One thing I have noticed looking for a new job myself, even in-person positions for which I am local are having all remote interviews. One interviewer even expressed surprise that I was wearing a suit and tie during the Zoom interview. That might not be true everywhere, but it does suggest that the costs of interviewing for in-person positions is a bit lower than it used to be, since you rarely have to go in.
I think you are spot on with the problems of never being around and interacting with people at work, as well. A lot of costs, not just associated with loneliness but also with work coordination and alienation.
Remote work popularity has made me wonder about other cases...telemedicine is great, distance learning is bad, online shopping is a mixed bag, zoom interviews seem fine? (Not just for jobs, but I see them for stuff like screening survey respondent demographics, initial consultations, town halls, etc.) Also more niche things, like most of jury selection happening during an hours-long at-home survey rather than dicking around in a courtroom grumpily. I think it's probably true that personal contact is underrated - that alone-time graph is painful - and also that there's actually a lot of time wasted in one's life on needless in-person requirements. But no hard and fast heuristic that would let us separate the two, other than just making a go of it and seeing what works in practice.
Distance learning is bad when it is intentionally copying everything bad about in-person learning, I am not convinced there are not good models of it. In general I think that's a big distinction in many things early on, that some things need rethinking to be remote and others don't, in addition to some being non-workable remotely for good reasons.
Well, I think there's also the specific-case distinction that education has divergent primary and secondary (hopefully) aims...the former being credible credential signalling of conformity and other servitor values, and the latter being Actually Learning Stuff. Distance *learning* has some good models, there have ever been cases of successful careers launched off coding bootcamps or non-autodidacts using MOOCS to great effect. I'd hesitate to say these don't actually scale effectively, because the resource deck is so heavily stacked in favour of analog learning. And of course there's all the everyday problem-solving of practical matters people can easily achieve via helpful internet guides. Doesn't truly add up to an old-fashioned shop or home ec class, but it's not nothing.
It's distance *credentialing* that I don't see any real hope for, not without reforming the meatspace equivalent and/or cultural expectations confusion first. (Or doing much more intrusive remote monitoring, that intentionally copies the bad bits, but at that point why even bother?)
Where *does* the Chinese obsession with surfaces come from? I encounter a good cross-section of people at work, and P (Chinese | wearing some form of face covering) is pretty high. This is comprehensible, cultural memories of MERS etc. are real and not even that long ago. But P (Chinese | neurotically wears gloves/sanitizes) is also pretty high, even compared to baseline security theatre tendencies in SF. Is it something pre-existing in the cultural water, leading to CCP emphasis on surfaces, or does causation go the other way?
This was somewhat noticeable even before covid, honestly...my company is known for providing unusually-high-quality compost bags, which our enterprising Chinese customers make extremely liberal use of. Like, takes-a-fistful-home level utilization. (What do they do with them?) Everything bagged, with no rhyme or reason...it's a huge pain to scan. I guess the norms around surfaces are just different, even absent disease considerations. Can't think of any simple explanation, like general cultural predisposition to conscientiousness...we're pretty chaotic and disorganized about lotsa other things, lol. And if restaurants are anything to go by, cleanliness standards more generally are, uh, <s>good for business</s> different.
One thing I have noticed looking for a new job myself, even in-person positions for which I am local are having all remote interviews. One interviewer even expressed surprise that I was wearing a suit and tie during the Zoom interview. That might not be true everywhere, but it does suggest that the costs of interviewing for in-person positions is a bit lower than it used to be, since you rarely have to go in.
I think you are spot on with the problems of never being around and interacting with people at work, as well. A lot of costs, not just associated with loneliness but also with work coordination and alienation.
Remote work popularity has made me wonder about other cases...telemedicine is great, distance learning is bad, online shopping is a mixed bag, zoom interviews seem fine? (Not just for jobs, but I see them for stuff like screening survey respondent demographics, initial consultations, town halls, etc.) Also more niche things, like most of jury selection happening during an hours-long at-home survey rather than dicking around in a courtroom grumpily. I think it's probably true that personal contact is underrated - that alone-time graph is painful - and also that there's actually a lot of time wasted in one's life on needless in-person requirements. But no hard and fast heuristic that would let us separate the two, other than just making a go of it and seeing what works in practice.
Distance learning is bad when it is intentionally copying everything bad about in-person learning, I am not convinced there are not good models of it. In general I think that's a big distinction in many things early on, that some things need rethinking to be remote and others don't, in addition to some being non-workable remotely for good reasons.
Not to mention that a lot of remote learning was badly implemented out of passive aggression, incompetence or indifference.
Well, I think there's also the specific-case distinction that education has divergent primary and secondary (hopefully) aims...the former being credible credential signalling of conformity and other servitor values, and the latter being Actually Learning Stuff. Distance *learning* has some good models, there have ever been cases of successful careers launched off coding bootcamps or non-autodidacts using MOOCS to great effect. I'd hesitate to say these don't actually scale effectively, because the resource deck is so heavily stacked in favour of analog learning. And of course there's all the everyday problem-solving of practical matters people can easily achieve via helpful internet guides. Doesn't truly add up to an old-fashioned shop or home ec class, but it's not nothing.
It's distance *credentialing* that I don't see any real hope for, not without reforming the meatspace equivalent and/or cultural expectations confusion first. (Or doing much more intrusive remote monitoring, that intentionally copies the bad bits, but at that point why even bother?)
Where *does* the Chinese obsession with surfaces come from? I encounter a good cross-section of people at work, and P (Chinese | wearing some form of face covering) is pretty high. This is comprehensible, cultural memories of MERS etc. are real and not even that long ago. But P (Chinese | neurotically wears gloves/sanitizes) is also pretty high, even compared to baseline security theatre tendencies in SF. Is it something pre-existing in the cultural water, leading to CCP emphasis on surfaces, or does causation go the other way?
This was somewhat noticeable even before covid, honestly...my company is known for providing unusually-high-quality compost bags, which our enterprising Chinese customers make extremely liberal use of. Like, takes-a-fistful-home level utilization. (What do they do with them?) Everything bagged, with no rhyme or reason...it's a huge pain to scan. I guess the norms around surfaces are just different, even absent disease considerations. Can't think of any simple explanation, like general cultural predisposition to conscientiousness...we're pretty chaotic and disorganized about lotsa other things, lol. And if restaurants are anything to go by, cleanliness standards more generally are, uh, <s>good for business</s> different.