Plum

I've torn this thing all the way down to the cassette mechanism and the service manual just refuses to acknowledge it's existence other than in passing and SOMEHOW I have to take this thing apart to verify in fact that one of the gears broke it's center section

help

ok well it turns out that gear with the busted center shaft is the encoder gear, with contacts on the back that presumably tell the camera what position the entire mechanism is in at all times. So this whole block needs to be replaced, because that gear isn't coming out without more disassembly that I'm not capable of. Poopy.

I've torn this thing all the way down to the cassette mechanism and the service manual just refuses to acknowledge it's existence other than in passing and SOMEHOW I have to take this thing apart to verify in fact that one of the gears broke it's center section

help

bottom text

There was a time when more journalism was like this, but, well.

im so sorry for the tiktok link and also the substack content but, well, I don't know how to better explain it than the interviewer having gotten a non-answer the third time, asks outright if substack would ever censor racism, and the substack CEO just sorta blinks for at least an entire minute.

edit: the transcript of the uncut version is even worse https://www.techdirt.com/2023/04/14/substack-ceo-chris-best-doesnt-realize-hes-just-become-the-nazi-bar/

(fwiw Patel does quote hate right off the bat so, be warned) link (embed under readmore)
Transcript follows:

Nilay Patel: "[quotes racists] you're going to censor that, right?"
CEO: "So we do have a terms of service that have narrowly prescribed things that are not allowed. There-- There are extreme cases, and I'm not going to get into like the--"

NP: "Wait. Hold on. In America, in 2023, that's not so extreme. right? 'we should not allow as many brown people in the country.' Not so extreme [in America]. Do you allow that on Substack? Would you allow that on Substack Notes?"
CEO: takes breath
CEO: "I think the like, the way we think about this is we want to put the writers and the readers in charge--"

NP: "No, I really want you to answer that question."
CEO: "I'm not gonna get into *gesticulates dismissively* gotcha content moderation--"

NP: "This is not a gotcha question! I'm a brown person. Do you think people on Substack should say I should get kicked out of the country?"
CEO: "I'm not gonna engage in... *gesticulates* y'know, content moderation 'would you or wont you at this or that?' content moderation ques--"

NP: "But it's the thing that you have to do."
CEO: blinks
NP: blinks
CEO: blinks
CEO: blinks
NP: blinks
CEO: blinks

NP: "Right? I mean you have to make these decisions, don't you?"
CEO: blinks
CEO: *looking away from camera, [I am genuinely unsure if it's at a handler's chat or out of shame]*
CEO: "The way that we think about this is yes, there's going to be a terms of service. We are gonna have... y'know, a- a- we have content policies that are deliberately tuned to allow lots of things that we disagree with, that we strongly disagree with. We think we have a strong commitment to freedom of speech, freedom of the press. We think these are, y'know, essential ingredients in a free society. We think that it would be a failure for us to build a new kind of network that can't support those ideals. And we want to design the network in a way where people are in control of their experience, where they're able to do that stuff. We're at the very early innings of that. We don't have all the answers for how these things work. We are making a new thing. And we are, you know, literally we launched this thing one day ago, we're going to have to figure a lot of this stuff out. I don't think it's--"

NP: "You have to figure that out? You have to figure out 'Should we allow overt racism on Substack Notes'? You have to figure that out?"
CEO: "no, I wo-- I'm not going to engage in content moderation gotch--"

NP: "you know this is a very bad response to this question, right? You're aware that you-- you've blundered into this. You should just say no."
CEO: blinks
NP: blinks
CEO: blinks
NP: "I'm wondering what's keeping you from saying no"
NP: blinks
CEO: blinks

I'm just kinda chosting this for myself in case I need to dig it up in the future. This is also from the link in the reggbuged post.

So if Substack Notes becomes overrun by racism and transphobia, that’s fine with you?

We’re going to have to work very hard to make Substack Notes be a great place to have the readers and the writers be in charge, where you can have the kinds of conversations that you find valuable. That’s the exciting challenge that we have ahead of us.

This is the absolute fucking peak of techbro business speak. Frame it in a museum as a fucking warning for future generations. People like this deserve nothing but suffering and despair.