Chthonic_Goat_666 posted:

i was thinking about maybe reading that Carreyrou book about Theranos and using that as a platform to discuss things. or maybe if i could pick up any insane hagiography of Musk secondhand. basically find a starting point where i can talk about things without talking about investment banking and immediately showing my ass

cool. imo you should have a little segment every time that talks about death metal but that's me.

shriekingviolet posted:

drwhat posted:


maybe a section about cats you've met recently


i was walking through the off leash park on my way to the grocery store and I met a giant tabby out for a walk with his bulldog puppy friend, they said hi to me then had a friendly wrestle. it was very cute. wish our cat would get along with our dog.

the only thing that's really good on the internet is this one japanese guy's youtube channel where he goes to a place where street cats are and pets them. lately he's been on the famous cat island. it is the best.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCshavgMGy2X0b9-9vuNEb9A

drwhat posted:

also if you could review a few new words in mandarin every podcast I'd appreciate it

it's actually really good when someone with a show about one topic has a little regular feature about something totally different they know a lot about. it makes them seem fun and well-rounded and helps them stand out.

A video that has gone viral shows a #TeslaModelS parked in a garage starting to emit smoke before bursting into flames in Shanghai on Sunday, leaving 3 vehicles burnt out. Afterward, @Tesla issued a statement, saying it has dispatched a team to the scene. pic.twitter.com/I9J43NWtLm

— People's Daily, China (@PDChina) April 22, 2019

As for full autonomy, Musk noted: "the software problem should not be minimized." He continued that, "it's a very difficult software problem." Still, he promised that Teslas will be capable of self-driving by the end of this year and self-driving robo-taxis will be on the road in 2020. Also, in two years, the company will be making cars without steering wheels or pedals at all.

Musk hopes to undercut Uber and Lyft with the cost per mile of a robo-taxi being less than $.18 a mile. Typical ride sharing costs are $2 to $3 a mile.

"If you fast forward a year, maybe a year three months, we'll have over a million robo-taxis on the road."

According to Musk vehicles will drive anywhere. "If you need geofenced maps, you're not self-driving," he said. He said that Teslas will be available to autonomously navigate dense urban areas like San Francisco and New York by the end of the year.

That self-driving prediction is far more aggressive than other automakers and Tesla has a history of announcing roadmaps then missing dates. But according to Musk, by next summer we'll all be cruising in self-driving Tesla to the beach.

the demo tesla posted to their youtube seems to be basically just cruising on and off highways:



that's nice, i guess, but doesn't instill me with confidence that these things are gonna be picking up passengers in urban environments next year.

some detail on tesla's self-driving allowing passengers to select more aggressive modes of driving:

https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/22/18511527/elon-musk-tesla-aggressive-autopilot-mode-fender-bender

which totally undermines the self-driving tech utopian dream of all self-driving cars speaking to each other and driving at the collectively optimal speed, all accelerating perfectly from stop lights etc.

now im imagining aggressive robot cars honking at other more timid robot cars lol

anyway, tesla q1 2019 results tomorrow.

Edited by Chthonic_Goat_666 (April 24, 2019 01:26:33)

Uber Technologies priced its initial public offering at the low end of its targeted range to raise $US8.1 billion ($11.6 billion), adopting a risk-averse stance toward the most high-profile U.S. listing since Facebook Inc seven years ago.

Uber's IPO came against a backdrop of turbulent financial markets, fuelled by the trade dispute between the United States and China, as well as the plunging share price of its US rival Lyft. It assigns a valuation to Uber of $US82.4 billion, significantly less than the valuation of up to $US120 billion that its investment bankers predicted last year.

The IPO was oversubscribed, but Uber settled for a lower price to avoid a repeat of Lyft's IPO in late March, which priced strongly but was followed by a plunge in the company's shares. Uber also wanted to accommodate big mutual funds, which unlike hedge funds put in orders for a lower price.

Lyft's stock slumped nearly 11 percent on Wednesday to a record closing low of $US52.91, well below the $US72 per share IPO price, after the ride-hailing company reported a $US1.1 billion quarterly loss.

Uber said it priced its IPO at $US45 per share, toward the bottom end of its $US44-$US50 per share price range.

Some still consider the stock overpriced.

Edited by Chthonic_Goat_666 (May 10, 2019 01:06:38)

cars posted:

The Triumph of CG666

well, its encouraging/schadenfreude that the uber ipo wasnt a runaway success. but it was mixed from my point of view. mostly because they raised 8 billion dollars, that's a massive amount and means they'll probably remain around for a couple more years at least. also it was oversubscribed, which means they could have sold more expensive shares and raised more money if they wanted to.

i don't really fully 'get' why they did that. i understand that they saw lyft shares drop by like 33% since their ipo, which looks pretty bad and they don't want to repeat that. but now some of their later investors probably wont be able to recover all of their investment? seems like something i'd be hopping mad about if i were the saudis.

anyway, interested to see how uber shares do over the next week or two. i guess if it goes up considerably the move will be justified?

Edited by Chthonic_Goat_666 (May 13, 2019 07:57:50)