The project does not accept bug bounty submissions without BBBS attestation. To get it, you must first submit your report to the BBBS for review.

Now, if this is your first submission (you are unknown to the BBBS), you must submit $50 to the BBBS along with the bug report, to pay a human to spend an hour looking at your work to verify it is written in good faith. This is not a review of whether the bug is real or valuable, just a readover to verify the report is coherent and plausible. If you have done this before, you can get a free attestation based on being a member in good standing, but submitting slop (per the judgement of the BBBS reviewer or the project receiving the report) is an account ban.

The BBBS couldn't steal your work and submit it themselves if they gave you some sort of signed hash as a receipt, which as a side effect would also be a deterrant against bounty programs stealing your work.

Submissions would only be expensive per submission for an anonymous user, enabling the low friction high trust communication under which collaboration works best when reputation has been established.

The BBBS itself won't be overrun by slop since the price of establishing an account far exceeds what a bot might expect to make with a single malicious submission. Nor can legitimate established accounts be sold since the cost of creating them exceeds the value to be expected from abusing them. Moreover, the cost to establish a reputation as a bug bounty hunter is small in dollars compared to the cost in time and expertise that a legitimate hunter would be expected to expend in the course of their work.

The vast majority of slop would go away as the cost of a first submission is much too high. The cost to the project is close to nothing - integrating with the BBBS attestation API. The cost to a legitimate bug bounty hunter is low - some human review while establishing a reputation, which could even be made useful if it came in the form of feedback. All review is paid for by the submitter, so no one is trying to counter infinite slop with volunteer hours.

Moreover, the BBBS can serve as a mediator of trust, not only against AI, but as a place to receive reputational merit for high value work and trustworthy bug bounty programs.

I realize I am describing a lightweight guild, which is subject to well known political failure modes (the most significant of which is exploiting newcomers), but the concept has the advantage that guilds have functioned as successful slop gatekeepers in society for a very long time and a lot is known about how to make them work.

It is not an us vs. them sort of thing. Don't get me wrong, there are wicked people doing awful things, but I breathe the same air everyone else does. I remember building things 20 years ago with breathless excitement about how it might make the world a better place, and these days I am much quicker to think about how to monetize. Asking a fair price for something isn't evil, but none of us is an island and I don't like how my dreams have changed. I write these things in part to teach myself.

There is no Caesar to assassinate because it is everyone, or near enough. It is the idea that this is how you do things. Tyranny is in the air and in the water, that exploitation of power for more power by means of misery, old as mankind.

In such a world, removing one tyrant only gets you ruled by his rival, who is often worse. The historical recipe for freedom and abundance is a people who, as a whole people, are generous with power and expect it of each other at every level, and are viciously intolerant of its abuse. Such was the world of technology for about five decades in the last century, but it hasn't been so for the last two or three. I think it doesn't take much for a few awful people to eat up any abundance, if they are allowed to, and that war is written across the history of computing from its very beginning. But these days, it is not a healthy society defending itself from would-be conquerers, but a world of feuding warlords anxious to eat up any excess anywhere, not only for profit but because thriving and independent people are inherently a threat. With few exceptions, and it seems like fewer every year, any kingdom now which consists of a group of people and some code, be it a software service, a phone, a game, a car, or a dang toaster oven, looks like a despot extracting taxes from his peasants, not a king sheparding his people. Certainly the big ones are that way, and the legacy of the last generation continues to be eroded.

Whatever the means, that tangle of the legal and economic and social and educational and technological and cultural, and I do not pretend it is anything but a thorny and incomprehensible thicket, Aristotle's identification of the broad themes remains relevant. Divided, humiliated, disempowered - whatever the pretext, the encroachment of dark forces is unmistakable. The only defense is (and ever was) those who see their work as in some sense sacred and power as conveying a duty to serve. The generation for whom Superman is a central myth builds one way; the generation for whom it is Game of Thrones builds very differently. Not that these stories are necessarily causes, but their resonance is a reflection of how two very different groups of people think about power.

Mark my words. General purpose computing and private, direct communication are things too powerful for a tyrant to permit the people to have. The freedom we've enjoyed for the last several decades, to build what we want, to run what we want, to network with who we want, is not the default and will always be under attack. We had it for a little while by the generosity of the previous generation. It was not then, and is not now, and never will be free.

[1] https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1...

Yahtzee was talking about Dark Souls, but it applies. (Vigorously NSFW, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=STrYyhEwkbY )

That said, I think Nethack is best experienced with liberal and unapologetic spoiler use.

I sometimes imagine gathering up some number of like-minded electrical and software engineers, and founding some sort of monastary in which everyone was fed and taken care of and built the best technology they could, as a gift to humanity. I do wonder if the day's robber barons would find a way to shut us down, of course, but I still remember a bright and optimistic time when technology was made to serve people, not to oppress them, and it seems to me like a bright expression of human spirit that oughtn't to have been sold.

Oh noooooooooo... yeah that's fair.

Lots of overdue gameplay changes here, really. I was something of an expert player 20 years ago, my best ascenscion being Atheist/Genoless/Wishless with no pet to boot. It seems a lot has changed. I see fixes on this list for things that bothered me then. :)

Interestingly, tragically, YouTube seems to have gotten the message that I like long form informational videos, and serves me ones with intriguing titles that are clearly written, illustrated, and read by AI. I seem to be training it to deceive me, which is not a good thing. In fact, I had trained it so well to push my psychological buttons that I recently had to leave entirely, which is surely not what anyone wants.

- The problem of counterfeit currency is well acknowledged and has roots in antiquity. Reasonable people agree that currency genuinely cannot do its only job if counterfeiting is possible, and have had that agreement for thousands of years. In addition, the sole right to print currency is given to the US government in its constitution (almost certainly for this reason). These two things grant government control over printing currency both a moral and a legal legitimacy that government control over printing gun parts doesn't have.

- Because the government has control over the design of legitimate currency, it is actually practical to prevent software from reproducing it. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation . Gun parts have no such distinguishing characteristic, and cannot be made to have one, since there is no authoritative body responsible for all of them. Having such a marking could be made legally mandatory, but it is not actually required for the function of the part, whereas currency needs to match the authentic design in order to be useful. It is therefore much less practical and effective to mark gun parts to prevent replication than it is to similarly mark currency.

- Creating your own guns specifically (and weapons, generally) is widely seen as a natural or God-given right. I would go so far as to say that it is intrinsically human, and that losing access to it would be as painful to some as losing access to rock 'n roll. I would say that due to this pain, losing that right is one of the chief signs of an enslaved people. While not everyone would agree with me, many would, which gives the issue a divisive moral edge. By contrast, creating your own currency might be seen as some sort of natural right by some people, but creating your own US Dollars certainly is not seen that way by anybody. Well, I'm sure you could find someone, but you know what I mean.

- As far as I know, there is no law compelling printer/photocopier manufacturers to use anti-counterfeiting software, and compliance is voluntary (but apparently pretty widespread -- though I doubt it's universal). A similar voluntary setup with 3D printer manufacturers would be less objectionable (though also much less likely to succeed). Introducing any sort of mandatory compliance regime introduces friction, slows innovation, and invites corruption.

- Manufacturing gun parts is actually pretty easy, and could be accomplished via many methods accessible to hobbyists, ranging from whittling by hand to duct taping hardware together to lost wax casting to desktop CNC to a desktop injection molding setup to metalworking on a lathe in a garage machine shop. It is in no way limited to 3D printing, though that admittedly lowers the bar a bit. Learning to work on guns is not significantly harder than learning to work on cars, though perhaps fewer people know how to do it. Thus, a focus on 3D printing seems much more driven by sensationalism, paranoia, and ignorance of this fact than it is by practical assessment of the issue. By contrast, creating even minimally recognizable counterfeit currency without the assistance of a computer is practically impossible and certainly cost-prohibitive. In manufacturing gun parts, it is perfectly practical in some cases to do the equivalent of drawing a dollar bill with a crayon -- something much less successful in the counterfeiting world.

- Adding broad pattern-recognition controls to a 3d printer is a novel and difficult problem that will likely impact innocent people doing legal things. Preventing the printing of accurate-looking currency has a much more narrow impact, and is much more focused on people doing illegal-adjacent things.

Without meaning any malice toward your question, I mention that I write because you have stepped on one of my pet peeves: it seems to me that an inability to see the difference between things that are, in fact, different, is one of the major failure modes of modern society in general. We need an appreciation for texture and nuance if we are to navigate the world rightly.

I don't think I am unique in that. In fact, I perceive that it is very normal for public figures, not merely to fade from public attention, but to actively seek out seclusion.

While I'm not Satoshi, I would put the odds of someone in such a position of maintaining radio silence far from "zero chance". I would put it more around 70 or 80 percent. And at any rate, it is certainly what I would do.

A government with aggressive surveillance ambitions but a decaying police department and justice system looks to me very much like the guy with a mountain of guns and ammo but no parallel investment in something like battlefield medicine. Whatever you're telling yourself about the reason for what you're doing, it is manifestly not correct, at least going by other investments I would expect to see and find neglected.

I don't think it's that video games have gotten worse (though perhaps they have). I think it's more that it's impossible to recreate the way they impacted us back then. It wasn't just about the games, but also about the times. DOOM today is a fine game and even a classic, but back then it was the first time anyone had ever seen anything like it and we were inventing online play and fps tactics and amateur map design in real time. Descent had that same blockbuster feel, but that for me that feeling faded from new releases over the next few years. (Though I won't deny Minecraft caught something of that old bombshell energy.)

I suspect the way I feel about the video games I grew up with is a feeling my kids will never exactly have. Sure, they love their games, but the 90s were an incredible time for the art form. By analogy, I love the music I grew up with, but I don't feel about it the way my parents feel about the music from the 60's. Music is always special, but that was a particularly special time for music and if you weren't there, you weren't there. In time the absolute electricity of the British Invasion became "So what kind of music do you listen to?" So I think it will go with games.

B5 spends most of the series saying that sort of thing.

As much as I love both shows, I wouldn't really recommend B5 to someone based on a love of TNG. I think it is more natural to recommend B5 to someone based on a minimial affinity for sci fi and a liking for Lord of the Rings, which will really tell you how different the two shows are.

TNG is wonderfully idealistic. It paints a picture of rising above your vices and being professional, civilized, and decent. It teaches you to work the problem, to examine the data, to think and consult and reflect and do better. I think it unrealistic -- I thought it unrealistic when I first encountered it -- but that doesn't matter. It's such a worthy ideal that it is worth encountering and remembering over and over again. As you go through life, you should remember that that is an option and strive for it.

B5 is wonderfully heroic. It is about dealing with a world of moral complexity and uncertainty, about trying to do good even when it is futile, about being a hero in the face of danger and risk and doubt. About how politics makes that difficult and keeps it in check and at any rate isn't a game you can check out of because it is the game.

Both shows encounter awful authoritarianism. One examines the law and philosophy in detail and gives a stirring verbal rebuke that carries the day. One starts a rebellion without certainty that it will be right or effective, but because under the circumstances, a good man feels compelled to do so. I think these are both extremely valuable takes on the topic, and I wouldn't want to have not seen either one. But I do have to say that at the end of the day, it is the second one I think of more as I go through life. For me the greater life lesson is not in taking the time to seek deeper wisdom, worthy as that is, but in having the bravery and faith to face danger, uncertainty, and tragedy.

Whenever I get the itch to watch the whole thing again but I don't want to spend the time, I watch this (which is so thick with spoilers that you shouldn't watch it unless you've seen the series so many times that the Vorlons make sense now). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHpMAubwfQg

It is hard to feel that way in the 2020s. Technology seems oversold, scammish, dystopian, inhuman. Everything is slop and skinner boxes. It impoverishes rather than enriches, and it seems to be getting worse. It is easy to feel that the Amish, nay perhaps even the medievals, have a point.

Worse, the science fiction oriented around starships took its cues from our experience of the naval - journeys of days or weeks would take you to alien places teeming with new and interesting and enriching life. Foods you couldn't eat anywhere else. People you couldn't meet at home. But now the globe seems smaller, explored, and conquered. Those faraway goods are easily shipped to your door, and those faraway people show up in your comments section and they're just people. The excitement of the seas is no longer such a part of our outlook that reskinning it in fantasy speaks to us.

Not only is the excitement of the seas greatly diminished, the more we have learned about the universe, the worse the naval analogy seems. The distant stars no longer seem like tropical islands, but rather hopelessly distant and inhospitable. In 1958, Heinlein wrote a wonderful short story about scout troops in the verdant jungles of Venus back when that was a reasonable expectation[1], but it seems like a silly thing to write now. https://xkcd.com/2202/ seems to capture the current expectation well.

Several decades ago it was easy to get excited about the march of scientific discovery and technological progress. But now we're asking why science seems to have slowed down so much, and new technology seems about as exciting as new mechanisms for dependence and dystopia.

Atheism is weakening and religion is rising.

The imagined global society of the UN that was reimagined at a larger scale as The Federation may have seemed like the way of the future for a few decades, but now that dream looks foolish and the globe is visibly fracturing.

The classic science fiction trope that progress will better us as people, that leisure will lead to fitness, that access to information will make us wise scholars, that we will use the convenience of machines to free ourselves for the pursuit of virtue... it makes for an inspiring story. I had my suspicions about how true all of that was back before the internet. I am now very sure that Wall-E and Idiocracy are nearer to the mark.

The human-like AIs of Star Wars' robots or Star Trek's androids or innumerable superintelligent computers from Asimov to Heinlein seem further away every year. AI is part of everyday life now, and our major concern is how to keep it from catastrophically failing at mundane research, not whether it should have voting rights or makes humans obsolete. Ambulatory human-like AI seems unlikely when data centers the size of small cities struggle with emdashes. The hope and promise of a generation of robot children and citizens seems as misguided as the forests of Venus.

I could go on. We GOT a lot of the wonders science fiction predicted, or things so much more powerful that our most audacious futurists didn't dare to imagine them. And yet it doesn't feel like the promised land. Science fiction promised instant video conferences across the globe, but when we got it, it didn't look like all the world's best researchers collaborating on its hardest problems. It looked like all of the miscreants with their dick pics and the dreary business meetings and school lessons suddenly having access to your home. I don't mean to imply it's all bad, but the difference between imagination and reality has been stark on many fronts.

I really think the truth is that in a thousand ways, the tropes of the genre no longer speak to the moment.

[1] https://writingatlas.com/story/3984/robert-a-heinlein-a-tend...