onfocus

“What’s good for workers is good for business, and as California’s fast food industry continues booming every single month our workers are finally getting the pay they deserve,” Newsom said in a written statement. “Despite those who pedaled lies about how this would doom the industry, California’s economy and workers are again proving them wrong.”

Interesting, restaurants didn't go out of business after minimum wage went from $15.50 to $20.

The deck does not say where CMG allegedly sources this voice data, be that a particular brand of smart TV, a smart speaker, or smartphone loaded with a particular app. It says that once it has used the voice data to identify an audience that is “ready-to-buy,” CMG builds a list of those audience members and uploads it to ad platforms to then target advertisements.

It sure sounds like CMG is selling advertising based on the idea that our smart devices are picking up our conversations and reporting them back to their company.

Loans of around $13 billion have remained ‘hung’ for nearly two years, bringing in interest payments but weighing on banks’ balance sheets

Just top notch business decisions from all the best business minds of our generation.

Harris “understands that most of us will never be afforded the grace of failing forward,” Obama said. “We will never benefit from the affirmative action of generational wealth. If we bankrupt a business or choke in a crisis, we don’t get a second, third or fourth chance. If things don’t go our way, we don’t have the luxury of whining or cheating others to get further ahead. No.”

“We don’t get to change the rules so we always win,” she continued. “If we see a mountain in front of us, we don’t expect there to be an escalator waiting to take us to the top. We put our heads down. We get to work.”

It's shocking to see real populism in action after years of billionaire-fueled simulation.

We briefly lived in an era in which the photograph was a shortcut to reality, to knowing things, to having a smoking gun. It was an extraordinarily useful tool for navigating the world around us. We are now leaping headfirst into a future in which reality is simply less knowable. The lost Library of Alexandria could have fit onto the microSD card in my Nintendo Switch, and yet the cutting edge of technology is a handheld telephone that spews lies as a fun little bonus feature.

Oh no. These examples are impossible to ID as AI.

Here are some more examples by Chris Welch at Threads.

Jeff Jarvis, a journalist and professor at the City University of New York's Graduate School of Journalism, reacted to that column with scorn, tweeting, “What ‘press’? The broken and vindictive [New York] Times? The newly Murdochian [New York] Post? Hedge-fund newspaper husks? Rudderless CNN or NPR? Murdoch's fascist media? No. [Harris] can choose many ways to communicate her stands with others outside the old press and with the public directly. The old press can and should be bypassed.”

Amen. They treated Biden like garbage and give endless respect, admiration, and smoothing-over to Trump who calls for acts of violence against them. It makes no sense.

But the analysis discovered one major change: The incomes of the rich grew much faster in countries where tax rates were lowered. Instead of trickling down to the middle class, tax cuts for the rich may not accomplish much more than help the rich keep more of their riches and exacerbate income inequality, the research indicates.

Huge if true.

I'm joking. Wealth inequality makes this so obviously true it doesn't need to be said.

Instead of freeing up employment opportunities, findings from one study suggest that the deportation of 11 million undocumented immigrants could result in 968,000 fewer jobs available for US citizens, losses that would be compounded each year the policy remained in effect.

Almost as if the leading conservative intellectuals are just making things up they think their base wants to hear. After painting any moderating voices as the enemy, they have to take more and more extreme positions that don't match up with reality.

Data from the Michigan State Police, compiled by the Detroit News as Trump was preparing to visit the state, shows a similar drop in violent crime. Trump was arguing that violent crime was up in a state where violent crime is clearly down.

Lying about crime rates. His campaign is about convincing people they live in some sort of fantasy hellscape where everyone is out to get them.

The political party that’s been battered and bloodied in America’s culture wars since the end of the 1960s by not even really knowing how to fight them, finally decided to stop worrying about churning out policy papers and pleasing newspaper nitpickers and instead start playing to win — and on their terms.

And this is one traditional media outlet that isn't afraid to post a positive story about Democrats. Nice to see some small change happening in the media.

Microsoft attempted to remove the false entries but only succeeded temporarily. They reappeared after a few days, SWR reports. The company's terms of service disclaim liability for generated responses.

It's almost like they're trying to say "generated responses" aren't the product. Every company should just add "we’re not responsible for the products we sell” to their TOS to avoid all liability. Genius!

The initial elevation of Kennedy’s campaign on the right — including by Trump ally Stephen K. Bannon and House Republicans at a hearing last year — is now looking even more like a real potential blunder.

Finding out what happens when you run a 2nd Republican. Everyone looks like a "radical leftist" when you’re inside the Trump cult, but Kennedy isn’t even close to a centrist.

Update (8/23): Fin.