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We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

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Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#291

Post by musicale »

gamblor956 wrote: post #272
JackFr wrote: post #228

> In the US, food insecurity has become an epidemic on college campuses. Difficult to the article seriously when reading this. (And I did follow the link to read the academic paper referenced. Though I am not in the field, I thought it was terrible. By defining food insecurity down and needlessly conflating categories it attempts to make a real problem seem worse than it is by viewing it through an ill conceived lens…

Yeah, comments like this are why so many people have turned against techies. A) There are plenty of students in the goldilocks zone of being from families to poor to afford a meal plan but too wealthy to qualify for free meals from their college. Some of these students are able to qualify for academic scholarships out of high school. The rest take on multiple jobs, including work-study, so that they can afford tuitio…

> A) ... There are plenty of students in the goldilocks zone of being from families to poor to afford a meal plan but too wealthy to qualify for free meals from their college

As I understand it, public and private 4-year universities in the US usually include meal plans in the financial aid package. Colleges may even force students to purchase (expensive) meal plans to make them profitable.

You may get stuck with oppressive student loans and mediocre, overpriced food, but you shouldn't starve.

You're not entirely wrong about COVID though - it disrupted food services and made it harder for students to get meals. You see students with meal plans resorting to food hoarding and even theft, which they rationalize based on the cost of the meal plan and lack of access.

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#292

Post by wolverine876 »

horsawlarway wrote: post #243
Retric wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s missed in these discussions is these regulations had a point to them. It’s obvious Uber driving around without passengers increases congestion. Really look at AirBnb, Bird, etc and they all offload externalities from the company and it’s customers to everyone around them. When the basic building model is to break the law, chances are the law had a point and people are going to want a return to normal eventuall…

> What’s missed in these discussions is these regulations had a point to them. This varies a lot by area - For example, I'd say the NY medallion regulations had a point to them, and that point was to systematically abuse cab drivers for the profit of the local government and banks. Then for example - in my area (Atlanta) medallion supply was capped at 1600 - the result meant cabs basically didn't exist outside of the…

NY medallion regulations auction off street space to the highest bidder, rather than allowing a tragedy of the commons: giving that limited public resource away to businesses who profit on it and consume it to the point where others are restricted from using it.

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#293

Post by wolverine876 »

version_five wrote: post #171

Where I was during uber's ascent, uber's defining value proposition was circumventing the artificial monopoly created by the taxi medallion system. This "disruption" was actually great, it shook up an industry that needed shaking up (ironically I now use cabs because they have become better than uber where I am. This would not be the case if uber never existed). But even if it did some good "disrupting", I think the…

> Same e.g. with self booked travel, self scan groceries, etc, they are not really innovating, they just change a power balance.

It is more efficient to accomplish the same thing with less time and labor.

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#294

Post by xyzzy123 »

lordnacho wrote: post #98
heurisko wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree that writing software is comparable to literacy. I think it's more similar to any other profession, with a skillset you can learn if you're interested, or learn to get paid. Not everyone is interested in writing software, and that's fine. It has also never been easier to tinker with things, as root VMs are cheaply available, in comparison to 20 years ago, when you really were just given a cpanel interface,…

Literacy is known at the top for things like the Iliad or the works of Shakespeare, but the major benefits are actually much more mundane, like allowing doctors to write prescriptions or being able to have instructions in a manual. Similarly, you may never write an OS or a AAA game, but being able to just automate a teeny tiny bit of your Excel spreadsheet, that's where software literacy will benefit the most people.

The first uses of literacy seem to be enabling beauracracy. Taxes, business records, laws, standardising things. The art stuff seems to have come later.

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#295

Post by hackernewds »

This article seems to have a primal understanding of how complex it is to run a company as complex as Uber - narrowed only to think of innovations as physical hardware, or software innovations. Easy to forget, the complexity of getting from point A to B efficiently and economically around the globe - with trust established against an unknown driver.

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#296

Post by nicbou »

verve_rat wrote: post #9
heurisko wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree that writing software is comparable to literacy. I think it's more similar to any other profession, with a skillset you can learn if you're interested, or learn to get paid. Not everyone is interested in writing software, and that's fine. It has also never been easier to tinker with things, as root VMs are cheaply available, in comparison to 20 years ago, when you really were just given a cpanel interface,…

Not writing software, using it requires software literacy. How many people do you know that refuse to learn the software they use everyday? How many times have you helped a friend or colleague with some problem just by googling it even when you don't really understand what they do for a living? It's not that we need everyone to create software, but it would unlock huge productivity gains if everyone stopped pasting s…

This literacy is particularly important because people operate in a field fraught with coercive, user-hostile design and scammers.

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#297

Post by Apocryphon »

BoorishBears wrote: post #189
talkingtab wrote: post #180

We do not have an economy built on disruption, we have an economy built on the myth of disruption. No better example than Theranos. And we have an economy built on lock-in. No better example that Apple, or perhaps Google and Amazon. These are both ways to extract value from the economic system, not ways to improve it. The Apple Tax, Google Adsense.

That's an awful example being such an exceptional case, so maybe you should elaborate.

What about WeWork then

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#298

Post by Apocryphon »

ozim wrote: post #176
Beltalowda wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that is an unfair summarisation since all the Wright brothers did was fly a very non-practical plane for about ten seconds as a kind of "MVP". There was no market. Commercial airliners took that core technology, refined it, and used it to actually create an entire new service and market.

I am writing about Ryan air or Southwest those companies did nothing to on R&D for flights. No one is accusing them that we don't have a Moon colony because they are doing what they do. Author is accusing application operating company that there is not enough innovation because of them. So it seems author just took Uber marketing division where they shout about "innovation" seriously. There are companies that are doi…

> So it seems author just took Uber marketing division where they shout about "innovation" seriously.

I mean so did VCs, the tech press, new CS graduates, and Silicon Valley in general.

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#299

Post by Apocryphon »

edanm wrote: post #276

Here's what I don't get - why is the existence of Uber proof of anything? Yes, you're right, Uber is not particularly innovative. Neither is the pizza place down the corner. They're both a business that's trying to make money, albeit at different scale and via different products. But the existence of the pizza place doesn't prove that there aren't companies creating innovation. Neither does the existence of Uber.

Perhaps there should be a study about how much of VC funding goes into companies that aim at “disruption” rather than “innovation.” If Uber, symbolizing the former, is more predominant over innovation companies, then the author has a point.

Also see the entire economy is MoviePass now:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17085538

Re: We must return to an economy fueled by innovation, rather than disruption

#300

Post by imtringued »

stevehawk wrote: post #230
zaptheimpaler wrote: post #178

The problem is incumbents get lazy and start profit-seeking. Competition is the only way we know to have a chance of fighting it. The taxi industry got away with ripping off customers and having terrible service for ages. In my country they would regularly overcharge or take longer routes. Or you call and they decide not to come, or you walk around waving your hands frantically at a taxi hoping they stop. As a touris…

you said profit seeking but I believe you meant rent seeking. All businesses profit seek, it's how you fund innovation after paying your bills.

Amazon didn't need profit to fund innovation.
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