Nobody cares

The fact that there are reasons for things that they are how they are is one thing, and it's true he does not elaborate - but I take it his point is one of general attitude: U.S. Americans are different from Japanese. I would not say either group cares less; instead, they probably care about different things (different cultures have different value systems; the weight put on individual versus society plays a large role here, too).

It's easy to spot problems everywhere, especially if you are an analytical mind. Somebody else might care, but they may not perceive things as problematic to begin with.

Different people have different levels of sensitivity and granularity of perception: I buy "just cheese" when my wife buys "Gruyère français medium-aged" and don't you dare getting her the wrong brand.

Then, some people actually like the things how they are, so there are differences in opinion and personal taste, heck, some may even financially benefit from the status quo financially (distinguish those who don't care to help make change happen but would enjoy it if others did the work from the ones who genuinely don't care about either outcome, and both of them sit next to a third group, who do not what that change, full stop.

The post was more than just a rant: he notices where he lives, his community and him do not have "value fit" (to borrow and modify the concept of "product-market fit", since this is HN), and he is comtemplating a move. But when he says he won't move to Japan (where in any case he would always be an outsider) he is looking for middle ground - so I read his blog post as a "search query aimed at human blog readers", a call for information to find out where may be more likeminded folks, which is a good idea, given his situation.

That people do not see the need for change, one former co-worker of mine calls the "fish bowl effect": a new person joins a company, and they see everything that is broken immediately. But all the other people who have been there for 20 years don't get it. Like a new fish that joins the aquarium, who blurts "hey guys, the water in here is pretty dirty!" and all the other fill shake their head about such a weird statement, "What is he talking about?" They have been around for so long, they can't even perceive the water as "not clear" anymore, perhaps a survival adaptation to avoid permanent state of frustration.

So I wish all readers of HN that they will never become that kind of fish who stops seeing things! (Belated happy New Year, too.)

I don't think there is a rule for that? At least not in my case. My eyesight got worse really fast out-of-nowhere when I was like, 15 years old? And since then it didn't change anymore. I got myopia, after a few years of too much computer screen (the old CRTs).

> This is a car-centric ableist take.

Growing up on a island with 700 people where the most common mode of transportation is probably bicycle (besides walking, or possibly moped), it really isn't :) People are really eager to jump on the "ableist" accusation, aren't they?

> And even if you can adjust to the night, which is Moon and cloud-dependent anyway, that completely goes away every time a car goes past with its LED high beams.

It really doesn't, at least it didn't for me. It's true that for some seconds you'll see less, but your eyes will adjust faster after that than the initial adjustment when you go from a fully lit environment to unlit, even without direct moonlight.

I'm not arguing for completely dark cities, that'd be bananas. I was just giving another perspective about how we can (usually) adjust to darkness if we let our eyes be used to it. Of course we should have lights in cities so everyone (not just us with good night-sight) can navigate without issues.

This is a bizarre take to me. If food is on my tray in 60 seconds, I'm concerned what corners they are cutting to serve food this fast. It sounds terribly stressful for the employees. How can 5-10 minutes be considered slow?

I think in any case, this is an entirely different qualm than the other issues, like taking orders only via kiosk, or constantly up-selling you during the order.

Personally, I hate the McDonald's app. All the vouchers seem quite plainly optimized to encourage you to come back. I hate this kind of psychological micro-optimization of human behaviours. I would take a ten minute order every time if they stopped trying to manipulate me.

It is really more about culture.