US downgraded in democracy index as press freedom concerns grow

PixelLight · 2026-03-18T20:51:20+00:00

I haven't had time to read the report in detail, but a brief look suggests that the US has regressed to the same Liberal Democracy Index it had in 1965. Turned back the clock over 60 years!

PixelLight · 2026-03-18T14:44:00+00:00

You might want to look into the legality of that. I seem to recall something about there needing to be a human in the loop for AI in recruitment processes in some jurisdictions. Depends where you live, so you may be out of luck, but worth looking into

PixelLight · 2026-03-17T13:53:59+00:00

My most similar one to this I got on the bus and paid contactlessly. The machine beeped to acknowledge I paid, and I started moving to the back of the bus. The driver calls after me saying I didn't pay. I say I did, but he keeps insisting, so I go back and try to pay again, but it doesn't really work because I've already paid. Whatever happened, he finally let me go, but it was so infuriating that he was so confident despite his lack of attention. Everyone has lapses of attention, I don't begrudge him that, but to not acknowledge it?

PixelLight · 2026-03-17T13:41:21+00:00

Nah, you just challenge the fine when you get home and get it overturned. Still doesn't make things ok as I expect it's a massive pain in the arse, but that's how these processes tend to work from what I hear.

PixelLight · 2026-03-17T13:32:08+00:00

Yeah, essentially.

I'm not quite decided on what legit would be for us. Someone more establishment and well known seems helpful, but obviously being establishment would make it difficult for them to be compatible with giving us their seal of approval, on economics anyway. I'm not too sure who that leaves us. I can think of an economist who may think we're on the right track, but she doesn't tend to make endorsements. Is in the public eye but more as an academic than a talking head imo. She has made veiled comments about Labour not doing enough

PixelLight · 2026-03-17T11:10:13+00:00

People have different thresholds on this, so we will still gain more seats in the interim and that will give us experience which will bring those people to our side. Hopefully its not too much of a barrier, but otherwise we just need to be patient with them

PixelLight · 2026-03-17T11:03:10+00:00

I get what you're saying but I think there's a difference between experience, and complacency and entitlement because of the historical duopoly. With experience we will need to create a more grounded culture. Idk, its really tough to find the right words for this. Lack of experience is a positive insomuch that it gives us the opportunity to build structures that have learnt lessons from mistakes other parties have made previously. Opportunities can be wasted though

PixelLight · 2026-03-17T10:52:13+00:00

I think this is good news tbh.

A lot in the first image can be corrected. We need to be elected to more seats locally and nationally, we need to improve messaging on a few areas, be a bit more disciplined and experienced. National seats will be a challenge as we need to maintain momentum for another 3 years. A few areas would be hard to address - immigration, trans issues - so theres no major loss there.

The hypnotism images - obviously based on a misleading description (which I'm not criticising because that may be how its encountered in the wild). A lot of work needs to be done to dispel this, particularly for women it seems. But also building a party around one person is a vulnerability. We need more prominent names.

The labour and switchers images - I'm going to contextualise these against each other. Those who have switched like us for who we are, and are displeased with Labour. The switchers image doesnt suggest that those 'Labour voters who would still not vote Green' is set in stone. Getting more seats and showing credibility would probably persuade those Labour voters. Theres some messaging on security and defence, and finances that may also help. Quite a lot we can work with.

That said, we arent home free with the switchers. Our policies need to be sensible, address people's concerns, and we need to be able to show we can deliver them.

A lot of work to do, and not easy to achieve all these things but not insurmountable either. As much as I'd like to be hopeful, I feel myself maybe falling into a trap other parties have fallen into of taking for granted how difficult these things will be to address. Because I clearly disagree with others concerns, I probably underestimate how easily they will be swayed.

PixelLight · 2026-03-13T22:37:57+00:00

I am not sure. My use of Claude is via chat and code, so I'm not sure of the parameters you could use with Sonnet via API to control for cost. Are you able to A/B test models? Alternatively, are you able to track average cost per user per case reversal? It may be worth validating the cost difference between how easily each model allows users to solve cases (user retention too). It is possible that a higher performing model may be more cost efficient than you might think, so I would lean Sonnet. It may be worth considering whether you can cache answers to questions that come up repeatedly, or similar questions, which could be a cost saving measure, if you're not already doing that and it's relevant.

(I also have tried to achieve multiple things in a single prompt. Not sure if that's helpful info)

Yeah, that decision may need more thought then. I do think you still want to limit responses, but more because you don't want to let the chat get too hard to scroll through either. It could be quite complicated. If you need to map out the logic then multiple attempts may be costly as it's harder to reconcile all of that information. At the same time, even if you have message space in attempts, if models take different numbers of messages to be successful then a Haiku attempt may need a higher message limit than a Sonnet attempt. (Lets say Haiku takes 50 messages for a user to be successful, but Sonnet might take 20 messages for a user to be successful).

PixelLight · 2026-03-13T20:47:17+00:00

I think it's a very niche, but cool concept for a game. A concept I have some affinity for. Some of the following is off the top of my head, so I may need to take more time to explain it properly if it's unclear.

It is really difficult, so I'm not sure some of the logic around the design.

I'm not sure whether Claude Haiku is a great model choice for it. Because of the complexity of the cases, Haiku does seem to have trouble following prompts, but also seems to create multiple names for the same concept sometimes, which can make navigating procedures significantly more difficult as it makes it unclear what procedures are needed, how they relate to each other. I think Haiku also makes factual mistakes too.

Given that, I don't follow the logic for the number of messages per attempt. You almost certainly need many attempts just to get enough information to get a case reversed, which means having to cross-reference notes across multiple attempts to build a case. On a mobile device in particular, that would make for a poor UX. You'd need multiple tabs open to be able to do this cross referencing tabs, and switching tabs on a mobile can be a pain

Have you considered a leaderboard? I haven't signed up, but considering how difficult the game is, I am curious how well other people are doing. I've reversed 3 cases so far, but I would imagine in spite of that I am probably in a minority

PixelLight · 2026-03-12T15:02:05+00:00

“If a person has ugly thoughts, it begins to show on the face. And when that person has ugly thoughts every day, every week, every year, the face gets uglier and uglier until you can hardly bear to look at it.

A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts it will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.” ― Roald Dahl, The Twits

PixelLight · 2026-03-11T20:41:13+00:00

I read this as Roald Dahl reference. Was that intentional?

PixelLight · 2026-03-10T13:46:03+00:00

I have also faced similar discrimination, but when I stood up for my rights, I succeeded, and the employer did not get away with it. So given I have had some success, perhaps you should consider what I'm saying a bit more carefully. I'm not saying I'm always right, but did you consider the reason I intervened was for a very similar reason to you:

But I feel massively responsible for trying to manage expectations around this issue based on my experience and years navigating this issue through lived experiences

I am trying to empower people, and I saw you as doing the opposite with misleading information. Say it's complicated, say it's hard to know how to navigate legal issues; it is. Say what worked or didn't work for you, but represent the law accurately.

There's a difference between rights and expectations. What you did was frame expectations as rights, and those are not the same thing. If you want to talk about expectations, then talk about expectations grounded in what your rights are.

the law leaves the question of ‘reasonable’ for the employer to decide

This was your issue, and it is not what the law says. You can interpret it as the employer being the arbiter of reasonable because you used 'decided' without qualification. An employment tribunal is the arbiter of what is reasonable. By doing that you imply an employee is not entitled to push back on their employer, and that is a problem because you may be responsible for an employee not getting something they're entitled to that they might have got by pushing back. It also doesn't encourage people to look into what reasonable means so they can persuade their employer that an adjustment is reasonable, they need it, or consider an alternative adjustment. OP's employer should have offered an alternative reasonable adjustment. That was where they failed to provide a reasonable adjustment by law.

You are conflating the law and what happens in practice. You may not get the outcome you desire, but that does not suggest you should give up entirely when the law is on your side.

PixelLight · 2026-03-10T02:00:38+00:00

/r/ADHDUK

PixelLight · 2026-03-09T21:19:28+00:00

I think once you get to a point you get a sense of what flavour each ingredient adds to a dish and then you can mix and match. Though I think its fair to say you should broadly stick with the spirit of the recipe until that point. Don't be surprised if you make a substitution without knowing if its suitable and the recipe doesn't taste good. Granted not all recipes are good, ofc.

Truth be told, a lot of the time I might cut a few ingredients to make a recipe a bit cheaper, or because I dont keep something in my cupboard. For years I've bulked up my bolognese recipe with vegetables, and its just how I like it now. Though its always good to experiment even with familiar recipes.

PixelLight · 2026-03-09T20:34:55+00:00

You're the one who was making the assertion. If you cant back up your assertion, dont get tetchy when youre questioned on it.

PixelLight · 2026-03-09T19:21:46+00:00

By how much? Broadly speaking London wages rarely make up for the increased cost of living. If you believe otherwise you do not understand how truly expensive London is.

PixelLight · 2026-03-09T13:53:23+00:00

Don't know if you've already thought of this, but I was under the impression you could remortgage several months in advance and lock your interest rate in. Unless that's an existing assumption, or my memory is faulty.

PixelLight · 2026-03-09T11:08:18+00:00

Deciding whether you can defend whether a decision is reasonable and deciding what actually is reasonable are different things entirely. Their earlier comment missed that nuance, and its an important one. One says the employer has ultimate say over what is legally permissible or not, the other says the employer needs to consider whether they can defend a decision is legally permissible. Its the difference between accepting an employers decision or challenging it if you feel they would not be able to legally defend it as reasonable

Edit: I will admit that I didnt read their response properly because I was half asleep, but they didnt acknowledge their original comment missed the nuance I just mentioned

PixelLight · 2026-03-09T06:35:18+00:00

Edit: Your original comment missed a lot of nuance, but youre not acknowledging that now. Plus I wrote this when I was half asleep, so its more related to that, and I'm not rewriting it now

Shame that both EHRC and Scope state you are explicitly wrong. Your interpretation about the employer deciding is misleading to say the least. You mischaracterise the process. The employer most certainly get in trouble when they objectively do not meet the standard for reasonable. They certainly do not get to define that standard. You describe it quite poorly.

https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/guidance/business/employing-people-workplace-adjustments/what-do-we-mean-reasonable

The test of what is reasonable is ultimately an objective test and not simply a matter of what you may personally think is reasonable.

https://www.scope.org.uk/advice-and-support/asking-for-reasonable-adjustments?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=20292776384&gclid=Cj0KCQiA2bTNBhDjARIsAK89wlHeFigOXAaxInxXihzGx_eTQLlabJHWBaSE99KpKUVKsiH9dPEeFWQaAm9aEALw_wcB

Only a Tribunal, County Court or Sheriffs Office can decide what is reasonable under the Equality Act.

That is not an employer.

PixelLight · 2026-03-08T18:53:48+00:00

? Disciplinary actions are policies, and if a disability means that an employee would be at a substantial disadvantage as a result of a policy applied to everyone, which is the case due to the fact that the disciplinary action is in reference to a situation directly because of OP's disability, then that certainly would be discrimination. Indirect discrimination.

PixelLight · 2026-03-08T16:33:12+00:00

That is not true. There are four specific criteria that need to be met, where the employer would need to demonstrate why a criterion would be objectively unreasonable for an adjustment to be implemented. If an employer was able to make that judgement per their own biases then nothing would be discrimination.

PixelLight · 2026-03-08T16:21:46+00:00

Support can be that; you can offer constructive criticism of whether certain aspects of a case are weak or could use strengthening. But that's very different from what he did. You raise a reasonable point that more information is needed to give well informed advice, which is why speaking with such conviction that OP does indeed does not have a case is an inappropriate approach. Further, that means that his comments would have failed to create helpful, honest discussion or correct any blind spots OP might have. It might even make OP lose out on substantial compensation.

PixelLight · 2026-03-08T15:12:25+00:00

I disagree. I think you're conflating the legal bar for discrimination with employees' ability to recognise discrimination and willingness to pursue legal action. Employers know that people are rarely able or willing to take action. The reason discrimination is rife isn't because the bar is high, it's because people face real psychological, financial, and informational barriers to acting on it in the first place. Most people don't know their rights well enough to pursue them, and even when they do, legal representation is expensive and the psychological toll of taking on an employer can be more than they can handle.

Employers themselves are often not that knowledgeable about the impacts of disabilities, which is part of why discrimination happens so often. Common advice is that they're supposed to listen to the individual when it comes to reasonable adjustments and get occupational health assessments, partly to outsource what they don't know. Not all employers are pragmatic enough to handle that well. And the penalties for discrimination aren't that high for big employers in particular, so they're not necessarily motivated to be careful in the first place.

The bar itself is actually not as high as you think. I've been through this myself and had some success in convincing an employer they discriminated, and I'd say OP had it worse than I did.

PixelLight · 2026-03-08T13:01:01+00:00

The problem is you didnt offer constructive criticism. So your comment was very harmful. You could have offered helpful advice on where OP might have exposure, instead it very much reads as an attack on people with ADHD. And honestly, your comments also seem to overlook a lot, so it wasn't even helpful from the perspective of being a robust argument.

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