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Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

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Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#131

Post by heavenlyblue »

nitrogen wrote: post #120
Aloha wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always looked at it this way "things must be pretty bad if lighting yourself on fire sounds like a better alternative then living" I dont need to understand the particulars beyond that.

I honestly think that there are people in the US who feel distraught enough to do so, but they know that it wouldn't do any good for anyone else -- they would be ignored, or labeled as "crazy". No doubt life in the US is still much better than many other places, but we have to remember that protest itself has been systematically marginalized and penalized as a form of expression, and adjust our evaluation of the stat…

Are you saying that burning yourself during Arab Spring has better hope for success than in the US?

Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#132

Post by snowwrestler »

Aloha wrote: post #112
austincheney wrote: post #105

Having lived for some time in a third world country that has real poverty and real day to day security worries, situations like this spring to mind when people completely without optics compare their situations to those in developing nations. Yes, as insanely ignorant as that sounds it happens. People here on HN last week, as one example, were trying to compare their experiences recently protesting to the Arab Spring…

I've always looked at it this way "things must be pretty bad if lighting yourself on fire sounds like a better alternative then living" I dont need to understand the particulars beyond that.

I think there are two ways to approach thinking about dramatic acts like self-immolation, rioting, looting, stealing, etc.

One way is to think "wow, those people have had very different experiences from me, to drive them to do that." I'd put your reply in that category and I prefer this. It recognizes shared commonality among people, which is a good place to start for constructive change.

The other way is to think "wow, those people are nothing like me, to want to do something like that." This treats differences as inherent and implies there are different "types" of people. It creates a sense of "us vs them," which makes it harder to build the empathy necessary for constructive change.

Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#133

Post by catalogia »

austincheney wrote: post #127
catalogia wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No matter what issue you examine, you can doubtlessly find that somebody somewhere at sometime had it even worse. I think these kind of observations are usually unproductive though; taking this attitude to it's logical absurd conclusion would have you telling people to stop complaining because at least they're not in death camps.

It’s not about who has it worse. That completely misses the point. It’s about accurately reflecting on your personal situation and not drawing absurd conclusions to justify a personal opinion. Let’s call this Dunning-Kruger for sympathy. If you are trying to qualify who has it worse you aren’t focused on a materially objective outcome. For example many of the people protesting in the US in the past few weeks are tryi…

I think there may be a miscommunication here. I read "The same absurd comparisons also come up when entitled people people try to talk about poverty when it’s clear they have never seen poverty in the US, much less in an economy where people earn less than $5 per day working 5x harder." as meaning you have no sympathy for the plight of poor people in America because people in other countries experience even more severe poverty. Seeing poverty in America is as easy as going outside and opening your eyes.

Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#134

Post by azinman2 »

danso wrote: post #92

The Mental Floss writeup from 2018 has actual details: https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/558202/pepsi-number-feve... > To determine winning numbers, Pepsi recruited D.G. Consultores, a marketing firm based in Mexico. The numbers were generated via computer, then secured in a safe deposit box in Manila. From there, the list would be used to “seed” bottle caps in the bottling plants. Each night, the company would ann…

10M is nothing to Pepsi with a market cap of 178B. If they're going to put something out as a token, they could have easily 10-20x'd that and had a much more meaningful payout.

Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#135

Post by emilsedgh »

nitrogen wrote: post #120
Aloha wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always looked at it this way "things must be pretty bad if lighting yourself on fire sounds like a better alternative then living" I dont need to understand the particulars beyond that.

I honestly think that there are people in the US who feel distraught enough to do so, but they know that it wouldn't do any good for anyone else -- they would be ignored, or labeled as "crazy". No doubt life in the US is still much better than many other places, but we have to remember that protest itself has been systematically marginalized and penalized as a form of expression, and adjust our evaluation of the stat…

I have a theory that distribution of power in democracies leads to "distribution of blame".

Living in a third world country means you probably are dealing with a (semi) dictatorship. That means there's only a few entities (eg regime, government, whatever) that you can assign the blame to.

Therefore, you can light yourself on fire in protest to them.

In the U.S. who would you light yourself to protest to? Elected congress? Elected government? Wall Street? Supreme Court?

Unfortunately when system gets rigged and gamed in a democracy it's really difficult to untangle the mess.

This also has a secondary effect: In these countries people are not so divided. They have a common enemy: The dictator [0].

Source: Anecdotal experience based in years of life in a third world country and the U.S.

[0] This is an oversimplification as even the dictators have support of a big chunk of the population to rely on.

Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#138

Post by kiliancs »

emilsedgh wrote: post #135
nitrogen wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly think that there are people in the US who feel distraught enough to do so, but they know that it wouldn't do any good for anyone else -- they would be ignored, or labeled as "crazy". No doubt life in the US is still much better than many other places, but we have to remember that protest itself has been systematically marginalized and penalized as a form of expression, and adjust our evaluation of the stat…

I have a theory that distribution of power in democracies leads to "distribution of blame". Living in a third world country means you probably are dealing with a (semi) dictatorship. That means there's only a few entities (eg regime, government, whatever) that you can assign the blame to. Therefore, you can light yourself on fire in protest to them. In the U.S. who would you light yourself to protest to? Elected cong…

> I have a theory that distribution of power in democracies leads to "distribution of blame".

I think there's some truth to this, but I think this eventually results in widespread cynicism, skepticism and loss of trust towards any sort of institution (aka "the system") in general --including science and religion--, which is a perfect environment for fake news and conspiracy theories. Long term it leads to chaos and unrest too.

Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#139

Post by nitrogen »

DevKoala wrote: post #129
nitrogen wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly think that there are people in the US who feel distraught enough to do so, but they know that it wouldn't do any good for anyone else -- they would be ignored, or labeled as "crazy". No doubt life in the US is still much better than many other places, but we have to remember that protest itself has been systematically marginalized and penalized as a form of expression, and adjust our evaluation of the stat…

So they suffer enough to want to burn themselves, but won’t because they fear being labeled crazy? I feel that comparing the suffering of such an individual to the suffering of people who actually burned themselves to protest the oppression they experienced is insulting to the sacrifice of the later. I agree with the sentiment of the protests in the USA, but there is no need to invent fictional martyrs who “could hav…

insulting to the sacrifice of the later.

I think it's insulting to all that we even feel the need to compare. This perhaps counterintuitively amplifies divisions, when we want to unite.

Re: Pepsi’s $32B Typo Caused Deadly Riots

#140

Post by xsmasher »

skybrian wrote: post #116
petters wrote: post #63

> The number “349” was the $40,000 winning number. > Pepsi had explicitly told its vendor factories not to print this number at all. Sounds dangerous to decide the winning number in advance. Makes it easier for a vendor or someone else to cheat. But I suppose they wanted short numbers.

It's not a lottery where people pick their own numbers. As long as you can't find out what it is without opening the bottle, it didn't have to be a number at all; it could just say "you have won" where all the other bottle caps say nothing. Though, making it non-forgeable might be trickier.

"You have won" caps would disappear mysterious from the factory floor.

You need a system where no one can identify a winner until after the caps have been printed, and the soda has been bottled and shipped.

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