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Convincing people to buy your product _is_ value creation.

Imustaskforhelp 1y ago
Convincing people to buy your product by hijacking the algorithm to just gather their attention thousand times and not meaningfully providing any justifiable content in return all in order to somehow sell your product is net negative for society. Seriously, if being a slop machine in some sense (while mostly) sell slop itself to either other slop machine wannabe's etc and this cycle continues.. I am not saying that all linkedin is like this, but to me most do seem like this. But is being a slop machine / being mediocre just to sell your product, itself net value creation though?
ohdeargodno 1y ago
Convincing people to buy your rotten meat is value creation! Convincing people to buy a bridge is value creation! Convincing people to buy your Teflon pan that will seep into the environment for centuries is value creation! Because after all, nothing else matters. Value creation. Value. Creation. Consequences ? Thoughtfulness ? That's for the dumbasses not creating _value_
- Imustaskforhelp 1y ago
  I searched some greed quotes and here's one I'd like to share "As long as greed is stronger than compassion, there will always be suffering"
  - hk__2 1y ago
    "Can you make a sentence look more intelligent if you surround it with quotes?"
    - Imustaskforhelp 1y ago
      I didn't want it to sound intelligent but I mean I was mentioning a quote so we do need to place a quote inside quotes afterall lol. I was just sharing something that I felt relevant to the discussion in the sense that greed is one of the most major causes of suffering, and it is our greed that we are ready to write linkedin mediocrity slop.
      - hk__2 1y ago
        This was more an humorous side comment than a critic, I’m sorry if it looked like this.
- simianwords 1y ago
  Not sure what you mean. You think people are inherently stupid and end up buying things they will regret. It’s not always like that and you are removing agency from the person purchasing the product.
  - alansammarone 1y ago
    No so much "stupid", just full of biases and somewhat lazy. This is a well-researched and documented fact. Knowingly abusing these biases to get them to buy or use something that they either don't need - or, worse, buying a low quality/low effort product when better alternatives exist - that's extremely detrimental. That's how we end up with the enshittification of everything.
    - simianwords 1y ago
      Yes there are biases sometimes and it can get exploited and this is an exception that proves the rule. But the rule is that people know what they want to buy and know what they are getting into. You are trying to get in between by suggesting you know more than the buyer and seller.
      - amanaplanacanal 1y ago
        They mostly don't know what they are getting into though. You can't trust advertising, obviously. You can't trust reviews. You have no way to tell if there is actually a better product than the one you are seeing the ad for. You better hope there is a good return policy.
        simianwords 1y ago
        You can't trust advertising completely nor can you trust reviews completely but they are signals. Treating things as binary will not get you anywhere. Signals exist and are useful if not 100% accurate.
        1y ago
ndriscoll 1y ago
Unless there was a better alternative that you drowned out, in which case it was value destruction.
- simianwords 1y ago
  That’s like saying your product is good unless it is bad and there are other alternatives
  - alansammarone 1y ago
    What? Your project might be good or bad, if it's bad/low quality/low effort and you take sales away from a better option by abusing human biases (such as recency bias), then you're destroying (potential, not actual) value.
    - simianwords 1y ago
      What if your product is good and you want people to purchase it? Why not let the customers decide what is good and bad - they have agency.
      - amanaplanacanal 1y ago
        How would they even discover that though? Every single customer would have to buy both products and test for themselves. Ain't nobody got time for that.
      - Levitz 1y ago
        Then they wouldn't need convincing?
        simianwords 1y ago
        Its bringing the signals closer to me than I would have otherwise had. The agency part is for me buying it but not necessarily for me to do the research so in that case you are right. But in practice it is beneficial (for both parties) to sometimes bring the signal closer. If you truly believe in agency then you must trust that the person who buys it after being shown the advertisement was better off being shown the advertisement.

Convincing people to buy your product by hijacking the algorithm to just gather their attention thousand times and not meaningfully providing any justifiable content in return all in order to somehow sell your product is net negative for society. Seriously, if being a slop machine in some sense (while mostly) sell slop itself to either other slop machine wannabe's etc and this cycle continues.. I am not saying that all linkedin is like this, but to me most do seem like this. But is being a slop machine / being mediocre just to sell your product, itself net value creation though?

ohdeargodno 1y ago

Convincing people to buy your rotten meat is value creation! Convincing people to buy a bridge is value creation! Convincing people to buy your Teflon pan that will seep into the environment for centuries is value creation! Because after all, nothing else matters. Value creation. Value. Creation. Consequences ? Thoughtfulness ? That's for the dumbasses not creating _value_

Imustaskforhelp 1y ago
I searched some greed quotes and here's one I'd like to share "As long as greed is stronger than compassion, there will always be suffering"
- hk__2 1y ago
  "Can you make a sentence look more intelligent if you surround it with quotes?"
  - Imustaskforhelp 1y ago
    I didn't want it to sound intelligent but I mean I was mentioning a quote so we do need to place a quote inside quotes afterall lol. I was just sharing something that I felt relevant to the discussion in the sense that greed is one of the most major causes of suffering, and it is our greed that we are ready to write linkedin mediocrity slop.
    - hk__2 1y ago
      This was more an humorous side comment than a critic, I’m sorry if it looked like this.
simianwords 1y ago
Not sure what you mean. You think people are inherently stupid and end up buying things they will regret. It’s not always like that and you are removing agency from the person purchasing the product.
- alansammarone 1y ago
  No so much "stupid", just full of biases and somewhat lazy. This is a well-researched and documented fact. Knowingly abusing these biases to get them to buy or use something that they either don't need - or, worse, buying a low quality/low effort product when better alternatives exist - that's extremely detrimental. That's how we end up with the enshittification of everything.
  - simianwords 1y ago
    Yes there are biases sometimes and it can get exploited and this is an exception that proves the rule. But the rule is that people know what they want to buy and know what they are getting into. You are trying to get in between by suggesting you know more than the buyer and seller.
    - amanaplanacanal 1y ago
      They mostly don't know what they are getting into though. You can't trust advertising, obviously. You can't trust reviews. You have no way to tell if there is actually a better product than the one you are seeing the ad for. You better hope there is a good return policy.
      - simianwords 1y ago
        You can't trust advertising completely nor can you trust reviews completely but they are signals. Treating things as binary will not get you anywhere. Signals exist and are useful if not 100% accurate.
        1y ago

ndriscoll 1y ago

Unless there was a better alternative that you drowned out, in which case it was value destruction.

simianwords 1y ago
That’s like saying your product is good unless it is bad and there are other alternatives
- alansammarone 1y ago
  What? Your project might be good or bad, if it's bad/low quality/low effort and you take sales away from a better option by abusing human biases (such as recency bias), then you're destroying (potential, not actual) value.
  - simianwords 1y ago
    What if your product is good and you want people to purchase it? Why not let the customers decide what is good and bad - they have agency.
    - amanaplanacanal 1y ago
      How would they even discover that though? Every single customer would have to buy both products and test for themselves. Ain't nobody got time for that.
    - Levitz 1y ago
      Then they wouldn't need convincing?
      - simianwords 1y ago
        Its bringing the signals closer to me than I would have otherwise had. The agency part is for me buying it but not necessarily for me to do the research so in that case you are right. But in practice it is beneficial (for both parties) to sometimes bring the signal closer. If you truly believe in agency then you must trust that the person who buys it after being shown the advertisement was better off being shown the advertisement.