throwaway_isms

>Which means that ultimately, the labor laws are far more our fault than the fault of the Labor Secretary.

It also doesn't really matter what the Federal law is or Labor Secretary does/says, worker agreements are governed by State law, and their are 50 States with similar, but not identical legal standards defining employees vs independent contractors. In some cases you may be defined as an employee at the State level but Independent Contractor for purposes of the Federal level (say the IRS Code/Federal Taxes). Even within a single State one agency say unemployment office was classify you as employee and another such as workers comp classifies you as independent contractor.

It seems to go without saying Employee protection laws are for the benefit and protection of the Employee. The law specifically prohibits employers from improperly reclassifying employees as independent contracts by simply titling a worker agreement/contract as an Independent Contractor Agreement in lieu of an Employment Agreement.

If these drivers want to be independent contractors and not employees, great, if these laws were fully enforced from the beginning it would be the drivers that organized and owned the ride sharing business and UBER would have never been able to compete with them (UBER's own S-1 admits this risk, and acknowledges if drivers were Employees it would be an existential threat to their business). Its also no surprise this legal inevitability comes after their public offering.

Sure many gig workers may not want to be employees, but they were, they just were not being provided the benefits and protections. I don't think the politicians are the only ones who benefited clearly the UBER investors and private shareholders pre-IPO were the single largest beneficiary.

Is there any reason on the merits you disagree with the current legal standards distinguishing employee vs independent contractor? I mean the drivers desires is not part of the standard, and in fairness, I don't think you are able to collectively speak on behalf of all drivers and say that's what they wanted, clearly based on the number of lawsuits and employment claims many of them did want the employee status and benefits that come with it.

If the 999,999 were worthless at the time they were initially transferred, then there is no taxable event.

Now if they become worth $1 each and he sells them at that price then it is a taxable event. The threshold may have changed with respect to gifts but if the coins were worth $1 at the time they were initially transferred there may be a taxable event, I think it used to be $50k was tax free.

>Sorry to digress but it’s important to mention that, the hate against Greeks will take an ugly turn in 1955

Almost no one is aware there has been constant armed conflict between the Greeks and Turks in Cypress for over 100 years on ethnic grounds. This includes genocide, terrorism, massacres, kidnappings, executions, and mass graves

If I understand your underlying question, then maybe the topic you are looking for is complexity vs entropy. Where complexity, such as life, would seem to violate the law of entropy.

It may be worth searching "complexity vs entropy", I think I have seen lectures by both Neil deGrasse Tyson and Brian Greene on the topic. I didn't put to much time looking for the lectures, but here is a quick Q/A from Neil's podcast which touches on it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTkpG79cbEE

It is, not so much so that the concept is not without precedent ("book burnings" are quite famous throughout history), but that the book burnings will be conducted by corporations that also have all the data on those who ever read them, and not to mention they are the ones who initially made money selling them in the first place.

In fact [blank] is a fantastic writing prompt for a dystopian novel, seems like a fun little game to play with friends.

Not sure why you were downvoted on this comment.

The city of Miami is putting together a investigating committee/task force to see how public services can incorporate blockchain.

I think it will be implemented, not at the City but the County level, for recording property Deeds. Though 1 year, 5 years, 10 years, its anyone's guess.

The NFT killer app, the writing is on the wall and it will be stocks/stock exchange.

The common definition of greed would be the selfish desire of more than one needs, the "little guy" by definition that us taken by investment scams or mass Crypto pump and dump scams usually isn't seeking more than they need, but in such a desperate and dire financial and economic position they are usually just attempting to gain some footing to put them on level ground. At the end of the day the scams exist because they work, whether you blame it on their the greed of the victim or it is just an act of desperation is irrelevant, the conduct that can and should be regulated is that of the scammers.

I have multiple decentralized websites and even a search engine on IPFS (the p2p web3 protocol)

>It's just greed, plain and simple.

I get that position, but it is a lot more than greed...or maybe a lot less.

It is uneducated investors that see something they don't understand that is unregulated, easily accessible and being marketed to them in ways they should be considered lying and defrauding.

Again the fact that you have a CEO of a publicly traded company constantly Tweeting Doge to the Moon...its easy to say well you bought in thats just greed, fine, but its dystopian as hell.

>right now everything suffers from high gas prices but it looks like that might be solved over the next 12 months

High gas prices are solved, its just no one really seems to understand or care about the technology.

Just as example, it might cost somewhere between $50-$80 in gas to use OpenSea's "free" NFT minting smart contract. But instead you can already use an L2 solution like Polygon(Matic). I minted 1,000,000 NFTs on Polygon(Matic) just to experiment and the total gas for all 1,000,000 NFTs was less the $0.01 (I think it was $0.00018xxx) and this has the double benefit of buyers normally having to pay the same $50-80 gas fees for an NFT on Ethereum Mainnet to only pay fractions of a cent. OpenSea even has a Polygon(Matic) Beta Marketplace, but funny story maybe after 1hour after my 1,000,000 NFTs were minted I listed them for sale and OpenSea took down the Beta for maintenance for a few hours and when it went back up they removed my NFT and listing entirely from the Marketplace lol.

Enjin is another interesting platform, which I'll begin to experiment with as well because it has built in staking and burning features, but until they adopt a side chain I think it will suffer from the same high gas fees.

Point is the actual tech is there, but it really seems all about the money not the tech, and that's why people are paying high gas fees.

The money behind big tech has mastered manipulating demand and that is exactly what you are seeing in the Ethereum/NFT ecosystem.

It is one giant fraud bankrolled by unlimited capital that can artificially increase prices at which point there becomes demand from people in fear of missing out, once the early capital has the suckers locked in the prices plateau at first as the capital stops buying and driving the price up, and then begins a steep crash as they cash out and lock in the gains, this only causes fear and panic among the late entries that made investments at the peak which they couldn't afford to lose...rinse and repeat.

The NFTs may be even more blatant and egregious than the ERC20 coins in terms of fake sales driving up interest, media and demand for shit no regular investor will ever flip. A lot of it is just transparent fraud and money laundering, with the people involved not even shying away from it but openly justifying it on the basis they feel the stock market and art collectors have always engaged in the same misconduct.

Take Elon Musk, openly pumping Doge...I'm not judging, I get the humor in it, but a lot of people have been crushed over the years in the crypto bubbles, yesterday was a prime example where Elon was likely the sole cause of Doge exploding in value (maybe 5x in a few days and 100x over a month) and as the big money way slowly cashing out these massive media campaigns were behind a marketing scam of "DogeDay" essentially making their killing on the backs of the poor uneducated late investors. One would hope his Tweets shined a bright light on the dystopia of it all, but it seems everyone is either so greedy or in such bad positions financially they would rather take part.

My guess is now that they have reaped their profits at the expense of the little guy, they will buy back in with the profits and we should see another pump following the -25% DogeDay scam.

There is a process all law students are taught when reading case law I.R.A.C. (pronounced like the County Iraq). It stands for Issues Rules Application Conclusion. So there was a method to the madness that was provided to us.

So those would be the types of things students highlight/annotate in the margins, whereas more than 50% of the time I would draw pictures. That said I don't think I have ever met anyone who says making notes or even rewriting what they read doesn't help them memorize it, of course memorizing isn't always the goal.

Coincidentally the school I went to was majority Hispanic so one day in my study group there was an interesting discussion about the language everyone thinks in, no one asked for obvious reasons, but what I found interesting was I realized I don't really think in words but images.

To each their own, but thinking in images and drawing pictures for notes went hand in hand with recalling a given case/case law when examining or issue spotting a given set of facts in the future. I think the take away is not to do as I do, but consider your biases, strengths, weaknesses and work on them accordingly and leverage them to your benefit, and don't be afraid to adjust your own strategies as your skillset develops.

I am lucky in that I have that natural curiosity that I see talked about a lot on HN, I might even go so far as to say I am passionate about learning in general.

It may sound ridiculous but I always thought I was a good reader, a tad slow but really good with comprehensions/recollection.

Then I went to law school and ever since I have said tongue-in-cheek I didn't know how to read until law school. I terms of recall, many classmates would highlight and write notes in the margins, but I would typically draw pictures of the case.

Coincidentally law school (at least my 1st year when I went) employed the Socratic method, it is certainly not everything regarding deep thinking or wisdom (probably nothing is a better teacher than experience itself) but it forces you to confront your own ideas, beliefs, and biases (good and bad). Lawyers are often the butt of jokes, and in most cases they deserve to be, but having insight into a wide breath of legal opinions spanning a few hundred years and the legal minds that wrote them does tend to reveal how shallow and poorly thought out most people's ideas are with respect to issues they feel so strongly about in the law (1st amendment rights, 2nd amendment), and its not even that I always disagree with someone's ultimate positions or conclusion, just how there is no meat on the bone.

I am not really sure how you might go about understanding my experience, but maybe you could find some law classes that have been recorded and put on youtube, find an are of the law you are interested and watch a few classes (1st Amendment, criminal law, torts, contracts might be good if they interest you)

Its just marketing...Banksy isn't just some anonymous street artist, its a well funded art studio. And they Banksy style itself was ripped a guerilla artist Blek le Rat...hence the use of Rats in Banksy works.

Society never really reacted to Blek Le Rat because he was a legit guerilla artist and as such his work remained unknown. Whereas the well funded art studio behind Banksy work mass marketed his art, it just so happens the marketing strategy was that of an anonymous street artist. Yet in reality his work was often shown and sold in galleries catering to the rich and celebrity types reinforcing its "value", now the studio even sells the work direct through auctions houses, it is anything but an organic reaction by society.

>lacking the space you assume they have

Did you even read my comment?

>Of course it doesn't mean owners have an extra room.

>That seems like an opinion given from a privileged position

Well, the Peloton is a $4,300 device, so it goes without saying anyone who owns one is in a privileged position. Of course it doesn't mean owners have an extra room. In situations like this, there is probably at least comparative negligence.

cortisol levels can be tested

Everyone thinks Elon was pumping Doge as he keeps saying Doge is going to the moon soon, he was, but this is what he was really talking about the entire time.