Steve Johnson

[Satya Nadella @satyanadella]

https://t.co/vLmiBKTtX3

[NOBUNAGA🇯🇵🏯_夏樹蒼依 @japan_nobunaga]

USA. A grocery register. The cashier held up my crackers and said "oh, these are SO good," and I understood that my entire basket was being judged.

I had not known checkout was an evaluation. No one tells you. The items ride the belt one by one, and the magistrate lifts each, and some receive a verdict.

"These chips? SO good." Approval. My heart rose.

"Oh, I love this salsa." Two for two. I stood straighter.

Then she scanned my mustard in silence.

Silence. No comment. The mustard passed unjudged, which is worse than condemned. I stared at it in the bag. What did I not know? Who buys the correct mustard? Where do they learn?

"And the mustard?" I asked. I could not stop myself.

"...it's fine."

Fine. In my land, when the tea master calls your tea "fine," you train for another decade. I will train.

The man behind me saw my face. "She's just makin' conversation, man."

Conversation. Sir. She has tasted EVERYTHING. She stands at the gate of the food and watches what ten thousand households carry home, and she has formed views, and for a few seconds those views are aimed at your basket. There is no more qualified judge in this nation. The judges of my land studied twenty years. She studies forty hours a week, scanner in hand.

In Japan, the cashier would sooner faint than comment on your groceries. Here, the verdicts are free.

A man does not shop to fill a basket. He shops to hear, at the gate, that he chose well.

I confess I now select one item each week purely to earn her praise. This week: the crackers again.

"These are SO good," she said.

I know. I know.

[Steve Johnson @Stever5]

@its_The_Dr Thun-der…

[Aaron Cannon @AaronLCannon]

I started talking to my co-founder like Claude

[Murray Rothbard @MurraySuggests]

The Iranian navy, which has been destroyed eight times, has apparently closed the Strait of Hormuz again, because the United States, for the seventh time, won the war that wasn’t a war, so now the United States has to open the Strait of Hormuz that was already open before the not-war began.

The not-war began because Iran had uranium that was totally, completely, beautifully obliterated, so they can’t build the nuclear bomb they weren’t building, which is why the United States had to start the not-war it definitely didn’t start.

Now the United States, which has nuclear weapons, is threatening to use nuclear weapons to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons, because nuclear weapons are far too dangerous for countries with nuclear weapons to allow other countries to have.

If the United States saw the United States doing what the United States does in other countries, the United States would invade the United States to liberate the United States from the tyranny of the United States.

[Shemeka Michelle @ShemekaMichelle]

“GAS IS TOO HIGH.” 😅

[Steve Johnson @Stever5]

“It is only with the help of government regulations that a man of lesser ability can destroy his better competitors - and he is the only type of man who runs to government for economic help.”

Ayn Rand (on American Free Enterprise. Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal)

[Peter Girnus 🦅 @gothburz]

Last quarter I rolled out Microsoft Copilot to 4,000 employees.

$30 per seat per month.

$1.4 million annually.

I called it "digital transformation."

The board loved that phrase.

They approved it in eleven minutes.

No one asked what it would actually do.

Including me.

I told everyone it would "10x productivity."

That's not a real number.

But it sounds like one.

HR asked how we'd measure the 10x.

I said we'd "leverage analytics dashboards."

They stopped asking.

Three months later I checked the usage reports.

47 people had opened it.

12 had used it more than once.

One of them was me.

I used it to summarize an email I could have read in 30 seconds.

It took 45 seconds.

Plus the time it took to fix the hallucinations.

But I called it a "pilot success."

Success means the pilot didn't visibly fail.

The CFO asked about ROI.

I showed him a graph.

The graph went up and to the right.

It measured "AI enablement."

I made that metric up.

He nodded approvingly.

We're "AI-enabled" now.

I don't know what that means.

But it's in our investor deck.

A senior developer asked why we didn't use Claude or ChatGPT.

I said we needed "enterprise-grade security."

He asked what that meant.

I said "compliance."

He asked which compliance.

I said "all of them."

He looked skeptical.

I scheduled him for a "career development conversation."

He stopped asking questions.

Microsoft sent a case study team.

They wanted to feature us as a success story.

I told them we "saved 40,000 hours."

I calculated that number by multiplying employees by a number I made up.

They didn't verify it.

They never do.

Now we're on Microsoft's website.

"Global enterprise achieves 40,000 hours of productivity gains with Copilot."

The CEO shared it on LinkedIn.

He got 3,000 likes.

He's never used Copilot.

None of the executives have.

We have an exemption.

"Strategic focus requires minimal digital distraction."

I wrote that policy.

The licenses renew next month.

I'm requesting an expansion.

5,000 more seats.

We haven't used the first 4,000.

But this time we'll "drive adoption."

Adoption means mandatory training.

Training means a 45-minute webinar no one watches.

But completion will be tracked.

Completion is a metric.

Metrics go in dashboards.

Dashboards go in board presentations.

Board presentations get me promoted.

I'll be SVP by Q3.

I still don't know what Copilot does.

But I know what it's for.

It's for showing we're "investing in AI."

Investment means spending.

Spending means commitment.

Commitment means we're serious about the future.

The future is whatever I say it is.

As long as the graph goes up and to the right.

[BSAT Properties @BSAT_Properties]

I was on a train in Tokyo. We stopped between stations. Announcement in Japanese, then in English: "We apologize for the delay. We will resume shortly."

The delay was maybe 3 minutes. Not a big deal.

When the train started moving again, another announcement: "We sincerely apologize for the delay. We were stopped for 3 minutes and 20 seconds. This is unacceptable. Thank you for your patience."

Three minutes and twenty seconds. They measured it exactly. And called it unacceptable.

When I got off at my stop, there were station staff on the platform bowing and handing out delay certificates.

I took one out of curiosity. It was an official document stating that the train had been delayed by 3 minutes and 20 seconds, signed and stamped.

The staff member said in English "for your employer. So they know the delay was not your fault."

I said I'm a tourist, I don't need it. He looked confused. "But the delay affected you. You deserve an apology."

Three minutes. They were treating a three-minute delay like a major incident.

Later I mentioned this to a Japanese friend. They said "oh yes, delay certificates are normal. Trains are supposed to be exactly on time. If they are late, they must apologize."

I said three minutes isn't late, it's nothing. My friend said "in Japan, three minutes is late. On time means on time. Not approximately on time."

They said the train company probably investigated why there was a 3-minute delay. "They will find the cause and fix it so it doesn't happen again."

I kept the certificate. It's framed in my apartment now. A reminder that somewhere in the world, people care about three minutes.

© 6IX.

[Codie Sanchez @Codie_Sanchez]

Underrated signs of a high performer:

• They hate small talk.
• Are not okay with wasting your time.
• Do what they say they’re going to do.
• Do it with urgency.
• Are obsessed, not just interested.

What am I missing?

[Robert Sterling @RobertMSterling]

*opens up TurboTax*

5 minutes later:

[Paul Bronks @SlenderSherbet]

Me all day: "I'm so tired"

Also me, at 2am, taking a quiz to find out what kind of cheese I am:

[Steve Johnson @Stever5]

Well folks, thanks for spending time with NASA lately. 🚀 Be sure to stop by the gift shop on the way out and get yourself a little souvenir!

“For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen.”
Acts 19:24

[Melissa the Hopeful🏠Homemaker @BiblicalBeauty]

Powerful and personal reflections from Francis Schaeffer on prayer, suffering, and the sovereignty of God during his battle with cancer in 1981:

"God is not a dispensing machine. God is a personal God, and I must allow Him to answer my prayers in the light of His wisdom instead of my limitedness."

Franky Schaeffer: "And that's not a cop-out?"

Schaeffer: "Not at all. It's rooted in the heart of all things and that is, He's infinite; I'm finite. I'll tell you something, nothing could terrify me more, and I'm being very serious, nothing could terrify me more than that I could ask for anything today and get it, because I don't know enough."

Franky: "Including, for your own health?"

Schaeffer: "Oh, absolutely. Just as much as for anything."

Franky: "Are you willing to say that as a person who, ok, let's face it, has cancer that's serious enough so it could be killing you?"

Schaeffer: "Yeah, of course...

If I could wave a wand or push a button and get rid of it, in one sense, of course I'd do it. Who wants cancer? Let's not kid ourselves. It's no pleasure to live with this thing on top my head all the time...

But on the other hand, more profoundly, I think I can honestly say sitting here that I would rather trust God's wisdom than mine."

[National Park Service @NatlParkService]

When hiking, the early bird gets the face full of spider webs.

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

Most CEOs have no idea what’s really going on

[𐌁𐌉Ᏽ 𐌕𐌉𐌌𐌉 @OrevaZSN]

Don’t EVER let your printer know you’ve waited until the last minute and you’re in a hurry, because it can sense fear.

[PUNS @ThePunnyWorld]

The U.S. should add 3 more states.

Because 53 is a prime number.
Then they can truly be one nation, indivisible.