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590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

finance.yahoo.com

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Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#101

Post by 0cf8612b2e1e »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #31
SimianSci wrote: post #21

It used to be that the thought process of receiving a portion of sale money before delivering any product allowed the company to pay suppliers and keep afloat as they drove towards the finish line of delivery. Now it seems the grifting-meta is to make promises around a product with no plans on delivering it, take in pre-order money, and then just park it in an investment account to grow during a bull market. By the t…

> Now it seems the grifting-meta is to make promises around a product with no plans on delivering it, take in pre-order money, and then just park it in an investment account to grow during a bull market. By the time the grift comes due, your "investment" will have grown to a magnitude where even if you are forced to pay it back, you will have made a tidy profit. There's never been a time where that would work. A dama…

Some people have argued that Sam Bankman Fried just had unlucky timing. If his Anthropic investment had an opportunity to mature everyone would have been happy.

I don’t subscribe, but I have seen the argument a few times.

Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#102

Post by HDBaseT »

jerlam wrote: post #68
Cheyana wrote: post #9

“ The device would work with Trump Mobile's service plan. For $47.45 per month, Trump Mobile's "47 Plan" (2), which operates on the T-Mobile network, claims to be "better than the rest," offering 100% U.S.-based support; extensive 5G coverage; unlimited talk, text and data; telehealth services; roadside assistance, and international calling to over 230 countries and territories.” If you fell for that you deserve to l…

A lot of people are still on ancient plans like $80/5GB since they don't know they can change providers and still keep their number. Or they're old and avoid changing any aspect of their lives. The mobile companies are fine with "grandfathering" these customers.

Mobile companies will never, however, grandfather plans which have better value. They will happily grandfather more expensive plans, hell they won't even tell you.

Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#103

Post by shagie »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #92
shagie wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an appeal to restore the country to some form of nostalgic view of it. https://www.npr.org/2016/06/07/481137357/the-fractured-repub... The fact that Americans are politically divided is self-evident from recent elections. But just how we are divided and why it's proved so hard to get past our differences are questions that admit to many answers. And here's an interesting one from the conservative political theor…

From what I can see, as a boomer myself, is that we were best at voting ourselves more and more benefits, lower and lower taxes, and mortgaging all the value out of everything that had been built up over the previous generations. And the generations to follow are being left an empty purse.

I don't entirely place the blame on boomers for the raise of 1950s nostalgia and the corresponding misalignment of economic goals.

Someone (not a baby boomer) working in a traditional blue collar job today looks back at the portrayal of life in a rerun of a 1970s sitcom - Happy Days (or spin off, or even an "average" person sitcom from the 80s... Roseanne, Married with children) on late night cable and wonders what it would take to have that lifestyle today? Well, taxes are taking too large of a chunk of the family budget so people gravitate to candidates that say they'll cut taxes.

Though, they're missing out on the 1950s tax structure... where people making $200,000 (1950s dollars - about $2M in 2020s dollars) were getting taxed at 91%. Corporate tax rate was much higher too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_tax_in_the_United_State...

The plank of "we're going to raise taxes" doesn't get as many nostalgic votes for people hoping to return to the lifestyle of the 1950s.

There's a whole lot of other factors too.

A right leaning 30 year old today is voting to try to have what they perceived how it worked in the 1950s from shallow portrayals of the period.

Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#104

Post by TitaRusell »

xnx wrote: post #46

Recent and related comment: "I can’t prove it, but it feels like the world recently decided that spamming/scamming is acceptable..." https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48094961

Trump is a throwback to the 19th century when US politicians had to appeal to illiterate yahoos who often couldn't even speak English.

Compulsory education was supposed to usher in a new age but obviously that didn't last.

Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#106

Post by snypher »

rationalist wrote: post #70

> Don Hendrickson and Eric Thomas — two of the three executives that run Trump Mobile Does anyone know who the third person is? Surely it's not Trump himself? I'm guessing Trump just sold the ability to use his likeness and name?

Eric Trump I believe.

Edit: still technically a Trump phone?

Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#108

Post by jazzyjackson »

ortusdux wrote: post #35

Was it crowdsourced? WA state has a crowdfunding law on the books, and the state AG has gone after people that are very late to deliver.

Does that require the corporation doing the crowdfunding to be based in Washington, or no?

Anyway it was never framed as raising money a la crowd sourcing, no more than the Tesla Roadster has been, you are promised nothing for your money besides a reservation to buy the product when it eventually exists.

Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#109

Post by atmavatar »

leereeves wrote: post #100
atmavatar wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I taught my kids the rule of law and what's right and wrong or desirable are totally separate concepts. You should be careful to distinguish "rule of law" from the law itself. Rule of law is merely the principle that laws should be applied equally to all. It shouldn't matter if you're rich or poor, man or woman, a member of the majority or minority race, famous or obscure, politically well-connected or not, etc. Th…

> Rule of law is merely the principle that laws should be applied equally to all. Which sounds good at first, but... "The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal their bread." ― Anatole France

"To my friends, everything; for my enemies, the law" -- Oscar Benavides

You have to both apply the law equally to all and apply equitable criminal penalties for breaking the law, but the latter is pretty useless without the former. In that way, you could say that honoring the rule of law is necessary but not sufficient for truly equal treatment under the law.

Re: 590k buyers paid $59M for Trump's gold phone, but not one has shipped

#110

Post by alt227 »

dudus wrote: post #56
actionfromafar wrote: post #39

Wow. That's a lot buyers. You likely know some of them.

I don't know any. Maybe I just have a better social circle than most. Or maybe this is a fake number. There are not as many people preordering this clearly fake device, instead this is just another way to launder money.

> I just have a better social circle

This is very subjective. You can have your own opinions, but its really important to remember everybody has a right to their own too.

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