No more CS, no more Salesforce.
It’s almost like this time last year they were doing everything they could to lower cost in advance of a now delayed IPO. And now they have to make sure they don’t implode before said IPO.
Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
121–130 of 136 posts
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#122>While Klarna pioneered the use of AI in customer service Local firms here have had bots in customer service for many years now, even well before the transformers era. Is Klarna living in a bubble?
They are pioneering too hard to pay attention to the rest of the industry.
Pioneer now, pay the technical debt later. :)
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think a lot of the dicussion is around the conflation of socialism/communism as a form of government or as an economic system. In practice, no country is self-sufficient and need not be due to comparative advantage. Thus, no country could truly be independent of capitalism as long as it exists, but capitalism is really just goods and services and salespeople and ads. It's a system of control that is powered by scar…
"because China already had cheap solutions better than AI for manufacturing, human workers." Yeah. They have cheap workers. But wasn't the whole point of socialism and the workers movement to not have cheap wage slaves anymore? But to value humans? "capitalism is really just goods and services and salespeople and ads. " And you don't think this is kind of an useless oversimplification? The point of free market system…
> But wasn't the whole point of socialism and the workers movement to not have cheap wage slaves anymore? But to value humans?
I don't know if socialism has a point as such. Value and dignity of humans is one goal, but the means by which that is accomplished is the distinguishing characteristic of socialism to my reading; that is, the means of production is not privately owned. What precludes inherently valuing humans under such a system?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism
The US has prevented other projects which could have overcome perceived weaknesses in socialism and capitalism by fusing aspects of them both.
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your intuition is wrong. As a simple example, during the months of saving in cash, by the time they have the cash, if they even save at all, they have more options for purchase. So maybe they go with the original merchant, maybe they don’t. Maybe they buy something else. Instead merchants prefer to lock in a sale right then and there, and they pay for that service.
Surely that averages out with people switching the other way during the save-up period? Perhaps for an individual shop right now, in a world where Klarna exists but not universally, yes, there's a benefit to using it to lock in that particular customer right now. It's less obvious to me, in the long run, that widespread Klarnification results in benefits to any particular shop. As mentioned earlier, having Klarna sap…
> Surely that averages out with people switching the other way during the save-up period?
Maybe? I’m not aware yet of any data that would support that hypothesis one way or the other. But we know that some businesses fail and some succeed so it would lead me to believe that hypothesis probably isn’t correct. As you mention though the availability of these offers isn’t universal, some businesses eschew these options and others don’t, and we will see that play out in the market.
If the businesses that don’t offer these services (cash only businesses as an analog) fail or convert you might have your answer.
I will also say that for many businesses they offer more than one BNPL provider at checkout so there is competitive pressure to offer good terms, have good creditworthiness models, and features to attract customers. Platforms like Shopify allow BNPL providers to create easy to use plugins that appear at checkout and merchants can add a few including Shopify’s home grown solution rather trivially.
In general I think your argument that it’s less obvious that it’s beneficial “in the long run” rests on the same logic that credit cards, 0% for 12 month offers, personal loans, etc. do as to whether there are benefits. Right now businesses add these products and see revenue go up, even if margins go down by 6-8% or so.
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
"because China already had cheap solutions better than AI for manufacturing, human workers." Yeah. They have cheap workers. But wasn't the whole point of socialism and the workers movement to not have cheap wage slaves anymore? But to value humans? "capitalism is really just goods and services and salespeople and ads. " And you don't think this is kind of an useless oversimplification? The point of free market system…
> But wasn't the whole point of socialism and the workers movement to not have cheap wage slaves anymore? But to value humans? I don't know if socialism has a point as such. Value and dignity of humans is one goal, but the means by which that is accomplished is the distinguishing characteristic of socialism to my reading; that is, the means of production is not privately owned. What precludes inherently valuing human…
Allende was probably using the most promising approach that I know of and yes, that was killed of.
"I don't know if socialism has a point as such. "
And since many different people used the word for very different things .. definitions are not clear. But people can be treated as slaves whether the factory is owned by a multinational cooperation, as well as a state run factory.
So what does it even mean, workers control the means of production?
Not a trivial question at all and it boils down who has power. And often or rather allmost always it developed to: not the workers working there.
But even if you would make a iron socialist law, that this should be the case. The workers always decide what they build - then you wouldn't have central planning anymore. And why should other workers decide to give their products to that factory?
Ah, they could negotiate contracts. Like in a free market?
Or they cannot and then it just means, they don't really control their means of production.
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
Glen Okun of NYU business school has written about BNPL loan portfolio weakness. The AI marketing is just an attempt to reframe the value narrative of the company before IPO. They would rather be seen as an AI company than an unsecured lender of last resort. The narrative on Klarna’s core business is not good in any case, either an extractive lender benefiting from people buying what they may not afford and charging…
If you default on your Klarna loan, you could pay them back in support hours: > The pilot has started small, with two of the new breed of customer-service agents live now, but the ambition is to tap into candidates such as students or rural populations. “We also know there are tons of Klarna users that are very passionate about our company and would enjoy working for us,” he added. [from the bloomberg article: https:…
Here is an archive of the article:
https://web.archive.org/web/20250512120733/https://www.bloom...
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But wasn't the whole point of socialism and the workers movement to not have cheap wage slaves anymore? But to value humans? I don't know if socialism has a point as such. Value and dignity of humans is one goal, but the means by which that is accomplished is the distinguishing characteristic of socialism to my reading; that is, the means of production is not privately owned. What precludes inherently valuing human…
Allende was probably using the most promising approach that I know of and yes, that was killed of. "I don't know if socialism has a point as such. " And since many different people used the word for very different things .. definitions are not clear. But people can be treated as slaves whether the factory is owned by a multinational cooperation, as well as a state run factory. So what does it even mean, workers contr…
> So what does it even mean, workers control the means of production?
> Not a trivial question at all and it boils down who has power. And often or rather allmost always it developed to: not the workers working there.
> But even if you would make a iron socialist law, that this should be the case. The workers always decide what they build - then you wouldn't have central planning anymore. And why should other workers decide to give their products to that factory?
> Ah, they could negotiate contracts. Like in a free market?
> Or they cannot and then it just means, they don't really control their means of production.
To this reading, the workers cannot even exercise their ownership rights over the means of production meaningfully without free markets, thus aligning the goals of capitalism with socialism. Somehow I expect both parties to be disappointed, which might be a workable compromise?
But what do Marx and Engels or other socialists etc say about free markets and freedom to enter contracts, and what bearing those aspects have compared to owning the means of production? I don't think they were talking about stock exchanges, for example. The goals were economic, opt-in via free association of free workers, but were governmental or democratic aspects even addressed in their works?
What if workers owning the means of production looks like cryptocurrency?
Perhaps some socialists and capitalists would agree: no, not like that!
But would they be arguing out of self-interest, or would they be right about crypto not being compatible with socialism?
Wouldn't that just reduce to capitalism all over again?
Do workers do the work, or does capital?
Is capital simply a voting/allocation mechanism for a given work unit of decision-making control enacted upon the means of production?
Does owning the means of production in the economy imply controlling the means of governance in the government? Would one presuppose the other?
These are honest questions because I'm honestly curious about the answers.
> But people can be treated as slaves whether the factory is owned by a multinational cooperation, as well as a state run factory.
Doesn't capitalism just make us slaves with extra steps?
Or were we slaves to our passions all along?
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
Glen Okun of NYU business school has written about BNPL loan portfolio weakness. The AI marketing is just an attempt to reframe the value narrative of the company before IPO. They would rather be seen as an AI company than an unsecured lender of last resort. The narrative on Klarna’s core business is not good in any case, either an extractive lender benefiting from people buying what they may not afford and charging…
I can't believe it takes b-school professors to figure out that people financing their DoorDash might not be the best people to lend money to.
Not that I necessarily disagree with your overall take, but can someone explain how 'financing' your DoorDash order with a credit card is perfectly OK, but financing with Klarna is somehow dubious and shady. Surely the problem is buying stuff you cannot afford, not how you choose to buy it.
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
You know some businesses are led by people not board rooms, and especially businesses that consider themselves part of a community, and sell to their neighbors, don't want said neighbors to be rat-fucked by exploitative financial products, even if it will possibly benefit them at no risk. This is generally called "being a person with a soul."
The board of a company are people.
Sure but it is easier to order genocide from an office than being the guy who has to march the children into the gas chamber.
Humans have come up with wonderful bureaucracy to dilute responsibility.
Re: Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes they are, a few years ago once got a scuffle with the Swedish tax agency because they were abusing some tax loopholes. The tax agency came in with the bill and they just immediately "layoff" 90% of the contractors working there (a good chunk of the workforce). All so their quarterly statements wouldn't look bad for the stock market. Klarna is the prime example of toxic public companies
Klarna hasnt even gone public yet...
Doesn’t matter. They want to go public and with that in mind will operate the business to ensure the financials look “good” for when it’s time to IPO