Hacker News Reader

Comment by PeterStuer | Hacker News Reader

I guess it takes a lifetime of wisdom to truly realize companies will never 'end' anything, as their whole existence depends on the thing happening at least enough to keep selling the cure.

View on HN

This is a shallow take. Even on its face it’s wrong. Ending mega-fires would be an ongoing expenditure, since you constantly monitor and manage smaller fires to achieve that.

Plenty of juicy government dollars to sustain vendors in that space indefinitely.

I partially agree, but you are ending the reasoning one level short. The government budget is a tradeoff. People react more to recent events than those far past, even if rationally they should not. So sadly, if no mega-fire had disastrous consequences, over the years there would be cutbacks, neglect and denial on mitigating this particular threat as opposed to so many others that required our recent attention.

There are plenty of economic models that can support cures to recurrent issues. For example, internal sprinklers & smoke detectors have dramatically improved survivability of structure fires, but that "cure" supports a whole industry of sprinkler and alarm system companies.

New buildings are continuously built as we developer new land or redevelop old land. These need sprinklers.

The companies mentioned in the article are all about detecting/managing a mega-fire once detected. If we "end" mega-fires, there's no business in detecting/managing them.

But, that's a pretty cynical view of these businesses. Maybe I'm just not jaded enough yet.

Pano will have a great business even if megafires are ended, since fire will always be a part of the landscape. One of their major usecases is monitoring controlled burns.

I never said things will not 'improve', even drastically, just not 'end' as the article touts. If sprinklers and smoke detectors truly ended fires happening (as opposed to mitigating the consequences), over time we would neglect them and de-prioritize them in the budget. Wy spend money on tings no-one has heard of in two generations when we have more pressing needs? Psychology and game-theory go hand in hand.

wait so you're telling me that every political organization that claims to be fighting against e.g. discrimination and inequality is actually wholly dependent on the existence of e.g. discrimination and inequality in order to continue functioning, such that they'll never put an end to the thing that gives them reason to exist in the first place?

OP said:

>I guess it takes a lifetime of wisdom to truly realize companies will never 'end' anything...

You said:

>wait so you're telling me that every political organization...

A company is fundamentally different from a political organization, especially in the context of this conversation.

how so? do political organizations differ from corporations in that they somehow don't have an inherent need to perpetuate their own existence, so as to keep people employed?

They are somewhat analogous, though. Not to mention intertwined. What keeps our dominant political parties running? Money from big business. Where do they get their money? By selling stuff. All the better for their profits if they can externalize costs. Which the politicians they bought will be reluctant to do anything about.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com