BC BUSINESS
Saved by @Mollyycolllinss

2018 was almost the year we won the #RightToRepair.

Instead, 2018 turned out to be the year we lost #R2R: 20 bills defeated in 20 state houses, and it was mostly @apple's fault.

1/

 Apple has a problem. As CEO Tim Cook warned his investors at the conclusion of his company's repair-killing lobbying spree, Apple's profits depend on people throwing away their devices, not fixing them.

https://t.co/joaNMGPaXs

2/
By monopolizing repairs, Apple doesn't just get to gouge you on parts and service - the real action is in pronouncing your device DOA, beyond repair. Then you have to buy another one.

3/
Other companies lobbied hard against R2R: John Deere, GM, and other monopolists backed Apple's play. But Apple wrote the playbook, coming up with risible bullshit like claims that blocking independent repair is essential to protecting privacy.

https://t.co/bkCZKBbXht

4/
Apple's anti-repair FUD got picked up and amplified by Big Car in 2020, when they spent millions fighting an automotive R2R ballot initiative in Massachusetts, claiming that letting independent mechanics at your car would lead to your actual MURDER.

https://t.co/Byh6VLuRKp

5/
2018 is the year we lost Right to Repair, but 2021 might be the year we win it. We're only a month in and 14 states are already debating R2R legislation, with more to come. The @RepairCoalition and @uspirg are leading the fight, buoyed by massive R2R successes in the EU.

6/
Independent repair isn't just fair and it isn't just good for the planet - it's also good for the nation and its economy. The average US family loses $330/year thanks to anti-repair practices, a $40b drag on the American economy.

7/
Repair creates local jobs for SMEs whose earnings - from helping their neighbors - are taxed (not hidden in offshore tax-havens) and contribute to their communities. These are on-shore, dignified tech jobs - not slave labor in Xinjiang or coerced labor in a Foxconn plant.

8/
Repair diverts ewaste from landfills. Each kiloton of ewaste creates <1 landfill jobs, or 15 recyling jobs.

But that same kiloton of ewaste creates 200 local repair jobs.

https://t.co/EGgWMWNQkS

9/
Repair creates a secondary market for low-cost devices that find their way into the hands of people on the wrong side of the digital divide - a divide that got starker and more consequential during the pandemic, and will only get more important in years to come.

10/
Speaking of the pandemic: anti-repair laws meant that when PB840 ventilators (the most common ventilator, sold by the monopolist Medtronic, which benefits from the largest-ever tax-avoidance "reverse takeover" in corporate history) broke, they couldn't be legally fixed.

11/
Instead, desperate med-tech people turned to a lone Polish hacker who built Medtronic defeat devices into old guitar-pedals and clock radios to get around the anti-repair measures in the ventilators that hospitals had bought and paid for.

https://t.co/czRntbpDzy

12/
R2R is a fight for justice. For the right to decide who fixes your stuff. For the right to set up shop and help your neighbors. For self-reliance and resiliency over profits. For on-shore small businesses over multinational cheaters.

13/
Once again, a wave of R2R laws is sweeping the nation. The monopolists who profiteered off our misery during the pandemic will once again turn out to stop them. PIRG and the Repair Coalition need our support - as do their coalition allies like @EFF.

eof/

More from Cory Doctorow #BLM

Cory Doctorow #BLM
Cory Doctorow #BLM
@doctorow
As the Qanon prophecies fail and the cult-members struggle to resolve their cognitive dissonance, it's a good time to revisit the history of paranoid, conspiratorial political movements in American history - the "paranoid style" that has dominated since the Revolution.

1/


After all, the very first skirmishes of the US war of independence were based on a conspiracy theory: that the levy on tea was a prelude to a sellout of the colonists to transnational mercantalist interests. US politics have always been conspiratorial.

2/

I found @zacharykarabell's @politico history of the Know Nothing party especially useful, as it tells the story of what happens when surging, paranoid, fractious political movements

The American Party was a secret 19th century organization founded on a conspiracy theory: that Irish immigrants were secretly planning a takeover of the US on behalf of the Pope.

4/
HISTORY
Cory Doctorow #BLM
Cory Doctorow #BLM
@doctorow
It's been twenty years, to the day, since I published my first blog-post.

I'm a blogger.

Blogging - publicly breaking down the things that seem significant, then synthesizing them in longer pieces - is the defining activity of my days.

https://t.co/lksXhU6HKM

1/


Over the years, I've been lauded, threatened, sued (more than once). I've met many people who read my work and have made connections with many more whose work I wrote about. Combing through my old posts every morning is a journey through my intellectual development.

2/

It's been almost exactly a year I left Boing Boing, after 19 years. It wasn't planned, and it wasn't fun, but it was definitely time. I still own a chunk of the business and wish them well. But after 19 years, it was time for a change.

3/

A few weeks after I quit Boing Boing, I started a solo project. It's called Pluralistic: it's a blog that is published simultaneously on Twitter, Mastodon, Tumblr, a newsletter and the web. It's got no tracking or ads. Here's the very first

I don't often do "process posts" but this merits it. Here's how I built Pluralistic and here's how it works today, after nearly a year.

I get up at 5AM and make coffee. Then I sit down on the sofa and open a huge tab-group, and scroll through my RSS feeds using @newsblur.

5/
CULTURE
Advertisement
Cory Doctorow #BLM
Cory Doctorow #BLM
@doctorow
Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread).

Inside: ADT insider threat; Billionaires think VR stops guillotines; Privacy Without Monopoly; and more!

Archived at: https://t.co/nu1HbReiEX

#Pluralistic

1/


This Wednesday, I'm giving a talk called "Technology, Self-Determination, and the Future of the Future" for the Purdue University CERIAS Program:

https://t.co/po5IivZyr4

2/


ADT insider threat: If you build it they will spy.

https://t.co/kJrmtu8L3S

3/


Billionaires think VR stops guillotines: TARP with tasps.

https://t.co/MIKwvsICkr

4/


Privacy Without Monopoly: Podcasting a reading of the latest EFF whitepaper.

https://t.co/R2sl75y4rb

5/
TWITTER
Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow
@doctorow
It's been eight years since @aaronsw took his own life. Aaron had been charged with 13 felonies under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (#CFAA) for violating the terms of service on the @JSTOR database of scholarly articles.

1/


Prosecutors Stephen Heymann and Carmen Ortiz didn't dispute that Aaron was allowed to access the articles he retrieved. Rather, they said that the WAY he accessed them (using a script instead of clicking on links) was a terms-of-service violation and hence a crime.

2/

In other words: any business could conjure a felony out of thin air by making you click through an unreadable garbage-novella of legalese proscribing the use of a service they granted you access to. Violate any of those terms and you face a prison sentence.

3/

This isn't law as we know it, it's Felony Contempt of Business Model, and the most alarming thing was that this interpretation of the CFAA wasn't completely ridiculous, given how badly drafted that law is.

4/

Ronald Reagan signed CFAA into law. Fed prosecutors had been seeking broad authority to punish "hacking" and had drawn up an absurdly broad definition of cybercrime that would give them latitude to go after anyone they didn't like.

5/
ALL
Cory Doctorow #BLM
Cory Doctorow #BLM
@doctorow
Inequality requires narrative stabilizers. When you have too little and someone else has more than they can possibly use, simple logic dictates that you should take what they have.

1/


The forbearance exercised by the many when it comes to the wealth of the few isn't down to guards or laws - rather, the laws and the guards are effective because of the STORY, the story of why this is fair, even inevitable.

2/

Think of the story of monarchy and its relationship to the Church: the Church affirms that the monarch (and the aristocracy) was chosen by God ("dieu et mon droit") and the monarchy reciprocates by giving the Church moral and economic power within the kingdom.

3/

Capitalism replaced the story of divine will with a story of a self-correcting complex system: humans are born and raised with a variety of aptitudes and tastes, and at any moment, historical exigencies dictate that some individuals are better suited than others to do well.

4/

When it's railroad time, there are people who were born to oversee the laying of track and the coordination of rail networks: markets find those people, allocate capital to them, and allow them to mobilize that capital to produce shared prosperity for all of us.

5/
CULTURE

More from Business

Nick Huber
Nick Huber
@sweatystartup
Customer friction is a huge part of running a biz.

How hard is it to engage a company to work with you?

Data-driven companies obsess over reducing this friction.

Mom-and-pop operators SUCK at this and it’s costing them millions.

Here’s what I’ve learned 👇👇👇

1985 companies have a lot of friction.

Call them. Leave message. Wait. Guy may or may not call you back. Quote by phone or email. Scan signed contract.

A self storage facility we purchased recently had a lot of this.

Drive across town M-F 9-5. Spend 20 mins. Sign paper lease.

Get a physical key and lock. Drive back. Get your unit. Mail a check each month or stop by office with cash.

Owner charged $52 a month for a 10x10. Completely full.

We instantly setup software for online rental.

No phone call necessary. Rent a unit in 4 mins from your browser.

Sign lease online. Pay online. Upload photo of DL on phone.

Go straight to your unit 24/7. Type in gate key that was sent to you by text. Lock and key waiting in unit.

We can now charge $77 a mo for the same unit. $25 more. And we rent MORE units faster.

How significant is this?

That $25 increase per unit across the board turns out to be a 35% increase in revenue.

That takes revenue from $14k a month when I buy it to $18.9k a few months later.

An extra $58k to the bottom line over the course of 12 months.
BUSINESS , SCALE A BUSINESS , BIZ
\u029c\u1d00\u1d20\u1d07\u0280\ua731 \U0001f30d
ʜᴀᴠᴇʀꜱ 🌍...
@haversfleeted
A thread of Popular brand names you've been mispronouncing all this time
BUSINESS
Advertisement
Chris Herd
Chris Herd
@chris_herd
I spoke to 1,000+ companies over the last 6 months about their plans for remote work going forward

Here are a few things I've learned

[ a thread ] 💻🏠🌍

🏢 HQ's are finished: companies will cut their commercial office space by 40-70%

The will allow every worker to work from home 2-4 days a week, and come into the office 1-2 days a

🎡 home-office setup: Companies who cut their office spend will use that money to provide world-class setups for their teams at home

Companies who don't will lose people to companies who do

🌍 Fully distributed: ~30% of the companies we talk to are getting rid of the office entirely and going remote-first

Companies doing this have seen their workers decentralize rapidly, leaving expensive cities to be closer to family

⭐️ Access talent: The first reason they are going remote-first is simple – it lets them hire more talented people

Rather than hiring the best person in a 30-mile radius of the office, they can hire the best person in the world for every role
BUSINESS
Anurag Singh
Anurag Singh
@anuragsingh_as
#PolicybazaarIPO Long thread: There is monetary printing by RBI, there is lending by banks & finally there is the Indian IPO. “Foreign owned” company with ~1 Bn investment is selling “Indian” unicorn to “savvy” Indians for $ 6.2 Bn. Want to know how this printing works? Let’s go-

The basics: Rs 6017 Cr being raised by new shares (Rs 3750) & re-selling (Rs 2267). Face value Rs 2 offered at Rs ~1000 per share is one of a kind. Who decides the price? Examine the valuation ladder below.
With ~$ 150 Mn invested till 2017, we see $ 525 Mn rushes in after 2018


So, a company valued $1 Bn in 2018 & $ 1.5 Bn in 2019 by key investors like Tencent, suddenly “needs money” in March 2021. Falcon Edge “invests” all of $ 75 Mn in March at valuation of $ 2.65 Bn.
Enter IPO bankers a couple of months later & they value the company at $ 6.2 Bn

Why does PolicyBazaar need $ 75 Mn just 6 months before IPO & give away 2.5 times in returns? And it doesn’t even use that money as the B/S reflects appx Rs 1000 Cr in cash lying around.
What kind of a favor is that? Why do they need US investment bank for this just before IPO?

Notice 50% rise in shareholding of promotors here & a 1: 500 bonus share issue. After all, how do you print money & still keep share price at “reasonable” Rs 1000?
Without bonus issue in June 2021, each share would have costed Rs 50,000. Heard of circular valuation?
BUSINESS , POLICYBAZAAR
Craig Forman
Craig Forman
@cforman
There are so many #HotTakes on the future of news and tech and digital this week. Now nearly half a year distant (and what a year - 2020, ugh!) from CEO and board @mcclatchy, I'd like to add a few thoughts: 1/


As @jbenton said in @NiemanReports : @mcclatchy transformation shows it STILL is possible NOW 'to be operationally profitable while still doing good journalism.' Not easy; Covid made it harder. But POSSIBLE and DONE by the great team in 2020 @mcclatchy. 2/

As @jbenton wrote: the #DIGITALTRANSFORMATION @mcclatchy 'shows a company that has managed the digital transition better than most; at last public count, it was making nearly half its ad revenue in digital and digital subscriptions were up 45% year-over-year.' Such focus 3/

On the future is digital is the SOLE way the still-powerful brands of local news and information will be able to have a business in the inevitable 'printless' future (Not today, not tomorrow, but printless someday) 4/

And the crisis in local news is relentless, unabating and by most measures WORSENING. More titles going dark; huge losses to our communities, because solely a blend of new digital startups AND existing footprint offer the scale 5/
BUSINESS

You May Also Like

k\u0101rthik \u0b95\u0bbe\u0bb0\u0bcd\u0ba4\u0bcd\u0ba4\u0bbf\u0b95\u0bcd \u0915\u093e\u0930\u094d\u0924\u093f\u0915 \U0001f1ee\U0001f1f3\U0001f1ee\U0001f1f3\U0001f1ee\U0001f1f3 | Sanatani
kārthik கார்த்திக் कार...
@almightykarthik
Hello Dear Tweeples!

It’s Siddhars time of the week! Last week I shared story of Guru (Machamuni or Yogi Matsyendranath), this week I bring you information on his Shishya.

#Thread on Gorakanathar Siddhar.

@LostTemple7


His origin story is interesting, though I couldn’t verify it’s authenticity, so not sharing the story here. He’s shishya of Machamuni Siddhar and also learnt from Agasthiya Siddhar.

@HelloNNewman @RajiIndustani @Kishoreciyer1

Unlike other Siddhars, he is depicted as either with a Tiger or seated & wearing Tiger skin. While I couldn’t find any explanation for this. My interpretation is as follows:

Tiger is a predator that lurks around and attacks unexpectedly.


Our 5 indriyas and 5 vikitis also similar to Tiger, they lurk around and attacks our thoughts when we’re least expecting. Gorakkar is said to have mastered these aspects, thus to denote this, he shown with Tiger.

@Itishree001 @VarierSangitha @jananisampath

Gorakanathar or Gorakshnath (as he’s known in the Nath Sampraday) is celebrated Guru in both Northern and Southern part of India. He’s one of the NavNath in Nath Sampraday and also 18 Siddhars of Tamil tradition. During his life, he’s travelled Indian subcontinent extensively +
RELIGION , ALL
Alex Oluwatobi
Alex Oluwatobi
@alexlobaloba
According to psychologists, there are four types of intelligence:

- Intelligence Quotient (IQ)
- Emotional Quotient (EQ)
- Social Quotient (SQ)
- Adversity Quotient (AQ)

1. IQ is the measure of one's ability to comprehend, solve maths; memorize things & recall subject matters.

2. EQ is the measure of your ability to maintain peace with others; keep to time; be responsible; be honest; respect boundaries; be humble, genuine, and considerate.

3. SQ is the measure of one's ability to build a network of friends & maintain it over a long period of time.

4. AQ is the measure of your ability to go through a rough patch in life and come out without losing your mind. It is a new paradigm and can be used to determine who will give up in face of troubles and may abandon their families.

Now to the very interesting & analytical part👇

People that have higher EQ & SQ tend to go further in life than those with high IQ but low EQ &SQ.

Most schools capitalize on improving IQ level while EQ & SQ are played down.

A man of high IQ can end up being employed by a man of high EQ & SQ even though he has an average IQ.

Your EQ represents your character; your SQ represents your charisma. Give in to habits that will improve these three Qs but more especially your EQ and SQ.

EQ and SQ make one manage better than the other.

Try not only to have a higher IQ but also to have higher EQ and SQ.
ALL
Advertisement
ArmaniTalks \U0001f399\U0001f525
ArmaniTalks 🎙🔥...
@ArmaniTalks
Manipulation Sign:

If you are compromising too much, there is a chance that you are getting manipulated.

Why are you the one that's always compromising?

How come the other person always gets their way?

Be more curious.

If something seems off, stick up for yourself.

'Wait, you sure I am being manipulated?'

I have no clue, that is only something that you can decide for yourself.

'Dang is there anything I need to look out for?'

Plenty..

But let me give you a few things to look out for.

👇

I see manipulation as skillfully controlling someone's behavior for egotistical or unethical purposes.

'How come people don't leave when it's happening to them?'

Because most people have 0 clue that they are being manipulated.

1. Guilt Trip

You ever made a mistake around someone, only for them to hold it over your head?

The will always bring up the mistake when you 2 are not seeing eye to eye.

These people will use that mistake as leverage to get what they want from you in the future.

Look out.

2. The Rationalizer

This person will commit the worst acts & find a way to rationalize it.

Example: cheaters when they get caught.

They have every excuse in the book for why they did it.

Heck, they are so good at rationalizing, they will make it seem like your fault.
LIFE
Vibhu Vashisth
Vibhu Vashisth
@VIBHU_Tweet
AGAMA SHASTRA:THE SCIENCE BEHIND THE MARVELS OF HINDU ARCHITECTURE

Agama Shastra is a Sanskrit word that means the manual for worship, temple building, rituals etc in Hindu Tradition.From Sanskrit,agama means handed down by tradition and Shastra means a commentary or treatise.


Therefore, Agama Shastra is a collection of ideas that drafts the rules for worship, temple construction, spirituality and rituals. It has been a guideline for many Hindus from ancient times. It's a collection of Sanskrit, Tamil and Grantha scriptures that mostly contains...


...methods of temple construction, idol creation, philosophical doctrines and meditative practices. It came into being after years of assimiliation and from a variety of sources. Some parts of it are pre-vedic while some are post-vedic.


Hindu Temples are not just temples, they are the pride and identity of Hindus. They are the symbols of Hindu unity and their religious aspirations. Temples are the places of spiritual healing and are our connection with the creator almighty.


Temples are the priceless treasure of our History, Heritage ,Art & Architecture. Architecture that mesmerises and spell bounds you. And Agama Shastra is that very text which is responsible for such a mesmerising and spell binding quality and beauty of our Hindu Temples.
ALL
Steve Stewart-Williams
Steve Stewart-Williams
@SteveStuWill
THREAD: 12 Things Everyone Should Know About IQ

1. IQ is one of the most heritable psychological traits – that is, individual differences in IQ are strongly associated with individual differences in genes (at least in fairly typical modern environments). https://t.co/3XxzW9bxLE


2. The heritability of IQ *increases* from childhood to adulthood. Meanwhile, the effect of the shared environment largely fades away. In other words, when it comes to IQ, nature becomes more important as we get older, nurture less. https://t.co/UqtS1lpw3n


3. IQ scores have been increasing for the last century or so, a phenomenon known as the Flynn effect. https://t.co/sCZvCst3hw (N ≈ 4 million)

(Note that the Flynn effect shows that IQ isn't 100% genetic; it doesn't show that it's 100% environmental.)


4. IQ predicts many important real world outcomes.

For example, though far from perfect, IQ is the single-best predictor of job performance we have – much better than Emotional Intelligence, the Big Five, Grit, etc. https://t.co/rKUgKDAAVx https://t.co/DWbVI8QSU3


5. Higher IQ is associated with a lower risk of death from most causes, including cardiovascular disease, respiratory disease, most forms of cancer, homicide, suicide, and accident. https://t.co/PJjGNyeQRA (N = 728,160)
LIFE