Don't believe strangers on the internet.
That's a paradox.
See also https://xkcd.com/552/
Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
11–20 of 114 posts
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#12>How do you navigate it?
I automatically assume any online influencer trying to sell me something is a grifter. I also don't use social media.
The best part is that there's zero downside and you don't have to do anything.
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#13Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#14In some areas a "community" culture¹ of "you shall behave - you will behave" has declined into a sort of anarchy of "everything passes"; once you were corrected, and now you are no more; once people would stand and say "wrong behaviour" directly, today such framework is greatly weakened, which causes all kind of deviations. Such weakening encourages abuse and exploitation. ¹Note that said community culture was not re…
I totally agree with this.
The active removal of any (even semblance) of community in society, to be replaced with radical individualism, has been horribly detrimental. There is no shame, there is no right or wrong, there is no responsibility to others.
And this extends to both sides of the political spectrum. The right glorify this "Don't step on me", "I don't care about others that don't exactly fit into my in-group", "no taxes (contributions to society)" mentality, while the left cultivates "we must take care of everyone and make everyone feel included as they are, no matter what, but we can't ask anyone to be responsible to society in any way in return".
We descended in to madness.
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#15Is there any specific examples of “everything”? Apart from robocalls and junk mails, I don’t think I’ve personally experienced a notable amount of scams. When I buy something, I almost always get what I buy, except a few incidents of lost delivery, where the orders was promptly refunded or reissued.
Amazon is now filled with pseudobrands (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/11/style/amazon-trademark-co...), commingling legitimate sellers' inventory with counterfeit products, and outright fraudulent products (try searching for 2TB flash drives). AliExpress allows sellers to ship you fraudulent products like a "USB3 1080p 4k capture card" which is only USB2 with a blue cable and drops frames, then when you request a refund, sides with the seller when they insist "you're using it wrong". And Kickstarter campaigns have a reputation of failing to live up to their promises or deliver any product whatsoever.
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#16Don't believe strangers on the internet.
On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog!
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#17There's a good chance we'll look back on this as a post-truth era.
I have some guesses about underlying drivers, but they're just guesses. At the top, we have regulatory 'avoidance' masquerading as 'innovation', and enough regulators stood down for it to have consequences. We have the entire journalism industry brought to it's knees financially, and turning to low-quality opinion written predominantly by immature, inexperienced people. We have politics-- international actors leveraging social media to sow disinformation, and domestic actor(s) enthusiastically and successfully denying truths with impunity. And we have official sources of truth corrupted-- the trends above, and others led to ready availability of bad information in sources previously regarded as authoritative.
Unfortunately, the epicenter in many cases can be traced to changes in society and power brought about by the technology industry, which 'disrupted' society and replaced it with substitutes that empowered anti-factual narratives and personalities. The recipes for avoiding being scammed are nice, but this is a structural problem that shouldn't be laid at the feet of individual people unfortunate enough to be conned.
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#18Society is visibly decomposing before our eyes. You can tell because trust no longer exists. And those who trust, get burned, because they're taken advantage of. The issue is without trust, society does not exist.
What's coming is frankly scary to me.
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#19In some areas a "community" culture¹ of "you shall behave - you will behave" has declined into a sort of anarchy of "everything passes"; once you were corrected, and now you are no more; once people would stand and say "wrong behaviour" directly, today such framework is greatly weakened, which causes all kind of deviations. Such weakening encourages abuse and exploitation. ¹Note that said community culture was not re…
I totally agree with this. The active removal of any (even semblance) of community in society, to be replaced with radical individualism, has been horribly detrimental. There is no shame, there is no right or wrong, there is no responsibility to others. And this extends to both sides of the political spectrum. The right glorify this "Don't step on me", "I don't care about others that don't exactly fit into my in-grou…
This is a very US centric concept, though. Whereas the original question was far more generic.
Re: Ask HN: Since when is everything a scam?
#20Tangent - Reviews are basically useless.
It's next to impossible to get good information to choosing some a local business / service on the internet.