Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2017/07/25/walking-dunning-krugers.html
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There are at least 39 Obama-era rules that Trump’s administration of billionaires has refused to enforce, and the DC Appeals Court decision is a kind of starter’s pistol for activist groups who are about to start racking up win after win after win, repeatedly kicking in the teeth of the walking Dunning-Krugers who think they can just Ayn Rand their way through government, insisting that a thing is so and having it be so.
I just wanted to repeat this paragraph, which is gorgeous.
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he tries sooo hard to be eEvil !! it is a really good thing that he and his cohorts are incompetent , clueless , and ignorant , not just of traditions , but of law !!
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I work in a highly regulated industry (in fact, due to international sales, highly regulated x50). My international colleagues chaff at US rules, but generally calm down once you explain particular rules and how they make sense. They really are good regulations.
Unfortunately, there are also regulations that are terrible. Regulators are people with ambitions and some try to build fiefdoms by creating rules. One example we are dealing with is a new recommendation for an expensive type of user testing, but contradictory advice on what products it applies to, how many people, what constitutes passing, etc. Don’t do it, and you run the risk of one guy vetoing approval for your product. Big companies shell out the 5 or 6 figures to do the testing with no hesitation to minimize risk. Smaller companies have to weigh risk of rejection vs hiring a person vs wasting the money, etc.
While no-one likes extra work from regulations, it’s these minefield of oddball requirements that crop up from regulations that give otherwise good regulations a bad reputation.
I don’t agree with just delaying or killing regulations on principal (and am highly suspicious of what Trump is doing). But I do understand the urge.
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They think of regulations as some sort of zero sum game but it’s really just an excuse to get rid of those pesky ones that hurt their plutocrat buddies that are most likely to get the axe.
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Squeaky wheels. Big squeaky wheels get more grease.
But I’ve also seen bigger companies embrace regulations. They increase barriers to entry to the market.
Most examples are pretty esoteric. But here’s one you might be familiar with: https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-locking-routers/
Funny thing is, the regulation in this example is coming from a very important need to prevent interference with weather radar.
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From the article: “The suspensions have often come at the request of affected industries.”
Given the evident failure of “Supply-Side” (aka “Trickledown”) economics, it’s worth noting that, as far as I know up to this point, Trump and the GOP have not specifically identified that theory as a reason for their ease up on industries. And the Dem side of Congress have not yet capitalized on that by bringing up its obvious avoidance by the other side; I believe that any Dem plan for 2018 should include that, focusing on and bringing up over and over again how supply-side in actual practice ended up hurting us AND how it only served to benefit those (easily filled in blank) who needed much, much more of what they already had much, much more of: https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/news/2012/08/01/11998/the-failure-of-supply-side-economics/
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The thing is about these regulations is whether they are good or bad, agencies like the FCC and EPA are regulatory bodies. That’s what they do. Forcing them to kneecap two regulations for every new one is just a way to further reduce their power which I believe is wholly intentional.
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The problem here is that DD-WRT has a setting for transmit power, and on some routers the setting was functional, and could be used to broadcast with power well in excess of FCC limits. Those limits aren’t just there for weather radar, they also make sure you don’t stomp all over your neighbor’s wifi.
I have mainly ASUS routers, all run 3rd party software fine but the firmware limits this particular parameter, and only this one. TP-Link’s decision to lock down their whole routers can’t be blamed on the FCC.
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Agreed. Almost. I was trying to find the recent article that covered this (Ars?). FCC wanted the radio locked down, not the router. Manufacturers used this as cover to lock the router. But FCC was warned repeatedly that manufacturers would do precisely this. So the FCC isn’t totally blameless, despite doing what is mostly a good thing.
One of the commenters brought up the weather radar part, which was fascinating. Notice how there is a gap in the 5 MHz channel numbers? That’s the radar band. Seems 3rd part wifi software sometimes re-enables these. The picture the commentator posted showed the effect beautifully. Made a nice supplement to the article.
Rather than blame the FCC even a little for this, the solution is to avoid these manufacturers. I buy ASUS not only because ASUS-WRT is the stock firmware, but also because 3rd party software like Merlin is company-approved.
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Not all of them. I was part of a regulatory team, and had absolutely no interest in building a fiefdom. I didn’t see that kind of thing where I worked.
“who think they can just Ayn Rand their way through government” - have to remember that verb!
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