I'm in sales (former programmer and IT consultant). My current employer measures phone calls as a way to track our performance. Sales have been flat for years but we see more and more phone calls being logged into the CRM. All these phones calls produced no extra benefit. Management response, break down calls into voice mails/messages and "discussions" (which presumably are higher value). Whoever logs more "discussions" is the better sales puke. Guess what's happening? We are suddenly logging lots more "discussions" but sales are flat.
Obviously the next step is to get rid of the salespeople with the lowest discussion counts and get new ones that log more discussions. Dial, dial, dial, like a trained monkey.
It basically boils down to arrogance. I was a IT consultant and went on site to Blackberry offices in the 2008-ish time frame. They were building new office space like a dot-com era venture funded business on crack and insisted it was all going up from there.The iPhone had come out and was eating the market alive and BB execs I talked to considered it little more than a fad device for consumers that would never penetrate the business market. R&D pretty much stagnated as they decided the BB was so damn good it pretty much could not be improved.
But what really did them in was apps. Ever try to write a BB app? It was frigging impossible to get it done. The API was poorly documented and often just flat out wrong. There was the public API and a API the internal BB developers used that legend has was much better. I don't know how much I really believe that but I can tell you for sure BB development sucked. Apple had it right, make app development easy and well documented. As far as I know, BB still has not learned this lesson.
"...what I really don't understand...
is how, with Coca Cola's flavo(u)r changing so little over the years, nobody seems to have reverse engineered a clone that actually tastes like Coca Cola."
I think they have, lawyers keep those clones off shelves.
"We still buy all this processed junk, with the bright coloured labels promising everything and being "fat free". We as a society have to immediately start buying other food products"
Good luck with that. Where do you go to buy it? My local grocery stores shelves are about 99% "processed junk" with high fructose corn syrup under 30 different names embedded in damn near everything. Sure, you can put a ton of effort into it and spend more to get 'organic' or whatever but selection is massively limited.
That's odd - I was working with scientists back in the day, and they thought exactly that thing. They also were 100% certain the "population bomb" would see us in a post apocalyptic, cannibalistic society living a roving mad max style existence.
The problem with claiming nobody I know believed it is that you didn't know anybody. It's called the the argumentum ad populum logical fallacy.
It doesn't matter if this is good economics or not, it's never going to happen. There is power in the current programs like SS, welfare, food stamps, etc, etc, etc. The people that wield that power will never willingly give it up. They control you and your vote with the promise of filling that need or this want or righting that economic injustice. They keep you divided and focused on the small things.
Basic income like this has no power to control built into it. It's just not gonna happen.
If you think something could be a bomb, you'd have to be a special kind of stupid to open it up and take "just a quick look". Bombs tend to, you know, go boom.
Yep. I worked for IBM for 15 years and finally got the pink slip. Within 6 months (after a HR mandated wait), my job was posted for rehire - reporting to the same manager, same district, same technology platform. I understand they hired a kid right out of college.
I would buy anonymity. Hire a team that would go through and erase all evidence of me. In panopticon we now inhabit, complete anonymity would be the most valuable thing in the world. People, corporations, governments, they'd have no idea I exist, where I live or what I do.
I don't know if it's possible, but with a few billion I'd give it a shot.
I not only RTFA, I have several dash buttons now. I get immediate feedback through a notification on my phone which lets me know it was ordered and the estimated arrival (as well as giving me the option to go to the app and cancel if it was a accidental order). I get routine updates as it moves through the delivery process - shipping, updated delivery times if it will be late, delivered.
It's handy as hell. Take the last paper towel out of the closet and the button is right there, just a press and new paper towels arrive and I don't have to cart them home.
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I'm in sales (former programmer and IT consultant). My current employer measures phone calls as a way to track our performance. Sales have been flat for years but we see more and more phone calls being logged into the CRM. All these phones calls produced no extra benefit. Management response, break down calls into voice mails/messages and "discussions" (which presumably are higher value). Whoever logs more "discussions" is the better sales puke. Guess what's happening? We are suddenly logging lots more "discussions" but sales are flat. Obviously the next step is to get rid of the salespeople with the lowest discussion counts and get new ones that log more discussions. Dial, dial, dial, like a trained monkey.
It basically boils down to arrogance. I was a IT consultant and went on site to Blackberry offices in the 2008-ish time frame. They were building new office space like a dot-com era venture funded business on crack and insisted it was all going up from there.The iPhone had come out and was eating the market alive and BB execs I talked to considered it little more than a fad device for consumers that would never penetrate the business market. R&D pretty much stagnated as they decided the BB was so damn good it pretty much could not be improved. But what really did them in was apps. Ever try to write a BB app? It was frigging impossible to get it done. The API was poorly documented and often just flat out wrong. There was the public API and a API the internal BB developers used that legend has was much better. I don't know how much I really believe that but I can tell you for sure BB development sucked. Apple had it right, make app development easy and well documented. As far as I know, BB still has not learned this lesson.
"...what I really don't understand... is how, with Coca Cola's flavo(u)r changing so little over the years, nobody seems to have reverse engineered a clone that actually tastes like Coca Cola." I think they have, lawyers keep those clones off shelves.
"We still buy all this processed junk, with the bright coloured labels promising everything and being "fat free". We as a society have to immediately start buying other food products" Good luck with that. Where do you go to buy it? My local grocery stores shelves are about 99% "processed junk" with high fructose corn syrup under 30 different names embedded in damn near everything. Sure, you can put a ton of effort into it and spend more to get 'organic' or whatever but selection is massively limited.
You've seen the fnords.
That's odd - I was working with scientists back in the day, and they thought exactly that thing. They also were 100% certain the "population bomb" would see us in a post apocalyptic, cannibalistic society living a roving mad max style existence. The problem with claiming nobody I know believed it is that you didn't know anybody. It's called the the argumentum ad populum logical fallacy.
It doesn't matter if this is good economics or not, it's never going to happen. There is power in the current programs like SS, welfare, food stamps, etc, etc, etc. The people that wield that power will never willingly give it up. They control you and your vote with the promise of filling that need or this want or righting that economic injustice. They keep you divided and focused on the small things. Basic income like this has no power to control built into it. It's just not gonna happen.
If you think something could be a bomb, you'd have to be a special kind of stupid to open it up and take "just a quick look". Bombs tend to, you know, go boom.
The term you're looking for is "lumbersexual"
Yep. I worked for IBM for 15 years and finally got the pink slip. Within 6 months (after a HR mandated wait), my job was posted for rehire - reporting to the same manager, same district, same technology platform. I understand they hired a kid right out of college.
By posting as Anonymous Coward? I don't think those balls are as big as you say.
I may be mistaken but I believe they are demonstrating the absurdity of it all by being absurd. It's like a cousin to sarcasm. A hot cousin.
I'd spend as much as I could on booze, drugs and women. The rest, I'd just waste.
I would buy anonymity. Hire a team that would go through and erase all evidence of me. In panopticon we now inhabit, complete anonymity would be the most valuable thing in the world. People, corporations, governments, they'd have no idea I exist, where I live or what I do. I don't know if it's possible, but with a few billion I'd give it a shot.
Yeah, in about 100 years I *might* have to move my chair and beer cooler another foot up the beach.
Probably the same point you would ...
You can only order 1 at a time. In the event of multiple presses, you get a notice and have to confirm that you really intended to buy that many.
I not only RTFA, I have several dash buttons now. I get immediate feedback through a notification on my phone which lets me know it was ordered and the estimated arrival (as well as giving me the option to go to the app and cancel if it was a accidental order). I get routine updates as it moves through the delivery process - shipping, updated delivery times if it will be late, delivered. It's handy as hell. Take the last paper towel out of the closet and the button is right there, just a press and new paper towels arrive and I don't have to cart them home.