it was definitely the forerunner of the tec hub phenomenon and still what people think of when they hear the term but there are a lot of silicon valleys / glens etc on the go and if San Francisco sank into the pacific the tec revolution would carry even if people did not want to share a car with a complete stranger.
15 Apr 23
Good news everyone:
Faking it is over. That’s the feeling in Silicon Valley, along with some schadenfreude and a pinch of paranoia. Not only has funding dried up for cash-burning start-ups over the last year, but now, fraud is also in the air, as investors scrutinize start-up claims more closely and a tech downturn reveals who has been taking the industry’s “fake it till you make it” ethos too far.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/15/business/silicon-valley-fraud.html