they're fairly unique in their free DDoS protection. They provide a LOT of security and uptime services for free that you just don't really find elsewhere (at least, the last time I checked; I'm sure they have reasonable competitors by now).
Even if a monopoly is not legally enforced, it can still dominate through quality or market forces or numerous other avenues.
giving people needles and drugs is called harm reduction for a reason - it's to reduce the risk of dirty needles and street drugs, these policies don't solve drug addiction, they just keep drug addicts safe(r). Solving drug addiction is actually a tremendously hard problem but it starts with helping rather than punishing addicts. Portugal is a good example of doing this right: drugs are broadly decriminalised and the government provides help to addicts. Here's an article on drug policies across Europe (and some other countries): https://www.foundationswellness.net/drug-abuse/do-other-coun...
I was thinking the infrastructure and amenities state of US suburbs, where they're basically stamped down in blocks off a highway. I live in a single family home and drive a car in the UK, but there are tons of amenities within walking distance (and I can walk anywhere), community events and green spaces, etc. I can drive, get a bus or cycle into the nearest city, which my town is clustered near to, so opportunities are aplenty. I know my neighbours, family are nearby, and so on. The vibe I get from American suburbs is that they're much more like isolated house-units and if you want to do anything you have to drive to somewhere totally different.
the American style of suburb is quite unusual compared to e.g. Europe though, and AFAIK is driven by zoning laws and car-centric infrastructure more so than by consumer choice. Markets don't necessarily offer people what they want, people's imaginations are often constrained by what's available on the market. Something something, "faster horses".
Also, presumably the issue of needles and human waste can be resolved with further prosocial investments in harm reduction facilities for drug users and housing for the homeless. These problems aren't intractable.
The UK's hardly a haven of social democracy, but I've never seen human excrement on the street and only seen needles off the beaten path. We don't do a very good job helping our homeless population though.
the myth is explained in the book. the only difference between 'philosopher's stone' and 'sorcerer's stone' is that the former provides a connection to a real myth.
Computers are already exponentially more intelligent than humans in constrained domains, like executing mathematics. Presumably we'll just keep expanding this category until they're better at everything than us, all the while reaping industrial benefits from each iterative improvement.
They're both calls to action: avoid cyberpunk, seek solarpunk. We've gotten so much "avoid this" fiction in the past decades that people are just burnt out and actual visions of a positive future have been largely absent since Star Trek, so it makes sense to say "hey, you know all these abstract political ideas that we talk about? this is what the world might look like if we implemented them". Nothing about solarpunk says that it is the default outcome. No reasonable person thinks that it is. It's an ideal to fight for.
The era of collapse fiction like cyberpunk has only really given rise to one political movement: accelerationism. Whose defining trait is "if the world's going to collapse, we should probably hurry it along so we can see if there's anything to salvage afterwards".
Solarpunk isn't about believing that social development will keep pace with technological development, it's about imagining what would happen if it did. Its politics are not a fairytale but a call to action to divert course. Cyberpunk says "the future is just gonna be awful" and explores just how awful it's going to be (which isn't rebellion, it's apathy), solarpunk says "imagine what the future could be like if we made it better". It's only a lullaby if you believe there's no hope for change.
This is just my headcanon but I think of the punk in solarpunk as being metatextual: it's not rebelling against its own world, it's rebelling against ours, and against the pervasive pessimism of capitalist realism. I think we need something like that in a time where most fictional futures are dystopian.
Solarpunk has pretty strong anti-capitalist leanings. It doesn't have the punk element of being "low-life" like cyberpunk is, but the commonality between the two genres is that cyberpunk imagines the world that unlimited corporate power would create (from an 80s perspective, hence the neon and ascendant Japanese themes), and solarpunk imagines a world where the negative side-effects of capitalism (exploitation, alienation, environmental damage etc) are mitigated. It's like the optimistic mirror image to cyberpunk.
it's also indicative of company culture if people with this type of disrespectful approach to interviews are allowed to continue without reproach. Remember that this person wouldn't just be joining a company where there's an asshole, they'd be joining a company that tolerates open assholishness.
Of course, this is predicated on the assumption that OP's perception of events was reflective of reality. Sometimes high-pressure situations can also make people over-sensitive (I know it can for me, at the very least).
I do try to remain more tone-neutral on the political threads, but it seems like no matter the degree to which you try to be well reasoned or diplomatic it just draws angry responses. But at the same time, the status quo of startup politics goes unchallenged under the rules (ie, neoliberal or libertarian perspectives) - so it's a matter of just let those perspectives go unchallenged even when there are level headed arguments to be made, or make the argument and risk people getting mad and then me getting banned for "flaming". I'm genuinely unsure what good answer there is, because this isn't an un-political forum (at least, not so much nowadays it would seem). Do we just ignore Thiel's fascistic tendencies in a thread surrounding one of his political projects?
I'm not expecting a reply because I know moderating this place must keep you busy, but it's a legitimate bind and the guidelines aren't very instructive. From an intent perspective, I'm not trying to sling mud, I think legitimate discussion of political perspectives is interesting and important.
Even if a monopoly is not legally enforced, it can still dominate through quality or market forces or numerous other avenues.