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Are we the baddies?

geohot.github.io

191–200 of 554 posts

Re: Are we the baddies?

#191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Taxis are almost always twice or sometimes (airport) 3x the price. Not where I live. Here, Uber is 50-100% more* than the price of a local taxi, at all times of day. Uber is also at least 30% more expensive than hailing a black cab. So even though I have the app, after optimistically checking the Uber price, I invariably choose to book a taxi instead. The shorter arrival times shown in the Uber app are sometimes te…

> Not where I live I never understand why people make comments like this and leave it to the reader to guess where they live. Your profile has your email and linkedin, so it's not like you're trying to stay anonymous. And to your point, local taxis being less expensive is unusual in my travels from 50+ countries. Uber/Grab/Bolt/Gojeck/Maxim are almost always significantly cheaper and more reliable in my experience, e…

Not GP but I didn't mention either; Netherlands.

Re: Are we the baddies?

#192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> make you comfortable while you exist I don't think there are many proponents of that type of ubi. The way, at least I, see ubi is absolute subsistence - with a right to earn above that without affecting your subsistence. IMHO something along UBI is needed for a democratized market economy - and I think the Scandinavian countries are the support for this claim.

If everyone gets an equal raise (whatever the UBI is), wouldn’t the entire market simply adjust to price that in, leaving everyone in the same relative position?

Price/income increases don't happen in a vacuum, it takes a while for it to become normal. If you got a £50 bonus and decide to get yourself to a McDonalds, only to find they've raised the price of their burgers to £50, would you still buy the burger? Your situation would be the same as before so logically you would, but of course you wouldn't. That price increase has overall lost Mcdonalds money, since now you're not buying anything (assuming everything else they sell also went up a proportional amount).

Obviously there are essentials that can effectively be at any price and you have to pay them if you can afford them, but everything else is fair game.

Re: Are we the baddies?

#194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> who think needing clean underwear is weak. Washing clothes was discovered several thousands years ago. And boarding plane is much faster. I really do not want to pay for your luggage!

> Washing clothes was discovered several thousands years ago. So you carry high quality detergent, and clean washing machine with delicate setting, and then air dry your clothes? Nice.

You just wear your dirty clothes in the shower. No worry about shrinking or stretching either. They will even air dry while you're wearing them if carrying a second set of clothes is not an option.

The big problem with traveling without any bags at all is that you get flagged by security for extra attention. Turns out terrorists are too cheap to buy a set of luggage and a return ticket if they're just going to blow themselves up.

Re: Are we the baddies?

#195

How could it take a smart person until July 5 2025 to realize this? I think that's the most concerning part. Long overdue realization.

Is that a slight against the author? If so, how does publishing an article imply they only just realised something?

Re: Are we the baddies?

#196
The issue is the market. These things are possible because of the skewed market.

There are far more men than women on dating apps, women don't buy the boosts, etc.

So you are paying for exposure in that skewed market.

If it were a complete free-for-all then women would get thousands of messages a day and not use the apps at all.

Re: Are we the baddies?

#197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, it’s very mild first steps anti-capitalism. Nothing about class, for example.

A few posts before he shared a story of a black woman Amazon delivery driver caught on camera complaining about delivering to a rich person's large house. He attributed this to basic monkey psychology and said it led to revolutions where all the rich people get killed and society gets poorer overall. I read it as mocking poor people, but maybe he was trying to warn the people who get killed in those kinds of revoluti…

Cf: https://geohot.github.io/blog/jekyll/update/2025/03/16/resen...

Re: Are we the baddies?

#199
The layers are part of the evolution. We may like to credit ourselves with great inventions which built these layers, but it is like trees claiming to create the wind, rivers claiming to create water flow etc. Humans are just facilitators or vehicles that carry the wind of change. We don't cause the change. The change has selected the agents who showed least resistance to the change. Then the agents gloriously claimed that they caused the change.

Re: Are we the baddies?

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> make you comfortable while you exist I don't think there are many proponents of that type of ubi. The way, at least I, see ubi is absolute subsistence - with a right to earn above that without affecting your subsistence. IMHO something along UBI is needed for a democratized market economy - and I think the Scandinavian countries are the support for this claim.

If everyone gets an equal raise (whatever the UBI is), wouldn’t the entire market simply adjust to price that in, leaving everyone in the same relative position?

I don't know about the long term economic effects, but there are people who currently earn less than the subsistence amount who will be better off with UBI than without it.
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