Simpler Times

     From The Copy Desk: The Boys have been yearning for things the way they used to be .... for example 5.1/4% interest on your passbook savings account and they could afford to hire many, many humans to collect and count the money. 

     Warren was hoping for so much more, but alas there it was ...... now he has to deal with it. "I hate dealing with ATMs, robots and 'interfaces' - where are the humans who used to serve us," Warren shouted at the locked glass door of the now-closed bank. "How are we going to access Marty's DARPA pension money now."
     Returning home, Warren had already figured out what Marty was going to say about banks, robots, the financial 'industry,' AI and the eventual obsolescence of humans. Even the climate seems to be against them, and like marmots, it's expected that underground living (sounds like a future magazine title) will become normal for humanity.

The Boys watching a favorite show.

     So Warren wandered off into the burrow and joined Marty watching one of their favorite TV shows, which thanks to the DVR-robot they can now enjoy any time. "Some things are way better with this technology and these robots," Marty said. "But indeed there is a substantial dark side," Marty added.
     "You remember that story about the plutocrats lounging in the Alps plotting to replace all their workers with either AI or robots. It was pretty disturbing. Or the report from the federal reserve that I saw a few weeks ago, or was it Brookings, that forecast which occupations face the most job losses."
     Warren couldn't resist and chimed in ..... "I remember that one, it was Brookings Institution. I liked the metro area data set. It was phun."

A robot?

 

 From The Copy Desk: Warren is, of course, easily amused. He liked the metro area map because when you mouse over the cities, balloons pop up. Warren really, really likes balloons.

     "As for the robots, don't get too down on them," Marty said. "It's not the fault of the soul-less machines, but rather the aforementioned plutocrats. Lots of people are very angry about the way things are going, but many of them are mad at the wrong people. Who got all the benefit of the last big tax cut, not the everyday Joe ..... "
     "Do some people have different names for different days," Warren interrupted, "Yet some people just use the same name every day, making them an everyday ..... Bob or whatever?"
      Marty continued on, " .... six-pack. That's not how it worked out. I'll show you which people benefited the most from the last Republic Party tax give-away .....

Mr. Burns.

     From The Copy Desk: The small picture above is hardly a robot.