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Cake day: July 5th, 2023

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  • test113@lemmy.worldtoLemmy Shitpost@lemmy.worldA small problem
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    9 months ago

    It’s a birth defect - Big Ed Brown from 90 Day Fiancé has Klippel-Feil syndrome, which makes his body look different from others.

    I don’t watch it, but making fun of someone for his looks, which he can’t control, is a doozy, so I hope they laugh because of his antics and not his body. Would be kinda cheap otherwise.


  • Well, it’s a bit surprising that Tesla is the worst-performing stock so far. I mean, the Boeing scandal was a disaster image-wise, and others are struggling real hard. But even with all that, Tesla is performing worse than the airplane manufacturer, who can’t build secure and quality-controlled aircraft. The tide is turning for Tesla. Competition is getting stronger and starting to roll out strategies like the BMW 50% 2025 Plan, which means Tesla as an electric automobile manufacturer has dire times ahead if they don’t start fixing things.

    Tesla long stopped delivering on promises they, or rather Musk, made. They need something other than words and visions to sell, and fast, otherwise, the stock is going to normalize more and more, to a degree a mid-sized automobile manufacturer would be, as the shareholders slowly start losing faith and jumping ship, as long as the stock is overvalued and there are buyers.


  • It is a lot more complicated than that - since G/O media was bought out in 2019, it goes downhill. The new owner pretty much goes with the strategy of prioritizing advertisers and shareholders over workers.

    So, they maximize revenue streams upwards to GHP, which is hard, but an easy way to do it is to minimize fixed costs like salaried workers and their benefits. If the revenue goes up or is stable but workers get laid off and salaries get squashed, and part-time or contract workers get hired to do the same job for even less, workers are not going to like this, especially workers who are organized in a union.

    Looking at one revenue number as the sole indicator of “healthiness” is exactly the mistake that ends up with worker protests and dwindling quality.

    In other words, the money for fair pay for all would be around, but the owners would rather have an even bigger piece of the pie.

    History and context behind the situation:

    G/O Media’s leadership, introduced after the purchase from Univision, has been subject to frequent criticism by employees.[9] Complaints include closer advertiser relationships, a lack of diversity, and suppression of reporting about the company itself.[9] In October 2019 Deadspin’s editor-in-chief, Barry Petchesky, was fired for refusing to adhere to a directive that the site “stick to sports.”[15] Soon after, the entirety of Deadspin’s staff resigned in protest, leaving the site inactive.[16] In January 2020 the GMG Union, which represents the staff of six G/O Media sites, announced a vote of no confidence in CEO Jim Spanfeller, citing, among other issues, a lack of willingness to negotiate for “functional editorial independence protections.”[17]

    On February 4, 2021, the Writers Guild of America East filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board alleging that G/O Media told employees it had fired Alex Cranz for labor activism.[18]

    In mid-October 2021, G/O Media removed all images from stories published before 2019 from the 11 websites it owns, including Gizmodo, Jalopnik, Deadspin, The A.V. Club, The Onion, and Jezebel.[19]

    In November 2021, Gawker reported on substantial staff resignations at Jezebel over the course of 2021, comprising around 75% of staff. The resignations were reportedly related to a “hostile work environment” created by G/O’s management and the new deputy editorial director Lea Goldman.[20] In January 2022, another article detailed similar staff decline at The Root, with 15 out of 16 full-time staff having left throughout 2021 since Vanessa De Luca started as editor-in-chief.[21]

    In January 2022, seven senior staff members at The A.V. Club left the site after management required them to move from Chicago to Los Angeles. According to the Chicago Tribune, the departing staffers cited a lack of salary increase to account for increased cost of living due to the transfer.[22]

    On March 1, 2022, GMG Union members went on strike after failing to reach an agreement on a new contract.[23] The strike was resolved on March 6 with a new contract that included some of the members’ terms.[24]

    On June 29, 2023, G/O Media implemented a “modest test” of artificial intelligence-generated content on its websites, in a move similar to BuzzFeed and CNET. The move sparked backlash from GMG Union members, citing AI’s track record of false statements and plagiarism from its training data.[25] The first AI generated articles on G/O Media sites appeared on July 5 and included a “chronological list” of Star Wars movies and television shows on Gizmodo’s io9 section that wasn’t in chronological order, omitted Andor and The Book of Boba Fett and stated that the events of the television series Star Wars: The Clone Wars came after those of The Rise of Skywalker; a list of the “best summer blockbusters of 2003” on The A.V. Club; and a list of “the most valuable professional sports franchises” on Deadspin.[26][27]



  • If I’m interpreting the CEOs Post post correctly, the severance package is only applicable if your contract gets canceled prematurely or if you are being laid off. If your contract ends and is not renewed, all obligations are fulfilled, so there is no severance package since the contract simply ends. (Timel/Project based contract). I could be wrong though. It would make sense to have project or time-based contracts - these layoffs mainly affect the “permanent employees.”



  • These are the quotes this article is based on according to another news outlet, and it is unsure if the translation (especially the wording for the proclaimed statement in the title) is up for debate since there are multiple translations.

    (“from the river to the sea,” according to an English translation on the Israeli news channel i24NEWS.

    According to other translations, Netanyahu said that Israel “must have security control over the entire territory west of the Jordan River,”)

    "Every area that we evacuate we receive terrible terror against us. It happened in South Lebanon, in Gaza, and also in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank] which we did it.”

    “And therefore I clarify that in any other arrangement, in the future, the state of Israel has to control the entire area from the river to the sea.”

    "This truth I say to our American friends,” Netanyahu said Thursday. “And I also stopped the attempt to impose on us a reality that will jeopardize us. A prime minister in Israel has to be able to say no, even to the best of friends. To say no when you need to and to say yes when you can.”

    Does anybody know what “proposal” the USA made that he’s referencing?


  • I agree — some gamers do not understand that the gaming industry is grown up now, or at least old enough to play in the big boy money league. And the big boys are not in the business to make games; they are in gaming to make business. Inherently different decision-making process.

    Also, before someone buys something, someone has to sell out. So why do we always have a problem with the buyers, aka investors, whose intentions are clear but not the sellers?


  • What issue? That unpaid interns or those one step below are not agreeing with long-term political decisions that were practically made before they were born and only understand the surface of the subject?

    Yeah, thanks. I think I’ll just ignore those as well if I were in a position of power, and you would too.

    What is this “moral responsibility,” and why is it just now relevant? There were, are, and will be much bigger and worse issues, like climate change, but no one is talking about moral responsibility and blasting the ones who are in charge like it is happening right now with the Israel/Palestine crisis.

    Maybe it is just the age of massive misinformation and propaganda campaigns from all sides (some are engaging much more than others) with which I have a problem. Because, in the end, I applaud people who stand up for what they think is right, like those interns. It just comes across as too selective to be a principle. I mean, the Israel/Palestine issue has been ongoing for what? 50 years? It’s not even the first hot phase or siege of Gaza. And then you start working in politics and then you became aware of the politics and stopped working there? What?


  • oh yeah for sure could be a reaction to the opium wars

    It’s never the drugs that make a society erode; it’s a symptom. If you have a big drug problem in a country, most likely it’s related to much bigger issues at the core. Like in the Opium Wars, it was the British Empire that basically drugged China as a means to get what they want. It’s not like they discovered drugs and then just stopped doing anything else; we humans had drugs and used drugs since we know about them.

    Some argue this tactic is still very much in use today, hence the fentanyl crisis, which seems to be fueled by China. It’s a destabilizing tactic. That’s also part of why China and other Asian countries are so strict because they know firsthand the effectiveness of literally drugging your foe to gain an advantage. This does not mean China and co do not have their own drug market; they have a pretty vivid drug scene.

    Also, as an example, Japan or China, yeah, sure, you can’t buy weed; they will basically curb-stop you legally. But you can drink as much alcohol as you want, smoke as much tobacco as you want, and drink as many caffeine drinks as you want. These are all recreational drugs with a much higher impact on society than weed, yet they are totally legal and accepted by everyone or are even traditional.


  • Yes, and you are entitled to your own opinion, but that does not change the facts. No, the influence is not “what if it is there” – it is there, plain and simple. That’s not up for discussion. It’s public knowledge that Tencent owns 40%, and Tencent is a government-controlled entity. It does not matter if they “abuse/use” it actively or not. It sounds like, in your mind, influence is only relevant when you use it actively, which is not true.


  • I never said it was not for profit. I said you invest to gain influence, which is true by fact, not an opinion. If I buy a significant number of shares in a company, I do so because I want more than money; I want influence on decision-making. I do not think the Chinese government is only interested in monetary gains; do you think that’s their only goal?

    And again, do you believe a country/government able to indoctrinate any business that wants a share of their market, like the Steam example, is only invested for monetary gains and nothing else?

    Tim Sweeney can do and decide many things, but opposing the Chinese government is certainly not one. And I don’t know how you imagine influence, but having 40% of a company is something I call influence, wouldn’t you? Even if they can’t tell him how to run the business, he sure as hell will do nothing that could worsen the relationship between him and his biggest investor, aka Tencent. And who is behind Tencent? The Chinese government.


  • lol XD, let me tell you, if someone is financing something like that, they sure as heck expect something in exchange someday.

    So, you believe a government powerful enough to make unaffiliated companies bow to their liking won’t leverage their investment?

    Why do you think they invested? Just for fun?

    You invest to gain influence, not to have less influence.


  • Again, I do not argue for or against separation, XD.

    very basic summary: You said they steal money; I ask how. All these sources say otherwise. You said these sources are propaganda; I asked how is the argument based on the data from the INE propaganda. You did not respond and insisted that people I spoke to are lying because I don’t have a “source” for their OPINION.

    Bro, what’s your point? No one is out to get you or is interested in internal Spanish politics enough to intentionally spread propaganda in the comment section of a random Lemmy post that maybe 80 people scrolled by, most likely not even living in Europe or near Spain and don’t care.



  • Bro, I’m not engaged enough for this… again, I don’t argue for or against separation. I never said it wasn’t a feudal system. I said the two Catalans I spoke to said they want more freedom within the feudal system, namely more self-determination like the states in the USA, not a separation from Spain.

    If you really think the INE is faking numbers to fit Catalan propaganda, then I don’t think you are able to make factual discussions or statements regarding the economic situation of this issue.

    Just a quote from the INE to help underline my point:

    “This statistical operation adopts the methodology contained in the European System of Economic Accounts (ESA-2010) in compliance with the provisions of Regulation (EU) No. 549/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council, of 21 May, as do the rest of the statistical operations that make up the Spanish National Accounts, which guarantees the international comparability of its results.”


  • If you were the one paying to keep most of the lights on, you might reconsider your position in the system as well. And yes, that is why we have political discourse; I wouldn’t word it or see it like you do, but again, yes, economic factors can be a bargaining chip in such political problems.

    For the Catalans I have spoken to, it’s more a cultural and historical thing that is amplified by the economic and political situation. Also, none of them believe or want to (fully) part with Spain, they want more self-determination and be more independent from Madrid but not leave Spain, much more like a state in the USA. But I have only spoken to two Catalan people about this issue, so it’s not a huge sample size.