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I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

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Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#231

Post by einhverfr »

thejteam wrote: post #189
tristan_louis wrote: post #77

This is, unfortunately, part of a trend against "make" culture. While it does impact LEGO (the tie-in stuff is pretty useless and the LEGO city sets still have more wholesome brick sets that can be used in more than one fashion), it is going on across many facet of toy manufacturing. Those of us who are parents of young children now may remember the days in school when they taught us basic programming as part of comp…

I was thinking the other day how much I really miss GW-Basic. A relatively simple set of instructions that I used at age 10 or so to start simple programming. How do I teach a 10 year old to program now? Class instantiation? Grab a bunch of libraries off the internet and put them together? Really sad that people don't want to build things anymore. I recently fenced in my acre yard(no I don't live in SV, couldn't affo…

I am starting my son with perl and C. Today is his 8th birthday.

Why perl and C?

1) Perl is very good at ad hoc programming, and it;s a very good language for learning very basic things.....

2) C is simple language for very basic stuff, but it is exacting and makes you think like a programmer.

Once he gets half-way decent with simple things in Perl, he's ready for Lego Mindstorms ;-)

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#232

Post by polshaw »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #135
codemac wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I blame companies instead of consumers because they market the shit out this stuff. No one is born with an innate desire for that specific Barbie or Lego set. The companies market to you, make you feel like you want it. The companies may not be able to change the entire macro environment, but they actively profit and exploit it. So yea, they are way more to blame than what 11 year old girls think their place in the w…

> No one is born with an innate desire for that specific Barbie or Lego set. The companies market to you, make you feel like you want it. True, but it's the fault of both companies and consumers at the same time. It's a feedback loop. Marketing strategies are based on what people are willing to buy, which is based on what companies market. The system feeds on itself.

The company is trying to maximise profit (NB the single use point made in this article). It is not the 'fault' of a child to want whatever fad is current. Yes, there are broader influences from society, but to paint the child as some kind of active and equal player in this game (aside from their natural love of awesome (eg. superheroes are better than vegetables)) is disingenuous, imo.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#233

Post by polshaw »

mvzink wrote: post #92
nostromo wrote: post #53

When I see these stories taking companies to task over why they sell what they do, I always wonder why nobody holds consumers to task. For example: why doesn't Lego sell to girls? Why doesn't Barbie have more realistic features? Why don't car manufacturers offer an electric vehicle? Why doesn't McDonalds sell salads instead of fries? Why do record labels offer such crappy music? It's easy to blame the companies -- bu…

I tend to agree, but there's a missing element in this economic model, though one that others have mentioned (cf. sunahsuh's comment): marketing. If you look at Marx, or even Smith, it's clear that the wants and demands of the consumers are not always organic, but are often fabricated by the companies themselves. Smith thought this was cool, Marx thought it was evil; in any case, you are right to some extent, but few…

twitter and ipad strongly come to mind here. (whored by the media vastly more than they marketed themselves).

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#234

Post by einhverfr »

wanorris wrote: post #120
maximusprime wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You assume people want a change. I do not think they do. Do people want an end to gender specific toys? Certainly some do. But the vast majority do not. I firmly believe, through interacting with people in general, and my own children, that female and male brains are completely different. They are hard wired to like different things, and behave differently. I don't see anything wrong with that, and don't see any reas…

And yet there are plenty of kids who are gender atypical, sometimes in a few ways, sometimes in many ways, sometimes such that they identify with the opposite gender. The reality is not that there are hard categories of things that we can simply say a person's brain is "hard wired" to be either A or B, but that there are clusters and statistical probabilities. Some people are one or more standard deviations removed f…

I am not sure that "gender" (as opposed to 'sex') is a biological state, though. Gender-atypicality may have a lot to do with navigating between social ideals of normality and a need of individuality.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#235

Post by trout »

They've also got the 'Creator' line which is more of what I traditionally think of Lego.

So, when I bought a set that's the one I chose. Now, I did have to wade through the other 30 brands to find it, but I was happy they still had at least one choice.

Now more people should buy these if the market wants it - but I'll agree these aren't marketed enough.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#236

Post by ugh »

tptacek wrote: post #221
ugh wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s complete and utter bullshit. Stuff like that used to happen (the dark late 90s and early 2000s) but not anymore. And even during that time (which was during my childhood) I always found a cool new way to use the special pieces. I actually always loved having special pieces I could repurpose in some way. This meme needs to die. It’s not based in fact. Case in point: http://city.lego.com/de-DE/Products/Default.a…

Wow, you have strong feelings about Lego, don't you?

I do have strong feeling about this particular meme – but I really should have toned down my writing a bit. Ah, well, you can’t always find the right words.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#237

Post by tptacek »

ugh wrote: post #236
tptacek wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, you have strong feelings about Lego, don't you?

I do have strong feeling about this particular meme – but I really should have toned down my writing a bit. Ah, well, you can’t always find the right words.

You and me both!

I agree that the new Lego pieces get a bad rap; my kids have done ridiculous things with them; in fact, I'm not sure they've ever actually built the thing the box told them to.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#238

Post by billpatrianakos »

pyre wrote: post #202
billpatrianakos wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But then if they're equally capable but prefer shampooing dogs then is that really a problem? All of us are capable of things that we prefer not to do. I was on a track to become a doctor but decided to program instead. I'm capable of both but prefer not to be a doctor. See what I mean?

> if they're equally capable but prefer shampooing dogs > then is that really a problem The problem is that their like/dislikes/personalities are not formed in a bubble. Society has influence over these things.

So then why should it be alright for men? No one really makes a stink about needing more men florists or hospice nurses? Doesnt it seem like instead of really talking about or trying to fix the gender stereotype issue we aren't doing much good by singling out women. It seems like we're making them into victims. Wouldn't you say the problem works both ways and focusing on one gender or race turns them into victims imstead of addressing the entire issue as a whole which could be more helpful?

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#239

Post by flomo »

mvzink wrote: post #92
nostromo wrote: post #53

When I see these stories taking companies to task over why they sell what they do, I always wonder why nobody holds consumers to task. For example: why doesn't Lego sell to girls? Why doesn't Barbie have more realistic features? Why don't car manufacturers offer an electric vehicle? Why doesn't McDonalds sell salads instead of fries? Why do record labels offer such crappy music? It's easy to blame the companies -- bu…

I tend to agree, but there's a missing element in this economic model, though one that others have mentioned (cf. sunahsuh's comment): marketing. If you look at Marx, or even Smith, it's clear that the wants and demands of the consumers are not always organic, but are often fabricated by the companies themselves. Smith thought this was cool, Marx thought it was evil; in any case, you are right to some extent, but few…

> marketing

Exactly. When I was a child, Lego held the patent on the plastic brick and therefore could sell bland collections of 4x2s at enormously inflated prices.

When the patent expired, the market was flooded with clone bricks at greatly reduced prices. Lego floundered a bit before figuring out their value was no longer technology but instead "brand recognition".

Since then Lego has been primarily a marketing-oriented company. In fact, "bricks" aren't even close to their main product anymore and only really exists as a branding element at this point.

It would be great if some Chinese company sold huge tubs of quality bricks for a penny each. But it's not going to be from Lego.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#240

Post by lemming »

billpatrianakos wrote: post #238
pyre wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if they're equally capable but prefer shampooing dogs > then is that really a problem The problem is that their like/dislikes/personalities are not formed in a bubble. Society has influence over these things.

So then why should it be alright for men? No one really makes a stink about needing more men florists or hospice nurses? Doesnt it seem like instead of really talking about or trying to fix the gender stereotype issue we aren't doing much good by singling out women. It seems like we're making them into victims. Wouldn't you say the problem works both ways and focusing on one gender or race turns them into victims ims…

Actually, when I put "we need more male" into Google, the two cases it suggests are "we need more male teachers" and "we need more male nurses" which were the two cases that I had immediately thought of.
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