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If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

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Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#91

Post by kls »

vacri wrote: post #58
kls wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well I don't know about smart, but it is practical. The problem with our profession and the reason the video while comical is not accurate. We get compared to other professionals a lot, like doctors or lawyers but the problem is unlike doctors or lawyers, each new job we do, is like performing a completely new procedure. I mean if the doctor overruns putting your new liver in, it is by a few hours at most. The econom…

"I mean if the doctor overruns putting your new liver in, it is by a few hours at most." Speaking as someone who went to get a new filling in June, went through getting a root canal on another tooth, and finally will end up going under a GA to get some more serious work done in a month or two, I can assure you that doctors (well, dentists) do not charge on a fixed-symptom basis. Even if you need to return to a doctor…

You are right, my exposure to medicine is pretty cut and dry, so I was speaking from my experience. As well I did not mean it as derogatory towards medicine practitioners. My summation was more geared towards routine surgery which for the majority of us, is what medicine is, check-ups and routine surgery.

Most of us are fortunate to not have medical anomalies that require anything other than routing medical attention in which case prices are pretty cut and dry. My point was when a doctor recommends a path of treatment they usually have a comfort level with that treatment and it's effectiveness.

In your case the filling, the root canal and the serious work where three separate projects. In the development world, you would get the requirements for the filling and the root canal would feature creep in as the filling was being done. That was my point, was that doctors (for the most part) have pretty fixed problem sets like root canal where developers have different problem sets for each new project.

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#92

Post by ZoFreX »

patio11 wrote: post #28
axiom wrote: post #14

This is the difference between business-to-business versus buying consumer goods. You can't waste time negotiating with every client who buys a $50 pair of shoes from you - it's just not cost effective. So you have a fixed price for everyone. However you can (and should) negotiate with people buying $20k worth of services from you. Historically, the consumer experience is actually the exception, not b2b. Up until fai…

You can't waste time negotiating with every client who buys a $50 pair of shoes from you - it's just not cost effective. This is where price discrimination comes in, and it is staggeringly effective: coupons, sales, discounts, etc etc. The great thing about fixed prices is that there are so many to choose from!

I learnt about price discrimination in a pop-economics book a few years ago, and it's everywhere. One of the most important things I've ever learnt.

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#93

Post by nimms »

vacri wrote: post #55
hartror wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take a walk down Lygon st or Hardware Lane of an evening. All the maitre d's will vi for your business with the best deal. You play it cool and you can get 30%+ off the menu costs especially in a large group (Lygon St for groups, Hardware Lane can be touch and go on tables as it is smaller). I am a bit more shifty as I normally have the target place chosen before I even leave home and will try to make sure the maitre…

Now I have an image of Lygon St spruikers madly typing in vi... A near lifelong citizen of Fitzroy and Brunswick, I've noticed that locals have shifted heavily away from Lygon St - for me, I refuse to eat there simply because even after you've had a satisfying dinner, you can't walk down the street without being accosted by every spruiker you come across. Having to walk a couple of hundred meters continually chanting…

There's the decent end of lygon where you can get great italian for cheap prices like tiamo.

then there's the gauntlet of death down the other end. we generally walk the back streets to avoid the spruikers

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#94

Post by Waywocket »

cubicle67 wrote: post #63
jberryman wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah better stop with the haggling for stale donuts ;) What are "white/brown goods"?

white goods are fridges, washing machines and the like. brown goods are tvs, stereos etc

>brown goods are tvs, stereos etc

Huh. I've always heard those referred to (on the few rare occasions) as black goods. Maybe it's generational.

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#95

Post by michael_dorfman »

vacri wrote: post #73
michael_dorfman wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* I can assure you that doctors (well, dentists) do not charge on a fixed-symptom basis.* Interestingly, under the Medicare reimbursement system, that's pretty much exactly how they are paid (if the patient is a Medicare patient).

Are you honestly saying that if you go to your local bulk-billing doctor with a stubborn symptom that won't go away, necessitating multiple visits, that the doctor will only ever be paid for the first consultation? That the rest are all (metaphorically) 'bug-fixes that are included in the original fixed-price spec'? Ain't so. Doctors get paid for their time, Medicare just has the government pay for it instead of the…

I was thinking of a hospitalization setting, where the payment is made for a DRG (a Diagnosis-Related Group) regardless of the specific procedures performed.

Cf http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnosis-related_group

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#96

Post by lucasjung »

patio11 wrote: post #28
axiom wrote: post #14

This is the difference between business-to-business versus buying consumer goods. You can't waste time negotiating with every client who buys a $50 pair of shoes from you - it's just not cost effective. So you have a fixed price for everyone. However you can (and should) negotiate with people buying $20k worth of services from you. Historically, the consumer experience is actually the exception, not b2b. Up until fai…

You can't waste time negotiating with every client who buys a $50 pair of shoes from you - it's just not cost effective. This is where price discrimination comes in, and it is staggeringly effective: coupons, sales, discounts, etc etc. The great thing about fixed prices is that there are so many to choose from!

What I love about price discrimination is that sometimes you have to think through a few steps to figure out who the target demographics are, which makes it a sort of game for me. Sometimes it's obvious (senior discounts), but often it's a little more indirect. One of my favorites: I drive a diesel, and every Monday Shell sells their diesel at a discount of $0.10/gal. I figure that they're trying to discriminate between businesses (the overwhelming majority of diesel drivers in the U.S.) and individuals: a long-haul trucker has to buy gas right when he needs it, and probably can't just put it off until Monday; I typically use slightly more than half a tank of gas each week, so I rarely need gas so badly that I can't put it off until Monday.

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#97

Post by gtufano »

merijnv wrote: post #76
Timothee wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

White goods are washing machines, dish washers, fridges…, while brown goods are the audio/video stuff (TVs, stereo). Kind of old fashion but based on the typical color of these items (mostly from a couple of decades or more ago: washing machines and fridges are in many colors and A/V stuff is almost always black and/or silver) According to Wikipedia, it seems to be mostly a UK idiom.

This idiom appears exactly the same in Dutch (and thus possibly other languages too?)

Italian too. We could probably say that this is an European thing. ;)

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#98

Post by krschultz »

lucasjung wrote: post #96
patio11 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't waste time negotiating with every client who buys a $50 pair of shoes from you - it's just not cost effective. This is where price discrimination comes in, and it is staggeringly effective: coupons, sales, discounts, etc etc. The great thing about fixed prices is that there are so many to choose from!

What I love about price discrimination is that sometimes you have to think through a few steps to figure out who the target demographics are, which makes it a sort of game for me. Sometimes it's obvious (senior discounts), but often it's a little more indirect. One of my favorites: I drive a diesel, and every Monday Shell sells their diesel at a discount of $0.10/gal. I figure that they're trying to discriminate betw…

Though I would think if you want to get consumers rather than trucks, you would do it on Sunday becuase that is the day most truckers take off.

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#99

Post by lionhearted »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #90
lionhearted wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great comment. > * Some stock is in constant demand, and you'll almost never get a discount. Black mens trousers, for example. The flipside is, if you're a guy and you're willing to wear light blue, pink, purple, and yellow, you can get some seriously great buys. You can get very high quality clothes in those colors for dirt cheap sometimes, which is why around half of my wardrobe is bright. It takes a little aesthet…

It takes a little aesthetic knowledge so you don't look ridiculous, but everyone should probably learn a little basic aesthetics anyways - it's one of those areas that a tiny bit of knowledge pays huge dividends. Very true, but how does one go about gaining this knowledge?

Here's a few suggestions, in ascending order of subjective difficulty to the average HN user:

Smashing Magazine (which doubles as good for web design).

Study the color wheel, read analyses of ways to use it.

Fashion websites.

Go to lots of museums.

Go to art galleries.

Flip through 2-3 fashion magazines per month at the bookstore.

Read book(s) on how to dress for different functions.

Go to high end stores and try things on.

Talk to artists, designers, architects, painters, etc. about why things look the way they look.

Take some art class, either crafting/doing-based, or art history.

Go with some sort of visual artist to a museum, and ask their thoughts about paintings.

Get a girlfriend/boyfriend/significant other who is an artist.

Any of those would help. The more you layer on, probably the faster you learn.

Also, study fashion/clothing advertisements. Scrutinize and analyze why they chose what they chose... many fashion ads will be regarded as high art in the distant future, because immense amounts of preparation, lighting, setting, and skill goes into making them. Almost anything that's in one is in it for a reason. Look at it and ask, "Why did they choose this? What are they trying to say/portray? Why this background/environment with that sort of clothing?" It's not instant gratification on the last one, but soon you start seeing the patterns. It's kind of beautifully awesome when you do.

Re: If people tried to pay for other services like they try to pay for programming

#100

Post by kawera »

merijnv wrote: post #76
Timothee wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

White goods are washing machines, dish washers, fridges…, while brown goods are the audio/video stuff (TVs, stereo). Kind of old fashion but based on the typical color of these items (mostly from a couple of decades or more ago: washing machines and fridges are in many colors and A/V stuff is almost always black and/or silver) According to Wikipedia, it seems to be mostly a UK idiom.

This idiom appears exactly the same in Dutch (and thus possibly other languages too?)

Portuguese too: branco/marrom
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