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The whole world seems dedicated to the goal of extracting value rather than creating it.
by oraphalous 2y ago
The whole world seems dedicated to the goal of extracting value rather than creating it.
- throwaway48476 2y agoOr tricking someone else into creating value for you to take.
- akira2501 2y agoPeople tend to create value inherently. If they are not receiving the benefit of that then it would most appropriately be described as theft with the aid of blind regulators.
- mmaunder 2y agoYou're surrounded by and typing on valuable goods and services that you received in exchange for a store of value called money, which you received by providing value to someone else.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- metadat 2y ago[flagged]
- WalterBright 2y agoIt's a free country. You're free to implement a search engine and let anyone use it for free. Good luck paying for it, though.
- rurban 2y agoSo we need to persuade the NSA to finance our new search engine? Or should we turn to Putin or Xi? The European surveillance services would not be able to
- WalterBright 2y agoYou still have to pay the NSA, in the form of taxes.
- stavros 2y agoThis is kind of disingenuous when the grandparent comment is complaining exactly about the particular way this country is free in.
- WalterBright 2y agoNot at all. If someone wants to fund a charity search engine, they can do it. No matter how you structure it, somebody is going to have to pay for it. Another way of saying it is there's no such thing as a free lunch. In any society, any where, any time. You might as well wish for an antigravity machine :-)
- stavros 2y agoDepending on who pays, the incentives are different. In a socialist society, where some things are funded by the government, those things are generally much more aligned with the interest of the public than in capitalism, where most money wins.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoMan, those Cambodians really loved the killing fields. You should have seen how excited they were
- WalterBright 2y ago> In a socialist society, where some things are funded by the government, those things are generally much more aligned with the interest of the public than in capitalism Just for fun, compare the Soviet built Lada cars with cars built by capitalists. Or the contents of supermarkets. Or the quality of health care. Oh, and the advice given to American tourists visiting the Soviet Union - pack a couple pairs of blue jeans, as they are great for trading for stuff! I'll make it easy - name any consumer product made by the Soviet Union that was preferable to one built by greedy capitalists. Did you wonder why the US did not import Soviet made consumer products?
- 2y ago
- smsm42 2y agoI'm sure that the glorious Communist Party would build a google where every site is equal in ranking and always occupies the first page.
- metadat 2y agoNot making any claims or value judgments about other economic structures. I wanted to point out that the value extraction aspect of capitalism is fundamentally cold blooded / soulless / impersonal.
- smsm42 2y agoAs opposed to value extraction under socialism, also known as "GULAG", "down to countryside", "killing fields", "reeducation camps" and "transitory labor regime". The most prominent feature of all those is how kind, warm blooded, soulful and personable they are. Literally everybody who was there (and came out alive, which wasn't easy) makes sure to point that out.
- pvaldes 2y agoCapitalism and thief are different things. We should stop using the first to justify the last. If this people was lured to work for free, this is not capitalism.
- WalterBright 2y agoAnything you get for free, that requires someone else to work to provide it, means you're going to pay for it one way or another.
- thaumasiotes 2y agoSure, if it doesn't exist before you order it. If it's already been made, someone may even pay you to take it away.
- lesostep 2y agoIt could be true for things that could only be "used" once. But I don't think that it's a valid point at all times. Recently, for example, I've made a little "Linux for dummies" zine, and put it on my shelf. Sometimes guests take it, read it, and put it back. Technically, all of them get to read it for free, through no additional cost to me, because this zine already existed before they knew they wanted to "use it", and this zine will continue to exist after they "use it".
- WalterBright 2y agoDo you let random people use your car for free, too? Do you pay for their gas as well?