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US Politics Mega-thread - Page 8792

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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please.

In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up!

NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious.
Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action.
Plansix
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States60190 Posts
Last Edited: 2017-09-21 13:00:08
September 21 2017 12:57 GMT
#175821
On September 21 2017 14:51 WolfintheSheep wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 13:29 Plansix wrote:
On September 21 2017 13:14 Nevuk wrote:
On September 21 2017 12:50 Plansix wrote:
On September 21 2017 12:33 ticklishmusic wrote:
yeah, i'm willing to give FB the benefit of the doubt on this. given the scale of their operation, i think it's more likely that whatever algo or tool they have generating the categories did it with zero human intervention, and that their filter just didn't catch it for one reason or another.

That is where you lose me. They created a system they cannot manage and then claim they have no idea stuff like this happens. They had an idea. This topic came up. They know hate groups use their services. They just assumed it would be a while until it became a problem.

On September 21 2017 12:25 TheLordofAwesome wrote:
On September 21 2017 12:10 Plansix wrote:


Like, do they think we are that stupid?

These keywords about Jewish people are not created by Facebook employees directly. These lists of advertising keywords are automatically curated by algorithms from what people post on the website. It's possible that Facebook actually had no idea that these keywords had been selected to be publicly offered for anyone to target. It's also possible that Facebook knew and didn't care as long as no one found out. Honestly, I find the second hypothesis unlikely, simply because the audience for those keywords is really, really tiny, as the article explains. Anyone with a brain would understand the potential PR backlash from "Facebook sells ads to literal Nazis" would be a million times worse than the pennies Facebook might make off said Nazis selling ads. I wouldn't jump to conclusions just yet about Facebook from this story.

My general opinion of Facebook is they know their product it to large to be managed without humans, but don't want to spend the money to do it. They know hate groups use their services and are more than happy to make money off of them. Just like reddit. Just like twitter. Just like youtube.
Facebook had humans managing things like fake news but conservatives complained it was biased and Facebook got rid of them. I think Facebook avoids having employees manage things like this to avoid that situation rather than anything else.

They could just be a real media company and have an editorial staff, but that would get in the way of them soaking up ad dollars. I really have zero sympathy for companies that build their buisness on disrupting established industries. The networks and media facebook would be out of buisness if they ran white nationalist news stories. No paper in the country could function for long shilling the 14 words. But facebook, reddit and twitter convinced everyone that they can't moderate their own services, so its just the price of free speech to have nazis use their sites. And if they happen to make money off the hate groups. Well that isn't their fault either, since they are so big.

Except Facebook, while always intended as a disruptive business, was never built to disrupt the news industry. Not because of a lack of desire, I doubt, but because no one could have predicted that these internet services would overtake the entire news industry.

And part of that is the news industry's complete lack of foresight or motivation to update themselves to an internet era. And part of that is everyone underestimating how willing people are to intentionally blinder themselves outside of their established worldviews. But one way or another, people would rather have information fed to them through a social circle instead of a informed source, so these tech companies are playing catch-up to improve a service they didn't know they'd be providing.

Also, probably importantly, I doubt 20 or 15 years ago people would've thought Nazi groups were genuinely a "thing". Yes, there is some vague sentiment of people like that still being out there, and they'd occasionally pop up in the news as a reminder. But it's really the information propagation of these social media services that these groups have properly entered public consciousness again. Which is the catch 22 of only knowing there's a problem that needs addressing, only after you've exposed it.

It also isn’t a level playing field. Facebook and others on the internet have complete liability protection that no TV network or news paper enjoys. They don’t need fact checkers because they can’t be sued if the facts on their site or incorrect. They are also not under the same regulatory scrutiny, since they don’t have provide or keep public records of political ads bought on the serve or details as to how they were distributed. Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

The news industry has plenty of faults, I’m not buying into the tech industry’s PR just providing a better service. They entered the field with an unfair advantage due to lack of regulation and act like it was a meritocracy the whole time. Which is complete bullshit.

As for the hate groups and Nazis, people have been complaining to facebook about that for years. And reddit. And youtube. All the way back to 2014 and earlier. There is no way they didn’t know about this, people have been telling them for years.
I have the Honor to be your Obedient Servant, P.6
TL+ Member
LegalLord
Profile Blog Joined April 2013
United States13779 Posts
September 21 2017 13:26 GMT
#175822
On September 21 2017 21:57 Plansix wrote:
Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

An apt way to put what we've come to know well over the past few years.
History will sooner or later sweep the European Union away without mercy.
Plansix
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States60190 Posts
Last Edited: 2017-09-21 13:35:23
September 21 2017 13:34 GMT
#175823
On September 21 2017 22:26 LegalLord wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 21:57 Plansix wrote:
Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

An apt way to put what we've come to know well over the past few years.


This is my personal favorite:

http://people.com/chica/former-google-employees-bodega-startup/

Two former Google employees, Paul McDonald and Ashwath Rajan, thought that their newest innovation would be the next big thing: unmanned five-foot-wide pantry boxes full of non-perishables called Bodegas. However, they are now facing a major backlash for their appropriation of a cherished Latino community tradition, the corner store. Yesterday, an article by Fast Company, which quickly went viral, announced that the two Google veterans were bringing mom-and-pop convenience stores to an end with their invention.


We invented this massive vending system that will cut out the pesky problem of human labor, which is always a problem when it comes to keeping prices low. Those stores that used to be the stepping stones for families trying to work their way to middle class status, those need to go out of business so these two can just strip money out of a local community and make millions. It avoids all those pesky regulations, inspections and health concerns.

This is a classic case of being high on your own Kool Aid.
I have the Honor to be your Obedient Servant, P.6
TL+ Member
KwarK
Profile Blog Joined July 2006
United States43609 Posts
Last Edited: 2017-09-21 13:49:55
September 21 2017 13:49 GMT
#175824
On September 21 2017 22:34 Plansix wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 22:26 LegalLord wrote:
On September 21 2017 21:57 Plansix wrote:
Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

An apt way to put what we've come to know well over the past few years.


This is my personal favorite:

http://people.com/chica/former-google-employees-bodega-startup/

Show nested quote +
Two former Google employees, Paul McDonald and Ashwath Rajan, thought that their newest innovation would be the next big thing: unmanned five-foot-wide pantry boxes full of non-perishables called Bodegas. However, they are now facing a major backlash for their appropriation of a cherished Latino community tradition, the corner store. Yesterday, an article by Fast Company, which quickly went viral, announced that the two Google veterans were bringing mom-and-pop convenience stores to an end with their invention.


We invented this massive vending system that will cut out the pesky problem of human labor, which is always a problem when it comes to keeping prices low. Those stores that used to be the stepping stones for families trying to work their way to middle class status, those need to go out of business so these two can just strip money out of a local community and make millions. It avoids all those pesky regulations, inspections and health concerns.

This is a classic case of being high on your own Kool Aid.

It doesn't necessarily follow that it will take money out of communities. Let's say you have $100 to spend on essential goods. You go to the local corner store and spend $100. $80 of that $100 ultimately goes to the wholesalers who supply the stock and $20 stays local in salaries paid to staff. Now let's say a disruptive intruder manages to give you all the same essentials for $70 through 12.5% lower wholesale costs and 100% lower staffing costs. There is now actually more money staying in the community than before.

Destroying jobs is a good thing, jobs are a necessary evil that we should want to reduce when possible. The real problem is how best to distribute the value created by reducing the need for those jobs.
ModeratorThe angels have the phone box
Liquid`Drone
Profile Joined September 2002
Norway28747 Posts
September 21 2017 13:58 GMT
#175825
On September 21 2017 22:49 KwarK wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 22:34 Plansix wrote:
On September 21 2017 22:26 LegalLord wrote:
On September 21 2017 21:57 Plansix wrote:
Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

An apt way to put what we've come to know well over the past few years.


This is my personal favorite:

http://people.com/chica/former-google-employees-bodega-startup/

Two former Google employees, Paul McDonald and Ashwath Rajan, thought that their newest innovation would be the next big thing: unmanned five-foot-wide pantry boxes full of non-perishables called Bodegas. However, they are now facing a major backlash for their appropriation of a cherished Latino community tradition, the corner store. Yesterday, an article by Fast Company, which quickly went viral, announced that the two Google veterans were bringing mom-and-pop convenience stores to an end with their invention.


We invented this massive vending system that will cut out the pesky problem of human labor, which is always a problem when it comes to keeping prices low. Those stores that used to be the stepping stones for families trying to work their way to middle class status, those need to go out of business so these two can just strip money out of a local community and make millions. It avoids all those pesky regulations, inspections and health concerns.

This is a classic case of being high on your own Kool Aid.

It doesn't necessarily follow that it will take money out of communities. Let's say you have $100 to spend on essential goods. You go to the local corner store and spend $100. $80 of that $100 ultimately goes to the wholesalers who supply the stock and $20 stays local in salaries paid to staff. Now let's say a disruptive intruder manages to give you all the same essentials for $70 through 12.5% lower wholesale costs and 100% lower staffing costs. There is now actually more money staying in the community than before.

Destroying jobs is a good thing, jobs are a necessary evil that we should want to reduce when possible. The real problem is how best to distribute the value created by reducing the need for those jobs.


I agree with this, but I'm not sure destroying jobs is a good thing until we've figured out the redistribution.
Moderator
Kickboxer
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
Slovenia1308 Posts
September 21 2017 13:59 GMT
#175826
Well the problem with widespread gun presence is that it escalates the general sentiment of danger in the public setting, reshaping something as common as road rage incidents between civilians into potentially homicidal situations

this problem is exponential when it comes to the dynamics between police and suspects / perps. In most strict gun control countries the police have no reason to even feel threatened by small-time criminals (and especially random civilians).

Kickboxer
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
Slovenia1308 Posts
September 21 2017 14:01 GMT
#175827
I mean, the obviously terrible reality of cops shooting innocent people is tied to the possibility of an "innocent" person having the potential (sometimes even wrongly expected) capacity of putting a cop's life into immediate and serious risk.
ticklishmusic
Profile Blog Joined August 2011
United States15977 Posts
Last Edited: 2017-09-21 14:07:40
September 21 2017 14:07 GMT
#175828
eh, bodega seems like a stupid idea anyways. i saw their pitch to investors, still kind of surprised people gave them money. i just don't see how a glorified vending machine, even with the power of "analytics" can possibly correctly match inventory to demand. i'd rather go to a convenience store for toilet paper instead of having to check 7 different machines because they're out.
(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻
TheTenthDoc
Profile Blog Joined February 2011
United States9561 Posts
September 21 2017 14:07 GMT
#175829
On September 21 2017 21:57 Plansix wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 14:51 WolfintheSheep wrote:
On September 21 2017 13:29 Plansix wrote:
On September 21 2017 13:14 Nevuk wrote:
On September 21 2017 12:50 Plansix wrote:
On September 21 2017 12:33 ticklishmusic wrote:
yeah, i'm willing to give FB the benefit of the doubt on this. given the scale of their operation, i think it's more likely that whatever algo or tool they have generating the categories did it with zero human intervention, and that their filter just didn't catch it for one reason or another.

That is where you lose me. They created a system they cannot manage and then claim they have no idea stuff like this happens. They had an idea. This topic came up. They know hate groups use their services. They just assumed it would be a while until it became a problem.

On September 21 2017 12:25 TheLordofAwesome wrote:
On September 21 2017 12:10 Plansix wrote:
https://twitter.com/ProPublica/status/910590800639270913

Like, do they think we are that stupid?

These keywords about Jewish people are not created by Facebook employees directly. These lists of advertising keywords are automatically curated by algorithms from what people post on the website. It's possible that Facebook actually had no idea that these keywords had been selected to be publicly offered for anyone to target. It's also possible that Facebook knew and didn't care as long as no one found out. Honestly, I find the second hypothesis unlikely, simply because the audience for those keywords is really, really tiny, as the article explains. Anyone with a brain would understand the potential PR backlash from "Facebook sells ads to literal Nazis" would be a million times worse than the pennies Facebook might make off said Nazis selling ads. I wouldn't jump to conclusions just yet about Facebook from this story.

My general opinion of Facebook is they know their product it to large to be managed without humans, but don't want to spend the money to do it. They know hate groups use their services and are more than happy to make money off of them. Just like reddit. Just like twitter. Just like youtube.
Facebook had humans managing things like fake news but conservatives complained it was biased and Facebook got rid of them. I think Facebook avoids having employees manage things like this to avoid that situation rather than anything else.

They could just be a real media company and have an editorial staff, but that would get in the way of them soaking up ad dollars. I really have zero sympathy for companies that build their buisness on disrupting established industries. The networks and media facebook would be out of buisness if they ran white nationalist news stories. No paper in the country could function for long shilling the 14 words. But facebook, reddit and twitter convinced everyone that they can't moderate their own services, so its just the price of free speech to have nazis use their sites. And if they happen to make money off the hate groups. Well that isn't their fault either, since they are so big.

Except Facebook, while always intended as a disruptive business, was never built to disrupt the news industry. Not because of a lack of desire, I doubt, but because no one could have predicted that these internet services would overtake the entire news industry.

And part of that is the news industry's complete lack of foresight or motivation to update themselves to an internet era. And part of that is everyone underestimating how willing people are to intentionally blinder themselves outside of their established worldviews. But one way or another, people would rather have information fed to them through a social circle instead of a informed source, so these tech companies are playing catch-up to improve a service they didn't know they'd be providing.

Also, probably importantly, I doubt 20 or 15 years ago people would've thought Nazi groups were genuinely a "thing". Yes, there is some vague sentiment of people like that still being out there, and they'd occasionally pop up in the news as a reminder. But it's really the information propagation of these social media services that these groups have properly entered public consciousness again. Which is the catch 22 of only knowing there's a problem that needs addressing, only after you've exposed it.

It also isn’t a level playing field. Facebook and others on the internet have complete liability protection that no TV network or news paper enjoys. They don’t need fact checkers because they can’t be sued if the facts on their site or incorrect. They are also not under the same regulatory scrutiny, since they don’t have provide or keep public records of political ads bought on the serve or details as to how they were distributed. Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

The news industry has plenty of faults, I’m not buying into the tech industry’s PR just providing a better service. They entered the field with an unfair advantage due to lack of regulation and act like it was a meritocracy the whole time. Which is complete bullshit.

As for the hate groups and Nazis, people have been complaining to facebook about that for years. And reddit. And youtube. All the way back to 2014 and earlier. There is no way they didn’t know about this, people have been telling them for years.


Yep, you just need to look at Uber to see how "disruption" can boil down to "avoiding the spirit of the law because the letter of it hasn't caught up to tech yet."
GreenHorizons
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States23663 Posts
September 21 2017 14:12 GMT
#175830
On September 21 2017 22:59 Kickboxer wrote:
Well the problem with widespread gun presence is that it escalates the general sentiment of danger in the public setting, reshaping something as common as road rage incidents between civilians into potentially homicidal situations

this problem is exponential when it comes to the dynamics between police and suspects / perps. In most strict gun control countries the police have no reason to even feel threatened by small-time criminals (and especially random civilians).



People (including police) think these interactions are far more dangerous than they actually are. The threat they "feel" and the threat they are under are distinctly different.

There's a lot of factors that go into this, but their training is one of them. There is no science in police training (or very little really). A lot of it is anecdotal (This one guy did this crazy thing and it could happen to you!) or completely made up urban legends.

Like the whole "21 feet" thing is not peer reviewed science, just something they pretty much made up. It's completely unjustifiable the amount of people cops kill because they had blunt objects or small blades vs what the threat (that they signed up for btw) they actually present to officers.
"People like to look at history and think 'If that was me back then, I would have...' We're living through history, and the truth is, whatever you are doing now is probably what you would have done then" "Scratch a Liberal..."
ticklishmusic
Profile Blog Joined August 2011
United States15977 Posts
September 21 2017 14:13 GMT
#175831
i think uber's a shitty company for a lot of reasons, but in all honesty the taxi industry was in some ways an even shittier industry.
(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻
Mohdoo
Profile Joined August 2007
United States15737 Posts
September 21 2017 14:21 GMT
#175832
On September 21 2017 22:34 Plansix wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 22:26 LegalLord wrote:
On September 21 2017 21:57 Plansix wrote:
Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

An apt way to put what we've come to know well over the past few years.


This is my personal favorite:

http://people.com/chica/former-google-employees-bodega-startup/

Show nested quote +
Two former Google employees, Paul McDonald and Ashwath Rajan, thought that their newest innovation would be the next big thing: unmanned five-foot-wide pantry boxes full of non-perishables called Bodegas. However, they are now facing a major backlash for their appropriation of a cherished Latino community tradition, the corner store. Yesterday, an article by Fast Company, which quickly went viral, announced that the two Google veterans were bringing mom-and-pop convenience stores to an end with their invention.


We invented this massive vending system that will cut out the pesky problem of human labor, which is always a problem when it comes to keeping prices low. Those stores that used to be the stepping stones for families trying to work their way to middle class status, those need to go out of business so these two can just strip money out of a local community and make millions. It avoids all those pesky regulations, inspections and health concerns.

This is a classic case of being high on your own Kool Aid.


It is amazing to me that someone can even allow themselves to say this:


To compete with bodegas and also use the ‘bodega’ name is unbelievably disrespectful.


Remarkably entitled and insanely out of touch. I am constantly disappointed by this type of activism. This relates back to what I have said about how Hispanic dynamics in the US are largely dominated by Mexican influence. Because Mexicans moving to the US tend to be not so wealthy, compared to immigrants from countries further south, they are largely disadvantaged and end up creating a culture of victimhood in the entire Hispanic community. We mostly do just fine. The term "Hispanic" is overused and destroys a lot of detail. The struggles of Mexicans are not the struggles of people who immigrated from further South.
Plansix
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States60190 Posts
September 21 2017 14:22 GMT
#175833
On September 21 2017 23:13 ticklishmusic wrote:
i think uber's a shitty company for a lot of reasons, but in all honesty the taxi industry was in some ways an even shittier industry.

One of those is a shitty local industry controlled by local regulators. They employ local attorneys who have other clients that same community and likely don’t work or the highest price firm in the area. I can bring a complaint to my local elected official to either have the regulators or have new laws passed if there is a problem.

The other one is a billion dollar multi-national company with zero investment in the community. Nothing short of a class action lawsuit will make them care.

So when picking between two shitty industries, I’ll pick normal taxi industry.

But really the ultimate solution is for the cities to develop their own Uber style apps and provide it to the taxi companies for a service fee. It might not be as good as uber, but it would deal with the worst part of the taxi service.
I have the Honor to be your Obedient Servant, P.6
TL+ Member
LegalLord
Profile Blog Joined April 2013
United States13779 Posts
September 21 2017 14:23 GMT
#175834
On September 21 2017 23:07 ticklishmusic wrote:
eh, bodega seems like a stupid idea anyways. i saw their pitch to investors, still kind of surprised people gave them money. i just don't see how a glorified vending machine, even with the power of "analytics" can possibly correctly match inventory to demand. i'd rather go to a convenience store for toilet paper instead of having to check 7 different machines because they're out.

Collective self delusion is a staple of Silicon Valley. They all convince themselves and a couple of investors that a whole bunch of utter crap will revolutionize everything. Some manage to peddle their crap on the open market and make not a lameass million, but a cool billion dollars.
History will sooner or later sweep the European Union away without mercy.
Plansix
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States60190 Posts
September 21 2017 14:23 GMT
#175835
On September 21 2017 23:21 Mohdoo wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 22:34 Plansix wrote:
On September 21 2017 22:26 LegalLord wrote:
On September 21 2017 21:57 Plansix wrote:
Disruptive is just a buzz word for “dodging regulations”.

An apt way to put what we've come to know well over the past few years.


This is my personal favorite:

http://people.com/chica/former-google-employees-bodega-startup/

Two former Google employees, Paul McDonald and Ashwath Rajan, thought that their newest innovation would be the next big thing: unmanned five-foot-wide pantry boxes full of non-perishables called Bodegas. However, they are now facing a major backlash for their appropriation of a cherished Latino community tradition, the corner store. Yesterday, an article by Fast Company, which quickly went viral, announced that the two Google veterans were bringing mom-and-pop convenience stores to an end with their invention.


We invented this massive vending system that will cut out the pesky problem of human labor, which is always a problem when it comes to keeping prices low. Those stores that used to be the stepping stones for families trying to work their way to middle class status, those need to go out of business so these two can just strip money out of a local community and make millions. It avoids all those pesky regulations, inspections and health concerns.

This is a classic case of being high on your own Kool Aid.


It is amazing to me that someone can even allow themselves to say this:

Show nested quote +

To compete with bodegas and also use the ‘bodega’ name is unbelievably disrespectful.


Remarkably entitled and insanely out of touch. I am constantly disappointed by this type of activism. This relates back to what I have said about how Hispanic dynamics in the US are largely dominated by Mexican influence. Because Mexicans moving to the US tend to be not so wealthy, compared to immigrants from countries further south, they are largely disadvantaged and end up creating a culture of victimhood in the entire Hispanic community. We mostly do just fine. The term "Hispanic" is overused and destroys a lot of detail. The struggles of Mexicans are not the struggles of people who immigrated from further South.

I prefer “Gentrification Box”. It really sums up the entire product perfectly.
I have the Honor to be your Obedient Servant, P.6
TL+ Member
Mohdoo
Profile Joined August 2007
United States15737 Posts
September 21 2017 14:29 GMT
#175836
One more thing on the Bodega bullshit: It is hilarious to me to see how many of these tweets have 10s of thousands of retweets or reactions or whatever. These people are feeling like they are leading some sort of revolution because it is all an echo chamber. There is this core group of people who listen for, and react to, benign events and blow them up into some bullshit civil rights movement. Despite my generally liberal environment, I never even heard about this Bodega shit. So this kind of activism clearly just kinda of blows up for a day and then maybe has secondary tremors.

Bodegas don't matter. God damn.
Plansix
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States60190 Posts
Last Edited: 2017-09-21 14:34:34
September 21 2017 14:32 GMT
#175837
On September 21 2017 23:29 Mohdoo wrote:
One more thing on the Bodega bullshit: It is hilarious to me to see how many of these tweets have 10s of thousands of retweets or reactions or whatever. These people are feeling like they are leading some sort of revolution because it is all an echo chamber. There is this core group of people who listen for, and react to, benign events and blow them up into some bullshit civil rights movement. Despite my generally liberal environment, I never even heard about this Bodega shit. So this kind of activism clearly just kinda of blows up for a day and then maybe has secondary tremors.

Bodegas don't matter. God damn.



Don’t questions peoples love of their local corner store. No busted ass vending machine is going to give me bad coffee at 3 am.
I have the Honor to be your Obedient Servant, P.6
TL+ Member
warding
Profile Joined August 2005
Portugal2394 Posts
September 21 2017 14:36 GMT
#175838
On September 21 2017 23:22 Plansix wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 23:13 ticklishmusic wrote:
i think uber's a shitty company for a lot of reasons, but in all honesty the taxi industry was in some ways an even shittier industry.

One of those is a shitty local industry controlled by local regulators. They employ local attorneys who have other clients that same community and likely don’t work or the highest price firm in the area. I can bring a complaint to my local elected official to either have the regulators or have new laws passed if there is a problem.

The other one is a billion dollar multi-national company with zero investment in the community. Nothing short of a class action lawsuit will make them care.

So when picking between two shitty industries, I’ll pick normal taxi industry.

But really the ultimate solution is for the cities to develop their own Uber style apps and provide it to the taxi companies for a service fee. It might not be as good as uber, but it would deal with the worst part of the taxi service.

What stops you from bringing complaints about Uber to your local elected official? Uber/Lyft are far superior to taxi services, from a consumer standpoint, in every european and american city I've been to in the past few years. I don't see what other local benefit the taxi service systems bring that could possibly compare with the massive consumer benefit from Uber.

Meanwhile, taxi services have developed local apps, and in some countries taxis are able to drive on Uber too I believe. The problem is that this kind of customer facing app benefits from scale (when landing in Kuala Lumpur, I have no idea what the local taxi app is).

We should be praising Silicon Valley, they're burning 2 billion dollars a year in Uber in order to give us a better transportation service.
Plansix
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States60190 Posts
Last Edited: 2017-09-21 14:42:41
September 21 2017 14:41 GMT
#175839
On September 21 2017 23:36 warding wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 23:22 Plansix wrote:
On September 21 2017 23:13 ticklishmusic wrote:
i think uber's a shitty company for a lot of reasons, but in all honesty the taxi industry was in some ways an even shittier industry.

One of those is a shitty local industry controlled by local regulators. They employ local attorneys who have other clients that same community and likely don’t work or the highest price firm in the area. I can bring a complaint to my local elected official to either have the regulators or have new laws passed if there is a problem.

The other one is a billion dollar multi-national company with zero investment in the community. Nothing short of a class action lawsuit will make them care.

So when picking between two shitty industries, I’ll pick normal taxi industry.

But really the ultimate solution is for the cities to develop their own Uber style apps and provide it to the taxi companies for a service fee. It might not be as good as uber, but it would deal with the worst part of the taxi service.

What stops you from bringing complaints about Uber to your local elected official? Uber/Lyft are far superior to taxi services, from a consumer standpoint, in every european and american city I've been to in the past few years. I don't see what other local benefit the taxi service systems bring that could possibly compare with the massive consumer benefit from Uber.

Meanwhile, taxi services have developed local apps, and in some countries taxis are able to drive on Uber too I believe. The problem is that this kind of customer facing app benefits from scale (when landing in Kuala Lumpur, I have no idea what the local taxi app is).

We should be praising Silicon Valley, they're burning 2 billion dollars a year in Uber in order to give us a better transportation service.

Because I know how powerless local officials are when trying to influence or impact massive, billion dollar multinational companies. I worked for this companies from 2008-2014 and watched every local regulator and elected official strike out over and over. I don’t thank companies for profiting for themselves. They can send me a fat check and then I’ll thank them for the check.

And better is subjective. Uber is great right up until they decide your city isn’t worth it because of regulations they don’t like. Then they pull out of the city without warning or repercussions. Which is exactly what will happen if they go bankruptcy. Except it will happen to every city that grows dependent on their services, all at once.
I have the Honor to be your Obedient Servant, P.6
TL+ Member
LegalLord
Profile Blog Joined April 2013
United States13779 Posts
September 21 2017 14:41 GMT
#175840
On September 21 2017 23:32 Plansix wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 21 2017 23:29 Mohdoo wrote:
One more thing on the Bodega bullshit: It is hilarious to me to see how many of these tweets have 10s of thousands of retweets or reactions or whatever. These people are feeling like they are leading some sort of revolution because it is all an echo chamber. There is this core group of people who listen for, and react to, benign events and blow them up into some bullshit civil rights movement. Despite my generally liberal environment, I never even heard about this Bodega shit. So this kind of activism clearly just kinda of blows up for a day and then maybe has secondary tremors.

Bodegas don't matter. God damn.

https://twitter.com/RealLifeKaz/status/907990984553885698

Don’t questions peoples love of their local corner store. No busted ass vending machine is going to give me bad coffee at 3 am.

I've seen ones that do.

Was a nice touch at a hospital that offered 24/7 service with a vending machine offering free coffee and tea. A very nice touch.
History will sooner or later sweep the European Union away without mercy.
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