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Comment by xwkd | Hacker News Reader

Is this speculation? The way that this and the parent comment read, it sounds like you have information that I’m not finding on the website.

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Imagine if you spent a ton of time and effort to launch a product and people on Hacker News start attacking it brutally based on things that aren't even true.

At this point I wouldn't be surprised if it is a viral marketing strategy.

What a sad sob story. It's so unfortunate for founders that they have to deal with such things as skepticism and preconceived notions.

How about this: if you care about my demographic of people, I'm happy to be appeased to in the form of commitments to have offline-only functionality for the hardware I'm paying for. But if you advertise the 1 millionth tech product and expect me to not assume it is like the 999,999 previous ones out of good faith alone, sorry, I'm fresh out of miniature violins.

I don't really want to be this flippant, but do you know how burned I am by this at this point? I've started returning things based on not being able to use them without an account. Just scroll through Google Home integrations some time and take a look at the vast mountains of internet of shit devices. Sometimes, it's proudly advertised that it needs a smartphone. Other times, you'd be hard pressed to know it even supports it, less requires it. Tooth brushes, bathroom scales, literally anything a Bluetooth radio will fit in.

If you want to be mad at anyone, don't get mad at me. Get mad at Juicero and all of the other folks dropping turds in the proverbial punchbowl. I am not sorry.

It's also unfortunate for the HN community that a bitter, reflexive dismissal with no basis in evidence that pertains to this actual product is the top comment on this story.

So what's the alternative? Just accept it without complaining ever and hope that it gets better, while people leach free advertising for their fresh internet of shit garbage to a hacker community? Why?

If it said something about having open source firmware you could flash yourself, the entire premise would be different. Without something like that, this is basically just free advertising.

I agree that it is unfortunate that I need to be bitter about this. Totally. Not our faults though, and again, I provide an out: give me a reason to believe this is different.

Of course it is natural for hacker types to be skeptical and cynical but I swear to God, I just want an inch of confidence. As it stands now I would bet you substantial amounts of money they are planning on putting a Bluetooth radio in the shoe.

> So what's the alternative? Just accept it without complaining ever and hope that it gets better, while people leach free advertising for their fresh internet of shit garbage to a hacker community?

Again, how do you know this product is one of those "internet of shit" ones?

Don't ask me to debunk a claim I never made.

They'll start collecting DNA samples of you from your feet and then create a clone. They'll lure you away on a fraudulent whiteboard coding interview assignment and then insert the clone into your family. When you return, the clone will have you arrested for impersonation and you will spend the rest of your life in Guantanamo while the clone lives your life. At a crucial moment, they will speak a trigger word that will cause the clone to kill the President, who they will then replace with a clone President, who will then use his now vast power to remove max-speed regulations on these devices, allowing them to go up to 10 mph.

It's terrifying.

This sort of "late-stage capitalism" cynicism used to be concentrated on reddit but is everywhere now. These shoes are extremely technically impressive, highly novel, and very useful, and yet they're still met with a combative dismissiveness even on a site ostensibly dedicated to such things. Sign of the zeitgeist.

I think it's a helpful cynicism. Remember when everyone rushed to 23andMe and those other DNA testing services and only later did we realize this is a new frontier of selling people's data?

I wanna know they're not gonna sell my strut

Hey, we are all just getting older and grumpier by the second

Another idea for them: Walkatron for NFTs token for "....." causes....

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