Mar

the left side actually made me sad to remember what we’ve lost

I was on a train in Tokyo. We stopped between stations. Announcement in Japanese, then in English: "We apologize for the delay. We will resume shortly." The delay was maybe 3 minutes. Not a big deal. When the train started moving again, another announcement: "We sincerely apologize for the delay. We were stopped for 3 minutes and 20 seconds. This is unacceptable. Thank you for your patience." Three minutes and twenty seconds. They measured it exactly. And called it unacceptable. When I got off at my stop, there were station staff on the platform bowing and handing out delay certificates. I took one out of curiosity. It was an official document stating that the train had been delayed by 3 minutes and 20 seconds, signed and stamped. The staff member said in English "for your employer. So they know the delay was not your fault." I said I'm a tourist, I don't need it. He looked confused. "But the delay affected you. You deserve an apology." Three minutes. They were treating a three-minute delay like a major incident. Later I mentioned this to a Japanese friend. They said "oh yes, delay certificates are normal. Trains are supposed to be exactly on time. If they are late, they must apologize." I said three minutes isn't late, it's nothing. My friend said "in Japan, three minutes is late. On time means on time. Not approximately on time." They said the train company probably investigated why there was a 3-minute delay. "They will find the cause and fix it so it doesn't happen again." I kept the certificate. It's framed in my apartment now. A reminder that somewhere in the world, people care about three minutes. © 6IX.

Nerds realized liking Japan is no longer niche so now they’re on Kazakhstan

Kevin O'Leary's massive data center was approved by a county commission in Utah last night. At 40,000 acres, it would be 2.5x the size of Manhattan. The commission approved the proposal despite opposition from hundreds of locals.

A college kid I know in Austin showed me his Stripe at a poker night last week. $43,000 last month. OnlyFans. I asked who the girl was. He pointed at his MacBook. She is four text files. 47 photos trained her face. 90 seconds of audio cloned her voice. 1,200 words made her a person. Total build cost: $70. First week: $4. Fourth week: $1,847. Last week alone: $11,400. His phone buzzed three times during the hand. +$15. +$22. +$8. A real OF model films 4 hours a day, splits her revenue 50% with an agency, pays $4,000 a month for a chat team. 1,247 subscribers. $1,433 a day. Maya replies in 6 seconds and never asks for a 50/50 split. He paid less to build Maya than he spent on textbooks last semester. Three other guys at the table are building theirs this weekend. You have a MacBook. You have $70. You have one free Sunday. Next poker night, someone shows his Stripe. The question is whose.

gpt image 2 is so good

This is just ridiculous, man.

This is more than 30 years ago fully hand drawn, no CGI, just pure art.

The WSJ just ran the most depressing headline in human history. The piece is a first-person column from two retirees. They say that without bosses, deadlines, or meetings, there's nothing to interrupt zombie doomscrolling. "We retirees have a particular vulnerability," writes one of the co-authors, Stephen Kreider Yoder, a retired WSJ editor. "We have time on our hands and no external authority telling us to snap out of it." "Let's have a show of hands: "How many retirees have ended a day looking up from the phone, wondering where the time went and feeling the mental equivalent of having finished off a family-size bag of potato chips?" "Yeah," he writes. "That's what I thought." We spend decades trying to buy back our time ... and then spend it staring at our screens.

FDA continues to see unapproved GLP-1s being mass marketed. These drugs can be risky and ineffective. We’ll continue to go after companies that are violating our regulations. We work for the American people.

AI ads are just a skill issue...