The gravitational pull of network effects has intensified at the top, while the low cost of spinning up niche offerings has grown at the bottom. The comfortable middle, the natural landing place for products with a loyal but non-universal audience, is being squeezed out of existence.

https://www.theindex.media/p/the-collapse-of-the-middle-867066ff5f2ea0d8

Perplexity offering $34.5 billion for Chrome is like showing up at to an auction for the Biltmore Estate with Chuck E. Cheese tokens and an IOU.

https://www.theindex.media/p/perplexity-s-chrome-bid-is-a-34-5-billion-publicity-stunt-5b70ae516766912b

Copilot is the crown jewel.

GitHub is the distribution channel.

Developers are the training data.

https://www.theindex.media/p/github-s-neutrality-is-over-ae97e9dfba287225

You can argue with data.

You can question methods.

But when the government starts firing people for publishing inconvenient truths, it’s no longer about statistics.

It’s about power.

https://www.theindex.media/p/the-future-is-certain-it-s-the-past-that-keeps-changing-2b5e37a274392b21

We tend to think of bureaucrats as bit players. But a nation with no credible statistics cannot know itself. It drifts. It improvises. It guesses. Over time, it forgets how to tell the difference between measurement and mood.

https://www.theindex.media/p/the-future-is-certain-it-s-the-past-that-keeps-changing-2b5e37a274392b21

Winston Churchill, after being outmaneuvered at Yalta, warned that feeding the crocodile does not guarantee it will eat you last. In the current case, the EU has fed the crocodile and called it diplomacy.

https://www.theindex.media/p/the-crocodile-eats-first-14d018c44db26940

This is Trump's conundrum:

Once people become convinced that something is being hidden, evidence to the contrary simply confirms the concealment.

The logic becomes circular: any lack of evidence is the evidence.
https://www.theindex.media/p/jeffrey-epstein-and-the-collapse-of-belief-e8d6244085a7970c

The problem isn’t just that Jubilee fails to change minds. It’s that it convinces people they are learning, when what they are actually doing is binge-watching ideologies collide.

https://www.theindex.media/p/jubilee-is-the-endgame-of-debate-me-bro-culture-218262bd65bf2845

There is a reason liberty requires courage. Because it forces you to inhabit a world in which you are not always in control. Where your deepest convictions can be mocked, your values criticized, your institutions doubted.

Some interpret this as a bug.

Some, as a feature.

The feature.
https://www.theindex.media/p/liberty-is-the-right-to-be-wrong-187483bb51d5a521