We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn’t, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.
But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell’s dark vision, there was another—slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.
What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.” In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.
This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right.
For those who may not know, this quote is Neil Postman’s summary of Huxley’s idea in his preface to the book “Amusing ourselves to death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business”.
Would definitely recommend reading it:
I prefer this reading of the Fitzgerald translation:
They were actually forced to back when they initially lost their payment rails. I remember it was check in the mail or bitcoin back then. They’ve since got their fiat rails back, but still accept bitcoin.
Their fork of mastodon is no longer interoperable with the larger fediverse, but it never really was because all the major instances blocked gab’s as soon as they switched to mastodon in 2019 after mastodon called them bad names:
https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2019/07/statement-on-gabs-fork-of-mastodon/
How is MiamiCoin doing these days?
At least he said #Bitcoin instead of crypto. Maybe he learned his lesson—one can hope, but I remain skeptical.
Bitcoin magazine has a short memory with these opportunist pump-and-dump players.
https://twitter.com/francissuarez/status/1438504891526250498?s=46&t=9krlMyf-jEHcbRMndZxEvw 
Try restarting Damus. And, if that doesn’t work, try disconnecting then reconnecting your wallet. Best of luck to you.
I’d stick to the well trod path here with Damus+alby. Make sure you create an alby account first.
I made the alby account. Funded it. Then linked it with Damus using the wallet connect flow.
You see this video yet?
nostr:note1ewpmpv4946zqk2gz407g95xm8pdg0rzuzwt8endjh848nek4w87q0vuudc
Living the one-tap-zap dream tonight! nostr:note1cwe9g9zz6djw3pre6hfs7llr75rsjnfx9whuxqkdda5t4cruz3js76k06v
Agreed. Like the concept, but the zap I just sent with breeze took about 60 from tap to app switch to approval which is an eternity in social-media time. Maybe other wallets are faster but still… would love to see an integrated wallet that can be topped up or something for frictionless zaps.
https://financialservices.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=408707
Best I can find on the subject… not sure where this headline came from?
Perhaps taken from the live stream?
#lapavonichain #coffeechain 
Weather back in the 70s, #btc back in the 30k’s
Hope you mid-coast Americans on here are enjoying this Easter weather as much as I am. Kicking off back-porch brew season tonight. Cheers.
close! it’s an acaia pyxis. i mostly drink espresso but it still works with these mugs decently well
I didn’t even know that existed, looks cool. I’m still using my six year-old pearl, but if it ever kicks the bucket I’m going for one of those tiny espresso scales.
