You are the end result of a “would you push the button” prompt where the prompt was “you have unlimited godlike powers but you appear to all and sundry to be an impetuous child” – Zero, 2022
Hi. My name is Rainbow Starshine. I'm here to solve your mystery.
now to make sure I do not melt my sister's acrylic sweaters
As long as you don't use super high heat or something they will probably be fine; I've knitted many things from acrylic and they tumble dry well on low heat.
If I have to see one more fucking newspaper website article Sesame Credit based on nothing more than fucking Extra Credits, I will command the earth to open up and give up its bounty of flaming metal to us all because we deserve nothing better.
I used to believe in journalism. I used to believe people wanted to know everything before making decisions.
That was my mistake. To believe in anything at all.
I
Honestly have no idea what additional context could possibly change anything about how insidious the concept of Sesame Credit is?
Unless you're saying something different in which case my apologies.
It's a system in China akin to a credit score, but instead of being an esoteric ranking of how reliable you are with money, it compiles your social media history and stuff to determine how good of a citizen you are. It's going to be mandatory in a few years.
Thankfully, it’s not quite as bad as all that. The ACLU seems to have been confused about a few things, but here’s the key one: Alibaba’s Sesame Credit scoring system, Tencent’s credit scoring system, and the mandatory government one (which isn’t mandatory until 2020) arenot the same things. They are three different things that many articles in the Western press are treating as if they were the same...
Sesame Credit does offer some of the features outlined in the ACLU article. It doesn’t hand out Singapore visas, obviously – I’m not sure how that would even be possible – but it wasoffering promotions for people with high credit scores, including access to a high-speed VIP check-in at Beijing’s Capital International Airport. China’s government has not endorsed this, though. In fact, according to Caixin, China’s central bank is annoyed by the promotional tactics and has reportedly ordered Sesame Credit to stop offering the airport promotional benefit.
The online score-sharing and bragging alluded to by the ACLU also seems to be coming primarily from Sesame Credit. Some critics have accused the scoring system of essentially being a marketing gimmick designed to promote use of Alibaba’s payment service Alipay (since an increased number of transactions will raise your score).
Many of the other details from the ACLU’s article seem to be based on Tencent’s credit score system, which doesmine data from users’ social networks in order to determine their credit. I haven’t been able to find any direct statement that Tencent factors in users’ political post history – or that of their friends – in determining a credit score....
For the moment, though, take whatever you read with a grain of salt. China has no mandatory “citizen score” system yet, and the details popping up all over the web about that system appear to be taken from Alibaba and Tencent’s wholly separate, definitely-not-mandatory credit scoring systems. A lot of these details also appear to be exaggerated.
Man is a most complex simple creature: see what he weaves, and how base his reasons for doing so.
Here's the thing.
I don't know what Sesame Credit is. Extra Credits says it's an omnipotent, Orwellian social control measure that will condition all citizens of the PRC into nice, compliant mindslaves. Other sources say that it's actually a means of compiling credit scores that other people can check, so people can know who they're dealing with, because the economic situation there is complicated. Some people have cars. Some people are really rich. And some people have a bicycle and a rice-cooker. And now that passage that Myr posted that it's actually three different things conflated as one.
Extra Credits can say whatever the fuck they want, no matter how alarmist they are, even if they're wrong about the facts. They shouldn't have said it, but they did, and there's no going back. But they're not journalists.
You know who the fuck are fucking journalists? The fucking Independent. No sources aside from Extra Credits. No checks. Nothing but information regurgitated from a Youtube video.
I'm more angry about these fucking people than I am at Extra Credits.
Comments
Cos I'm dumb
It replied "42" in a sarcastic tone
Actually it is the original thing-number.
8 is, probably unsurprisingly, another thing-number.
now to make sure I do not melt my sister's acrylic sweaters
also a good part this class is Sacks based. I'm cool with that
Fuck yes
with the exception of the occasional thing that is dark navy or blue
also that paisley shirt I have
and a bunch of white t-shirts, and 2 or 3 white oxfords for job interview purposes
i've only heard of it and sacks, and read part of musicology, though. i'm looking forward to this. also watching Awakenings.
Honestly have no idea what additional context could possibly change anything about how insidious the concept of Sesame Credit is?
Unless you're saying something different in which case my apologies.
Sesame Credit does offer some of the features outlined in the ACLU article. It doesn’t hand out Singapore visas, obviously – I’m not sure how that would even be possible – but it wasoffering promotions for people with high credit scores, including access to a high-speed VIP check-in at Beijing’s Capital International Airport. China’s government has not endorsed this, though. In fact, according to Caixin, China’s central bank is annoyed by the promotional tactics and has reportedly ordered Sesame Credit to stop offering the airport promotional benefit.
The online score-sharing and bragging alluded to by the ACLU also seems to be coming primarily from Sesame Credit. Some critics have accused the scoring system of essentially being a marketing gimmick designed to promote use of Alibaba’s payment service Alipay (since an increased number of transactions will raise your score).
Many of the other details from the ACLU’s article seem to be based on Tencent’s credit score system, which does mine data from users’ social networks in order to determine their credit. I haven’t been able to find any direct statement that Tencent factors in users’ political post history – or that of their friends – in determining a credit score....
For the moment, though, take whatever you read with a grain of salt. China has no mandatory “citizen score” system yet, and the details popping up all over the web about that system appear to be taken from Alibaba and Tencent’s wholly separate, definitely-not-mandatory credit scoring systems. A lot of these details also appear to be exaggerated.