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> Today, you’d probably have to schedule an electrician to fix what some children back then knew how to make: electric bells, buttons, and buzzers. Where I liv

> Today, you’d probably have to schedule an electrician to fix what some children back then knew how to make: electric bells, buttons, and buzzers. Where I live you are technically not allowed to install equipment on 120 or 240 if you are not a certified electrician. Insurance won't cover water damage if installation hasn't been done by a professional plumber. People still do it, but this is not going in the right direction.

acheron 4y ago
But it keeps work coming to the electricians' and plumbers' unions (motto: "If you didn't make any mistakes, you're not working fast enough"), and isn't that the important thing?
- charles_f 4y ago
  For the story, I used "professionals" to rebuild drywall after a flood. They managed to fuck up my ethernet network in the process, but they don't want to admit guilt, and they're telling me to "use wifi instead".
- Infernal 4y ago
  Strange, my experiences with unionized labor have found the exact opposite - safety conscious to the nth degree, and much more likely to criticize each other for working too quickly than too slowly. They seem to be incentivized to 1) not get dinged for safety infractions and 2) get as many billable hours out of every work order as possible.
throwie_wayward 4y ago
I completely disagree... on the trend you back up, I see a future where you cannot cook your own food unless you've become a professional specialist of cooking (for food safety). going to cartoon levels of ridiculousness, a society in which you cannot do anything other than consume unless you're doing a job (which would involve safety, insurance, and other various legal and bureaucratic requirements). what keeps things sane where you live is the 'technically' aspect. which I read as "individuals often ignore those rules for personal reasons (meaning when no businesses are involved)"...
- mellavora 4y ago
  Huh. Extending your distopian cartoon by reference to an earlier (today) HN thread about sex workers, and thinking of a society where ...
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- charles_f 4y ago
  Yeah I think that you mis-interpreted what I meant. Being prevented to do stuff as simple as changing a switch, a plug or a faucet is plain stupid, and I'm pretty sure it's not even backed by data (or if it is, it's probably overconservative).
- KennyBlanken 4y ago
  > I see a future where you cannot cook your own food unless you've become a professional specialist of cooking (for food safety). This has already happening to some degree in the US, in the sense that one has to follow a lot of food safety practices in order to keep from getting violently ill eating food sold in a grocery store. The best example being the poultry industry. Instead of our government requiring chicken farms control salmonella (which is required of European farmers), the poultry industry has convinced both the government and the consumer that it's totally cool to shift things to "you didn't cook your chicken properly so it's your fault that you got salmonella." Processed chicken in the US is washed in chlorine because there's so much salmonella and it would spoil the chicken between the packing plant and consumer's fridge. Similarly, eggs sold in the US can't be stored outside the refrigerator because they've been washed to attempt to control salmonella; the washing destroys the egg's natural protective barrier. We can't eat vegetables bought in a grocery store without washing them; otherwise we might get e.coli, because corporate megafarms refuse to provide proper sanitation for field workers and use enormous field sizes in order to eek out as much profit as they possibly can. Yet again: it's your fault you got e.coli because you didn't wash your vegetables well enough, not the fault of the farms and distributors and grocery stores for selling you unsafe food.
  - lupire 4y ago
mickael-kerjean 4y ago
This is very much like this in Australia. I had friends warning me against setting up my own pendant light because of insurance and other blabla and was denied to buy some electrical cables at the local hardware shop as I wasn't certified even though I hold a bachelor in electronics .... Compared that to France where I spent time at uni building my own guitar amplifier for my bachelor thesis, manipulating 300V-500V and blowing a couple valve along the process, ha fun time
- CodeSgt 4y ago
  Wow the insurance is one thing but not even bring able to buy electrical cable is crazy to me. Australia's government truly is more dystopian than most people give it credit for being. Every now and then I hear about another fundamental freedom I take for granted that they just don't have and it just reminds me how lucky I am not to live there.
JTbane 4y ago
That's pretty ridiculous, so you can't change a socket without calling a guy?

acheron 4y ago

But it keeps work coming to the electricians' and plumbers' unions (motto: "If you didn't make any mistakes, you're not working fast enough"), and isn't that the important thing?

charles_f 4y ago
For the story, I used "professionals" to rebuild drywall after a flood. They managed to fuck up my ethernet network in the process, but they don't want to admit guilt, and they're telling me to "use wifi instead".
Infernal 4y ago
Strange, my experiences with unionized labor have found the exact opposite - safety conscious to the nth degree, and much more likely to criticize each other for working too quickly than too slowly. They seem to be incentivized to 1) not get dinged for safety infractions and 2) get as many billable hours out of every work order as possible.

throwie_wayward 4y ago

I completely disagree... on the trend you back up, I see a future where you cannot cook your own food unless you've become a professional specialist of cooking (for food safety). going to cartoon levels of ridiculousness, a society in which you cannot do anything other than consume unless you're doing a job (which would involve safety, insurance, and other various legal and bureaucratic requirements). what keeps things sane where you live is the 'technically' aspect. which I read as "individuals often ignore those rules for personal reasons (meaning when no businesses are involved)"...

mellavora 4y ago
Huh. Extending your distopian cartoon by reference to an earlier (today) HN thread about sex workers, and thinking of a society where ...
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
charles_f 4y ago
Yeah I think that you mis-interpreted what I meant. Being prevented to do stuff as simple as changing a switch, a plug or a faucet is plain stupid, and I'm pretty sure it's not even backed by data (or if it is, it's probably overconservative).
KennyBlanken 4y ago
> I see a future where you cannot cook your own food unless you've become a professional specialist of cooking (for food safety). This has already happening to some degree in the US, in the sense that one has to follow a lot of food safety practices in order to keep from getting violently ill eating food sold in a grocery store. The best example being the poultry industry. Instead of our government requiring chicken farms control salmonella (which is required of European farmers), the poultry industry has convinced both the government and the consumer that it's totally cool to shift things to "you didn't cook your chicken properly so it's your fault that you got salmonella." Processed chicken in the US is washed in chlorine because there's so much salmonella and it would spoil the chicken between the packing plant and consumer's fridge. Similarly, eggs sold in the US can't be stored outside the refrigerator because they've been washed to attempt to control salmonella; the washing destroys the egg's natural protective barrier. We can't eat vegetables bought in a grocery store without washing them; otherwise we might get e.coli, because corporate megafarms refuse to provide proper sanitation for field workers and use enormous field sizes in order to eek out as much profit as they possibly can. Yet again: it's your fault you got e.coli because you didn't wash your vegetables well enough, not the fault of the farms and distributors and grocery stores for selling you unsafe food.
- lupire 4y ago

mickael-kerjean 4y ago

This is very much like this in Australia. I had friends warning me against setting up my own pendant light because of insurance and other blabla and was denied to buy some electrical cables at the local hardware shop as I wasn't certified even though I hold a bachelor in electronics .... Compared that to France where I spent time at uni building my own guitar amplifier for my bachelor thesis, manipulating 300V-500V and blowing a couple valve along the process, ha fun time

CodeSgt 4y ago
Wow the insurance is one thing but not even bring able to buy electrical cable is crazy to me. Australia's government truly is more dystopian than most people give it credit for being. Every now and then I hear about another fundamental freedom I take for granted that they just don't have and it just reminds me how lucky I am not to live there.

JTbane 4y ago

That's pretty ridiculous, so you can't change a socket without calling a guy?