A Boring Dystopia

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/48123523

https://fortune.com/2025/07/16/delta-moves-toward-eliminating-set-prices-in-favor-of-ai-that-determines-how-much-you-personally-will-pay

Delta has a long-term strategy to boost its profitability by moving away from set fares and toward individualized pricing using AI. The pilot program, which uses AI for 3% of fares, has so far been “amazingly favorable,” the airline said. Privacy advocates fear this will lead to price-gouging, with one consumer advocate comparing the tactic to “hacking our brains.”

Yeap, this seems to fit.

Way too many good crosspost material lately.

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/5569695

It's the art of the deal!

DOGE wasn't about saving money, that was only the ruse, it was about collecting enough information on people, the government, the state to fine-tune AI on, so it could be sold to well, the governments and security forces - just like Musk's AI is now. I remember calling it out and posting about it at the time DOGE was constantly in the news, only for (I presume) bot accounts to shoot me down.

Tariffs are not about Making American Great Again, another ruse, instead about insider trading. Manipulating the price of commodities like the reserve gold, copper tariffs make a predictable change to its price and attacking Europe / China hugely affects currencies and relevant stock in those markets.

This is where America is. Using the presidency as a position to make more money, not to lead a nation. It has been done subtly before for centuries with politicians taking sizeable back handers for certain favours, but now, this is on a whole new level and there is no turning back. The country is powerless to stop it.

A persons online world is shaped depending on which states' bots they read - and they're so manipulative people will end up believing them,

There is no fixing it. Each American government is about manipulation of the whole country and making more money for themselves and others.

Robotaxi! It's like a regular cab, but less safe.

Don't worry, there's even still a stranger sitting up front. That's because it's less safe.

Anyway, Tesla stock is trading up with 5 times the market cap of Uber and maybe 20 times the market cap of the Ford Motor Company, so mission accomplished.

The fellow proudly tweeting about Tesla's shiny new Experience Center in Mumbai is the Chief Minister of the state, btw.

The tweet on the right goes on to state that the Minister took action...against the NGO that put out the report.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly criticised the military’s proposal to construct a so-called “humanitarian city” in Rafah, warning that the project could take up to a year to complete and would cost billions.

During a closed-door security cabinet meeting on Sunday, Netanyahu and several ministers dismissed the Israeli army's timeline as unrealistic, according to a source cited by Haaretz.

Israeli officials estimate that building a so-called “humanitarian city” in Rafah could cost between $2.7bn and $4bn, according to Israeli media outlet YnetNews.

The proposed concentration camp which would hold up to 500,000 displaced Palestinians, has been widely denounced by rights groups as a form of forced displacement and ethnic cleansing. Critics say the plan amounts to corralling civilians into a zone they would be barred from leaving, with no return to northern Gaza allowed.

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/5542552

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/plague-kills-arizona-resident-health-officials-say/

cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/30242210

A homeowner in Goodyear, Arizona is locked in a dispute with his homeowner's association over his practice of distributing free cold water from his driveway.

Odd this was not already cross posted...

I grew up pre-internet and only embraced it at uni, early www time. I grew up not having a mobile phone because they didn't exist, went to the local (crappy) library if I wanted a map of the world or to do any form of research. Things most people today can do it seconds involved having to get up, go out, and interact with people one way or another.

I rushed out one day and forgot my phone and headphones. I got about 40m away before realising and thought 'meh'. Didn't make any difference to my day.

I look at what I do today, and even typing this wouldn't really have been possible some 25-30 years ago, unless it was in an email to someone I probably personally knew. I only had read-only access to usenet.

Now, everyone (and any bot) can write text on to another computer that others can be influenced by.

Posts that are clearly attempting to manipulate me are everywhere - propaganda thrived in the newspapers, on the radio, the television, and now internet. He who wins, gets to write history.

Having so much information at my fingertips (both biased and factual) mean I actually need to interact with the world less because any inquisition can be solved within seconds.

So now, I'm actively stepping away from the online and want you encourage you to do it too! I've started to read a physical book, ask more people questions forget my phone more often, and take a better look at the world around me, and things are so much more quieter!

"Muh anxieties" have no excuse because I need to forget about them to do stuff.

We're actually becoming a world of isolated people falling into particular funnels that shape us. Break free now and do something afk that scares you. Put your phone down, leave it at home when you go out, ask a stranger for directions.

You owe no online community anything, especially not your short-lived time.

Cultural assimilation to the UK going well

This is real

The staff were pretty kind all around, facility was clean.

The dystopian aspect was how many people I saw denied, because they had donated yesterday. You can give twice a week, but have to wait a day in between. I saw at least four or five people get turned away, and they were all pretty upset. The line was extremely long - there are tons of people desperate enough to wait in line for hours to go through the painful process of having their blood sapped out.

I also got a preloaded card as my payment, which has a ton of fees associated with it - I’ll get charged if I use it at an atm or check the balance. I know these cash cards are often also used to pay people who work at like McDonald’s - it just seems like so much of the US is designed to nickel and dime the shit out of the poor.