Robots and industrialization in developing countries [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/presspb2016d6_en.pdf <comment><USER3> I had a dream where I had the last programming job in the world - <USER2> cobol printer drivers. Then somebody came in and put a box on my desk. "What's that?" "Its a device that can write cobol printer drivers".

I stood up, and went to the door, and opened it, and there was only a grey blankness. Then I woke up.

<comment><USER4> Why would computers need to communicate through printouts, tho?

<comment><USER5> Pink slips gotta be printed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's interesting and a little scary, we're going to have to drastically rethink the way our economies operate and what our lifestyles will be like in the future, and fast.

The problem is we've seen that people struggle to let go of old ideals, for instance climate change deniers, because they're reluctant to let go of their lifestyle despite all evidence that it's not sustainable. Unfortunately, the more you fight it the harder the fall will be.

This also makes Trumps promise to bring manufacturing back to the US quite interesting, because the labor cost is too expensive in places like China and they are loosing the manufacturing jobs themselves, just to automation.

The only way to reverse the tide would be for large subsidies on US based manufacturing, and tariffs on imports, i.e. a protected economy, which has never worked in the past.

In fact manufacturing IS returning to the US, Foxconn has been building US factories as have other large contract manufacturers, it makes sense from a supply chain perspective. But the return of manufacturing does not equate to a return in manufacturing jobs, those jobs are gone and will never return. And many, many more jobs will be lost within the coming years.

<comment><USER7> > _This also makes Trumps promise to bring manufacturing back to the US quite > interesting...._

The voting in of Trump shows how conservative and not forward-looking the US is. Vast swaths of the South are hell-bent on keeping things the way they are (for better or worse).

The US has also been one of the "lower" OECD countries for a decade or two in a lot of measures [1].

I won't be surprised if it's one of the last OECD countries to have a strong manufacturing sector, requiring humans to do a lot of work that in other countries has been replaced. Other countries will figure out how to rethink economies, happiness, purpose, etc, and the US will just keep doing what it's always done.

I think there will be tens of millions in OECD countries living with basic income (or something in a similar vein) with tens of millions in the US are still laboring at work.

[1] The US is at or very near the worst among OECD countries in: infant mortality, child poverty, child health and safety, life expectancy at birth, healthy life expectancy, rate of obesity, disability-adjusted life years, doctors per 1000 people, deaths from treatable conditions, rate of mental health disorders, rate of drug abuse, rate of prescription drug use, incarceration rate, rate of assaults, rate of homicides, income inequality, wealth inequality, and economic mobility.

<comment><USER6> It's very easy to judge, but when you're in the situation that you've lost your job of 20 years because the plant you work at is no longer competitive, your bank is about to foreclose on your house, and you have to pull your kids out of university because you can no longer pay the tuition. Then the promises of the Trump campaign (and Brexit) become very persuasive. The scary thing is if the politicians themselves actually believe in what they're saying.

But maybe they're right, the US has the benefit of being a huge country with most of the resources it needs to survive within its borders, perhaps you tear up trade agreements and start a policy of being more reclusive to protect your industries and employment.

I see one huge advantage that the US has in a global world though, and that is (at least for now) it is by far the dominant player in the web space. Countries like Russia and China have their own services that are playing catch up on their US counterparts, but they are still well behind for the most part. In any future imaginable the web, or a successor is going to continue to be the biggest part of our lives and therefore the worlds money will continue to flow into the US.

Despite what I just said, I too worry about the US. There seems to be a deep seated suspicion of anything socialist and most of the solutions to a massively automated society seem to be socialist ones (i.e. a universal basic income, or the government regulating businesses to provide for the common good).

You'd hope that if it came to that scenario the US would follow suit and provide for its citizens that cannot work. But there is precedent for the opposite, the world went through a similar scenario in the 30's with the great depression. Most countries in the OECD came out of that decade with comprehensive social welfare systems, the US did not.

<comment> T-A > In any future imaginable the web, or a successor is going to continue to be > the biggest part of our lives

Reality check: the Internet economy (all of it, not just the web) contributes ~5% to US GDP [1].

[https://www.statista.com/statistics/250703/forecast-of- inter...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/250703/forecast-of-internet- economy-as-percentage-of-gdp-in-g-20-countries/)

I would also not be so quick to dismiss especially China's web companies. It's a different world on the other side of the Great Firewall.

<comment><USER6> I was talking about the flow of the worlds money in the future.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Many of the folks here like CGP Grey's video on this topic, "Humans Need Not Apply" [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU)

But you should watch that in contrast with one of his newest videos, "The Rules for Rulers" [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs)

> The more the wealth of a nation comes from the productive citizens of the > nation, the more the power gets spread out, and the more the ruler must > maintain the quality of life for those citizens. The less, the less.

> Now if a stable democracy becomes very poor, or if a resource that dwarfs > the productivity of the citizens is found, the odds of this gamble change, > and make it more possible for a small group to seize power.

<comment><USER9> That's why basic income is inevitable. We simply don't have enough jobs for everyone.

<comment><USER8> I used to think this, but I no longer do. If we get mass automation, I think we're going to get one of these outcomes:

1) Individuals have their own robots. For example, everybody gets their own automated hydroponic garden, enough to provide them with sufficient calories.

2) A dictatorship seizes control of the automation and lets the people starve.

I think it's very unlikely that we'll have a welfare-capitalist society where major corporations own mass automation, where the government taxes the corporation so highly that government can pay for everyone else to survive.

Taxing mass automation to pay for basic income is just too fragile. If the people themselves aren't providing wealth through productive labor, then at some point, somebody will try to starve them instead of feeding them, and they'll succeed.

<comment><USER10> Some throwaway thoughts:

Having all production automated will result in falling prices, including the cost to automate something. This should result in a lot of competition, driving prices down even more. In this scenario, it is difficult to imagine someone having a monopoly on production for long, unless they are already a dictator.

Dictators tend to have to keep at least a portion of their population happy, otherwise they lose control. A large portion of the population with nothing to loose (as they are starving) tends to result in revolution. If the cost of production (or cost of imports) is close to 0, what motivation (beyond bond style villany) does a dictator have to make their population starve?

If everyone is out of work, no one has any money to pay for the products of the capital owners. What's the point of that?

<comment><USER8> > Dictators tend to have to keep at least a portion of their population happy, > otherwise they lose control.

The portion can be very small. It has to include the military, and it has to include the people involved in creating GDP, but if production is centralized (e.g. because the nation's resources are in digging stuff out of the ground), then the masses can be kept very poor.

Watch the "Rules for Rulers" video I linked above. Resource-rich dictators don't need to provide public education or adequate roads, say nothing of adequate food. "The people stay quiet, not because this is fine, or because they're scared, but because the cold truth is: starving, disconnected illiterates don't make good revolutionaries."

So can production be centralized in the face of mass automation? I think so. Look at farming. Seizing control of all of the farms in the 1880s would be a massive operation spanning the entire North American continent. Seizing control of today's Big Farming conglomerates would be relatively straightforward for a modern dictator.

Which is to say, we'll get through this _if_ the automation is decentralized, but if it's like farming, where a few _expensive_ machines make all of the food for hundreds of millions of people, then we're on a path to ruin.

<comment><USER11> > we'll get through this if the automation is decentralized

I'm following the 3D-printing and makerspace movement because of this. It's imperative that blueprints for vital objects to be 3D-printed aren't locked up by copyrights.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I have yet to see a political party with a coherent response to the looming specter of automation. Don't get me wrong, I'm very much in favor of robotic technology, but it's not compatible with existing capitalistic structures.

<comment><USER13> Well there is considerably less threat to workers in regards to automation in the West than in the developing world, we've outsourced everything already to the developing world, now the developing world is about the experience the same thing.

The west has sufficient capital and social infrastructure to get by even without a preemptive socioeconomic changes the developing world doesn't have the luxury.

The girls that work in sweatshops in Bangladesh won't be able to retrain or become master crafters selling overpriced crap on Etsy because you'll going to be buying clothes from a dispensary that would 3D print or weave the clothes in minutes to fit your size and specifications perfectly, while people in the west can.

Truck drivers will likely to find other things to do since there will be sufficient capital to pay for jobs, newer generations would have jobs that don't exist yet, heck as long as the west keeps generating wealth the "self employed neohipster economy" can continue growing, we have youtube stars that make millions each year, and there aren't as few of them as you think, you can make a pretty good money from selling bamboo sticks on Etsy, and when everyone will have a 3D printer, weaver and CNC milling machine in their home or at the local 7/11 people would be able to sell their designs on the printer's template store.

Just like smartphones enabled everyone with even basic programming skills to make a decent income from selling apps, like youtube and other sites enabled people to make money by generating content, automation including on-demand manufacturing will generate new opportunities.

But these opportunities will likely to be limited to the already privileged just like every other opportunity beforehand, the developing world always gets the scraps of the table.

<comment><USER6> The west is going to loose millions of jobs, and you're talking about replacing them with thousands.

The mainstay of developed countries are the service industries, but already we've lost bank tellers, checkout operators, petrol station concierges, etc. to automation. Next in line will be couriers, truck drivers, taxi drivers, etc. Eventually most jobs will be lost. As a developer, if I'm lucky enough to have a job in the future, it will be writing specifications for code that will be automatically generated.

We aren't going to replace all of those jobs with hand crafted jewelry.

<comment><USER14> What people need to consider is that new jobs are being made and economics has not stopped working.

The question is - are the new jobs as well paying as the jobs which are lost.

<comment><USER12> Some new jobs are being made, but not enough. Actually, serious economists are beginning to worry that macroeconomics _is_ broken and that the existing models of economic development are no longer functioning as expected. I think the chief economist at the World Bank counts as a 'serious economist' and urge you to read his paper described in this news article: [http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/policy- trends/...](http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/policy-trends/world- banks-chief-economist-romer-says-macroeconomics-in- trouble/articleshow/55508187.cms)

I really love economics, but you've got to realize that while microeconomics is extremely rigorous and everyone should know some of it, macroeconomics involves a great deal of ideological assumptions and hand-waving, and doesn't have a good theory of technological disruption any more than it has a really good theory of oligopoly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I cannot help it but see this as a socialist opinion piece.

 _Clearly, without the introduction of a major tax on robots as capital equipment, robot-based manufacturing cannot boost the fiscal revenues needed to finance both social transfers, to support workers made redundant by robots, and minimum wages, to stem a decline in the living standards of low- skilled and medium-skilled workers._

If robots do the work AND there is a functioning market, this will have two effects:

\- substitution of low-skilled labor

\- cheaper prices across the board

People most often forget the second item and ask for transfers as if people were automatically entitled because socialism. But they will get their share via the second item.

Also, work is infinite because human needs are infinite. Maybe servants in households become more popular again, who knows? If work weren't infinite we would all be unemployed already, according to the theories of 19th century economists. Yet here we are, working, and repeating the same mistake.

Another argument is that in the worst case we can just destroy all robots (and factories and wheels while we're at it), let's find out if we're better off after that or worse.

Finally, the current economic mainstream calls out "deflation" as the biggest threat to the economy, yet it is deflation that will increase real wages automagically. Of course, highly indebted entities (such as your government) will want you to believe otherwise so they claim that everything grinds to a halt if we just have negative inflation for a few months. Also, Central Banks would lose their justification if deflation is discovered to be not as bad as claimed.

<comment><USER16> I make decent but not insane money and feel zero need to budget because there is just not all that much stuff I want to buy. Unlimited wants is really an unproven assumption not reality.

PS: Planned obsolecence for example is a direct result of limited wants.

<comment><USER15> While I do believe you don't want more stuff, I have a hard time believing you wouldn't want more _time_ , be it via a chauffeur, cleaning service, butler, cook, someone to run your errands or wait in line at the doctor.

There is also improvements you might want to have like

\- a faster computer \- a bigger apartment

Now I know these options are not on the table today because you can get along without them but I doubt that if the price was low enough that you'd skip them.

But if indeed none of this convinces you, let me know your profession - my bet would be you are a well-earning Zen monk :)

<comment><USER17> Why would I need to invest into having more time when work is supposedly going away, this leaving me with more time automatically?

<comment><USER15> I did not say "need to", I said "want to".

Please comment below and say "I promise I will never want more time or more money, neither today nor in the future" if this is untrue.

EDIT: I used _human needs_ before but I'm not sure this is entirely synonymous to _human wants_

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> In my line of work, the recent increases in health and safety legislation and resulting costs of compliance with having personnel on site in situations where they might get harmed in any way means that the return for automating processes is HUGE even compared to five years ago.

My prediction is that we will be forced into a situation where we have millions unemployed and needing universal basic income because they were educated to be employed in a system that suddenly lost its ability to accept any risk to people....which coincided with the technological ability to automate their jobs away.

The fact that people get hurt will eliminate their ability to be a viable means of production in many industries.

<comment><USER19> I like to think about the locomotive train. It must have been a very difficult time to be in the horse business. Yet here we are.

<comment><USER20> And where are the horses?

<comment><USER14> That's actually good enough to spread quickly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Happened to father-in-law. Worked at a printing company. Before used older machinery which needed more manual operations, more fixing and supervising. Company bought a new German printer, it was automated and more advanced. Required only a fraction of people from before to run it.

Owners tried not to be evil and kept a lot of employees. People who used to do more intense manual work, were now standing around watching the new marvelous German-engineered printer do its magic. Some of the positions were almost made up just give workers a chance to stay longer.

At some point they offered people money to quit. Some took that option, including father-in-law. Not sure what happened to others.

Basic income is a good idea. I am behind it. But people like my father-in-law would be against taking it. They'd need to do some work, to feel like they are useful and they are earning a paycheck. I think the idea has to be promoted carefully so it doesn't seem like a handout or redistribution of wealth. Not exactly sure what the solution would look like.

<comment><USER22> Why not just pay people to do what they were doing before? You still have to paint, but you do it for free for whoever wants it. Since you're doing it by hand, and can take as long as you need, you can do more personal work, for people you care about. Paint a church. Paint a local business.

Have a skeleton organization that basically just works as a dispatcher and collector of time sheets. You still only get paid for work done.

<comment><USER21> Could, be yeah. They tried some of that there and it worked for a bit. I think the company probably found it unsustainable and first they offered a lump sum for people to quit, then they might lay people off.

At some point the idea is that companies who automate and don't keep the people because, well that's what makes them more money, will win or out- compete those who don't.

Maybe basic income can be used to incentivize people to learn more -- learn to program, social help (learn to help others, provide care for elderly), learn to manage and maintain robots, maybe find a way to strengthen the community (we'll pay you, but if you help build or maintain the local school you get paid more...?)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> So, way less drastic than the number of agriculture jobs taken by machinery (reduced from "practically everyone" to "the U.S.A. is at under 2%"). Cool.

<comment><USER24> People don't realize that the tractor was basically the number one job killer for humanity. We went from 70%+ of the population involved in farming to less than 3%. We created new industries and jobs from that and we will do so again.

<comment><USER3> What jobs? There is a limit to human needs. At some point the robots will feed, clothe, transport, heal and entertain us all. What remains? Hobbies?

We will have to invent make-work things for folks to do I guess. And call it work.

<comment><USER25> Art, music, creativity. Spending time with friends and family. Getting back to basics. Going fishing, hang out at the beach. Stargazing. Plant a garden. No commute or cubicles, work for the sake of doing interesting work. Traveling to Mars for fun.

If all of our basic material needs are fulfilled, and we only take what we need, it would be an interesting and rewarding ride.

That's the optimist side of me speaking. It could go the other way too if we humans want to keep fighting and arguing over resources and power. I hope that we could learn to get past that if everyone has what they need.

I think about the change my 94 year old grandmother has seen in her lifetime. The technologies and types of jobs we have now compared to her early days are mind blowing. The rate of change today seems orders of magnitude faster and keeps accelerating.

Bring on the robots.

<comment><USER26> My grandmother was born in 1901 and passed away in 2000. The list of new technologies that came into being during her lifetime is astounding.

Your todo list is very sensible and, in my opinion, very doable. Other than a couple items, I do it now. I would like to be optimistic and say that in the future with more automation that many more could live as well as I do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> There are four major categories of jobs that can resist automation:

1) Entrepreneurs and organizers who initiate new products, services, movements, or new styles of arts and interactions.

2) People experts--designers, entertainers, artists, experience enhancers, high-level service personnels, value-enhancing salespeople--who understand deep human needs and use their creativity, empathy, interpersonal skills, and technology to realize them. Routine "people jobs" that customers wouldn't pay more to interact with humans could be replaced by AI agents, in some cases in humaniod robotic bodies.

3) Well-rounded analysts who can communicate with clients and stakeholders and translate their needs into fairly high-level specifications for automation technology to perform. Low-level programming jobs will increasingly become more of a niche as software & platforms can adapt better through machine learning and upcoming AI advances. More and more software will be programmable, implicitly and explicitly, by end users.

4) Locomotion specialists--physical therapists, specialist nurses, dentists-- who integrate theoretical knowledge and experience with their flexibility and dexterity. Robotics technology will take a good many decades before it can cost effectively compete with these experts. I think we may achieve human- level ability to think and solve problems flexibly before these people are challenged.

 _(Let me know if there are categories I miss.)_

\--

It seems to me categories 1) and 2) above may have the most openings for workers in the future. Education systems in most of the world are badly inadequate for preparing people for those jobs, however. The worst-fit systems are in developing countries where they are still heavily rooted in models for training 20th century industrial workers. Open-ended educational models like Montessori need to spread much more widely to prevent inequitable jobless future for the masses.

Note: Basic income is orthogonal to having respectable occupations and providing value to community. It is likely that human psychology has been shaped, culturally and even evolutionarily, in a way that people need a purpose and a valued occupation to live and feel well. (Perhaps the average number of working hours will be reduced to 3-4 hours per day and people will be free to pursue their hobbies and social activities.)

<comment><USER28> What about caregivers, like baby sitters, nurses etc? Will we entrust unattended machines with our children any time soon?

<comment><USER28> Also: we are mainly talking of automating manufacture and transportation, but are we that close to automating house and road building and repairing?

Edit: damn autocorrect

<comment><USER27> Yes, on-site constructions seem to be among those I left out. The locomotion, weight-balancing, sensory, and reasoning skills required are close to or at AGI level as well. It could probably be grouped with category 4 above.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I wouldn't be surprised if that happens in the developing world. As someone else pointed out, if your economy changes from a mostly agricultural one to one more similar to developed nations (where most people aren't involved in agriculture), you're naturally seeing most of your old jobs disappear to automation (and many new ones open up).

In the developed world we don't seem to be going through much of a automation revolution at the moment - for example, U.S. productivity growth is actually fairly low right now[1].

[1] [http://www.bls.gov/lpc/prodybar.htm](http://www.bls.gov/lpc/prodybar.htm)

</comment><comment><USER30> Yet another election issue that never was. Let's hope everyone promised manufacturing jobs doesn't get upset when they find out the truth

<comment><USER31> There does seem to be a plan there. The President elect plans to abolish the federal minimum wage[1]. Not even robots can compete with free.

[1] [http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/05/09/donald- tr...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/05/09/donald-trumps- excellent-economic-idea-abolish-the-federal-minimum-wage/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Good thing, that in our heads, we are just medieval community monkeys, yearning for a role, a place in our daily life.

Well - the replaced already replaced a president, to replace those that replace them, in the short and long run. Now- if everybody loses his place in society's maze at this pace, then the unraveled community's will take up the mace and smash the enlightenment straight in the face. The Last AI to go may as well, be the UN-Report Writer in space.

"Anything that gives a human being meaning - as long as it chooses it voluntarily, is off limits to the machines." Hammer that in stone, put it up on Palo Alto Plaza.

The scape-goat hunt is in full progress, and once the Society runs out of scape-goats, they will start to bite into the financial protective shields of the transformation accelerators and propellers. He who runs out of propaganda money last, shall sit upon the crumbling hill - victorious?

Makes for a interesting Fermi Paradox solution- society self-medievialized and religious entrenched against progress and machinery until the cosmic dice ends it.

</comment><comment><USER33> Freedom from Robots [http://marshallbrain.com/robotic- freedom.htm](http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-freedom.htm)

</comment><comment><USER34> I can't wait to live in that world.

The sheer increase in wealth and quality of life that this will represent, at every stratum of society, is going to be immense.

<comment><USER35> Let's pretend food, clothing, and shelter (structure) can be made cost free due to automation/robots. Land itself right now is not free, it is either owned or rented. In either case people need an income to pay for that. Where does this income come from? Or, do you destroy land ownership? And if it's destroyed, how is it determined who lives where and how much they get if all land "costs" the same.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Robots solve one problem very, very well: Labor shortages.

Rural America is poor, not because it is not rich in natural capital and real estate, but because it suffers from a perpetual labor shortage. (14 percent of the U.S. rural are spread across 72 percent of the Nation's land area) Urbanization has a monopoly on talent at this point in time because of globalization and the wealth structure of internationalist neoliberal capitalism. (The Silicon Valley model)

Robotic labor will change that, especially given the strictness of UAV laws in the US and the UK today. They are practically legislating that drones must find profitability in low-value, low-population areas.

Fine. Challenge accepted.

To give another example of such labor shortages, 75% of the United Arab Emirates population is Chinese, Indian, Pakistani, and Filipino immigrants doing construction jobs. The other 2.3 million native UAE nationals can't possibly engage in all of the ancillary labor opportunities that Dubai money commands.

Wealthy nations are suffering from labor shortages all over the world and have been for decades. They've raced to solve these problems in the only way they know how: _attracting the flow of post-colonials because of standards of living arbitrage_. (Very often, people used to being so poor being treated like garbage in a wealthy nation is a significantly better prospect than staying home) In the EU, for example, they can no longer print their own currency, but each member state can still issue bonds. They are already engaging in socialist taxation regimes, so raising taxes to pay for the bonds is impossible. Therefore, you need to enrich your corporations by giving them access to cheap labor and pray you can tax them before they allocate their new found wealth in the Isle of Mann.

Unfortunately, this impulse isn't such a clean transition, as most of these old world nations (with old world money) have the political, institutional, and cultural reflex to give new blood two options: _Comply with your role in our social pecking order 100% or be exiled /imprisoned/exterminated._ Race riots, cultural flare-ups, demographic conflict, and other Huntingtonian events can easily be exploited and exacerbated by political opportunists, ultimately destabilizing the very social configuration that made your nation attractive to begin with. No matter what the well-wishers say, when it all goes belly up, civilizations always divide themselves along ethnic (the American definition) lines.

If we continue to refuse (as many have since the 1970s) addressing the labor shortage problem with our established institutions, people like me will be forced to address it technologically and your cherished institutions and the morality that they stand upon will be ground into the dirt upon its passing.

<comment><USER37> A labor shortage means wages go up. If wages aren't going up then there's no labor shortage.

An alternate theory for why resources aren't being exploited is an aggregate demand shortfall. This would result in low capital utilization, low labor utilization and slow growth.

Which model better fits the facts in the world today: the one which supposes there's a labor shortage or the one that supposes a demand shortfall?

<comment><USER36> > A labor shortage means wages go up. If wages aren't going up then there's no > labor shortage.

This is correct in theoretical economics. This is incorrect in actual economic practice only because theoretical economics has no game theory model for political advantages. In fact, the entire concept of these advantages are hand-waved away as "corruption". Labor shortage only justifies wage advantage among specialist workers. (Programmers, lawyers, accounts, and other symbol artisans) Labor shortage among common workers justifies _cost crisis_ for the producer, forcing them to engage in political games via lobbyists to discover advantage for the cheapest worker and alter the laws to make that worker accessible. (The Ford model)

> An alternate theory for why resources aren't being exploited is an aggregate > demand shortfall. This would result in low capital utilization, low labor > utilization and slow growth.

The current aggregate demand shortfall happened after 2008, in which the Fed absorbed all toxic mortgages and cut off the productive forces of the world to supply the American housing boon. The entire global economy was geared for that type of collective oil consumption, and when it became obvious Americans couldn't pay their mortgages, the jig was up. Yes, this resulted in slow growth for the PREVIOUS configuration of human interaction. (The Miltonian model) Every housing opportunity short was taken off of the books AND off of the market, depriving housing service labor wealth opportunities and consolidating them all into the Fed. Thus, the housing market was forced into an artificial labor shortage because of artificial inventory contraction. In exchange, the banks were given an asset swap, flooding them with liquidity, and they all sought profit opportunities overseas to pay themselves out of outright nationalization in exchange for their hard assets. Thus. the post-war American consumer role of first and last resort for world productivity was intentionally stifled by Federal Reserve intervention, resulting in time- specialized capital utilization, which cause low mass capital and mass labor utilization, finalizing in slow growth.

> Which model better fits the facts in the world today: the one which supposes > there's a labor shortage or the one that supposes a demand shortfall?

Current demand shortfall is a byproduct of the factors I have mentioned above, and hardly a model worth extrapolating from unless you can eliminate the Federal Reserve's role in the matter. In a world in which there is no consumer of first and last resort, what is the alternative? China absorbs its own productive capacity? African consumption absorbs… what? Facebook's benevolence? You're left with an intentionally fractured world in which nations are forced to realign their entire political and social arrangements to maximize oil consumption from a dynamic list of competitors to stave off politically destabilizing labor shortages. This means that, if oil is deprived from your nation, you will absolutely experience a politically destabilizing labor shortage! You will not be able to mobilize your masses to chase global opportunity because you will be priced out of the game before you even start… unless you engage in socialistic configuration to absolutely control prices, and then you're just managing peak production limitations.

If my reasoning holds, then the question is thus: Is America experiencing an oil shortage?

<comment><USER38> Oil prices are lower than they have been in years. We can buy as much oil as we want for cheap.

<comment><USER36> Consuming oil means you are engaging in economic activity. If oil is cheap, then the profits from that economic activity should be higher across the aggregate of labor.

If oil is cheap and it is not being consumed, then the profits to be had through its consumption _are not high enough_. If the oil is cheap and it __is __being consumed, then the profits to be had through its consumption are _too low_.

If the profits of oil consumption are not high enough, then what we are actually describing is a labor shortage because the _human_ cost of living has deterred additional oil consumption. Thus, labor that does not have to shoulder such costs of living (robotic) CAN consume oil and achieve profits to sustain its own consumption.

So if oil is cheap and no one is buying it, it is because we have a labor shortage for that particular oil price point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Bernard?

</comment><comment> c-smile Don't worry! Mr. Trump will build the wall between us and robots. And those robots will pay for it.

Hasta la vista!

</comment><comment><USER40> I think what we need is a new economic paradigm whereby humans work in symbiosis with AI and ever encroaching automation. There's a model I'm working on where the base economic protocols are coded into a decentralized blockchain platform like Ethereum.

Usually the knee-jerk easy response to automation is universal basic income. And while I wish/want us to all have a UBI; those in the developing world will definitely be the last groups on the planet to receive one.

The future vision of the blockchain is the complete dismantling of all hierarchies and total autonomy at the individual level. So governments, organizations, VC, companies, jobs etc are replaced with DAOs and blockchain- based co-ops capable of the same or greater complexity and value-add without the hierarchy.

The big issue I'm facing, and I think the whole ecosystem is facing, is how do you transition the global economy to that future? It needs to be incremental but rapid, familiar but new, to exploit existing human incentives and status quo's while hiding all the unfamiliar crypto jargon behind the scenes such that anyone can immediately and intuitively adopt the new economic protocol.

<comment><USER6> I wonder if it's going to be that big a deal where you live, the huge companies now know no borders.

We live in a world of such scale that it's nearly impossible to compete with the companies that are established.

As we loose jobs to multinationals and automation then something has to change in the way we structure our economies, because the income divide will grow as the rich (who earn wealth from owning) will not suffer as much as the middle class and poor (who earn money from working).

At the very least companies like Google, Amazon, Facebook, etc. Are going to have to start paying fair taxes in any jurisdiction that they operate in. The fact that technology will be cheaper and more accessible (see the SpaceX internet satellite constellation) and no one will have jobs in the developed or developing world, coupled with the fact that in general poorer countries seem to have more natural resources (that can be automated but still generate wealth for the house country), means that things might actually level between the developed and developing.

Of course the big companies will be based in the US and Europe, but unless you're giving every single person shares the money that they make will go to a few. In this admittedly doomsday scenario the money will actually drop because people won't be working to pay for services or buy products, but the scale will be such that they will still be highly profitable.

Expect revolutions before that day.</comment></comment>


The Value of Ideas - <AUTHOR> http://www.contrast.ie/blog/the-value-of-ideas/#more-180

<comment><USER2> NOTHING? Tell that to all the people with skills, assets, time, connections and tenacity but a poor idea.

To say idea's are worth nothing is asinine.

<comment><USER3> the cost of coming up with a good idea (or what you think is one) is very cheap/near nothing (not to mention it will change as time goes on). the cost of good skills, assets, team members, connections, and so on is much higher in terms of both time and resources

<comment><USER2> Correct, but cost == value? I'm not sure.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I saw these guys speak at BarCamp Cork today and although they preach from much the same book as 37Signals, they do so with even more passion and enthusiasm, and a healthy dose of wit to go with it.

</comment><comment><USER4> You need both! You need ideas so as to use the connections, efforts, etc.</comment>


AMD denies killing off big cores (Kaveri, Steamroller, and Excavator) - <AUTHOR> http://semiaccurate.com/2012/11/19/amd-kills-off-big-cores-kaveri-steamroller-and-excavator/ <comment><USER2> The article has been amended:

"Updated 11/19/2012@10:15am: AMD contacted us with an official denial of the story and stated that Kaveri and the big cores are still on track."

<comment><USER3> Ugh, they should put that at the top of the article. Not that it's a long read but that comment invalidates the entire thing!

<comment><USER4> The whole point of SemiAccurate is to report "true rumors" before they become official, so pretty much everything they publish is officially denied. So either this article is completely wrong or it's right but AMD isn't willing to admit it yet.

<comment><USER5> I don't know, but considering the transition would happen within 2 years, I can see how they wouldn't want people to find out 2 years earlier about it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I've been thinking that Win RT and Surface are the real future of Windows - ARM based, no more backwards compatibility. This pretty much seals it. Apple and MSFT were already moving to ARM, ChromeOS and Android are obviously already there. AMD is going there now too. Many/most machines we use in 3-5 years will be ARM powered, not x86 powered.

Intel of course is going to resist ARM and low power computing for one huge reason - profit. There are only so many machines sold each year and switching to ARM doesn't sell more processors for Intel. So, switching to lower perf and lower power processors like Atom means Intel can only sell them for $20-30 vs. $100-300 for a core i3/5/7. That is why Atom hasn't been pushed by Intel on mobile, it would destroy their whole business model. You can't drop billions into manufacturing if you don't have the revenue and profits to fund it.

AMD's future is going to look a lot more like nVidia's current plan than Intel's.

<comment><AUTHOR> Even in an all ARM world, Intel would still be very much able to charge $100-300+ for desktop chips, and $1000+ for server chips.

With their fabs and engineering talent, they'd still be strong leaders in terms of IPC, core counts, computing density, performance per watt, etc.

The dynamics would be similar to AMD vs Intel today. Charge double for a 50% lead, 5x as much for a 100% lead, etc. When marginal performance is important, the premium is gladly paid.

While they'd have countless fabless design companies competing with them for the low end, few if any companies will be able to compete toe to toe at the cutting edge. Maybe IBM - who else?

While a shrinking percentage of the market is fitting in that high performance bucket, I would hazard a guess that the absolute numbers are still going up, if only because of server chips and gamers. Though I could not find any data on this and would be happy to be proven wrong.

<comment><USER7> That is an interesting assertion. While it is true that Intel has great fabrication chops, their biggest competitor in that space, Samsung, makes ARM chips. There is an outside possibility that AMD gets into the ARM space, gets some traction and Samsung brings their manufacturing muscle to bear and captures the 'high' end.

It is interesting to understand the 'Intel monopoly' [1] and how it came to be. I worked at Intel in the mid-80's and basically IBM 'created' a personal computer market by bringing their reputation to the market, Microsoft provided the software, and rigid compatibility was demanded by the market to maximize software re-use (software and training has always been the biggest 'cost' of switching instruction set architectures). Early on Intel was cross licensing that 8086 architecture with partners to get market share against the 68000 architecture but later they clawed back a lot of the licenses.

The requirement that is be 'windows compatible' created a giant moat around the x86 instruction set architecture. That moat wasn't officially breached until the early 2000's when AMD announced their Sledgehammer (aka Opeteron) AMD64 architecture. Here was an architecture that was _not_ Windows compatible (windows didn't _really_ support 64 bit chips until Windows 7) and yet AMD managed some big design wins in servers because of Linux and OEMs who could adapt quickly to the new extensions. Intel finally caved and shipped the AMD extensions in their own chips, even though they knew it was probably the end of the Itanium as a viable product.

Now AMD announces an ARM server chip, they have some expectation that it will gain some market share because they did it with Opteron. They are even calling it an Opteron perhaps as a nod to that history. They will be able to innovate in the peripheral chips because all off the 'bets' are off in terms of what has to be in the 'south bridge'. They can do more creative memory interconnects because they aren't constrained by folks expecting the Intel stuff.

And here is the interesting thing, there are easily 10x the ARM licensees than the x86 licensees. That pretty much guarantees a lot of competition and price pressure.

The strategic questions are these:

Can AMD establish a 'server' standard? Something like the PC spec but for ARM chips, a minimum set of things that will always be there and a way to find out what optional things are there. This enables shipping a generic kernel that boots on everything and customizes itself to the environment.

Can AMD survive the ingress of a number of other players earlier in the life cycle rather than later. If they are getting traction expect competitive chips in 12 months rather than 24 or 36 months.

What is Intel's "Thermonuclear war" strategy and would they be willing to pull that trigger. Unlike Apple's Android antagonists, AMD is not well positioned to survive a huge litigation punch.

We'll see of course, the game is afoot as Sherlock Holmes would say. I'm hopeful that we crack this thing open and start innovating again.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Normally, this would've been the right strategy - if done 2-3 years ago. But at that point whoever was running AMD was still being dismissive about ARM and the mobile market. Now they realized they shouldn't have been, but it may be too late.

This is why it pays to have a visionary CEO, one that can _feel_ where things are moving years ahead of the others, instead of a mere "manager". Transitions to disruptive markets can literally kill your company if you're not doing it on time. By the time a "pragmatist" manager - one that looks only at _present_ data - realizes what is going on, it's already too late.

Flawless execution for the switch to ARM may not be enough. They may need a good differentiation strategy, too. If they knew they would do this, it may have even paid off to be the ones buying the MIPS architecture. The ARM market is starting to consolidate right now, and I'm not sure there will still be room for AMD's stock ARM CPU's (and probably stock GPU's too?) by 2014.

<comment><USER8> > _"This is why it pays to have a visionary CEO, one that can feel where > things are moving years ahead of the others"_

The problem is, you only ever find this out with hindsight.

<comment><USER9> Exactly. The hindsight bias that is present when discussing CEOs, failed companies, successful companies and business in general is absolutely stunning.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is bad. We now have an x86 chip monopoly.

<comment><USER11> And newcomers can't enter the market because they'd need a patent cross- licensing agreement with Intel, like AMD had. And a newcomer is unlikely to get such an agreement.

<comment><USER12> I'm sure AMD would be more than happy to sell their position to any would-be competitor, if it's transferable.

I think the bigger problem is just that it's extremely difficult and expensive to compete with Intel on x86. And all of a sudden the x86 market has taken a turn toward lower growth and lower margins. So, really, why would anyone bother when it's cheaper to get into the mobile/low-power ARM race and those markets have so much more up-side and room to make advancements that aren't contingent on billion dollar foundry investments?

<comment><USER13> _"I'm sure AMD would be more than happy to sell their position to any would-be competitor, if it's transferable."_

It's almost certainly not transferable to the extent allowed by law, given the trouble Intel caused just over AMD spinning off their fab business.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I guess this means the end of x86. Many companies still refuse to buy single vendor equipment.

</comment><comment><USER15> Goodbye reasonable priced Intel chips.

Welcome overpriced i9 or whatever will be the next generation.

</comment><comment><USER16> For those not in the know, semiaccurate is not exactly reliable. They post just about any rumor, and get things wrong as much as right.

Take this with a grain of salt, and file it into the "hrm, this might happen" category.

</comment><comment><USER17> I've always been an AMD fan, but their recent cores have left much to be desired when compared to Intel. I'll really be looking forward to what they do with ARM servers.

</comment><comment><USER18> Updated 11/19/2012@10:15am: AMD contacted us with an official denial of the story and stated that Kaveri and the big cores are still on track.

</comment><comment><USER19> Maybe 2600k@5GHz is practical and theoretical limit for silicon based chips. Scientists were talking about this nearly two decades.

BTW: AMD makes low-end chips, maybe it is more perspective line for future development (power efficiency). Something like that happened with Pentium4 and Pentium3 Mobile.

</comment><comment><USER20> One of the saddest things about this move is that they're moving into a market currently dominated by a competitor that they directly enabled. One reason that Qualcomm is doing so well is due to their purchase of the Adreno platform from AMD in 2008.

</comment><comment><USER21> doesn't this guarantee an antitrust suit against intel?

<comment><USER22> Like ElliotH mentioned, having a monopoly is not illegal. What is illegal is using your market power to drive out competitors and crush upstarts. If Intel is guilty of this[1], then they will face anti-trust hearings. If they're not, having a monopoly on x86 processors will not be enough for them to be punished.

On this one, it seems to be AMD causing their own downfall by poor management decisions leading to bad engineering practices. There's a lot of talent over there that is going to waste.

[1] I believe AMD successfully sued them for this in the past, but that seems to be over and settled.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> _facepalm_

Ugh, should I grab an intel CPU now before the prices get jacked up due to monopolization?

<comment><USER24> There is still VIA for producing x86 chips.

<comment><USER25> The segment in which VIA competes seems better served by cheap ARM cores IMHO.</comment></comment></comment>


Parody Color Pitch Deck - <AUTHOR> https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=ajdtctfhv4hn_264g329gwcc&ncl=true

<comment><USER2> I realize it is supposed to be funny but it comes off like sour grapes, just saying. Even the Cuil poster [1] (which is strikes me as really funny) is really only funny in hindsight.

[1] [http://blog.reddit.com/2009/11/interrobang-your-wall-with- th...](http://blog.reddit.com/2009/11/interrobang-your-wall-with-this- new.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> link not working for me. :-(

Edit: sort of works.

Also, this is a joke deck, not a real deck.

<comment><USER4> But despite that it's a joke deck, it fits with everything I've seen about them so far.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This was already top of HN with 304 points or something crazy like that and was killed off.

Not sure why, unless it's because google docs is dying trying to serve this up.

<comment><USER6> I think some HNers aren't bothering to distinguish between satire/parody and silly memes. So they kill great posts like that one off just to be sure, and then we're left with a bunch of posts where people make the exact same points using more serious-sounding language.</comment></comment>


The Most Useless Machine Ever - <AUTHOR> http://www.instructables.com/id/The-Most-Useless-Machine/

<comment><USER2> Back in my high school Basic Electronics class (more then 30 years ago, now) we had to draw the schematics for electronics projects of our choosing. I tended to specialize in "useless machines", much to my instructor's befuddlement.

My favorite was the "solar-powered nightlight", which was a solar panel wired directly to a lightbulb.

<comment><USER3> That brings back memories of the Battery Discharger that I submitted to my high school science fair.

<comment><USER4> Hmmm. I actually got paid to design and build one of those :-)

For some industries they can be quite useful.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm surprised no one has mentioned that the machine was invented by Claude Shannon and that this is an inferior knockoff.

The original has an uncanny hand which changes the character of the device from purely mechanical to somehow philosophical.

(Normally I'd dig up a link, but I don't have time right now.)

<comment><USER6> <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ34RDn34Ws>

<comment><USER7> i laughed at this version i found on the related video list: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gw2Bq0HYu1M>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Arthur Dent: I wonder what'll happen if I press this button.

Ford Prefect: Don't.

Arthur Dent: [presses it] Oh.

Ford Prefect: What happened?

Arthur Dent: A sign lit up saying "Please do not press this button again."

<comment><USER9> <http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/The-Do-Not-Click-Button.aspx>

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Very fun in that it appears to be alive in some way and allows the user to project feelings/emotions onto it.

To me, it looks like the machine is bothered when the user flips the switch and wants to be left alone. Of course, that's ridiculous, but that's the fun of the machine.

</comment><comment><USER11> I really like this thing, but I don't see why it has to be even this complex. Although since the servo is powered in both directions, the machine will work even when upside down.

A simpler alternative would have a STSP switch with a battery and motor. When you turn the switch on the motor raises the arm and switches itself off, a weight on the arm could lower it. Then again my version wouldn't work in zero gravity.

</comment><comment><USER12> Andrew Lipson (and I'm sure many others) built one out of lego.

<http://www.andrewlipson.com/lego.htm>

This is the same Lipson as in the Lipson-Shiu Corporate Type Test

<http://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/LipsonShiuTest.html?HN>

</comment><comment><USER13> Hmm...looks like my first internship must have replaced me with a machine.

<comment><USER14> Well, don't feel bad. That machine will get what's coming to it when they outsource its job overseas.

<comment><USER15> Beware if your job could be done by a simple script and you get lippy with the sysadmin...

Fortunately this machine seems to be immune against that.

Now if they made a variety that turned itself _on_ , that would be something.

<comment><USER16> Reminds me of that hack I read about, where someone used a CD tray on an old machine to hit the reset button of another.

<comment><USER17> <http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/ITAPPMONROBOT.aspx>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> i think my next little building project will be trying to make this happen without electricity somehow.

<comment><USER18> I can imagine one with a crank and a flywheel, where pumping enough energy into the flywheel mechanically activates a hand that cranks in the opposite direction to discharge the potential...</comment></comment>


Why Physicists Are Saying Consciousness Is a State of Matter - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/why-physicists-are-saying-consciousness-is-a-state-of-matter-like-a-solid-a-liquid-or-a-gas-5e7ed624986d#.b2kmxbgq6 <comment><USER2> Is it me, or does all this follow from some unproven assumptions?

 _In 2008, Tononi proposed that a system demonstrating consciousness must have two specific traits. First, the system must be able to store and process large amounts of information. In other words consciousness is essentially a phenomenon of information.

And second, this information must be integrated in a unified whole so that it is impossible to divide into independent parts. That reflects the experience that each instance of consciousness is a unified whole that cannot be decomposed into separate components._

So, we've been given constraints, but where is it proven that those constraints match what we think of when we talk about consciousness? Or is all this predicated on "consciousness" being an overloaded term here, and it's not necessarily referring to what the layperson would think of as consciousness? Is this just a matter of overlapping terms and an article taking advantage of that misconception?</comment>


Out of the Frozen Deep - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@abarbararich/out-of-the-frozen-deep-i-e0e2a0e2efd1 <comment><AUTHOR> I'm quoting the first para here because this is an interesting, in-depth, historical post, in four parts.

> This is the story behind and beyond the facts and evidence in Ommanney v > Stilwell, a case decided in the High Court in England in 1856. The court had > to consider the unknown date of death of naval lieutenant Edward Couch, an > officer of HMS Erebus, one of the two ships of Sir John Franklin's lost > Arctic expedition of 1845, in order to determine who should inherit under > Edward's will. This dispute involved the surviving members of Edward's > family, and the will made by his father, Captain James Couch.</comment>


Unearthly Powers (Review of Asimov's The End of Eternity) - <AUTHOR> http://www.threepennyreview.com/samples/lesser_su10.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Choice quote:

 _Part of the pleasure of reading old science fiction is precisely this: with the special powers vested in you by historical hindsight, you can compare the playfully visionary forecasts with what actually took place._</comment>


Apple's Official Technician Guide Leaked for the iPhone 4, iPhone 4S - <AUTHOR> http://cydiaism.com/download-leaked-apples-official-technician-guide-for-the-iphone-4-iphone-4s/ <comment><USER3> This doesn't exactly seem useful. I was expecting a guide to repairing/identifying issues. The one problem I had on my old iPhone 4 - <USER2> Home button not responding (a problem a lot of people seem to have), the end of the flow was "Determine if the issue is caused by accidental damage.", and mostly consisted of instructions on wiping the phone.

I'm assuming this is a store "Genius" guide, and not for actual technicians.

<comment><USER4> The home button problem is fairly common and it is _usually_ due to gunk/corrosion hampering the underlying connections.

There's an easy, tool-free fix: Liberally spray the home button with some Deoxit [which can be found at a RadioShack or on Amazon]. Then press the home button several times to ensure that the solution fully saturates the underlying connection. Wipe off the excess and let your phone sit for a while. Your home button should work wonderfully after that.

<comment><USER5> A little bit OT but if you have an iPad you can enable additional gestures in the settings. This allows you to switch from one app to another app by swiping with four fingers across the screen and it allows you to go back to the home screen by pinching five fingers together. This allows you to still use the iPad even with a broken home button.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I can't believe Apple still hasnt responded to this issue on the iPhone4S: <https://discussions.apple.com/message/19619592#19619592>

It's approaching 470,000 views and not one real response from them.

<comment><USER7> Does apple respond to questions in it's forums?

<comment><USER8> From the forum main page:

 _"Join the conversation. Share tips and solutions with fellow Apple product users from all around the world."_

So, no.

If you have an iPhone 4S and your WiFi doesn't work after a software update, _DON'T_ follow the instructions in that discussion thread. There's some really bad advice in there, like putting your phone in an oven or a freezer. Instead, make a tethered backup, then contact Apple to get your phone repaired or replaced.

<comment><USER9> > [...] then contact Apple to get your phone repaired or replaced.

You can only get your iPhone repaired or replaced without paying if you bought AppleCare.

<comment><USER8> You can always get your iPhone repaired or replaced by Apple. Whether you have to pay for it is determined by a lot of variables. The main ones:

\- Is the product newer than 12 months, or if isn't, did you purchase an extended warranty (AppleCare)? That certainly helps.

\- Is it a manufacturing defect, or hardware damage caused by an Apple software update? Then Apple won't charge you for repairs, even if your phone is officially out of warranty.

\- Did the product stop working correctly after something you did to it? (dropped it, banged it, froze it, fried it, took it into the shower with you, opened it up, etc etc.) Even if you did do something stupid to your phone, chances are that Apple will fix it for free.

<comment><USER10> This is my experience as well. Although Apple has a reputation as an "expensive" brand, between the low depreciation and generous support I think I've come out financially ahead of where I'd be over the years if I'd gone with the lower sticker price.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> >Users can download Leaked Apple's Official Technician Guide for the iPhone 4, iPhone 4S before it disappears from the internet.

Yeah...no. Nothing ever dissapears from the internet. It's like taking piss out of a swimming pool.

<comment><USER12> That's what I thought; but then the links didn't work. Looks like one has to actually make an effort to track down where it's at. I'm sure it'll be on wikileaks or TPB or somesuch.

<comment><USER13> They were uploaded to Scribd, so if you're on a Mac you can choose the print option and then open it in Preview as a PDF or save it directly as a PDF right from the Scribd preview on the page. I had trouble using this method with Chrome, but Safari worked fine.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is a newer version of the guide that lacks the "Visual Mechanical Inspection Guide." (it was broken out into a separate document) Basically the step by step guide used to determine if something is the users fault or covered under warranty (i.e. are the moisture sensors tripped).

</comment><comment><USER15> Apple don't do any actual service on iPhones, iPads or iPods. They are replaced with a "replacement unit" which can be a brand new one of the production line (which is likley in the beginning of the product cycle) or a unit with a new battery and new consumer facing parts (casing, screen, buttons, etc). The old unit is then recycled, either for parts or materials.

So this is the actual guides for Apple Technicians, but they are not exactly so useful since all hardware related issues is always resolved by replacing the unit.

The Macbook Pro repair guide can be of some use though. But on the other hand, iFixit will probably give you the same or more information.

</comment><comment><USER16> I like the big metal jig with a pressure roller for pressing the battery into place (page 141). It's also interesting that they suggest using the calculator app for testing the screen, since it's wall-to-wall buttons.

</comment><comment><USER17> I've seen this problem many times, and I've always fixed it by plugging the device into iTunes and there's been a button that literally says "Enable WiFi on this device".

<comment><USER18> I'm not sure which issue you're referring to, but that checkbox is to enable WiFi syncing with iTunes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Reading the document kind of felt like being a journalist with a piece of highly secret leaked government data in his hands.

</comment><comment><USER20> "Make them buy a new iPhone."

</comment><comment><USER21> Mirror anyone? Already down.

<comment><AUTHOR> [http://evasi0nblog.com/download-leaked-apples-official- techn...](http://evasi0nblog.com/download-leaked-apples-official-technician- guide-for-the-iphone-4-iphone-4s/)

<comment><USER21> Downloadlink there does not work for me: AccessDeniedRequest has expired</comment></comment></comment>


Origin of Wireless Security: the Marconi Radio Hack of 1903 - <AUTHOR> http://hackaday.com/2017/03/02/great-hacks-of-history-the-marconi-radio-hack-1903/ <comment><USER2> Nevil Maskelyne: The world's first electronic communications troll.

<comment><USER3> ..-. .. .-. ... -!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Fun to read a security hacking story from 1903

</comment><comment><USER5> That was a very interesting story!

</comment><comment><USER6> There was a court case in the US where Marconi's essential patents on radio transmission were refuted as everything in them were already patented by Tesla.

Marconi was a student and assistant of Tesla for a time and decided to steal his work and go into business for himself.

Unfortunately this is not widely understood and Marconi is still widely thought to have invented radio when in fact it was Tesla.

<comment><USER7> If this would be /pol/ would I be seeing a Serbian flag? ;)

<comment><USER6> [http://www.pbs.org/tesla/ll/ll_whoradio.html](http://www.pbs.org/tesla/ll/ll_whoradio.html)</comment></comment></comment>