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Radio Prune
Feb 19, 2010

PT6A posted:

In practice, you don't own a TV, though, and if you do it's probably poo poo and doesn't work properly because the electronics industry is controlled by some lovely government bureaucrat, since allowing the means of production to be owned by someone who has the faintest loving idea how to make a television would be unacceptably capitalistic.

Yes, Marxism should work, in theory. In practice, it hasn't, it doesn't, and it probably never will. Unlike every Marxist state that's ever existed in real life, the capitalist system does allow for the workers to own and meaningfully control the means of production. This is why entrepreneurship is so popular! Now, it does carry with it quite a bit of risk -- so we should remove a lot of that risk by providing a GMI of some sort, and make sure that things like healthcare are not coupled to one's employment status. Fund it with a progressive income tax. Voila: social democracy!

How do you have a government bureaucrat in a stateless society?

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Gantolandon
Aug 19, 2012

Ardennes posted:

True but a lot of these guys were "communists" at one time even if they are empty neo-liberal shells at this point, there is still the general perception (which is fading obviously) that these parties were the legacy of that period. It also works in a negative sense, I have met Poles who think the Left Alliance was basically a front for Russians infiltrating Poland "just like the old days."

Yes, but it's like using Obama as a proof that socialism can be popular in US. After all, he got elected despite the fact that some Americans consider him a closed communist. I would say that when you have a major supposedly social-democratic party clamoring for flat income tax, something went wrong with the country's political spectrum.


squirrelzipper posted:

Holy poo poo. I'm fairly ignorant of the state of fascists in Europe as I live in Canada but wow. It seems so strange that extremism like this is flourishing in Poland where both Nazi and Soviet history was so profound.

The country's history doesn't help. The first Republic of Poland was basically the libertarian's wet dream, until it was co-opted and eaten by its neighbors (hilariously enough, natural elites, pursuing their rational self-interest, were being bought by Russian, Prussian and Austrian rulers en masse). Cue over 100 years of not having our own country, having our culture eradicated, being treated as second-class citizens and occasionally launching uprisings most of them were quite pitiful. Some really weird and embarrassing ideas got thrown during this time. We finally regain independence then get invaded again after only 20 years. Then, after the war, some weird poo poo happens - the general consensus in Poland is that we are sold by the West to Stalin who gets to have another buffer country protecting the Soviet Union from invasion.

The key to understanding Polish nationalism is remembering that it's less about national pride, victories and race. It's more a general idea that anyone either hates us or doesn't care, so gently caress this poo poo, let's go off the deep end. These people don't understand the irony of doing Nazi salutes and parading around dressed similarly to loving Sturmabteilung, because in their minds, the fact they are descendants of the victims of fascism makes it totally right. It's that weird notion that, if you suffer enough, you are in right to do the same poo poo to others.

SSJ2 Goku Wilders
Mar 24, 2010

PT6A posted:

In practice, you don't own a TV, though, and if you do it's probably poo poo and doesn't work properly because the electronics industry is controlled by some lovely government bureaucrat, since allowing the means of production to be owned by someone who has the faintest loving idea how to make a television would be unacceptably capitalistic.

Yes, Marxism should work, in theory. In practice, it hasn't, it doesn't, and it probably never will. Unlike every Marxist state that's ever existed in real life, the capitalist system does allow for the workers to own and meaningfully control the means of production. This is why entrepreneurship is so popular! Now, it does carry with it quite a bit of risk -- so we should remove a lot of that risk by providing a GMI of some sort, and make sure that things like healthcare are not coupled to one's employment status. Fund it with a progressive income tax. Voila: social democracy!

:lol: i am down with this post BRO, with this guy, he is right. lets export our exploitation to the periphery and extract superprofits from it to fund our insatiable lust for hambubger and telebision and pretend social democracy hasnt been a complete and utter failure in each of its consecutively more horrible forms put together that has survived for a shorter time than the soviet union ahahahah

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_leAgd1Sh4&t=63s

SplitSoul posted:

This argument didn't work so well for you in the GBS communism thread, why would you try it again?

:allears: Please share what happened because this has to be good poo poo. I mean if it's totally valid to post that the system fo social democracy, whose greatest achievement is continuously brutally insanely producing the very thing central to the topic of this thread, is Really Good, then gently caress. SplitSoul give me some dumps.

SSJ2 Goku Wilders fucked around with this message at 00:34 on Nov 23, 2013

Enjoy
Apr 18, 2009

PT6A posted:

In practice, you don't own a TV, though

That's real interesting, do you have a source

ekuNNN
Nov 27, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Enjoy posted:

That's real interesting, do you have a source

Here's a quick thing I could find that implies he's wrong:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Cuba

In 1996 there were 2.6 million television sets in Cuba, making them 54th in the world for television ownership, while they only have around the 70th largest economy.

ekuNNN fucked around with this message at 03:03 on Nov 23, 2013

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

ekuNNN posted:

Here's a quick thing I could find that implies he's wrong:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Cuba

In 1996 there were 2.6 million television sets in Cuba, making them 54th in the world for television ownership, while they only have around the 70th largest economy.

Is the 70th largest economy figure from 1996 too? Also is that "54th in the world" for per capita or just raw numbers?

ekuNNN
Nov 27, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Install Windows posted:

Is the 70th largest economy figure from 1996 too? Also is that "54th in the world" for per capita or just raw numbers?

Good points, I'll take a look.

edit: Ah, they were 67th on television ownership per capita (I assumed it already was per capita because who cares about total number of TV's :psyduck:) and it seems in 1996 they were ~78th in GDP per capita.

ekuNNN fucked around with this message at 03:47 on Nov 23, 2013

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

ekuNNN posted:

Good points, I'll take a look.

edit: Ah, they were 67th on television ownership per capita (I assumed it already was per capita because who cares about total number of TV's :psyduck:) and it seems in 1996 they were ~78th in GDP per capita.

Well, old figures like that tended to just attempt to count how many TVs (and radios, and telephone lines etc) were in a country as a loose way of judging markets for those things - two countries with 2 million TVs can be expected to have a similar appetite for new TVs in the near future, even if one has 3 million people and the other 300 million people.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

quote:

Yes, but it's like using Obama as a proof that socialism can be popular in US. After all, he got elected despite the fact that some Americans consider him a closed communist. I would say that when you have a major supposedly social-democratic party clamoring for flat income tax, something went wrong with the country's political spectrum.

It probably has in this case, still my point is it is hard to generalize because Eastern Europe is a vast area and it is hard to generalize one phenomena. There might be similarities in the "goldilocks" (not too far west, not too far east) but there probably is something going on than just the post-Soviet/communist experience ie just because these countries were occupied by the Soviets/were a part of the Soviet Union doesn't necessarily condemn far-left parties.

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Fojar38 posted:

You're going to have a really hard time convincing anyone but the most destitute that they should give up the notion of private property when it turns out people really like owning stuff.

This was addressed already, but are you trolling or just not familiar with what that term means?

PT6A posted:

In practice, you don't own a TV, though, and if you do it's probably poo poo and doesn't work properly because the electronics industry is controlled by some lovely government bureaucrat, since allowing the means of production to be owned by someone who has the faintest loving idea how to make a television would be unacceptably capitalistic.

What the hell does this even mean? If anything you'd be free from planned obsolescence.

PT6A posted:

the capitalist system does allow for the workers to own and meaningfully control the means of production.

You can't be serious.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe
"Planned obsolescence" is highly overblown and ironically enough outdated in itself.

Especially when it comes to TVs... TVs have lasted decades for decades now, with more recent models seeming like they'll last even longer. People often keep the same TV for a decade or more. It's no longer 1965 when you're dealing with primitive vacuum tubes and unreliable earlier CRT setups that kept the entire TV repair business going when TV repairmen were a thing.

Nintendo Kid fucked around with this message at 07:01 on Nov 23, 2013

visceril
Feb 24, 2008

Install Windows posted:

"Planned obsolescence" is highly overblown and ironically enough outdated in itself.

This is a good point. People love to complain about not being able to get the latest iOS on their first-gen iPads. The fact of the matter is, that decision to "obsolete" first gen iPads has more to do with product liability and accounting rules than it does with selling next gen stuff.

In the American accounting system, selling software is seen as selling two things: the package of code itself, and the promise to keep updating it--so essentially a good and a service, respectively.

Apple has to determine how much the selling price of its iPhone is attributable to A) the hardware, B) iOS, and C) the service contract they make to update iOS. Once they do that, they cannot recognize the portion allocated to the service until it has been 'earned'--until they have substantially completed the service.

If they kept updating it forever, theoretically they could never complete the service and never recognize that revenue. Practically, companies guess when people will stop using their service and get an auditor to approve their estimate.


And besides that, apple would be on the hook to deal with a product that increasingly struggles to deal with more and more advanced software.

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Install Windows posted:

"Planned obsolescence" is highly overblown and ironically enough outdated in itself.

So what will you call it when the iPad 11 is out in a few years? The term doesn't just refer to technical durability, but that kind is nonetheless also very real.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

SplitSoul posted:

So what will you call it when the iPad 11 is out in a few years? The term doesn't just refer to technical durability, but that kind is nonetheless also very real.

That has absolutely nothing to do with planned obsolescence. Are you seriously suggesting things improving is a bad thing??

It is usually quite difficult, if not impossible, to build something now that will have the performance of cheap electronics from 5 years from now. That's just how the engineering works, and most people would rather pay say $500 now and $500 in 5 years as a replacement then pay $10,000 now to not need a replacement in 5 years.

Nintendo Kid fucked around with this message at 07:08 on Nov 23, 2013

Emden
Oct 5, 2012

by angerbeet
That's literally the definition of planned obsolescence.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

Emden posted:

That's literally the definition of planned obsolescence.

No it isn't.

visceril
Feb 24, 2008

Emden posted:

That's literally the definition of planned obsolescence.

They stopped numbering them, but I think we're on the sixth iPad now.

Only the first gen iPads have stopped being upgraded, and they still have access to the App Store. You can still use it just fine. It's not obsolete.

Planned obsolescence is when a product magically breaks completely just after the warranty expires.

Emden
Oct 5, 2012

by angerbeet
It's not just about poo poo breaking. It's also about slight variations and then saying 'Oh you have model x? X+1 is soooo much better!' when in reality it's a new color and slightly thinner or whatever. Either way it gets people buying the same stuff over and over again.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

Emden posted:

It's not just about poo poo breaking. It's also about slight variations and then saying 'Oh you have model x? X+1 is soooo much better!' when in reality it's a new color and slightly thinner or whatever. Either way it gets people buying the same stuff over and over again.

That's not planned obsolescence. It gets rich idiots buying over and over again, the scientific term is "suckers". And those people represent a very minor part of the marketplace at large.

Normal people simply don't have the money to do it even if they wanted to.

It would basically be idiotic to arbitrarily refuse to release improvements until like 5 year intervals just to satisfy people offended by the mere idea of new models existing.

Nintendo Kid fucked around with this message at 07:18 on Nov 23, 2013

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Install Windows posted:

That has absolutely nothing to do with planned obsolescence. Are you seriously suggesting things improving is a bad thing??

It can refer to several different concepts, not just technical or functional obsolescence, but we're getting off on a stupid tangent here and you're making me agree with Emden, so let's forget I even mentioned it.

PT6A
Jan 5, 2006

Public school teachers are callous dictators who won't lift a finger to stop children from peeing in my plane

Radio Prune posted:

How do you have a government bureaucrat in a stateless society?

Jesus, you're talking about a stateless society and people are calling me unrealistic? gently caress me... I thought we're talking about things that could actually happen, not some idealized reality.


Enjoy posted:

That's real interesting, do you have a source


ekuNNN posted:

Here's a quick thing I could find that implies he's wrong:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Cuba

In 1996 there were 2.6 million television sets in Cuba, making them 54th in the world for television ownership, while they only have around the 70th largest economy.

Thankfully, you picked Cuba to use as an example, which is the one communist country I've travelled to on a regular basis, and am reasonably familiar with. Let me let you in on a little secret: TVs and mobile phones are bought with hard currency brought in by tourists, meaning bartenders are asking me to bring iPhones while doctors go without. Every bit of reasonably modern technology I've seen down there has been brought and maintained by poo poo carried in a suitcase from a capitalist country. If my friend needs a manual to repair his car, or a TV (or the associated mounting bracket, which I have personally hand-carried through loving Jose Martí airport), or a battery for his PDA, or what have you, guess what? He asks me to bring it and he pays me in hard currency he's obtained from myself and other tourists. Doctors and professors don't have TVs; guys that work in the tourist industry do, and no one moreso than those who have opened private businesses (private restaurants and hotels/B&Bs).

Don't talk bullshit to me about communist countries; if you think nepotism is a miserable thing in capitalist countries, just wait until you see how crucial networking is in a socialist nation. My buddy jokes that it's socioismo, not socialismo. Meanwhile, most of the people who aren't in the tourist industry get supported by family working outside Cuba. I honestly don't know any Cuban people who aren't in poverty, and don't rely on some source of foreign income, and I love the country and I wish I could tell you otherwise.

Now, do we need to learn some things from Cuba and other socialist nations? Absolutely! Their education and healthcare systems are both incredibly impressive, even by the standards of a first-world nation, and they make sure that people do not starve in the street. I'm saying there has to be a healthy balance between a control economy and pure free-market capitalism, and with all I've seen everywhere I've been in the world, I think a properly-constrained and regulated capitalist system (with the taxation that must entail) which provides a robust safety net is the best answer. You can disagree all you like, but please try to at least provide an example of a place where the alternative has actually loving worked..

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

SplitSoul posted:

It can refer to several different concepts, not just technical or functional obsolescence, but we're getting off on a stupid tangent here and you're making me agree with Emden, so let's forget I even mentioned it.

You're agreeing with emden because you both misunderstand the whole concept.

Having new models every year isn't a problem or planned obsolescence, it's merely the result of the products in question improving and there being no particular reason why the new model should wait for 2 year's worth of improvements instead of 1 etc. Planned obsolescence really does refer to actually making products that can't function for too long to mandate replacement, rather then what you see with technology where its all "oh I 've had this for a couple years and its not so good anymore (but still working perfectly fine, still does everything it did when you bought it more or less)".

Everything will be obsolete at one point or another. This is the result of not arbitrarily halting progress like fascists wish to do.

Ardennes
May 12, 2002

PT6A posted:

Jesus, you're talking about a stateless society and people are calling me unrealistic? gently caress me... I thought we're talking about things that could actually happen, not some idealized reality.



Thankfully, you picked Cuba to use as an example, which is the one communist country I've travelled to on a regular basis, and am reasonably familiar with. Let me let you in on a little secret: TVs and mobile phones are bought with hard currency brought in by tourists, meaning bartenders are asking me to bring iPhones while doctors go without. Every bit of reasonably modern technology I've seen down there has been brought and maintained by poo poo carried in a suitcase from a capitalist country. If my friend needs a manual to repair his car, or a TV (or the associated mounting bracket, which I have personally hand-carried through loving Jose Martí airport), or a battery for his PDA, or what have you, guess what? He asks me to bring it and he pays me in hard currency he's obtained from myself and other tourists. Doctors and professors don't have TVs; guys that work in the tourist industry do, and no one moreso than those who have opened private businesses (private restaurants and hotels/B&Bs).

Don't talk bullshit to me about communist countries; if you think nepotism is a miserable thing in capitalist countries, just wait until you see how crucial networking is in a socialist nation. My buddy jokes that it's socioismo, not socialismo. Meanwhile, most of the people who aren't in the tourist industry get supported by family working outside Cuba. I honestly don't know any Cuban people who aren't in poverty, and don't rely on some source of foreign income, and I love the country and I wish I could tell you otherwise.

Now, do we need to learn some things from Cuba and other socialist nations? Absolutely! Their education and healthcare systems are both incredibly impressive, even by the standards of a first-world nation, and they make sure that people do not starve in the street. I'm saying there has to be a healthy balance between a control economy and pure free-market capitalism, and with all I've seen everywhere I've been in the world, I think a properly-constrained and regulated capitalist system (with the taxation that must entail) which provides a robust safety net is the best answer. You can disagree all you like, but please try to at least provide an example of a place where the alternative has actually loving worked..

Compared to countries like Honduras in which don't even have those improvements and the people who can afford iphones are just wealthy people living in enclaves. Pretending Cuba should be able to compete with the first world is pretty ridiculous especially since it is still under an embargo. Do you actually think life in Cuba is actually worse than it was before the revolution or nearby countries with far lower HDIs?

If anything the embargo encourages corruption and overemphasis on the tourism industry because it is one way the Cuban government can get capital.

YF-23
Feb 17, 2011

My god, it's full of cat!


Install Windows posted:

You're agreeing with emden because you both misunderstand the whole concept.

Having new models every year isn't a problem or planned obsolescence, it's merely the result of the products in question improving and there being no particular reason why the new model should wait for 2 year's worth of improvements instead of 1 etc. Planned obsolescence really does refer to actually making products that can't function for too long to mandate replacement, rather then what you see with technology where its all "oh I 've had this for a couple years and its not so good anymore (but still working perfectly fine, still does everything it did when you bought it more or less)".

Everything will be obsolete at one point or another. This is the result of not arbitrarily halting progress like fascists wish to do.

New models ARE planned obsolescence if they're used as a marketing strategy that way. It's fine to release new better models, sure, but don't act as though it's improvement just for the sake of making a better product.

reignonyourparade
Nov 15, 2012
If anything what you're talking about is a process that has made planned obsolescence obsolete. You don't need to plan obsolescence, you just need to keep up with current technology.

Mans
Sep 14, 2011

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

PT6A posted:

Frankly, if any part of the former Eastern Bloc wants to tell communism/Marxism to go gently caress itself as forcefully as possible, I can't say I have a problem with it. They've been through it before, all y'all college Marxists haven't. If you discount things like Ostalgie, which is tantamount to Stockholm Syndrome in my opinion, I'm guessing no one wants to go back to communism. The people who think it would be an improvement are as foolishly hopeful as the poor folks who vote Republican in the States because, hey, it'll be worth it once they make their millions.

My parents lived through the attempted socialist revolution in Portugal.

Sucessful or not, the country was much better when oligarchs were fleeing with their tails between their legs to Brazil, farmers and workers were taking over their workplaces and even the scummiest of the right had to accept all sorts of compromises to avoid their heads being detached from their bodies.

I'd gladly go back to the time where politicians could be sieged for 24 hours because they aren't keeping their promises and where most of the work wasn't composed of part-time or minimum wage slaves. At least back then there was, at least, the illusion of fighting back.

Emden posted:

I didn't even make a post about fascism. I asked a legitimate and interesting question so in an effort to keep this poo poo on track I'll restate it in the hopes we can have a discussion.

Is it ever okay to have non-liberal beliefs? Can a sane, rational person ever hold non-liberal beliefs? How about in the West? I mean liberal as in Locke, Hume, Adam Smith; philosophical and economic liberalism. This is in response to many earlier posts calling fascists ~evil~ and a general trend that I've noticed where any opposition to liberalism must be a sign of mental illness or some other problem.

After toppling a fascist government it is quite permissible to allow for liberal democracy and bourgeois democracy, if only to create a democratic basis, kill fascist zealots' popular opinion and promote worker organization now under much more freer terms.

Holding faith to economic liberalism in the 21st century is like a Stalinist saying the problem with the Soviet Union in the late 30's was that not enough people were being sent to the gulags.

PT6A posted:

To make it more applicable to, you know, this thread, there were plenty of people who supported fascism, and wish to go back to it. They're as deluded and dangerous as people who think Marx-Leninism is a good idea. Why don't we try social democracy for a while, and keep it on the rails without letting it tip to full communism, regress to neoliberal democracy, or turn into a strange fascist state?
The effort it would take to "try social-democracy" would require a notable organization from the workers and specifically from the non-centrist,liberal left. You would need to fight back against the impositions from Brussels, you would need to fight back against the policies of the EU, against austerity, capital flight. You'd need to nationalize the banking sectors, make land reforms and re-nationalize all that has been privatized.

To make such a loving huge effort just to end in a middle ground where we once again accept to concede power back to those whoo turned Europe to what it is nowadays would be an insult to the entire effort. Why are you so opposed to the democratic control of the workers? Why do you think someone is superior to another human being because they have the divine right of heritance, property and capital?

Look at what the workers of France had to endure to create their Social Democratic state. Look at what the Russians had to endure so that the pressure of France's capital and property owners had to concede for a few decades some of their privilege. Europe's social democracy was built on the back of the Soviet Union and it didn't even last as long as the socialist experiment of Eastern Europe.

Fojar38 posted:

And before you point out that compromising hasn't worked either, consider for a moment that maybe in fact the working class that communists claim to represent might not in fact want socialism (under the Marxist definition of the term) or communism. You're going to have a really hard time convincing anyone but the most destitute that they should give up the notion of private property when it turns out people really like owning stuff.

:stare: This isn't the GBS communist thread dude, buying anti-semite avatars for Judakel is funny there, but you need at least some arguments in here.

PT6A posted:

In practice, you don't own a TV, though, and if you do it's probably poo poo and doesn't work properly because the electronics industry is controlled by some lovely government bureaucrat, since allowing the means of production to be owned by someone who has the faintest loving idea how to make a television would be unacceptably capitalistic.

Yes, Marxism should work, in theory. In practice, it hasn't, it doesn't, and it probably never will. Unlike every Marxist state that's ever existed in real life, the capitalist system does allow for the workers to own and meaningfully control the means of production. This is why entrepreneurship is so popular! Now, it does carry with it quite a bit of risk -- so we should remove a lot of that risk by providing a GMI of some sort, and make sure that things like healthcare are not coupled to one's employment status. Fund it with a progressive income tax. Voila: social democracy!
What if the rich don't want a progressive income tax?

What if the rich prefer no GMI so that your workforce becomes cheaper?

What if they depend on naive idiots like you to maintain their grip on society, even when the misery of Europe is reaching points where literal Fascists are taking power and gaining votes?

What if the rich have a grip on the main sources of mass media and can send out their propaganda in much better terms than anyone else? To the general public austerity is inevitable, the crisis was made by the existance of wellfare systems, privatizing national assets, for costs bellow market price even, is a positive thing and destroying worker's rights, making it easier to fire people and pay them less, is the road to prosperity. This, which is all false, is what is sent out as truth.

You simply don't have a loving clue.

Obdicut
May 15, 2012

"What election?"

YF-23 posted:

New models ARE planned obsolescence if they're used as a marketing strategy that way. It's fine to release new better models, sure, but don't act as though it's improvement just for the sake of making a better product.

The term originally meant "This poo poo will literally fall apart after X years" not "This poo poo will be obsolete in X years because of style/fashion/upgrades." It's expanded to include that meaning, but that's a little dumb because it's not really built into the product the way real planned physical obsolescence is.


Edit for actual content:

http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/world/article/2-Chileans-charged-with-causing-Spain-church-blast-4989149.php

How not to bash the fash: Explode a dumb pointless bomb in a cathedral for past ties to fascists, get arrested for it.

Obdicut fucked around with this message at 16:14 on Nov 23, 2013

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

reignonyourparade posted:

If anything what you're talking about is a process that has made planned obsolescence obsolete. You don't need to plan obsolescence, you just need to keep up with current technology.

Yeah, that's probably a better way to put it. You need to plan obsolescence for something like a toaster because it's relatively simple and has been fairly static for the past few years/decades. You can't really plan obsolescence for a Smart Phone because it's an immature market that is rapidly developing.

YF-23
Feb 17, 2011

My god, it's full of cat!


Obdicut posted:

The term originally meant "This poo poo will literally fall apart after X years" not "This poo poo will be obsolete in X years because of style/fashion/upgrades." It's expanded to include that meaning, but that's a little dumb because it's not really built into the product the way real planned physical obsolescence is.

That really doesn't mean anything though, at this point we're arguing semantics because we all fully understand what we're talking about but describing it by using the term "planned obsolescence" (which as you point out has come to include the thing we're talking about) is something that apparently some people don't like?

I mean yeah obviously it's not planned obsolescence in the sense of a lightbulb breaking after a year but it sure still is planned obsolescence. Sorry for treading on your dictionary I guess.

Obdicut
May 15, 2012

"What election?"

YF-23 posted:

That really doesn't mean anything though, at this point we're arguing semantics because we all fully understand what we're talking about but describing it by using the term "planned obsolescence" (which as you point out has come to include the thing we're talking about) is something that apparently some people don't like?

I mean yeah obviously it's not planned obsolescence in the sense of a lightbulb breaking after a year but it sure still is planned obsolescence. Sorry for treading on your dictionary I guess.

It really does mean something. It's very important to be able to distinguish a planned attempt by companies to sell products that they know will break and wear out, and companies knowing that, because of desires to upgrade and marketing, customers will want a new version in a few years. They're two different things, and though the term 'planned obsolescence' can cover them both, it's a lot more of a stretch for the latter. As someone else just said, you don't need to really plan the second kind of obsolescence, it just happens.

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

YF-23 posted:

That really doesn't mean anything though, at this point we're arguing semantics because we all fully understand what we're talking about but describing it by using the term "planned obsolescence" (which as you point out has come to include the thing we're talking about) is something that apparently some people don't like?

I mean yeah obviously it's not planned obsolescence in the sense of a lightbulb breaking after a year but it sure still is planned obsolescence. Sorry for treading on your dictionary I guess.

There's a very big difference from "company releases a product and designs it so it breaks after two years" and "company releases a product and then releases another product two years later hoping people would upgrade to it", and yet both are covered under "planned obsolescence".

HighClassSwankyTime
Jan 16, 2004

Mans posted:

What if the rich don't want a progressive income tax?

What if the rich prefer no GMI so that your workforce becomes cheaper?

What if they depend on naive idiots like you to maintain their grip on society, even when the misery of Europe is reaching points where literal Fascists are taking power and gaining votes?

What if the rich have a grip on the main sources of mass media and can send out their propaganda in much better terms than anyone else? To the general public austerity is inevitable, the crisis was made by the existance of wellfare systems, privatizing national assets, for costs bellow market price even, is a positive thing and destroying worker's rights, making it easier to fire people and pay them less, is the road to prosperity. This, which is all false, is what is sent out as truth.

You simply don't have a loving clue.

Neither do you, if you actually think killing everyone you disagree with leads to... anything.

ekuNNN
Nov 27, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

HighClassSwankyTime posted:

Neither do you, if you actually think killing everyone you disagree with leads to... anything.

That's not at all what he said you dumbass. :psyduck:

Enjoy
Apr 18, 2009

HighClassSwankyTime posted:

Neither do you, if you actually think killing everyone you disagree with leads to... anything.

You show that straw bastard who's boss

Diet Lime
Aug 11, 2013

by toby

Obdicut posted:

It really does mean something. It's very important to be able to distinguish a planned attempt by companies to sell products that they know will break and wear out, and companies knowing that, because of desires to upgrade and marketing, customers will want a new version in a few years. They're two different things, and though the term 'planned obsolescence' can cover them both, it's a lot more of a stretch for the latter. As someone else just said, you don't need to really plan the second kind of obsolescence, it just happens.

I've been reading the thread quite a while and really didn't want to extend the derail; but I can't help but notice some serious Apple fanboyism going on here.

Apple absolutely practices planned obsolescence, the moment you design mobile hardware that relies on a battery and make it such that that battery cannot be replaced without tools and disassembly you've built-in a lifespan.

They're quite possibly one of the best examples of a company practicing planned obsolescence, some of their early OS versions obsoleted their predecessors; and despite backwards-compatibility being practical older devices were locked out of upgrading their software to sell more hardware with better features. Features that weren't a part of the hardware at all.

Shibawanko
Feb 13, 2013

Diet Lime posted:

I've been reading the thread quite a while and really didn't want to extend the derail; but I can't help but notice some serious Apple fanboyism going on here.

Apple absolutely practices planned obsolescence, the moment you design mobile hardware that relies on a battery and make it such that that battery cannot be replaced without tools and disassembly you've built-in a lifespan.

They're quite possibly one of the best examples of a company practicing planned obsolescence, some of their early OS versions obsoleted their predecessors; and despite backwards-compatibility being practical older devices were locked out of upgrading their software to sell more hardware with better features. Features that weren't a part of the hardware at all.

From what I gathered they also intentionally pulled all of the sleeves you could buy for earlier iphones from the market so that you had to upgrade to be able to wear a sleeve, or dig up a second hand one somehow.

Obdicut
May 15, 2012

"What election?"

Diet Lime posted:

I've been reading the thread quite a while and really didn't want to extend the derail; but I can't help but notice some serious Apple fanboyism going on here.


I have never bought an Apple product in my life, don't know how to use a Mac, and I have no idea why you think I'm an Apple fanboy.


quote:

Apple absolutely practices planned obsolescence, the moment you design mobile hardware that relies on a battery and make it such that that battery cannot be replaced without tools and disassembly you've built-in a lifespan.

Why are you telling me this, since I never talked about Apple.

Did you mean to tell this to someone else or something? All I'm saying is that there's a difference between physical obsolescence-- planning that your poo poo will break-- and marketing obsolescence-- knowing that your customers are going to want a new version in a few years.

I don't care about Apple or your opinions about Apple. How about we stop talking about Apple unless you're saying they're fascists.


More content:

Reasonably good Salon/Alternet article arguing that austerity leads to fascism, or more accurately, that the failure of government to solve real social ills leads to extremism. Pretty good read.

http://www.salon.com/2013/11/20/could_austerity_give_rise_to_american_fascism_partner/

V. Illych L.
Apr 11, 2008

ASK ME ABOUT LUMBER

420 knit your own gadget sleeves every day


(What I mean to suggest is that this is a stupid discussion to be having in the "Return of fascism" thread)

KoldPT
Oct 9, 2012

V. Illych L. posted:

420 knit your own gadget sleeves every day


(What I mean to suggest is that this is a stupid discussion to be having in the "Return of fascism" thread)

It's more interesting than Marxism thread #500.

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SSJ2 Goku Wilders
Mar 24, 2010
I don't know what Marxism thread you've been following but the Marxism thread on the first page in D&D is one of the most genuinely interesting threads on the whole forum atm

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