> I’ve seen generations grow up. Some grandparents come in with their grandkids and say, “Anna, remember the jukebox?” > Today, however, young people no longer come to the bar. They came when we had the dance floor and the music. Today, they like to spend time with the smartphone; they even take it to bed when they go to sleep. What are we losing, what are we taking away from life, now that we ourselves have become a…
The most profound colonization and erasure of human culture worldwide that has ever occurred
> I’ve seen generations grow up. Some grandparents come in with their grandkids and say, “Anna, remember the jukebox?” > Today, however, young people no longer come to the bar. They came when we had the dance floor and the music. Today, they like to spend time with the smartphone; they even take it to bed when they go to sleep. What are we losing, what are we taking away from life, now that we ourselves have become a…
"now that we ourselves have become a resource to extract"
I take your general point, but I'm interested in what you mean by "we" here - the general population or HN readers? People have been a resource to extract from since the beginning of farming, and particularly so since the beginning of the industrial revolution. The difference is perhaps that the attention of rich, western people is being exploited now and is causing this particular concern. Read any first-person accounts of the industrial revolution and the idea that this is anything new falls apart.
Socrates would have drawn the line at writing and reading texts.
I always find this argument dubious at best. It's akin to saying "A dude was wrong once 2000 years ago, anything new is progress, and progress is desirable".
Maybe we are talking about the same thing, but my intent was to say that original quote was in the theme of "kids these days...".
Not all progress is desirable, of course, and smartphones have their own problems, but same was told about younger generations and internet, TV, newspapers, etc. But those generations grew up out of it and personally I'd argue that smartphone addiction is not only young people problem.
If they worked for a decade and never got a pay rise (other than minimum wage increases), why are they still working there? In an ideal world, you get wage and career progression over time, or move on to a different career otherwise.
I know that he was learning programming on the side so his plan was to work on that, I don't know how that ended up.
I agree with you, the infection hit quite a lot of older people very hard as well. I have problem getting some 40somethings to meet in person, even in professional contexts, they are just so soaked in a WhatsApp maelström of utterly irrelevant messages that they are conditioned to answer NOW! That said, the core of the message should not be judgments between the young and the old, but the problem that we have introdu…
hit quite a lot of older people very hard as well. I have problem getting some 40somethings 40something is not old, despite what Zuckerberg claimed before he himself aged.
In the context of the above posts, which is young people eschewing dancing in favor of using smartphones, old is an adult that is expected to behave at or near peak maturity compared to a younger person whose is just coming into their own (presumably 20s).
Is it defrauding it if you contributed to it all your working life?
Yes. You can’t work and collect a pension.
You are saying that very matter-of-factly, while that is not how it works here in the Netherlands, and probably also in other places in Europe. The reasoning being, the pension isn't an unemployment benefit, pension is a fund you spent your career investing into.
When ever in the history of the world were humans not exploited by other humans, in much worse ways than now? I'd rather be google's data source for ads than be someones actual slave for example. Also I don't really like these luddite sentiments, usually shared between the two extremes, old ladies that never used the internet so they don't understand what they are missing, and IT guys that are too jaded to see the be…
> than be someones actual slave for example. Some argue you're still one, they give you just enough crumbs so that you shut your mouth and bow your head while you work from birth to death, being taxed every step of the way, with more and more limited privacy and liberties. Meanwhile the top 1% still live like kings, laws barely apply to them, they're in charge of everything even though most of them haven't been elect…
I would guess an actual slave would find that comparison horribly offensive. And kings were born into their position, but there is quite a bit of churn in leadership during my lifetime, so I struggle to see that equivalence either.
I talked with a barista that had worked 10 years at Starbucks and he still made minimum wage after all that time, it was specially worrying since minimum wage in this country it's equivalent to 420 usd a month.
If they worked for a decade and never got a pay rise (other than minimum wage increases), why are they still working there? In an ideal world, you get wage and career progression over time, or move on to a different career otherwise.
> or move on to a different career otherwise.
Folks rarely have this choice. What industry wants a barista outside food service? This is why we get stuck wearing a green apron for a decade, or working call center jobs, or any other crappy job.
I talked with a barista that had worked 10 years at Starbucks and he still made minimum wage after all that time, it was specially worrying since minimum wage in this country it's equivalent to 420 usd a month.
I once decided to plot my salaries corrected for inflation and found out that they only really went up a couple of times in 30 years.
If you are in the US, you also have to incorporate the employer paid benefits in compensation, the big one being health insurance premiums/deductible/out of pocket maximum/provider network size (the premium is easily referred to by looking at W-2 box 12 code DD).
There are also other considerations such as PTO, 401k match, HSA match, DCFSA match, yadda yadda, so the only way to keep up with the market is to always be interviewing and evaluating new offers to compare your current compensation to.
> robotic baristas Coffee vending machines? That’s what’s inside the box, it’s nothing new really… There are very high quality ones too. It’s not a particularly skilled job for a human to do, besides the customer service aspect of course, perhaps I am ignorant in that regard. Indeed, coming from Spain, I don’t really see the lady as a barista, she is the classic bartender that listens to you and knows everybody. Exce…
I am also Spanish, living in Japan, and our bars is one the things I miss the most. Seriously, you don't realize how amazing Spanish bars are until you don't have them. Here I just stop by a konbini, grab a can coffee and a plastic-wrapped sandwich, and off I go. There is no social nexus, and no neighbourhood for that matter. It's depressing.
When I was teaching in Ube, Japan in 1979, there was a great jazz music coffee bar. The entire wall behind the counter was covered with jazz LP's. They had huge speakers, a massive turntable, and a McIntosh amp. You would go in, pick an album and order coffee. The counter was lined with vacuum coffee makers. The barista would grind your choice of bean and fire up the coffee alembic. The boiling water would erupt into the upper chamber, brew a while, then magically get sucked down into the bottom carafe when he took it off the flame. You could drink at the counter or go to a table. I didn't look like a beatnik, but I felt like one! Cool, daddio.