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Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

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Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#481

Post by dsfyu404ed »

nigelcleland wrote: post #430
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd personally flip 4 and 5 since I think having incentive not to screw you and recourse if you get screwed is important. Local businesses have much more reason not to screw people and people have much more recourse when screwed compared to state or national government.

I'd agree, another way to look at is who do you have the greatest recourse to when something goes wrong. Local businesses will often be more sensitive to their customers than local governments. National governments will be even less sensitive.

Local businesses can't shoot your dog or take your kids and say "oops, take it to court if you don't like it" (well they can, it'll just work out very, very badly for them).

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#482

Post by taurath »

angersock wrote: post #459
taurath wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess is the goal for everyone to join in some sort of majoritarian social contract? Being a lgbt person growing up I didn't interact in my local small community at all, because there was a damn good chance the local community would band together and mob me for being what I am. Finding a group of people I can identify with probably saved my life, literally, if not from some band of bigots than depression and suicid…

> I guess is the goal for everyone to join in some sort of majoritarian social contract? Being a lgbt person growing up I didn't interact in my local small community at all, because there was a damn good chance the local community would band together and mob me for being what I am. Alternately, by removing yourself from your community you failed to give them examples that would've broadened their horizons. Like, this…

When you're in a place that is actually unsafe, where people get assaulted for being different, that's a difficult ask. I went to a safe space first. And due to the magic of the internet (and telling my parents) people definitely know. The culture has changed enough to where it IS safe now to come out in that community (the worst that will happen is you get put into a camp, unlikely assaulted other than at school), but it wasn't then - the ADULTS would come after you. The first thing I heard after I came out was "don't tell anyone, I don't want anyone firebombing my house".

People weren't unenlightened because LGBT people were hiding, LGBT people were hiding because of a fear of violence and ostracization. Only when it became unacceptable to be violent towards people did they change, and that's a slow process. Only then can you effect any change. There are braver people than I who stayed in those situations, but most of them were also a lot better at fitting in with the community in the first place.

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#483

Post by Groxx »

lolsal wrote: post #333
supernovae wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the value of "owning" something? I've owned VHS's, they're worthless I've owned houses - that I had to short sell I've owned DVD's - they're worthless I've owned Books - they're worthless What is the value of owning over just paying to enjoy access? I like spotify because i can sync music to my phone to play offline - but "owning" all this music is worthless... I had a HUGE cd collection growing up but they w…

> I've owned VHS's, they're worthless ... > I've owned DVD's - they're worthless > I've owned Books - they're worthless I honestly find this unbelievable and amazing. You have never rewatched a video, or re-read a book? You've never lent a movie or a book to a friend? You've never used a movie or a book to job your memory and spark a conversation with someone? There is value in all of those things to me, not to menti…

It depends.

Have I rewatched every video I own enough times to offset the cost of renting it for each time I've watched it? Overwhelmingly "no". Not even close. Rentals of even new things are a couple bucks, DVDs are often $20 or more. I'm quite free to lend stuff out too, but it's still Add in that the stuff I do rewatch is relatively old and rent-able for dirt cheap, and it's even more "no". There are a literal handful I'd buy, that's it.

Same pattern with books, except that odds are pretty good that the library has a copy of it :) And even slightly not-super-famous books are pretty likely to be new to people I lend to because there are so many. (technical books are another matter, they're frequently not in libraries, but there too I've only reread a couple that are meaty enough to actually justify more than one pass)

---

Books I still keep buying, especially since much of what I read for fun is somewhat old and available for extremely cheap. But I haven't bought a movie in... a decade? And I feel zero desire to do so.

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#484

Post by badminton1 »

There is an overlap between ownership and access.

Reduced access is bad.

Reduced ownership is bad only if it leads to reduced access.

-

I have a lot of books here at home that I haven't read in a long time. If I didn't own them that would not affect me in any way, since their resell value is very low. My exclusive ownership of these books makes them highly inefficient.

Same goes for a lot of stuff that people own but hardly ever use. Owning fewer things is not necessarily bad.

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#485

Post by bluishgreen »

Recently I gave away my linux compute machine and use AWS instead. I can dial up to 400GB of RAM/100 cores when I need to run a major compute job, and dial down to a machine which is 10 cents an hour for 99.0% of my compute time. I get the benefit of owning a 10,000$ machine for a fraction of the cost, approx 80$ a month.

"The erosion of personal ownership and what that will mean for our loyalties to traditional American concepts of capitalism and private property"

If the lament here is for the mountain of garbage that each individual generates in the name of private property, color me not-amused. Think of those broken old DVDs that were used at most once or twice. Think of those cars that sit on parking lots and garages 99% of their lives. Wounding the earth to extract all that resource and burying our future in a carbon cloud. And for what! To hold on to some vague notion of private property like a comfort blanket.

The future is one we have not seen before, of all powerful trillion dollar companies. But the recent past is a hell scape which led to global warming and other atrocities. We should be willing to walk boldly into this unknown future if only for the promise of reducing waste and possibly a better climate future.

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#486

Post by dredmorbius »

ddingus wrote: post #346
dredmorbius wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Content isn't king. Channel control is.

Yes. Thought experiment: There are two channels. One airs very compelling content (the king), but is low quality. The other has tepid content, but is excellent quality. Which do you use? Over time, I have asked this of a ton of people and have A/B tested it a few times in my home. Originally about legacy, broadcast media and choices I did not understand. Compelling is the majority answer people give. And yes, that va…

The vein I had in mind would better be reflected by; excellent content but generally unavailable, vs. mediocre content, but it's unavoidable. Sole-vendor contracts with major metro areas, piped into all public spaces, stores, restaurants, bars, coffeeshops. Incorporated in other entertainment (films, video games).

That's control over channel.

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#487

Post by Hasz »

supernovae wrote: post #311
ryandrake wrote: post #241

I’m surprised at the criticism here and I think the critics are missing the author’s point. He’s not saying, “buy more stuff you don’t need” or even, “possess more stuff.” He’s saying, “you ought to own the stuff you possess.” Which I didn’t think was a controversial opinion but I guess I stand corrected. I might be an outlier. I make a deliberate effort to own instead of rent. My commute is enormous because I moved…

What is the value of "owning" something? I've owned VHS's, they're worthless I've owned houses - that I had to short sell I've owned DVD's - they're worthless I've owned Books - they're worthless What is the value of owning over just paying to enjoy access? I like spotify because i can sync music to my phone to play offline - but "owning" all this music is worthless... I had a HUGE cd collection growing up but they w…

I would point out the very fact someone was willing to risk jail time to steal that CD collection means it's not worthless.

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#488

Post by cableshaft »

jonknee wrote: post #437
nigelcleland wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a huge network cost towards doing this. The centralised platforms by definition will push us closer towards the mean (as the mean is most profitable) at the expense of the outlier. This means that you'll have a higher quality median (note, not mean) experience at the cost of experiencing any true outliers. The best way it's been put to me is the follows: * (AI/ML/Algorithmic Recommendation) = 8/10 products y…

I guess what I'm saying is I am OK with this and vastly prefer it to collecting things in my home. I could put a ton more effort/money in and clutter my house and get some marginal more enjoyment from movies, but for me that is a losing proposition. I'd rather not buy anything or put in the time and enjoy the content less. I can definitely understand if movies are a passion this would be undesirable, but they're not…

I think that point of view is fine on an individual level. For people who like to live a minimalist lifestyle and don't want to be tied down to a location or want to be able to pack up and move easily, or just plain hate clutter and don't find enough personal value in owning these things that's fine (although you can store a lot on a single external hard drive nowadays).

But I don't think this is a good idea for the world to become like this as a whole. The more things are centralized (stream from one server as opposed to living in a bunch of locations all over the world), the easier it is for parts of our culture to disappear.

The artifacts we find from thousands of years ago are a super tiny handful of many, many, many more that existed (perhaps not exact copies, but the same types of things), and we have lost who knows how knowledge and cultural artifacts from the past, in particular the ancient past, due to things like libraries and museums getting burned down or destroyed, statues being removed, massive wars fought, etc.

Even in our own lifetimes there have been the Taliban that have destroyed ancient Buddhist statues in Afghanistan[1], ISIS destroying artifacts in Iraq museums[2], and looters destroying or stealing artifacts from a Cairo museum while the Arab Spring was underway[3]. Along with many, many other examples[4].

We collectively have the capability to have exact or near-exact copies of all sorts of documents, art, video, audio, etc. The more people that hang on to these things, the more future generations benefit from it. And the more we can benefit from the archival actions of others now.

But again, it doesn't require that everyone do it, or even for each person to try to have a copy of literally everything that exists. Just that enough people own copies of the things they love and share them with people as much as they can, helps insure the survival of our cultural heritage.

BTW, I found an interesting site that chronicles all the various types of media that are known to have existed but are now lost. It's called LostMediaWiki, if you're curious. I was surprised how long the list was just for video games, which aren't that old as a medium.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhas_of_Bamiyan

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destruction_of_Mosul_Museum_ar...

[3] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-12442863

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_destroyed_heritage

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#489

Post by gniv »

burfog wrote: post #194
amelius wrote: post #6

It may be better for the environment to not own stuff, but instead use services. For example, take a fridge. If I buy a fridge, the company I buy it from has an incentive to make it break in N years, so they can sell me a new one, i.e. "planned obsolescence". However, if I subscribe to a service to keep my food and beverages at a certain temperature, then the company has the incentive to make the fridge last as long…

I got burned by "buying a product and not knowing when it will fail". Samsung made the largest fridge available. I got the $2500 model: stainless steel, no IoT but digital, double doors over drawer freezer. It looked really solid and durable. It failed in so many distinct and interesting ways! The door shelves constantly shattered, at $50 each. The structure had been compromised by artistic design, with two kinds of…

> I've learned my lesson: do not pay more in an attempt to get quality, because you'll just pay more for the same old junk.

I don't agree. I think you can still buy quality things. The problem is that the market pushed the prices so low for "good enough" products, that it's difficult to justify paying much more. In the case of refrigerators, you'd have to pay at least three times more for a Sub-Zero fridge, for example.

Re: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

#490

Post by LMYahooTFY »

Kalium wrote: post #331
qubex wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I might add that Silicon Valley et al has not simply cleverly redefined the meaning of ’sharing’ to cover their rental practices, but even the meaning of community has been totally warped out of shape. A community used to be a group of geographically proximate people whose collective survival depended on getting over their sometimes conflicting mutual interests and opinions in order to survive; now we use the term ’c…

Personally, I view this as a distinct upgrade. Instead of being coerced into lots of interaction with people I may have nothing in common with except vague geographical proximity, I have the option of interacting with people who actually share my interests or concerns or hobbies. To me, this isn't isolated loners. It's the first real community I've ever known. The first one I've ever actually felt like I was a part o…

I think you're applying the words "tyranny" and "coercion" very sloppily here, and seem rather dismissive of community as it's existed prior to "real community".

I don't see anything you've stated as mutually exclusive to the previous comment.

I point out what I perceive as dismissive because I think there are important aspects of human character that 'tyrannical' circumstances help to shape, enabling us to learn patience and tolerance of opposing views.

It's how we ultimately achieve error correction in culture and progress as a society, and it's not clear to me that an option for people to utterly extinguish all of that from one's environment is an upgrade.

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