Maybe Some Ad Discretion, Youtube?

  I get it, Youtube. I watch some "grown-up" content at times, such as music videos from the likes of Kid Rock, Pink, or even on occasion really weird stuff like Die Antwoord. It is a guilty pleasure. Youtube might be forgiven for thinking I would be interested in commercials of an adult nature. In no case should they ever show such commercials prior to wholesome videos. There is absolutely no reason I should turn on a video about rocket launches and be served an ad with the opening seconds being women talking about [independent bedroom activities]. It's like Google has never considered that people might watch different content based on who is in the room together, or simply might want to decide for themselves when to indulge in indecent topics.
  I immediately checked my google ad-settings to see if there was some category that listed me as interested in adult topics. There is no obvious category for such things. Nor should there be, really. Content providers should realize they cannot see into the homes and should never make assumptions about the current audience's appropriateness for adult content. Commercials should never be more indecent than the viewer-chosen content they are playing beside, to ensure viewers desire such material at the moment. I'm tired of content companies across the board not respecting their viewers.

Apparently, we're too pathetic for simple rules

https://townhall.com/columnists/gabriellahoffman/2020/05/29/northams-mask-edict-puts-suffering-businesses-in-a-nowin-situation-n2569634

It seems an argument against requiring masks is:
“It will be up to the businesses and their untrained employees to confront someone who isn't wearing a mask to either compel the violators to wear a mask or expel them from the premises. As we have seen in other states, this has led to confrontations between businesses and their customers, even in one case leading to a shooting death at a Dollar Store.” 

Seriously? Ever see the signs in stores, "No Shoes, No Shirt, No Service". It's a simple system: abide by the rules or we're simply not dealing with you. We don't even need to ask violators to leave, just don't serve them. That's all it takes. I can't imagine that not meeting the responsibility expected from businesses. "You're not wearing a mask, so I'm not serving you".  Most people will get tired of not being served, and comply. If people get angry over that and start shooting, chances are there's more to their instability than just the masks. Many in the anti-shutdown crowd are keen to say, "it's mostly old people who would have died soon anyway". Well, that shooting probably was going to happen anyway; scattered violence from random lunatics is not a good argument against any policy.
  And what's with this "untrained employees" part? Are we really so pathetic of a people that we can't understand and enforce a rule as simple as, "You must be wearing a mask to shop here"? Since when did basic communication require training? I'm sure someone will say, "But what if someone refuses, and gets angry...they clearly need training!" Most business already deal with unruly customers and have training in place for such issues. Just continue doing whatever you already do.

Extrapolating Early Numbers

Reference:
   https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/27/upshot/coronavirus-deaths-new-york-city.html
  
I've so far been unwilling to join the crowd that says "COVID-19 was overblown". The numbers seen so far support plausible values(had we done nothing), close to their original predictions. Originally the government gave a potential number of deaths on the order of 2 million, then on the order of 250k, then 67k, and now(with 79k official deaths) it's back up to a predicted 140k by August.There is of course controversy over which deaths to count as COVID-19, which to count as other causes, but there's one statistic that is most useful right now: excess deaths(expected deaths for an average year vs actual deaths). This value can't separate deaths caused from the virus to deaths caused potentially by the response, and can underestimate deaths from the pandemic if we had a drop in deaths due to other causes, but if we assume our actions didn't significantly raise the death rate by accident then it gives a reasonable ball-park figure to how bad this virus is.

New York has been hardest hit in the U.S. by COVID-19. They were hit early, hard, and long. They've likely seen an overall infection rate far beyond what the rest of the U.S. has seen so far, but obviously not beyond what is possible. Let's use them as a bellwether for the rest of the U.S., with a few assumptions:

1. Our response did not itself cause significant extra deaths. There's likely some who did die due to new delays in treatments for survivable ailments, but lacking data suggesting otherwise, we should assume this isn't a large percentage of excess deaths.
2. There's nothing special about New York's COVID-19 or their population that makes COVID-19 more deadly there than elsewhere. It isn't a more dangerous mutant version. The population is close enough to average demographics and risk profiles. Comparing deaths per cases there(if we knew the "true" count), would result in similar death-rate in other states. It is true that they have a higher population density than other areas, which will impact the rate of spread, but shouldn't on its own change the death-rate.
3. There's nothing special about their handling of COVID-19 that would result in a death rate different than throughout the U.S. Their hospitals, while overworked at times, could do little else to save lives. Those who died would have died anywhere else in the U.S. There are of course the accusations that sending stable COVID-19 patients back to their nursing homes has increased deaths by exposing vulnerable populations; while this can increase the apparent death-rate in the short-term, if we assume most would eventually get infected anyway, then it changes little in the long-run.

With these assumptions and some real-world values, we can do some basic math. New York City has had over 20k "excess deaths" as of April 25th(more deaths than expected over the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic; keep in mind these values are weeks out of date and are now higher). 16k of those have been attributed to COVID-19; some of the rest may also be COVID-19 caused, or may be side-effects of the pandemic(such as reduced treatment access for non-COVID-19 ailments). In any case, NYC has 10 million people. The U.S. has 320 million people. So...(320m/10m)*20k = 640k. Were the rest of the U.S. to see the same percentage of their population infected, with the same death rate, we would have 640k extra deaths. Even if we limit this to the 16k deaths attributed to COVID-19, that's still 512k deaths. 512k deaths may not be close to the original fears of over 2 million deaths, but keep in mind this is with a successful "flatten the curve" campaign to prevent severely overloading the hospitals. Those who needed treatment largely got treatment. New York City's experience validates the scale of the original national predictions.

Automatic Speed Limiting Systems and Regulations

"New cars sold in Europe from 2022 will have to be fitted with systems to limit their speed.
Under new safety rules agreed by the European Union, all new vehicles are required to have “intelligent speed assistance” systems as standard equipment.
The EU rules don’t mandate specific technology for the systems, which can be temporarily overridden by the driver. Some carmakers have already developed ways of using GPS or cameras to detect posted speed limits and make sure vehicles adhere to them."

http://asq.org/qualitynews/qnt/execute/displaySetup?newsID=25434

   I'm sure this will eventually come to the U.S(or at least California), so I'm quite interested to see how implementations of such systems and regulations go. My first reaction is that I wouldn't trust such a system to not kill me. It's pretty common to need an extra 10+mph quickly when you're dealing with merging and passing on a busy freeway. Even if such a system can be overridden by the driver, I can imagine it being an issue: if you're not regularly overriding the system, when you suddenly find you need to do so there can be some dangerous delay in doing so. I also worry the system may cause worse problems by drivers becoming accustom to just holding the pedal down till the car stops accelerating.
   It is pretty clear that excessive speeding is a major contributor of deaths, and I fully expect a system like this to eventually be a component of solving that problem. I'm therefore quite open to seeing some real-world experiments with such things, but it seems far too early to mandate it. I would love to see it as an option(especially an after-market add-on), primarily to be used on cars driven by teenagers; or even as an enforced add-on for repeated reckless speeders. But a blanket requirement on all cars when we haven't even seen them really tested seems premature. Maybe the article linked above leaves out nuances of the law: for example, if it was a slow-rollout where only some require it the first few years as the system is evaluated, that seems reasonable. But three years is too soon to expect the kinks and dangers to be resolved(or perhaps even discovered). I worry that perhaps the hype of self-driving cars has made lesser, still-complex components seem so clearly "doable" that the regulations are going to push too fast against cost, reliability, and unexpected driver adaptations.
   Of course, with speed-related deaths being around 1/4th of vehicle-related fatalities, it's quite possible that even if such a system is flawed it could still result in fewer deaths. This alone could save tens of thousands of lives over the next 10 years if successfully implemented in the U.S. That is a staggering number when the solution could potentially be as straight-forward as comparing GPS coordinates against a database of speed-limits.  In such a case, it would be important to move the system to production as soon as possible. I would be 100% behind a near-term requirement for this in the U.S. if it included reasonable conditions for delay or was built using thresholds that help protect the consumers against cost increases. For example, if such a system is sold on 50% of vehicles of the same class in a given average price range(such as within $2000 of final sale-price), it should then become mandatory for all within that bracket the following year. Manufacturer's would ensure they're getting ready to install it, as they wouldn't want to find themselves without a solution and unable to sell cars, while actual deployment is limited by demand and reasonable market conditions. Perhaps better would be to quickly mandate an open interface where an after-market system could be fitted in the future. Then, you could either have it dealer-installed with the new car or added to it later when prices drop. I can't imagine such an interface costing any noticeable amount: just a simple hook into the control system where the outside controller plugs in and dynamically tells the car the max speed to allow, and the car obliges.

People are Stupid over the Stupidest Things

I read an article about new car-safety technology(specifically intelligent speed-limiters being required in the EU), which lead me to look up highway death statistics, which led to the fact that over 50% of teens and adults killed in car accidents were not buckled. Not only that, less than 80% of those involved in accidents were wearing a seat belt in 2016. Every time I hear seat belt statistics, they astound me. I can't imagine *not* buckling a seat-belt. I would simply feel stupid to not wear it. I've had to readjust a seat belt on occasion while the car is moving, and especially find rear Toyota seat belts consistently lock in the most troublesome manner; still, I've never felt the need to not wear a seat belt. In fact, In my life, I've only known of a tiny number of people who don't always buckle(three in my recollection...one an oldie who grew up without them and frequently wouldn't think about it until prompted, one who had medical equipment the belt interfered with, and one generally stupid person).
  More amazing is that seat belt use among children is *not* universal. Isn't it a crime to not have a child properly restrained? Shouldn't we have hundreds at least per year of high-profile cases with parents prosecuted when their children are killed in a death preventable by seat belts? I've heard the same PSA's all my life about seat belts and preventing injury and "Buckle Up. It's the law." Yet we're still no-where near 100%? Maybe it's time to change tactics. Advertisers long ago found out that you have to make a message "personal" or emotionally memorable. That's why we're given ads with cute kids selling snacks and the "previously suffering-grandpa" selling pharmaceuticals. We need to start stricly enforcing the law, prosecute parental negligence almost mercilessly; and advertise every single instance of needless-death.

Silly Settlement over Pokemon Tresspassing

From Ars Technica: 

A proposed settlement filed last week could give homeowners some control over whether or not Pokémon Go's augmented-reality attractions show up in and around their property.
[...] homeowners will be able to use a Web form to complain about any "points of interest" (i.e., Pokéstops and Gyms) that are within 40 meters of their single-family home.
[...] Public parks will also be able to request that POIs on their grounds be inaccessible outside of that park's posted hours of operation.(https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/02/niantic-poised-to-settle-pokemon-go-trespassing-complaints/)

I'm glad this didn't go to trial, since I don't believe it could possibly have been ruled correct, but I still think this settlement is bad. The part about homeowners limiting attractions on their single-family home properties makes sense enough. This should be obvious. But "around" their property is much less defensible to limit.
  I would hate a Pokemon gym being placed on the sidewalk in front of my house, but I don't see how I could rightfully limit such placement. It is a public space. It would be reasonable for a city to pass a loitering law which targets individuals who don't live nearby, making mass usage of such a gym difficult(perhaps enforcement triggered upon complaint of or posting by the nearest homeowner); but to tell neighbors "you can't stand on this spot of sidewalk for a game", exceeds any right I would ever imagine I have.
  The situation is even sillier with the after-hours issue of public parks. There is zero difference between someone entering a park after-hours for Pokemon or to make use of a baseball field or playground. The resource is statically placed, it is up to the user to mind the rules. I can't imagine trying to maintain a database of such after-hours exclusions while keeping it accurate to changing hours. A city might update their request when they narrow the hours, but I doubt they'd pro-actively update their request if park hours are widened. Then, if a solution as this were to become standard, it would leave cities in the position of making sure any similar AR-style games are independently limited. We don't need cities having to manage *more* useless paperwork when we *should* expect the burden of following the rules to fall on the users(that burden being the resulting fines when caught blatantly violating the rules).
  The article says nothing of businesses. If they really are left out of this plan then that's quite a silly exclusion: public parks get protections but private businesses don't? That's quite reversed.

How To Fix a City Like San Francisco's Construction Delays

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiXjiJ5GSoM (ReasonTV: Bad Laws Worsen The Homeless Crisis)

  ReasonTV released a new video talking about how SF made their homeless problem worse by their police ignoring on-street drug use, the city encouraging homeless by choice through subsidizing their lifestyle, as well as preventing new construction for low-income or high-density housing. On that latter point, they used an example of a developer who wanted to take an old building, 15 years vacant, and turn it into apartments but was delayed four years before he could get the ok. Meanwhile, he still had to pay taxes and other costs associated with the property. Permit delays are common in CA, even in some otherwise decent cities, and do much to harm affordable housing or prevent full use of private property. It would be nice if voters in these cities simply fixed their own messes, but I believe it is wrong for the state to let a city hold a minority of their residents and property owners captive to policies where crime is permitted and reasonable private property use prevented.
  As one step towards preventing this, I think there's a law we could attempt to pass at the state level that would go a long way to help. At the point a property-owner files for permits for a complete redevelopment of a property, property taxes must stop until that permit gets final ruling(including time it may take to wind through courts while the owner seeks an appeal of improper rejections). This way, the property-owners have at least some protection against hostile municipalities.
   There would have to be some protections against abuse, of course.

• Granting this on full redevelopment only(complete razing of property) would be a straightforward way to prevent a land-owner from using an expected denial as a way to avoid property taxes. This might encourage too many teardowns instead of more efficient and history-friendly remodels, so perhaps it could be based on whether the property would be continuously populated or used for current purposes during construction. This way, if you're remodeling half an apartment building, while the other half stays in use, you could declare as such and only pay taxes on the portion that would be in continuous use. This would also encourage cities to permit remodeling more often, as they would lose less tax revenue versus trying to deny a redevelopment. It would leave more room for debate on what percent is in-use and what percent vacant.
• It would only start at the beginning of the scheduled construction date: if you're seeking permits but construction wouldn't start for six months after expected approval, protections would only kick in after six months.
• You could require the land-owner to continue to pay taxes into an escrow account; if you fail to meet the start of development deadlines after having accepted tax protections, you will pay back-taxes on those dates. This is still pretty risky for the landowner, because it could let a city bleed their resources during appeals while still having to risk additional money on back-taxes(that would otherwise not exist if you had abandoned your plans and sold the property). If you win your appeal but then cannot fund the development on original deadlines, you again risk losing money. 
• Tax protections end once a final ruling is given, or during any delay between a ruling and filing of an appeal(you cannot sit for months before filing appeal, while still under tax protections). An appropriate grace period should be granted before tax protections are lost, equal to a typical minimum time needed to prepare such an appeal. 

The hope would be that cities would be encouraged to speed up their permitting processes and prevent needless delay through improper denials. It would also protect property owners from delays caused by lawsuits from third-parties who attempt to prevent otherwise legal and approved construction: if you are approved and your neighbor files a lawsuit to challenge that approval, that would likewise trigger protections(and prevent a hostile city from using third-party challenges to get around these protections).