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> We're not here to produce things to be used, but rather things that increase usage! That sounds exploitative and dystopian.

stankondrat 2y ago
> > We're not here to produce things to be used, but rather things that increase usage! > That sounds exploitative and dystopian. If "things" are considered as content too, TikTok users will use them, even though the videos on TikTok will be generated with AI.
nonrandomstring 2y ago
We haven't had anything like a "classical" economy since the second world war. It's not "dystopian" it's just a tragic waste of human and natural resources. """ Forget the idea that "spontaneous utilitarian consumer demand" drives markets. That mid 20th century 'pull model' passed into the era of cynical manufacture where successful businesses care not about what people want (let alone need, or just what might sell) so much as about what people can be made to want. Genuinely new inventions able to create wild, fresh markets, like in the golden age of nonlinear physics between 1940 and 1980, no longer happen. We've been in an incremental push economy for about 50 years now. Western capital economies manufacture demand by influence. We once used market research, but surveillance data now fills that need to shape markets. """ - from Chindogu [0] [0] https://cybershow.uk/blog/posts/chindogu/ https://cybershow.uk/blog/posts/chindogu/
- stankondrat 2y ago
  Thanks for link! """ Indeed we know in our hearts that they appeal to the weakest parts of human psychology, selfish, voyeuristic fantasies of omnipotence and omniscience. Yet they offer virtually no societal utility. """ Looks like the new toys my children want every day, but driven by their curiosity to explore the world. > tragic waste of human and natural resources People have solved major problems with technology: 5% of farmers can feed the world. There are no real visible challenges now. All problems are made to keep people on their toes to keep them moving. Otherwise, the heat death of the universe will come for humanity.
- cratermoon 2y ago
  Interesting. I'd read Ed Zitron's take at https://www.wheresyoured.at/never-forgive-them/ https://www.wheresyoured.at/never-forgive-them/ and he's zeroing in on the tech companies doing this: 'Every app we use is intentionally built to “growth hack” — a term that means “moving things around in such a way that a user does things that we want them to do”'

stankondrat 2y ago

> > We're not here to produce things to be used, but rather things that increase usage! > That sounds exploitative and dystopian. If "things" are considered as content too, TikTok users will use them, even though the videos on TikTok will be generated with AI.

nonrandomstring 2y ago

We haven't had anything like a "classical" economy since the second world war. It's not "dystopian" it's just a tragic waste of human and natural resources. """ Forget the idea that "spontaneous utilitarian consumer demand" drives markets. That mid 20th century 'pull model' passed into the era of cynical manufacture where successful businesses care not about what people want (let alone need, or just what might sell) so much as about what people can be made to want. Genuinely new inventions able to create wild, fresh markets, like in the golden age of nonlinear physics between 1940 and 1980, no longer happen. We've been in an incremental push economy for about 50 years now. Western capital economies manufacture demand by influence. We once used market research, but surveillance data now fills that need to shape markets. """ - from Chindogu [0] [0] https://cybershow.uk/blog/posts/chindogu/ https://cybershow.uk/blog/posts/chindogu/

stankondrat 2y ago
Thanks for link! """ Indeed we know in our hearts that they appeal to the weakest parts of human psychology, selfish, voyeuristic fantasies of omnipotence and omniscience. Yet they offer virtually no societal utility. """ Looks like the new toys my children want every day, but driven by their curiosity to explore the world. > tragic waste of human and natural resources People have solved major problems with technology: 5% of farmers can feed the world. There are no real visible challenges now. All problems are made to keep people on their toes to keep them moving. Otherwise, the heat death of the universe will come for humanity.
cratermoon 2y ago
Interesting. I'd read Ed Zitron's take at https://www.wheresyoured.at/never-forgive-them/ https://www.wheresyoured.at/never-forgive-them/ and he's zeroing in on the tech companies doing this: 'Every app we use is intentionally built to “growth hack” — a term that means “moving things around in such a way that a user does things that we want them to do”'