I remember a TV station I worked at, that had a lot of good redundancies with 3 redundant UPSs that could keep a bunch of equipment on air until the big generator took over, one day had the UPS controller die and took all 3 UPSs out. I think it took the engineers a couple days to get everything back up and running.
There was an article a few weeks ago about a developer who used a standard research AI image training dataset and had his Google account locked out when he uploaded it to Google Drive. Turns out it has CSAM in it and it was flagged by Google’s systems. The developer reported the data set to his country’s reporting authorities and they investigated the set and confirmed it contains images of abuse.
I’ll give a +1 to RadarScope; it’s by far the most useful radar app I’ve used. The only thing I’ve seen surpass it are desktop software, most of which is also paid like GRLevelX or products more oriented towards professional meteorologists (and most meteorologists I know from a past career in TV still seem to use RadarScope on their phones when they don’t have access to their more powerful software at work).
I’m a developer for a major food delivery app. The ‘Priority Fee’ and ‘Driver Benefit Fee’ go 100% to the company. The driver sees $0 of it.
I’m posting this from a library Wi-Fi on a burner laptop because I am technically under a massive NDA. I don’t care anymore. I put in my two weeks yesterday and honestly, I hope they sue me. I’ve been sitting on this for about eight months, just watching the code getting pushed to production, and I can’t sleep at night knowing I helped build this machine.
You guys always suspect the algorithms are rigged against you, but the reality is actually so much more depressing than the conspiracy theories. I’m a backend engineer. I sit in the weekly sprint planning meetings where Product Managers (PMs) discuss how to squeeze another 0.4% margin out of “human assets” (that’s literally what they call drivers in the database schemas). They talk about these people like they are resource nodes in a video game, not fathers and mothers trying to pay rent.
First off, the “Priority Delivery” is a total scam. It was pitched to us as a “psychological value add.” Like I said in the title, when you pay that extra $2.99, it changes a boolean flag in the order JSON, but the dispatch logic literally ignores it. It does nothing to speed you up.
We actually ran an A/B test last year where we didn’t speed up the priority orders, we just purposefully delayed non-priority orders by 5 to 10 minutes to make the Priority ones “feel” faster by comparison. Management loved the results. We generated millions in pure profit just by making the standard service worse, not by making the premium service better.
But the thing that actually makes me sick—and the main reason I’m quitting—is the “Desperation Score.” We have a hidden metric for drivers that tracks how desperate they are for cash based on their acceptance behavior.
If a driver usually logs on at 10 PM and accepts every garbage $3 order instantly without hesitation, the algo tags them as “High Desperation.” Once they are tagged, the system then deliberately stops showing them high-paying orders. The logic is: “Why pay this guy $15 for a run when we know he’s desperate enough to do it for $6?” We save the good tips for the “casual” drivers to hook them in and gamify their experience, while the full-timers get grinded into dust.
Then there is the “Benefit Fee.” You’ve probably seen that $1.50 “Regulatory Response Fee” or “Driver Benefits Fee” that appeared on your bill after the recent labor laws passed. The wording is designed to make you feel like you’re helping the worker.
In reality, that money goes straight to a corporate slush fund used to lobby against driver unions. We have a specific internal cost center for “Policy Defense,” and that fee feeds directly into it. You are literally paying for the high-end lawyers that are fighting to keep your delivery guy homeless.
And regarding tips, we’re essentially doing Tip Theft 2.0. We don’t “steal” them legally anymore because we got sued for that. Instead, we use predictive modeling to dynamically lower the base pay.
If the algo predicts you are a “high tipper” and you’ll likely drop $10, it offers the driver a measly $2 base pay. If you tip $0, it offers them $8 base pay just to get the food moved. The result is that your generosity isn’t rewarding the driver; it’s subsidizing us. You’re paying their wage so we don’t have to.
I’m drunk and I’m angry. Ask me anything before this gets taken down.
Sure sounds like DoorDash
They can look a little odd on Lemmy, but not crazy. I don’t know how they look on PieFed, Mbin, Friendica, etc. Lemmy doesn’t use hashtags so having a lot of them looks odd, but I think PieFed and the others support them so they might work better there.
I don’t see Mastodon-originated posts often, mostly on the photography groups. They haven’t been a problem there. I don’t know how it works to get posts from a Lemmy/PieFed/Mbin community in Mastodon, so I don’t know if you get the full experience that way. You might get more by creating an account in one of the other services. But that’s the beauty of the Fediverse, you usually can access the content in the way that works best for you.
British advertising executive Rory Sutherland coined the term “doorman fallacy” in his 2019 book Alchemy. Sutherland uses the concept of the humble hotel doorman to illustrate how businesses can misjudge the value a person brings to the role.
To a business consultant, a doorman appears to simply stand by the entrance. They engage in small talk with those coming and going, and occasionally operate the door.
If that’s the entirety of the job, a technological solution can easily replace the doorman, reducing costs. However, this strips away the true complexity of what a doorman provides.
The role is multifaceted, with intangible functions that extend beyond just handling the door. Doormen help guests feel welcome, hail taxis, enhance security, discourage unwelcome behaviour, and offer personalised attention to regulars. Even the mere presence of a doorman elevates the prestige of a hotel or residence, boosting guests’ perception of quality.
When you ignore all these intangible benefits, it’s easy to argue the role can be automated. This is the doorman fallacy – removing a human role because technology can imitate its simplest function, while ignoring the layers of nuance, service and human presence that give the role its true value.
Watch me hit the rewind button! ⏪
Oof, that jump might make solar more attractive if you get enough light!
It’s other passengers alleging she was actually already dead
I feel like BMW charging a monthly subscription for the heated seats in the car should’ve been enough to stop anyone from buying their new cars, but they continue to sell!
Didn’t some cultures do that?
A friend of mine had a similar situation, although this was on a highway with someone driving slowly and weaving everywhere. The cops did show up after his call, though, I think while he was on the phone with the dispatcher.
I did that once when I was working at a small TV station as the local broadcast engineer. Phones were not my responsibility but there was no IT person at our location and they didn’t send anyone when they did a system upgrade, so I spent a couple late nights at the station dialed into a conference call on my BlackBerry since the Cisco phones weren’t going to work. I don’t know how many times I called 911 and got the Miami dispatch (I was 800 miles/1300 kilometers away from Miami).
I think you can actually edit titles on Lemmy
I was going to ask the same thing but it’s also been 15 years since I’ve built a computer so I have no idea what’s current on that.
So far I think it’s a Reddit thing; the few times I’ve seen sales spam here it’s been the OP
Man, I haven’t seen their comic in a long time
The statement is probably true, but the only quote in the article that mentions “slop” doesn’t really support the headline’s claim:
The article makes a lot of solid points about the AI hype bubble that Nadella is promoting in his year-end LinkedIn post, but it doesn’t seem like he was actually calling for people to stop using the term “slop.”