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People do make the conscious decision to consume more wholesome experiences than heroin every day though, even if heroin was in front of them next to their food

by ENGNR 10y ago

People do make the conscious decision to consume more wholesome experiences than heroin every day though, even if heroin was in front of them next to their food/drink/work day. NYT has already carved out a profitable niche selling access to plain old long form journalism, it's one of the few success stories

intended 10y ago
Thats if people know they are imbibing heroin. I dont think half the people on HN itself are aware that most mobile games are designed and sold as differently themed skinner boxes. What hope do normal people have to even be aware? And That's something ubiquitous and only recently being questioned and condemned by people in the industry. Awareness of the pitfalls of simple apps is an issue. Forget the really insidious stuff being made by people with the intention to deceive and manipulate. ------ Holding up NYT as a survivor is telling. The websites and newspapers that remain today are a small fraction of the Print Media industry which was thriving in 1985. Holding these few existences as successes, ignores the huge survivorship bias baked into the example. NYT was already a massive name, and worked very very hard to adapt to the new medium. It was one of the few magazines which attempted - very early on - to build interesting HTML/multi media articles. They tried making subscriptions work, a move widely derided at the time as a sure shot to failure. (if people forget, once upon a time subscriptions and pay walls were considered sure shots to failure on the web). The powers and membership of the fourth estate has been vastly eroded, and the ability of people to get past a persons defences, or to build an echo chamber has been significantly enhanced. The recent American elections were a low throughput event, but it showed how simply tweeting allows someone to significantly take advantage of (a particular) group think.

by ENGNR 10y ago

intended 10y ago

Thats if people know they are imbibing heroin. I dont think half the people on HN itself are aware that most mobile games are designed and sold as differently themed skinner boxes. What hope do normal people have to even be aware? And That's something ubiquitous and only recently being questioned and condemned by people in the industry. Awareness of the pitfalls of simple apps is an issue. Forget the really insidious stuff being made by people with the intention to deceive and manipulate. ------ Holding up NYT as a survivor is telling. The websites and newspapers that remain today are a small fraction of the Print Media industry which was thriving in 1985. Holding these few existences as successes, ignores the huge survivorship bias baked into the example. NYT was already a massive name, and worked very very hard to adapt to the new medium. It was one of the few magazines which attempted - very early on - to build interesting HTML/multi media articles. They tried making subscriptions work, a move widely derided at the time as a sure shot to failure. (if people forget, once upon a time subscriptions and pay walls were considered sure shots to failure on the web). The powers and membership of the fourth estate has been vastly eroded, and the ability of people to get past a persons defences, or to build an echo chamber has been significantly enhanced. The recent American elections were a low throughput event, but it showed how simply tweeting allows someone to significantly take advantage of (a particular) group think.