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Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

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Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#71

Post by RandallBrown »

melling wrote: post #12

I skimmed the article and got to the first comment complaining that Larry Ellison spends millions on the America's Cup and he doesn't give a crap ... Basically, the problem is that for years CA, and America in general, spent money that it didn't have and now it's going to get painful. There's no point in whining and complaining. Americans are doing it to themselves. Sit down and decide what we can afford to pay for a…

I think you read the wrong thing. This post is about the metafilter comment that is a story about a poor person using a library.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#72

Post by philwelch »

true_religion wrote: post #50
clintjhill wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Police, Emergency and Fire departments are all "good" and "provide value" however they are not profitable. Nor do people run out to voluntarily pay for them. And there are a few cases where counties/municipalities created subscription like fees for these to the effect of somebody losing a house to a fire while the fire fighters stood to watch. This is the core of the problem with "no taxes" - principally it's good on…

People aren't asked to voluntarily pay for the police force, however people in the middle class and above do pay for security services which approximates a part of what the police do. People also pay for detective services when the police fail, are unwilling, or are not tasked to inquire into a particular crime. Also people pay investigative services for breech of contract civil offenses that the police generally do…

The crux of libertarian thought is that public services like the police can be entirely replaced by voluntary organizations--that the neighborhood watch or private detectives should assume the powers of, say, arresting people and putting them in jail.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#73

Post by melling »

RandallBrown wrote: post #71
melling wrote: post #12

I skimmed the article and got to the first comment complaining that Larry Ellison spends millions on the America's Cup and he doesn't give a crap ... Basically, the problem is that for years CA, and America in general, spent money that it didn't have and now it's going to get painful. There's no point in whining and complaining. Americans are doing it to themselves. Sit down and decide what we can afford to pay for a…

I think you read the wrong thing. This post is about the metafilter comment that is a story about a poor person using a library.

I thought it was about how people need libraries and the funds are being cut.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#74

Post by DanBC »

xenophanes wrote: post #56
afterburner wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They provide the most service to those unable to afford help. Also, they mostly provide the intangible service of raising peoples' education. That's why they don't make money. People only go to college because they think they're screwed if they don't, but almost nothing else education related has that amount of leverage in the peoples' decision-making.

Fundamentally they don't make money because they don't charge, and also don't sit around trying to think of ways to make money (while still remaining true to their core values and purpose). I don't think we should assume it's an insoluble problem. Once one has an audience and does something useful, monetizing can often be tricky, but is often possible. Just as one example, what if libraries had some ads somewhere? Th…

> Just as one example, what if libraries had some ads somewhere? Then they could be provided for free to poor people but also gain some revenue.

Perhaps when people borrow a book they are only given the first four chapters; they have to promote the library to get access to the next three chapters; and they have to pay to get access to the last four chapters?

I doubt freemium models will translate well to libraries.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#75

Post by danielford »

anrope wrote: post #34

Maybe I'm just not in a skeptical mood today, but the anecdote in that story points out something that I tend to take for granted. I'm probably not alone, especially here on HN. That is, the fact that some people just really don't understand the most basic concepts of using a computer. And it's not their fault. Your breath seizes in your chest, and you realize you have no idea what to do. You have the form that they…

I've been surprised by the lack of technical ability in my college classes, especially from students that are my age or younger. This semester, a student told me she couldn't find a program to write a short assignment. I sent her a link to OpenOffice and was baffled by how excited she was about it. She informed me that she was writing papers nonstop, just because she was happy to finally have a tool that let her do it. And this wasn't a dumb person either. Last week she was half a point away from a perfect score on an exam that would have ruined my semester back when I was in college.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#76

Post by gokhan »

If there's demand, there will emerge scriveners of the new era, helping computer illiterate people.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrivener :

Scriveners remain a common sight in countries where literacy rates remain low; they read letters for illiterate customers, as well as write letters or fill out forms for a fee. Many now use portable typewriters to prepare letters for their clients.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#77

Post by unimpressive »

melling wrote: post #73
RandallBrown wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you read the wrong thing. This post is about the metafilter comment that is a story about a poor person using a library.

I thought it was about how people need libraries and the funds are being cut.

It's about a lot of things at once. But libraries are the frame for the rest of the piece.

As far as I can tell topics covered are:

0) The digital divide.

1) Cutting of Public benefits

2) Cutting of library funds specifically

3) How libraries help gap the digital divide but even with funding are just helping people tread water.

4) That the will, money, and effort to change this situation might not be there.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#78

Post by pessimizer »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #45
urbanjunkie wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If they are a great idea, why not persuade people to voluntarily pay for them? Because, in this specific case, the people who most need libraries can often barely afford to pay for food and shelter. Libraries are such an obvious public good that I will never understand why they're not treated (both in the US and in the UK, and perhaps in other countries), as a basic and absolute necessity. [edited to add not which…

Libraries are a private good, not a public good. Since so many people seem to be getting confused on this point, I'll just post these articles: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_good http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_good The fact that their customers are broke (but not so broke they can't afford cable TV) doesn't change this.

Do you have any information about the cable TV subscription rates of the poor, or are you just trotting out bullshit theories of poverty as lack of impulse control and proper priority setting that were already dusty when Reagan took office?

edit: That is definitely information. Appreciate the references (that were given as a reply to the other comment.) Will look at them later to see if they answer the question that came to mind as I was reading your numbers; what's the churn? How many people were in that 14% during any particular period?

For example, if I did a survey during a famine to find out how many people had a meal that day, and found out 2/3s had, it would be incorrect to say that only 1/3 of people had been effected.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#79

Post by urbanjunkie »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #64
urbanjunkie wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And you know they can afford cable tv how, exactly? There are apparently 1.5 million homeless children in the US. Are they watching cable tv? But it's ok - you can link to the correct definition of public vs private good. I'm actually disgusted by your attitude.

And you know they can afford cable tv how, exactly? Because the US government did a survey measured this. I link to the raw data in a separate post on this thread, currently downmodded for reasons unknown. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3607475

I think it's pretty obvious why you're being down-modded. It's what happens when you set up your own strawman and then demolish it.

Re: Every day at my job I helped people just barely survive

#80

Post by unimpressive »

tomjen3 wrote: post #49
unimpressive wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"These gov't forms are often ripe for improvement via improved UX with step-by-step inputs, contextual help, and multi-language capabilities." Sure, and this would undoubtedly relieve a lot of pain points. But the authors intent here goes deeper than just interface. A significant, very non-trivial portion of the population is being left behind by digitalization. These people have no recourse if certain government ins…

If you are 53 you have had plenty of time over the last ten years to learn to use computers. As for what I would do if I was operating firefox for the first time? Try. Or ask somebody next to me (or one of those standing in line).

While I like to think that if you asked for help you would get it, how do you normally respond when people ask you to help them with computer tasks? Now I don't know about you, but my first instinct is to flee. Helping people with computers, a lot of the time, is annoying.

This is compounded by the condescending attitude that most computer users have towards "non-computer" people. If you ask someone to help you with filling out forms, or logging into facebook, or whatever it is you want to do, your probably going to be met with an attitude analogous to "You silly idiot...". I'm not trying to take the moral high ground here, chances are I've acted on this attitude just as many times (On average for years of life.) as you may have, probably more.

It's a very damaging meme. And very hard to eradicate.

EDIT: This was originally appended to my post above. But I eventually decided that was basically just a way of replying that bloated the discussion.

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