3 ms·

> There is a unique pride in being part of a community built around honor. It has been 100(s) of years since community like this existed, now this is utopia

twoWhlsGud 5mo ago
Princeton was that way in my lifetime (and I'm not that old : ) - corruption is not inevitable nor should honor be considered some sort of utopian dream.
- alephnerd 5mo ago
  > I'm not that old I'm not sure. Most HNers appear to be in their late 30s to early 40s, which is a massive generation gap. Classes and incentive structures have changed for people who graduated in the early 2010s compared to the late 1990s or early 2000s and neither would understand students who graduate in the mid-late 2020s.
  - bdangubic 5mo ago
    exactly this
  - aidenn0 5mo ago
    ggp said 100s of years. I am certain that gp is not 100s of years old.
galleywest200 5mo ago
I definitely still see honor system pay boxes in the USA. Maybe not in big cities, but outside of them. Disc golf courses, fire wood piles, that day’s chicken eggs in a wooden box on the side of the road.
- bdangubic 5mo ago
  I came to this country as an immigrant and one of the first memories I have was walking to the gas station to get the Sunday paper for my host father. I remember opening up the door and seeing tens of Sunday papers and was taken aback thinking how can this be, wouldn't someone just put in a quarter and take ALL of the Sunday papers home with her/him. In today's society (and especially if we are talking Princeton-like places) I do not believe honor-anything "works" anymore and am wondering just how small a place needs to be where this exists today... just as a small recent-ish example, I live in a white-collar affluent area and this Halloween we took our daughter to her friend's neighborhood but left a dish full of candy outside with a sign to take a couple. we have a camera outside and the very first "group" of 3 kids (with two adults) that came took all of the candy that was there...
  - bombcar 5mo ago
    There are places today in the USA where the roadside stands don’t even have a lockbox, just a bowl of money. We specifically don’t tell you where because we’d like to keep it that way.
    - sgc 5mo ago
      I think that is not an exception, but is pretty common almost anywhere in the US rural enough to have a roadside stand. Although bowls are not immune to wind, so generally the exact implementation takes that into account. Often a slotted box with no lock, etc.
  - asdff 5mo ago
    There is no benefit to taking all the newspapers out of the stack. What do you do next? Try and hawk them to people walking by? Candy though, you can eat all that candy.
    - bdangubic 5mo ago
      see I often wonder the same thing like why would you take 20 newspapers when you don’t need 19 of them but human mind works in misterious ways. my answer would be cause it is free and I’ll burn the 19 of them in my backyard for fun. or just like “it is ‘free’ I am taking it!” I had a similar experience going to an all-you-can-eat restaurant for the first time. the universal reaction from anyone I talked to about this experience (same as mine) was “there is no way in hell place like this in my home country would be in business more than a month.” people be eating not until full but until their body would physically reject additional food :)

twoWhlsGud 5mo ago

Princeton was that way in my lifetime (and I'm not that old : ) - corruption is not inevitable nor should honor be considered some sort of utopian dream.

alephnerd 5mo ago
> I'm not that old I'm not sure. Most HNers appear to be in their late 30s to early 40s, which is a massive generation gap. Classes and incentive structures have changed for people who graduated in the early 2010s compared to the late 1990s or early 2000s and neither would understand students who graduate in the mid-late 2020s.
- bdangubic 5mo ago
  exactly this
- aidenn0 5mo ago
  ggp said 100s of years. I am certain that gp is not 100s of years old.

galleywest200 5mo ago

I definitely still see honor system pay boxes in the USA. Maybe not in big cities, but outside of them. Disc golf courses, fire wood piles, that day’s chicken eggs in a wooden box on the side of the road.

bdangubic 5mo ago
I came to this country as an immigrant and one of the first memories I have was walking to the gas station to get the Sunday paper for my host father. I remember opening up the door and seeing tens of Sunday papers and was taken aback thinking how can this be, wouldn't someone just put in a quarter and take ALL of the Sunday papers home with her/him. In today's society (and especially if we are talking Princeton-like places) I do not believe honor-anything "works" anymore and am wondering just how small a place needs to be where this exists today... just as a small recent-ish example, I live in a white-collar affluent area and this Halloween we took our daughter to her friend's neighborhood but left a dish full of candy outside with a sign to take a couple. we have a camera outside and the very first "group" of 3 kids (with two adults) that came took all of the candy that was there...
- bombcar 5mo ago
  There are places today in the USA where the roadside stands don’t even have a lockbox, just a bowl of money. We specifically don’t tell you where because we’d like to keep it that way.
  - sgc 5mo ago
    I think that is not an exception, but is pretty common almost anywhere in the US rural enough to have a roadside stand. Although bowls are not immune to wind, so generally the exact implementation takes that into account. Often a slotted box with no lock, etc.
- asdff 5mo ago
  There is no benefit to taking all the newspapers out of the stack. What do you do next? Try and hawk them to people walking by? Candy though, you can eat all that candy.
  - bdangubic 5mo ago
    see I often wonder the same thing like why would you take 20 newspapers when you don’t need 19 of them but human mind works in misterious ways. my answer would be cause it is free and I’ll burn the 19 of them in my backyard for fun. or just like “it is ‘free’ I am taking it!” I had a similar experience going to an all-you-can-eat restaurant for the first time. the universal reaction from anyone I talked to about this experience (same as mine) was “there is no way in hell place like this in my home country would be in business more than a month.” people be eating not until full but until their body would physically reject additional food :)