anon_gona said in #4664 5d ago:
California is the western terminus, the perennial leading indicator. Even more than the rest of the West, we have completely forgotten how to build in the material world. We led the shift from physical to virtual and got stuck there, like a kid in Narnia trying to find the closet door back home. This is now an urgent, even existential issue.
We begin by taking stock of the good news.
California has succeeded beyond all imagination in the virtual world. We create the world's movies, short-form video, songs, media platforms that distribute movies and videos and songs, blueprints for "Designed in California" devices, and all kinds of software that is eating the world with great dispatch and alacrity. We have HIGH ENERGY institutions devoted to each of these things, institutions capable of risking billions on unproven ideas with a low chance of success, all chasing the power-law logic of expected value. We have live players in each of these fields aggressively executing on those bets. The world's undersea cables flash with bits made in California. Our virtual leadership remains secure.
We are also blessed with an incredible natural world. We have beautiful beaches, mountains, forests. Great human capital. Our ecosystem is mostly healthy.
Meanwhile, we have completely neglected the material world. We inherit an iconic built environment--the Golden Gate Bridge, the hillside Victorians, the Venice Boardwalk, but what do all these things have in common? They were all built a century ago. Building quality housing, factories, or industrial capacity in California at any kind of scale is near impossible today. Even our (excellent, mountain spring) water comes from a dammed valley-turned-reservoir next to Yosemite; the dam and pipeline were also built a century ago, and the chance that either could be built today is precisely zero.
AI will not save us. We have no monopoly. We cannot prevent our rivals from obtaining smart computer. If we have "smart computer" and China has "smart computer plus a supermajority of global manufacturing and construction capacity", where does that leave us exactly? We can use smart computer to achieve exquisitely personalized goonbots.
We are not winning until we have beautiful, inspiring, and HIGH VELOCITY construction in California, cranes dotting the sky.
We begin by taking stock of the good news.
California has succeeded beyond all imagination in the virtual world. We create the world's movies, short-form video, songs, media platforms that distribute movies and videos and songs, blueprints for "Designed in California" devices, and all kinds of software that is eating the world with great dispatch and alacrity. We have HIGH ENERGY institutions devoted to each of these things, institutions capable of risking billions on unproven ideas with a low chance of success, all chasing the power-law logic of expected value. We have live players in each of these fields aggressively executing on those bets. The world's undersea cables flash with bits made in California. Our virtual leadership remains secure.
We are also blessed with an incredible natural world. We have beautiful beaches, mountains, forests. Great human capital. Our ecosystem is mostly healthy.
Meanwhile, we have completely neglected the material world. We inherit an iconic built environment--the Golden Gate Bridge, the hillside Victorians, the Venice Boardwalk, but what do all these things have in common? They were all built a century ago. Building quality housing, factories, or industrial capacity in California at any kind of scale is near impossible today. Even our (excellent, mountain spring) water comes from a dammed valley-turned-reservoir next to Yosemite; the dam and pipeline were also built a century ago, and the chance that either could be built today is precisely zero.
AI will not save us. We have no monopoly. We cannot prevent our rivals from obtaining smart computer. If we have "smart computer" and China has "smart computer plus a supermajority of global manufacturing and construction capacity", where does that leave us exactly? We can use smart computer to achieve exquisitely personalized goonbots.
We are not winning until we have beautiful, inspiring, and HIGH VELOCITY construction in California, cranes dotting the sky.
California is the we
