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Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

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Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#61
post #20

"everyone agreed on a solution: let the cat handle it. And so, for what seemed like an eternity, the cat went to work on the mouse, slowly torturing it limb-by-limb. This went on for at least a day, probably longer." Yikes. What the hell is wrong with these people?

This is "dark humor", and probably involves a healthy amount of poetic license. I found it funny. But I also butchered, cooked, and ate a rooster last weekend.

Nothing wrong with (presumably) humanely butchering an animal to eat. I would guess you didn't pull it's legs and wings off one-by-one and watch it scream and writhe just for fun.

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#62
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found this very weird too. If the cat found the mouse by itself, sure, there's not much you can do about it. But giving the mouse to him and watching him torture it for a day? That's honestly very weird and cruel.

Have you really never done this? This is the main reason to own cats.

Uh yeah, I've never given my cat a live animal to torture on purpose. I also don't let it out to roam and kill all the local songbirds either.

If you have a barn full of crops to protect from rats or something, then sure, use a cat as a ratter, though there might be more humane ways to deal with your rat problem.

But if you're giving animals to your cat to kill for your own entertainment, then you seriously need help.

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#63

There was a point in time, maybe circa 2008, where platforms were expected to be a thing. The web was/is a platform. Operating systems were a platform, and MSFT even got rich. Platforms had the power to support an ecosystem so rich their inventors' could never have imagined it. Facebook and Twitter genuinely had plans to be platforms, remember? Paul Graham even called it a new core protocol, and YC recruited startups…

Closed platforms are still platforms.

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#64
What the author fails to account for is that even if Stripe is a mouse, the majority of its customers are insects. Small businesses with <$10000/mo revenue are not going to care about Stripe's other services because the small business only has a few avenues of revenue generation anyways. Larger businesses have the capital to just cut Stripe out when they need to. Not everyone who uses Stripe is making millions of dollars a year, and not everyone needs to worry about their payments provider nullifying their business model when they sell coffee down the street.

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#65

Am I the only one who finds it weird that somebody is living with his lawyer and family?

Before one writes the next six-figure check to his attorney, he may realize he'll need to sell the Tribeca loft, and be prompted to inquire desperately "where will I stay when I'm in New York?" Enterprising attorneys will put their client at ease and deposit that check at their first opportunity.

I have so many questions

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#66
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you really never done this? This is the main reason to own cats.

Uh yeah, I've never given my cat a live animal to torture on purpose. I also don't let it out to roam and kill all the local songbirds either. If you have a barn full of crops to protect from rats or something, then sure, use a cat as a ratter, though there might be more humane ways to deal with your rat problem. But if you're giving animals to your cat to kill for your own entertainment, then you seriously need help…

We're talking about mice. They have been the bane of humanity since the dawn of agriculture. Imagining they have some sort of moral worth is living in a dream world.

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#67
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uh yeah, I've never given my cat a live animal to torture on purpose. I also don't let it out to roam and kill all the local songbirds either. If you have a barn full of crops to protect from rats or something, then sure, use a cat as a ratter, though there might be more humane ways to deal with your rat problem. But if you're giving animals to your cat to kill for your own entertainment, then you seriously need help…

We're talking about mice. They have been the bane of humanity since the dawn of agriculture. Imagining they have some sort of moral worth is living in a dream world.

Mice in or around my house has no relation to "the bane of humanity since the dawn of agriculture", I live pretty far from any farm, and the most they ate from me is crumbs on the floor. Wanting to kill them is fine, and I understand totally. Letting your cat kill them if he catches them before you, totally fine for me too. He hunted her, it's his prey, why not? On the other hand, giving mice that you caught to your cat so he can torture them is not in the same in my book.

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#68
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're talking about mice. They have been the bane of humanity since the dawn of agriculture. Imagining they have some sort of moral worth is living in a dream world.

Mice in or around my house has no relation to "the bane of humanity since the dawn of agriculture", I live pretty far from any farm, and the most they ate from me is crumbs on the floor. Wanting to kill them is fine, and I understand totally. Letting your cat kill them if he catches them before you, totally fine for me too. He hunted her, it's his prey, why not? On the other hand, giving mice that you caught to your…

I give all mice to the cats, whether dead or alive. Supervising a cat's treatment of a mouse is not something I will ever spend a second of my life doing. Enjoying how demented and evil cats naturally are, I have spent so far, in total, at least twenty minutes over 45 years doing.

I'm glad that cats are on our team.

Re: Stripe isn’t a platform, it’s a mouse

#69

There was a point in time, maybe circa 2008, where platforms were expected to be a thing. The web was/is a platform. Operating systems were a platform, and MSFT even got rich. Platforms had the power to support an ecosystem so rich their inventors' could never have imagined it. Facebook and Twitter genuinely had plans to be platforms, remember? Paul Graham even called it a new core protocol, and YC recruited startups…

Closed platforms are still platforms.

I don't want to argue the semantics.

Beyond that, I did note that windows is a platform, so obviously there are exceptions. In any case, the implication of "platform" in the sense that I (and pg, in 2008) used it implies that the ecosystem transcends the platform. Salesforce is a platform in a sense, but it can only go so far.

That is possible, for a private platform, but unlikely. OSS has, empirically, been much more amenable to this sort of thing.

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