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Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

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Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#201

Post by SimbaOnSteroids »

jwn wrote: post #95
Clubber wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The problem with them is that Juciero was an immensely dumb idea that was never checked or questioned and thereby wasted tons of money Like bottled water. The idea of people paying 1600x markup for something they got essentially free while creating massive amounts of waste when sports bottles already existed. When bottled water came out, I remember thinking, "that's a friggin' joke." It sure worked out though.

Unlike the Juicero, bottled water provides added value in that I can have access to suitable drinking water when I otherwise would be forced to drink tap water. Before someone replies that tap water is perfectly suitable for drinking: Sure it's safe, but I have never had municipal water that didn't taste bad. Never. Maybe I'm just spoiled because I have a well that provides tasteless water.

St. Louis tap water tastes about the same as bottled water.

We can substitute bottled water with premium bottled water and the argument holds though.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#202

Post by reaperducer »

touchofevil wrote: post #168
nsxwolf wrote: post #105

Middle America is not too keen on your "basic income" solution to all the problems you are creating. It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore. There will be torches and pitchforks coming for you.

Middle America generally lives in the suburbs and does not interact with homeless people everyday who are dying on the streets in front of them like those who live in SF, LA, and NYC do. Basic Income is meant as a "floor" that those people will not be able to fall below.

That used to be true, but the nation's very poor live mostly in the suburbs and rural parts of the country now. It shifted about 20 years ago. You can't go anywhere without encountering desperately poor people these days.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#203

Post by rgrieselhuber »

reaperducer wrote: post #190
austenallred wrote: post #24

People generally do love Silicon Valley and what it creates. It’s the media that doesn’t. Ask the average person what brands and products they like and use the most (or just look at the data on where and how they spend their time and money) and you’ll see that Silicon Valley is doing just fine in the eyes of the populace. In fact, Silicon Valley has never been more influential. Ask people to go to a world without iPh…

> People generally do love Silicon Valley and what it creates. It’s the media that doesn’t. Don't blame the messenger. "The media" is a reflection of the people. Not only is it made up of, largely, ordinary people; it spends billions of dollars each year to find out what ordinary people think, want, and feel. It tracks their lives in ways that companies like Google could only dream of, and is sitting on almost a cent…

> "The media" is a reflection of the people

Relevance to this particular topic aside, I'd recommend looking into the corporate structure behind the "media" in the US before making that statement.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#204

Post by aylmao »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #181
nsxwolf wrote: post #105

Middle America is not too keen on your "basic income" solution to all the problems you are creating. It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore. There will be torches and pitchforks coming for you.

> Middle America is not too keen on your "basic income" solution to all the problems you are creating. It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore. Except that all of those things are the exact opposite of what…

A different approach, one in which people can still work to get paid, but wages are reasonable.

Fulfillment is not all about the money and what you can buy with it. It's about feeling that your'e serving some purpose, and there's value to what you do.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#205

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

leggomylibro wrote: post #149
nsxwolf wrote: post #105

Middle America is not too keen on your "basic income" solution to all the problems you are creating. It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore. There will be torches and pitchforks coming for you.

Middle America doesn't seem to be keen on much of anything these days, besides torches and pitchforks. I'd rather put my money on the people trying to build solutions rather than more problems. Sure, it seems like the actual silicon valley location is mostly making solutions for problems that it created, these days. But there's plenty of tech outside of California. And anyways, dire imprecations of fire and brimstone…

> And anyways, dire imprecations of fire and brimstone if we don't do things your way is so 1700s.

You think if the majority of people in this country continue to experience a declining quality of life, there won't be riots in the streets?

This method of shifting blame from economic issues to social issues won't work forever.

edit: To those downvoting me, can you please explain why? Am I wrong in some way?

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#206

Post by occultist_throw »

api wrote: post #170
mschuster91 wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well people can think of something like TNG but the (alt-)right will instantly crapstorm you for being a communist. Just look at how they're opposing healthcare for all, a society like TNG would be the ultimate enemy for them.

The alt-right is the logical endpoint. It kind of combines all the worst ideas from liberalism over the past 50 years (postmodernism, identity politics) with all the worst ideas from conservatism (nationalism, racism, biological determinism) in the previous century. I remember years ago having a discussion with a friend about "what's the worst ideology you can possibly imagine" and it kind of resembles what I came up…

But that's what is talked about in Star Trek DS9. Except we have the similar name, but very different meaning... Sanctuary Districts.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Past_Tense_(Star_Trek:_Deep_Sp...

Effectively, the governments at the time (USA), figured it was cheaper to ghettoize poor, sick, and others whom cannot support themselves. Wall them off, and keep them out of society. Out of sight, out of mind.

This literally is the thoughts of the Right-Wing. Ive seen that justification here, on HN. Why bother with the poor? They have no money! Better to keep them 'away', as 'We' are better. Of course, right now we have White-Nationalists beating on their drums. But the real war here is against the poor. Black people are.. disdained by the Conservative elite because they are primarily low income (by way of discrimination, but thats aside the point!). Ideally, all poor trash should be taken out, white, black, asian, native - you name it. No money = no livelihood = no choice = no living.

EDIT: Seriously? -1's? Am I wrong? I would love to see the conservative plans to boost people from poverty, medical maladies, and systemic discrimination. So far, what I see are attacks on any programs trying to assist with poverty, medical, and discrimination. And these attacks are done by the "ruling party", Republicans, with their base plans being as such.

This article is a great internal view of how Republicans support white supremacy values. https://www.thenation.com/article/exclusive-lee-atwaters-inf...

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#207

Post by wutbrodo »

api wrote: post #170
mschuster91 wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well people can think of something like TNG but the (alt-)right will instantly crapstorm you for being a communist. Just look at how they're opposing healthcare for all, a society like TNG would be the ultimate enemy for them.

The alt-right is the logical endpoint. It kind of combines all the worst ideas from liberalism over the past 50 years (postmodernism, identity politics) with all the worst ideas from conservatism (nationalism, racism, biological determinism) in the previous century. I remember years ago having a discussion with a friend about "what's the worst ideology you can possibly imagine" and it kind of resembles what I came up…

> It kind of combines all the worst ideas from liberalism over the past 50 years (postmodernism, identity politics)

Not to be pedantic, but those are _illiberal_ ideas. You're conflating liberals and the left, which was mostly fine when they were in a coalition for a while. But if you're talking about identity politics et al, you're very specifically describing things that are almost definitionally illiberal.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#208

Post by aylmao »

Frondo wrote: post #193
nsxwolf wrote: post #105

Middle America is not too keen on your "basic income" solution to all the problems you are creating. It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore. There will be torches and pitchforks coming for you.

If middle America wants to blame someone for the changes that have hit rural life in the last 50 years, they'd do better than to look at Silicon Valley. Uber isn't the reason Big Ag took over the family farm, and Google isn't the reason their daughter moved to Brooklyn and is now dating a girl. But actually, I think the rural folk will be the first to adopt the "basic income" (scare quotes and all), because in a lot…

SV is a symptom of the same problem; a system that allows wealth to concentrate and companies to become monopolies.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#209

Post by Buttes »

nsxwolf wrote: post #105

Middle America is not too keen on your "basic income" solution to all the problems you are creating. It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore. There will be torches and pitchforks coming for you.

>It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore.

If I don't have to work, sign me up.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#210

Post by AnthonyMouse »

aylmao wrote: post #204
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Middle America is not too keen on your "basic income" solution to all the problems you are creating. It brings to mind a future of living in a 300 square foot government apartment in some hideous Brutalist concrete block of a building, eating our daily Amazon rations, knowing that's just how life is going to be, forever, no need to have dreams anymore. Except that all of those things are the exact opposite of what…

A different approach, one in which people can still work to get paid, but wages are reasonable. Fulfillment is not all about the money and what you can buy with it. It's about feeling that your'e serving some purpose, and there's value to what you do.

That's what a universal basic income does. It lets the person whose labor is only worth $3/hour take a $3/hour job and still not starve to death.
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