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Yeah, and home cooks do billions of dollars worth of free cooking per year for their friends and family. The fact that something can be valued in dollars doesn

by Taywee 4y ago

Yeah, and home cooks do billions of dollars worth of free cooking per year for their friends and family. The fact that something can be valued in dollars doesn't actually mean that it's wrong that it's being done for no monetary compensation. You can put a dollar value on anything, including every constructive hobby, sport, and pastime that people do.

juanani 4y ago
Except those who benefit from home cooking are your family and friends, not the investor class/ad traders. Cant see how this relates at all..
- nh23423fefe 4y ago
  Should your family pay you to cook, or did you actually cook for them because you like it.
  - fortuna86 4y ago
    Right, but the benefit is food for your family, not money for a corporation.
jfim 4y ago
Home cooking doesn't have a single business entity that aggregates this value though. Reddit would be worth much less without this free labor, as well as most other social media companies would without user generated comment.
- OJFord 4y ago
  It also isn't a public service which makes it quite different to me at least. A better analogy might be 'soup kitchen' staff, gurdwara kitchen staff (at least I assume they're volunteers?), church choir & bell-ringers, etc.
- kelseyfrog 4y ago
  Home cooking supports every worker and their children as future labor that aggregates into every business entity. A single business entity is not a requirement for this condition. See the entire underground economy of social reproduction.
  - lostlogin 4y ago
    Reddit’s core business is the comments, and moderation is a requirement. Some (many?jurisdictions have laws around what can legally be written, so moderation becomes important. Cooking food isn’t the core business of my employer.
    - kelseyfrog 4y ago
      I mean I guess we can define core business whichever way we want, but if unpaid labor vanished overnight the entire economy would collapse so it actually is fundamentally connected to Reddit whether we like it or not.
koheripbal 4y ago
It's worse than that. They just added up the number of hours mods spend on Reddit and multiplied it by $20/hr. That isn't "worth" - that's a "cost" estimate.
lamontcg 4y ago
What it means though is that the people doing the work are often doing it due to power tripping, political axe grinding or outright being paid by other organizations to astroturf their viewpoints. Nothing is actually "free" and reddit isn't getting free moderation, there's a cost to that which shows up in the quality of the moderation. It is sort of similar to the aphorism that if the product is "free" that you are really the product. The moderation (at least on large subreddits) comes at a cost, it just isn't a direct financial cost that reddit pays.
Fnoord 4y ago
This comparison is moot. Home cooking isn't voluntary work in any sense, nor is it in any public interest. Its ensuring your _family_ has dinner. The alternatives (such as takeaway) are each more expensive. The problem with your take is that free, public labor devalues paid, public work. This is also why its difficult to compete with 'free' services such as 'free email'.

by Taywee 4y ago

juanani 4y ago

Except those who benefit from home cooking are your family and friends, not the investor class/ad traders. Cant see how this relates at all..

nh23423fefe 4y ago
Should your family pay you to cook, or did you actually cook for them because you like it.
- fortuna86 4y ago
  Right, but the benefit is food for your family, not money for a corporation.

jfim 4y ago

Home cooking doesn't have a single business entity that aggregates this value though. Reddit would be worth much less without this free labor, as well as most other social media companies would without user generated comment.

OJFord 4y ago
It also isn't a public service which makes it quite different to me at least. A better analogy might be 'soup kitchen' staff, gurdwara kitchen staff (at least I assume they're volunteers?), church choir & bell-ringers, etc.
kelseyfrog 4y ago
Home cooking supports every worker and their children as future labor that aggregates into every business entity. A single business entity is not a requirement for this condition. See the entire underground economy of social reproduction.
- lostlogin 4y ago
  Reddit’s core business is the comments, and moderation is a requirement. Some (many?jurisdictions have laws around what can legally be written, so moderation becomes important. Cooking food isn’t the core business of my employer.
  - kelseyfrog 4y ago
    I mean I guess we can define core business whichever way we want, but if unpaid labor vanished overnight the entire economy would collapse so it actually is fundamentally connected to Reddit whether we like it or not.

koheripbal 4y ago

It's worse than that. They just added up the number of hours mods spend on Reddit and multiplied it by $20/hr. That isn't "worth" - that's a "cost" estimate.

lamontcg 4y ago

What it means though is that the people doing the work are often doing it due to power tripping, political axe grinding or outright being paid by other organizations to astroturf their viewpoints. Nothing is actually "free" and reddit isn't getting free moderation, there's a cost to that which shows up in the quality of the moderation. It is sort of similar to the aphorism that if the product is "free" that you are really the product. The moderation (at least on large subreddits) comes at a cost, it just isn't a direct financial cost that reddit pays.

Fnoord 4y ago

This comparison is moot. Home cooking isn't voluntary work in any sense, nor is it in any public interest. Its ensuring your _family_ has dinner. The alternatives (such as takeaway) are each more expensive. The problem with your take is that free, public labor devalues paid, public work. This is also why its difficult to compete with 'free' services such as 'free email'.