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And who is going to police this? All the trinkets and gadgets that we produce all fall in the same category. >Nest, Echo, Homepod... Just get up and turn off

And who is going to police this? All the trinkets and gadgets that we produce all fall in the same category. >Nest, Echo, Homepod... Just get up and turn off the damn lights yourself. >Drones How many people bought one or two, flew it around for a while and crashed it. Very few are making videos or doing something interesting with them. >Starbucks Do we really need separate stores, trucks shipping product all over for someone to have the convenience of a cup of coffee? >TV/Netflix If we want to talk about the utility of something, this one is amazing. How much money, time and energy has been spent so that someone can watch a 30 minute show on demand. And we have to keep spending money and energy because the novelty of the old stuff has worn off.

ctdonath 5y ago
Yet the net result of all this "waste" is to employ billions, to incentivize productivity to the point of surplus bringing much of civilization into a luxurious life - rather than scrimping bare sustenance. Remove the smart speakers, entertainment UAEs, luxury drinks, screen time, etc and the economic ripple effects will stop funding essentials that near all currently enjoy. We've driven world abject poverty from >90% to <10% in half a century. End the products you mention (and the like), and those buying them won't themselves have customers enough to fund their own work. End Starbucks etc, and coffee farms worldwide will crash. Money is the ultimate arbiter of value. Many deride whatever as "trinkets and gadgets" etc, but they're not putting up the sustenance calories to support life otherwise.