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“The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.” He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he t

by kps 3y ago

“The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.” He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he tried the knob. Again it remained locked tight. “What I pay you,” he informed it, “is in the nature of a gratuity; I don’t have to pay you.” “I think otherwise,” the door said. “Look in the purchase contract you signed when you bought this conapt.” In his desk drawer he found the contract; since signing it he had found it necessary to refer to the document many times. Sure enough; payment to his door for opening and shutting constituted a mandatory fee. Not a tip. “You discover I’m right,” the door said. It sounded smug. From the drawer beside the sink Joe Chip got a stainless steel knife; with it he began systematically to unscrew the bolt assembly of his apt’s money-gulping door. “I’ll sue you,” the door said as the first screw fell out. Joe Chip said, “I’ve never been sued by a door. But I guess I can live through it.” — Philip K Dick, Ubik, 1969

whoisstan 3y ago
Warren Ellis at Thingscon 2017 "1. It’s hard. Don’t get me wrong. I know it’s hard. And Samsung and Apple and several other large corporations want in on it. On the bright side, that will give you lots of exit opportunities, and soon you could be drinking cocktails in Bali while Amazon deals with the backlash from the smart doorlock you sold them that still doesn’t work properly. And they’ll spend the money on iteration until the device either goes away or starts working properly, and the users will have to buy Amazon Prime membership for their houses. And then someone will hack your house through the buggy wifi thermostat you bought, and your house will start ordering DOWNTON ABBEY downloads and you’ll come home to find it’s 40 Celsius indoors and the sink is flooded and your fridge has been turned into a porn spambot and you’ll realise that your house is masturbating to DOWNTON ABBEY. If you can get in the front door."
throw0101b 3y ago
More recently see Cory Doctorow's "Unauthorized Bread": > The toaster wasn’t the first appliance to go (that honor went to the dishwasher, which stopped being able to validate third-party dishes the week before when Disher went under), but it was the last straw. She could wash dishes in the sink but how the hell was she supposed to make toast—over a candle? * https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-near-future-tale-of-refugees-and-sinister-iot-appliances/ https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-... * From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radicalized_(Doctorow_book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radicalized_(Doctorow_book)
- dylan604 3y ago
  This would funny but since it's pretty much exactly how printers behave it's more just a slap in the face
  - znpy 3y ago
    I guess it's time to echo the meme: "The band 'Rage against the machine' does not explicitly says what kind of machine they are enraged to, but I'm pretty sure it's a printer". EDIT: screen of the original tweet: https://old.reddit.com/r/printers/comments/vqmbu4/rage_against_the_machine/ https://old.reddit.com/r/printers/comments/vqmbu4/rage_again...
    - throw0101b 3y ago
      Neil Young's song "Piece of Crap" was (supposedly) about a (then-innovative) plain paper fax machine (previously they used thermal paper): * https://genius.com/Neil-young-and-crazy-horse-piece-of-crap-lyrics https://genius.com/Neil-young-and-crazy-horse-piece-of-crap-... * Album: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeps_with_Angels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeps_with_Angels
renewiltord 3y ago
Well, now we're straying from the original, but there's the libertarian copypasta on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/copypasta/comments/7iqxko/libertarian_police_department/ https://www.reddit.com/r/copypasta/comments/7iqxko/libertari... > I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief. > “Bad news, detective. We got a situation.” > “What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?” > “Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.” > ... and so on.
- renewiltord 3y ago
  I've later found that this is a New Yorker humor piece https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/l-p-d-libertarian-police-department https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/l-p-d-libertari... That makes sense. Their fiction was always top notch when I subscribed.
  - greenyoda 3y ago
    When Michael Bloomberg was the mayor of NYC, he did actually ban trans fats from NYC restaurants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Bloomberg#Political_positions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Bloomberg#Political_po...
  - throw0101b 3y ago
    LOL: > “Not yet. But mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down … provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so.” > “Easy, chief,” I said. “Any rate the market offers is, by definition, fair.”

by kps 3y ago

whoisstan 3y ago

Warren Ellis at Thingscon 2017 "1. It’s hard. Don’t get me wrong. I know it’s hard. And Samsung and Apple and several other large corporations want in on it. On the bright side, that will give you lots of exit opportunities, and soon you could be drinking cocktails in Bali while Amazon deals with the backlash from the smart doorlock you sold them that still doesn’t work properly. And they’ll spend the money on iteration until the device either goes away or starts working properly, and the users will have to buy Amazon Prime membership for their houses. And then someone will hack your house through the buggy wifi thermostat you bought, and your house will start ordering DOWNTON ABBEY downloads and you’ll come home to find it’s 40 Celsius indoors and the sink is flooded and your fridge has been turned into a porn spambot and you’ll realise that your house is masturbating to DOWNTON ABBEY. If you can get in the front door."

throw0101b 3y ago

More recently see Cory Doctorow's "Unauthorized Bread": > The toaster wasn’t the first appliance to go (that honor went to the dishwasher, which stopped being able to validate third-party dishes the week before when Disher went under), but it was the last straw. She could wash dishes in the sink but how the hell was she supposed to make toast—over a candle? * https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-near-future-tale-of-refugees-and-sinister-iot-appliances/ https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-... * From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radicalized_(Doctorow_book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radicalized_(Doctorow_book)

dylan604 3y ago
This would funny but since it's pretty much exactly how printers behave it's more just a slap in the face
- znpy 3y ago
  I guess it's time to echo the meme: "The band 'Rage against the machine' does not explicitly says what kind of machine they are enraged to, but I'm pretty sure it's a printer". EDIT: screen of the original tweet: https://old.reddit.com/r/printers/comments/vqmbu4/rage_against_the_machine/ https://old.reddit.com/r/printers/comments/vqmbu4/rage_again...
  - throw0101b 3y ago
    Neil Young's song "Piece of Crap" was (supposedly) about a (then-innovative) plain paper fax machine (previously they used thermal paper): * https://genius.com/Neil-young-and-crazy-horse-piece-of-crap-lyrics https://genius.com/Neil-young-and-crazy-horse-piece-of-crap-... * Album: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeps_with_Angels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeps_with_Angels

renewiltord 3y ago

Well, now we're straying from the original, but there's the libertarian copypasta on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/copypasta/comments/7iqxko/libertarian_police_department/ https://www.reddit.com/r/copypasta/comments/7iqxko/libertari... > I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief. > “Bad news, detective. We got a situation.” > “What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?” > “Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.” > ... and so on.

renewiltord 3y ago
I've later found that this is a New Yorker humor piece https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/l-p-d-libertarian-police-department https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/l-p-d-libertari... That makes sense. Their fiction was always top notch when I subscribed.
- greenyoda 3y ago
  When Michael Bloomberg was the mayor of NYC, he did actually ban trans fats from NYC restaurants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Bloomberg#Political_positions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Bloomberg#Political_po...
- throw0101b 3y ago
  LOL: > “Not yet. But mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down … provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so.” > “Easy, chief,” I said. “Any rate the market offers is, by definition, fair.”