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I often learn a lot at the check out lines here in Oregon. People chat, exchange information. Often banal, sometimes valuable. Always nice.
by dennisdamenace 9y ago
I often learn a lot at the check out lines here in Oregon. People chat, exchange information. Often banal, sometimes valuable. Always nice.
- hn_throw2 9y agoI'm sorry, but it's completely unclear how nice chats do anything to resolve "American tribalism", or, more pertinently, why it's the responsibility of marketplace owners to generate squares of social interaction at all. Even if this slight increase in social interaction did anything ("cash or credit?" -- "Credit, ma'am"), that's as ridiculous as fixing race conditions with sleep() calls (hehe, race conditions).
- 1024core 9y agoWhy use a throwaway account? But to answer your comment: the comment was not about the chit-chat with the cashier, but other people in the line.
- hn_throw3 9y agoI am genuinely afraid of any even modestly political claim being publicly attached to me ("it's not the marketplace owner's responsibility" has a libertarian flavor to it).
- melq 9y agoNice chats don't have to resolve 'American tribalism' to be worthwhile.
- hn_throw3 9y agoSure, they might be worthwhile in isolation, but the context from the GGP was that they're worthwhile enough to worry about Amazon Go (by being a valuable source of interpersonal contact during times of "increasing tribalism").
- degenerate 9y agoI can confidently say that's _not_ the case in most urban areas.
- 1024core 9y agoI dunno. Yesterday at the Farmers Market, I was shopping for produce (salads) and had a conversation with 2 different women. The first offered advice on what to pick, and their health benefits. The second, in turn, was the recipient of my limited knowledge. I live in San Francisco.
- not_kurt_godel 9y agoIf those supposed health benefits aren't real or are misrepresented, which I would guess is likely, then that social interaction was a net negative for society.
- sotojuan 9y agoMost HN users live in urban areas. Here in NYC your average check out line is people on their phones and/or with headphones on. And before you say NYC is an outlier, it was the same when I lived in semi-rural suburban Texas.
- rainbowmverse 9y ago>> Most HN users live in urban areas. I didn't know YC published HN's demographics. Do you have a link?
- isitwhatitis 9y ago>80% of the American population lived in what is called an urban area in the 2010 census [1]. While their definition of urban is looser than you might use, still >60% lived in 'cities'[2]. Unless the wealthier, more connected, more educated readership of Hacker News strongly bucks every trend suggested by their demographics, it's pretty safe to say we mostly live in urban areas. [1]https://www.citylab.com/equity/2012/03/us-urban-population-what-does-urban-really-mean/1589/ https://www.citylab.com/equity/2012/03/us-urban-population-w... [2]https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2015/cb15-33.html https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2015/cb15-33....
- mulmen 9y agoHow do you know HN is made up of only Americans?
- wyager 9y agoThis is a regional cultural thing. I’ve mostly noticed it in ethnically and linguistically homogenous areas. Absolutely not the case in most American urban centers outside of the northern US.