Posted on 12/26/2015 7:38:04 PM PST by SoFloFreeper
Astra Taylor's iPhone has a cracked screen. She has bandaged it with clear packing tape and plans to use the phone until it disintegrates. She objects to the planned obsolescence of today’s gadgetry, and to the way the big tech companies pressure customers to upgrade.
Taylor, 36, is a documentary filmmaker, musician and political activist. She's also an emerging star in the world of technology criticism. She's not paranoid, but she keeps duct tape over the camera lens on her laptop computer - because, as everyone knows, these gadgets can be taken over by nefarious agents of all kinds.
Taylor is a 21st-century digital dissenter. She's one of the many technophiles unhappy about the way the tech revolution has played out. Political progressives once embraced the utopian promise of the Internet as a democratizing force, but they've been dismayed by the rise of the "surveillance state," and the near-monopolization of digital platforms by huge corporations.
I think I may have fallen on the Luddite side of the tech curve.
Have been in software/IT for 22 years. Still love tech- but, got laid off in July, had to return the snazzy company paid for current gen smart phone. Pulled an old Blackberry Bold out of my drawer, charged it up, slapped a SIM in and have not really missed all the must have apps that I thought I couldn’t possibly live without. I’ve still got a phone, I still get my email, I still have a GPS and I still have web access- and that covers more than 99.9% of what I couldn’t possibly live without while I’m away from a more robust device (computer, tablet, whatever).
And suddenly I’m feeling nostalgic for my old TRS-80 Model I...
You apparently have never taken an economics class
What type of screen did it have? Also how large was the screen?
Plus no warranty is very meaningful in terms of electronics because all that is usually covered is manufacturing defect.
Too often people think of warranties as being like a car warranty but in most electronics it is much more limited.
Just because you pay $$$ does not mean that you purchased something that wasn’t crap
Indeed my brain mixed an iPod with my iPad. iPad is only 5’5 yrs old and going strong
Lynx also continues to work with Gopher (lynx-cur now in at least some repositories).
My "old school" reaction to an IT director who asked what a card scale (that was on display in our DC) was that I instantly lost a measure of respect for the man. I never worked with a mainframe that used punch cards, but I sure heard the war stories about them and read all about them. If you don't have the basic curiosity about the history of the technology your career is based on what do you really expect to achieve? (in that particular case it was downsizing to make a bonus schedule) One can't avoid future problems without a firm grasp of history, and that is certainly true when it comes to technology and management of technology.
I said “ price” & “ cost” are two different things.
So I obviously never took an economics class.
Ok, Bro, whatever.
You then asked if I meant value, hence my comment.
Cost and price differentiation is well explained in a basic Econ class. Value has nothing to do with it.
I think in your posts you were “quoting” another poster,but not in italics or quote marks,so it got a little convoluted trying to follow.
You know, kinda an IPad IPod thing.
Well I guess I chose the company that intentionally manufactured "crap" TVs. They were 42 inch sets; one was plasma; the other LCD.
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/home_electronics/samsung_tv.html
Well I guess I chose the company that intentionally manufactured "crap" TVs. They were 42 inch sets; one was plasma; the other LCD.
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/home_electronics/samsung_tv.html http://www.dailytech.com/Samsung+to+Pay+Millions+to+Settle+Lawsuits+Over+Mass+LCD+TV+Failures/article24065.htm
From Wikipedia: Customer cost refers not only to the price of a product, but it also encompasses the purchase costs, use costs and the post-use costs.
Or, one could say
total cost describes the total economic cost of production and is made up of variable costs, which vary according to the quantity of a good produced and include inputs such as labor and raw materials, plus fixed costs
you are both referring to 2 different concepts, and one of you does not know it. ;)
I only recently came across that possible explanation. Plausible and very interesting.
The technocracy-congressional conspiracy will insure that business can treat us like little economic pimping units.
To a central socialist government, “control” is the key component of it’s operation. Barring an overthrow of such a government, this will never change.
Obsolescence of electronic gadgetry is the key to America’s phony economic miracle that continues to milk our meager cash reserves to feed the factories of China.
Remember how Obama’s Blackberry was always clutched in his greedy paws? Now he has a central government authorized cell phone that plays rap ‘music’ to sooth his sociopathic brain.
Yesterday I read a news story about some fool who walked off a cliff while pressing buttons on his cell phone.
What happens when the power grid gets hacked, cutting off the nation’s power supply and our cell phones need recharging? The way we allow this criminal in the White Hut and his retinue to continue shoveling money into windmills and ruining the coal business, the power grid may not need hackers to accomplish the shutdown.
Where does the ‘big screen’ television sets end?
When finally the ‘consumer’ has a set as large as a highway billboard that dwarfs his living room?
We shouldn’t wonder when we see a family of three or four living in a 6,000 plus square foot house struggling to make house payments with both parents working 40-50 hour weeks. While they’re at work the unfortunate children are amusing themselves with electronic gadgets.
political activist, nuff sed
“Tucker and Dale Vs. Evil.”
It’s an extremely funny and surprising movie that is spoiler-proof. Not for small children (gory special effects necessary to the plot and parody theme, a few vulgarities common in today’s sad culture). A couple of very realistic characters incorporated into a movie plot that is all too common in entertainment. Here’s a synopsis, etc.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1465522/
I was not talking about production costs. In fact we were actually talking about the cost to the buyer. Total production costs are for accounting purposes but price vs cost to the buyer is mostly different and is driven by other things.
For example, John buys a $10 pair of shoes thinking he has gotten a great deal because he didn’t spend $130 on the really well made pair. in three months the $10 shoes have fallen apart.John buys another $10 pair of shoes. This is his buying pattern. Consider if he had spent the $130 on a pair of shoes that have a life time of at least ten years(because of how well they are made). In that ten years John will have purchased 4X10 pairs of $10 shoes. even allowing for a resoling or two and polishing spiff up the old pair, the $130 pair of shoes is easily a better deal by a factor of two. Why? Because the price ($10 vs $130) does not take into account the actual cost of owning said shoe
Consumer cost
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