Although I've noticed that options have been replaced more and more these days with RSU's (plain old grants) because options have a tendency to go "underwater", suggesting that they weren't all that great to begin with.

(Google tells me this is a relevant summary of US GAAP https://carta.com/uk/en/learn/startups/equity-management/asc... )

I happen to have read probably everything that Warren Buffet wrote on this subject, and in my opinion your take is confused at best.

First, you say that “stock options did become nearly universal“. No, they were already nearly universal at the time that this conversation was happening. I remember that Warren Buffet was quoting, going by memory, something like all but 3 out of 500 S&P DONT companies do it, or nasdaq or whatever index he was talking about. The fact that almost all companies do it doesnt mean its the right thing to do and if almost no company did it, Buffet wouldnt be complaining about it.

Second, you say “companies that granted them outcompeted companies that did not“. I literally have no idea how you came to this conclusion since, like I said, at the time this conversation was going on almost all company did it. Not because the companies that didnt do it died out, but because companies that didnt do it switching into doing it.

Third, and most important, I believe you misunderstand what the conversation is about. Expensing stock options is not a competitive advantage. Granting stock options might be, the rationale that paying management and staff more attracts the best people is an argument worth having. But the conversation isnt about whether its a good idea to grant stock options, the conversation is about which entry you should put your stock options when preparing financial statements. The author says clearly that this is about accounting, but you missed that. Theres no competitive advantage in doing one way or the other. The reason why Buffet complains about them is that A) it makes harder to discern from financial statements how much staff is costing the shareholders, not that its a competitive advangage or disadvantage, and B) if theres a cost that you need to pay in order to run the business, thats called an expense, and by your own argument you need stock options to run the business, therefore those are expenses and thats how they should be labeled in the income statement. The argument of companies doing it is that “earnings“ is bigger if there are things which are expenses but you dont call them that. Its literally saying that pnl = P - L but you know what, its bigger if I just report the P and hide the L.

What are you basing this claim on?

We know why it's being pushed so hard - people need a return on all that money being burnt.

It's effectiveness is argued about because it's not clear one way or the other where things are, where they are heading, and where they will end up.

There has been a strong push for AI/AGI since before computing, so every time there's a breakthrough to the next level there's a hypewagon doing the rounds, followed by a "oh, actually it's not there yet" - and this time, like every other time, we go through a "is this the time? It's so tantalisingly close"

Are we actually there now? Emphatically no.

Are we at a point where it's usable and improving our lives - yes, with a PILE of caveats.

Edit: I wanted to add

There's always "True believers" whenever there is a fork in the road, and con artists looking to take advantage of them, but that happens whether there is a genuine breakthrough, or not - the hype is never a guide on whether the breakthrough exists OR not, so purely being a sceptic isn't worthwhile (IMO)

Was it immaterial to the fact that we were going to war, regardless of the effectiveness of the "sell"? Yes, that's true, but it gives a lot of cover to the Bush administration that so many people, including 110 Democratic congressmen, voted for the authorization to use military force.

Why is it being re-posted now? Who knows... AI, Iran, whatever.

This was the stated purpose of the war! If Bush and Blair had said "there are no WMD in Iraq", the war would not have happened.

It is a bit of a weird article, though. Correctly predicting Iraq isn't some amazing feat. All it required was being paying some vague attention to the available facts. The question is not, how did some people get it right. The question is, how did so many people not?

That is in fact because coal energy is a terrible idea. It has 0 upsides compared to renewable alternatives, and is on the whole worse than even other non-renewable alternatives.

If you have to lie to make it sound good, that's probably because it isn't actually good

Some good ideas might need a whole lot of marketing to catch on. Some bad ideas might need very little. The quote merely argues that if you must deceive people for an idea to catch on, the idea is not good. A corollary is that if you are tempted to lie in your advocacy, you should probably reexamine what you are advocating for.

If its a good idea that's obvious, it's already used widely. If its not obvious, you'll still have to convince people. None of that requires lots of lies, though.

I think this true but misleading — conditioned on other people going with the herd in the wrong direction, it is easy to be right. However, often the herd is going in a right (or at least acceptable) direction. The continual effort to check if the herd is going in the right direction _is not_ easy. If a magic eight ball could alert you “hey the herd is wrong right now, take a closer look”, that would be great! But we have no such magic eight ball.

Korean War, Panama, and Gulf War were rather successful, resulting in a (more) US-aligned and prosperous South Korea/Panama/Gulf. Without these wars, South Korea wouldn't exist, Panama would probably still be a dictatorship, Saddam Hussein would control Kuwait and the US would have significantly less influence among the GCC.

For example: http://fototour.blogspot.com

Because that's what I see constantly on social media in response to progressive ideas the rest of the world has largely accepted but apparently just can't possibly work in the United States...

No big mystery: a) most people keep cars for 20 years or more, b) most people don't buy new cars - they're too expensive.

So I still run an old Landrover with a massive V8 engine.

I would say that investing oneself and one's money in an idea changes how one feels about the choices that was taken. I would say that those not invested might think that some of the arguments might have untruths more than those who have invested.

(For me inertia does play a role too! "Why fix what's not broken")