Sunday, April 15, 2012
The Great Technological Watershed
Will the internet, with its ready information, lead to a "Great Technological Dumbing Down" - and, to even smaller elites making the real choices? Or will it give more power to all - make it easier to find out; easier to publicise; easier to coordinate; easier to get just things done?
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Commercial Spam from Prompts and Keywords
How much did 'Christies' (the auction house) pay to get top rank in the prompts of my phone? Did they pay the phone manufacturer HTC, or Microsoft who own the operating system (who also did other downgrades, 8 months before the contract ended)?
'Christ***' pops up, exclusively, and ahead of Christmas, Christ, or Christian. Also, the phone chooses not to remember that I have never (and probably never will) wish to type 'Christ***'.
Could I offer to pay an extra (one off) $5 to opt out of all such prompts? In a world where consumers need to be informed, and suspicious, it would only be just if we were offered the chance to outbid commercials. Which, by aiding the rich and powerful rather than the good, actually act against competition, rational choice and good in the world.
One can say the same of Google prompts in search and Chrome/Android/Etc - where strange things like Dubonnet, and American Airlines sometimes intrude suspiciously.
'Christ***' pops up, exclusively, and ahead of Christmas, Christ, or Christian. Also, the phone chooses not to remember that I have never (and probably never will) wish to type 'Christ***'.
Could I offer to pay an extra (one off) $5 to opt out of all such prompts? In a world where consumers need to be informed, and suspicious, it would only be just if we were offered the chance to outbid commercials. Which, by aiding the rich and powerful rather than the good, actually act against competition, rational choice and good in the world.
One can say the same of Google prompts in search and Chrome/Android/Etc - where strange things like Dubonnet, and American Airlines sometimes intrude suspiciously.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
The Supicious, Penny-pinching and Ruthless Shopper
British Gas (Centrica Plc - the UK corporation) believe the lazy shopper should be punished with higher charges - so they charge loyal customers more. They also use complex tariffs so that it is very difficult to tell if another tariff is actually any cheaper.
Is this is a good, or even the best, policy from the point of view of society?
British Gas Customer Relations declined to comment... Perhaps, in the interests of economy, they don't have a corporate philosopher and shareholders discourage their managers from thinking about social impacts of their business model?
According to Adam Smith, "Trust" is fundamental to economic development, and to the equitable workings of "Market Economies" (Evensky; JHET 2011). This policy of punishing the loyal, and rewarding the suspicious, penny-pinching, and ruthless, shopper who considers nothing but price, seems to me like a breach of trust. Certainly spamming customers with complex tariffs is a breach of trust. Also it discourages the most effective strategies for development and to maintain well-being (in repeated interactions). Namely: 'tit-for-tat' (with forgiveness) and 'you-scratch-my-back-I'll-scratch-yours'.
Naively, perhaps, I would have hoped that our biggest commercial organisations were not like that.
On the other hand, it could be helpful to sometimes remind shoppers that the primary raison d'etre of corporations is to make profits. It is making profits that makes corporations frugal. When there is little excess profit in our spending corporations will serve our interests most effectively. But, in markets where customers are lazy and ill-informed sellers will extract excess profits, and allocations will be less than ideal. Consumers will be poorer.
Rewarding price comparisons, and the lowest bidder, would ultimately lead to bankrupting of all but the least ethical - and so to calls for a strong and more active state.
This situation, where our biggest companies encourage the ruthless shopper, leaves a lot of responsibility on institutions that influence our 'morals' and our 'values' (namely: leaders; parents; churches; & the media). So strong ethics, within companies, are vital to avoid the worst effects of free competition.
Is this is a good, or even the best, policy from the point of view of society?
British Gas Customer Relations declined to comment... Perhaps, in the interests of economy, they don't have a corporate philosopher and shareholders discourage their managers from thinking about social impacts of their business model?
According to Adam Smith, "Trust" is fundamental to economic development, and to the equitable workings of "Market Economies" (Evensky; JHET 2011). This policy of punishing the loyal, and rewarding the suspicious, penny-pinching, and ruthless, shopper who considers nothing but price, seems to me like a breach of trust. Certainly spamming customers with complex tariffs is a breach of trust. Also it discourages the most effective strategies for development and to maintain well-being (in repeated interactions). Namely: 'tit-for-tat' (with forgiveness) and 'you-scratch-my-back-I'll-scratch-yours'.
Naively, perhaps, I would have hoped that our biggest commercial organisations were not like that.
On the other hand, it could be helpful to sometimes remind shoppers that the primary raison d'etre of corporations is to make profits. It is making profits that makes corporations frugal. When there is little excess profit in our spending corporations will serve our interests most effectively. But, in markets where customers are lazy and ill-informed sellers will extract excess profits, and allocations will be less than ideal. Consumers will be poorer.
Rewarding price comparisons, and the lowest bidder, would ultimately lead to bankrupting of all but the least ethical - and so to calls for a strong and more active state.
This situation, where our biggest companies encourage the ruthless shopper, leaves a lot of responsibility on institutions that influence our 'morals' and our 'values' (namely: leaders; parents; churches; & the media). So strong ethics, within companies, are vital to avoid the worst effects of free competition.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Global Sustainability - some notes
| Title | Consider |
|---|---|
| WHAT DO WE WANT? {why} | |
| Sustainable__ | Species/Habitats/Ecosystem |
| °C | |
| ↑LivingStandards / ↓Deprivation__ | Energy |
| Ferts/Chems | |
| DO? {what} | ↓CO2 ↓Energy ↓Fert/Chem ↓LandUsed[?] |
| TOOLS? {how} | |
| Incentives/Rewards - $ | |
| Values/Norms - debate/ideas - celebrities - prizes - religions/church - media | |
| Costs - taxes - subsidies - user fees | |
| Regulations - punish/fine | |
| Rights: to Use/Do things | |
| PROBLEMS? {but} | |
| conflicting ↑LivingStds <==> ↓E/Fert | |
| incommensurable Spp; LivingStds; E; °C | |
| costs transaction/ monitoring/ dead_weight | |
valuations
| |
| {who} {when} {where} |
Monday, March 15, 2010
Trapped in Our Modules? - Cars and the Ideal City
can't drive his module
road movies
rebel without a cause
max max - with his nitro enhanced machine [/monster]
chrysler socal LA [factcheck!]
Is there not something completely out of proportion with a primate weighing perhaps 70kg choosing to travel about in vehicles weighing between 1000kg (Fiat) and 2400kg (Chev)? Per day these vehicles use an average of around 41,000 kCal from fuel, to transport people who need around only food with 2,300 kCal per day for good health.
instinct for size;power;image;loudness;freedom;agency
manipulated
remember all of the types driven/owned
- partially sex driven/ appeals to our most basic instincts
aspirations of the world popn
not only in the 'rich west': a minor leader in the revolution nicaragua (provincial Matagalpa) chose to receive a Land Cruiser as a reward of office - a great expense and a rarity in the country. Given the levels of deprivation a bus, or truck, could have served a great many more. In North Korea, as is true in virtually every other country, "[The passenger car] is the ultimate symbol of the prosperity of high officials" (Bloomberg). In developing economies car sales are booming. Sales in India and China are at record levels and, there too, cars are seen as a necessary symbol for having reached a 'good standard of living' (Gallup). Lagos is being rebuilt to suit automobile driving commuters.
In America, the relative prices of cars have not changed in the last 90 years (using Wage Rates, or GDP per capita). For example, in 1925 agricultural labourers earnt $630 per year (NBER 1929) and a Model T Ford cost just under $300 - and, in 2010, the cheapest cars were around $10,500-$14,500 and agricultural workers earnt $22,000 (18,800 median earnings; 24,400 citizens: USDA-ERS 2008).
Thus automobiles have become the icons, in the religious sense, in the modern world.
Margaret Thatcher famously commented that "A man who, beyond the age of 26, finds himself on a bus can count himself as a failure" (House of Commons, 1986).
In the USA there are around 240 million registered cars, SUVs, & pickups (Statistical Abstract of the USA) - and many more scrapped or unregistered. This is equivalent to 0.8 vehicles per capita. If all countries took up motoring at the same rate as the USA, there would be 5.4 billion passenger vehicles in use on earth - using 56 billion barrels of oil per year, compared to total consumption of 3.1 billion barrels in 2008. These might need 5 billion tonnes of steel and much energy to manufacture, with immense CO2 emissions. Road deaths would also increase, and the problems from such greatly increased CO2 emissions could be very grave.
purchase of influence [thru instinct; affinities;
networks; legitimated aspirations;
advertising; and explicit lobbying]
all these have together given aspirations to the world popn
- which would be difficult to realise in practice
'modern' cities designed around cars - need not be so. many other arrangements are possible and provide shorter, healthier, and more pleasurable, commutes - as well as a more enjoyable environment. Congestion, time pressures - for example getting children to school - are all things that could be greatly eased by better planning and incentives. There are still many habited places without vehicles - some inaccessible; some poor, or ancient, and ill-adapted for cars; and some cut off by bad roads in wet seasons. Some of the most valued cities in the world are in fact old ones in Europe where driving is impractical.
road movies
rebel without a cause
max max - with his nitro enhanced machine [/monster]
chrysler socal LA [factcheck!]
Is there not something completely out of proportion with a primate weighing perhaps 70kg choosing to travel about in vehicles weighing between 1000kg (Fiat) and 2400kg (Chev)? Per day these vehicles use an average of around 41,000 kCal from fuel, to transport people who need around only food with 2,300 kCal per day for good health.
instinct for size;power;image;loudness;freedom;agency
manipulated
remember all of the types driven/owned
- partially sex driven/ appeals to our most basic instincts
aspirations of the world popn
not only in the 'rich west': a minor leader in the revolution nicaragua (provincial Matagalpa) chose to receive a Land Cruiser as a reward of office - a great expense and a rarity in the country. Given the levels of deprivation a bus, or truck, could have served a great many more. In North Korea, as is true in virtually every other country, "[The passenger car] is the ultimate symbol of the prosperity of high officials" (Bloomberg). In developing economies car sales are booming. Sales in India and China are at record levels and, there too, cars are seen as a necessary symbol for having reached a 'good standard of living' (Gallup). Lagos is being rebuilt to suit automobile driving commuters.
In America, the relative prices of cars have not changed in the last 90 years (using Wage Rates, or GDP per capita). For example, in 1925 agricultural labourers earnt $630 per year (NBER 1929) and a Model T Ford cost just under $300 - and, in 2010, the cheapest cars were around $10,500-$14,500 and agricultural workers earnt $22,000 (18,800 median earnings; 24,400 citizens: USDA-ERS 2008).
Thus automobiles have become the icons, in the religious sense, in the modern world.
Margaret Thatcher famously commented that "A man who, beyond the age of 26, finds himself on a bus can count himself as a failure" (House of Commons, 1986).
In the USA there are around 240 million registered cars, SUVs, & pickups (Statistical Abstract of the USA) - and many more scrapped or unregistered. This is equivalent to 0.8 vehicles per capita. If all countries took up motoring at the same rate as the USA, there would be 5.4 billion passenger vehicles in use on earth - using 56 billion barrels of oil per year, compared to total consumption of 3.1 billion barrels in 2008. These might need 5 billion tonnes of steel and much energy to manufacture, with immense CO2 emissions. Road deaths would also increase, and the problems from such greatly increased CO2 emissions could be very grave.
purchase of influence [thru instinct; affinities;
networks; legitimated aspirations;
advertising; and explicit lobbying]
all these have together given aspirations to the world popn
- which would be difficult to realise in practice
'modern' cities designed around cars - need not be so. many other arrangements are possible and provide shorter, healthier, and more pleasurable, commutes - as well as a more enjoyable environment. Congestion, time pressures - for example getting children to school - are all things that could be greatly eased by better planning and incentives. There are still many habited places without vehicles - some inaccessible; some poor, or ancient, and ill-adapted for cars; and some cut off by bad roads in wet seasons. Some of the most valued cities in the world are in fact old ones in Europe where driving is impractical.
Friday, January 1, 2010
The Aims of This Blog
Most of the world's problems are ultimately due to the choices and actions of individuals. These can be changed for 'good-living'. You can make a bigger pie; You can restrict access to the pie - Or, redirect shares of it (while possibly making the pie smaller); Or, you can use information and incentives to get people to behave better.
Sunday, December 27, 2009
There Is More To Value Than Just The Price
You Are Voting for Company Values with Your Spending
Efficiency is very important, because it is by being efficient that we get richer: through doing more with less (or the same). Hence it is important that we do not promote waste.
None-the-less when you buy anything you are actually voting for the values of the company, (or co-operative, farmer, stallholder, or state-enterprise) that is selling the item to you.
Thus if you always buy the cheapest, you are telling the company that it is only price that matters. And leaving it to other people to tell them things like: how well to pay their unskilled workers; how much to spend on the environment; whether to contribute to good causes; whether to use unethical marketing practices; and how much to minimise tax. (With globalization most of these can often just be ignored).
If you always buy the cheapest, the companies that find ways of getting round these 'external' costs will win. The others will just go bankrupt. Your spending is an enormous influence on producers, so choose your brands with care, and vote with your money for worthy corporations and coop's.
Some Chinese state enterprises, and Israeli kibbutzim, have schools, old age homes, and housing to support - and although they are moving slowly to market provision of these things, they still face markets where some employ 16 year-olds and house them in dormitories. Most large companies in the UK provide corporate pension plans for their workers - these can be a big burden, and make it near impossible to compete with companies that avoid the responsibility.
"Vote Wisely With Your Money"!
Efficiency is very important, because it is by being efficient that we get richer: through doing more with less (or the same). Hence it is important that we do not promote waste.
None-the-less when you buy anything you are actually voting for the values of the company, (or co-operative, farmer, stallholder, or state-enterprise) that is selling the item to you.
Thus if you always buy the cheapest, you are telling the company that it is only price that matters. And leaving it to other people to tell them things like: how well to pay their unskilled workers; how much to spend on the environment; whether to contribute to good causes; whether to use unethical marketing practices; and how much to minimise tax. (With globalization most of these can often just be ignored).
If you always buy the cheapest, the companies that find ways of getting round these 'external' costs will win. The others will just go bankrupt. Your spending is an enormous influence on producers, so choose your brands with care, and vote with your money for worthy corporations and coop's.
Some Chinese state enterprises, and Israeli kibbutzim, have schools, old age homes, and housing to support - and although they are moving slowly to market provision of these things, they still face markets where some employ 16 year-olds and house them in dormitories. Most large companies in the UK provide corporate pension plans for their workers - these can be a big burden, and make it near impossible to compete with companies that avoid the responsibility.
"Vote Wisely With Your Money"!
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