ktguru

SoCal & the Tropics

[ktguru @ktguru]

Source:
https://t.co/3n1Oo0Hke6

[ktguru @ktguru]

It’s always been quite intangible to describe why space exploration has been so globally inspiring and exhilarating, since manned (and robotic) space travel was willed into human existence, in 1961.

A touching glimpse is offered by @bvsveera in his Apollo Moment blog post about the Artemis II mission. 😊

I’m sure @NASAArtemis & @SpaceX will give us more, soon.

[ktguru @ktguru]

@nntaleb Any thoughts for Nassim, @RnaudBertrand...?

[ktguru @ktguru]

Andreessen’s “half-dozen key things” to replicate Silicon Valley that government officials can’t or won’t implement.

He may’ve left out government funding a $292B (inflation-adjusted) Apollo-equivalent program to save a Fairchild Semiconductor-equivalent startup from going bankrupt — to jumpstart it all…

https://t.co/k81CnXq3GI

[Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 @pmarca]

I have had 1,000 conversations with government officials that go like this:

1. “How do we have a Silicon Valley of our own?”
2. [I list the half dozen key things]
3. “But what if we can’t do any of those?”

The world would be better with 10, 100, 1,000 more Silicon Valleys.

[ktguru @ktguru]

Wow, great to hear Charley Steiner's voice again tonight, in the @Dodgers radio booth.

He's still painting pictures & telling stories for us with Mo. Best of health to you, Charley...!

[ktguru @ktguru]

@Palsvig He can't be that self-delusional about atomic testing camera set-ups... 🤣
@pmarca

https://t.co/KrGCOoBuFy

[ktguru @ktguru]

@RAllenser @DarrigoMelanie Rich, you're getting played like a violin, but you don't even realize it...

https://t.co/2Cg78vEqt9

[ktguru @ktguru]

There were found 31 credible cases (out of over ONE BILLION votes cast) of in-person voter impersonation, Elon.

The amazingly tiny failure rate of Falcon 9 is more than that.

What other issues are you hyper about with that level of minuscule-percent occurrence…?

https://t.co/KvR0IjATIF

[ktguru @ktguru]

@neiltyson @nyknicks Hilarious, Neil.

(I would've never guessed you for a thumb-shutter dude.)

[ktguru @ktguru]

@elonmusk 😂🤣

[ktguru @ktguru]

Watching holographic games is getting closer quickly...

Gene Roddenberry's holodeck after that.
@EWRoddenberry

[SportsCenter @SportsCenter]

The technology Hurricanes fans are using to watch their team play in Vegas 👀

(via @Canes)

[ktguru @ktguru]

@Vfynn_ Painful to read & watch.

The two 3-minute "TV timeouts" will garner US Fox TV (allowed by FIFA) about $500M of additional advertising revenue this World Cup.

They love more money, much more than the beautiful game.

Rupert Murdoch simply doesn't care.

[ktguru @ktguru]

Fine, I’ll allow it, given the horrid “hydration” breaks…since this was one of the all-time entertaining TV ads, ever. (If you’ve ever visited Brasil, you’d understand.)

[Trung Phan @TrungTPhan]

Ronaldo, Roberto Carlos and 1998 Brazil team probably did the best Nike soccer ad ever

[ktguru @ktguru]

Rupert Murdoch still cashing in on 10 hours of your (and every other US/FOX TV viewer’s) life, before he checks out…

[Trung Phan @TrungTPhan]

The World Cup’s mandatory 3-minute “hydration break” is most devious ad unit inevntion since YouTube’s triple pre-roll back-to-back unskippable ad.

Across 104 matches, FIFA now has 624 minutes (10 hours) of new ad inventory.

That’s total of $500m potential new ad revenue that didn’t exist before (~$400k per 30-second slot).

Hydration breaks in previous year were called if heat/humidity crossed a threshold.

An estimated 200-250 million people watched Brazil vs. Morocco (Super Bowl is 130 million-ish, but still juiciest ad rates at $8m per 30 second spot).

***

WSJ says ad range start at $250k (early games) to $750k or more for top-attraction matches (eg US games) for 30-second slot: https://t.co/sTku3obdPR

[ktguru @ktguru]

@Monkeyiobe @TheAliceSmith Interesting root causes…wow.

https://t.co/OsyKHkVlJ8

[ktguru @ktguru]

@canary_earth Did you have your protective glasses on…??
😂🤣

[ktguru @ktguru]

@CharlesPattson Wow, beautiful work, @abjt14.

Used appropriately, designers can make the web more lovely.

[ktguru @ktguru]

@mtaibbi Matt, I’ve been wondering about the delayed voting results (in California), as well, but these are plausible reasons listed here...

https://t.co/xFZHmkKO0h

[ktguru @ktguru]

@Bitcoin_Teddy Nope.

https://t.co/snHlRhxGUA

[ktguru @ktguru]

How many media appearances are not scripted…?
@NewsHour @cspan @RalphNader

[ktguru @ktguru]

Beyond the campaign allegations of toxicity & PTSD…is it freaky to read about how much political dialogue we see and hear in speeches, newspaper op-eds and interviews is spoon-fed by SuperPAC wordsmiths…?

[Ryan Grim @ryangrim]

It's kind of wild to find out that the Republican in the NYT story that says she had a toxic relationship with Graham Platner is Lyndsey Fifield. Having been in DC for too long, I know a decent number of people who know her quite well. For a long time she was the co-host of a podcast with her best friend Bethany Mandel, called Ladybrains, though she has also worked for multiple super PACs, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Heritage Foundation.

Some background, presented without judgment: In 2014, Fifield began work as digital director for American Action Network, a Republican Super PAC that oversees House races. The next year she became social media manager for the Heritage Foundation, where she stayed for the next seven years.

In 2022, she joined the Super PAC backing Nikki Haley for president, switching to the official campaign side the next year, and staying until the campaign flamed out. She now lists herself as a visiting fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum, a prominent dark money group that is best known for helping usher Brett Kavanaugh on to the Supreme Court and giving Susan Collins the talking points she needed to make her decisive speech in his favor.

The NYT breezed past all this, saying she was "a Virginia conservative who has worked for right-leaning groups and Republican campaigns."

In an interview for a news outlet called Red Alert Politics that named her to a “30 under 30” list back in 2016, she said that she wanted to “emulate the late conservative blogger Andrew Breitbart’s approach to online activism.” Breitbart, known for pushing the boundaries when it came to political combat, is perhaps best remembered for having exposed Anthony Weiner’s penchant for sending nudes to young girls, and for his work elevating James O’Keefe.

That she worked for Independent Women's Forum recently is even wilder since IWF played a critical role in Kavanaugh's confirmation and in persuading Collins to support it.

Heather Higgins, chair of IWF, laid out the group’s role in a talk several years ago. “We wrote a memo. It was used by a lot of members of the Senate and the House, Fox News, and elsewhere. Most important, Susan Collins told me that without that memo, she would not see how to support him,” Higgins said. “And if you look at the speech she gave on the Senate floor, it’s entirely the playing out and architecture of how we said to structure the argument — what to say and how to say it, which is just so gratifying. We’re watching TV and we’re like, ‘That’s ours! That’s ours!’”

Meanwhile, the timeline Fifield gives of their relationship is confusing, because during at least some of that time she was actually dating a different person, her longterm boyfriend who became her fiancee before she called off the wedding in 2018. We all know this because she and Mandel did a podcast episode on it that went mega-viral in Republican circles back then. Apparently this is the kind of thing the NYT thinks is important now, so I guess it requires more reporting. I'll report back.

Here is Heather Higgins celebrating IWF's role in getting Susan Collins to confirm Kavanaugh: